Don't Trust Her

by Elizabeth Boles

  And Court, you’re the enigma of the group, the one who was hardest to crack. You think that you’ve kept your secret from everyone, don’t you? But you haven’t. I know what it is, and it’s time to share.

  I promise y’all that there is peace in purging. There is peace in confessing. Because even though y’all are best friends, you don’t know shit about one another.

  So it’s time to start blabbing. Who wants to go first and reveal why I blackmailed you? Let’s start with Faith, shall we?

  And remember, you can come upstairs and pound on my door and be angry at me all you want, but I suggest you take a little time to get to know each other better, find out more about your friends…

  Chapter 25

  There are many betrayals here, but I think the worst one of all is that Paige, or Charlotte, or Charlotte or Paige, whoever she is and was, was taken advantage of by Sam’s father.

  Bile surges up the back of my throat as an image forms in my head. I see sixteen-year-old Charlotte being convinced that having sex with an older, married man is the best thing for her.

  It’s vile. It’s repulsive, and it doesn’t surprise me at all that Sam did what he did with her. He obviously learned shitty behavior from someone.

  Guilt rushes through me. Oh God, what we did to her.

  It’s unbearable to even think of now, that a girl would be wrongfully accused of such a heinous crime. That the three of us were involved makes it so much worse.

  Shame runs deep in me. I bury my face in my hands and wish that Paige had told us. The least we could have done was apologize for what happened. Maybe it would have lessened some of her wounds. Maybe we could have healed together.

  I remember the first time that I met Paige—and I mean Paige, not Charlotte. It was a sunny day, early spring—about a year ago. The birds chirped, and there wasn’t a hint of humidity in the air. It was a morning brimming with hope and possibility.

  But even with all the beauty around us, there was still a fragile brokenness to her. Paige carried wounds. I didn’t know how deep until now.

  I cast curious glances to Faith and Blanche. Do they feel the same as I do?

  Anguish twists up Faith’s face. “Oh my God, she was Charlotte. I never knew.”

  “Me neither,” Blanche says. “Even if I suspected, I would have shrugged it off. I mean, Charlotte was gone, out of our lives. She was right—I never thought about her once she left town with her folks.”

  “What we did,” I murmur. “She was right to blackmail us.”

  The money that Paige took is a small price to pay for the suffering that she endured. I would have paid double if it could have erased some of her pain.

  “Oh God,” Faith sobs. “She was raped by Sam’s dad?”

  “Sounds more like she was lied to and coerced,” Blanche says. “But yes, she was technically underage.”

  “Why didn’t she tell anyone?” Faith says.

  I shake my head. “How could she? No one believed her when she said that she was innocent—not even her parents.”

  “She was a kid.” Blanche slumps to the couch. “She was a kid, and we fed her to the wolves.”

  “We were kids, too,” Faith argues.

  Blanche’s gaze snaps to Faith. “What are you going to say? That we didn’t know any better? We knew better. We knew a helluva lot better, but we let it happen anyway.”

  “She could have told someone about the officer.”

  “Who?” I direct to Faith. “Everyone thought she pushed Brittany off the bluff, thanks to us. Who was going to buy that a respected police office had talked her into having sex? Especially when folks knew she was already screwing around with Sam. She might have been wounded when she arrived in town, but by the time Paige left, she was broken.”

  Blanche pulls a throw blanket up to her chin and shivers. “I’m surprised she didn’t find us earlier and do worse to us than just bleed us for money.”

  “We deserve worse,” I agree. “I just…I wish we’d had time to apologize, to try to make amends. Not that what we did could ever have erased her hurt. But it might have helped.”

  Faith stares at the letter. After a few moments she quietly murmurs, “What don’t we know about each other?”

  Blanche twists the blanket between her fingers. I add more wood to the fire. When I look back at my friends, we exchange uncomfortable stares.

  Apparently we don’t know a lot.

  I think I know these women as well as I know myself, but I’m wrong. I want to know how different we are. It compels me. It’s a strange yearning, like being a voyeur. And just like that, with the snap of two fingers, we have moved past Paige and are on to us—the true mystery here.

