“Okay, start sending me screenshots of what you’re dealing with. I’m sure we can figure it out, easy as cake.”
“You mean pie.” Charlie giggled. No matter how gorgeous he was on the outside, Jess was still a geek at heart.
Charlie powered up the bank of computers and began the complicated work of unraveling the mess she’d made. Jess helped her
troubleshoot the gaps in the code once she was sure she’d correctly rewired the hardware, and after an hour or so and some
smart suggestions from Jess, Charlie knew they were on the right track.
“It’s getting late. I think I can take it from here,” she said. “Let me try some things out and Skype you back tomorrow.”
“But, Charlie, I think we’re almost done; we just have to look up how to—”
“You don’t want to talk again tomorrow?” She tilted her head to one side, daring him to say no.
“Oh! Yeah! Of course!” Jess blush-smiled. “Sure. Try some stuff out and call me.”
“Night…” Charlie quickly pressed the END button before Jess could see how blotchy her chest had become.
Of course, Charlie wanted to impress Shira and fix the cameras tonight. But Shira had spent fourteen years thinking Charlie
was useless—she could wait one or two more days.
After all, Darwin had moved on—he’d moved on
twice
.
Maybe it was time for Charlie to do the same.
CENTER FOR THE ARTS
THEATER OF DIONYSUS
WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 22ND
10:44 P.M.
Flitting around the studio in time with Lady Gaga’s “Paparazzi” blasting out of the speakers, Skye was the belle of the ball,
the star of the show, and the ringleader of the circus. Her dance party was officially a success. She wore a black leo under
a black miniskirt and a coppery Alpha-issue shrug, tying the look together with her resurrected black mesh dance sleeves with
charms jingling at her wrists: a horseshoe for luck, a dance shoe for love, a pair of lips for kissing, and a key to the studio
that Mimi had given each of the dancers for practicing after hours. Skye had found another use for the key—a party that could
get her booted from Alpha Academy faster than the tempo of the final grand jeté in
Swan Lake
—but at least she was keeping it in a safe place!
In a fit of paranoid party prep, Skye had tacked up some bedsheets from the Jackie O house to cover the windows and hide the
action inside, but if anyone passed by underneath the clear dance floor, they would get an eyeful of dancers and other Alpha
girls shaking their buns to the beat. But the real shock would be seeing the most forbidden and delicious fruit at the Academy:
four out of five Brazille Boys. Taz, Syd, Mel, and Dingo had arrived together and turned the room into an insta-party for
the boy-starved girls, who buzzed around them like bees in a honeysuckle patch.
Besides Skye, the only Jackie O in attendance was Charlie. Triple would never waste precious sleep time on a party. Not that
Skye had invited her. And Allie the Imposter was obviously not welcome.
“One more time! Holo holla!” Skye shouted to Ophelia, who had just figured out how to work Mimi’s insta-playback hologram
emitter. Five hologram dancers from today’s class flickered on in the middle of the dance floor, ball-changing and high-kicking
in slo-mo.
“We got this!” said Mel. “Come on, Dingo, let’s show them our dance moves!”
Bobbing to the beat, the boys lined up behind the holo-girls, imitating their routine and trying to keep their baggy jeans
up while Lady Gaga belted out the chorus.
“And twirl!” shouted Prue. The boys spun around clumsily, reminding Skye of the dancing bears in tutus she’d seen with her
mother on a trip to Russia.
“Sharper, Mel, watch that right foot!” added Ophelia, giggling as they gave up and began waving their hands through the flailing
arms and legs of the holo-girls.
“You dancers need to eat more!” Mel laughed, sucking in his cheeks. “I can see right through you!”
Taz danced his way over to Skye, put his hands on her shoulders, and whispered in her ear, “Your party’s a hit!”
Skye shivered at Taz’s touch. He was all confidence in a blazer over an untucked white oxford shirt and khakis. But then Skye
looked over at Syd on the other side of the room, every bit as crushable in a pair of distressed black jeans, gray Chucks,
and a green hoodie with leather patches on the elbows. He was busy snapping pictures with his aPod and e-mailing them to Skye
so they’d never forget the evening. Skye’s feelings seemed destined to bounce like a greased pinball from Taz to Syd and back
again.
