Sara Shepard - Unbelievable

Maya reached out, then recoiled, as if sensing Emily’s vibe. “Isn’t it so sweet your parents invited me to Duck with you? It’ll be so fun!”

Emily pumped a huge pile of foamy soap into her hands. When they went to Duck, Emily and Carolyn always spent at least three hours in the ocean every day bodysurfing. Afterward, they watched marathons on the Cartoon Network, refueled, and went into the water again. She knew Maya wouldn’t be into that.

Emily turned around to face her. “This is all kind of…weird. I mean, my parents hated me last week. And now they like me. They’re trying to win me over, having you surprise me at dinner, and then inviting you to the Outer Banks.”

Maya frowned. “And that’s a bad thing?”

“Well, yes,” Emily blurted out. “Or, no. Of course not.” This was coming out all wrong. She cleared her throat and met Maya’s eyes in the mirror. “Maya, if you could be any kind of candy, what kind would you be?”

Maya touched the edge of a gilded tissue box that sat in the middle of the bathroom’s vanity counter. “Huh?”

“Like…would you be Mike and Ike? Laffy Taffy? A Snickers bar? What?”

Maya stared at her. “Are you drunk?”

Emily studied Maya in the mirror. Maya had glowing, honey-colored skin. Her boysenberry-flavored lip gloss gleamed. Emily had fallen for Maya as soon as she’d laid eyes on her, and her parents were making a huge effort to accept Maya. What was her problem, then? Why, whenever Emily tried to think about kissing Maya, did she imagine kissing Trista instead?

Maya leaned back against the counter. “Emily, I think I know what’s going on.”

Emily looked away quickly, trying not to blush. “No, you don’t.”

Maya’s eyes softened. “It’s about your friend Hanna, isn’t it? Her accident? You were there, right? I heard that the person who hit her had been stalking her.”

Emily’s canvas Banana Republic purse slipped out of her hands and fell to the tiled floor with a clunk. “Where did you hear that?” she whispered.

Maya stepped back, startled. “I…I don’t know. I can’t remember.” She squinted, confused. “You can talk to me, Em. We can tell each other anything, right?”

Three long measures of the Gershwin song that was twinkling out of the speakers passed. Emily thought about the note A had sent when she and her three old friends met with Officer Wilden last week: If you tell ANYONE about me, you’ll be sorry. “No one is stalking Hanna,” she whispered. “It was an accident. End of story.”

Maya ran her hands along the ceramic sink basin. “I think I’m going to go back to the table now. I’ll…I’ll see you out there.” She backed out of the bathroom slowly. Emily listened to the main door waft shut.

The song over the speakers switched to something from Aida. Emily sat down at the vanity mirrors, clunking her purse in her lap. No one said anything, she told herself. No one knows except for us. And no one is going to tell A.

Suddenly, Emily noticed a folded-up note sitting in her open purse. It said EMILY on the front, in round pink letters. Emily opened it up. It was a membership form for PFLAG—Parents and Friends of Lesbians and Gays. Someone had filled in Emily’s parents’ information. At the bottom was familiar spiky handwriting.

Happy coming-out day, Em—your folks must be so proud! Now that the Fields are alive with the sound of love and acceptance, it would be such a shame if something happened to their little lesbian. So you keep quiet…and they’ll get to keep you!—A

The bathroom door was still swinging from Maya’s exit. Emily stared back at the note, her hands trembling. All at once, a familiar scent filled the air. It smelled like…

Emily frowned and sniffed again. Finally, she put A’s note right up to her nose. When she breathed in, her insides turned to stone. Emily would recognize this smell anywhere. It was the seductive scent of Maya’s banana gum.

Thursday evening, after a dinner at Smith & Wollensky, an upscale Manhattan steak house Spencer’s father frequented, Spencer followed her family down the W Hotel’s gray-carpeted hallway. Sleek black-and-white Annie Leibovitz photographs lined the halls, and the air smelled like a mix between vanilla and fresh towels.

Her mother was on her cell phone. “No, she’s sure to win,” she murmured. “Why don’t we just book it now?” She paused, as if the person on the other end was saying something very important. “Good. I’ll talk to you tomorrow.” She clapped her phone closed.

Spencer tugged at the lapel of her dove-gray Armani Exchange suit—she’d worn a professional outfit to dinner to get into award-winning essayist mode. She wondered who her mom was talking to on the phone. Perhaps she was planning something amazing for Spencer if she won the Golden Orchid. A fabulous trip? A day with a Barneys personal shopper? A meeting with the family friend who worked at the New York Times ? Spencer had begged her parents to let her be a summer intern at the Times, but her mother had never allowed it.

“Nervous, Spence?” Melissa and Ian appeared behind her, pulling matching plaid suitcases. Unfortunately, Spencer’s parents insisted that Melissa come along to Spencer’s interview for moral support, and Melissa had brought Ian. Melissa held up a little bottle labeled MARTINI TO GO! “Do you want one of these? I could get one for you, if you need something to calm you down.”

“I’m fine,” Spencer snapped. Her sister’s presence made Spencer feel like roaches were crawling under her Malizia bra. Whenever Spencer shut her eyes, she saw Melissa fidgeting as Wilden asked her and Ian where they’d been the night of Ali’s disappearance and heard Melissa’s voice saying, It takes a very unique person to kill. And that’s not you.

Melissa paused, shaking the mini martini bottle. “Yeah, it’s probably best you don’t drink. You might forget the gist of your Golden Orchid essay.”

“That’s very true,” Mrs. Hastings murmured. Spencer bristled and turned away.

Ian and Melissa’s room was right next to Spencer’s, and they slipped inside, giggling. As her mother reached for Spencer’s room key, a pretty girl about Spencer’s age swept past. Her head was down, and she was studying a cream-colored card that looked suspiciously similar to the Golden Orchid breakfast invite Spencer had tucked into her tweed Kate Spade bag.

The girl noticed Spencer staring and broke into a glimmering smile. “Hi!” she called brightly. She had the look of a CNN newscaster: poised, perky, congenial. Spencer’s mouth fell open and her tongue lolled clumsily in her mouth. Before she could respond, the girl shrugged and looked away.

The single glass of wine Spencer’s parents had allowed her to drink at dinner gurgled in her stomach. She turned to her mom.

“There are a lot of really smart applicants up for the Golden Orchid,” Spencer whispered, after the girl rounded the corner. “I’m not a shoo-in or anything.”

“Nonsense.” Mrs. Hastings’s voice was clipped. “You are going to win.” She handed her a room key. “This one’s yours. We got you a suite.” With that, she patted Spencer’s arm and continued down the hall to her own room.

Spencer bit her lip, unlocked the door to her suite, and snapped on the light. The room smelled like cinnamon and new carpet, and her king-size bed was loaded with a dozen pillows. She squared her shoulders and wheeled her bag to the dark mahogany wardrobe. Immediately, she hung up her black Armani interview suit and placed her lucky pink Wolford bra and panty set in the top drawer of the adjacent bureau. After changing into her pajamas, she went around the suite and made sure all of the chunky picture frames were straight and the enormous cerulean bed pillows were fluffed symmetrically. In the bathroom, she fixed the towels so they hung evenly on the racks. She positioned the Bliss body wash, the shampoo, and the conditioner in a diamond pattern around the sink. When she returned to her bedroom, she stared blankly at a copy of Time Out New York magazine. On the cover was a confident-looking Donald Trump standing in front of Trump Tower.