I grabbed my jacket out of my locker. My mind kept replaying the situation over and over. No one could focus after the drug drama, so we ended rehearsal early, and the halls were already empty. Most of the students and teachers had gone home. I could hear people in the student newspaper office. I wondered if they would consider this a breaking story. The janitor was waxing up the floors, and the hum of the machine bounced off the tile floors and cement walls.
I shut the locker door and Brenda was standing there. I stepped back.
“Whoa, way to sneak up on people,” I said.
Brenda didn’t even crack a smile. “What are you going to do?”
“About what?”
“About what happened.” Brenda looked to see if anyone was around and lowered her voice. “You were the one who put those in her bag, weren’t you?”
“Where did you get the pot?” Brenda’s head kept whipping back and forth as if the vice squad might swoop down on us at any moment.
“I asked Tyler from my gym class.”
“And he just gave it to you?” Brenda looked appalled.
“Well, he made me pay for it. It wasn’t like a charity thing or anything.”
“What happened to giving up the revenge plan? You couldn’t resist one last chance to get her back?”
“I did give up the plan. I stuck the stuff in her purse a while ago, but I swear I didn’t call LaPoint. I’d been planning to make an anonymous tip to the cheerleading coach, but that was before we talked and I decided to dump the whole revenge plan. I never told anyone.”
“The cheerleading coach? Why?”
“So Lauren would be kicked off the squad. They have a zero tolerance policy. Cheerleading was the only item that I hadn’t checked off.”
“Well, you wouldn’t want to leave anything unchecked.”
“I keep telling you, I’m done with all that,” I said, throwing my arms up in the air. “Someone else called LaPoint.” I was practically yelling at this point and I noticed that the janitor had turned off the floor buffer and was watching us like our little drama was better than cable TV. I gave him a smile and pulled Brenda down the hall. We went outside and stood by the door.
“I didn’t plan for this to happen,” I said. Brenda gave a snort. “Okay, I planned it, but I gave up the plan. I don’t know who did this today. Maybe someone else saw a chance to get her back. Who knows, maybe karma finally caught up to her.”
I shuffled in place. I’d waited a long time for Lauren’s downfall. I’d dreamed about it for years. Now that it finally happened it didn’t feel nearly as good as I’d anticipated. Especially with the way Brenda was looking at me.
Brenda’s mom pulled into the parking lot and flashed her lights.
Brenda shook her head at me, then jogged over to the car and got in. I waved as they drove away, hoping it would infuse Brenda with confidence that somehow things would work out for the best.
So much for victory being sweet.