Nessa was humbled by this. She nodded.
“When I was in high school,” she said, “I had an affair with my dad’s best friend.”
“That’s awful,” Nessa said.
“I know,” Isabeau said. “I’ve never been able to forgive myself for it.”
Nessa was horrified at that misinterpretation of her comment. “Not awful of you. Awful for you. You were a kid. It’s the guy who should be shot. It’s called statutory rape.”
“His name was Dusty Matthiasen. I wrote about him in my diary, and looking back, I really think I wanted my mom to find it and read it. I think I wanted her to stop it. I so wish she would have.”
“I had just the opposite problem,” Nessa said.
“What do you mean?”
“My mom snooped through everything of mine, from the time I was little. No privacy at all. But really, that wasn’t the worst of it. It was the reason she did it.”
“What do you mean?” Isabeau said again.
Nessa thought for a moment. She’d never actually put this into words, and it was a revelation. “I wrote about everything in my diary—-sex, drugs, shoplifting—-all kinds of stuff. But that wasn’t what bothered her. No. She wasn’t snooping to find out what I was up to. She was snooping to see what I was saying about her. What I thought about her.”
“That is bizarre.”
“Isn’t it?”
“I even wrote about a suicide attempt,” Nessa said. “Another thing Marlon and I have in common.”
“Marlon tried to commit suicide? I thought he loved himself too much!”
Nessa covered her mouth with her hand. Oh, this was bad. She had just broken the cardinal twelve--step rule. What’s said in confidence stays in confidence, and she’d just tossed out this information as if she were disclosing his favorite ice cream flavor.
“Oh, shit,” she said. “I assumed you knew. I don’t know why I assumed that. I’m sorry I dumped that on you.”
Isabeau made a locking motion in front of her mouth and pantomimed throwing away the key. “I’d never hurt him. He’s been such a great mentor to me.”
“Me too,” Nessa said.
A low moan sounded, making her jump. “What was that?” Her heart was racing again. She realized it was the wind outside.
Isabeau looked up at the ceiling. “Ghosts,” she said, raising her eyebrows up and down.
“Or is it skeletons in the closet?” Nessa said.
The wind suddenly whipped up and lightning flashed outside the windows. “Storm’s a--comin’,” Isabeau said as the thunder boomed. “Supposed to get, like, two inches of rain and heavy winds.” She stretched. “So how did you and Marlon meet?”
“Through AA, of course,” Nessa said.
Isabeau grimaced.
“You didn’t know that either,” Nessa said.
Isabeau shook her head.
“Oh, shit. I have such a big mouth.”
And this was why she shouldn’t have friends—-getting close to -people produced pain. But then again, she’d experienced pain in her loneliness. Sitting here with Isabeau, sharing stories, the pain of the last few weeks seemed to lessen a little.
“No, you don’t,” Isabeau said. “This is the most I’ve ever heard out of you.” They sat in silence for a moment. “So how does a girl get hooked on heroin anyway?”
“It’s a long story.”
“I’m not going anywhere.”
Nessa looked at her. This is what friends do. So she told Isabeau all about it.
“So you thought you were doing coke,” Isabeau said.
“Yeah,” Nessa said. “And H was so great, I just had to turn my best friend on to it too.” She gestured to her constellation tattoo and said, “Obviously we started shooting it. Stupid. Really stupid. And yes. I started turning tricks to support my habit.”
The judgment, the disengagement, the revulsion she feared seeing on Isabeau’s face failed to materialize. The tightness in Nessa’s chest loosened further.
Isabeau leaned her head back against the couch and gave Nessa a sorrowful smile. “I’m sorry you had to go through all that.”
“I’m sorry your dad’s best friend was a rapey douchebag.”
“I’m sorry your best friend died. That’s never happened to me. I can’t even imagine.”
She probably couldn’t imagine causing a friend’s death either.
Chapter Twenty--One
Sunday, June 26
THE NEXT MORNING, Nessa called Lauren’s husband, Mac. They’d only spoken in person before, when she’d drop Daltrey off to play with Tosh and Ziggy, so he sounded surprised to hear from her.
“I wonder if you can track some IP addresses for me.” She resisted offering to pay for his time. “I have a very persistent troll on my blog who’s made some nasty comments.”
“Some reason you think the guy’s local?”
“Possibly,” she said. “So you can trace an IP address? Find out where it originates?”
“Sure,” he said. “And it’s not even illegal. Why don’t you email me a list of the IPs and I should be able to pinpoint the basic location within a mile or so, unless he’s using proxies.”
“Thank you, Mac,” Nessa said.
He gave her his email address and said he’d get back to her as soon as he could. She hung up and emailed him Isabeau’s spreadsheet of IP addresses.