Read Betsy Wickwire's Dirty Secret for Free Online

notice. She picked up my napkin, licked it and started wiping something sticky off the table.
    â€œNo, seriously, I mean it,” she said. “What are you doing here? Zinnia’s isn’t the type of place you’d normally find the—dot, dot, dot —’popular kids.’”
    She stopped wiping the table and looked at me as if she actually expected an answer.
    â€œWell. I was just, I don’t know, hungry so I …”
    Dolores slid the smoothie toward me. It felt like she’d aimed a blowtorch at face. I had to turn away.
    â€œHow come you’re not drinking it, then? Too ‘granola’ for you or something?”
    I managed to shrug.
    Dolores said, “Oh, no. Don’t tell me. Hold on …” She stuck her nose deep into the glass, sniffed, then slumped back in the booth with her hand on her heart as if she’d just averted a major disaster. “Phew! For a second there, I was worried you’d ordered the Power Smoothie. Big mistake. They put kelp in it. Seriously. A seaweed smoothie. Like, ugh, gross.” She sat up and took another sniff. “But this one smells okay. Not too fishy or anything … So you just, like, savouring it or something?”
    I couldn’t bring myself to mention the hair. “No. Just not as hungry as I thought, I guess.” I hoped that would put an end to the smoothie discussion.
    â€œReally? Geez. Well, I’ll take it, then.” She didn’t wait to see if that was okay. She wrapped her lips around my straw and took a big slurp.
    My brain gagged. There was no way I’d ever have just taken somebody else’s smoothie. No way I’d ever have used somebody else’s straw. Especially somebody I barely knew.
    Dolores swung her tongue around her lips and groaned pornographically. “Food is definitely love. Don’t let anyone tell you different.”
    She picked up the straw and started to lick it. The hair was still there but now a mushy hunk of strawberry hung off the end.
    A clot .
    I wished I hadn’t thought of that.
    A clot of strawberry .
    My shoulders curled forward. I was definitely going to hurl if Dolores put that in her mouth.
    â€œHair.” I said it quickly, keeping my teeth together, just in case.
    â€œHunh?”
    I wagged my finger at it.
    Dolores held up the straw and tilted her head as ifshe was checking the underside of a car. “Oh.” She slid her fingers down the hair and the clot plopped back into the smoothie. “Wow. The hair’s as long as my arm. Look!”
    I couldn’t.
    â€œOh. Does this bother you?”
    I turned my face to the wall and nodded. Even Carly knew better than to joke about something like this.
    â€œYou’re kidding. It’s only a hair.” I heard her take another long slurp. “I mean, a head hair. I could understand if it was a body hair or something. Like, if I found evidence that, say, somebody’s armpit—or, you know, whatever—had been dangling over my smoothie, I’d definitely have second thoughts but …”
    I wouldn’t normally be rude but I had to stop this. “Could we talk about something else please?”
    Dolores didn’t seem the least bit offended. “Sure.
    What?”
    I shrugged like you decide . All I really wanted to do was leave but I didn’t want to hurt her feelings.
    â€œWell, okay.” Dolores pulled her feet up and sat cross-legged on the seat. There was a big hole in the knee of her pink-striped leggings. “You still going out with Nick Jamieson?”
    It was like putting a match next to a plastic bag. My skin shrunk up tight. Who’d she think she was asking me stufflike that? I gave a little shake of my head and turned away.
    I could see the front door from here. What if I just stood up right now and walked out?
    What difference would it make? I’d never escape. I’d never be free of this.
    Dolores quit vacuuming the bottom