All That Glitters by J. Minter Page B

date in SoHo.
    But when I realized that the voice belonged toWilla—and that she wasn’t talking to me—I quickly shut my mouth and turned back around.
    â€œWhat’s she up to?” Camille asked suspiciously as a small crowd gathered around Willa. Something about it made my stomach cramp up. I’d been feeling so confident during lunch, but seeing the student body hold court around Willa was a grim reminder that she definitely had some major sway at Thoney. After all, they
had
voted her class president.
    â€œMy father’s screening a brand-new movie tonight at the Aphrodite,” she announced prissily. “Everyone from our class is invited.” Willa placed invitations one by one in the hands of her admirers. When she turned to me and my friends, she paused. “Whoops, well,
almost
everyone. Sorry, Flan. Coincidentally, I
just
ran out of invitations.”
    It was all so pathetically staged, but the weirdest thing was that it seemed to work. All around me, freshmen girls were opening their invitations with universal
oohs
and
aahs
. Sure, I was curious about the screening, but I wasn’t going to let Willa see it get to me.
    â€œNo biggie,” I told her, looking at her perfect blue eyes and trying to play it off. “I wouldn’t have been able to make it anyway.”
    Willa leaned forward, both arms crossed over herchest. “Wow, lying about having other plans comes so naturally to you. You must be used to being excluded. Sad.” She put her finger on her chin in deep mock-thought. “Don’t worry, you and your little friends can always Netflix my father’s movies any Saturday night when you have nothing better to do.”
    I opened my mouth to come back at her, but Harper grabbed my arm. “Don’t waste your breath on rebuttal right now,” she said. “You’ll get Willa back when it counts.”
    I wanted to believe she was right, but in the face of Willa’s icy stare, I started to wonder whether I was really up for this. Harper might be able to teach me every trick in the debating book, but Willa was out for blood.

Chapter 12
    The best place in Manhattan to Fall
    Later that afternoon, I was standing in front of the full-length mirror in my bedroom wondering why there were never any wardrobe indecision scenes in fairy tales. I found it hard to believe that all these girls just knew what to wear to the ball with Prince Charming. Here I was, getting ready for my skating date with the Prince of New York, and feeling totally crippled by my lack of costume options.
    This wasn’t like me. Usually I just slapped on whatever I was most comfortable in, as per my mother’s cardinal rule: In order to look comfortable in your own skin, you have to first feel comfortable in your clothes.
    But now I was rifling through my closet, feeling absolutely certain that I had nothing at all to wear on this first date. I thought about popping down the street to Intermix or Marc Jacobs—but nothing I’dseen in the windows recently seemed quite right either.
    Was the Thoney preppiness getting to me already?
    Or was it something about Alex that was intimidating me?
    I’d first met Alex in the Hamptons a few Fourth of Julys ago. It was the summer between seventh and eighth grades, when my friends and I spent our time hanging out with guys who were constantly trying to outdo each other organizing late night parties on the beach.
    I remember Alex stood out because he insisted that everyone go through this one private entrance behind Garrison Toyota’s mansion. People were complaining about having to sneak in, about how the view from Alex’s parents’ private beach was even better than the one we were risking getting busted to see. The night I met Alex, I remember Camille summing it up perfectly by saying, “This guy must just get a thrill out of breaking every rule he can find.”
    In a way, I sort of got that. I’d seen