  I am looking through a window at women I’ve known my entire life. Veneers that I never knew existed are finally being pulled back, revealing their inner lives.

  “I understand why none of us would have confessed to each other about the blackmail,” I say. “It’s embarrassing. Who wants to be in that position? I know that I didn’t. And I can’t believe that…I mean, I paid it. Of course I was frantic, worried about who would have done this to me—”

  “But you never knew it was Paige,” Blanche says. “Me neither, though I suspected.”

  “Why?” I ask.

  She flicks her hand in dismissal.

  Faith pulls a chair out from the dining table, from the place where Paige had her last meal. She sits with a sigh. “I guess I just never figured that Paige knew about me.”

  Blanche quirks a brow. “Knew what?”

  She hedges. “Oh, I don’t know.”

  “Bullshit. You know what.” She jabs a finger at each of us. “We all know what or else we wouldn’t have paid. And I know you paid, same as the two of us. So. Whatcha got, Faith? You tell me and I’ll tell you, and I promise, mine is worse than yours.”

  “I need a glass of wine.” Faith rises, heads into the kitchen. The refrigerator opens, and she rummages inside. Glass clinks and plastic containers shift. “Blanche, you want a glass?”

  “Please. Anything to make this day fuzzy, because let’s face it, we’re not getting out of here. So why not spend it getting sloshed and hashing shit out?”

  “Want something, Court?”

  I can practically taste white wine. It will calm my nerves, make all of this tolerable. I know what I’ve done, but what acts have my friends committed? How could it be worse than mine?

  Faith asks again. “Court? Anything to drink?”

  My throat is dry. My nerves are fireworks. Just one drink, I tell myself. I can handle one, can’t I? It won’t go anywhere. I’ll be able to stop after that.

  But I made a promise long ago to never touch the stuff. So instead of saying yes, I tell Faith, “Just water.”

  She brings out a bottle of water for me and white for them. Faith fishes big wineglasses from a rack. They’re the type that look like they can hold half a gallon of liquid. She pours chardonnay just short of the rim and hands a glass to Blanche.

  Faith pours her own, takes a sip, and tops it off.

  “Atta girl,” Blanche says. “Now. Who’s going first?”

  “The letter says I should go, so…” Faith offers.

  I exhale quietly, then sip my water. “Do we really have to talk about this? Does it actually help anything? Paige is dead. We betrayed her years ago.”

  “She’s not the only one allowed to know the dirt. We’re in this together. I want to know what sort of power she had over us,” Blanche says. “I want to understand how we could all love her, but in the background she was plotting to extort us. Like, I get why. But that’s almost not enough. I want to know all of it. Don’t you?”

  No. I want what’s buried to stay buried. I want to creep into a hole and forget that any of this has happened. I don’t want to remember the name Charlotte and have to drag up memories of what happened to her, and think about that girl clawing to regain her reputation, sewing up the pieces of herself to heal the cuts that we created.
r />   Faith sighs loudly. Her mouth sags, as if her insides have been pulled out and thrown on the table, leaving her raw and naked.

  “Are you sure that you want to do this?” I ask her.

  She runs her thumb aimlessly over the moisture that collects on the wineglass and shrugs her hunched shoulders.

  “I guess. What else are we doing?”

  I curl my legs under me and wait for Faith to begin.

  She clears her throat a couple of times and looks like she’s working up the courage to tell a story. She rakes her fingers through her hair and coughs.

  “Y’all are going to hate me when I’ve told you what I have to say.”

  “We would never hate you,” I reply. “Never. We’re your friends.”

  It occurs to me that maybe this is part of what Paige wanted, to rip us to shreds. I nearly slap myself because it’s so obvious. Of course that’s what Paige wanted—to ruin us, destroy us inside and out.

  Just like what had been done to her.

  Faith exhales a shaky breath. “So. Y’all know how I go to thrift stores and sell what I buy on eBay?”

  “Yes,” Blanche answers.

