Tarnished Crown

by Erin Watt

  “She’s trying to help out,” I say in Dinah’s defense. She was the one who brought Dr. Whitlock here when I mentioned that I was worried about taking Mom to the hospital. Mom would hate everyone around here knowing her business.

  “Is that what we’re calling it these days?” Sandra mutters.

  Since I have no idea what she means by that, I let it go. But upstairs, I wonder. Do other people watch me interact with Dinah and think that something’s going on? No, of course not, I assure myself. The woman’s nearly a decade older than I am. Besides, for all intents and purposes, Steve is my uncle and that makes Dinah my aunt. She’s nothing more to me than a nice older relative who’s trying to help our family through a difficult time.

  Ultimately, I believe in Dinah. Telling Sav what’s going on in this house will give the poor girl ulcers. It’s best that I keep this to myself for now. Once everything gets sorted, I’ll confess everything. Better to ask for forgiveness than permission, right?

  Right.

  Chapter 10

  Savannah

  Three Years Ago

  “What’s with the frowny face?” Lydia Scully asks, adjusting the thousand-dollar silk Hermes scarf that’s tied around her hair.

  Shea and I were invited to Lydia’s house to hang out after school. So far, it’s just been a lot of boring fashion talk, but now that everyone’s attention is suddenly on me, I’m not bored so much as uncomfortable.

  “Don’t frown. It gives you ugly wrinkles,” Ginnie advises. Next to her, Francine nods. The three of them make up Jordan Carrington’s main girl posse. Everyone calls them the Pastels. The girls think it’s because they tend to wear Easter egg colored clothing when they’re not in their Astor Park uniforms, but it’s mostly because their personalities are pale and featureless. They have no true color of their own. Whatever vibrancy they have is borrowed from Jordan.

  “I didn’t realize I was frowning,” I say awkwardly.

  “Well, you were.” Lydia informs me. “Is it boy stuff? No offense, but it wouldn’t surprise me if you’re having problems with Gideon Royal. He’d be a handful for anyone, let alone a sophomore.” She stares at her manicure as if she cannot care less about my response, but I know she’s dying for details about Gideon.

  They all are. Even Jordan, who’s busy texting one of her three boyfriends, is intensely curious about how I managed to hook one of the Royal boys.

  The Royals have been elusive up to this point. None of the older brothers have had a serious relationship—until now. So everyone wants to know why me. As if I have some secret technique that can collar a Royal.

  “I can’t believe I’m dating him, either,” I say in complete honesty. I don’t know why Gid’s interested in me. And, frankly, I’m afraid I’m already losing him.

  Hence the frown.

  On the lounger beside me, Shea twitches and not from the cool night air. I’m supposed to pretend everything is awesome in my life, and admitting that I’m less than confident about my relationship violates the family code.

  Oh well. The truth will be out there soon enough when he breaks up with me.

  Lydia snorts. “No one can believe it.”

  The truth stings. I glance at Shea, knowing that she’d rather I keep my mouth shut, but I could use some advice. These girls have more experience handling boys than I ever will, and I’m not talking about sexual experience. They just date more. Plus, Jordan’s otherworldly pretty. She always has boys giving her their number. She was stopped on the street the other day by a girl who wondered if she was a model.

  According to the Pastels, during Jordan’s summer trip to Sweden, she had flowers sent to her hotel room every day by a guy she literally bumped into at the train station. Two Astor Park guys have broken bones trying to impress her. One cracked his wrist during a failed skateboarding trick, and another fractured his trying to make a jump on an untrained horse. Currently, she has three guys making fools of themselves over her.

  Talking about Gideon and me is embarrassing, but I feel desperate, which is why I open my mouth and start blabbing. “Not only do I not know why he’s into me, but I don’t really know how to keep him, either.”

  Lydia’s eyes light up. This is some good gossip and she’s here for it. Jordan’s busy fingers pause as well. Although she doesn’t look in my direction, I can sense her attention. Shea sighs.

  “Are you putting out?” Lydia asks.

  “That’s not any of your business,” Shea barks.

