Project Paper Doll Read Online Free PDF Page A

outside.”
    See what I mean?
    “She was in my Advanced Comp class. I think,” Cami said.
    “What are we talking about?” Trey had evidently abandoned Matty and Jonas in the pool. His feet made splatting sounds on the deck as he approached.
    “That girl ,” Rachel said, with a pout in her voice.
    Oh God, not this again. I could predict how this was going to go. Rachel would be all needy and “love me, love me,” Trey would swoop in and try to save the day, and then Rachel would find some way to bitch-slap him back to the last century. That’s the trouble with having the same friends your whole life—you know what they’re going to do before they do it. Various people on the fringes of our circle flowed in and out, depending on Rachel’s mood, but at the core, it was always Trey and me and Rachel and the twins. Since that first day of kindergarten, when Rachel had picked our table to sit at and scored us all an extra cookie at snack time by telling us to hide the first ones we’d gotten.
    “Babe, you’re not still upset about her, are you?” A louder splash and a shriek from either Cami or Cassi meant Trey had joined them in the tub.
    And here we go…
    I opened my eyes and squinted in their direction long enough to see Trey slipping his arm over Rachel’s shoulders. I’d give that about three minutes.
    “I’ve never even seen that girl before,” he said, baffled. “She must be new, right?”
    Dude. Trey. I sighed. He never saw anyone but Rachel. Especially not someone like Ariane Tucker, who looked as if she practiced being invisible. To be fair, I’d never paid much attention to her either, until last year when I sat behind her in Algebra II. Then, I don’t know…no matter what my old man says, his eye for detail must have rubbed off on me. Something about Ariane was off in some vague, indefinable way. No one would probably describe her as pretty, but there was something about her that drew me in. Maybe attractive was a better word, in that I couldn’t define what caught my eye, but it was impossible to look away once I noticed her. Most people didn’t seem to notice her at all, which seemed more than fine with her. Another oddity.
    I’d gathered pieces of the puzzle that was Ariane Tucker here and there—like how she always did her homework in ink. INK. Who does their math with a pen?—but never enough for them to add up to anything.
    Today’s events only gave me more mismatched details to work with, building my interest.
    “Something you want to add, Zane?” Rachel’s voice cut through the too-hot August air, bringing a chill with it.
    “She always missed two questions.” I wasn’t sure why I spoke up. I knew better than to engage in Rachel’s games. Blame it on the beer buzz or exhaustion from surviving the summer with my dad constantly on my case. I’d thought life would be better with Quinn—my perfect older brother—staying at college this summer to work. Less opportunity for direct comparison, and therefore less falling short on my part. But if anything, my dad was worse than ever.
    I’d been living for the start of school until Rachel had to go and make things complicated this morning with her “joke.” I was so tired of all this “we’re better than everyone else” bullshit. I couldn’t believe I’d once found it funny.
    “What did you say?” Rachel demanded.
    I stared up at the designer Japanese lanterns hanging above my head. “I sat behind Ariane in math last year. She always used pen, and she missed two questions on every test, quiz, assignment, everything.” She was so much shorter than me, it had been easy to see over her shoulder when Mr. Scaliari handed back our stuff. I’d started paying attention when I noticed the ink thing.
    “The same two questions?” Cami asked, frowning.
    “No, different ones every time, but always two,” I said. Which meant sometimes she got a 98 out of 100 and other times, when it was a three-question quiz, she completely