I dig into the remains of the omelet so he won’t suspect anything’s wrong. He grins and I am momentarily dazzled, which feels 50 percent like fire in my chest and 50 percent like cold panic. I look away and shove a big, cheesy bite in my mouth. I don’t have the time or the heart to be dazzled.
It’s late when we pull into the Prices’ circular driveway. Chad parks his Jeep in their three-car garage, packed to the rafters with grown-up toys like mountain bikes and ski poles and kayaks and golf clubs. Jessa’s family is big on expensive outdoor sports; they’ve even got a medium-size boat docked in Buzzards Bay to the east, which is why big, shiny fishing poles hang on a rack by Dr. Van Tassel’s convertible.
Our (considerably smaller) garage is stacked with Tupperware bins of my baby clothes and stuffed animals, blurry photos of a youthful Ma Ma and Grandpa Scott, Halloween decorations we haven’t untangled in a decade. Old and mostly useless things Dad never looks at but couldn’t bring himself to get rid of when Lindy moved in and we needed the space, so now it’s out there, exiled but preserved. No pictures or sweaters or fishing poles from Sidonie Faye, though. Believe me, I’ve checked.
“You sure you don’t want to stop by your place and grab your stuff real quick?” Jessa asks once Chad’s out of the car.
“Very sure.” There is no chance of a “real quick” stop. I left a voice mail on Lindy’s cell a little while ago, when I knew her precise bedtime schedule had placed her in the shower. Easier to stay away and stay mad about our ill-fated road trip if I don’t have to hear my stepmother’s voice.
We let ourselves in through the garage door that leads into the big metallic kitchen. The lights are off; Dr. Van Tassel’s shift won’t end till eleven and Mr. Price is in bed already, still adjusting to US time after his business trip. Jessa stops to grab us Cokes out of the fridge while I wave off Chad, who heads down to his basement. We make our way to Jessa’s room on the second floor, every part of it familiar. Her pastel peach walls are plastered with photos of the Prices’ vacations—the whole shimmering blond family glowing and sunburned on a cruise to the Bahamas; kid-Jessa and Chad sword-fighting with baguettes in front of the Eiffel Tower; her parents canoodling in a gondola in the narrow green waterways of Rome. Jessa reserves her vanity mirror for pictures of her and Jeremy. Her shelves are stocked with souvenir snow globes and tiny dolls and little statues Mr. Price brings home from trips. Her shirts and dresses and skinny pants have overflowed the closet and crept into the corners of her room, draped over an armchair patterned in bright red lips, flung into her satin laundry hamper, balled up on the white writing desk.
I could describe it as easily as my own bedroom after all these countless nights when we were supposedly hanging out, though mostly we were coexisting: Jessa doodling in notebooks or lip-synching to Taylor Swift, and me reading or daydreaming about how Chad’s and my future wedding table numbers would be printed on pages copied from old medical textbooks. It was a solemn and sacred pastime, always.
While Jessa unzips her coat and boots, I dig through her pajama drawer. Pushing aside the Victoria’s Secret stuff—why would anyone want so many pairs of sweatpants with PINK stamped on the butt? That’s the real secret—I settle on a pair of striped drawstring pants and a tank top with cupcakes hugging on the chest.
“So,” Jessa says, and claps. “Let’s do this.”
“Can I—can I wash up first?” I ask.
She shrugs. “You know where everything is.”
I pad down the hall and into Jessa’s bathroom, where I grab a new toothbrush out of a basket under the sink and wash my face with her twilight-roses cleanser, then take my time dabbing on her midnight-violets toner. I brush out my ponytail and loop my hair into a loose bedtime braid, patiently smoothing out the bumps. When I’ve run out of grooming tools I know how to use—though lilac under-eye butter and cashmere-infused hair lotion sound intriguing—I lean over and grip the sides of the sink, the porcelain slick and cool on my shaky, sweaty palms.