"No! Who told you that?"
"It's a rumor going around school. People keep seeing you guys talking really close and someone said they saw Dean kiss you at your locker."
"He did NOT kiss me. Whoever said that is lying. And I am definitely not sleeping with him. I have a boyfriend. Why are people spreading rumors about me?"
She shrugs. "It's high school. It's what we do." She sits down at the teacher's desk and puts her feet up. "I didn't think it was true. You wouldn't sleep with the Destroyer." She eyes me. "Would you?"
"No! Even if I didn't have Chad, I still wouldn't do anything with Dean. I wouldn't even go on a date with him." I walk over to the desk and stand in front of her. "That's why you wanted to talk to me? To ask about Dean?"
"That, and I might have a job for us. The daycare job was taken but there's this store that needs help. It's a store for people my mom's age but it'd be an easy job. We'd just have to fold clothes and keep the dressing rooms clean. You want to go apply with me tonight?"
"I can't. I already made plans."
"Doing what?" She twirls strands of her orange-colored hair between her fingers.
"I got a job."
"Already? That was fast. Do they need anyone else?"
"No. It's not a job at a store." I don't want to tell her I'm working for Dean after she just got done accusing me of sleeping with him. She'll think I lied and that there really is something going on with us, which is completely false. Me and Dean? Never going to happen.
"So what's the job?"
"Tutoring. I'm going to tutor a kid in English. Not a kid. A teenager. He's 15."
"I could see you being good at that. How'd you get the job? I didn't see it on the job board."
"I knew someone. Anyway, it starts tonight. Tell me about this store you might work at. Is it by your house?"
She stares at me as she takes her feet off the desk, keeping her eyes on me as she comes around in front of me. "What are you not telling me?"
"About what?"
"I don't know. I'm trying to figure it out. I just know that when you blabber really fast and sound out of breath it means you're lying, or not telling me something."
"That's not true," I insist. "You just met me. You don't know me well enough to know when I'm lying. And for the record, I almost never lie."
"Everyone lies. And I don't have to know you well to know the signs. Detecting lies is one of my many skills. My mom said I should work for the FBI. I'm actually thinking about it."
"I'm not lying. I got a tutoring job and it starts tonight."
"Who got you the job?"
"My mom. She knew someone who—" I hear myself and how out of breath I sound and realize she's right. I get out of breath when I lie. "Okay, I lied. It wasn't my mom."
"Who was it?"
"Dean."
She cocks her head. "You're tutoring Dean?"
"Not Dean. His younger brother."
"Huh." She walks past me. "Dean asked you to tutor his brother."
"It's no big deal. It may not even work out. I'll find out after tonight. I'm going over to his house at seven."
She walks back to me. "Dean Sanders doesn't invite people to his house. Likeever. And he doesn't let people meet his brother. He doesn't even like people talking about his brother. He's super protective of him."
