I nodded.
Dixie sat with me. We were both mesmerized, by how the needle left ink on my skin and by the high buzzing of the gun. It didn’t really hurt. Just enough for you to know something was happening to you. Elton worked fast—he was already moving on to the second star when I glanced at Dixie and saw tears in her eyes again.
“What?” I asked quietly.
“Nothing.”
When Elton finished mine, he cleaned everything up and wrapped my arm in plastic and told me how to take care of it. “You guys can take a walk around the block if you want while I clean everything and set up for you,” he said, nodding at Dixie.
We went out and I took the pack of Haciendas from my bag. “You want a smoke?” I asked Dixie. She shook her head and I realized I didn’t want one, either.
She wasn’t crying anymore but she didn’t seem herself. My arm felt bruised. “It kind of hurts now,” I said.
“Yeah, it’ll be like that for a few days.”
We walked down the street. It was dark by then except for streetlights, and colder than it had been the night before. Dixie wrapped her arms around herself, shivering. “Don’t you think Mom is probably worried for real now?” she asked. “Like, reporting us missing?”
“Maybe.”
“I don’t want her to worry. We should call just to say don’t worry. From Elton’s phone or something so she can’t get the number of yours.”
It was like she had a kind of amnesia. About how mad she’d been about Mom earlier, after their phone call. And how obvious it was our parents weren’t worried about us. Dad wanted the money, Mom wanted the money. Maybe they wanted us, too, but neither of them would want to have to explain the money to anyone like police.
“We’re probably going to be on the news tomorrow,” Dixie continued. “Our pictures will be around, so it will be harder to stay hidden. If we call her, maybe she won’t report it. If she hasn’t already, which she probably has.”
She waited for me to say something.
“Maybe.”
We’d walked around the whole block and were back to the tattoo place. Without speaking, Dixie went in and climbed onto the table and pulled her shirt up and the waist of her jeans down. She rested her head on her folded arms, with her face away from me.
Afterward we waited outside for Kip. I wanted Dixie to talk. About how she was feeling, or maybe to say that it meant something that we had matching tattoos now. All I got was the back of her head, then her annoyed face when she turned to ask, “Where the fuck is she?”
A minute later Kip’s car rolled up. “Hey,” Kip said.
Dixie yanked the door open and climbed into the backseat; I settled into the front, holding my backpack on my lap.
“You guys want to go to a party?” Kip asked.
“No,” I said.
“What kind of a party?” Dixie asked.
“A party.” Kip cranked up the windshield defrost and looked at Dixie in the rearview mirror.
“Not if it’s, like, five people sitting around smoking a bowl and talking about five other people that we don’t know.”
Kip turned around in her seat and stared at Dixie. “You like to have things your way, I noticed.”
Dixie stared back. “Doesn’t everybody?”
“It’s not going to be five people sitting around smoking a bowl. It should be pretty big. Everyone knows each other here. Music and snacks and probably whatever you want to drink.”
“I thought you said your school was all assholes,” Dixie said.
“I was in a mood. Anyway, even if they are, they’re the only people I know and I get bored. So.” Kip hit my thigh lightly with the back of her hand. “Do you want to?”
“We should get back to the motel,” I said. I touched my wrapped arm. It was tender. I was tired. I needed rest so I could leave in the night, if that’s what I decided to do.
“You can go back,” Dixie said. “I’m going to the party.”
Maybe it was an opportunity—I could ask Kip to drop me off, send Dixie to the party with her. But when Kip pulled the car out onto the road, she said, “I’m only taking you if Gem comes.”
“That’s bullshit.”
We drove a short way. It was one more thing we could do together. Then, then for sure, I could make a move. “Fine,” I said. “I’ll go.”
We went back in the direction of the motel for about fifteen minutes. Kip pointed. “That’s where I live. Down that street.”
It was dark and we went by it too fast to see, but I got an impression of arching trees and fenced-in front yards. It was the kind of street I wouldn’t mind living on someday. I only pictured myself, alone. Not with a husband and not with children, not even with a roommate. Just me. Quiet mornings and peaceful evenings and a fenced-in front yard.
Kip made a turn off the main road, and another turn, and slowed. “Parking is gonna suck.” She glanced at me. “If you have like five bucks, throw that in the vase or whatever when you go in. To help with the snacks and drinks.”
Dixie laughed. “Yeah, we have five bucks.”
When we finally parked and Kip got out, I turned to Dixie. “Don’t say anything to anyone about us or what we’re doing here. Just say we know Kip from . . . through our parents or something.”
“I’m not an idiot.”
I got out, and as I pulled my backpack onto my shoulder, it brushed against my tattoo. I winced.
Kip noticed. “You need some Advil or something?”
“If there is any.”
“So you’re supposed to know us through our parents or some shit,” Dixie said to Kip.
“Plausible. My parents know a lot of people.”
When we got in sight of the house where the party was, Dixie strode ahead of us straight for the front door, where some kids were crowding through and light shone out.
Kip turned to me. “What happened? You guys were kind of getting along for a minute in the tattoo place.”
“Yeah,” I said. “We were.”
23.
AS WE walked in, I caught a glimpse of myself in the entryway mirror and remembered I had on my new clothes and this is how people would see me. This is how Kip saw me. A little tough, a little badass. A girl that just got a tattoo. The truth, though, was it was my first party—the first one since cake-and-ice-cream parties from childhood.
A big pottery bowl in the hallway overflowed with dollar bills. I threw in a five.
“People usually put their coats and stuff in one of the bedrooms, if you want to keep your backpack in there.”
“That’s okay.” I craned to try to see where Dixie had gone, but she’d already disappeared into the house. I looked back at Kip to ask where a bathroom was. I could take one of the sockfulls of money and put it in my pocket.
She grabbed my arm and pulled me down the hall. “Come on. Let’s get a drink. Do you drink?”
“I . . . No.”