In Jesse’s truck, he leans over and kisses me deep, catching me off guard. As we pull out, I check Nell in the side-view mirror, but I can’t tell her from the porch shadows anymore.
Libby’s always saying how bad I am. God knows she’s not the only one. But when I see our good girl sitting out there in the dark, mourning some sick excuse for love, playing make-believe because she isn’t allowed the real thing, I think maybe I’ve got the better deal. I’ve got more freedom than Nell will ever know.
SEVENTEEN
SOMETHING’S DEFINITELY UP with Jesse. We were late to the movie, so we parked in the way back, and he’s been nice and everything, but underneath it all, he’s tense. I catch him checking out the other cars like he’s looking for somebody.
“Want popcorn? I’m buying.” It’s the only thing I can think to say to break the silence.
“I got it.” He stuffs a twenty in my hand before I can argue, then goes back to scoping out the tailgates in front of us.
I slam the door behind me. On the way, I stop to use the gross bathrooms around back of the snack shack and projector. I pause under the fly-specked bulb outside, looking for Kat’s pickup. It’s in its usual spot. Wonder if Kenyon’s over there, holding on to whatever secrets he didn’t want to share with me the other night. What would Rhiannon say if she knew he was still carrying a torch for her? I can hear that dry laugh of hers now, see her flick her greenish-hazel eyes up, like he’s just too, too pathetic, the way she did whenever we’d gossip about people. But I guess she thought she could trust him.
When I come out of the bathroom, Kat’s standing at the edge of the light. She wavers a little, like she might step back out of sight, then says, “What up, chiquita?”
“Not much.”
She’s wearing black shortalls with a skull-and-crossbones patch safety-pinned to the bib, a cami so thin it sags to show her breastbone. She sticks her hands in her pockets. “Here with the girls?”
“Not tonight.” I know better than to say who I came with.
Kat rakes her fingers through her hair sideways, making it rest funny. “Sorry about the other night. I was pretty freaked.”
“He’s your brother. I get it.”
She cuts her eyes at me, checking to see if I really do. She’s probably smoked half a bowl since sundown, but I guess she finds whatever it is she’s looking for, because relief flickers over her face. Then she slides back into her stoner thing like a favorite pair of sneakers: “Stop by the truck, if you want. Bet you could get Braden Mosier to drink Jaeger out of your belly button.”
“Come on. Gimme a challenge.” We smile a little. So maybe we’ll never be besties. What we’ve got is still worth having. I could let her go, but I’m not quite ready. “Hey . . . who do you think Rhiannon was waiting for that night?”
Kat shrugs. “Somebody she knew pretty well, I’m guessing. Rhiannon was smart. She wouldn’t meet-in-person with some creeper. Not saying she didn’t do a lot of random stuff that night, but . . .” Her gaze lingers on me.
I remember Kat’s expression that night when her phone hummed and she read the caller ID, holding it out to me. For you. I think. My stomach rolled. Michaud. I’d saved Kat’s number in Nell’s phone for emergencies only, life-or-death.
Darcy? Her keening voice, tear-choked and faraway. Please, please come get me. A gasp. I wanna go home. Then she started sobbing, hard.
Took forever, but I found out where she was—outside that convenience store Chase’s on Irish Lane in Hampden, a half-hour drive away—but I couldn’t get her to say how she got there, if she was hurt, nothing. I said, Call home, I don’t have a ride.
She cried. I can’t. I can’t tell. Mom can’t find out. Please, Darcy.
Ice went through me. You wait, I said. I’ll get there.
Kat was too drunk to drive me. She laughed and sprawled over in the scrub grass when I asked to borrow her truck. Lots of people did the same—Ha-ha, Darcy can’t drive, no way, she’ll put it in the ditch—and I was breathless and scared and about ready to call home when—
Rhiannon stepped up to me, for the first time in nearly a year. I’d almost forgotten how her face looked straight-on: heart-shaped, high cheekbones, her mouth fuller since she’d started outlining it with lip pencil. She held out her car keys in the firelight. When I didn’t move, stunned, wondering if maybe somebody’d roofied me, if this whole thing was a bad trip, she said, Just take them.
In spite of every mean, nasty thing I’d ever wished on her, how I hated her in the way you can only hate your best friend, I took them. Not thanking her, just running to the Fit. Because Nell needed me.
“Why’d she do it? Why’d she give me the keys?” I’m asking myself as much as Kat, a shaky edge to my voice.
Kat lets her gaze slide over the peeling siding, where people have been scribbling for-a-good-time-call graffiti since the 1970s. Half the girls on that wall are probably grandmothers now. I’m on there, fourth down from the left, written in blue ballpoint beside something filthy about a girl name Jennie. “I dunno. Maybe she heard karma’s a bitch.”
So maybe she knows. Maybe Rhiannon told her what really went down between us sophomore year; she’s the only one who could’ve. I take a few steps away, feeling stripped in front of Kat. I don’t know which feels worse, the lies or the truth. “Stay out of jail, lady.”
She watches me go, hugging one thin arm. “No promises.”
I buy more food at the snack counter than I really want and get back into the cab with Jesse, turning it all over in my mind. On-screen, all the people in this wicked uptight town called Peyton Place are having a picnic with three-legged races and pie-eating contests and stuff. I hold out a package of Twizzlers to Jesse. When he doesn’t take any, I bite into one, letting his gaze burn on me until I can’t stand it anymore.
When he kisses me tonight, it’s like he can’t get enough, or like he thinks he won’t get another chance. He presses me back against the door, and we slide down together; the popcorn spills into the darkness under the seat. His hands move up under my shirt, over my stomach and bra and around to the clasp, which I know he won’t be able to open because no guy ever can, so I help him.
I lie there for a couple seconds with my eyes closed before I realize that he’s pulled away. When I look, he’s facing the wheel again, shoving his hair back with one hand. I prop myself up on my elbow. “What now?”
“I shouldn’t—” He breaks off, shakes his head. “Not supposed to be doing this.”
“Why?”
He gives me a look, kind of unbelieving, then shakes his head again. “Tonight wasn’t gonna be like this. I told myself we were really gonna talk and . . .” He swears, looking out the window. “Then I did it again.”
“Did what? What’s the problem?”
“What do you think, Darcy?” When I throw my hands up, he says, “I feel like a piece of shit, hooking up with you. But you’re so—” He breaks off again. “Nobody knows about us. Well—Mason. But I didn’t tell anybody else what we been doing.”