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  Damned if you don’t

  Adam crushed the paper into a ball and crammed it into the bottom of his backpack, then butted his head against the wall of a nearby locker—stupid idea, since all it produced was a dull thud and a sharp pain, neither of which went very far toward alleviating his frustration.

  But a stupid idea seemed appropriate; after all, what other kind did he have?

  Fifty-eight percent.

  Maybe if he and Miranda had spent more time working and less time playing video games and talking about Harper ... At the time, it had seemed like the right thing to do. For those few hours, he’d felt more normal and more hopeful than he had in a long time.

  She was a good friend, he’d realized.

  Just maybe not a very good tutor.

  Or maybe it’s just me, Adam thought in disgust. He’d actually studied this time, staring at the equations long enough that at least a few of them should have started to make sense and weld themselves to his brain.

  Fifty-eight percent. It was scrawled in an angry red, next to a big, circled F and a note reading Come see me.

  Instead, Adam dumped his stuff in his locker and walked out of school, the pounding of his footsteps mirrored by the rhythmic battering of a single word against his brain:

  Stupid.

  Stupid.

  Stupid.

  SEVEN DEADLY SINS

  Lust

  Envy

  Pride

  Wrath

  Sloth

  SOON TO BE COMMITTED:

  Gluttony

  SEVEN DEADLY SINS

  Sloth

  ROBIN WASSERMAN

  This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real locales are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  SIMON PULSE

  An imprint of Simon & Schuster Children’s Publishing Division

  1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020

  www.SimonandSchuster.com

  Copyright © 2006 by Robin Wasserman

  All rights reserved, including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form.

  SIMON PULSE and colophon are registered trademarks of Simon &

  Schuster, Inc.

  Designed by Ann Zeak

  The text of this book was set in Bembo.

  Manufactured in the United States of America

  First Simon Pulse edition December 2006

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4

  Library of Congress Control Number 2005937176

  ISBN-13: 978-1-4169-0718-3

  ISBN-10: 1-4169-0718-1

  eISBN-13: 978-1-442-40812-8

  For Aunt Sherry and Uncle Jim,

  and for Brandon,

  who likes to sleep

  How heavy do I journey on the way

  When what I seek, my weary travel’s end,

  Doth teach that ease and that repose to say,

  “Thus far the miles are measured from thy friend.”

  —William Shakespeare, “Sonnet 50”

  Nothing to do

  Nowhere to go

  I wanna be sedated

  —The Ramones, “I Wanna Be Sedated”

  chapter

  _______________

  1

  “I’m in heaven,” Harper moaned as the masseur kneaded his supple fingers into the small of her back. “You were right, this is exactly what we needed.”

  Kaia shooed away her own masseur and turned over onto her back, almost purring with pleasure as the sun warmed her face. “I’m always right.”

  “I wouldn’t go that far,” Harper snarked, but there was no venom in her tone. The afternoon sun had leached away most of her will to wound—and a half hour under Henri’s magic fingers had taken care of the rest. “Mmmmm, could life get any better?”

  “Zhoo are steeel verreee tense,” Henri told her in his heavy French accent.

  “And zhoo are steeel verreee sexeeeee,” Kaia murmured, in an impeccable accent of her own. The girls exchanged a glance as the hunky but clueless Henri smoothed a palmful of warm lotion across Harper’s back.

  “This weeel help you reeelax,” he assured her. As if anyone could relax with a voice like that purring in her ear. “I leave you ladies now. Au revoir, mes chéries.”

  ”Arrivederci, Henri!” Harper cried, giggling at the rhyme.

  “That’s Italian,” Kaia sneered. “Idiot.”

  “Who cares?” Harper countered. “Snob.”

  “Loser.”

  “Bitch.” Harper narrowly held back a grin.

  “Slut.” Kaia’s eyes twinkled.

  “Damn right!” Harper pulled herself upright and raised her mojito in the air. Kaia did the same, and they clinked the plastic cocktail glasses together. “To us. Good thing we found each other—”

  “—since no one else could stand us,” Kaia finished, and they burst into laughter.

  It was the kind of day where the clouds look painted onto the sky. The scene was straight out of a travel brochure—five star all the way, of course. Storybook blue sky, turquoise ocean lapping away at the nearby shore, gleaming white sand beach, and a warm tropical breeze rustling through their hair, carrying the distant strains of a reggae band. The girls stretched out along on their deck chairs, their every need attended to by a flotilla of servants.

  “I could stay here forever.” Harper sighed. She let her leg slip off the chair and dug her bare toe into the sand, burrowing it deeper and deeper into the cool, dark ground. “I wish we never had to go back.”

  “I don’t know about you,” Kaia drawled, “but I don’t have to do anything.”

  “Right,” Harper snorted. “The great and powerful Kaia Sellers, with the world at her fingertips. As if you can ditch real life and just stay here in paradise.”

  “I can do anything I want. Haven’t you figured that out yet?”

  Harper rolled her eyes.

  “Why not?” Kaia continued. “What do I have to go back for? What do you? Isn’t that why we came out here in the first place, to leave all that shit behind?”

