Thirty-One

The Big Betrayal

Quinn's POV

Mom came into the house at about 5:00 and started immediately prattling about how she'd always known Cody and I would get together and how she was so happy for us, and wasn't I glad that I had him for a boyfriend instead of that stuck-up pretty boy Andrew Summers? I avoided responding to this when Vanessa came downstairs and loftily began tattle-taling on me.

"Quinn tried to take Cody upstairs," she said, propping herself up on the arm of the couch and crossing her legs regally. "Isn't that against the rules?"

"Aw, it's just Cody, Vanessa." Mom ruffled Vanessa's hair and shot Cody and me a wink before disappearing into the kitchen, still grinning from ear to ear. My stepsister snorted and glared at us before following Mom over to the counter, where she immediately resumed complaining.

Shortly after Vanessa's whining reduced to offended whimpers, Cody stood up from the couch and smoothed down his t-shirt. "I'd better go work on homework," he said. "And I don't want to stay longer than I should, anyway."

"You can stay for dinner, honey!" called Mom from the kitchen--I could hear the sound of her pulling a pot out from the cabinet. "I'm making pasta!"

Cody smiled and I raised my eyebrows to accentuate my mother's point. "All right, fine," he finally said, then added loudly enough for Mom to hear, "I think I actually will. Thanks Mrs. Ramirez!"

"Suck-up," I muttered at him, and he rolled his eyes.

Half an hour later, I found myself seated at our dining room table, the one we only used for Thanksgiving and Christmas, as Mom handed a plate of pasta to Cody. He took it with a smile and thank you before taking a bite, scooting inconspicuously away from Vanessa, who was sitting beside him.

"So!" said Mom, clearly trying to start conversation. "Homecoming's this Saturday. Are you going with Cody, Quinn?"

Vanessa took this moment to have a coughing attack, clearly to draw the attention back to herself because Mom quickly shoved her water glass at her before adding, "And Vanessa! You're going with that boy Shane Thomas, aren't you?"

"Yes I am," she said proudly, recovering miraculously from her wheezing. "He asked me over the weekend. And Kenzie's having a party afterwards, so I'll probably end up sleeping over there. Of course..." She surveyed Cody and me with an air of glaring at two people who were very below her, "You two probably weren't invited."

"I wouldn't go near that party if I was paid," I snapped, biting into my Hawaiian sweet roll. "Not with all the people like you who'll be there."

Vanessa opened her mouth to shoot something back at me, but Mom intervened quickly, saying, "Vanessa, I don't know that I'll let you go either. You should ask permission, you know, instead of just announcing that you'll be going."

"You're not my mother," she snapped back. "I'll be fine."

"I will be your mother soon, and it's about time you start treating me like one." Mom set down her fork so that she could reprimand my stepsister, and Cody and I exchanged awkward glances. "You should take into consideration other people's convenience, you know."

Vanessa rolled her eyes and threw her napkin down on the table before shoving back her chair. "I'm getting some air," she said, storming out of the room.

"Well, she won't be coming back!" I said brightly as we listened to her footsteps ascending the stairs.

Mom just frowned and took a tiny bite of pasta, and after that the mood in the room was severely lessened.

Cody left right after he finished his bowl of pasta and thanked Mom for the meal, and I helped her do the dishes while we both tried to ignore the sounds of Vanessa's door slamming upstairs. Finally, I was able to escape up to my room--I was looking forward to a nice long shower and some time alone before I finished up my homework.

On my way to my room, I snatched a glass vase from the kitchen cabinet, and upstairs I carefully filled it halfway with water before putting the flowers Cody had given me inside. They looked beautiful on my nightstand, and the fragrance permeated through my room.

I went inside my bathroom to take a shower and saw a pink Post-It note adhered to my mirror, just like the day the Andrew Summers plan had started. And it was written in that same cursive.

Glancing back at my door, I peeled the note off of my mirror and read it.

Hey, Quinn! Did you like what went down in room 705? Well, Andrew's going to be at Rosario's Italian Restaurant this evening at 7:30. He's got reservations, and I think you want to go and talk to him :)

What was going on? First of all, this note made no sense. Nothing at all had happened in room 705 earlier; I'd sat in an empty room for twenty minutes before I'd finally given up and left. And why would I want to go stalk Andrew more? I'd made it clear that I was done with him, and he'd already asked Julia out, anyway.

