Sara Shepard - The Lying Game

“Get your hands off him!” I wailed. But—you guessed it—nobody heard me. I mean, I got it that Emma had to pretend like everything was normal. I really did. But seeing Garrett affectionately touch someone else filled me with both jealousy and sadness. Garrett wasn’t mine anymore. He would never be mine again. I kept waiting for the moment Garrett would stand back, cross his arms over his chest, and say, Oh my God. You’re someone else. I kept hoping for it. But it didn’t come.

“You’ve been such a stranger lately.” Garrett shifted his backpack on his shoulder.

Yes! I thought. Someone noticed!

Emma had the same response, immediately working up a defense. But then Garrett added, “I feel like I haven’t seen you in weeks. Want to go to Blanco for nachos?”

Emma peered inside the locker. “What, right now?”

Garrett crossed his arms over his chest. “Yeah, right now. You don’t have tennis, right? I don’t have soccer, either. And don’t freak—one plate of nachos isn’t going to make you gain five pounds. And anyway I’d still love you even if you did gain five pounds.”

Emma scoffed. She wasn’t balking because of that— she’d gotten honorable mention in a hot dog–eating contest in Vegas the year before. A tiny Japanese girl with an apparently hollow leg had edged her out. It was more that she felt strange going out with Garrett . . . alone. I’d still love you , he’d just said. If he really loved Sutton, wouldn’t he have realized Emma wasn’t her?

“I’m kind of busy,” she murmured.

Garrett took Emma’s hands in his. “We really need to talk. I’ve done some thinking about . . .” He trailed off. “You know, what we talked about this summer? I think you’re right.”

“Uh-huh,” Emma said warily, suddenly feeling like the conversation was taking place in a language she didn’t speak. It was exhausting to pretend she understood what everyone was talking about all day.

Last night, after tennis with Ethan, she’d logged onto Facebook on Sutton’s computer, desperate to find out anything she could about Sutton—who she was, what she liked to do . . . who might have wanted to kill her. Thanks to autofill, the site had loaded Sutton’s profile, her screen name, and her password. Emma had read Sutton’s Facebook posts again, trying to glean as much intel as she could about her personality, her past, and her friends, but there hadn’t been much she hadn’t already seen before. The only new thing Emma had learned about Garrett, for instance, was that Sutton cheered him on at his varsity soccer games, hung out with him and his younger sister, Louisa, and made all his fashion decisions for him. Sutton had even written posts like “Love the new shirt I picked out for my BF? He’s like my little doll!”

At first, I felt like I needed to defend myself. Who was she to judge my life? But then I wondered—why did I care so much about what Garrett wore? Was it because I just wanted someone besides myself whom I could dress up . . . or was it because I was actually really controlling?

Emma had also started to use Sutton’s phone—it had rung a zillion times since she’d come into possession of it, and it would probably be weird not to answer it. She’d checked the past texts to see if they shed light on anything about Sutton, but all of them were either vague instructions on where to meet (MI NIDITO AT SEVEN) or timing issues (RUNNING LATE, C U IN 10) or insults shot back and forth—LOSER, she’d written to Charlotte, and Charlotte had shot back with BEE-YOTCH.

As for the night Sutton had written back to Emma’s Facebook note summoning her to Tucson, there was an answered call from Lilianna at 4:23, a missed call from Laurel at 8:39, and then three missed calls from Madeline at 10:32, 10:45, and 10:59. There were no voice mails, though.

And then there was the file cabinet underneath Sutton’s desk, the one that had the big pink padlock on it and the sign that said THE L GAME. Emma had searched everywhere for the key. She’d even taken a shoe to the handle, slamming it down hard on the lock, but all that had done was bring Laurel to her doorway to ask what in the world she was doing. She had to open it—but how?

“What are you two crazy kids up to?” Madeline appeared from around the corner and inserted herself between Emma and Garrett. Emma hadn’t seen her since the day before when they’d eaten lunch together. Today she wore a green dress that was so short it surely broke the school’s dress code, black fishnet stockings, and black boots. The corners of her ruby-red lips spread into a smile.