Across the room, Ophelia pushed a button and soon their holo-twins moved in double time. Skye joined them and motioned for
Ophelia and Prue to do the same. “Ah-one and two and three and four!”
At the end of the ten-second number, as Skye and the other dancers slid into their closing poses and tried to catch their
breath after moving faster than Powerpuff Girls, the rest of the party guests burst out in a rowdy round of applause. Especially
Taz and Syd.
Skye smiled at both of them, praying they would each feel like they had her full attention.
“Here’s to Skye,” said Syd, “for being an awesome dancer and for throwing a great party!”
“To Skye!” a few partiers answered back. Skye curtsy-twirled. Finally, she was the center of attention in a dance studio again.
She hadn’t felt this appreciated since her days as top banana at BADS.
“Thanks for coming, everyone!” she said, channeling her inner Cat Deeley, the beautiful, poised host of
So You Think You Can Dance
. “And thanks to Charlie for turning off the cameras! We wouldn’t be here without her!”
Charlie wave-shrugged as another smattering of applause rippled through the room. “No biggie,” she said.
“Okay,” Skye said, “let’s do the routine again in triple time!” She was eating up the attention like pizza bagels after a
week of Atkins.
“Mmkay, lemme just figure out which button…”Ophelia studied Mimi’s remote control as Lady Gaga faded into a Kanye West track.
But before the holo-girls were cued up again, the elevator doors slid open, revealing AJ in a shaggy faux-fur jacket, her
guitar slung over one arm and Darwin on the other.
“Hey,” she drawled, her voice languid and scratchy like her vocal cords needed a break. “Cool space.” She walked over and
joined Skye in the center of the room, took off her jacket, and proceeded to sit on it cross-legged, as if the dance studio
were a campfire jamboree. Seemingly oblivious to the Kanye blasting from the speakers and Skye’s attempts to keep dancing,
AJ took a guitar pick out of her pocket and started playing her usual eco-folk.
“AJ, should we maybe do that later? This is a dance par—,” Skye started.
“But I wrote you guys a new song.” AJ looked up at Skye and smiled reassuringly, as if now that she had arrived, the party
was officially awesome.
Skye glared down at AJ’s pale, mousy face framed by black tendrils and wondered for the first time if Imposter Allie wasn’t
a slightly better alternative to the real thing. Imposter Allie would never barge into a party and take over—it wasn’t her
style.
AJ traced a circle in the air with one tiny, unmanicured finger, and before Skye could think of a way to regain control of
the room, everyone gathered around like it was time for show-and-tell and AJ was the kindergarten teacher.
“Turn down the music!” someone yelled. “We can’t hear AJ!”
Ophelia turned off the Kanye, shrugging at Skye.
Skye looked at Charlie, who was staring at Darwin like she’d just eaten a bad piece of sushi.
There’s a little group of chicks I know
They call themselves the Jackie O’s
They put their friends ahead of the Brazille bros
(Except for one girl, a fake, a faux—)
But the truth won out and the lies exposed
And now the Jackie O’s are friends, not foes,
Because they have talent that naturally shows.
As AJ sang, Skye’s turquoise eyes met Charlie’s toffee-brown ones and silently beamed a message:
SOS!
It wasn’t just that AJ was stealing Skye’s thunder—though that didn’t help. It was that the song seemed cheap. AJ had been
a Jackie O for exactly
one
day—she hardly even
knew
them.
Charlie crossed her eyes and sucked in her cheeks, silently stabbing an imaginary knife repeatedly into her own chest.
Skye giggled. But all around her, Skye’s wild party had turned into a mellow folk-fest. The songstress was sucking up the
attention in the room faster than a Dirt Devil. Skye bit her lower lip in fury. Did the girl have a MUTE button?
Nope.
“Shout out a word and I’ll turn it into song lyrics,” she commanded as she strummed her guitar. Her grass-green eyes circled
the room, daring anyone to say no.
“Butt crack!” shouted Taz. Was it his way of derailing AJ and putting the focus back on Skye? Or was he just goofing around?
“But crack the surface and take a look,”
sang AJ. “
You can’t cover up an open book….”
“Wannabe!” Syd yelled, winking at Skye.
Skye shivered pleasantly; his intention was clear. Her party may have gotten the kiss of death from AJ, but if she was lucky,
she might be kissing one of the brothers before the night was over.
“People will be who they wanna be,”
AJ warbled.
