“Okay, bye,” Nessa said.

“Do you see him?” Eve asked her, fidgeting all about.

“Not yet.” Nessa took her hand.

Eve squeezed Nessa’s hand and went off to look for Brody.

Would Eve just slow dance with Brody or something and forget their whole plan? Nessa tried to have faith that her friend hadn’t changed that much. Hey, at least her goofy Renaissance Faire costume, despite its newly snug fit, screamed, “I’m still the old Eve.”

Nessa scanned the room for any other fun people. Lara Alexander, Erin O’Brien, and a couple of other kids from the show danced in their own little corner. Lara wore a gown and a crown and looked like actual royalty. Erin O’Brien had a red cardboard airplane around her chair and was dressed as Amelia Earhart. Nessa wove through some skeletons, zombies, and various types of princesses and superheroes as she headed toward that safe zone.

“Hey, is Brody here yet?” Nessa asked the crowd.

Erin rolled her eyes. “No, I don’t think so. I would’ve smelled the cologne and ego.”

Nessa snorted. “True.”

A paper jack-o’-lantern hanging from the ceiling fell, and a couple of teachers scrambled to get its string out of a girl’s hair. Amina, dressed as Catwoman, twirled around the dance floor with Hayley, who wore a costume as vague as Sophie’s. Winston Byrd, that night the Green Hornet, and Caleb Rhines, Han Solo, stood in a corner under an art-class-made papier-mâché monster, arguing. Probably about sports. Caleb pointed a menacing finger at Winston’s chest and shouted something. Okay, maybe not sports. Rose Reed, dressed as Princess Leia, came over and took Caleb’s arm to lead him to dance.

But no Brody. And where had Eve gone?

Everyone looked different this year. Glam-ier. A bunch of the girls wore more makeup than she’d ever seen on them. This was probably the one night their parents allowed them to do that. But Nessa suspected that wasn’t the only reason. Every girl’s outfit screamed “Put me on the list!”

Whatever happened to simply wanting to win the costume contest?

But wait. Sophie was right; Nessa shouldn’t act like the costume police.

She heard a group of voices over the music. They came from somewhere far off. The dancing stopped, and people began to crowd around something. A fistfight?

Wait, could it be Eve? Was Eve okay? Nessa felt her best-friend instinct kick into high gear, and she tried to run toward the action, but the crowd blocked her. She attempted to push her way through, but Nessa still couldn’t see who was yelling or why. She saw Mr. Flynn coming from another side, also trying to get to the center of the noise, as another teacher rushed out of the room.

And then, nudging through the gawking bystanders, she saw what all the commotion was about. Standing right in front of Sophie and Eve, his hand on his hip as he tossed back the hair of his cheap blond wig, stood Brody Dixon dressed in the most horrifying Halloween costume Nessa could imagine.