I wrinkled my nose. “Seriously, Veeks?”
“Yeah.” Pravika nodded. “She’s more than devious enough.”
Truly in a league of her own, I thought before biting my pinkie nail. The farther I stayed away from Blair Greenberg, the better.
“Personally, I hope it’s Alex.” Zoe swayed us away from Blair. “He was my vote for the Class Clown superlative.”
“Zoe, he waseveryone’svote,” Pravika said while I failed at battling back a grin. Alex Nguyen would be the perfect Jester. He’d been devising pranks for forever.
“He willnotstop,” I remembered Tag saying sophomore year. We’d been doing homework together in the library, legs entwined under our study table. “Becoming the Jester is the Alexander Nguyen equivalent of winning an Oscar.”
“But you would help,” I’d said. “If he was chosen as Jester and tapped you to help, you wouldn’t even hesitate.”
We stared at each other for a moment before Tag’s lips curled up in a mischievous smile. “No,” he replied, eyes evergreen. “I wouldn’t.”
“I’d love to see what Alex does,” Pravika giggled. “You’dknowit’d be a major production, so he’d need a team.” She raised an eyebrow. “Would you guys do it?”
Zoe groaned. “Girl, don’t get my hopes up!”
Pravika turned to me. “Lily?”
“No,” I said without any hesitation.
“Why not?”
I shrugged. “For a million reasons. The first being that I would never make it out of my house undercover. You know what a night owl my mom is. She grades papers until 2:00 a.m.” I waved my hand. “Recruiting me would yield zero results.”
“Wait, so isthatwhy there’s been no prank?” Zoe joked. “Because you can’t sneak out?” She lowered her voice. “Areyouthe Jester?”
I flipped her the bird.
My friends laughed.
“No, no, we know.” Pravika smiled. “It would never be you, Lily.”
“Yeah, never me.” I smiled back, hoping neither of them noticed it was forced. There was no chance I’d be the Jester, let alone ever joke with the Jester, because the Ames student body couldn’t be too sure where my loyalties lay. With them? Or with the teachers who had raised me?
As a fac brat, I was caught in the middle.
Josh was coming over to make dinner tonight, so knowing my mom would be safe from a takeout menu, I stayed on campus and ate in the dining hall with my friends. Tonight’s enchiladas made us sweat, but we persevered through their spice before sharing a slice of chocolate cake and going our separate ways. Zoe and Pravika headed back to their dorm while I made onelast stop: the mail room. Students checked their mail often at Ames, and not just because of Amazon Prime’s two-day shipping. Teachers returned homework assignments, lab reports, essays, and exams through the mail instead of spending class time distributing them. Administration notices also appeared in our boxes. Tonight, I unlocked my box to find a Latin paper from Mr. Hill—theAin his signature meandering handwriting—along with a reminder from the dean of students’ office that a draft of my salutatorian speech was due three days before graduation for approval. Mrs. Epstein-Fox had only given me a B-plus on my physics lab report, but before I could read her feedback, I noticed a strange piece of paper. It was a black envelope with spelled out in colorful cutout magazine letters.
Creepy ransom note-style.
My stomach began stirring as I quickly ripped open the flap and pulled out a piece of cardstock. Again, no handwriting—only the magazine letters. It said:
The game is almost afoot.
It’s happening in forty-eight and you have twenty-four to decide.
Will you join my band of fools?
Email [email protected] with your answer.
If yes, be ready for further instructions.
“Oh, Alex,” I whispered to myself, staring at the card so hard that the words blurred together. It was him; I was sure it was him. The notesoundedlike him! “Why me?”
TWO
