by Kaira Rouda
“Just go,” she said and he shrugged and walked away.
Finally alone, Ashley took a deep breath and pushed into the crowd, attempting to cross the fair through the packed center aisle. She realized her mistake at the Chapman University booth, a quarter of the way in. She was shoulder-to-shoulder with kids, classmates, the same people who elected her ASB president and homecoming queen. She was suffocating with their attention, with the expectations they all had of her perfection. She tried to paste a smile on her face. University of California, Berkeley, loomed on her right, Harvey Mudd College on her left. The USC double-wide booth was just ahead of her, and beyond that was her ticket out of the state: the East Coast colleges. She felt dizzy and knew she had to get out of here, out of this stifling place.
The overweight blonde girl in front of her stopped suddenly and Ashley bumped into her.
“Sorry,” she said, trying to move around the poor thing, while contorting her face into a look that could only be described as concerned, tilting her head to one side, pursing her lips. What was this girl’s name? Ashley wondered, deciding it wasn’t worth focusing on.
“Ashley, really? Are you sorry? You should pay more attention to things, to others. You don’t own the school,” the girl said.
Kiley, that was her name. Usually the girl was riddled with piercings and her light blonde hair was typically dyed black. “Yes, of course, I am, Kiley. Sorry to upset you so much,” Ashley said, proud of her recall. This Kiley had been at the private school in town until high school, that’s why Ashley didn’t know more about her. In fact, Ashley knew nothing other than Kiley always dressed in black, was a natural blonde—this just becoming apparent tonight—presumably was on the track team because she had the team shirt on, was the daughter of a rich car dealer and his second wife, and was, at the moment, sucking on a red lollipop. Ashley considered telling her that wasn’t professional, but decided against it. “How’s track?”
“I just quit. Caught my mom on the beach with a guy who isn’t my dad, so she pretty much had to let me,” Kiley said. She’d pulled the end of her blonde ponytail forward and was twirling the end around her finger.
“Wow,” Ashley said, tapping her pen on her blue notepad. What was the proper response to a pronouncement like this, she wondered, thinking that as stressed and shrinking as her mom was, and as absent as her dad was, at least they weren’t this messed up. “I’m sorry,” she said, unable to come up with a better response.
“Don’t be. I knew it was going on, I just didn’t know who. She sent me a text meant for him. She’s an idiot,” Kiley said. “What school are you going to see?”
“Um, Boston College,” Ashley said, lying. She wondered why this stranger was telling her deepest secrets in the middle of the fair. “Want to come with me?”
“Sure,” Kiley said, falling in behind Ashley. “UT Austin has lollipops if you want one.”
Ashley didn’t want a lollipop and she didn’t want the loser following her around. But, she was a compassionate leader. That’s what she had said she was in her common application essay at least. She took a deep breath. The Boston College booth was just one booth away.
“Shit,” Kiley said, grabbing Ashley’s shoulder and spinning her around. “Should I tell her?”
“Tell who what?” Ashley asked, annoyed. She hoped Kiley didn’t get lollipop goo on her black cashmere sweater. It was her favorite.
“Marni. It was her dad. That’s who was with my mom.”
Marni was in front of them, talking to the Boston College rep. “Oh, no. That’s awful,” Ashley said. Marni was one of her oldest friends. They’d even survived having her mom as a principal together. She didn’t want to know this, not at all. “Principal Parker’s husband? Are you sure?”
“Yup, Mr. Parker is my mom’s lover. Gross, isn’t it? I took a photo, just for proof.”
Ashley thought the grossest part was that she now knew about it. It was much easier to deal with life if she didn’t have to think about things like this, the undercover duplicitous world that every adult seemed to be living in. She felt the familiar tightness in her chest, like the asthma attacks she used to have as a kid, and rubbed her chest.
“Hi girls, meet John from Boston College,” Marni said, turning and pulling Ashley to the booth while waving her hand at the short, nervous-looking man behind the table. “John, this is Ashley. Our school’s it girl. You will want her, just like everyone else does. At your school, I mean. And this is Kiley. She’s new here, but her dad is really rich. Good for endowments, am I right? I didn’t realize you were blonde, Kiley. Nice.”
