Free Notorious by Allison Brennan Page A

friendship. It hadn’t, but it had changed it.
    *   *   *
    Like she did nearly every day after school, Max rode her bike over to Lindy’s house. She bypassed the grand main house and made her way straight to the tree house.
    Tree house was a misnomer—the stately, three-story clubhouse had been built around two old trees. Lindy’s father originally had it built for her older brother, Jerry, but Lindy had taken it over when she was eight, marking her territory by painting the inside pink.
    The pink had long ago been replaced by a pale green that her mother said spurred creativity. But the house was all Lindy’s. It’s where they talked, where they played, where they shared. And today, Max had something big to share with Lindy:
    three thousand miles away. fShe’d gotten a birthday card from her mother.
    It was three weeks late and short, but it was from her, signed with her flowery “Mommy” even though Max had stopped calling Martha Revere “Mommy” when she was six.
    “Happy birthday, Maxie! Happy big thirteen. I hope you have a wonderful year. I’d hoped to visit, but something came up and I couldn’t get away. I love you! Mommy.”
    She said the same thing every year, and every year Max had a flash of hope—hope that her mother meant it, that she’d truly meant to visit, but knowing in her heart since that Thanksgiving she’d left Max with her grandparents, the month before Max turned ten, that she’d never see her mother again.
    Lindy wasn’t in the clubhouse, but the door was never locked and Max walked in. She collapsed on the overstuffed couch and reached into a popcorn bowl with day-old popcorn. That’s when she saw Lindy’s diary.
    It was out in the open, right there on the table. Lindy was possessive of her diary. She’d let Max read things in it, because they were best friends, but she didn’t let her read everything.
    The hardest thing Max had ever done was not pick up that diary. She desperately wanted to, but Lindy trusted her, and trust was important. She stared at it, and Lindy walked in.
    Lindy had always been one of the most beautiful girls on campus. They were in seventh grade, but Lindy had never gone through the awkward, gangly stage. She grew from cute, blond, Kewpie doll, when Max had met her in the middle of fourth grade, into young teenage beauty queen. Max had a growth spurt over the summer and went from average to five foot ten practically overnight. She was suddenly the tallest girl in junior high, all arms and legs and no breasts.
    “Did you read that?” Lindy snapped and grabbed the diary.
    “No.”
    She glared at her.
    “I’m not lying,” Max said. “I wanted to, I was sort of willing a breeze to come in and turn the pages.”
    Lindy laughed. “Okay, I believe you.” She opened the diary to the middle, flipped through, and handed Max the book. “Read Monday.”
    Max did. Her eyes widened. Ms. Blair was cutting herself? The PE teacher? Why? “You have to tell Mr. Horn.”
    Lindy grabbed the book. “No way, then Mr. Horn and everyone else will know that I was kissing Andy in the locker room.”
    “You can say you were just getting something you left. Or—”
    But Lindy cut her off. “You think this is the only secret I have on the teachers at school? Really? I know everything about everyone in this town—and if I don’t know it, I will.”
    “She needs help.”
    Lindy wasn’t even listening to her. “I know that Mr. Horn’s secretary gives him a blow job under his desk, and the janitor, Miles, he jerks off after watching our swim meets.”
    “That’s disgusting.”
    “People are gross. Take Kimberly. I know she’s cheating on my father. I’m going to prove it.”
    Lindy and her mother were constantly at odds. She called her Kimberly to get under her skin.
    “You’re spying on all these people?”
    “Hardly. I’m just more observant than most people.” Lindy stared at her. “So are you. You’re the one who told me Miles was a