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I rest my head on my desk as the bookshelves of the library melt away, turning into basketball hoops and banners in our school’s colors. Just like the last time I slid into Scotch, the students are doing laps.
Scotch’s sneakered feet slap against the wooden floor. His breathing is more labored than it was the last time I was inside him. He’s probably feeling the ill effects of the alcohol from last night’s party. Serves him right.
“So how was it?” a voice to my right asks.
Randall Fritz.
Here comes the part where Scotch brags about his conquest to his friend. I brace myself for a detailed description of Scotch’s sexual prowess. And then a troubling thought occurs to me. There’s no way for me to verify whether Scotch is telling the truth. If he says he had sex with Samantha, it could be true or it could be a lie. If it is true, having sex with a practically unconscious girl makes Scotch a date rapist. If it’s a lie, that just makes him scum.
Before I can think about what I’ll do if Scotch does say he hooked up with Samantha, he throws a curveball.
“Oh, man. Last night was so freaky. So Samantha and I were driving out in the country, looking for a quiet place to have some privacy if you know what I mean . . . and who do you think we came across, just walking along the side of the road?”
Oh shit. Hold everything.
“Who?” Randall asks, panting for some juicy gossip.
“Vee Bell.”
“Damn,” Randall says. “She is hot. Especially since she dyed her hair back and doesn’t look like such a freak anymore. Tell me, did you get some of that?”
Scotch stops running for a second. “Do you even need to ask? Vee’s had the hots for me since freshman year. I went out with her last year, but then I had to cut her off when she went through that weird goth phase. But she was begging for it last night.”
Scotch stops speaking and starts grinding his teeth together. Without my realizing it, the rage brewing inside me has taken over. “Asshole,” I mutter.
Randall looks confused. “Uh, did you just call me an asshole?”
“Misogynistic douche bag.” I can’t help it. The words just fly out of Scotch’s mouth.
“Wait. Miss-oh-ginous . . . what?” Randall scratches his head.
“You want to know what really happened last night?” I ask. Since we’ve stopped running, more and more people are slowing down to listen to our conversation. The gym teacher has disappeared into his office.
Randall looks seriously freaked out now. “Um. Okay?”
I take a deep breath. “Last night, I dropped Samantha off so I could go home and watch some Golden Girls. That Betty White gets me hot, if you know what I mean.” I wink at Randall twice, and he turns bright red.
A couple of girls start to laugh.
“What did he just say?” asks a guy with a fauxhawk.
“I think he just said he whacks it to Golden Girls,” a girl in a pink Juicy Couture sweatshirt answers helpfully.
Considering my job done, I slide back into my own body. I lift my head from the desk and realize I’ve drooled a little bit on the copy of Sports Illustrated. I wipe the corner of my mouth with my sleeve. The librarian didn’t even notice me appear to fall asleep.
(#ulink_c766558c-10db-5c42-ad99-08c6a699d1f3)
fter school, Rollins waits for me in his car. He’s got his radio turned up and is beating his hands on the steering wheel, but the minute I open the passenger door, he shuts off the music.
“So I heard an interesting rumor today,” he says, crossing his arms. “I thought you might know a little something about it.”
“Oh yeah?” I ask innocently, arranging my backpack on the floor.
“Evidently Scotch Becker announced his fondness for Betty White today in gym class?”
I’m unable to suppress a smirk. The rumor had spread like wildfire, and almost everyone was talking about it by lunchtime. I overheard Scotch in the hallway, bewildered, trying to explain to his football buddies that it was all a joke. I almost felt sorry for him. Almost.
“Not that I’m Scotch’s biggest fan, but why would you do that to him?” Rollins asks, sounding genuinely flabbergasted. “Yeah, the guy’s an ass, but you don’t need to be messing with his head.”
It occurs to me that, in the confusion of last night, I never did tell Rollins about running into Scotch or how Samantha was wasted in the back of his car. Quickly, I fill him in, explaining how distraught Samantha seemed in English this morning and how I slid into Scotch to find out what really happened between the two of them. When I get to the part about Scotch claiming that I came onto him last night, Rollins holds up his hand for me to stop. He looks like he’s going to puke.
“Okay, okay, I get the picture. I guess it served him right. Do you really think he took advantage of Samantha?”
I shrug. “There’s no way to know. Scotch is a lying sack of shit, and Sam doesn’t trust me enough to tell the truth. I hope he’s all talk. For her sake.”
