“Right. So if you did, WKen you would have stopped her,” I said, turning
away as my face started to burn. “Thanks a lot.”
“I didn’t mean that,” Shannen said, the eye roll obvious in her voice.
“Come on, Ally, take a joke.” She bounced her ball off the center of my
back, right between my shoulder blades.
“It’s not a joke,” I said through my teeth, turning to face her. “And you
can take your truce and choke on it.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” she asked.
I st epped up and squared off with her. “It means unless we’re on the
court, don’ t talk to me. Don’ t come near me. Just leave me alone.”
Shannen took a st ep back, shoving her tongue into her cheek. “Fine.”
“Fine.”
“Are you sure about this?” Shannen said, her tone growing darker .
“Sure about what?”
“About making an enemy of me, knowing what I know?” she said.
My cheeks colored. She was threatening me now? My adrenaline took
over, even as fear sliced through my heart. “I’m pretty sure you won’t say
anything about that, knowing what I know .”
She gaped at me, stunned. It was a low blow, considering how much
more personal and potentially devastating the secrets were that I held. What
she didn’t know was, I would never tell anyone about them, even if she
called my bluf f.
Which was why it was called a bluf f.
Then Shannen’s eyes flashed with ire, and for a moment I felt uncertain.
She looked like she was about to say something—something devastating—
and my stomach hollowed out. What? What horribleness was hanging on
the tip of her tongue?
Coach blew her whistle to start practice, and I turned around, acting
casual. Trying not to let her see that I was shaking. I grabbed a ball off the
floor and shot one last three, which bounced off the rim and flew toward the
bleachers. As we lined up for drills, I made sure to avoid any and all eye
contact with Shannen and tried not to think about what we’d just done.
What she’d been about to say . What it might actually mean.
It turned out I didn’t care. That was the thing. I didn’t care that Hammond
and Ally had hooked up. I thought that every time I looked at her I was
going to see him, but I didn’ t. All I saw was her .
And I couldn’ t stop staring.
“What? Do I have something on my face?” Ally lifted her rubber-gloved
hands toward her nose.
Snagged. “No. Sorry . I just zoned out for a second,” I said.
It was our third morning of detention, and we were still scraping gum. I
never knew the people at my school chewed this much gum.
“Oh. Okay.” She got back to scraping. “So, Jake Graydon, tell me about
yourself.”
My brain went completely blank. I picked up my putty knife and went to
work on a wad of pink gum. “T ell you about myself?”
“Yeah. I mean, we’re gonna be here every day for the next seven days.”
She smiled over her shoulder at me. “May as well talk.”
We’d talked yesterday . And the day before. About basketball and soccer
and lacrosse and swimming and the shore and the city and Baltimore, where
she’d lived before moving back. But I guess we hadn’t talked about
anything real, really . The way girls seemed to love to do.
“What do you want to know?”
“I don’t know. What’d you do for Christmas?” Ally asked. She tossed her
ponytail over her shoulder as she bent over the table.
“Visited my grandparents in Philly,” I said. “It’s the only time all year I
get to see all my cousins at the same time, so it was pretty cool.”
“Really? How many cousins do you have?” she asked.
“Twenty-three.”
Her jaw dropped. “Shut up!’
“Why? How many do you have?” I asked, sitting up straight.
“Um, five,” she said. “And they all live in California, so I never see
them. Can you, like, name them all?”