Trouble Never Sleeps

by Stephanie Tromly

  • • •

  All I wanted to do when I got home from school was to bake up some wings and put on some fake reality so I could watch people survive worse things than my current situation and feel maybe things weren’t so bad. I tried to comfort myself with the thought that I’d survived the trek through the desert of high school friendlessness before but the idea that none of the supposed new friends I had managed to make were working out made me even sadder. Digby, Sloane, Henry, Felix . . . yeah, okay. But shenanigan friends were different from lip gloss and lunchtimes. A girl needs both.

  I was actually starting to feel better halfway through my meat and garbage TV binge, but then the horrible thought occurred to me that I’d have to get up and have the same crappy day all over again. And the next and the next until the people at school found someone else to ridicule. And then I realized if I self-soothed like this after every school day, I’d be headed for a coronary before summer vacation.

  The detritus of my pity party filled the kitchen trashcan and when I went outside to dump it, I recognized a familiar logo on a lipstick-stained napkin sitting on the top of our trash. It was from a café in our old neighborhood in Brooklyn. Mom still talked about how much she missed their coffee.

  “She was in the city?” I said. Just to make sure I wasn’t looking at an old napkin she’d found and only now just thrown away, I rubbed the lipstick mark. The pigment was fresh enough to still smear under my finger. “She was in the city.”

  * * *

  • • •

  I mumbled my way through dinner. My mother didn’t seem to notice I’d put a little extra mustard on my usual hostility dog and, of course, that pissed me off even more. I watched her mouth move as she rattled off some weird account of her day at work without really hearing what her singsong voice was trying to tell me.

  I was in bed reading when she knocked, opened my door, and said, “Everything all right?” She had a huge smile on her face that annoyed me even more.

  “I’m fine,” I said.

  “Are you sure?” She ignored my attempt to blow her off and came over to the bed to feel my forehead. “I don’t think you have a fever.”

  “No, I don’t have a fever,” I said. “But . . . I might have one tomorrow morning.” I was sort of kidding when I’d said it, but taking a sick day did sound good.

  “Oh?” she said. “Do I need to worry? Are you actually sick?”

  “No, I’m just tired,” I said. “Worst case, I’ll have a mild cold that could last until Wednesday.” She made me move over so she could sit next to me on the bed.

  “Sounds serious.”

  “No, no. I’m okay,” I said.

  “I know what it is. You’ve checked out of school, right? Mentally, I mean,” she said. “I bet you’re dying to get out of here.” She hugged me. “Oh, Zoe. Thank you for being so so good about moving here with me. I’m going to miss you. But this is right. You belong back in the city.”

  “Mother.” I peeled her off me. “Is this about the summer? I’m gone for two weeks.”

  “Zo-e.” Mom bobbed her head side to side in that inside-joke way. “I know. I know.”

  “You ‘know’ what?” I said.

  “I know,” Mom said. “About Prentiss . . .”

  “You do?” I said. “How?”

  “I woke up after you got home from the party and when I came in here to check on you, I found you passed out in your sleeping bag, holding that letter like . . .” She mimed how I’d been sleeping with my fist clutched against my chest. “I’m so proud of you. Congratulations, babe.” She hugged me. “You see? You didn’t even need your dad’s help.”

  “You told him already?” I said.

  “Your dad? No. I thought you’d want to tell him yourself.” She looked confused. “Why? Is something the matter?”

  “I just need time to decide if I’m going,” I said.

  “Time to decide? What do you mean you need time to decide?” Her smile dropped. “Zoe. Of course you are going to that school.”

  “I don’t know, Mother,” I said.

  “Are you playing hard to get now?” she said. “After all the emotional blackmail crap you’ve been pulling on me for moving you out of New York City? You need time to decide?”

  “‘Emotional blackmail crap’? So when you said I was really good about moving here, you were just being nice because you thought I was leaving?” I said.

  “Zoe, I’m confused,” she said. “Is this about that boy?”

  “I assume you mean Digby,” I said.