There was clearly only one explanation for who'd been leaving the Post-It notes, because only one person could get inside my house. And I wasn't going to not confront her anymore just because I didn't want her going around blabbering about it later.

Striding across the hallway, I shoved open Vanessa's bedroom door and saw her lying dramatically on her bed, staring up at the ceiling while a single tear trickled down her cheek.

"All right, Vanessa Sloane," I said, shutting the door with my hip and then crossing the room to drop the Post-It note onto her stomach. "The game's over. Stop leaving these."

Angrily, she sat up and threw the Post-It note back at me; it missed its target and floated innocently to the floor. "Will you stop only caring about yourself?" she demanded. "I'm in the middle of a crisis here."

"Because you can't go to that party?" I asked.

She sniffed airily. "You wouldn't understand."

I reached down and picked up the Post-It note, shoving it back at her. "Franky, I don't care about that right now. I want to know why you've been leaving these."

"Because I was told to, duh," she said, snatching the note from me and studying it. "You would have recognized her handwriting, so I had to write all the notes. Anyway, I'm obviously the only person who has access to your room."

"Who are you talking about?"

She blinked up at me innocently. "Who are you talking about?"

"I just asked you to tell me why you were leaving these!" I threw my arms up in the air, frustrated. I should've known I would never get anywhere talking to Vanessa. "Do you have an accomplice or something?"

Flopping back down on her bed, she said, with her voice slightly muffled, "Obviously. Why would I want to leave you those things, anyway? What would be in it for me?"

"So who's been leaving them?" I pried.

She was silent for an agonizingly long amount of time, and I could tell by the satisfied smile slipping over her face that she was enjoying leaving me hanging. She'd only been a helper in the Andrew Summers plan, not the mastermind, which meant someone else was out there. Someone who'd been following me very closely, who knew everything about me.

"Vanessa!" I demanded, plopping down on the bed next to her and shaking her shoulder. "Can you please tell me?"

"Oh, sorry! I totally zoned out." Her Cheshire cat grin implied that she'd ignored me on purpose, but I decided to let it slip so we didn't deviate from the pressing question any more. "You really should've caught on by now, seriously, Quinn."

"Well then who?"

Vanessa crossed her arms. "Who knows your class schedule and your routine at home inside and out? Who has free period at the same time as Andrew Summers? Who's friends with a lot of upperclassmen so that she has contacts to plant things and get Andrew's friend Joshua to help her out?"

My jaw dropped and I realized who was behind this at the same time that Vanessa said simply, "Julia Reiss."

I grabbed back the Post-It note from Vanessa and studied it, trying to find some trace of my friend in it. This made no sense. Why would Julia want me to date Andrew Summers? And why would I continue receiving notes from her after Andrew asked her out to Homecoming? Why would Julia want me to keep liking him when they were an item now? When we'd spoken at lunch earlier, she'd seemed happy when I announced I was over him.

"I'm so confused right now," I said slowly, blinking a few times to try and let the facts sink in.

Shrugging, Vanessa grabbed a pillow and promptly rolled over. "Don't come to me with questions," she said, shutting her eyes. "I'm not all buddy-buddy with you. Get your answers somewhere else."

"Vanessa," I pleaded, "please, please explain."

Her eyes popped open as she slowly rolled over to face me. "Are you begging?" she asked, smirking.

I didn't really know how to answer this question, and luckily, I didn't have to because she added, "Fine, I'll tell you. But only if you convince your mother to let me go to that party after Homecoming."

"Fine," I snapped, rolling my eyes. I couldn't honestly care less what she did as long as I got answers. "Now are you going to explain?"

She took her time fluffing up her pillows and reclining against them like a queen, lacing her fingers together regally before she said, "Yes. So, Julia Reiss came up to me on the first day of school practically on her knees begging me to help her out. She had an enormous crush on Cody Marlett, and she knew that he liked you, so she figured if she could draw you towards Andrew Summers you and Cody would fall apart."

My lips slowly parted until my mouth had made an "O" shape--much as I couldn't believe my best friend would ever do something like that, she was ruthless sometimes, and I wouldn't put it past her.

