Sara Shepard - Never Have I Ever

“Have a nice life, Sutton,” Garrett whispered, his voice icy. His cleats made loud clacking sounds as he stalked across the driveway, mounted his bike, and cruised away.

“Goodbye,” I whispered to his receding back.

That went well. Technically, this had been Emma’s first breakup ever—all her previous relationships had either ended in mutual friendship or fizzled away. No wonder people said it sucked.

Shaken, Emma turned to head inside. As she walked across the porch for the front door, a white SUV on the street caught her eye. She squinted at the flash of blond hair through the windshield. But before she could make out a face, the car sped up, rocketing away in a plume of gray exhaust.

Emma found Laurel in the kitchen, slicing an apple into thin pieces. “Do we know anyone who drives a white SUV?” she asked.

Laurel stared at her. “Besides the Twitter Twins?”

Emma frowned. The twins lived all the way across town.

“So?” Laurel asked. “What happened with Garrett?” There was a smug look on her face. Now she wants to talk , Emma thought bitterly.

Emma walked up to the island and popped a juicy apple slice into her mouth. “It’s over.”

Laurel’s expression softened just a bit. “Are you okay?”

Emma wiped her hands across her tennis shorts. “I’ll be fine.” She looked at Laurel. “Do you think he’ll be okay?”

Laurel crunched an apple slice and glanced out the French doors into the backyard. “I don’t know. Garrett always struck me as sort of an enigma,” she finally said. “I always wondered if there was something more lurking beneath the surface.”

Emma flinched, thinking of how Garrett had loomed over her on the porch. “What do you mean?”

“Oh, I don’t know.” Laurel waved her hand dismissively, as if she suddenly remembered she wasn’t speaking to Emma today. She slid a stack of mail across the kitchen table. “These are for you.”

Then she wheeled around and sauntered down the hallway. As Emma absentmindedly sorted through the catalogs, mulling over Garrett’s visit and Laurel’s haunting words, an envelope with a bank logo in the upper corner caught her eye. AMEX BLUE, said the label. It was addressed to Sutton Mercer.

Emma’s breath caught in her throat as she tore it open. This was Sutton’s credit card statement, the one from the month leading up to her murder. With shaking fingers, she unfolded the paper and scanned the column of charges in August. BCBG . . . Sephora . . . Walgreens . . . AJ’s gourmet market. Then, her gaze landed on a charge on August 31. Eighty-eight dollars. Clique.

Nerves snapped inside of her. Clique. The word suddenly seemed ominous, like the sound of a safety latch releasing from a gun.

Emma yanked Sutton’s phone from her bag. Ethan answered on the second ring. “Clear your schedule for tonight,” Emma whispered. “I think I’ve got something.”

Hours later, Emma and Ethan sat in Ethan’s beat-up, dark red Honda in the back parking lot of a series of shops near the University of Arizona. The smell of brick-oven pizza filled the air, and tipsy college students walked past, singing Taylor Swift songs off-key. There was a head shop called Wonderland, a punk-rock beauty salon called Pink Pony, and a place called Wildcat Central, which sold University of Arizona sweatpants and shot glasses. On the very end was a boutique called Clique.

Ethan pulled down the brim of his red Arizona Diamondbacks ball cap. “Ready?”

Emma nodded, suppressing her nerves. She had to be ready.

As Ethan unlatched his seat belt, Emma felt a surge of gratitude rush through her. “Ethan?” She touched the soft spot behind his elbow, tiny pricks of heat shooting down her fingertips. “I just wanted to say thank you. Again.”

“Oh.” Ethan looked slightly embarrassed. “You don’t have to keep thanking me. I’m not Mother Teresa.” He pushed the car door open with his foot. “C’mon. It’s showtime.”

The mannequins in the Clique storefront wore avant-garde Halloween masks. Luxurious cashmere coats, silk dresses, and diaphanous scarves draped their bodies. Their hollow black eyes stared at Emma. Bells dinged when she and Ethan pushed through the front door.

I looked around the place, trying to get a tingle of recognition. A large table stuffed with skinny jeans, skinny chinos, skinny cargo pants, and even skinnier skinny leggings took up most of the real estate in the front of the store. Boots, flats, heels, and espadrilles were lined up on the windowsill like soldiers readying for battle. But nothing stood out; it just looked like the normal sort of boutique I used to frequent.

Emma walked to a rack and checked the price tag on a plain white cotton tee. Eighty dollars ? Her entire junior year wardrobe cost less than that!

“Can I help you?”

Emma whirled around to see a tall brunette with a Megan Fox scowl and Heidi Montag boobs. When the girl saw Ethan, her face brightened. “Ethan? Hey!”

“Oh hey, Samantha.” Ethan ran his fingers along a garment on the table, then blushed and backed away when he realized it was a pair of lacy pink panties. “I didn’t know you worked here.”

“Only part-time.” The shopgirl glanced at Emma again. Her expression soured. “Are you two . . . friends ?”

Ethan glanced at Emma, the corner of his mouth twitching. “Sutton, this is Samantha. She goes to St. Xavier. Samantha, this is Sutton Mercer.”

Samantha snatched the cotton tee from Emma and placed it back on the rack. “Sutton and I are already acquainted.”

Emma squared her shoulders, wary of Samantha’s tone. “Um, right,” she said. “Actually, I was wondering if you kept transaction records?” She held up her sister’s Amex bill. “I’m kind of in trouble for overspending on my credit card, and I want to return some stuff I bought on August thirty-first.” She let out an embarrassed giggle. “The problem is, I can’t remember what I bought where.”

Samantha pressed her hand to her chest, feigning surprise. “You don’t remember what you purchased?”

“Uh, no.” Emma wanted to roll her eyes. If she knew the answer, why would she be asking? But she needed Samantha’s help, so she’d have to bite her tongue and save her retort for her Comebacks I Should Have Said folder, a collection of nasty responses she’d thought of but hadn’t dared to say.

“Do you remember what you stole ?” Samantha challenged.

“Excuse me?”

“The last time you were in,” Samantha said slowly, like she was speaking to a kindergartener, “you and your friends stole a pair of hammered gold earrings. Or have you conveniently forgotten that, too?”

Looks like I spent my last day on Earth as a shoplifter.

Emma clung to Samantha’s words. “My friends? Which ones?”

“Seriously, what are you on?” Samantha’s eyes were on fire. “Trust me, if I knew who they were or had solid proof of what you guys did, I’d press charges in a heartbeat.” With that, she whipped around, strode to the back of the store on her spike-heel booties, and began feverishly reorganizing a display of argyle sweaters.

For a moment, the only sounds in the store were the pounding beats of a Chemical Brothers dance mix. Then Emma ran her fingers over an itchy wool sweater dress and glanced at Ethan. “Which friends could Sutton have been with? Why wouldn’t they have just told me?”

Ethan picked up a ballet flat, turning it over in his hands before setting it next to its twin. “Maybe the shoplifting had them freaked out.”

“Freaked out about shoplifting? Are you serious?” Emma moved closer to Ethan and lowered her voice to a whisper. “These are the same girls who strangled Sutton for fun . And when the police escorted me to Hollier in a cop car on the first day of school, they were thrilled.”