Ashley and Kiley blushed, as did the man behind the table who looked to be only a few years older than they were.
“Nice to meet you,” he said, shaking Ashley’s hand before turning to Kiley. His palm was moist and soft and he couldn’t hold Ashley’s eye contact.
“I need to talk to you in private, Marni,” Kiley said.
“Sure. John and I were finished anyway,” Marni said.
Ashley noticed John was avoiding eye contact with all three of them now and had eagerly turned to speak to a junior and her parents. Strange behavior, she thought, but then again, he was an adult so he was weird and untrustworthy. Ashley picked up his business card, she had explained to the senior class the thank-you note process during assembly, and was anxious to move on, away from the girls and this booth.
“See ya, Ashley,” Kiley said as she and Marni walked together, pushing toward the far corner of the gym.
Ashley wondered what Marni would do with the information she was about to hear from Kiley. Would she believe what Kiley saw on the beach? Did Kiley really see anything, or was she looking for attention? And even if it was all true, none of them could do anything to change their situations. They were just the offspring. They had no control. The only way out was to finish senior year, no matter how bad senioritis got, graduate, and start life over. A life separate from her perfect-looking parents who were actually quite a mess. She needed to break free of them so she could stop worrying about her ever-shrinking mom and whatever it was her dad was doing. Because Ashley was becoming certain that whatever was wrong with her mom, it was because of her dad. Just like he’d made her mom into his version of physical perfection, he was ruining her from the inside with his version of how their lives should be lived.
Ashley couldn’t be sure of what his secrets were, but she knew he had them, and when she took the time to think about it, she had become certain his secrets were tied somehow to his incessant travel.
Turning to her left, Ashley made her way to the edge of the gym, the outside row where the least-popular schools had their displays. She made a point to smile and take a card from even the most obscure college. She wondered which of her classmates would attend community college and which ones would just leave here with their high school diploma, nothing more. But more than anything, she wondered if she had enough leverage over her dad to force him to allow her to go to Stanford, just a short plane ride from her mom, but far enough away to be outside of his control. She didn’t understand why he wanted her far away in Boston, although it probably had something to do with Blake. But because her dad wanted her at Harvard, she wanted the opposite. Her parents were on her last nerve, especially her dad, she realized. He was selfish. If he wanted something, he would buy it. If he wanted to change something—her mother’s breast size, for example—he’d change it. Twice. Whenever she caught him looking at her, she imagined what he wanted to fix, even though he always told her she was perfect. She didn’t buy it for a minute.
She was safe from his knife, she knew, because her mom had forbidden it. It was the only thing she’d stood up to him about, that Ashley could remember. Ashley secretly believed it was because her mom wanted to remain more beautiful, more perfect than her own daughter. But she didn’t really know for sure. One thing she did know was that she’d never let a guy change her body like that, ever.
It was disgusting. Her dad was disgusting. H
er mom was pathetic.
She needed to get out of here.
“Hey, babe,” Blake said. He had appeared out of nowhere and was sucking on a lollipop. He looked like an idiot.
“Look, I’m tired. I think I’m just going to head home. Rain check on dinner?” she asked.
“Sure, yeah, I’ve got homework and stuff. I’ll call you later?” Blake said, leaning forward and kissing her on the cheek. He smelled like cherry cough drops, like sickness. She felt hot and sick, her stomach turning.
“Talk later,” Ashley said. Tears had popped into her eyes without warning. She had to get out of the gym before anybody saw her. She looked for the closest exit, saw Dr. B and a swarm of parents. If she hurried back the way she came, she could escape through the side exit where Marni and Kiley had gone. Wiping at her face, Ashley hurried along the edge of the gym and had just pushed on the door when Dane appeared next to her.
“I’m out of here, too,” he said, grinning and holding the door open for her. “Whoa, what’s wrong?”
Now he’d done it, Ashley thought. The tears came fast and hot, she couldn’t make them stop. Shit. Shit. Shit.