“So nurture your spirit organically….”
People started shouting out words left and right. Apparently, cheesy songwriting made a good party trick. Skye glowered at
the enthusiastic crowd. She had a few choice words of her own for this eco-maniac.
“One-trick pony!” she shouted.
But of course AJ spun Skye’s words into green gold.
“Thought you were a one-trick pony,”
the beastly brunette sang,
“but you pranced in and became my one and only!”
Skye looked around helplessly as everyone in the room swayed to the rhythm of AJ’s music.
What happened to my big night?
Skye’s lungs were starting to tighten. She walked toward the corner of the room and lifted the edge of one of the sheets
she’d painstakingly tacked up to crack the window and get a whiff of jasmine-scented air.
Just when Skye was rebounding from all of Mimi’s abuse,
just
when she’d started to feel like there was something at the Academy that she might be the best at, someone had to show her
up. She couldn’t win! Everywhere she turned, some girl was there to outdo her. Triple out-danced her in class, and now AJ
was out-partying her at her big event. Skye pulled her heel against her butt and felt the sweet burn of her quad stretching
out. At least she still had two boys to choose from, she reminded herself.
She closed the window and began to move in Syd’s direction, until she noticed him rocking back and forth on his heels and
clapping, singing along with AJ like he was her biggest fan. Skye pursed her lips and whipped around on her heels. She didn’t
want to look at Syd for one more second.
Decision made: Syd is out!
Her face hot with anger and humiliation, Skye stood on her tiptoes and searched out Taz.
I knew it all along,
she thought, clinging to the one positive thing about tonight.
Taz’s obvious-leh meant for me
.
But when her eyes finally landed on Taz, he was kneeling in the middle of the circle. He had taken a pair of decorative toe
shoes off the wall and was using them as castanets, banging them together in time with AJ’s freaky folk song. Skye could see
sweat glistening along his hairline, proving just how into AJ’s music he was. He was totally hooked by AJ, too!
Has everyone gone bananas?!
Both boys had tossed her out quicker than a used-up wad of gum. If everyone weren’t singing along with AJ, Skye was certain
they would hear the
splat
of her heart bouncing out of her rib cage and onto the dance floor.
“Your toxic ways pollute my ozone,”
sang the green guitarist as Skye seethed with toxic green envy.
“You’re headed from yes right into my no-zone!”
Stalking around the edge of the jam session like a caged leopard, Skye did the only thing she could. A tight smile played
on Skye’s lips as she began to plot her revenge.
HAD No. 7: Tear AJ a new ozone-size hole!
CENTER FOR THE ARTS
THEATER OF DIONYSUS
WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 22ND
11:08 P.M.
Charlie stared helplessly at her right elbow. She could almost feel the heat from Darwin’s arm two inches away from hers.
Her eyes followed his sleeve up to where it attached to his body and traced the profile of his face with her eyes, just like
she used to do when they were a couple. She could scream out his name right now and he wouldn’t even notice. He was too busy
swaying back and forth to the sounds of AJ’s pretentious crooning, staring at the songstress with the kind of adoration and
pride that used to be reserved for Charlie.
Sighing, she spotted Taz standing on the other side of the pulsating circle of revelers with AJ at its center. He danced along
with the music, clapping a set of ballet slippers together in time with the song. Syd, who was usually so remote and withdrawn
and always hated crowds, seemed to have gotten over his agoraphobic tendencies. He clapped in time with AJ’s song, too, nodding
at the skin-deep lyrics, cheesy rhymes about oil slicks and dirty tricks. Even Melbourne and Dingo had stopped clowning around
and checking out girls to rock out with AJ.
It was official: Every one of the Brazille brothers was caught in AJ’s eco-net.
Charlie felt the heat rise in her cheeks. The dance studio was suddenly more suffocating than a too-tight turtleneck. She
used to be the girl the Brazille brothers all adored—she was the sister, the girlfriend. The one they all secretly wanted
to date. One Mother’s Day three years ago, Dingo had asked her if she would be his mum instead of Shira. If that wasn’t love
and adoration, Charlie didn’t know what was. But her lifetime spent with the Brazille Boys clearly meant nothing to them now.
Charlie was just another uniformed Alpha girl, and AJ’s star power had eclipsed even the shiniest of them. Next to her, a
normal Alpha was practically a beta.