The Two Wrong Halves of Ruby Taylor by Amanda Panitch

Author:Amanda Panitch
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Roaring Brook Press

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

SARAH REFUSED TO TELL US anything more. “You’ll see,” she kept saying, even as I changed into black jeans and a black sweater. I did have to wear a gray jacket, which hopefully wouldn’t be our downfall. “Nothing dangerous. I just have something I need to do.”

“Was this why you wanted to sleep over here?” I asked her. We had a movie playing, the one Aubrey’d wanted to see, but none of us were actually watching it. Somebody was even getting stabbed, which normally would’ve made me pay attention.

Sarah looked over my left shoulder. “Of course not.”

“You’re totally lying,” Aubrey said.

“How can you tell?” I was intrigued.

“I can just tell,” Aubrey said. She tossed her hair. “She won’t look us in the eyes. Her foot’s jiggling like she’s nervous.”

“Shut up,” Sarah said, but she didn’t tell Aubrey she was wrong.

“Is it Joey Ramirez?” Aubrey asked. “Do you want to hook up with him or something?”

Sarah wrinkled her nose. “No. Gross.”

“Who else lives in this neighborhood?” Aubrey turned to me. “Besides Joey. Doesn’t Jamilah from our science class live around here somewhere?”

“I don’t even know who Jamilah is,” Sarah said. “Anyway, was that your parents’ door closing?”

I checked the clock. It was eleven o’clock sharp. Henry had been sleeping for hours, and now my parents were most likely going to bed, too.

“We’ll give it twenty minutes or so to make sure they’re not going to come back out,” Sarah said. She didn’t even hesitate. It made me wonder how she’d come up with this plan. If this was her first time, or if she’d snuck out before. “And then we’ll go. Aubrey, you don’t want to come?”

“Definitely not.” Aubrey was firm. “Besides, you’ll need someone here to cover for you. What if your parents get up and want to talk to you or something? Or Henry runs in here and screams loud enough to wake everyone up?”

He was known to do that.

“A lump of pillows in the sleeping bags won’t cut it,” Aubrey continued. “But I can tell them that … I don’t know, you’re in the shower.”

I wrinkled my forehead. “That Sarah and I are both in the shower?”

“I’ll work on it,” Aubrey said. “Just get this over with so we can actually watch the movie.”

“Thanks, Aubrey,” Sarah said.

“Yeah, thanks, Aubrey. And sorry to make you do this,” I said. I hoped this wouldn’t mess up our friendship, but this was really Sarah’s fault, not mine. Next time I’d make sure it was just me and Aubrey. “We’ll be back soon.” That I said with a look over at Sarah, who, again, pointedly refused to meet my eyes. “Soon, I say.”

And with that, we climbed out the window. I’d done it before, just for fun, but this was the first time I’d done it when I wasn’t supposed to. Well, to be fair, I was never actually supposed to climb out the window unless there was a fire or something and the doors turned into fiery deathtraps. But since my room was on the first floor, Mom and Dad didn’t get too mad.

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