“Hey, it’s gonna be all right,” Dane said, wrapping an arm around her shoulders and leading her to a dark corner of the quad. The air was chilly, thick with fog, and Ashley started shivering on top of her sobs. “Who upset you? I’ll go beat them up. As long as it isn’t Blake or any other member of the football, water polo, or volleyball teams.”
Ashley smiled and took a shaky deep breath. Her face had to be a complete mess. She ripped a piece of paper out of her notebook and tried to use it as a tissue.
“Hold on. Let me tell my dad you’re giving me a ride home and I’ll go get you a tissue or twenty from the bathroom. Are you okay here?” he asked.
She nodded and he ran back in the direction of the gym. Standing alone in the quad, she could hear the murmur of girls’ voices in the distance, but she couldn’t see anyone because of the fog. She hoped it wasn’t Marni and Kiley. She didn’t want to talk to them, and she didn’t want them to think she was spying on them or that she cared about their stuff. She had enough of her own.
What the fuck is wrong with parents? Ashley wondered. Didn’t they know being a teenager was hard enough without all of this added stress of their pitiful drama? And why was her dad so selfish? Was he having an affair, too, or did she just imagine his prolonged absences had something to do with another woman, not just work? He said he was taking time to work on himself, but what did that really mean? And if he wasn’t being a jerk, then why did her mom act like he was slowly killing her, day by day?
Was he slowly killing both of them? Maybe her dad was a murderer who was poisoning them somehow? Putting arsenic in their granola, perhaps, Ashley wondered. She imagined the label: Gluten-free. Non-GMO. Ancient grains. Added arsenic. She dropped her head in her hands and sunk to the ground. She was afraid if she stood any longer she’d fall over. And she was pretty certain she was going crazy.
“Ashley?” Dane said. “Are you still here?”
“Yup, right where you left me,” she said and smiled up at his concerned face. He had a wad of toilet paper in one hand, college brochures in the other.
“Thanks,” she said, taking the hunk of toilet paper from him as he sat down next to her on the cold cement.
“So what’s the problem? Hopefully you dumped Blake and realized your eternal love for me?” Dane asked. Ashley noticed how his eyes twinkled, even in the dim light. She loved the dimple on his cheek.
“That’s it. You guessed it,” she said, trying to add spunk back into her voice. She shifted her body, leaning against Dane. She pulled at the arms of her black sweater, pulling the sleeves down to cover both hands.
“I wish,” Dane said. “But seriously, if I can help, let me know. We should go to your car, though, you’re shaking.”
“Can we just stay here for a bit?” Ashley asked, telling herself to breathe and drop her shoulders, she’d warm up. She just didn’t want to move, didn’t want to face a parking lot full of people.
They sat side by side in silence, something she knew Blake could never handle. He always had to fill the silence with talk or action, like a fidgety toddler. But tonight, Dane surprised her. He wasn’t trying to crack a joke or tell her a story. She knew Dane was different. He always had been. He’d arrived a misfit from the Midwest but he’d survived this place and it was hard here. He was cool and mature, way over high school. Her mom would call him an old soul. Maybe she’d finally caught up to him, she thought.
She reached for his hand and he took hers, hooking her arm under his, pulling her closer to him. He turned and looked into her eyes with a soft smile on his lips, and Ashley knew they had to kiss. Dane wrapped his arm around her shoulder and with his other hand, gently tipped her head up. When his lips touched hers, they were soft and gentle, until Ashley pushed into him. She heard him gasp, and he pulled away.
“Hey, you know I’ve dreamed of this since I moved to town freshman year, but not quite like this, with you and Blake, and the whole football team,” Dane said, using his hand to brush the hair back from her face.
Ashley wasn’t accustomed to rejection, but his gentle touch softened the blow. And he was right. She was still seeing Blake, still needed him as leverage with her dad. She didn’t need to pull Dane into her stupid mess. “You’re right, it’s too complicated right now. I’m sorry, it’s just that you’re so, well, you.”
“Ah, thanks, I think?”
“It’s a compliment. You seem so much older than all the other guys in our class. Like you’ve been here before or something,” Ashley said.
