Sara Shepard - Never Have I Ever

She hated lying, but she didn’t want to get into her embarrassing fiasco with Russ Brewer, whom she’d made the mistake of liking. After he’d asked her out, she’d prepared for the date, borrowing a dress from Alex, wearing the last-season Kate Spade shoes she’d scored at Goodwill, rewashing and restyling her hair three times to get it right. But when she’d gone to the mall entrance, Russ wasn’t there. Instead it was his ex-girlfriend, Addison Westerberg, and her posse, their laughs high, horrible cackles. As if Russ would date the foster girl? they’d teased. It had been a setup. Not, in fact, unlike a Lying Game prank.

Ethan opened his mouth, perhaps to say more, but suddenly his eyes widened at something behind them. “Shit.” He leaned forward and clamped down on Emma’s arm.

Emma swung around and stared. Nisha Banerjee, dressed in a high-neck black dress and snakeskin heels, stood by a huge photograph of a mostly naked man. Her father was next to her, glancing around with a blank look on his face.

“Oh my God,” Emma whispered. Just then, Nisha turned and stared right at her and Ethan. A chicken satay skewer dangled from her fingers, forgotten.

“Come on.” Before she could think, Emma grabbed Ethan’s hand and pulled him through the crowd. She ditched her champagne flute in a big trash barrel and wound around the guests, nearly upending a waitress’s tray of cheese puffs. A man in a blue ruffled suit and a teal cowboy hat sneered at them over his martini, as though they were two children escaping the scene of a schoolyard scuffle. But Mr. Tuxedo opened the double doors for them placidly, as though he saw people fleeing from art openings all the time. They scurried down the stairs into the twinkling Tucson night.

Only when Emma had safely reached the street did she turn around to see if Nisha had followed them. There was no one at the entrance.

Ethan straightened his jacket and wiped a bead of sweat off his brow. All of a sudden, Emma burst into giggles. Ethan chuckled, too.

After a moment, she grew serious. “Nisha definitely saw us.” Emma flopped on a green city bench and heaved a sigh.

“Who cares?” Ethan asked. He sat down, too.

“ I care,” Emma answered. “She’ll tell my parents I snuck out.”

“Are you sure that’s all that’s bothering you?” Ethan glanced at her out of the corner of his eye. “You wouldn’t mind if she saw us . . . together?”

Emma’s stomach flipped over. “No, of course not. Would you?”

Ethan stared at her without blinking. “What do you think?”

Jazz music drifted out from the party. Across the street, a stray cat darted between the tires of a parked car. Ethan moved a little closer so that their legs touched. Emma wanted so badly to kiss him, but her body trembled with nerves.

“Ethan . . .” She turned away.

Ethan laid his hands in his lap. “Okay, am I misinterpreting things?” He sounded both sheepish and annoyed. “Because sometimes it seems like you really want to . . . you know. But then you always pull back.”

“It’s . . . complicated,” Emma said, trying to keep her voice steady.

“How?”

Emma bit her fingernail. She’d always wanted a serious boyfriend. Back in Vegas, she’d even named a star in the sky the Boyfriend Star, hoping it was a sign that she’d finally meet the person with whom she was meant to be. But now she was torn.

“It’s this life I’m living right now,” Emma started hesitantly, a lump hardening in her throat. “I love being with you. You make me laugh, and you’re the only person I can be myself with—my real self. I’m Sutton to everyone else.”

Ethan glanced up to meet Emma’s gaze. His eyes were huge and imploring, but he waited for her to go on. “I’m pretending to be a dead girl, Ethan,” she said. “And I’m being threatened, and you’re the only person who knows about it. I don’t have my own life right now, which makes this . . . bad timing.” She’d always thought excuses like “bad timing” were made up, occupying the same file as “It’s not you, it’s me.” But this was real. She did have feelings for Ethan, strong ones, but she didn’t know how to be with him when her life was in such upheaval. “And what if we start something and it ends badly? What if we get in a fight? Then I’ll have no one again.” She wrung her hands in her lap. “Maybe, when I’m finally free of all this we can . . .” She trailed off.

Finally, Ethan exhaled loudly. A frown marred his lips. “Are you saying that if we got into a fight, if we broke up, I’d abandon you? Do you really think I’d do that?”

Emma raised her palms to the air. “Breakups can be ugly.” Then she sighed. “I like you so much. But there are so few people I can trust—and you’re the only one I can rely on. I can’t jeopardize that. Not now.”

Ethan turned away, saying nothing. Emma stared at the parked cars across the street. A cleaning service called Clean Machine had stuck flyers under each of the windshields. A convertible cruised by with its radio blasting hip-hop.

“I think we need to keep it as friends,” Emma whispered into the darkness, afraid to look at Ethan head-on. “At least until I can figure out this mess and live my own life again.”

Next to her, Emma felt Ethan’s body slump from the weight of her words. “If you think that’s best,” he said slowly.

“I do,” Emma insisted in the strongest voice she could manage.

Without answering, Ethan rose and reached into his pocket for his car keys. Emma followed behind him to the Honda, feeling like someone had scooped out her insides with a big ladle. Had she just ruined everything?

As she swung into the passenger seat, a crackling sound made her turn. Her eyes scanned the dark road. Then, she spied something moving in the bushes across the street near the bench where they’d been sitting. The cherry-red tip of a lit cigarette glowed in the darkness. It dangled, disembodied, as though held by a ghost.

“Ethan,” she whispered, grabbing his arm. But as soon as Ethan twisted around to look, the spooky burning cigarette vanished.

After tennis practice the following day, Emma threw her gear into the hatchback of Laurel’s VW. “ Ahem ,” Laurel whispered, nudging Emma’s side. “Looks like you have an anti–fan club.”

Emma swung around, and her stomach dropped. Two figures stared from the gym doorway, their mouths angry red slashes. It was Nisha . . . and Garrett .

“Do you think she’s still pissed about you sneaking into her room?” Laurel asked.

“I doubt it,” Emma said slowly. It more likely had to do with Nisha seeing Emma and Ethan at the art opening last night. Thankfully, Nisha hadn’t called up the Mercer parents to rat her out, but it seemed she’d just spilled the beans to Garrett. Why else would he look at Emma with such fury?

“Let’s get out of here,” Emma mumbled, slamming the car door.

As Laurel plopped into the driver’s seat, her phone screen flashed. “It’s Mads,” she said, checking the message. “Looks like Operation Titanic is good to go. I told the other girls on the court about the real outfits. I also told them not to discuss their outfits with anyone—that we were planning to prank two of the court members.”

Emma’s stomach turned, thinking about her discussion with Ethan last night. “Are you sure this is a good idea? Maybe we should lay off the Twitter Twins for a while.”

Laurel’s eyebrows made a V . “Of course it’s a good idea. We can’t back out now. Besides,” Laurel went on, “I can guarantee you no one’s gonna talk. They’re all eager to see someone else go down. Everyone loves a big embarrassing social disaster.”