by L V Chase
“You look so gorgeous,” she gushes. “Klay is going to eat his heart out.”
My forehead furrows. “Ethan is my date.”
Her eyebrows shoot up. “Oh. Right. Yes, sorry. Ethan. Their names are so similar.”
She fidgets with her makeup. Not the most subtle mistake, but she’s so flighty, it’s hard to tell if her blunder was an innocent mistake, or if she’d been distracted by a thought she’s trying to keep hidden.
“Come sit down,” she says, tapping on the backrest of a chair she must have taken from the kitchen. “I think I know what kind of look we should go for, but I need final approval from you.”
When I sit down, the glare of the sun blinds me. I keep my eyes downcast.
“Did you have any plans for your hair?” she asks.
“Hoping it doesn’t look terrible,” I say.
She laughs. “I can work with that.”
She combs my hair. After the third stroke, I glance over at the mirror above my dresser.
“What’s my relationship with Klay and Ethan?” I ask.
In the mirror, I see her motions stop. Her face is impossible to read.
“What do you mean?” she asks, starting to brush my hair again. Her tone is cheerful, which is normal for her, but something about it sounds bizarre.
“Did I have crushes on them?” I ask. “Did I have a past relationship with either of them?”
“No,” she says. “I don’t think you had any real history with Ethan.”
“He acts like we have an extensive history.”
She shrugs. “I know you two have talked to each other. He’s always been a little bit interested in you. But there’s no actual history between you. He’s a creep. I don’t approve of this date, but I’m not going to stop you.”
“Why do you think he’s a creep?” I ask.
“Just an instinct I have,” she says. “You know, like a dog smells out cancer, I smell out creeps.”
Her motions are getting jerky now. I let her calm down before pressing on.
“And Klay?”
“Well,” she says, drawing the word out. In the mirror, a small smile lights up her face and her gestures become relaxed again. “Mostly the same thing. But I think you were both interested in each other.”
“He doesn’t seem interested in me anymore.”
“Klay is a bit of an enigma,” she says. “I wouldn’t worry too much about it. He’ll come around. I’m sorry, Sadie, but I have to go pee. All of those energy drinks make me need to pee like a pregnant lady. I really need to learn to love coffee if I’m going to survive in nursing school.”
She sets the comb on the dresser and slips out of my room. I turn to face the mirror fully. With my hair slicked back, a memory tugs at the back of my head. It smells like chlorine. My clothes are soaked and heavy. Some water is stinging in my nose and in my eyes. My lungs are burning with exertion.
If I wanted to drown you, Klay’s voice says. I would have. Did you just swear?
I must reply something, but my head can’t quite put it together. But I remember his response.
You don’t.
And somewhere in my mind, I knew that he knew me better than I knew myself. I thought I could put some part of myself in his hands, and he’d keep it safe. I wasn’t afraid he’d drown me. I was afraid that he knew me so well that he could see right through me and know every fractured part of me. I was afraid that the person who knew me so well also hated me.
“God,” Emmy bounces back into the room, breaking me from my reverie. “I love that soap in your bathroom. Is it lavender? All my family has is some organic garbage.”
She picks up the comb. She starts to brush my hair again, loosening the tangles and yanking out the knots. I avoid the glare of the sun. I wait until it sets to raise my eyes.
18
Klay
I set the water bottle down on my mother’s nightstand. Two pill bottles, a ripped open bag of chips, and her cell phone are already cluttering the space. She’s huddled under a heavy quilt. I lean over her, watching her until I see her chest rise and fall.
Breathing should be easier when we’re unconscious, but under a haze of drugs, it becomes a statistics problem—what’s the chance that an accidental overdose happens when every day is subdued by opiates? Higher than it needs to be.
The door creaks open. My father steps in. I crumple up the bag of chips, hearing the last few chips crunch in my hand.
“You shouldn’t be here,” my father says. “The homecoming dance is about to commence.”
