Read One Night That Changes Everything for Free Online

are streaming through the door, girls dressed in short skirts and dresses, guys in jeans and T-shirts. How come guys are allowed to wear jeans and T-shirts and girls have to wear heels and tight stuff? Of course, the more important question is why did I allow myself to be bossed into wearing heels and revealing stuff? It’s so not me. I sigh and try to pull the top of my shirt up a little.
    “Wow,” Marissa says as she watches Clarice wrap her arms around the guy’s neck. “I guess she wasn’t kidding when she said she wasn’t afraid.”
    “I guess not,” I say morosely. Although if I looked like her, I wouldn’t be afraid either.
    “Wait until that guy she’s dancing with finds out he’s not getting any,” Marissa says. “He’s going to be so pissed.” She keeps throwing glances over to the other side of the room, where Jeremiah is deep in conversation with Julia.
    My cell phone vibrates in my pocket, and I pull it out. One new text. Cooper. “‘ TIME’S RUNNING OUT ,’” it says. Time’s running out? What does that even
mean
? No one said anything about there being a time limit on all of this. I mean, what does he think this is, an episode of
24
? I should be able to take my time. I look over to the corner, and Cooper’s still there with a bunch of his dumb friends, calmly drinking his drink and laughing with them and not even looking at me.
    “What does the text say?” Marissa asks. She gets in close to me and reads it. “‘Time’s running out’?” She frowns. “What does that mean?”
    “It means,” I say, “that if I don’t do what they say, like, now, they’re going to post my notebook online.” Okay. I take a deep breath. I can do this. What’s one second of humiliation compared to a lifetime of humiliation? Because, let’s face it, that’s what will happen if that notebook gets out. Much better to be laughed at by a random guy I don’t know than have the whole school knowing my secrets.
    “Uh-oh,” Marissa says.
    “What?” I ask. I look out onto the dance floor, which is rapidly becoming filled with people. Clarice is still dancingwith the hottie, only now her back is to his front, and he’s got his hands on her hips. Wow. I never knew Clarice had such good rhythm. She’s like a little minx out there.
    “Not Clarice,” Marissa says, elbowing me. “Look.”
    I follow her gaze across the room until my eyes land on the guy I’m supposed to be asking to dance. Before, he was just sitting there all by himself, bopping his head to the music in this semi-dorky fashion. Now he is flanked by a girl on either side! And he is talking to them.
    Well, not to both of them. One of the girls is talking to his friend. What? Where did his friend come from? He was by himself just two seconds ago. Now I’m going to have to ask him to dance in front of his friend! And two girls, both of whom have very, very long blond hair and are very, very tan. In November. Hello, girls, skin cancer, ever heard of it?
    “You better go,” Marissa says. “If he starts dancing with one of them …” She trails off, and I’m not sure if she means I’ll never get a chance to ask him, or if he just won’t want to dance with me. I don’t stick around to find out, and before I can stop myself, I’m pushing through the crowd on my way over to the guy.
    It becomes rather obvious rather quickly that even if I
did
want to ask this guy to dance, it’s going to be, uh, kind of difficult. Their whole group is sitting in a round booth, and him and his friend are in the middle, with the two girls on the outside, surrounding them like some kind of security guards.The weird thing is, I totally think they planned it. The girls, I mean. They planned it so that no one else could get at the guys. Unless those guys are their boyfriends. But that would be a complete disaster, so I decide to push that thought right out of my mind.
    I stand by the side of the booth for a second, trying to come up with some sort of