Thursday afternoon Andie sat at her desk, her hands trembling with excitement. For the third day in a row she was talking to Kyle Lewis on IM. It turned out Kyle went snowboarding every winter at Killington too, and they were both obsessed with the New England clam chowder they served at the lodge. They both agreed that Sam’s Town was the Killers’ worst album, with the exception of “Read My Mind”—which was by far the best song they’d ever written. They even went to the same soccer camp in New Hampshire last summer, just on different weeks. It was starting to feel like Kyle was the boy version of herself.
STRIKER15: WHAT R U UP 2 2MORROW?
SLOANE28: NM. Y?
STRIKER15: U SHOULD COME 2 MY BAND PRACTICE
STRIKER15: WE REHEARSE AT THE LIVING ROOM
STRIKER15: U CAN HEAR ALL OUR NEW SONGS
SLOANE28: SOUNDS AMAZING
Andie’s legs felt like they were made of oatmeal. The Living Room was a music hall on the Lower East Side that Andie had only read about in New York magazine. She pictured her and Kyle sitting at a table after the practice ended and his band had gone home. He’d lean over her shoulder, his hand on top of hers, showing her how to play a G chord. They’d walk around the neighborhood, stopping at Sugar Sweet Sunshine for the peanut butter pie Andie was obsessed with. It would be their first official date.
“Andie!” Lola’s voice echoed off the bathroom walls.
SLOANE28: G2G
Andie slammed the laptop shut, feeling like she’d just been caught stealing from Cate’s closet. There was still one problem with her date with Kyle: Lola. But even if they had gone on a date to Madame Tussauds, even if Lola had “fancied” him, she hadn’t mentioned anything about it since the fight on Saturday—not a word. Andie was starting to think she’d forgotten about the whole thing. After all, if Andie were the one meeting Gunther Gunta and his entourage of French socialites, or swapping calls with Ayana Bennington, she definitely wouldn’t be obsessing over her childhood best friend.
“You were right!” Lola cried, bursting into Andie’s room. She was still wearing her black chiffon dress and the shimmery white MAC eye shadow Andie had managed to apply two hours ago, even though Lola flinched whenever the brush came within an inch of her eye. “Gunther loved me! I’m heeezzz guttaaa and light.” Lola clapped her hands in front of her face as she impersonated Gunther’s accent.
“Wow.” Andie tried hard to smile, but her cheeks were numb, like she’d just gotten a cavity drilled. She’d been prepared for Lola to meet Gunther, but she wasn’t prepared for Gunther to make Lola the next Kate Moss. Most models spent years doing minor advertising campaigns, switching agents, and even then few ever went on a go-see with someone as renowned as Gunther Gunta. Lola’s modeling career had gone from zero to sixty in less than a week, while Andie’s was in the same place it had always been: nowhere.
“Congratulations.” Andie wrapped her stepsister in a hug, her arms feeling like Jell-O. “I can’t believe you’re going to work for Gunther Gunta.” She took a deep breath, trying to steady her voice. Talking to Kyle was officially the only good thing that had happened all day. After Cate threw her out of the Chi Sigma open call, she was so mad, she’d picked two of Cate’s favorite dresses out of her closet and hid them under her dresser. Then she’d written Cate was here on the top of her dad’s rolltop desk with a ballpoint pen, so he would find it when he got back from the honeymoon. Sometimes she just wanted him to see that Cate wasn’t perfect. Maybe she had better grades than Andie, maybe she was the lead in the play and the president of Junior Honor Society, but she had more sides than an octagon. And she could be cruel—even to her own sister.
“Oh, he’s a complete nutter!” Lola continued. She threw herself on Andie’s queen-size bed and rolled onto her stomach, scattering the red and orange-embroidered throw pillows in every direction. “He kept on about me not ‘baaaathing,’ and how ‘freeesh’ looking I am. And he’s even shorter than you!”
Andie sat back on the bed, a little stung. She knew Lola didn’t mean anything by calling her short. It was just a fact. Andie was four foot ten and three quarters, and Lola was five seven and a half. But still, Andie didn’t need any reminders.
Lola squeezed the throw pillow in her hand. “And this is going to change everything with Kyle.”