“I don’t need to be around her constantly,” I say, moving past him.
He grabs my arm. “Yes, you do. She’s in critical condition. Stabilize her.”
I look down at his hand. He releases my arm, raises his hands in mock surrender, and takes a step back.
“Your irresponsibility is turning out to be a bigger hindrance than I would have imagined,” he says. “Forgive me, if I care about our family and understand the consequences of your idiocy. Go to the homecoming dance and convince Sadie to fall back in love with you. I know you want to be with her, so you might as well not piss the hours away. If you drag your feet, Ethan is going to convince her to sign the contract that much faster. After she’s signed her life over to him, you’ll never hear from her again.”
“As opposed to seeing her life signed away to you?” I challenge.
His hand is on my throat, slamming me against the wall. All those days in the gym since the Hunt restarted has been working out for him. He squeezes enough to cut off my air. I grip onto his wrist, applying pressure. Black spots flash in my vision.
“Don’t fuck with me, Klay,” he snarls. His face blurs in front of me. “You can believe that I’m the devil if it makes you feel like a man, but if you believe that, you’d know what I’m willing to do to win. And what happens if I don’t. Your girlfriend’s going to suffer no matter what. You ensured that. It’s in both of your best interests to let her suffer under someone whose schedule is too occupied to fuck her more than a few times a week. But if you keep this up, I’ll reconsider my schedule.”
He relaxes his hand around my throat and takes a step back. I bend over, coughing and desperately taking in air. I run my hands over my throat, but it only makes me cough harder.
“Take this as a lesson, Klay,” my father says. “Stop fucking around. Prove that you’re a Harrington.”
I look up at him. It would be better if my eyes weren’t wet from coughing so hard, but he’d survey me with the same contempt regardless.
“All you care is about the damn Society,” I rasp. “Trying to please your masters like a good lap dog.”
He raises his hand again, his nostrils flare. He puts his hand back down.
“Your family’s relying on you,” he says through clenched teeth. “If the other boys start suspecting that you’re not trying to win the Hunt, they’re going to become suspicious. And if they realize that you and Sadie already had an extensive history and that we duped them twice, you know what the Society will do to all of us. Your mother, your brothers, too.”
As much as my father is trying to manipulate me, what he’s saying is still true. Ethan is already suspicious since Sadie told him my behavior toward her has been inconsistent. If he asked enough other students whether they’d seen Sadie and me together, and if he managed to get Sadie to talk more, he could put enough pieces together to figure out the deception. And Ethan is the son of two lawyers. There’s nothing he hates more than going into a trial and finding out that he’s not in control.
I need to convince Ethan and Roman that nothing strange is happening. I need to prevent Ethan from getting any closer to winning. I need to stay far away from Sadie while wanting nothing more than to be closer to her.
“I’ll go,” I say. “But remember what you said about our deal.”
“I’ll be a saint to your girlfriend when you win,” he says, poison squeezed out of his voice.
I glance over at my mother. Sh
e’s still fast asleep. I could have died right here, and she likely wouldn’t have found out for days. I sidestep my father to get out of the room.
If I could retaliate against him, I’d destroy him. Once I find a way to get to him, I’ll keep it subtle. I won’t use brute force to strangle him like he does to me. I’ll be the carbon monoxide, slowly choking him out.
19
Klay
As I enter the school’s gym, I could swear my father did kill me and send me to Hell for torture. Whimsical decorations hang from the ceiling, the bouquets of white and blue balloons mingling with metallic stars. The gym is overheated with the crowd of people, all demons dressed in their Sunday worst and sluttiest. I haven’t come to these dances for the last three years, and it’s good to see I wasn’t missing anything.
Except her.
She’s so beautiful. The red silk dress makes the strands of her cinnamon hair more prominent while the black lace of the dress emphasizes her curves. She’s smiling as she sways on the dance floor. She doesn’t have much rhythm, but her movements are graceful and exuberant. She’s radiant.
