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see.” And she walked out.

    7
    Fast-forward through the evening. Picture a typical dance, lame music, chaperones trying to keep us from actually mating on the dance floor. All sort of a pre-party for the real party to follow. But I kept hearing Kendra’s words, ringing in my ears: You’ll see. Sloane got friendly, and once we got crowned prince and princess, she got even friendlier. With some girls, popularity and the power that goes with it are some kind of aphrodisiac. Sloane was like that. We stood on stage, getting crowned. Sloane leaned toward me.
    “My mom’s out tonight.” She took my hand and put it on her butt.
    I removed it. “Great.”
    You’ll see.
    She continued, pressing closer, her breath hot in my ear. “She went to an opera – three and a half hours. I called the Met to find out. And she usually gets dinner after. She won’t be home until almost one… I mean if you wanted to come over awhile.” Her hand slipped down my stomach, edging closer to the Danger Zone. Unbelievable. She was groping me in front of the whole school?
    I moved away. “I only have the limo until midnight.” Brett Davis, who’d been prince last year, came toward me with my crown. I bowed my head to humbly accept it.
    “Use it wisely,” Brett said.
    “Cheap,” Sloane said. “I’m not worth taking a cab? That’s what you’re saying?” What did “You’ll see” mean? And Sloane and Brett were too close, cutting off my air. Things and people were coming at me from all sides. I couldn’t think straight.
    “Kyle Kingsbury, answer me.”
    “Will you just get away from me?” I exploded.
    It seemed like everyone and everything in the room stopped when I said that.
    “You bastard,” Sloane said.
    “I have to go home,” I said. “Do you want to stay or take the limo?” You’ll see.
    “You think you’re leaving? Leaving me?” Sloane whispered, loud enough for anyone in a ten-mile radius to hear. “If you leave here, it will be the last thing you’ll ever do. So smile, and dance with me. I’m not going to let you ruin my night, Kyle.”
    So that’s what I did. I smiled and danced with her. And afterward, I took her back to her house and drank Absolut vodka, stolen from her parents’ bar (“Absolut Royalty!” Sloane toasted), and did everything else she expected and I’d been expecting too, and tried to forget the voice in my head, the voice saying, “You’ll see,” over and over. And finally, at eleven forty-five, I made my escape.
    When I got home, the light was on in my bedroom. Weird. Probably Magda had been cleaning in there and forgot it.
    But when I opened the door, the witch was sitting on my bed.

    8
    “What are you doing here?” I said it loud enough to hide the fact that my voice was shaking, and sweat was dripping out of every pore, and my blood was pounding like I’d been running the track. And yet I couldn’t say I was surprised to see her. I’d been expecting her since the dance. I just didn’t know when or how.
    She stared at me. I noticed her eyes again, the same bottle color as her hair, and I had this weird thought: What if it was natural, the hair as well as the eyes? What if they’d grown that way?
    Crazy. “Why are you in my house?” I repeated. She smiled. I noticed for the first time that she held a mirror, the same one she’d had the first day on the benches. She peered into it as she chanted,
    “Retribution. Poetic justice. Just deserts. Comeuppance.”
    I stared. In the moment she spoke, she didn’t look as ugly as I remembered her. It was those eyes, those glowing green eyes. Her skin glowed too.
    “What do you mean, ‘Comeuppance’?”
    “It’s an SAT word, Kyle. You should learn it. You will learn it. It means well-deserved punishment.”
    Punishment. Over the years, lots of people – housekeepers, my teachers – had threatened me with punishments. They never stuck. Usually, I could charm my way out of them. Or my dad could pay someone off. But what if