“I was trying to convince Sutton to grab nachos with me,” Garrett said.

Madeline made a face. “Nachos give you cellulite.” She clamped her hand around Emma’s wrist. “Anyway, she can’t. She’s coming shopping with me. It’s an emergency. I’m badly in need of a new everything.”

“But—” Garrett crossed his muscular arms over his chest.

“Sorry,” Emma said, gratefully taking Madeline’s arm.

“We’re still on for this Saturday though, right?” Garrett called after her. “Dinner?”

“Uh, sure!” Emma yelled back.

She and Madeline turned the corner into the science hall. All the doors stood open, revealing blocky lab tables, cabinets full of shiny glass flasks, and giant posters of the periodic table of elements. “You don’t mind me stealing you away, do you?” Madeline said. “Hos before bros, right?”

“Totally,” Emma agreed. “Garrett is kinda smothering me, anyway.”

“Well, that is his MO.” Madeline bumped her hip. “Race you!” She took off down the hall, and Emma ran after her. They darted out into the rain and through the parking lot until they reached Madeline’s car, an old Acura with a dancing ballerina sticker on the back that said SWAN LAKE MAFIA. “Get in!” Madeline cried, hurtling into the car and slamming the door. Emma followed, giggling.

Rain pelted the windshield and the roof. “Whew!” Madeline threw her studded leather bag in the backseat and jammed her keys into the ignition. “La Encantada?”

“Sure,” Emma answered.

Madeline gunned the engine and whipped out of the parking lot without checking for oncoming cars. A Katy Perry song came on the radio, and she cranked up the volume and belted out the refrain in perfect pitch. Emma’s jaw dropped.

“What?” Madeline asked sharply.

“You have such a nice voice, that’s all,” Emma blurted. And then, in case that wasn’t a very Sutton-like thing to say, she added: “Sing, bitch!”

Madeline tucked her dyed-black locks behind her ear and sang another verse. Halfway down the winding stretch of Campbell Avenue, Madeline’s cell phone bleeped. She pulled it out of her pocket and checked the screen, one eye on the road. Her face settled into a scowl.

“Everything okay?” Emma asked.

Madeline stared straight ahead, as if the traffic light they’d stopped at was infinitely interesting. “Just more Thayer crap. Whatever.” She threw the phone into the backseat. It hit the cushion hard.

“Do you want to talk about it?” Emma asked.

Madeline let out a little exclamation point of a breath. “With you ?”

“Why not?” That was what good friends did, wasn’t it?

I’m sure it was. But I had a feeling my friends and I weren’t exactly the touchy-feely kind.

The traffic light turned green, and Madeline hit the gas. Her eyes were glassy, as though she was about to cry. “It’s just, the cops told my parents they aren’t searching for him anymore,” she said in monotone. “He’s, like, officially a runaway. There’s nothing more they can do.”

“I’m really sorry,” Emma said. She’d hunted around Facebook for information about why Madeline’s brother had run away, too, but there were hardly any mentions of it. She’d found a page dedicated to the fact that he was missing, listing the details of what Thayer had last been wearing (an oversized polo shirt and camo cargo shorts), where he’d last been seen (the hiking trails near the Santa Rita mountains in June), and recounting that there had been a search that had yielded nothing, not a missing shoe, not an empty water bottle, absolutely no trace of Thayer. There was an 800 number for people to call if they had any information. Sutton wasn’t Facebook friends with Thayer, so Emma couldn’t get to his private page and find out anything more. She did notice that Laurel interacted a lot with Thayer—there were shared pictures of them horsing around, YouTube posts on their Walls, and comments back and forth about upcoming rock shows at the U of A. But Laurel’s page didn’t tell her much else. In fact, Laurel didn’t even comment on Thayer’s disappearance—her only entry the day he went missing was a post that said, “I’m going to see Lady Gaga in November! Super psyched!”