I love her. More than I’ve ever loved anyone. In this moment, I’d be willing to sacrifice my family for her, but I know I’d regret it for the rest of my life.
As I take a step forward, she wraps her arms around Ethan’s neck. He looks like himself—a chameleon that would sell out every member of his family to prove he was the smartest man in the room. It’s too bad that he’s not wearing a tie. It’d make it much easier to hang him.
I see his mouth move. She laughs. I should be happy that she’s happy, but he’s only making her happy to manipulate her. I can’t be happy that she’s swimming with the sharks while she thinks she’s in a kiddie pool.
I realize it, then. There’s no way this Hunt is ending without violence.
Roman is grinding up against another girl, his arm swinging around in a lassoing motion. The song is too slow for this type of dancing, but they’re both enjoying themselves. His attention isn’t on Sadie, so I have no intention of looking down on him for it.
As the song ends, he taps the girl on the ass before walking over to the refreshment table. I follow him over.
He doesn’t notice me until I’m an inch away. He slurps down his fruit punch, staring straight at me.
“What’s up, Klay?” he asks. “Which reminds me, I came up with something clever.”
“First time in your life?” I ask.
“How about I redirect your anger issues,” he says. “I point you at Ethan, and you can deal with both of our problems. Then, you get punished. I win.”
“Is that what the banker’s son considers clever?”
“He considers it a better solution than being a pussy and just glaring at them from across the room,” Roman counters.
I raise my eyebrows.
“Yeah,” Roman says. “I know you think I’d be too dumb to notice, but I keep track of all of the game pieces. I just don’t mope around like you do. I’ll take that girl home tonight, fuck her brains out, and still win the Hunt.”
“A valid plan,” I say. I pour myself some of the punch. I swallow it and some of my pride down. “You may also be right about the solution.”
“What do you need to do it? How about a rock? Because I know a stone quarry that has some big motherfuckers in it.”
“No,” I say. “As satisfying at that would be, I meant your previous plan. We could work together to ruin Ethan’s chances of winning.”
He crumples up his plastic cup, tossing it in the garbage. “I knew you thought I was a moron, but this is extra insulting. You’ve sucker-punched me twice like a little bitch. I’d be an idiot to trust you again. I’d trust my left hand to jerk me off faster than I’d trust you.”
“I was wrong, but now I’m focused on winning,” I say. I toss my cup into the garbage. “I’ll make it up to you tonight. I’ll lure Ethan away from Sadie. As soon as Sadie is alone, you can go up to her. You insinuate that she’s a whore for going with a man who pays everything for her. That will plant a seed of doubt in her mind about getting together with Ethan. Then, you show her the prostitution ad that I sent out last time. That will seal the deal. She won’t fall in love with Ethan, because she’ll be too worried about how it looks. She’ll see you as her alpha male.”
The corner of his mouth curls up into a smile. “Sounds great. But I know you wouldn’t do all of this without getting something out of it. What’s the part you’re leaving out?”
“I’m leaving out the part where it evens out the score,” I say. “After this, you forget that I attacked you in gym class and once Ethan—”
“And biology class. You also attacked me in biology class.”
“And biology class,” I concede. “But once Ethan is out of the running, we can go back to competing against each other. This is just a tactical strategy. We both increase our chances of winning once we get rid of Ethan.”
“Hmm,” Roman pretends to contemplate the offer.
His arms are relaxed as he crosses them over his chest, and he’s staring up at one of the metallic stars with a small smirk on his face. He’s already hooked. It’s obvious that Ethan is winning, and Roman wants to win too much to not take this chance to eliminate him.
And I’ve set it up far too well for him to think I’m about to fuck him over.
He drops his arms down. “Alright, Klay. I’ll give you a chance. Prove your worth.”
