Then the mermaid grabbed her hand, leaned into Emily, and kissed her on the mouth. Emily froze. She hadn’t kissed anyone since Real Ali last year, and this girl’s lips felt soft and warm.

The mermaid pulled away, grinning. “There. Now you can cross off one item on your bucket list. You kissed a stranger.”

“That only half counted!” Beth cried. “She kissed you! Now you have to go kiss someone!”

“Yeah, pick someone!” The mermaid clapped her hands. “Or even better yet, close your eyes, spin around, and point!”

Emily tried to catch her breath, her lips still tingling. That kiss had felt amazing, and it flipped a switch inside her. Suddenly she wanted to show the new girl she was brazen and unafraid—worthy of kissing again. She whirled around the room and pointed. When she opened her eyes again, she was pointing at a tall, cute girl in dark-framed glasses and a Superman suit and cape.

“Supergirl!” Beth pushed Emily forward. “Go for her!”

Fueled with adrenaline, Emily knocked back the second shot and marched over, hoping the mermaid was watching. Supergirl was talking to a group of guys. Emily grabbed her hand and blurted, “Excuse me?” When Supergirl whirled around with a questioning look, Emily stood on her tiptoes and planted a big kiss on her lips. At first, the girl seemed shocked, her lips firm, but after a moment she softened and kissed her back. She tasted like blueberry-flavored lip gloss.

Emily pulled away, winked, and ran back to her sister. “Well?” Beth asked. “How was it?”

“Fun!” Emily admitted, feeling flushed and exhilarated. She looked around for the mermaid, but she had vanished. She tried not to feel disappointed.

“Good,” Beth said. She took Emily’s hands and swung them back and forth. “What do you want to do next?”

Emily spun around the room, then pointed at the couch. “Bounce on the cushions?”

“Do it!”

Beth pushed her forward, and Emily tentatively climbed on the couch and bounced lightly. She was about to get back down, but a guy nearby dressed in a sombrero and an ornate Mexican vest grinned at her. Go for it! he mouthed, giving her a thumbs-up. So Emily jumped higher and grinned, suddenly feeling like she was back in her living room, bouncing on the couch when her mom’s head was turned. With every leap, she felt just a little bit freer and lighter. When Beth helped her off, she was even giggling.

The next dares came fast and furious. She bummed a cigarette from a big Asian guy with a piratelike bandana on his head. She raced across the dance floor, pinching girls’ butts. Beth told her to go up to the big floor-to-ceiling window and moon Market Street, and Emily almost did it, until she remembered that Beth might see her C-section scar if she pulled up her dress. She danced wildly in front of the window instead, giving the traffic below a show. After indulging each and every impulse, she felt lighter and lighter, shedding her normally scared self in a crumpled, discarded heap on the floor.

After goading the DJ to show her how to spin records, Emily sloppily engulfed Beth in a hug. “This is amazing. Thanks so much.”

“Told ya you needed to get out,” Beth teased. “And how about Miss Goddess of the Sea?” She pointed at the mermaid, who was gyrating on the dance floor. “She’s totally into you. You should go for her.”

“She’s not into me.” Emily swatted her. She snuck a peek at the mermaid anyway. Her shimmery green dress hugged her every curve. When she noticed Emily watching, she blew her a kiss.

When Emily and Beth stood in line at the bar to get more drinks, the mermaid danced back over to them. Emily leaned into her. “So do you know who’s throwing this party?”

The girl patted her green wig. “I’m not sure anyone here does. Rumor has it this is a big record exec’s loft. I found out about it online.”

A couple of girls swished past in a cloud of pot smoke. Emily ducked out of their way. “Are you from around here?”

“The suburbs.” The girl made a scrunched-up face. “Boring.”

“Me too. Rosewood.” As soon as Emily said it she flinched, sure the girl would probably look at Emily carefully and realize that she was one of the Pretty Little Killer girls.

But the girl just shrugged. “I go to a private school close to there. I’m almost out though, thank God.”

“Do you know what college you’re going to yet?” Emily glanced at the University of Pennsylvania keychain swinging from the girl’s expensive-looking gold handbag. “Penn?”

An undefined expression moved across the girl’s features. “I don’t think any colleges would want someone like me.” Then she grabbed Emily’s arm, her face brightening again. “I’ve got a dare for you, badass.” She pointed at a girl across the room who was wearing a fringed, Pocahontas-like jumpsuit and a large Native American headdress. “Steal that from her. Put it on. I bet you’d look hot in it.”

Emily’s stomach swooped. Maybe Beth had been right about this girl’s crush. “You’re on.”

Giggling, she darted across the floor until she was a few feet away from Pocahontas. Then, with a quick, brave, light swipe, she grabbed the headdress from the girl’s head. Emily’s arms were suddenly full of feathers. Pocahontas’s hands flew to her hair. She whipped around in time to see Emily plopping the headdress on her own head and running wildly through the loft.

“You rock!” the mermaid cried when Emily returned. “When can I hang out with you again? I’ll die if we don’t become friends.”

Emily almost blurted that she hoped they’d become more than friends. “Give me your information,” she said instead, pulling out her cell phone. “God. I just realized. I don’t even know your name.”

