What Goes Around by Denene Millner Page A

other day, but she made it sound kinda serious.”
    â€œHonestly, I haven’t even read the stories,” Sydney lied as she pulled her Tom Ford sunglasses over her eyes to avoid Carmen’s gaze. “Altimus and my mom are really confident that everything is going to be fine. So you know, I just have to trust them.”
    â€œI understand,” Carmen said with a nod. “I don’t want to stress you. I was just a little worried. You know you can tell me anything.”
    Sydney paused as she thought about the IRS auditor who had set up shop in her stepfather’s home office the past week, and the strict $150 monthly spending limit that Keisha had imposed on her AMEX that very morning. She took a deep breath and forced a smile. “Of course,” Sydney said as she reached out to pat Carmen’s hand reassuringly. “Of course I would tell you.”

8
LAUREN
    â€œMy God, not again,” Donald said, flopping down on the floor while his friend queued up the music for the thousandth time. He and Lauren were in the middle of a powwow on how to make Caroline play the rear on the dance squad—a four-hour session that involved three strawberry-banana smoothies, several packages of Ritz crackers with American cheese slices, two humongous bags of gummy bears, a pack of grape Now and Laters, and at least thirty rewinds of a TiVoed episode of 106 & Park featuring throwback videos by Beyoncé, OutKast, and Thug Heaven, meant to provide a little inspiration and more than a couple of moves for Lauren’s choreography. “It’s hot already, goodness. If you do the damn thing one more time, you’re not going to be able to shake it fast at practice tomorrow.”
    â€œOkay, seriously? I’m gonna need you to stop acting like you’re the one doing all the work,” Lauren snapped, pushing the PAUSE button on her Bose stereo.
    Lauren was on a mission—a righteous one, indeed. Word on the curb was that Caroline, the sophomore basketball dance squad member with the hots for Sydney’s ex, was coming for Lauren’s Number One spot, and she would be damned if she was going to just let somebody come in and steal her head cheerleader-in-charge title. About this much, Lauren was clear: She wasn’t about to go down without a fight.
    â€œYou’re going to need me to walk into practice and show those girls a thing or two if you want to continue riding on the team bus to the games,” Lauren snapped at Donald, who, though he’d graciously agreed to watch and give feedback, was now too overloaded with sugar to put in critical work. “Stay. Focused.”
    â€œTrue,” Donald said, popping a red gummy bear into his mouth. “You know how I feel about the backseat of the squad bus. It makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside when I’m bouncing around back there.”
    â€œEasy,” Lauren laughed. “That was a mental image I just don’t need.”
    â€œOkay, okay,” Donald giggled. “Let me fix the mental, then. Caroline? With the squad captain’s bullhorn? Not good.”
    â€œI know, right?” Lauren said, huffing and rubbing her sore knee. “I’m going to need to do a little bit more than go in there with jacked Beyoncé moves to get the team to vote for me—that much I know.”
    â€œCome on,” Donald insisted. “They’d be fools not to vote you captain.”
    â€œThat’s the problem,” Lauren said. “They are fools. Haven’t you read YRT lately? My entire existence is under question now that stories about Altimus’s business are being downloaded directly onto the site. I swear, don’t people have anything better to do than get in my family’s business?”
    â€œUm, not really,” Donald deadpanned.
    â€œExactly,” Lauren said. “Just today, Elizabeth Chiclana raised her hand in Econ and asked Mr. Siegret to explain the difference