I let his remark slide. I’d been telling my brothers to choose their battles wisely, turning myself into a hypocrite, but for once, I need to abide by my own advice. If Roman needs to believe that I’d ever submit to him, I’ll let that become the noose that hangs him.
The other students move out of the way as I walk up to Ethan. Sadie glances at me, her face crinkling up before she looks away.
“Hey, man,” I say, clapping my hand on Ethan’s shoulder. “I just saw someone back into your car. It was too dark to see their license plate, but it was a red Accord. His headlights were too bright to see his face, but I—”
“How bad is the damage?” Ethan cuts in, his fear coming off him like a bad cologne.
“I came in right after I saw it happen,” I say, shaking my head. “I didn’t look too closely, but it sounded like thunder when it hit.”
Ethan sprints away from me, pushing people out of the way as he leaves the gym. I follow him a few steps, but I stop as the music changes to an upbeat song. Everyone shouts and hollers, dancing with an unfathomable level of excitement. I turn around.
Roman walks up to Sadie. I take a few steps forward. Sadie is facing away from me and Roman is too focused on her to notice me.
“You’re whoring it up out here, aren’t you?” he asks her. “How much shit did Ethan give you in order to pay for tonight?”
I can’t hear her answer, but Roman laughs harshly.
“I know that’s not true,” he says. He pulls out his phone. He taps it twice before showing her the screen. I can see a corner of the prostitution ad I’d made of her during the previous round of the Hunt. “In fact, you have quite the escort service going. Bargain basement prices, too.”
He laughs and slides his phone back into his pocket, then grabs her by the hips. He tugs her too close to him. Something ugly and serpentine coils in my chest and is ready to strike.
Sadie stomps on his foot. As he recoils, she takes three steps back, stopping when she bumps into a group of dancing students. Roman’s face is a dark red as he steps forward, his fists clenched. He stops. His hand slips into his pants pocket, and he pulls out a small vodka bottle.
Sadie raises her eyebrow before slipping in between the two dancing students and disappearing.
She planted the bottle on him.
Clever woman.
Everyone has become oddly motionless, waiting for Roman’s reaction. The contrast between the upbeat music and the stillness of the students attracts the attention of the chaperones. One of them, Mr. McKinney, points to the vodka bot
tle.
“Mr. Shaw,” Mr. McKinney sighs. “We’re going to need to escort you out.”
I turn, heading out toward the door. Still, over the music, Roman’s voice rages.
“My father is going to be pissed,” he hisses. “You have no right to just throw me out. This bottle isn’t even open, it’s not illegal for me to be holding it, and it’s not even mine. Sadie shoved it into my pocket when I wasn’t looking.”
I smile to myself. She’s far more intelligent than he ever gave her credit for. On the other hand, he sounds exactly like the liar he is.
20
Sadie
As I step out of the school building, the air’s exhilarating. Every time I try to stop smiling, it comes back like a snapped rubber band.
It feels good to inject Roman with some of his own poison, but I hate to be turned into someone calculating and manipulative. I want to live my life honestly, and being sneaky doesn’t sit quite right with me, even if he deserved it.
I knew he was going to try something tonight like he always does every time we encounter each other, so I kept that bottle in my wristlet. I managed to sneak it out when he was showing me the prostitution ad—a whole new venom for me to contend with—and slip it into his pocket after he grabbed me. It’s was nasty, devious, and unbelievably satisfying.
Ethan is in the parking lot, talking to another senior. It’s a pretty brunette from my English class. I should feel unraveling jealousy, but there’s nothing in my chest.
I stop at the road between the school and the parking lot. I need to disappear before Roman comes out, but I don’t want to explain what happened to Ethan. He’ll be a good man about it—telling me that Roman is an asshole and reassuring me that my actions were understandable—but I don’t need platitudes or someone to treat me like a child. I need sharp edges and grit.
I can’t walk all of the way home. It’s barely home anymore—not without my grandmother and with a stranger living there.