Rollins shakes his head. “If I ever hear him talking about you that way . . .”
“Hey,” I say softly, reaching out to grab his arm. “I can take care of myself.”
Rollins stares at me for a moment and then nods, starting the car.
“So. Friday Night Fright?” I ask, mentally thumbing through my DVDs, wondering which horror flick we should watch.
“Uh, yeah. I have some things to do first, though,” Rollins says vaguely.
“Oh,” I say. “Okay.”
It’s not unusual for Rollins to have to run home and give his mother supper and get her ready for bed before he comes over, but he’s usually pretty up-front about it—at least, he has been since I learned about his mother’s condition. However, something about the way he’s avoiding my gaze makes me feel like he’s trying to hide something.
We don’t say anything more until he pulls into my driveway. I grab my backpack, trying to think of something lighthearted to say to ease the awkwardness between us. “I, um, guess I’ll see you later.”
“Later.” He barely waits for me to close the door before he’s backing out into the street—a definite contrast to the way he usually waits for me to get inside before he leaves. As I watch him disappear around the corner, I feel a bit queasy. If he’s not going home, where is he going?
Some part of me wonders if, wherever he’s going, Anna will be there.
Onscreen, Jason Voorhees chases some poor girl through the woods. Mattie and her friend Regina are sprawled on the floor, devouring a bowl of popcorn.
Mattie started hanging out with Regina a lot after Sophie and Amber died. She’s a sweet girl, but she kind of reminds me of Eeyore. Her older brother, Todd, was killed in a boating accident a few years ago, and she brings him up all the time. One minute she’ll be talking about how hot the new band teacher is, and the next she’ll be in tears because she remembers how her brother used to play the clarinet in elementary school. It’s exhausting to spend time with her, but I think she gets Mattie in a way that few other people do.
Rollins sits inches away from me on the couch. Almost everything about him is familiar—the scent of leather that lingers on him long after he takes off his jacket, the way his lip ring shines in the light from the television, the warmth that emanates off his body in our otherwise chilly living room.
But there’s something about him that’s changed. There’s a tension in his shoulders, as if he isn’t completely comfortable sitting this close to me. I wonder if it’s because he’s thinking about Anna.
God, these thoughts are torturous. And I feel ridiculous, getting so worked up over practically nothing. So he has a new, hot friend. So he might have gone to see her tonight before he came over here. Why is it any of my business? Why did it take Rollins possibly being interested in someone else before I came to my senses and realized what a freaking amazing guy he is?
A loud noise causes Mattie and Regina to shriek. In the movie, Jason has jumped out at the girl, his knife blade flashing. I take the opportunity to pretend to be startled and move a bit closer to Rollins, setting my hand next to his until our pinkies meet. Almost imperceptibly, he moves an inch away from me, so we’re not touching. Did he mean to do that? Can’t he stand to be close to me anymore?
I look around the room, searching for some way to get Mattie and Regina to leave us alone. My eyes fall on the popcorn bowl on the floor, nearly empty. I grab the remote control and hit the Pause button.
“Hey, Mattie. Way to eat all the popcorn. Rollins and I didn’t get any.”
Mattie glances at the bowl and then looks up guiltily. “Oops. Sorry.”
“Maybe you and Regina could go make some more?” I raise my eyebrows and tilt my head slightly toward the kitchen, hoping to convey that this is an order, not a request.
Mattie looks at me and then Rollins, and she smiles. “Oh, sure. Come on, Regina.” Mattie scoops up the popcorn bowl.
“Hey, do you have any of that flavored powder to sprinkle on top?” Regina asks, following Mattie. “Todd used to love that stuff. He could go through a whole bottle in two days.”
With the two gone, I turn toward Rollins. “I was hoping we’d get a moment alone to talk,” I say, my heart banging so hard I’m afraid he might hear it.
I know what I have to do now. Somehow, I have to find the words to tell Rollins how I feel, before this thing with Anna gets going. Otherwise, I might lose him forever.
Rollins looks down at his hands. “About what?”
“About us,” I say, my voice small.
Finally, he looks up. “What do you mean?”
Jesus, this is hard. So hard that I’m tempted to just let it go, leave things the way they are. I mean, we’re best friends. Do I really want to mess that up? What if I confess my feelings for him, and Rollins denies them? What if we never speak again?