“Kyle?” Andie grabbed a fistful of blankets in her hand. His name suddenly sounded strange coming out of Lola’s mouth. It was as if Andie had caught Lola wearing her favorite pair of J Brand jeans, or telling people she played soccer.
“Once he sees me in those ads, with my hair done and wearing a Gunther Gunta dress, he’ll really fancy me.” Lola stared out the window, as if picturing Kyle looking up at her billboard in Times Square. “I’ve barely talked to him since Saturday, though. Every time I ask him to hang out he’s doing homework, or going to dinner with his parents. I asked him if I could go to his band practice on Friday, but he said I’d probably be bored.”
“Really?” Andie squeaked. She reached for her ponytail, but all her movements felt slow and forced. There was her answer. Lola was still interested in Kyle.
Lola pulled a bright yellow throw pillow to her chest. “I don’t know what I did. Everything was brilliant until Saturday. I know I shouldn’t have pushed him out of the door, but still.”
“You probably didn’t do anything.” Andie’s palms were slick with sweat. The room felt hot, the way it had last August when the central air was broken for two days. “Why don’t we go get Pinkberry?” she offered, trying to change the subject.
Lola ignored her, her green eyes focused on a spot on the ceiling. “It’s like he has a girlfriend or something.” The end of her freckled nose twitched. “Do you think I should ask him about it?”
“No!” Andie snapped. She pulled at the collar of her mint green Lacoste button-down, feeling like it was choking her. “Definitely not. Just…give him some time.”
Lola narrowed her green eyes at her stepsister. “You’re acting barmy.” She’d never seen Andie so nervous before, even when they went to Ford Models to meet Ayana. Her cheeks were bright red and she kept staring at her patent leather flats. Lola had seen a special on the BBC once, on how investigators determine if someone is lying. Avoiding eye contact was the number-two way, right under stiff body movements. Lola looked past Andie, where a boy’s gray hoodie was slung over the end of the bed. She eyed it, suddenly suspicious. It looked just like the one Kyle had worn to Madame Tussauds. “Why do you have that boy’s sweatshirt in your room? Whose is that?”
“This?” Andie held up the sweatshirt. She’d completely forgotten about Kyle’s hoodie. She’d been holding on to it since Tuesday, wearing it every now and then before she went to bed. She looked at Lola, her heart pounding like she’d just run ten sprints, one after the next, after the next. “This is…” She searched her brain, trying to think of something—anything. She couldn’t tell Lola about Kyle now, not after it was so completely obvious she was still obsessed with him. “This is…Clay Calhoun’s.”
“Clay Calhoun?” Lola furrowed her brows. “Why do you have Clay Calhoun’s sweatshirt?” She’d only been at Ashton Prep a week and a half, but she’d learned who Clay Calhoun was before she learned her homeroom. All the Ashton girls kept on about him like he was Prince Harry or something.
“He’s,” Andie heard herself say, “my new boyfriend.” She shot Lola a smile that said, Isn’t that just so crazy? So it wasn’t the truth. It wasn’t even a small sliver of the truth. But how could she have possibly explained the shirt?
“You’re dating Clay Calhoun?” Lola asked, clapping her hands in front of her face. “Since when?”
“Since Tuesday,” Andie hugged the sweatshirt to her chest. “I just didn’t want to say anything…” One lie came after the other, tumbling out of her mouth. She couldn’t stop them now.
“I can’t believe you didn’t tell me.” Lola threw her pale arms around Andie. “And here I was keeping on about Gunther Gunta. This is brilliant.”
As Lola squeezed all the air out of her lungs, Andie stared at the digital picture frame on her desk. It was on a photo of her and Lola at the wedding. They were holding their bridesmaid bouquets, their arms wrapped around one another like they had known each other forever. Her stomach sank with guilt.
“I can’t wait to meet him,” Lola said. “I heard he’s the fittest bloke at Haverford.”
“Yeah…he’s great,” Andie lied. Technically, Clay was “the fittest bloke at Haverford.” And he was an expert at making armpit farts, butt buddies with Brandon O’Rourke, and the son of Scooter Calhoun, who’d somehow managed to become the CEO of a major investment bank despite his name. Clay Calhoun was a lot of things. But he wasn’t Andie’s boyfriend. Not even close.