She nods quickly and laughs a little frantically. “Yeah. I think so.”

I smile a little. I’m glad that she considers me a friend, but I’ve also spent my entire life living under the umbrella of my overprotective parents, and if friends are the family you choose, I choose not to be friends with people who try to hold me back. “I don’t need you to protect me,” I tell her.

“Good.” And then she adds, “I don’t think you’re weak, Millie. Not at all. I just . . . I’m starting to realize that I’m the kind of person you should be protected from. I’m the jerk or the bully or whatever.”

“You don’t have to be”—I clear my throat—“an a-hole, as you put it.”

She picks up her backpack and shakes her head. “That’s what you keep telling me. Maybe someday it will stick.”

When I get home, I sit in the driveway for a minute to text Malik. My mind is absolutely spinning, but somehow I still find myself focused. I have tasks that need accomplishing. I need help, and the only way to get it is by asking for it.

ME: I need your help with something.

MALIK: Is it legal?

ME: I am a strictly by-the-books kind of girl.

MALIK: Dangit. I was hoping to make my criminal debut.

ME: Do you have any access to the AV equipment at school?

MALIK: Do I have access? DO I HAVE ACCESS? I am access.

ME: You? Me? Sunday afternoon? A room full of AV equipment?

MALIK: Sounds like a date.

When I get to school on Tuesday morning, it takes me a moment to realize there’s something different about the main hallway where the front office is, like my eyes are adjusting to a bright light.

It’s green. The whole hallway is green.

“What is this?” asks Amanda as she plucks a green sheet of paper off the wall.

“I have no clue.” But my stomach grumbles with unease.

The first bell rings, but no one in the hallway really makes any move to get to class. Amanda and I stand there as I read over her shoulder.

THE SHAMROCK SECRET SHIT LIST

Jill Royce has a raging crush on her stepdad.

Hayley Walker pooped in the community pool on Jefferson the summer after eighth grade but blamed it on Janelle Simpson.

Addison Caliro stole her mom’s oxy and sold it to Mr. Graham, the tennis coach, who’s in rehab now for a prescription drug addiction.

Whitney Taylor created the anonymous Twitter account that slut-shamed Chelsey Lewis until her parents sent her to private school.

Lara Trevino took her parents’ car for a joyride and ran into a cop cruiser. When she got caught, she pretended to be sleepwalking.

Jess Rowley saves her toenail clippings and catalogs them by year.

Bethany Howard is obsessed with eating her own earwax and once even ate her brother’s earwax off an old cotton swab to see if it tasted different.

Gretchen McKinley purposely walked into a door and broke her own nose so she could get a nose job before tenth grade.

Zara Espinosa flushed a cherry bomb down the toilet in the library. Not only did the toilet explode, but the priceless art on loan from the Dallas Museum of Art, which was housed on the other side of the wall, was also destroyed.

Emma Benjamin wanted to impress her senior friends by forking a rival team’s football field, but she got too drunk and just ended up forking our own field, which resulted in a forfeit during the historic season when the football team was just one game away from qualifying for District playoffs.

Natalie Forrester sells her little brother’s Adderall to a select few faculty members in exchange for good grades.

Samantha Crawford accidentally ran over the former school mascot Penelope the goat with her dad’s truck, hid the body in an oil field, and then blamed the Marble Falls High School cheerleading team. As retaliation, the CCHS cheerleading team kidnapped the MFHS’s prized iguana, who was never returned.

Melissa Gutierrez replaced her sister’s birth control with aspirin after they got into a fight. Not only did her sister get pregnant, but she got kicked out of the house too.

“Oh my gosh,” I gasp. “Penelope.”

Amanda nods. “That was all over the local news. She was so cute with her fake little ram horns and football jersey. This is nuts.”

I take the paper from her and tear a fistful off the wall before shoving them into the nearest trash can.

My heart slams against my chest. This is all my fault.

Callie did this. It must have been her. And she did it because she thinks someone on the team sold her out.

I should have told her it was me. I should’ve just put it out there in the open. But now she and I are friends—real friends. And all these girls . . . their secrets. If Callie wasn’t the villain before, she definitely is now.

Callie

Twenty-Two

When people seek revenge, they almost always make one big mistake: they go too big. They go for elaborate detail over precision. Not me. Covering the main hallway with green flyers listing the girls’ secrets was simple enough to do, but also lethal enough to sting.

When Keith drops me off in the morning, I walk into the front hallway to find chaos. For the first time in weeks, I feel like normal Callie. Maybe even better than normal Callie.

Melissa is ripping flyers out of hands as fast as she can. The final bell before first period rings, and not a single person in the hallway even makes a move to budge. Right now this place is like the last day of school. For one brief moment, the students have realized they outnumber the faculty and no amount of yelling or coercion on the part of Principal Armstrong and Vice Principal Benavidez is making any bit of difference.

I see Sam a few feet behind Melissa, her arms crossed as she shakes her head furiously.

I give her my most dazzling smile and wave. Oh yeah. This feels good.

And then, because the universe is on Team Callie today, I spot Bryce a few feet away. His head is bowed, and if he had a tail, it’d be between his legs. He makes brief eye contact with me before elbowing past a few guys to get into the restroom. This whole display is a nice reminder for him. His name might not have been on this list, but I’ve got enough dirt on Bryce to make a list every week for the rest of the school year.

Someone yanks on my elbow and I whirl around, prepared for a fight.

“Oh,” I say. “Hey, Mama.”

My mother wears a long white sundress with a turquoise shawl. Her red lips are almost as intense as her gaze. “Come with me. Now.”

She digs her red claws into my arm and drags me to the faculty bathroom in the front office. Once the door is closed and locked, she holds up a green flyer for me to see.

For the first time, doubt quakes in my stomach. “What?” I ask.

“Don’t pretend like you didn’t do this.”

I cross my arms over my chest and inhale deeply. “Mama, every one of those girls hung me out to dry. They’re all just as guilty as I am.”

Her nostrils flare, but there’s not much she can say to dispute that.

“Am I in trouble?” I ask, my voice sounding more like a squeak. I was already suspended for what happened at the gym. What’s next? Expulsion?

Her lips spread into a thin line. “There’s no way to prove who did it,” she says. “And it’s not like you damaged any property this time. I think Armstrong and Benavidez are more concerned about damage control at this point.”

“Great!” I say. “Can I go to class now?”

“No!” she snaps, and waves the list in my face. “I did not raise you to do shit like this, Callie. Not only did you violate the trust of these girls, but you broke your oath as a Shamrock.” She reaches for the doorknob. “What a hurtful thing to do. I’m so ashamed.”

Mama leaves me there in the faculty bathroom, and that high I was riding when I first got to school has evaporated completely. I want so badly to stick to my guns. Those girls screwed me over. They had it coming. But the regret rising up my throat like bile is too much to ignore.

I brace my hands on the porcelain sink and give myself a long look in the mirror. They deserved it. I say it over and over again until I almost believe it.

Since my very public breakup with Bryce and getting booted from the Shamrocks, I’ve spent my last few weeks of lunch periods in my mom’s office. But today she’s kicked me out, which should come as no surprise. She swears it’s tough love. I swear it’s rude.