"So she scheduled out this whole system of Post-It notes," Vanessa barrelled on, clearly intending on getting her explanation over with as soon as possible. "She told me what to write and when and where to plant them, and I did. Easy, really." Raising her eyebrows pointedly, she asked, "Are you happy now?"

Slowly, I tried to process what she'd said. Julia had been jealous--that much had been obvious from the very first day of school. She'd wanted Cody to like her back, and she thought that if I was in a relationship he'd forget about me and move on. A cruel plan, but ruthless. And it had almost worked.

"Why's she still telling you to plant Post-It notes?" I asked. "She's got Andrew now. I don't think she likes Cody anymore."

Vanessa shrugged. "She never told me to stop giving them to you, so I just kept going with the plan. Do you think I really pay attention to who she is and isn't dating?"

She said this in a voice that implied that she wouldn't be caught dead prying into Julia Reiss's business, and whether it was because she admired her or felt superior to her I wasn't sure.

Even though my stepsister seemed finished with the conversation, I was anything but through with it. "What's she giving you in exchange?"

"Pardon?" asked Vanessa primly.

I crossed my arms. "You wouldn't even talk to me without blackmailing me. I know you wouldn't go through all that for Julia without a price."

"Maybe it's just because I hate you."

I continued to stare her down until she finally threw up her arms and said, "Fine! Jeez, you're demanding. She set me up with Shane in exchange. You know she knows people."

"You were that desperate, huh?"

Vanessa just glared at me, forcing me to mush my lips together so I didn't say anything else. "Do you have any more questions, or are you just going to sit here and be annoying?"

Without bothering to reply to that, I crumpled the pink Post-It note in my fist and stalked out of her room, shutting the door behind me. I heard her dramatically flop down on her bed and huff as I crossed the hall back to my bedroom.

After I closed my door so that she couldn't come intruding, I sat cross-legged down on my bed and tried to think things over. Naturally, I was furious at Julia. It didn't matter that I didn't like Andrew anymore and she didn't like Cody--setting me up like that had been selfish, and it had ultimately ruined not only my relationship with Andrew but our friendship. She'd kept the secret from my all school year, going behind my back and pretending to be surprised when I showed her the love letters, video, and text conversations. She must not have even regretted it, either, because she hadn't come to me to confess or apologize, even though she was finished leaving the notes.

How long had she been planning on going on with this game? Was she just going to leave them all year until she'd split Cody and me up? Had she wanted to ruin my friendship with him, too, all so she'd have a shot at dating him? She had basically been trying to break his heart just so she could be happy. And that was really terrible.

My fingers inched towards my cell phone to call Julia and tell her exactly what I thought of her actions, but at the last moment I let my hand fall limp against the sheets. This wasn't something I could settle over the phone; I'd have to talk to her in person. And it was already eight o'clock at night, so I couldn't invite her over to chat. Her parents had given her a nine o'clock curfew on school nights.

Curling up in a little ball, I rested my chin on my knees like I had after I'd seen Andrew ask Julia to Homecoming. When had things gotten so confusing? I thought everything had been cleared up when Cody had asked me to Homecoming and I realized I did like him, after all. And though I'd known I still had to catch the mastermind of the Andrew Summers plan, I had expected my discovery to be inconsequential. I definitely hadn't expected my own best friend to go against me like that.

What if Andrew Summers found out what Julia had done? He'd told me the Post-It notes were creepy, and if he knew Julia had left them he'd probably break up with her. Knowing him, he probably wanted out of all of this drama, anyway. I wondered when he'd decided that he preferred Julia over me. Had it been at the bowling alley during our double date? Or maybe they'd just bonded over Chemistry like Julia had said. But what if there had been a particular moment? There seemed to be a moment for everybody--that time when they realized that they actually liked somebody. It had been when I'd been lost on my first day of freshman year with Andrew. And with Cody, it had been the second we'd sat outside on the bench earlier today and he'd told me what had happened when I'd been semi-unconscious.

I guessed I'd finally realized that maybe my gut had been right about Cody all along, and I just hadn't listened to it because I'd been too busy ogling over unattainable and honestly slightly boring Andrew Summers.

And much as I wanted to say everything was better now that I'd had my revelation, it wasn't, because I still had a lying best friend who had betrayed me just to get the boy she wanted.

A/N: Remember those votes and comments!