  “What?” Lydia says innocently. “I need to know details in order to be helpful.”

  I can’t stop my cheeks from heating up. These aren’t my besties. They’re girls that I hang out with because my dad insists on it and because Shea thinks it’s good for my reputation at school. It’s a shield, she explained. No one’s going to go after Jordan, so by extension, I’m safe, too.

  Gideon’s not really a shield because he’s a guy. He’s not in the girls’ locker room or in the bathroom or at the private parties where the real slings and arrows come out.

  You need a good girl posse who will watch your back, and although Jordan’s circle is the best there is at Astor, that doesn’t mean I want to share any intimate details with them.

  “He’s not complaining,” is the best answer I can come up with.

  “She’s boning him,” Lydia concludes.

  I’m not, but I don’t bother correcting her assumption. She won’t believe me anyway.

  “Send him a sexy picture,” Francine suggests. “Torin loves it when I send him stuff.”

  “That’s dumb,” Shea says bluntly. “The minute that you and Torin are done, he’s going to share those pics with twenty different guys and those guys will share it with their twenty friends until you’re some meme about how dumb girls are.”

  “Thanks for nothing, bitch.” Francine scowls. “Torin and I are not breaking up. We love each other.”

  “Don’t get mad at Shea,” Jordan interjects. She smiles at my sister, and I nearly recoil at the venom in her eyes. “She doesn’t know any better. Remember the bad experience she had with Dooley? I wouldn’t want to share a picture with anyone if that had happened to me. But not every guy is going to humiliate a girl like Dooley did. That was just poor decision-making on Shea’s part.”

  I’d be laid out on the floor if Jordan cut into me like this, but Shea merely smiles back as if Jordan didn’t just pour salt on an old wound. “Maybe not,” Shea says coolly, “but why take the chance?”

  The Dooley incident happened two years ago. Shea was on a ninth grade class trip. Matthew Dooley was a senior. They’d been flirting heavily. Shea texted him a picture of herself on Francine’s boat, only she didn’t realize she’d spilled berry juice in her lap. Her white swimsuit showed a red stain in an unfortunate spot. Dooley shared the picture on his Instagram feed with a shark photoshopped in the background. The caption read: “Sharks can detect a single drop of blood in the ocean. Be careful out there. #sharkbait #auntflosrevenge #dontwearwhite”

  Shea spent the next six months humiliated and mocked by everyone at Astor. Thinking back, that was about the time she started hanging with Jordan, even before Dad instructed us to suck up to her.

  “Oh, let the girl live,” Jordan says. She leans across Francine to address me directly. “The sad truth is that guys are super visual. If he’s going to be looking at a naked girl’s body, why not yours? You’re gorgeous, Savannah. It’s better that he’s fantasizing about you rather than Olivia Munn, right?”

  Everyone but Shea nods. Even I’m starting to be convinced.

  Jordan somehow senses my indecision and presses me harder. “If you can’t trust Gideon not to share a sexy pic, then you shouldn’t be dating him and you certainly shouldn’t be sleeping with him. Feed the beast.”

  “She has a point,” Francine says. The other two Pastels nod their agreement.

  Shea’s had enough of this conversation. “Speaking of couples that are mismatched, di
d you see how hard Abby was panting after Reed the other night?” she asks, throwing chum into the water. The sharks go after it, and the topic turns away from me and Gideon and naked selfies.

  *

  Later in the car, Shea unloads on me. “Don’t do it. You just started dating him and if he’s already straying, sending him nudes will look desperate. Plus, what if he shares them with Three or someone?”

  “He wouldn’t do that.” Gideon doesn’t seem like the type to brag. He doesn’t even talk about his swimming success, constantly downplaying any wins as part of a group effort.

  Shea purses her lips and rolls her eyes, implying I could not have said anything more stupid. “Right. Just like he wouldn’t cheat or break your heart.”

  “He’s not cheating and my heart’s just fine, thanks very much.” But I avoid looking into her eyes.

  “Ugh. You’re going to do it, aren’t you?”

