Another Faust (19 page)

“Always dig deeper, Belle. Always look for the weak points. For instance, you could ask Connor to do so much more. He’ll do it. Men always do. Look carefully and you’ll see much more than just what’s at the surface. Like the fact that Lucy and Connor aren’t that close. You should be able to observe things like that by now.”

Belle thought about that for a minute, then picked up her phone.

“And sending written messages seems a bit foolish,” said the governess.

“What do you mean?” asked Belle.

“How can you read what he’s thinking? How can you charm anyone using that hideous shorthand? It’s so . . . frank. A waste, in my opinion . . .”

Belle shrugged and dialed Connor’s number.

When he picked up, she got right to the point. “Know any good gossip about Lucy?” she asked.

“Like?” said Connor, obviously excited that she had called. Vileroy had been right — again.

“Like what?” Belle asked Madame Vileroy, putting her hand over the phone.

The governess waved a hand in the air dismissively. “Indiscretions, cheating, embarrassing medical conditions . . . whatever you like.”

Belle said to Connor, “Like stuff she’s done. Embarrassing things.”

“I could find out.”

“If you do, tell Thomas.”

“What if there’s nothing to find out?”

“It doesn’t have to be true. You think she’s not doing the same thing to me right now? Besides, she called you a dumb jock at your parents’ party.”

Just as they were finishing dinner, Belle heard the sound of a text message from Maggie.

Maggie:
Tru about kiss. Lucy has big crush. Been wrkng on
         him 4 dance.

Belle:
Tell T that. Tell him L’s dying 2 go out w/ him.

Maggie:
Y?

Belle:
Looks desperate.

Just then, Madame Vileroy approached her from behind, whispering as usual. “It would be a lot more effective if you turn them against each other.”

“Why?”

“Because then they would cling to you more.” Creating a gulf between people — that was Madame Vileroy’s favorite pastime. Every cold moment between Christian and Belle Madame Vileroy prized as her own recent accomplishment.

“Good idea,” said Belle, feeling a bit stupid for not having thought of this herself.

“If you practice,” said Vileroy as she slinked away, “you can come up with your own good ideas.”

Belle:
Thx Mags. UR sweet. CW is just being a jerk btw.

Maggie:
Huh?

Belle:
He said UR really nasty to freshmen and hobos.

Just then, Belle’s phone rang. It was Maggie, tired of texting. Without saying hello, she screamed, “It was April Fool’s! And he’s done way worse!”

“I know. Will you just do that one thing for me, then? Please?”

“OK, sure.”

Belle giggled at the extent of her own power.
This stuff isn’t even because of the bath! I did that on my own.
For some reason, that made her proud. It had been so long since anything she’d done was her own work. And after what happened with Christian, after that talk with Madame Vileroy when the governess had told her how much she could do without the help of any baths or potions, after that, something about manipulating a bunch of unsuspecting classmates made her feel good. Each time she used some tidbit of information to predict exactly how they would react, a small part of her rejoiced.

As if she was learning.

As if she could do so much on her own.

Just like a daughter.

Later that night, when Belle was working on her laptop, she got an instant message from Charlotte.

CharChizzle:
They have debate together every day. Spencers are friends with G-Bs. They go to his golf games. Oh, and they hang out when Connor is around. C & T are friends.

Bellissima62:
Thx, babe.

CharChizzle:
No biggie. It’s all public info anyway.

Bellissima62:
Will you do me one more little favor?

CharChizzle:
Sure. What is it?

Bellissima62:
Just keep watching her for me. Connor says she’s a crazy witch. You never know what she’ll do next.

CharChizzle:
She’s not that bad.

Bellissima62:
Do it for me?

CharChizzle:
OK, but there isn’t that much to tell.

Bellissima62:
You’re a doll. Maggie was completely wrong about you.

Belle turned around in her chair just in time to see Bicé standing there, her arms crossed, having just read Belle’s conversation over her shoulder.

“Belle, how can you be so nasty to them?”

Belle blanched and shrugged. “Just trying to find out more. . . .”

Bicé sat down next to Belle and looked her in the eyes, trying to find something of the old Belle, the one who looked like her, deep inside this beautiful girl. “You . . . the old Belle never would’ve played these games.”

“They’re not games. You don’t understand, Bicé. You don’t know how I feel about Thomas.”

“Maybe not. But it’s not worth losing your soul to win a guy.”

Belle gasped at the word “soul.” Did Bicé know? But the soft, sweet expression on Bicé’s face suggested that she was only using it rhetorically. And so Belle kissed her sister good night — her heart pounding hard — and promised to be good.

