Whim Manor And the Boy Who Wasn't.

Harper Watson and the Girl Who Wasn't

I bit my lip. For Whim's sake, this was not the time to be drawing any extra attention from Victoria.

My shoes squeaked as I stuttered to a stop in the library. "Suzi, I need to be a boy again, now."

She looked up. "No Eng—"

"No. Not today." My voice rang cold. "You don't have to say anything, you just have to help me."

When we got to her room, I said, "Victoria is back and I think Whim is missing."

Nodding, she pushed me into a chair and set to work. She wrapped acetone-soaked cotton balls around my fingers, holding them in place with tin foil, as she stripped the makeup off my face with a bottle of eye-makeup remover.

I flinched when she lifted a pair of scissors. "What are you going to do?"

"Do you need your hair cut?" she whispered, "like a boy?"

"No," I shook my head, "Just get it back to usual."

She took out a flat iron and straightened my hair, and when she was done, we removed the cotton balls from my fingertips and wiped them clean...

I looked at the mirror and sighed. The girl was gone.

"Thank you." I gave Suzi a nod and went back to my room where I put on my brown suit and went down to dinner.

Nora gave me a curious glance, as did Christie. But Victoria just gave me her usual sneer down the nose, and Whim... Whim didn't do anything because she wasn't there.

I checked my phone, still nothing.

"Where were you?" Nora asked Victoria.

Sliding her eyes with disdain, Victoria answered, "Family emergency. My great aunt died."

"I'm sorry."

"Are you?" Victoria shrugged. "I heard about what Whim did, creepy little liar. I told her to tell Ms. Windsor, gave her a phone number and everything. Well, what have all of –you– been up to?"

All eyes drifted to me.

"Ah... not much..." I didn't think I should mention the geisha incident. "A friend of mine came into town for a visit, Justin."

"Is he your boyfriend?" she said as an accusation. And when I paused, trying to think of an answer, Victoria gave a snort, "figures."

"Actually," Nora raised a finger. "I was thinking of asking him out..."

Normally I would have choked on my water, but I was too shocked about Whim to be shocked about anything else.

"Or not," Nora lowered her finger back down, glancing at me nervously. "Forget I said that..." she eked out.

"So, you two are into 'sharing'?" Victoria smugged. And just then, I felt a tap on my shoulder.

"Ms. Windsor needs you in her office right away." It was Tilly. She didn't look angry or upset; she looked disturbed if anything.

"Oh, you're going to get it." Victoria practically laughed.

Curtly escorting me through the halls to the office, Tilly didn't say a thing. And when she opened the door, Ms. Windsor was behind her desk with Graham sitting in the far chair, facing her.

She motioned me to the empty near chair, next to Graham, as Tilly took up position in front of the door.

"What's going on?" I asked... suddenly remembering the wad of stolen cash hidden under my bed, the one that only Victoria knew about, a bead of cold sweat slowly making its way down my face.