“No,” I insist, lifting a wrist to wipe my streaming eyes. “I’m not crying. I’m just really tired. It’s been a really long day. And I really don’t appreciate your doing what you did.”

“What I did?” Luke looks totally confused.

He also, in the light from the little lamp by my bed, looks totally hot. He’s changed into his party clothes, a collared white linen shirt and black trousers with a razor-sharp crease down the front of each leg. The white shirt brings out the deep tan of his neck and arms.

But I will not be swayed by masculine hotness. Not this time.

“Oh, right,” I say. “Like you don’t know.”

“I don’t know,” Luke says. “I don’t know what Dominique said that I said, Lizzie, but I swear-”

“I’m not talking about what you said to Dominique,” I interrupt. “I already know that was a lie. But why…” My voice catches. So much for refusing to cry in front of him. Oh well. It’s not like he’s never seen my tears before. “…why did you tell Shari about my thesis?”

“What?” His expression, in the lamplight, is a mixture of incredulity and confusion. “Lizzie. I swear. I never said a word.”

Wow. I really hadn’t expected that. You know, denial. I’d fully expected him simply to come clean…to admit he’d done it and ask for an apology.

Which I’d been willing to accept, of course, on account of my own guilt for having spilled the beans about him to his mom. It’s true things would never be the same between us, of course. But maybe, with time, we might have been able to build up some modicum of mutual trust…

But to stand there and deny it? To my face?

“Luke,” I say, my disappointment causing my voice to throb a little, “it had to be you. No one else knew.”

“It wasn’t,” Luke says. A glance at his face shows he’s no longer feeling incredulous or confused. Now he’s mad. At least if his frown is any indication. “Look, I don’t know how Shari found out about your not graduating. But I didn’t tell her. Unlike some people in this room, I can keep a secret. Or are you not the one who told my mother that I want to go to medical school?”

Oops. In the silence before I reply, I can hear more rattling of silverware from below, along with the chirp of crickets, and Vicky’s voice, crying out very distinctly, “Lauren! Nicole! You made it!”

I swallow.

I. Am. So. Dead.

“Well,” I say, “yes. Yes, I did. But I can explain-”

“Do you really think,” Luke interrupts, “that it’s okay for you to go around accusing people of failing to keep a secret when you obviously can’t keep one yourself?”

“But-” I say, feeling all the blood drain from my face. Because he’s right. Of course. I’m the biggest hypocrite in the world.

“But,” I say again, “you don’t understand. Your girlfriend-your uncle-everyone was going around saying you were going to take that job, and I just thought-”

“You just thought you’d get involved in something that was none of your business?” Luke demands.

I. Am. So. Stupid.

“I was trying to help,” I say in a small voice.

“I never asked for your help, Lizzie,” Luke says. “Help was never what I wanted from you. What I wanted from you was…what I thought we might have-”

Wait. Luke wanted something from me? Luke thought we might have-what?

Suddenly my heart starts pounding a mile a minute. Oh my God. Oh my God.

“You know what?” Luke says suddenly. “Never mind.”

And he turns around and stalks from the room, closing the door very firmly behind him.

22

Can I just say it’s really hard to snip straight when you’re crying so hard you can’t see?

Well, whatever. Who needs him, anyway? I mean, okay, sure, he seems really nice. And he’s definitely good-looking. And smart and funny, too.

But he’s a liar. I mean, obviously he told Shari about my thesis. How else could she have found out? I don’t know why he couldn’t have just admitted it, the way I did, about having told his mom about his secret dream of being a doctor.

At least I did that for a good cause. Because I suspect Bibi de Villiers is the kind of woman who, upon learning her child has a secret dream, will do everything in her power to see that that dream is achieved. Should a mother like that really be kept in the dark about her son’s most heartfelt ambition?

I was actually doing Luke a service in telling his mother. How can he fail to see that?

Oh, all right. I’m a busybody and a loudmouth and a big stupid jerk.

And because of it, I’ve lost him…though the truth is, I never really had him. Oh, sure, there was that moment this morning, when he bought me the diet Coke-

But no. That was clearly all in my head. There’s no doubt about it now. I am destined to live and die alone. Romance and Lizzie Nichols simply do not mix.

And that’s just fine. I mean, there have been plenty of people who have had perfectly happy, fulfilled lives without a significant other. I can’t think of any right now. But I’m sure there have been. I’ll just be like one of them. I’ll just be Lizzie…alone.

I’m trying to angle my scissors beneath a particularly tight row of stitches when there’s yet another knock on my door.

Seriously. I don’t know how much more of this I can take.

The door opens before I even have a chance to say “Come in.”

And, much to my surprise, Dominique is standing there, looking tall and cool in high-heeled Manolo slides and a low-cut slinky green dress.

I shake my head.

“Look,” I say, “I know it looks bad, but it’s always worse before the storm. I’ll get the dress done if people would just leave me alone so I can work.”

Dominique steps into the room, looking around carefully, as if afraid there might be trip wires across the floor, instead of just mounds and mounds of lace.

“I didn’t come here about the dress,” Dominique says. She stops by my open suitcase and looks down at the jumble of vintage dresses and Sears jeans that are lying there. Then she smirks.

“Look,” I say. I have really taken about all I can mentally stand. “If you want me to finish this thing by morning, you’re going to have to leave me alone, okay? Tell Vicky I’m doing the best I can.”

“I told you,” Dominique says. “I’m not here about Victoria or her dress. I’m here about Luke.”

Luke? That causes me to lay down my scissors. What could Dominique have to say to me about Luke?

“I know you’re in love with him,” she says, lifting my family-size pack of Tums from the top of the dresser and examining it closely.

I stare at her openmouthed. “Wh-what?”

“It’s quite obvious,” Dominique says, putting the Tums back where she found them. “At first I was not alarmed because…well, look at you.”

Like the total jerk that I am, I actually do look down at myself. There are now approximately eighty-five thousand bits of white lace stuck to my black dress. I’ve pulled my hair into a haphazard ponytail and lost my shoes somewhere under all the folds of material lining my floor.