After a long moment of racking my brain for the perfect turn of phrase, I decide maybe words are overrated. I squeeze my eyes shut tight and lean forward, my lips in a loose pout.
Nothing happens.
I open one eye. Rollins is staring at me like I’ve grown another head.
“What are you doing, Vee?”
Heat rushes into my cheeks. I pull back and try to act nonchalant. “Nothing. It’s nothing. Don’t worry about it.”
His eyebrows knit together in concern. “Are you sure?”
“Yeah. I just—I don’t know what I was thinking.”
A buzzing noise interrupts the moment.
Rollins pulls his cell out of his pocket. It’s clear that someone has called him, but he turns away slightly so I can’t see who’s on the other line. After a moment, he stuffs the phone back into his pocket.
“You know,” he says, rising. “It’s late. I should go.”
“Sure,” I say, standing to walk him to the door. “No problem.”
“Hey, you don’t need to get up. Sit down. Enjoy the movie.”
“Oh, yeah.”
Rollins grabs his jacket from the back of the couch and pulls it on. “I’ll call you later.”
“Okay,” I say, mumbling. I hope it’s dark enough that he can’t see the tears welling up in my eyes. I’d like to think, if he did see them, he would stop. But he doesn’t.
A few seconds later, I hear the door open and close.
I’ve locked myself in the downstairs bathroom while Mattie and Regina finish watching the movie. Pathetic. Here I am, weeping on the toilet like some stupid girl who’s just had her heart broken. And the worst part is I should know better by now. Things like relationships just don’t go well for me. I should just accept it and move on. And become a nun or something.
The thought of me in a habit, dancing around a mountaintop and singing or some crap, makes me smile. I hold on to the image as I blow my nose.
The doorbell rings.
He’s back.
He’s changed his mind and has come back.
I peek in the bathroom mirror and make sure my face isn’t too blotchy. Then I hurry out into the foyer. The light is on outside, but through the sheer curtain, I can barely make out the figure standing there.
I throw the door open, ready to tell Rollins what an idiot I was being and that we should just stay best friends and that’s totally cool with me.
But it’s not Rollins standing on my front porch.
It’s my dead mother.
(#ulink_87703f8e-33bc-5a82-af5d-1cf4d4679a3b)
don’t say anything. I can’t say anything. I feel my jaw drop open, but I can’t force my lips to move or exhale the breath required to make a sound.
Logically, I know this can’t be my mother. I was there the day she died. I attended her funeral, dropped a single white rose onto her coffin as it was lowered into the ground. It’s as though my eyes are betraying me. She’s just as I remember her—long blond hair, now wet from the rain that started up soon after Rollins took off. Her eyes are bright blue, just like mine. Only her clothes are different. Instead of the ripped jeans and band T-shirts my mother wore when I was little, this woman is wearing khakis and a button-down blouse under a peacoat. She is completely soaked. Mascara trails down her cheeks, but I can’t tell if it’s from the weather or if she’s been crying.
After a moment, I realize this must be my mother’s sister, Lydia. She’s the aunt I never met. My father explained she moved to California a long while ago and lost touch with the family.
“You must be Sylvia,” the woman says. “You look just like your mother.”
I clear my throat. “So do you.”
“Who’s here?” My father’s voice emerges behind me.
“Hello, Jared,” Lydia says, almost businesslike. “It’s been a long time.”
I turn to examine my father’s face. He looks like he’s in shock, just as I was a moment ago. He’s probably struggling with the very same emotions that flooded me—longing for his wife, who passed away years ago, confusion that someone who looks so much like her could just show up on our doorstep, unannounced. He opens his mouth and then closes it again, like he’s not sure what to say. I reach out and touch his arm.
“I’m sorry to just show up like this.” The woman gestures to the yellow Toyota parked in the driveway. “I can leave if you like.”
“No,” my father says quickly. “No, don’t go. I’m sorry. I just . . . wasn’t prepared. Come on in. It’s raining buckets outside. Don’t you have an umbrella?”
I notice a small suitcase on the porch beside Lydia. She stoops down to grab the handle and then walks through the door that my father is holding open for her. I take a step back. It’s so strange to see my aunt here, in my house. She honestly looks like my mother’s ghost.
“I didn’t bring an umbrella,” Lydia explains, pulling off her soggy coat. “It was kind of a spur-of-the-moment-type thing.”
My father takes the coat from her and hangs it on the coat-tree. “You must be freezing. Would you like some coffee?”
