Nikki looked hopeful, but not only that. She looked satisfied. That’s not why I said no.
We couldn’t stop, not yet. Because Lacey was too eager; because there were still secrets. Because if I let it be over, I would never know what was true.
Secrets were a claim, and as long as they shared one, they owned each other. I needed Lacey to be only mine. We would stay in this boxcar until everything was said. For Lacey’s own good, whether she knew it or not.
“Not yet,” I said. The air hissed out of both of them. “One more confession.”
“You need a break,” Lacey said. “Let’s go sit in the car for a while, listen to some music.”
“That’s right, Saint Kurt will solve all your problems,” Nikki said. “And if that doesn’t work, you can always knock her out and leave her in the woods to rot.”
“Shut up!” Lacey screamed.
I didn’t like her losing control. Nikki shouldn’t have been able to make her do that. Nikki could have no power over Lacey. I couldn’t allow it.
“We should stay here,” I said. “We should listen.”
Nikki laughed.
“We promised,” Lacey hissed, and the we was them, not us. “You promised.”
“And you tied me to a fucking chair and tried to drown me,” Nikki said. “Pretty sure that means all promises are void. Let her hear what you did.”
“What we did. You always forget that part.”
“I’m done with that. This sad story of how we’re both to blame. Fuck that.”
“Enough,” I said.
“I’m sorry, Hannah, I tried to spare you from finding out that your friend here is a sociopath, but you wouldn’t let me. So now you get to hear the whole truth.”
“I’ll kill you,” Lacey said, like a growl. “I actually will.”
“Right, because you’re so scared that Hannah will find out what you’re capable of that you’d kill me right in front of her? That’ll convince her you’re a good person. Foolproof plan.”
Then they were shouting at each other, about who was a monster and who was to blame, and they didn’t hear me tell them stop; they didn’t see me at all. I thought maybe I was the ghost. Maybe I wasn’t there, never had been.
“Tell me the story,” I said finally, and these were the words that summoned silence. “Tell me everything.”
“Smartest thing you’ve ever said, Hannah. See, Lacey and I use to come out here—”
“No,” Lacey was quiet. “I’ll tell.”
There was no more yelling. I felt it again, what Nikki had once told me, that this was a sacred place, haunted by all the ruined futures of the past.
“So you can lie to her? Again?”
I didn’t see Lacey’s hand move, only the silver blur of the knife. Then there was blood, just a dab of it, on Nikki’s collarbone, and a tiny yelp of pain.
“I’ll tell,” Lacey said, quieter still. “The truth this time, Dex. All of it.”
I was not afraid of Lacey.
I would not allow myself to be afraid of Lacey.
She would tell her story, prove her faith in me. I would repay her by finding a way to believe. “Tell me, Lacey. Everything.”
“Go ahead then, tell her,” Nikki allowed, magnanimous in victory. “Tell her the story of us.”
LACEY
1991
NIKKI DIDN’T JUST WANT TO watch; she wanted to conduct. I tried to teach her chaos, but she understood only control. So it had been from the beginning: Nikki leaning against a tree, head cocked, eyes narrowed, ordering us from one position into another, telling Craig to lick my neck or turn me over and drive my face into the ground. It made three more manageable: two bodies and one will.
Craig didn’t want to do it, not at first. That’s something else to remember. He could never say no to Nikki.
“On your knees, bitch,” she said to him, and he dropped.
He should see what it was like, she said. She should get to watch him seeing it.
She hated him, if you want to know what I think.
What I think is, she wanted to take that gun and shove it up his ass and pull the trigger. His punishment for the person she was when they were together, the act she put on that required a Craig by her side. But Nikki Drummond doesn’t get her hands dirty.
I held the gun. I held it where a dick would be.
“Not gonna happen,” he said, even though he was already on his knees. “That’s totally gay.”
“It’s a gun, not a dick,” Nikki said. “How is that gay?”
He grunted.
“You know what’s gay, Craig? Two naked girls writhing around together. Panting. Sucking. Sweating. You don’t mind that, do you? You ever want to see that again?”
She knew so much, Dex, and yet somehow she hadn’t clued in that he really, really didn’t.
“You ever want me to touch your gun again? Or you want me to tell the whole school it’s got warts?”
“Like anyone would believe that.”
“Have you met me, sweetie? They believe anything I tell them.”
This, for them, was foreplay.