  Harper sighed. “You’re right. And it worked. I can barely even remember what we were escaping from, and—” Her eyes widened. “You’re bleeding.” A small trail of blood trickled down Kaia’s temple; Harper raised her hand to her own face, as if expecting to feel a similar wound.

  Kaia frowned for a moment, dabbing her head with a napkin. “Just a mosquito bite,” she said with a shrug. She took a closer look at Harper, whose face had gone pale. “You were totally freaked, weren’t you?”

  “No,” Harper lied. “It’s just gross. All these bugs ...” She swatted at a mosquito that had just landed on her bare leg, then another whizzing past her nose. “They’re everywhere.”

  “Easy way to fix that.” Kaia stood up, her bronze Dolce bikini blending seamlessly into her deep tan. “Come on.” Without waiting to see if her orders were followed—after all, they always were—she bounded toward the shoreline, kicking up a spray of sand in her wake.

  Harper raced after her, and they reached the ocean’s edge at the same moment. Harper stopped short as a wave of icy water splashed against her ankles, but Kaia didn’t even hesitate. She waded out, the water rising above her calves, her knees, her thighs, and then, submerged to her waist, she turned and flashed Harper a smile. It was the eager, mischievous grin of a little kid sneaking into the deep end even though she’s not quite sure how to swim. Harper waved, frozen in place, unable to force herself to go any deeper into the churning water, unwilling to go back.

  Kaia took a deep breath, closed her eyes, and dove under the surface, her arms slicing through the water, pulling
her into the deep. She resurfaced, gasping for air, and leaned back into an easy float, the salt water buoying her body, the gentle waves bouncing her up and down. Harper’s shouts, dim and incoherent, blew past with the wind, but Kaia dipped her head back and the roaring water in her ears drowned out the noise.

  Harper stood in the same spot, the tide carving deep rivulets around her feet as the waves washed in and back out again. The wind picked up, but the sky remained clear and blue. Harper stood, and Harper watched, and Kaia floated farther and farther out to sea—

  And then she woke up.

  She’d hoped the dreams would stop once she weaned herself off the Percodan. They hadn’t. Just like the phantom pains that still tore through her legs when she tried to sleep, they’d outstayed their welcome.

  For a long time, the pain had kept her awake.

  Ambien had helped with that, the little pink pills that carried her mind away. But when sleep came, so did the dreams. They weren’t always nightmares. Sometimes they were nice, carrying her away to somewhere warm and safe. Those were the worst. Because always, in the end, she woke up.

  It was better just not to sleep.

  But she needed her strength, they were always telling her. For what? she wanted to ask. For tolerating her disgustingly bubbly physical therapist? For avoiding phone calls and turning away visitors? For limping from her bedroom to the kitchen and back again? For zoning out through a Little House on the Prairie marathon because she was too lazy to change the channel? For turning two weeks of recuperation into four, inventing excuse after excuse until she no longer knew how much of the pain was real and how much was just expedient?

  Maybe they were right. Because her strength had finally given out. She’d run out of imagined excuses, and the big day had arrived: back to school.

  She’d already picked out the perfect outfit: an eggplant-colored peasant top with a tight bodice and sufficiently low neckline, a tan ruffled skirt that flared out at the bottom, and, just for added panache, a thin, gauzy black scarf woven through with sparkly silver.

  After a long, too hot shower she slipped into the outfit, certain it made the right statement: I’ m back. She brushed out her hair and mechanically applied her eye shadow, mascara, a touch of gloss, barely looking in the mirror; it was as if she went through the routine every morning, and this weren’t the first time she’d dispensed with her cozy gray sweats since—

  Since the accident. Since what had happened.

  It still hurt her to say the words. It hurt to think them. And that was unacceptable. She couldn’t afford to indulge in that kind of frailty, especially not today, when everyone would surely be staring at her, the walking wounded, waiting for a sign of weakness.

  So she’d been practicing. Every day, she forced herself to think the unthinkable, to speak the hateful words aloud. She whispered them to herself before she drifted off to sleep, in hopes of forestalling the dreams. She murmured them while watching TV, while waiting for the doctor, while pushing her untouched food around on the plate— she had once shouted them at top volume, her stereo turned up loud enough to drown out her voice.

  Speaking the truth didn’t make it seem any more real. In fact, it sounded just as strange, just as surreal, each time it trickled off her tongue. And it always hurt. But she was hurting herself, and that gave her power. It made her feel strong, reminding her that there was nothing left to be afraid of.

  She said them to herself now, as she hovered in the doorway, gathering her strength to face the day. The first day. She ran a hand through her hair, willing it not to shake. She zipped up the new boots that rose just high enough to cover the bandage on her left calf. She applied a final layer of Tarte gloss, then practiced her smile. It had to look perfect. Everything had to look perfect.

  She took a deep breath and held herself very still. And then, softly but firmly, she said it:

  “Kaia is dead.”

  And with that, Harper Grace was ready to go.

  “Haven High!

  Haven High!

  Haven High!”