“God I hope not. One time through high school is quite enough,” Dane said. “I think most people are gone now, and, unfortunately, my mother dearest will be upset if I don’t report in for a full college fair debriefing. My poor dad is probably getting the third degree right now for leaving me here.”
“Did you find the right school?” Ashley asked as Dane helped her stand up.
“I’m not going to college. I’m moving to LA and doing music. I have to. I’m just going through the motions to keep my parents calm,” Dane said.
“Your mom is going to kill you,” Ashley said as they made their way through the quad.
She watched as Dane swallowed and pushed his hair out of his face. “I just can’t be what she wants me to be.”
“At least you know who you are, and what your parents want,” Ashley said. “I don’t even know that much.”
MARNI
As she followed Kiley to the corner exit of the gym, she waffled between wanting to hear what the weird girl had to say and following the impulse to dart back into the gym, losing her in the sea of overeager seniors.
She had been having fun with John from Boston College, flirting with him and making him blush. She’d tried to get him to agree to a rendezvous after the college fair. Most of her classmates would be surprised to know how adventurous she was behind her thick dark glasses. So would her parents. It was always with boys outside of school, no one she knew or hoped to see again. Like John. She’d slipped him her number and was fairly certain she’d closed the deal when Ashley showed up. Ashley was her friend and it wasn’t her fault she was hot or that she had that typical popular girl way of sucking all the attention from the room. No, Marni couldn’t really blame Ashley for coming between her and a possible hookup, even though this was one of the few nights her parents had given her the car.
Okay, maybe she was a little pissed at Ashley, even though the two had been friends since sixth grade. She’d have to talk it over with Ashley tomorrow at lunch. Though they were opposites, Ashley was Marni’s best and only close friend. They talked about everything, usually over lunch each day in the quad. They didn’t hang together on the weekends, of course. Marni would never be included in the in crowd, and she didn’t want to be. But at school, they were inseparable. They needed each other. They’d hash this out tomorrow. Before following Kiley o
ut of the gym, Marni looked up and scanned the crowd, wondering why she was following the newly blonde girl out of the fair. At least she’d already sucked up to the Vanderbilt reps.
“Okay, new girl, what is it?” Marni asked. They’d stopped by one of the courtyard planters and Kiley had pulled out a cigarette, offering her one. “No thanks.”
“Suit yourself,” Kiley said, lighting the cigarette and taking a deep pull. “So this is weird to tell you but I thought you should know.”
“Know what, new girl?”
“Can you stop calling me that? I transferred here freshman year,” Kiley said, knocking her cigarette ash into the palm tree container. “Your dad is, well, fucking my mom.”
Marni felt the courtyard tilt and leaned back on the planter. “What?”
“It’s true. First my mom sent me a text by accident. It was gross. All about how excited she was to see him, how she felt so young. Then, a couple of weeks ago, I caught them making out on the beach.”
Marni stared at Kiley not wanting to believe her, even as a part of her already knew what she was saying was true.
“How do you know it was my dad?” Marni asked.
“Brilliant question. After my sudden departure from the track team, I had plenty of free time to do some detective work,” Kiley said, crushing her cigarette out in the dirt of the planter and leaning against the cold cement beside Marni. Marni slid over a bit, uncomfortable touching the new girl’s arm. “My mom promised me they were over and that it would be our little secret. I didn’t believe her. I saw the look in her eye when they were together on the beach.”
“Oh, God,” Marni said, wishing she smoked. She slid down the side of the planter, landing on the cold concrete. Kiley followed suit.
“I waited until my mom was asleep, swiped her phone, and read all the text messages between them. Because of course it wasn’t over. She’s really pushing him to leave your mom, by the way. And he keeps texting her, saying he has a plan. It’s creepy. She has his contact name as ‘Bob,’ no last name. But I had a photo I snapped of the two of them from a few feet away on the beach. I went on my mom’s Instagram, her Facebook, and then I cross-referenced places where she’d checked in on her Foursquare. She’s so stupid, she had no idea she’s leaving a trail a mile wide.”