  Faith nods for no reason, pumping her head as if it gives her energy. “Well, I don’t go to thrift stores.” Her gaze lifts to catch mine. “All of that is a lie.”

  Chapter 26

  Faith twists a curl around her finger. “I remember the first time it happened. I’d just had Katie, and I was so tired, y’all. I was drained emotionally and physically. I was up all night with the baby while Scott slept because he had to work the next day. I wasn’t thinking straight, and there was so much to do—housework and getting used to being a mom, and a screaming baby. She wasn’t sleeping at night. She wasn’t sleeping during the day. It was horrible.

  “One day I was able to get out of the house,” Faith explains. “My mom came to watch the baby. I went shopping just so that I could see other humans. There was so much anxiety and frustration building up because Scott wasn’t helping at all. I had to do everything by myself. It wasn’t his fault. He didn’t know what to do, how to help.”

  She takes a big gulp of wine and stares at the golden liquid as it sloshes from one side of the glass to the other. “Suddenly I was in the jewelry department of Dillard’s, and there was a pair of earrings I wanted. They were simple gold hoops with a freshwater pearl swinging from the very bottom. I could have bought them. I had the money. But I didn’t. Instead I glanced around to see if anyone was looking, and I slipped them into my pocket.”

  “Oh, Faith,” Blanche says, annoyed. “Is that all? I’ve accidentally left a store without paying for something.”

  “I have, too,” I offered. “A birthday card once. I felt bad, but I didn’t go back in and buy it.”

  Faith shakes her head. A haunted look flashes in her eyes. “I wish it had ended there, but it was just the beginning.”

  Blanche shoots me a concerned look.

  “After that, I started searching for opportunities to take the baby out. She was perfect cover.” Faith says it blissfully, and my skin crawls. “You’d be surprised what you can hide in a car seat or a diaper bag. I’d take jewelry, small articles of clothing. It made me feel so good—so useful.”

  She licks her lips and bashfully glances at us. A flush creeps up her neck. “But soon the little stuff wasn’t working for me anymore, so I moved on to bigger things—shirts and pants, jeans and even shoes.”

  “Shoes?” I say, surprised. “How did you do that?”

  “Funnily enough, that’s how I met Paige.”

  She says it like it’s a normal way to meet someone—shoplifting. It makes my stomach turn. The entire way that she’s telling this story disgusts me. Like it was a game she played, seeing how much she could get away with. While she was stealing, I was thinking, Poor Faith. She has no money. Poor thing. I need to help her out.

  Blanche taps an unlit cigarette against her knee. “You met Paige shoplifting? You’re joking.”

  “I’m not.”

  My gut twists at how blasé Faith is. “How did you meet her, exactly?”

  Faith looks uncomfortable now, as if she’s in trouble. Good. She should feel that way because I’m ticked.

  “One day I was trying on shoes. We chatted for a few minutes. Then she left. As I was walking out of the store, the alarm went off. Security came. I was so scared, y’all. I thought—this is it. Scott’s gonna find out. I’ll be charged. The kids’ll hate me. It’ll all be over. But Paige was suddenly standing there beside the door, a Michael Kors purse in her hands—the kind with a security tag. She told Security that she’d accidentally tripped the alarm. We talked and she wanted to take me out to lunch. Since she’d saved my skin, I said yes. She didn’t know that, of course.”

  “Sure she didn’t,” Blanche says skeptically. “She watched you, Faith. She knew.”

  “I don’t think so,” Faith says without conviction.

  “She set you up,” Blanche snaps. “How can you be so stupid, Faith? Paige fucking watched you. She watched you, and she knew exactly what she was doing.”

  “Don’t call me stupid,” Faith whimpers.

  “And what about eBay?” I ask. “How does that tie in?”

  Faith sips the liquid too fast, and wine spills down her chin. She swipes a hand over her mouth.

  “Don’t get sloshed on us.” Blanche pauses before adding, “Never mind. Get as sloshed as you want.”

  “So the thing about eBay is true. I do sell items on there.”

