Getting Caught by Mandy Hubbard Read Free Book Online

out of my shorts, wondering what he was going to say. And wondering, had we had another twelve minutes, if he might have remembered my name.
     

Chapter Seven
    Peyton
     
    I think I might puke.
    Actually, I’m not sure I can puke, since I already did this morning and now my stomach is completely vacuous of contents.
    At least, I think it’s vacuous. Vacuous was one of my vocab words, and I think it means empty, but at the moment my brain has nearly ceased functioning all together.
    In four minutes I’m going to walk through this door and sit across from a Harvard admissions officer. And he’s going to decide if I’m good enough for them. All based on the words coming out of my mouth. At the rate I’m going, those words will be pure gibberish.
    Even as I stand here, I can’t believe I’m about to take the next step toward my dream. I can’t believe it’s mid-January already, and senior year is going so fast, and I’m about to do something so important I can hardly breathe. I know based on countless Google searches they interview way more people than they admit. An interview is, in no way, a shoo-in for admittance.
    But I’m still so excited I’m in near meltdown mode. If only my brother were here to calm me down. He’s the only one who can.
    Instead, in a moment of insanity, I invited Bryn. She’s pacing the hall like a caged animal and chattering on and on about how I’m about to change my life forever, and how I’d better sound really smart and sophisticated, and don’t forget to thank them profusely. I’m starting to get the whole concept of herd mentality and why stampedes get started, because we’re feeding off each other’s nerves and we’re both about to explode.
    The halls are completely empty. Of course, who would be here on a Saturday unless they were either crazy or interviewing for Harvard? Just as I’m contemplating that, I hear a door swing open, and Jess Hill strolls into the hallway. Her combat boot-clad footsteps echo across the emptiness. Speaking of crazy… Her head is down, so she doesn’t see me, but I see the blotchy dye job on her red and blond hair. How did she go from my best friend to most-likely-to-be-an-inmate?
    When she looks up, she’s surprised to see me. In fact, I think I scared her. Her eyes get big and her mouth hangs open for a moment.
    “Why are you here?” I ask. Surely Harvard is not interviewing her. She’d make a mockery of their college.
    “Saturday detention,” she says with a scowl. With her lips pouting like they are, I can’t help but notice the too-dark lip liner. It’s like she wants to scare people away.
    I roll my eyes. “Figures.” Jess probably single-handedly keeps the detention room in use.
    “You?” Now she looks intrigued. She knows I’m not here for Saturday detention. Until now, I didn’t even know that existed.
    “None of your business.” I cross my arms at my chest but then uncross them. The last thing I want to do is wrinkle my freshly starched blue button-up. I’d bought it specifically for this occasion, along with a pair of eighty-dollar gray slacks, complete with the crease down the front. I want to look perfect, not frumpy.
    “She’s here for a Harvard interview,” Bryn says.
    I shoot her a glare. Seriously. She did not have to tell her that.
    “Oh? Good luck,” Jess says, her voice dripping with sarcasm. “Break a leg.”
    I cross my arms again, even though I know I shouldn’t. Luck is for losers. “A winner makes her own luck,” I say, reciting from one of the Harvard manuals I’ve read.
    She shrugs. “You never know.” Then she wanders off, and the echo of her boots disappears just as she does.
    “God, she’s such a loser,” Bryn says.
    For some reason I have the fleeting urge to defend her. But I brush it off, because Jess is a loser. She’d been normal at one point, and then she betrayed my family, and after that she just got progressively weirder. It’s her own fault she has no friends.
    I hear the