  “I haven’t made up my mind.”

  Shea knows me too well. The lack of an outright denial is the same as saying yes.

  “Let’s hope that Dad’s willing to spring for a boarding school for you in Switzerland, because that’s where you’ll have to go after your nudes leak.” She guns the engine through the intersection.

  I sigh. “Thanks for the vote of confidence.”

  “Have you never heard of a thing called revenge porn? It’s real and it’s ugly. You’re happy now, but the minute that things go bad, he can put up a picture of you on the Internet and it’ll live there forever. You’ll apply for a job and someone on the hiring team will search your name and your tits will be the first result.”

  “That’s not going to happen.” But I say it with more confidence than I feel.

  After dinner, a text from Gideon comes in.

  What r u doing?

  Studying. I glare at my chem book. I hate science. You?

  Hanging w/ the bros.

  And then, as if he senses my insecurity, I get a little video panning the Royals’ media room. Some game is being played up on the projector screen. I see Easton lying on the floor and the back of the twins’ heads. At the end of the short video, Reed gives me a two-fingered wave. He must be sitting next to Gideon.

  Wanna come over?

  Yes! I scream internally, but he’s with his brothers and I don’t want to intrude.

  Too much homework L

  Gotcha. Miss u tho. Let’s go somewhere this weekend. Boat? Just u n me?

  My heart flutters like crazy.

  YES!

  I get a thumbs-up picture in return. God, I love his hands. Now other parts of my body are fluttering.

  Send me a selfie. Miss ur pretty face

  Send me one, I shoot back. He’s the king of taking pictures of other people, but he surprises me by sending a dark, grainy picture of himself. He has one eyebrow arched and his tongue is touching the corner of his upper lip. Christ, I’m dead.

  Rude, I type back. Stick that tongue back in ur mouth before u kill me with it.

  Gotta feed my girl

  His words are an unintentional echo of Jordan’s earlier ones. She’s right. If I can’t trust Gideon, then I shouldn’t be with him.

  I hurry to the bathroom and strip down to my bra and panties. Of course, they don’t match. I wore nude panties today and a white-and-pink polka-dotted bra. What was I thinking?

  I whip off my bra and then lift the camera.

  No. I’m not ready for a topless photo. Baby steps, I caution myself.

  I grab a tight fitting tank top and a new pair of panties, both in black, and return to the bathroom. I take a picture and look at it. The flash is reflected in the mirror and is that toothbrush splatter in the corner? I can’t send this!

  My phone beeps. Another text from Gideon.

  U alive?

  1 min, I reply.

  Frantically, I glance around. My room’s clean and the bed’s a sexy place. I’ll take a picture there.

  I stack three books on my desk and then set the timer on the camera phone. I rush to the bed, kneel, and try to look at the camera with smoldering eyes. Once the flash goes off, I hop over to the desk and check out the picture.

  Not sexy enough. In fact, it looks like I’m constipated. Maybe I should smile?

  I reset the timer and return to the bed. This time, I tuck a finger under the side of my panties and pull up the tank so my stomach and hipbones are showing. And I smile.

  I check the picture again. It’s okay, but I still look awkward. So I take several more. Some are with my top off. Some are of me lying down. Some are of me completely naked. I cross off the naked ones entirely. I don’t love my body enough to send those, but in the twenty or so selfies that I’ve captured, one of them is good.

  My head’s slightly chopped off, but you can still tell it’s me. The strap of my tank is sliding off my shoulder and my panties are riding low on my hips. One arm is raised behind my back as I lift my hair off my neck and the other one is reaching for the bed.

  I select a soft filter and then press send before I can talk myself out of it.

  I don’t get an immediate response.

  Deflated, I sink back on the bed. Maybe I should’ve sent a different picture. I flip through the photos. I should’ve spent more time setting the stage and playing with the lighting. I could’ve bought a special set of underwear. God, I feel so anxious! Maybe I shouldn’t have sent it at all. Maybe I—

  The phone rings. It’s Gideon.

  My heart’s hammering as I answer. “Yes?”