  Beth Manning did her best to hold back a sigh at the roars of the crowd. When she’d volunteered to organize Senior Spirit Week, she hadn’t taken into account the fact that it would require so much ... spirit. That meant mustering up some kind of enthusiasm for the place she was most desperate to leave.

  But that was her penance, right?

  She forced herself to smile as she handed out the carefully crafted info packets to the rest of the Senior Spirit team. Too many tasks and not enough people meant Beth had been up for two days straight pulling things together; despite a morning espresso and a late-morning Red Bull, her energy level was still in the toilet.

  “Lets hear it for the senior class!” she shouted now into the microphone, tossing back her long blond hair and aiming a blazing smile out at the crowd. She pumped her fist in the air, trying to ignore the embarrassment creeping over her. So she sounded like a cheerleader. So what? “Are you ready for an awesome end to an awesome year?” she cried.

  College apps were in. Decisions were pending. Grades were irrelevant. And, as tradition dictated, the senior class was treated to a whirlwind of activity: a senior auction, a community service day, a school spirit day, student-teacher sports challenges—day after day of celebration, kicked off by this inane afternoon rally. An official Haven High welcome to the beginning of the end, capped off by a very unofficial blow-out party.

  There’d be a lot of hangovers in the next couple weeks.

  And a lot of girls weeping and guys manfully slapping one another on the back as the realization began to sink in: High school came with an expiration date.

  It couldn’t arrive soon enough, Beth thought, as she announced the schedule of upcoming activities in the perkiest voice she could muster.

  Once, she would have enjoyed all of this. Even the marching band’s off-key rendition of the school song. Even the cheerleaders firing up the crowd and the jocks preening under the spotlight. Especially the jocks—one of them in particular. Beth had been eager for college; she’d spent half her life preparing—studying, working, saving, dreaming—but she hadn’t been eager to leave behind everything and everyone she knew. She would have mourned and celebrated with the rest of them, cheered and shouted and wept and hugged until it was all over.

  But that was before.

  As she stepped away from the microphone to let the student council president make his speech, Beth’s gaze skimmed across the crowd—until, without meaning to, she locked eyes with Harper. Only for a second. Then a lock of curly auburn hair fell across Harper’s face, hiding it from view, and Beth looked away.

  One glance had been enough to confirm it: The queen was back. Her lady-in-waiting Miranda hovered dutifully by her side, and in the row behind them, fallen courtier Adam, angling to get back into his lady’s good graces. It was as if nothing had ever happened, and from the self-assured smile on Harper’s face, Beth could tell that was just the way she liked it. Surely it would only be a matter of time before Harper and Adam picked up where they left off—

  Stop, she reminded herself. She was done with all that bitterness, anger, and—she could admit it now—jealousy. She was better than that. And she owed Harper the benefit of the doubt, even if her former rival could never know why. She owed everyone the benefit of the doubt; that’s what she had decided on that day last month. When you’ve screwed up everything, not just stepped over but set fire to the line, you needed all the good karma you could get. When you can’t apologize for what you’ve done, and you can’t fix it, all you can do is forgive others, and try to make everything better. And Beth was trying, starting with herself.

  Even when it was hard; even when it seemed impossible.

  After the accident, things are strange for days. Silent, still, as if a loud voice could break through the fragile frame of reality that they were slowly trying to rebuild. Eyes are rimmed with red, hands tremble, empty spaces sprinkle the classroom—absent faces who couldn’t bea
r to stare at the chair that will stay empty forever.

  Beth wants to stare at the chair in French class, but she sits in the front. So all she can do is tune out the substitute and imagine it behind her. And in her imagination, the seat is filled.

  I’m not responsible, Beth tells herself. It has become her mantra. Not my fault. Not my fault.

  But that feels like a lie. A comforting lie, supported by cool logic and endless rationales, but a lie nonetheless. There are too many what-ifs. What if Harper had been in the school, rather than in the car? What if Kaia had gone inside, rather than drive away? What if Harper hadn’t had such a reason to escape?

  Step one to being a better person: Forgive. She sees Adam every day at her locker, and on the fourth day, she talks to him.

  ”I’m not angry anymore,” she says, wishing that it were true. “I don’t hate you. Life’s too short.”

  And it is. But when she looks at him, all she can think about is his bare body on top of Kaia’s, the things they must have done together. And when he beams and hugs her, she can’t forget that he pledged his love, then betrayed her. He slept with Kaia. She can’t forgive that, not really.

  Of course, she forgives Kaia, she reminds herself Of course. Next up is Kane.

  ”Apology accepted,” she says, although he never apologized. He wrecked her life—tricked Adam into dumping her, fooled her into turning to Kane for comfort, trashing her reputation when the truth came out—and he walked away unscathed. Kaia helped. Not because there was anything in it for her; just for the fun of it. Just to see what would happen.

  ”I hope we can be friends,” Beth says, hoping she never has to speak to him again.

  Kane nods and walks away. He knows a lie when he sees it.

  Beth smiles as she closes her locker. She smiles as she waves at someone across the hall.

  She should start smiling more, she decides. Being a better person is supposed to feel good; she should look the part.