Once we figure out where the wings are, we’re ready. Her cue turns out to be scratchy theme music blasting from two giant speakers. Each line hops out onto the stage like they’ve been poked with cattle prods.
For the most part, we all remember what we’re supposed to do. Sounds silly, but it’s hard work, thumping up and down those big risers, remembering when to pivot, all the while being loomed over by the huge grandstand across the track. I’ve seen the crowd at the coronation before. Most of Hancock County comes, and then some. Those bleachers will be packed.
We take a fifteen-minute break at the one-hour mark, and Mrs. Hartwell steps away to make a call. She brought juice and doughnut holes, which I scarf down, glad to have something to take my mind off how freaked out I am. I didn’t sleep so great last night, either, my conversation with Kenyon running around in my head. Rhiannon. She really knew how to win people over. I think of all the time I wasted watching anime with her, trying to see what was so great about Kiki’s Delivery Service or Wolf Children. I never figured out how she did that, got you to bend your rules for her and then feel good about doing it because it made her so bouncy-happy. Wonder who picked her up that night. Where they took her, how they hurt her. If we’ll ever know.
“Now that’s a healthy option,” I hear Bella say quietly, but when I fix her with a death glare, she’s facing away from me, checking out the food with Alexis. “Because they definitely hand out a crown for most cellulite.”
Alexis giggles. “I know, right? Like I’m going to touch sugar.”
“I’ve got a fitting for my dress today. Three weeks of cardio better have me down to size four or I swear to God I’ll kill somebody.”
“You went with the peach?”
“Obviously. It’s my signature. People, like, expect it. Remember my Homecoming gown? Fitted bodice, lots of tulle?” Alexis mm-hmms like it haunts her dreams. “This is way hotter. That was so, like, classic? This one’s backless, slit up the side, spaghetti straps. Looks kind of amazing.”
Alexis oohs, and then they both stare narrow-eyed at Nell as she pours herself a cup of juice and picks out a chocolate-glazed doughnut hole, not paying them any mind. “Then there are the people who wouldn’t know style if it bit them in the ass.”
Bella smiles, tilting her head. “You mean the people who will be wearing a piece from the Salvation Army’s latest line to the coronation?”
They laugh. Nell looks up, aware of them for the first time, and I move in.
Bella’s wearing a sundress, and I close my fist around the neckline, twisting it. She takes a stumbling step backward in her platform sandals. “What’d you say?” She puts her chin up, but her eyes give her away. She’s scared of me. “Say it again.”
“Don’t touch me.” Bella’s gaze jumps around to the other girls who are watching.
“Now, that’s not very nice.” I’m so mad that I want to keep twisting, but considering where we are, I hold for a second more and let go, smoothing out the wrinkles before Mrs. Hartwell sees. I grab another doughnut hole and pop it into my mouth whole, then take Nell’s arm and lead her away from them.
Nell shakes free before the steps. “Why did you do that?”
“Huh?” I’m surprised to see tears in her eyes. “Forget it. They’re bitches. You should’ve heard—”
“It doesn’t matter, Darcy. I don’t want you doing stuff like that for me. I don’t need you to.”
Some part of me tightens like the last crank on a dial. My voice comes out low. “Bullshit you don’t.”
She looks at me, lips pressed together, like she’s thinking a hundred things she can’t say because I’ve made her swear on her life not to. She turns and runs up the steps, joining her group and shutting me out.
Great. Now she’s mad. Only because she doesn’t understand. She’s got no idea how much little things like that matter. Letting people dump on your family, letting people dump on you. How can anybody take the high road with crap like that raining down?
Watching Bella walk her prissy self up the risers brings back everything Shea said about me the other night. How I could dress up as pretty as I wanted, but I’d still be trash. Maybe what I did to Bella proves him right.
Shea made it sound like he was coming to the coronation, like he’d be sitting right out there in the audience, watching me. I have a feeling he took the festival booklet home with him after Gaudreau’s, too. Brought it home so he could keep twisting me in his hands.
Nell’s still mad at me when we get home. She goes back to the trailer with Libby. I pour some iced tea and wander out onto the porch, where Mags sits on the floor, dealing solitaire onto the wicker table.
“How was Princess training?” She looks up. “Can you turn into a pumpkin at the stroke of midnight? ’Cause I’d like to see that.”
“Jealous much?”
“Nope,” she says simply, and it irks me because she means it. Mags has never been jealous of anything I have. Must be nice to be so steady and levelheaded that nobody can get a rise out of you, no matter how hard they try.
“Anyway,” I say, “the coach turns into a pumpkin in ‘Cinderella,’ not her. That’d be dumb.” Mags shrugs, and I blow out a long breath, propping my feet on the railing. I must look exactly like Mom.
Scraping sounds come from overhead, and I hear paint flakes sprinkling down onto the porch roof. “How’s it going, Hunt?” I call.
The scraping stops. “Can’t complain.” Scrape, scrape. “Wouldn’t do me any good if I did.”
I nurse my tea, pulling on my lower lip, wishing something, anything, would happen to make me forget about being an awful person who wanted to beat up Bella Peront again because I could and it would be easy. Nobody’s better at making me feel like this than Nell.
Maybe I’ve got a fairy godmother after all, because awhile later I hear a dual exhaust bellowing in the distance, getting closer all the time. Jesse’s pickup blows past our house doing a good sixty miles per. He brakes hard down by the logging road and reverses onto the shoulder in front of our house.
There’s somebody sitting in the passenger seat beside him, but I can’t see who. Doesn’t stop me from running up to the open window.
Jesse grins, leaning forward to see around Mason. It’s like the weirdness after the quarry never happened. “Bored?”
“How’d you know?”
“Figured once you got out of Sunday school, you’d have some time on your hands.” I laugh. “We’re running over to Agway to pick up some stuff for my uncle. Wanna come?”
“Sure.” I know I should tell Mom, but instead I step back so Mason can climb out and let me slide onto the bench seat. I look back at the house, see Mags watching, wave bye. Hunt’s watching, too, turned partway around on his ladder as we drive off.
“Was that your dad?” Jesse says.
“No. My dad’s dead.”
“Oh. Sorry. I think I heard that somewhere.”
This is one story I don’t like to tell. I keep it short: “He worked on the crew that built the bridge. He fell.”
“Jesus, that was him?”