“Really?” Trying to regain some composure, she wiped at her nose and sniffled.
“Yeah-huh,” Kenzie said. “He likes you a lot, Avis. Jeff is picky. He only sleeps with some girls once. Robin and Lily, they got initiated—everyone gets initiated—but that was the end of that for them.”
“Initiated . . .” She muttered the word to herself. Kenzie didn’t seem to hear her.
“Besides, Jeff talks about you a bunch.” He blanched, then gave her a strained look. Don’t say anything.
“I won’t tell,” she said, immediately garnering a sigh of relief from the all-angles boy. “What does he say?” she asked, hoping that the ego boost would help her crawl out of the emotional hole she’d stumbled down. But this time Kenzie shook his head. He’d already said enough, possibly more than he should have.
“We aren’t supposed to gossip.”
“But we’re supposed to keep secrets?”
He suddenly looked conflicted, his face going ruddy. His lips—which he pressed into a tight line—turned pale. A moment later, his hand moved from Avis’s calf back up to her knee, then farther up until she stopped it midtravel. Her reaction caused him to pause, to cant his head and study her in an animalistic sort of way. It was then that she noticed just how awkward Kenzie was. His head looked too big for his body, as though he had once lost a lot of weight and had never been able to gain it back. She remembered what Jeffrey had said about how most of the group would have ended up strung out on drugs or dead in a back alley. Kenzie had a definite post-junkie look. Even his teeth appeared oversized, like big white Chiclets squares pushed up into his gums.
Avis didn’t find Kenzie at all attractive. If anything, he struck her as a little creepy, all spindly and thin like a skeleton wrapped in cloth. But she knew if she pushed him away again, he’d leave her to the laundry while reporting the rejection to Jeff. Rejecting Kenzie, no matter how unsightly she found him to be, was a direct affront to the entire family. If she wanted to be part of the group, she had to do as she was told. They expected her to love everybody . . . not only Jeff.
She imagined Jeffrey explaining it to her in a way that would make the situation strangely appealing. This is what makes us different from everyone else—what makes us special, what fulfills our souls.
Who was she to argue against the beliefs of the group that had swept her off her feet? They held the key to the happiness that she’d basked in for the past month. If physical love was a part of that equation, who was she to say it was wrong?
“Can it be just us?” Her pulse whooshed in her ears. “Please?”
Kenzie looked down to her hand on top of his, as if contemplating her request, and finally gave her a slow nod. “Okay,” he said. “But only because it’s the first time.”
And so she rose from her chair, quietly closed the laundry room door, and snapped the lock into place.
When she looked back, Kenzie was already fumbling with the buckle of his belt.
Aldous Huxley sadly stared up at her, halfway kicked beneath the washing machine. A Brave New World, indeed.
WASHINGTON STATE POLICE ACCIDENT/INCIDENT REPORT
REPORTING OFFICER: Eugene Vetter BADGE NO: 2874
DATE OF INCIDENT: April 1, 1986
TIME: 11:54 PM
INCIDENT LOCATION: US HWY 101, 4 MI N of Schneider Creek, Thurston County VEHICLE(S) INVOLVED: Silver 86 Lincoln Continental INJURED PARTY #1: Terrance Roosevelt Snow, deceased INURED PARTY #2: Susana Clairmont Snow, deceased REPORT: I received radio confirmation of an accident while just south of Taylor Towne, doubled back, and arrived approximately ten minutes after the call. Upon seeing the vehicle in question, I immediately radioed for paramedics. The vehicle appeared to have been heading north on US 101 during initial impact. Markings on the driver’s side of the car, as well as damage to the back bumper, suggest a possible sideswipe situation. Closer inspection of the damage suggests the second vehicle involved was red in color. Upon approaching the vehicle, it became clear that the car veered off the road after said impact and hit a tree. The vehicle sustained extreme damage, most likely traveling at an excess of 60 MPH when impact occurred. Both driver and passenger were unresponsive. The driver was slumped against the steering wheel with severe bleeding and facial trauma. The passenger was partially ejected from the vehicle via the windshield with severe bleeding, possible skull fracture, and multiple lacerations to the face, neck, and arms. Paramedics arrived on scene at approximately 12:08 AM. Paramedics marked both driver and passenger dead on the scene shortly after arrival. No witnesses.
26
* * *
IT WAS THE second morning that Jeanie refused to talk to him—though there was one slight improvement: she’d bothered to come downstairs for breakfast. They sat across the table from each other. Jeanie kept her head bowed over her bowl of cereal, surfing the web on her phone. Lucas chewed his bland toast smeared with cheap grape jelly—the kind that rolled around on top of the bread rather than spread the way it was supposed to. The bruise beneath her eye looked better, and perhaps it was just the blue glow of her screen, but the girl herself looked as though she hadn’t slept in days.
“Jeanie?” Lucas waited for his kid to reply, to at least look up at him. It took her a minute, but her eyes eventually flicked up from her phone. “Can we talk?” She looked down again, flicked her thumb across her screen, and shoveled another spoonful of soggy Cocoa Puffs into her mouth.
“Look, I know I screwed up,” he said. “All I can say is that I’m sorry, and that we’re going to move as soon as I can find us another place to go.”
She shot him another look, sat up in her seat, abandoned her spoon against the rim of her bowl, and sighed. “No,” she said.
Ah, she speaks. “No, what?”
“No, I don’t want to move.”