After the initial excitement of starting school had died down, Valentin settled into a routine of people-watching, occasional writing of poetry that his teachers called “superb” and “exceptional,” and frequent toying with the lives of his classmates. In the afternoons he managed to avoid every class, every obligation, and every family member by finding strings of flawless ten-minute increments and playing them over and over again so that he could just lounge, observing from all the various angles. Or he wandered around Marlowe, adding his signature here and there, sometimes undetected, writing the scene without appearing in it, sometimes placing himself at the center of it all, in the lead role.

One day, Valentin was slumped next to a row of lockers, legs extended into the busy hall, head back against a heavy metal door, as if he were so bored he could barely contain the urge to give up and fling his body in all directions, limb by limb succumbing to gravity. He didn’t seem to care when people looked at him as if he were strange, or when girls giggled as he tapped his head against the locker and hummed tunes that may or may not have yet been written. To be fair, not all the girls thought he was weird. In fact, none of them did. In groups, they giggled and rolled their eyes, but each one, individually, found his indifference intoxicating. Each one thought she was the only one who saw how cool it was to be different, that she was the only visionary in the history of womankind to be attracted to the boy who simply didn’t care. And so Valentin had plenty of friends, not in the mob-scene, competitive way that Belle had friends, or the tightly packed, five-on-five way that boys like Connor Wirth had friends. He was friends with everyone privately, individually — secretly. When he was alone, he wasn’t truly, completely alone like Bicé. He was every girl’s secret boyfriend. And a good number of guys gave him a nod and a slap on the back when the halls were empty enough. And for him, this was the ideal way to live. People didn’t run from him, as they did from Victoria. Their giggles didn’t come from deep down, as they did with Bicé. Secretly, everyone was in love with Valentin.

Valentin rolled his head lazily to the side. His eyes settled on a lanky stranger fumbling with a nearby locker. He was uncomfortably tall and skinny, like a boy on stilts. He wore a large pair of old brown loafers — the kind with the giant tassels and protruding outer rim that goes all the way around, making big feet look like boats. Above the shoes were two inches of scrunched-up athletic socks, another inch of dry, patchy skin, and then the shockingly tapered cuffs of a pair of worn-out jeans. He looked stretched. Like the recipe for a normal person that’s been poured into the wrong mold, without enough mass to fill it completely. Valentin recognized him. He was a sophomore: Dustin McGuiness. Better known as Douchey McGee. You couldn’t go five minutes in Marlowe without hearing the name Douchey McGee followed by fits of laughter.

Just then, something made Dustin go white in the face. He dropped all his books and scampered to pick them up. When Valentin saw what had caught Dustin’s attention, his eyes lit up with all the possibilities — a nice long scene that could go on for hours.

Standing two lockers down from Dustin and Valentin was Missy Patterson, the head of the Pom Squad. Missy Patterson was the best-looking of them all. She wasn’t classic like Belle. She was average height, perfectly proportioned, with long, thick brown hair, full lips, big blue eyes, and creamy, pale porcelain skin. Missy Patterson walked as if she was on a runway, her clothes always a little tight. A fantasy in an ill-fitting uniform.

Valentin got up and walked over to Dustin. “So you have a thing for Missy, huh? Well, you’d make a good pair. Neither one of you fits in your clothes.”

“I gotta go,” Dustin said, and turned to leave. But Valentin grabbed his arm and pulled him back.

“Now, now, Dusty, don’t run off. Go and talk to her!”

“Are you nuts?” Dustin looked down at Valentin. “If I get within ten feet of her, that whole dance team will make sure I never hear the end of it.”

But there was no stopping Valentin now. The gears in his head were going full speed, and he had no intention of missing out on this much fun. He slapped Dustin on the shoulder (which was a strange upward motion because of their height difference) and started pulling him toward Missy.

“I give you my personal guarantee that she will never bug you about this. I promise. Now come with me.”

“Hey, let me go. I’m not talking to her.” Dustin kept trying to pull free of Valentin’s grip on his arm. But he was too bony and frail to pull it off. And his height was working against him, all that momentum making him stumble forward, right into Missy’s locker.

“Hey!” she yelled as a pile of pencils fell out of their case. “What do
you
want?”

“Hi, Missy. I’m Valentin. And this is Dustin. Dustin McGuiness of the Belfast McGuinesses.”

“Whatever.” Missy rolled her eyes and pursed her lips, so that Dustin gave an involuntary sigh, which made Missy snicker disdainfully.

“Well.” Valentin jumped right to the point. “We just want to know one little thing, Missy. What would it take for you to go on one date with our friend Dustin here?”