  “But it’s what you’ve stolen,” I guess.

  “Right.” Faith ducks her head and pulls her curls to one shoulder. “I sell everything.”

  I’m piecing this together. Faith is a liar and a kleptomaniac, but she’s still broke. She sells on eBay for the betterment of her family. She needs the money. There must be treatment programs out there for folks who need help with this sort of mental illness.

  I say as much.

  “I promise that I’ll get into one. I swear,” Faith tells me. “As soon as we get home, I’ll enroll. It’s just…I never wanted Scott to know what I’ve done.”

  “But how did he think that you were getting all this extra money to pay for things? I mean, from the way it sounds, you have extra cash,” Blanche asks. “Does he think it grows on trees?”

  She shrugs, embarrassed. “Well, I always use a little of it to pay for stuff, but not very much. His check does cover most things. I put money toward the kid’s clothes and to the bills, but most of it is tucked away in a separate account. You never know when you’re going to need a wad of cash.”

  A wad of cash? My jaw floors. “Exactly how much money do you have, Faith?”

  How many casseroles have I whipped up to help her? Not once, not ever, did she say that she didn’t need the food. Yes, I’m her friend and making food for someone is something to do out of the niceness of your heart. But I also did it because Faith complains about money. I thought that I was helping her out.

  All I was doing was being used.

  It’s like she gets off from having the powerful secret—money and a second life that no one knows about. It’s sick is what it is. Her husband, her children—they could use the money, but they don’t even know about it or have access to it.

  How easy is it for a small lie, a tiny thing to grow beyond your control until it’s a cancer eating away at you?

  And that’s what I see when I look at Faith. I see the edginess in her eyes. I see brittle fingers caressing the stem of her wineglass.

  I burn up as she avoids my question.

  “How much money?” I ask again. Faith ignores me. My shoulders roll back as I temper my anger. “Faith, you tell me that for years you haven’t been lying to us,” I demand. “Tell me that you’ve had a hard time making ends meet. You tell me that, Faith! You say it, because right now I think that everything you’ve ever said has been a lie.”

  She doesn’t answer, and I know that she’s been sitting on a fortune.
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  “How much?” I grind out.

  “I had twenty grand until Paige took ten of it,” she whispers.

  “Twenty grand!” The words explode from me. “All this time you’ve been saying you’re broke and you’ve got a good little nest egg? I can’t believe this. How could you lie?”

  Faith shrinks. “I’m so sorry. I don’t know what to say.”

  Blanche gazes at Faith with disgust. “So at any time you could have bought a new van, and yet you’ve blamed it all on Scott. You said he spent like crazy when you were the one stealing and then doing your damnedest to keep us thinking that you were broke.”

  Faith covers her eyes. “I’m sorry. Y’all”—she sobs—“I’m so sorry. See? This is why I couldn’t tell you. Because you wouldn’t understand. I said that you’d hate me when you discovered the truth. You don’t know how ashamed I’ve been.” Faith smears tears across her face with a tissue. “I’ve wanted to tell y’all. So many times I came close, but then keeping the lie going always seemed to be the best choice.”

  Faith’s face sags, and her eyes are puffy. She looks miserable, and she should be. She’s brought this on herself.

  “I just don’t understand why you lied,” Blanche murmurs. “We’re your best friends. We would have found you help. Besides, you could have saved Court a lot of time in the kitchen if you’d admitted it earlier.”

  Faith starts to laugh and chokes on a sob. “Court, I’m so sorry,” she whispers.

  I can hate her. I can choose to never forgive her and to hold anger in my heart. But holding anger never helped anyone. It festers in the soul, twisting your insides until you wither.

  I sigh and close my eyes. I just want this all to be over. I want to be in my house, in front of my own fire, letting the flames heat my face while I inhale the woodsmoke.

  “I accept your apology.” Faith immediately brightens. I point a finger at her. “But on one condition.”

  “Anything.”

  “The first thing you do when we get home is find yourself a treatment program. If you need me to go with you to a meeting, I will.”