“Lex. Seriously. You do not want to do that.”
My voice must be scary, because Alexa promptly shuts her mouth. She buries herself in her phone for the rest of the ride to her house; Rach has to turn the radio up, the silence is so awkward.
When we drop Alexa off at her house, Rachel looks at me head-on. “I’m worried about you.”
“Don’t be,” I say. “Things are just messed up with my family right now. They always are at this time of year.”
Rachel puts the car in reverse and inches out of Alexa’s driveway. When we’re on the main road again, she eyes me. “Why can’t you talk to me about it? Bethany was my cousin. I understand.”
I look away from her so she can’t see my face flush with annoyance. She can’t possibly understand. Jen was my sister, and her death will never compare with Rachel losing a cousin she didn’t even like.
“I don’t talk to anyone about it,” I say. “It’s nothing personal.”
After a beat, Rach speaks, her voice frosty. “Do you talk to Ginny Cordero about it?”
I close my eyes and tilt my head back. “Rach, don’t do this.”
She doesn’t have much else to say to me until she pulls into my driveway and I get out of the car. “I got the triple today,” she says. “In case you were wondering.”
* * *
—
I don’t want my mother to figure out that barring me from going to Spirit Night is the best gift she could have given me this week, so I make sure to be quiet and sulky during dinner.
As I’m clearing the table of pizza grease–stained paper plates, I force myself to look at my mom. “Can I go to the Newton versus Shrewsbury football game tomorrow?”
She blinks, as if she can’t grasp how I could possibly have the balls to ask her that. “You’re still grounded.”
Tom’s head snaps up from the garlic knot he’d been polishing off. “Grounded? Why?”
Mom doesn’t look at him as she collects balled-up dirty napkins from the table. “She got detention.”
“Seriously?” Tom looks at me.
“For the stupidest reason,” I say. “I’m really sorry. I’ll come straight home after the game.”
My mother inhales sharply as Tom sits back in his chair. “Why do you want to see Newton versus Shrewsbury anyway?”
“My friend Ginny’s cousin is playing,” I say. “He’s Newton’s running back.”
Tom is incapable of saying no to football. He raises his eyebrows at Mom. Her lips form a line, and I can tell she’s feeling guilty about making me miss Spirit Night when she can’t stand Mrs. Coughlin either.
“Fine,” she says. “Straight home, though.”
When her back is turned, Tom gives me a triumphant smile. For some reason, it makes my stomach turn over.
I wake up early in the morning. I went to bed at ten, for lack of anything better to do, and the sunrise leaking in through my blinds has me flopping between positions, unable to fall back asleep.
Mrs. Cordero doesn’t have to work until tonight, so Ginny can borrow her car to drive us to the game. I shower and blow-dry my hair, and when Petey wakes up at eight, I even sit at the kitchen island with him as he eats breakfast, listening to his plans for the model Vietnam Veterans Memorial he’s designing for his social studies class.
The game doesn’t start until two, and the school is only twenty minutes away, but Ginny picks me up at one. Newton High School East’s team is ranked first in the county. Their games sell out quickly, and we want to make sure we find a parking spot.
Newton East’s campus is a lot bigger than Sunnybrook’s, and even though the game doesn’t start for another half hour, Ginny has to fight for a parking spot several hundred yards from the field.
The spot is a tight squeeze; I climb out of the car to help direct Ginny into it. When she gets out of the car, she’s put on a knit cap with earflaps. “Ready?”
I nod, and we fall into step with a crowd of people heading for the field. A group of tailgaters gathered around a charcoal grill starts to boo. I tense up, worried they’ve somehow recognized Ginny and me. Then I see the real object of their scorn—a pack of high school kids behind me, wearing green and white. Shrewsbury’s colors.
Ginny protests when I pay the fourteen-dollar admission fee for the two of us.
“Stop,” I say. “It’s the least I can do.”
“I’m seriously not mad about detention.” She thrusts her hands into the front pocket of her hoodie as we pick our way up the bleachers in search of a free spot. We settle into a row three-quarters of the way up the first level. As soon as we sit down, Ginny produces a steel thermos from her bag and hands it to me. “Hot chocolate.”
The thought of hot chocolate, and Ginny pouring two packets into the thermos, warms me before I even take a sip. I peel off my gloves so I can unscrew the top of the thermos. The last time I was here was for a NHSE vs. Sunnybrook game freshman year, with Rachel and Alexa and Matt. One of Matt’s friends had smuggled in a flask of rum, which we mixed with hot apple cider from the concession stand. It was only the first weekend of November, but the forecast said there was a chance of snow flurries. Under the blanket we brought, Matt traced a finger up the inside of my thigh and I shivered, thinking, If I weren’t me, I would kill to be me.
“Are you okay?” Ginny asks.
“I’m good,” I say, and in spite of everything, I mean it.
“Look.” Ginny points across the field, where a bunch of girls in navy-and-white skirts are huddled. Someone shouts, and they break apart, staggering into groups of three. Ginny and I watch them bend, pop the fliers up into formation. The fliers pull their legs up into scorpion positions. They hold them while someone shouts a count to three before the bases drop them back down. The girls march into a pyramid formation.
The counter—a slender and tall black woman—is off to the side, admiring the pyramid as if it were a piece of art. Her hair is in a high bun, and she’s wearing a navy-and-white warm-up jacket to match the girls’ uniforms.
“That’s Patrice,” I say.
I keep my eyes on her through the anthem, the home team’s ceremonial entrance set to an AC/DC song, and through kickoff.
“Have you figured out what you’re going to say to her?” Ginny asks.
Shrewsbury picks up a first down, and the crowd boos. Below us, at the bottom of the bleachers, a line of cheerleaders in green and white attempts to lead our side of the stadium in a cheer, waving their pom-poms.
“Not exactly,” I say. “But Patrice isn’t Facebook friends with Carly. I’m not that worried about it getting back to her.”
At halftime, the score is 21 to 14, Shrewsbury. The field clears so the NHSE cheerleaders can perform their routine; a techno remix of this summer’s most played-out pop song blares from the speakers. The girls are out of sync in a way that would make Coach claw her eyes out, but the crowd goes wild for their tumbling passes.
Shrewsbury winds up winning 34 to 27. Ginny and I stay seated while the bleachers around us clear out. I say a silent prayer that no one from Shrewsbury gets the shit kicked out of them on the way back to the parking lot.
Down on the field, Patrice is giving the cheerleaders a pep talk. They raise their pom-poms in a cheer of solidarity before breaking apart and heading through the locker room entrance below the box. Patrice hangs behind, collecting pom-poms.
“Let’s go,” I say.
Ginny is at my heels as we hurry down the bleachers. Patrice looks up. Looks through us and goes back to packing up the pom-poms.
“Patrice?” I say.
Her back tenses as she takes Ginny and me in. “Yeah?”
“Do you have a minute?”
Patrice studies my face. “Where do I know you from?”
“I’m Jennifer Rayburn’s sister.”
Patrice’s onyx eyes soften. “Monica, right?”
I nod. “This is Ginny. We’re both on the dance team.”
Patrice’s mouth tightens in a polite smile. “I’m glad you came and said hi.” No doubt wondering what the hell this is all about.