  “How much homework do you have left?” he asks tightly.

  “What?” I send him a sexy selfie and he asks me about my homework? What kind of failure am I? Was it that bad?

  “How much homework do you have left?” he repeats.

  “Um, a page or two?”

  “I’ll be at your house in ten minutes,” he says.

  “What?” I’m so confused. “Why?”

  “Why? Because if I don’t get my hands on your body within ten minutes, I will be dead.”

  And then I get nothing but silence, because he’s hung up. And he’s coming over in ten minutes! I throw the phone up in the air in utter glee. Then it hits me. He’s coming over in ten minutes!

  I jump up and scurry to the bathroom. I guess Jordan was right. Hot selfies are the way to a guy’s heart.

  Chapter 11

  Savannah

  Three Years Ago

  I have way too much junk, I decide, as I scurry around my room. There are piles of books stacked by the desk. The counter in my bathroom has more makeup on it than the Dumpster behind the Sephora store.

  I scoop all the discarded clothes off the floor and shove them in my closet. It takes three kicks to get the door shut. I only have two tiny drawers in my vanity, so I end up dumping all my toiletries in the bathtub and then tugging the curtain shut. I mean, when is Gideon going to be opening my closet doors or taking a bath, right?

  I throw on a pair of skimpy sleep shorts and an oversized hoodie that makes it look like I don’t have anything on underneath. The hoodie’s for Gideon and the sleep shorts are to make me feel more comfortable.

  My phone dings.

  Here, the text reads.

  I rush out of the bathroom and hurry to the door. I’ve got the doorknob in my hand when I hear a throat clearing behind me. Whirling around, I find Gideon leaning against the wall between my two windows.

  I gasp. Actually, the sound that flies out is more like a shriek. “How’d you get in here?” I hiss.

  With one side of his mouth tilted up, he jerks a thumb at the window. Wide-eyed, I rush over and peer out. Like most big plantation homes, I have a balcony, but the two attached to my windows are Juliet balconies, which means the foot-wide structures with the wrought-iron fencing jutting out from each sill are merely for show. They’re not meant to be stood on or climbed on.

  I try to retrace his path. There’s the garden, a drain spout, the trell
is covered in Carolina Jessamine vines. The trellis is composed of cedar but isn’t well anchored to the ground. The boy who mows the grass is constantly knocking it off kilter. Daddy gripes about how he has to reset the northern post every Sunday.

  I eye Gideon suspiciously. “You didn’t?”

  “I did,” he says smugly. His arms are folded across his chest, making his biceps bulge in a mouthwatering way. “But I have to say that it’d be easier if you had a tree outside your window. Maybe we should plant one.”

  “Sure. And you’d be able to use it in, say, ten years or so.” I manage to say the words lightly despite my excitement over what he’s implying. Does he really believe that we’ll be together that long?

  The thought of still being with Gideon years from now, long enough to see a tree grow from a sapling into a mature tree, makes me want to clap with glee. I manage to hold myself together and bury those feverish fantasies underneath a curtain of coolness. It’s bad enough that I sent him the selfie. I don’t need to make myself look more desperate.

  “Bamboo trees are fully mature in sixty days,” he says as he crosses the room and stops in front of my bed. He toes off his shoes and lies down, tucking his hands behind his head, looking for all the world as if he’s as comfortable here as he is in his own room.

  I crawl onto the bed, lying down but leaving enough space for another person between us. “Mom’d chop down that growth before it got knee high. Bamboo wouldn’t go with her Southern Living couture.”

  “Your mom loves the South more than raccoons love garbage.”

  “You know it.” Mom was born in Connecticut, but she hates any reminders of her past. In her mind, life started when she enrolled in Mississippi State. Ever since her Freshman year, she’s been trying to erase her Northern origins. Not that Mawmaw will ever let Daddy forget that he married a Yankee.

  Gideon pats the space between us. “You expecting company?”

  “No. I wasn’t expecting you.” I scoot over and fit myself against his side. He tucks an arm under my neck and positions my head in the slight dip formed beneath his collarbone.