  “How many times have I said it? Never change your life to fit a boy’s.” She jumped off the bed and said, “The closest thing I have to a regret is dropping out of grad school—”

  “Okay, yes, thank you. This is all great advice, Mother. Super helpful. Not at all condescending,” I said. “And by the way, didn’t you drop out of school because you were pregnant with me?”

  “Zoe.” She put on her therapy-approved soothing Mom voice. “All I’m saying is . . . I don’t want to see you making big life decisions based on hormones and what feels good in the moment—”

  “Hormones? And ‘what feels good in the moment’?” I said. “Do you mean, like, cheating on your current relationship with your ex-husband?” I got a rush from watching the shocked expression cross her face.

  “Is this still about the texts from your dad inviting us on a family trip? I’ve told you. I was just trying to be friendlier with him . . . for my own sanity. I was sick of our divorce being so predictably petty,” she said. “How could I know I’d sweep him off his feet just by being civil?”

  “Ohhh . . . I see. You didn’t mean to lead him on.” Even before I’d blurted it out, I knew what I was about to say was wrong. But I was too angry to stop. “There isn’t a little part of you that wanted to mess with his new marriage? Maybe show that skank Shereene”—I leaned on my father’s new wife’s name and enjoyed the cheap thrill of watching my mother’s face fall—“that cheaters can’t change their spots? How far did you go to show her? Hey, what did you tell Cooper you were doing yesterday?”

  “Zoe.”

  I could see my mother struggling to repress whatever mean comment she had in the barrel to fire back at me. “I can’t believe you’re doing this again,” I said. “You never learn.”

  “And what, exactly, haven’t I learned?” she said.

  I didn’t feel like getting any further into it but I’d gotten her going, so I didn’t see that I had a choice. I sighed.

  “If you’re going to attack the entire history of my relationships, then you’re going to have to do better than a judgmental sigh,” she said.

  “It’s so annoying watching you do the same things with Cooper that you did with Dad,” I said. “You withhold, then you’re outraged when they give up and check out on you.”

  “Wait. I withhold? You think your father checked out on our marriage because I was withholding?” she said. “Are you blaming me? For his cheating?”

  I suddenly worried that maybe that was exactly what I was implying.

  “Careful, Zoe. You are punching way above your weight,” she said. “And what am I supposedly withholding from Mike?”

  I opened my dresser drawer and pulled out the dirty napkin I’d dug out of the trash. I threw it on the bed.

  And then, emboldened by my mother’s silence, I said, “Did you at least get him to pay for your plane ticket? Or do liberated women go Dutch on booty calls?”

  And I thought I’d won the fight when she just turned and walked out of my room. In fact, I’d already moved on to struggling with the guilt of having been mean to her when she walked back in and threw a thick envelope on the bed.

  “Open it,” she said.

  “What is it?” When she didn’t answer, I opened it to find money. Lots of money. Money bound in thick bank-fresh bundles.
“Is this Dad’s money?”

  “It’s my money,” she said. “I went to the jewelry place near our old apartment and sold my engagement ring. I wanted to make sure we could pay for boarding at Prentiss.”

  “What? Why?” I said.

  “Why?” she said. “What do you mean ‘why’? Your father will definitely pay for tuition, but unless you want to live with him and Shereene . . .” She pointed at the cash on the bed.

  “I don’t even know that I’m going yet,” I said.

  “I mean, maybe I misread this situation. But what else was I supposed to think? I assumed you wanted to go. You went and did all this applying . . . in secret . . .” Mom paused. “How did you do all this, by the way? Didn’t they need paperwork from your parents?”

  “The proof of financial ability stuff? Yeah, they did ask for that,” I said. “I used the copies you had on file from your mortgage application for this house.”

  “Wow. Pretty crafty,” she said. “But see what I mean? That takes real effort. How was I supposed to know you weren’t serious about going?”

  “I need to think about it, Mom.”

  “Do you want to think about it together?” she said.

  “No thanks. You know I like to think for myself.” I handed the envelope of money back to her. “I’m sorry you went to this trouble.”

