Free Romance of the Snob Squad by Julie Anne Peters Page A

owe you.”
    “No p-problem. You gotta see these. C-come on.”
    We jammed into the girls’ restroom and shut the door. “Open it. Hurry,” Lydia said. She was so excited, I thought she’d wet her pants. We were in the right place, anyway.
    Slowly, carefully, Prairie lifted the flap of the photo envelope. She reached inside and pulled out the first picture.
    “Oh, my God!” Lydia shrieked over Prairie’s shoulder. She wrenched the picture out of Prairie’s hand. “My God. If anyone sees this, I’ll be the laughingstock of school.”
    You already are, I almost said. Maybe I did. “Let me see.”
    “No way.” Lydia slapped the picture against her chest.
    “It can’t be that bad.”
    “There’s m-m-ore,” Prairie sang. She showed us another one of Lydia, and we howled.
    Lydia grabbed the picture and cringed. “All right.” She took a deep breath and narrowed her eyes. “Let’s see the rest of you.”
    Prairie passed around the stack of photos. My glamour photos were, in a word, hideous. Worse than hideous. I looked like a hussy, humpback hippopotamus. In ballet pink, if you can imagine.
    When Max saw her first picture, she smirked. “Bad,” she said. “Really bad.”
    She loved them. Hers were the only ones that did anyone justice.
    After we got over the initial shock, we all agreed that a couple of Prairie’s glamour photos weren’t horrible. In fact, they were pretty good. The ones in focus anyway. She looked radiant. Sparkling, at least, with all the sequins. We took a few minutes to vote on our favorite, the one we’d sneak to Hugh.
    A rush of air blew through the bathroom door as someone opened it. Max charged over to wedge it shut with a shoulder. “Hey, I need to go,” some girl yelled.
    “Go away,” Max growled. “It’s a private party.”
    “We can put the picture in Hugh’s lunch box,” Lydia said. “He always brings his lunch.”
    In an insulated, zip-up lunch box with matching Thermos. You get the picture.
    “N-no.” Prairie’s eyes filled with terror. “We c-can’t do it at school. I d-don’t want anyone to see my picture. I mean, anyone besides Hugh.”
    Lydia tapped an index finger on her lips. “Maybe we could find out where he lives and send the picture to him.”
    Prairie said, “I know where he lives.”
    We all stared at her. Her face flared. In a tiny voice she said, “Hugh’s my next-door neighbor.”
    Okay, granted, the Solanos were not bosom buddies with their next-door neighbors. The Crotchety Crockerds on the south scolded me once in public when I accidentally left my Barbie bride doll in their driveway. Old man Crotchety crushed it flat with his classic Chrysler. Then he had the gall to holler at me when I started screaming, “Murderer! Murderer!” We hadn’t spoken to them for six years.
    To the north side loomed a hash house. At least that’s what Dad called it. More people came and went at midnight than the drive-up window at Wendy’s. So I can understand how Prairie and Hugh had never once talked, even though he’d moved in next door to her the summer before fifth grade.
    Still, it was weird. She said Hugh and her brother Sun were friends, and that Hugh came over after dinner sometimes to surf the Internet with Sun. Imagine having your one true love in the same house. Close enough to smell his sweat. Which Hugh had plenty of.
    We decided to stick Prairie’s picture in an envelope and address it to Hugh. Anonymous like. Then, after school, Prairie’d slip the envelope in the Torkersons’ mailbox.
    We offered to help Prairie deliver the photo, but she said no thanks. I think she wanted us as far away from Hugh’s house as possible. Which was fine with me. If we got caught, she’d hate us forever. Prairie wasn’t worried, though. She said as soon as Hugh came over to surf the Net, she could sneak out and do it. I wondered if she really would.
    Lydia said, “Do you mind if I take the other pictures home tonight? My mom wanted to see how they