“Hello!” Jessica said with a big smile, revealing tiny teeth that reminded Brooke of white Tic Tacs. “You must be Brooke. We’re so happy you’re here. Lily can’t wait to meet you.”
Brooke dropped her eyes to the floor and didn’t respond. Gina could make her live here, but she couldn’t make her talk. She looked around the living room as Jessica and Gina excused themselves to the kitchen. The walls were painted a pale blue, and the trim was white. All the furniture looked as though it had been taken from a magazine and plopped down in just the right place—a couch the color of peaches, two navy-blue armchairs, and a wrought-iron coffee table with a glass top. There was a tan brick fireplace and pictures on its mantel—Brooke took a few steps over to them and peered at the couple, Jessica in her mermaid-style white dress with huge, puffy sleeves and her husband looking movie-star handsome in a tuxedo with his hair feathered perfectly on each side of his head. He was blond, too, his hair cut shorter on the sides and left longer in the back, almost to his shoulders. He had a strong jaw and bright green eyes. There were pictures of a girl with blond hair, whom Brooke assumed was their daughter, Lily. She looked mostly like her mother, with the exception of having her father’s large teeth, which, with her oval face, Brooke thought made her look a bit like a horse.
Brooke smoothed her hand over her unruly black curls and looked at the pictures again. However much she hated the idea of living with this family instead of her mother, she caught herself wishing that she looked more like them—that people might easily mistake her for a member of their family. It was a game she played, spotting physical traits she shared with other people, wondering if she could pass as one of their relatives. Everyone commented on her violet-blue irises, a color she had yet to see in another person’s eyes. “Your mom had them,” Gina had once told Brooke, thinking, Brooke was sure, that this piece of information might make her feel better, when in fact it only made her feel worse.
Gina soon left, and Jessica showed Brooke the rest of the house. There were two bedrooms, one at the front of the house, where Jessica and Scott slept, and the other, down the hall, which Brooke had to share with Lily, Jessica and Scott’s nine-year-old daughter. When Brooke met Lily later that afternoon, the older girl announced that since it was her house, first, she was in charge of their room. At this, Brooke rolled her eyes, but at the time, kept her mouth shut.
Over the next several weeks, as she tried to get used to another new school and living in a house with three strangers, Brooke stayed on her best behavior, which wasn’t the easiest thing to do with Lily around. The older girl talked incessantly, and it drove Brooke crazy.
“I love my teacher,” Lily said. “She has the nicest smile and always gives me the papers to hand out to the rest of the class. Mrs. Pearson wasn’t like that last year. She was cranky all the time. We used to laugh at the stupid glasses she wore, but then I felt bad about it and told the other kids they should stop, which Mom said I was brave to do and I think she was right. Do you think that was brave?”
“I think you should shut up,” Brooke said, sounding as nasty as she could. She was already sick of the sound of Lily’s yammering. And then, she couldn’t help it, Brooke threw her math book at Lily’s head. Lily ran to her mother and tattled, of course, and as punishment, Jessica told Brooke that she had to stay alone in her room for the rest of the night, missing out on the pizza they were going to order and the video they had rented—Mr. Mom.
“You can eat in here and think about what you’ve done,” Jessica said. She brought a sandwich and a glass of milk, then left again, closing the door behind her. Brooke pulled the sandwich apart and smeared mayonnaise, turkey, and cheddar cheese across the cheery yellow paint on the wall. I hate you, she thought as she poured the milk on Lily’s pillow.
A while later, Scott came to check on her. When he discovered what she had done, his eyes darkened as he took a couple of steps over to where she lay on her bed, her arms crossed over her chest. “Get up,” he growled.
Brooke glared at him, her chin raised, but didn’t move.
“Fine,” he said. He grabbed her, lifted her up, and managed, despite how she flailed against him, to sit and then lay her facedown, over the tops of his thighs.