“This house rocks,” Hannah said, giggling awkwardly.
“I’ll be back.” I scanned the crowd of sunburned faces and found Parker on a lounge chair playing a game on her phone, probably counting the minutes until college.
“Parker, slide over.” I crawled up next to her and sighed heavily.
“The juniors have moved in,” she said. “This is bullshit.”
Shawn’s back deck teemed with drunken ruffians (also Shay’s term): the assholes who made everyone loathe my class. In true clichéd form, the ruffians targeted the weak kids, the smart kids, the robotics kids, the loner kids, the theater kids, and anyone else they could get away with harassing.
“Filling the void with assholes,” Parker said.
I spotted Hannah and Chelsea side whispering near a potted tree. “I’m going for a walk,” I said.
I wove through the shot takers and pool poseurs to the beach path and made my way over to the hump of sand a few feet from the surf. I sat down, brought my knees up to my chest, and planted my chin on my stubbly kneecap. The party sounds blended with the waves under the sliver of a moon.
Loneliness set in like thunderclouds.
When I got home, I sent Shay a long-winded text about how I was better off removing myself from the Shawn Flynn party scene and how I really was looking forward to reading books on the porch. I wanted to downsize my social life and just hang out alone for once.
She responded with: Parker told me Shawn’s was a shit show. I don’t blame you.
To which I replied: Good. You can stop pimping me out to the gadflies. I’ve got my Flopper. He’s all I need.
TWO
ON DAY TWO of work, the family of tourists stood in line behind old Mr. Upton, who swatted at a mosquito on his cheek, leaving a crush of black and blood the size of a dime on the rosy area to the right of his bulbous nose. He held a quart of peaches and I noticed his nails were long and yellow. I tried to tell him there was something on his face, but his hearing aids weren’t in. “What?” he kept saying, until I mouthed Nothing and walked away. His aide, Sissy, wandered up to the farm stand counter. Sissy held two bunches of flowers and a head of Swiss chard. Sweat beaded on her dark Caribbean skin. She wore teal mascara, and her loose-fitting rust-colored T-shirt had a purple stain near the collar. I wondered if it was plum juice.
The car barreled through the gravel parking lot so quickly a few rogue pebbles flew up and hit Mr. Upton’s Lincoln. We all stopped where we were. Mr. Upton and Sissy. Daniela. The two women near the wildflowers. The family shopping for their Montauk picnic.
The car made that much of a commotion.
A guy jumped out and slammed the door. He called somebody a fucktard on the phone as he pushed past the berry display and into the building where we all stood, staring.
“What are you looking at, rich bitches?” the guy slurred.
I hadn’t seen someone so angry drunk since a kid from Watermill had had to be transported out of Shawn Flynn’s snow day party in an ambulance to have his stomach pumped.
“Eat shit and die,” the guy yelled into the phone before he shoved it into the pocket of his faded jeans. He clumsily wove around the vegetables and opened the cold case. He grabbed a fistful of cheeses and threw them into a basket. His face, mottled with acne scars and covered in patches of salt-and-pepper facial hair, was almost purple, probably because he was wearing a flannel shirt and work boots in ninety-degree weather.
Sissy shook her head and raised her eyebrows. Mr. Upton fumbled with his wallet. A noise came from the parking lot. At first it sounded like the guy had left the car radio on. But then the noise revealed itself.
Herself.
She was a crying baby.
I stepped away from the counter and walked out to the guy’s burgundy sedan. The tinted windows were up tight, except for the baby’s window, which was down only an inch or two. The baby’s shape moved frantically as the wailing sounds got worse.
“What the hell?” His voice hurtled toward me from behind. “Get away from my car, you little A-rab.” He was talking to me.
I whipped around. The stink of liquor and B.O. hit me in the face. His eyes were wild, the whites stained yellow. Some sort of valve opened inside me and adrenaline shot through my body. It was massive and electric and, in a weird way, calming.
My voice was measured when I said, “Sir, why don’t you take out the baby and get her some cold water? She’s probably really thirsty.”
“She’s fine.”
“I don’t want to offend you, sir, but I think you’ve had a bit to drink and maybe it’s not a great idea to drive right now.”
His face purpled even more. “I don’t want to offend you, but you’re a twat.”
The crying got louder.
The guy hurled the plastic basket onto the ground. Cheese bricks, strawberries, and jars of honey scattered. One of the jars smashed and honey oozed into the gravel. He reached into his pocket for his keys and stumbled around to the front of the car. I tried the back door handle. It was locked. I ran around to the driver’s side, where he was climbing in, and I dove on top of him, trying to grab for his keys.
I was not going to let him put his key into that little slit.
Sprawled across his foul-smelling body, I felt his hand grab my ponytail and yank my head upward. For a split second, I was angled toward the backseat and noticed the baby’s face, bright red and tear streaked, brown eyes fixed on the guy’s hand pulling me up by my hair.
For another split second we were all suspended in silence.
The grip tightened on my ponytail and forced my head downward. My face collided with something hard on the passenger seat. He yanked up and forced my face down again. The cold metal of a toolbox cut into my forehead. I cried out before reaching again for the keys.
In an instant, he let go of my ponytail and grabbed a nearly full bottle of liquor. The amber liquid swished upward before he struck me on my back. My body curved instinctively. Blow after blow, he pummeled the bottle into my torso. I cried out from the crushing pain of each blow as my own guttural sounds blended with the staccato cries coming from the backseat.
It was only after the sirens were surrounding the car that I noticed the police. A cop reached in to pull me out. I resisted at first, because I still hadn’t gotten the keys.
“It’s okay, Sadie.” I heard Daniela’s voice echo through the pounding in my head. I stumbled and collapsed onto Daniela, who couldn’t handle the weight of my body, and we fell to the ground. The gravel tore into my knees as the cop who’d pulled me out and several others wrestled with the guy until they finally got him down. He landed inches from me, his face stuck to shards of glass and honey. I looked up and saw another cop carefully unbuckle the baby. She had stopped wailing, as if she knew she was safe.