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I said.
    â€œYeah, I know,” he said coldly. “I can read the caller ID.”
    â€œWell, what do you think you’re doing, writing about me that way on your blog?” I yelled at him, letting out all the anger I’d been trying to keep under control. “You know all that stuff you wrote is lies.”
    â€œJust doing you a favor,” he said with a small prickish laugh.
    â€œEx cuse me?”
    â€œHey, take it as a compliment,” he said. “I’m just trying to make you look hot. You know—like everything you’re not.”
    â€œThat’s ridiculous,” I said, spitting the words. It sounded lame, but I couldn’t think of anything else to say.
    â€œYou’d never get another date at Norton if people found out what a prissy little virgin you are,” he said nastily.
    â€œJeez!” I shouted at him. “How can you stand there and talk that way to me in front of your sister?”
    He didn’t answer. He just hung up on me.
    Unbelievable!
    I threw the phone onto my bed and then stomped around the carpeted room for a minute, fuming.
    Well, at least I called him. That part felt good. I wasn’t going to take this crap without putting up a fight.
    I called Rachel back.
    â€œOh, no,” she said while we were talking. “He just posted another entry about you.”
    â€œWhat?”
    My throat felt tight. What now? I wondered. I dashed over to my computer and refreshed the page of his blog.
    Subject: Buyer Beware
    Yo, guys. Word of warning: if you take Carmen out, be prepared to listen to a long, boring yak about her stupid miniature pig collection. Not that she talks about it while she’s doing it . . . and not that getting into her pants isn’t worth a little chatter . . . but the girl can’t shut up about her stupid pig collection. Don’t blame me if you end up crying “Wee Wee Wee” all the way home.
    My throat closed up, and I choked back some tears, but I tried not to let Rachel hear.
    â€œWhat an asshole,” Rachel said, cold as ice. When Rachel gets mad at someone, she really gets mad. You don’t want to be on her bad list. “How did he know about your pig collection, anyway? You never even let me touch most of them.”
    â€œI know,” I said, shaking my head and wishing I knew some horrible, painful, endless form of death I could inflict on Joey. “We got bored during the second half of the game, and started playing truth or dare. He asked me what one thing I’d sell my soul for. As a joke, I said it was my miniature pigs.”
    My miniature pigs are seriously important to me. My dad gave me the first one when I was five years old, after he’d been away on a two-month-long trip. I told Joey that I’d do practically anything to keep from losing that pig.
    â€œHe’s a real piece of work,” Rachel said. “I wish I were at Norton, believe me. You and I could slap him down in under a week.”
    That much was true. Rachel was loyal, and when her friends were crossed she could get really spiteful. Right now I wouldn’t have minded if she’d worked a little of her voodoo on Joey.
    â€œWell, you’re not, so I’m going to have to deal with it alone. I just wonder what will happen at school tomorrow. Do you think everyone will have read his blog? Do you think they’ll believe it?”
    Rachel was silent again. What could she say? She had no idea what life was like at my new school.
    I was just going to have to wait and see. And face it all alone.

Chapter 4
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    â€œOh my God, Carmen, everyone’s staring at you.” Ariel nudged me and mumbled under her breath as we walked through the hall to homeroom Monday morning.
    â€œI know.” I pasted a semiconvincing smile on my face and kept walking.
    This was exactly what I’d been afraid would happen, which is why I had gone out Sunday afternoon and bought a new little