“Where are my manners?” The girl slowly traced her finger over the label of her handbag. “I’m Kay.”

“I’m Emily.” She gave the girl a big smile and handed over her unlisted phone number. She’d vowed not to give it out to anyone besides family and very close friends, but all of a sudden, that felt like something scared Old Emily would do.

And tonight, she’d left Old Emily behind.

Chapter 6

A FALLEN STAR

The following morning, Spencer perched on the edge of a green velvet chair in the auditorium at Rosewood Day. In her hands was a ragged copy of William Shakespeare’s Macbeth with all of the lines for Lady Macbeth, the character she was playing in the Honors Drama production, highlighted in pink marker. As she thumbed nervously through the first scene, Pierre Castle, the brand-new Honors Drama teacher and director, clapped his hands.

“Okay! Lady M, up on the stage!” Pierre, who insisted that students use his first name, refused to utter the name Macbeth in fear of the centuries-old curse—apparently, those who dared speak it aloud had succumbed to deadly fevers, suffered severe burns, endured stabbings, and gotten mugged. Today was Pierre’s first rehearsal as director, and he’d started off by calling the production “The Scottish Play” and addressing Macbeth and Lady Macbeth by their initials, which confused most of the freshmen. Pierre had been called in to pinch-hit when Christophe, the school’s venerable old teacher-director, moved to Italy with his boyfriend. Everyone said Pierre had been a score, though. He’d been a dramaturge for a production of Cymbeline in Philly and quite a few Shakespeare in the Park seasons in New York City.

Tucking the script under her arm, Spencer climbed the risers, her knees wobbling. Last night, she’d tossed and turned until the wee hours of the morning, trying to figure out how the horrible Princeton admissions mix-up had happened. At 2 A.M., she’d thrown the covers back and looked at the letter again, hoping it wasn’t real. But when she’d looked up Bettina Bloom on Princeton’s website, there she was, head of the admissions board, looking smug in her photo.

It was preposterous that there was another high-achieving Spencer Hastings in this world. Spencer had also Google-stalked Spencer F., as she’d begun to call him. Apparently, Spencer Francis Hastings had run for mayor in Darien, Connecticut, as a sixteen-year-old and almost won. On his Facebook profile, he bragged about sailing around the world with his dad last summer and that he’d been a runner-up for the Westinghouse science prize in tenth grade. All of the pictures on his page showed a scrubbed, handsome guy who looked like he was exceedingly polite to old ladies but had six girlfriends at any given time. When Spencer F. received the same Princeton letter Spencer had, he’d probably shrugged and contacted some foreign dignitary or Hollywood director he was BFFs with and asked them to make one convincingly worded phone call to admissions.

This wasn’t fair. Spencer had worked much, much too hard to get into Princeton. She’d also done horrible things in order to secure her spot, including ruining Kelsey’s future last summer. She had to be the Spencer who was admitted.

But while Spencer may not have run for mayor, she did have acting. She had starred as the lead in every play the school put on, starting with her title role in The Little Red Hen in first grade. From there, she’d beat out Ali—really Courtney—for the role of Laura in the seventh grade’s production of The Glass Menagerie, impressing even the seniors with her maturity and fragility. In eighth grade, after Ali vanished—or, rather, after the Real Ali killed her—she’d played Mary in Long Day’s Journey into Night, receiving a standing ovation. Last year’s Hamlet was the only production she hadn’t starred in, and that was because she’d been banned from all school activities because she’d plagiarized her sister’s Golden Orchid essay. It was actually a godsend that Rosewood Day was putting on Macbeth this year and that Spencer was cast as Lady Macbeth—it was a challenging role, one that the Princeton admissions board would be very impressed with. It could be enough to give her an edge over Spencer F.

The floorboards on the stage squeaked under Spencer’s battleship-gray J. Crew ballet flats. Pierre, who was clad in all-black garb and wore what looked suspiciously like guy-liner, tapped a silver Mont Blanc pen against his lips. “We’re going to try your sleepwalking scene, Lady M. Did you run through that with Christophe?”

“Of course,” Spencer lied. Actually, Christophe had been so busy with his relocation plans that he’d assumed Spencer knew her lines and didn’t need to practice.

Pierre’s gaze dropped to the script in Spencer’s hands. “Are you still using that? The performance is in less than two weeks!”

“I’ve almost got all my lines down,” Spencer protested, even though it wasn’t exactly true.

She heard a snicker off to the left. “She would so not get into Yale Drama,” someone said in a low voice.

Spencer whipped around. The voice belonged to Beau Braswell, another new transplant to Rosewood Day and Spencer’s costar as Macbeth. “Pardon?” Spencer demanded.

Beau clamped his lips together. “Nothing.”

Ugh. Spencer turned back around and pushed up the sleeves of her Rosewood Day blazer. Beau had moved here from Los Angeles, and with his high cheekbones, longish dark hair, intentional bad-boy scruff, and beat-up Indian motorcycle, he’d quickly become the It Boy of Honors Drama. To every girl except Spencer, that is. Last month, when all the early college acceptances rolled in, he’d casually mentioned that he’d gotten into Yale’s drama program. If “casually mentioning” was pompously talking about it Every. Single. Day. The Yale reference especially stung today, now that Spencer’s future was so precarious.