Sara Biren has been with Westgate Prep since the beginning, as have the Central Florida Inklings: Julie McAlee, Brad Shreffler, Cheryl Flesch, and Alli Martin. I couldn’t ask for a better group of readers and co-commiserators than the friends I’m proud to call my Team Weber sisters: Leslie Dunnett, Rebecca Hackett, Precy Larkins, Sophie Lira, Andrea Jackson, L.S. Murphy, and Gail Nall. Nicole Brinkley and Shae McDaniel found the cure for my writer’s block (in the form of Richard Armitage in North and South), and Nicole and the YA Interrobang crew — especially Kaye, Lindsay, and Natasha — taught me how to step back and look at stories from different angles. Nico Galfond answered all my music-related questions (to help justify Jake’s music snobbery), and Kirsten Banks made sure I had a properly angsty playlist as I wrote Talia’s story. I am eternally grateful to them all.
I also have the most extraordinary family. My sister is my touchstone and my loudest cheerleader, my husband is getting used to my #5AMWritersClub membership, and my son is an endless source of smiles and cuddles as he reminds me not to work too hard. I love them all and am truly blessed to have them in my life.
Finally, the book in your hands would not have been possible without you, the reader. Thanks for coming to Westgate Prep. Ally and I will see you after spring break!
Books by Ella Martin
Will the Real Prince Charming Please Stand Up? (Westgate Prep #1)
I Love Him, I Love Him Not (Westgate Prep #2)
About the Author
Ella Martin is a young adult author and self-described “prep school survivor” from Southern California. With a keen sense for combining relatable teen characters with engrossing stories, her books blend aspects of romance, angst, and intrigue. Her Westgate Prep series of books tackle female friendships, quirky characters, and sensitive topics with equal tact.
Also by Ella Martin
Chapter One
“The exit polls are in, guys. It’s still early, but Bianca may actually win this.”
I looked up from my salad at the lanky boy who took the seat across from me. “Exit polls?” I asked. “Finn, you can’t be serious.”
His cool cerulean blue eyes peered at me over the top of his wireframe glasses. “How often is it that one of my friends has a chance at being Homecoming Princess?”
Beside me, my friend Talia crunched into a carrot stick. “So what is she ahead by?”
I glared at her. “Don’t encourage him.”
She flipped her long ponytail over her shoulder, revealing a bright green streak in her dark hair as she grinned at me. I sighed, knowing I was defeated.
Talia Nicoletti was the only person I knew brave enough to thumb her nose at the Westgate Prep Appearance Guidelines. The green streak she sported was her way of coping with the birthmark on her scalp that turned a lock of hair white. It totally violated all the rules, but after her mom had a meeting with the principal last year, both of the school deans gave up, stopped calling out her blatant disregard for the guidelines, and let her get away with everything. We called it the Talia Clause. Not even her knee-high combat boots and larger-than-regulation silver hoops that day earned a second glance from the faculty. But it probably didn’t hurt to have a high-powered attorney who terrified the entire administration for a mom, either.
“Based on the thirty-five random people I asked, which is a sample size of about twelve percent, she’s up by almost sixteen percentage points,” Finn replied, picking up his burger. “It’s just outside the margin of error, but I’m really confident in my math.”
Of course he was. Finnegan Marks was Westgate Prep’s top mathlete and the only sophomore taking pre-calculus while most of us slackers suffered through geometry. Come to think of it, Finn was probably the only sophomore not taking any regular tenth-grade classes. He stood about a head taller than I did (which was significant since I was considered kind of tall at five-foot-nine) and, despite his skinny frame, was fairly athletic. He was the best shooter on last year’s JV basketball team, though he said that wasn’t as much skill as it was a basic understanding of physics and geometry.
“I’m only on that stupid ballot because you and Jake thought it would be a fun social experiment,” I said with a snort. “You really think campaigning will have any effect on who’ll win?”
“Well, there has to be a way to level the field to prove it’s possible to rig a popularity contest,” he said, sounding hurt.
“So I get to be the guinea pig?” I stifled a groan. It wasn’t that I couldn’t win the Homecoming Princess crown on my own because I was ugly or anything. I thought my boring brown eyes were a little too big for my face, I was never crazy about the way my small nose turned up a bit at the end, and I really wished I’d inherited some of my mom’s Latin curves, but my looks were better than passable.
No, I wouldn’t win because I mostly kept to my close circle of friends, and I was a pretty ordinary student. I wasn’t hyper-involved in a ton of clubs, I was only in a handful of honors classes, and I wasn’t one of those girls who guys were drooling over. I was the girl you saw walking down the hall and didn’t think twice about.
Finn held up his burger and studied it. “You have to admit, Bianca, this has been an interesting experiment. We’ll know for sure when they announce the winners at the pep rally tomorrow, but it seems our campaign has been pretty effective.”
“All your campaigning has done is make my name more recognizable.”
“Hey, those videos got, like, a couple thousand views each.”
“A couple thousand?” I said, mortified. “But there are only, like, three hundred people in our class.”
“I know.” Finn was ecstatic. “So if my calculations are right, which we know they are, the videos we posted and email blasts we sent boosted both name and facial recognition, which led to an increase in your popularity quotient beyond those of the other candidates, thus securing a win.”
“In English, please?”
“He’s saying their campaign made you more popular than the cheerleaders,” Talia explained.
He furrowed his brow. “Jake and I merely presented her as the best representative for our class.”
“How would I be representing our class? All the Homecoming princesses do is sit on their class floats and smile and wave to the crowd at halftime. A trained monkey could do that.” I pointed at Finn with my fork. “And I don’t like being your lab rat.”
“But you have to admit, Bianca,” Talia said thoughtfully between bites of her sandwich, “it would be kind of cool to win.”
“Kind of cool?” Blonde spiral curls appeared out of nowhere as my friend Ally set a tray onto the table and slid into the seat beside me. “It would be totally epic.”
Ally Katz was the social butterfly of the sophomore class and easily the biggest gossip. She had a sweet, cherubic face with large, inquisitive green eyes, and a petite but rather curvy figure. I thought she would have been a better choice for Jake and Finn’s little experiment, but the guys told me Ally was too well-known and well-liked despite (or perhaps because of) her gossip blog. It was like Westgate’s Gossip Central Station, which Ally totally took as a compliment because she wanted to be an entertainment news reporter.
“You guys are way more excited about this than you should be,” I said.
Ally beamed at me. “You do know what this would mean, right?”