  “You and I need to work on our communication. And of course Mike knew what I went into the city to do. He and I have our ups and downs but we’re on the same page for the big things.” Mom picked up the dirty napkin from the bed. “You have a big, beautiful brain, Zoe. Don’t use it to make yourself miserable.”

  SIX

  I spent the next morning lolling around in bed, trying to convince myself that the excused absence note I got from my mother wasn’t totally a lie because I felt legit bad enough to justify skipping school. But then I started thinking about the last time I serial skipped, before my parents got divorced, and I remembered how after two days, I basically felt like I couldn’t go back to school. I spent so much more energy digging myself out of that trap than I would have if I just hadn’t started skipping in the first place. I decided to take my chances and got dressed.

  I was oblivious with my headphones on and my head in my locker when Sloane poked me in the ribs.

  “Damn it, Sloane,” I said. “What?”

  “What is all this?” She waved her hand to indicate my clothes.

  “What does it look like?” I said.

  “It looks like we have a possible school shooter,” she said. “What are you wearing?”

  “I just thought it might help me gut it out today.” I pointed at my all-black-everything outfit. “I kicked a lot of ass in these clothes.”

  “Then why didn’t you wear your prom dress with the glued-on feathers? You blew up an entire house in that thing,” Sloane said. “Or have you already released it back into the wild?”

  “Can we just move on to the conversation you came over here to have with me? Or was this just a drive-by insult assault?” I said. “Where were you yesterday?”

  “I took a personal day,” Sloane said. “Actually, I’m surprised you came to school . . . have you seen . . . ? Or are you not doing any social media right now? Because wait until you see what that little—”

  “Careful. Phrasing,” I said. But then I glanced down at her phone and saw the hashtag below a post of my picture. “‘Ugly ho’?”

  “Yes, she sure is,” Sloane said. “You know, sometimes, that’s just the right word.”

  “No, I’m reading out the hashtags on these posts about me.” I grabbed her phone. “They’re calling me ugly now too? What happened? I feel like it’s getting worse.”

  “That’s what I’m trying to tell you. It got worse when someone posted that you get off on hooking up with guys who are already taken and that you did the same thing with Henry as you did with Digby,” Sloane said.

  “‘Someone’?” I said. “It wasn’t you, was it?”

  “Ha-ha,” Sloane said.

  But we both knew who it was.

  Sloane rolled her eyes at me and we both said, “Bill.”

  “She is human click bait,” I said.

  “She is, like, my greatest fear,” Sloane said.

  Despite myself, I kept scrolling. “Sloane . . .” I showed her the phone’s screen. It was a picture of Henry and me talking very closely. “This post is yours.”

  “That’s an old post of mine that got reposted today,” Sloane said.

  “Hashtag SwiperNoSwiping, hashtag Skank, hashtag ShadyHo?” I said. “Those are your hashtags.”

  “Those are old,” Sloane said. “It’s from back when you were—”

  “I know, I know. From back when I was making a move on your boyfriend,” I said. “Speaking of whom . . .” I pointed down the hall to where Henry was standing, looking around with a little lost boy expression on his face. “Is he okay?”

  “Ugh. He’s being super-high-maintenance. He doesn’t know who to trust . . . he doesn’t want to be around his teammates,” Sloane said. “He follows me everywhere. Literally, he tried to follow me into the bathroom this morning.”

  I gave her phone back.

  “But I thought you should know,” Sloane said.

  “Yep,” I sighed. “Now I know.”

  * * *

  • • •

  I went into the library right at the end of the day. I was hoping to avoid running the hallway gauntlet of people letting off whatever last little bit of meanness and poison they had left in their tanks before heading back to their home-cooked meals and good-night kisses. I’d just walked up to the librarian’s desk when I spotted Bill herself sitting at one of the nearby computers.

  I didn’t even break stride. I just executed a tight turn and walked straight back out the door. I kept a brisk pace in case she’d spotted me. My heart sank when I heard her yell my name. I picked up speed and started making random turns until I cornered myself in a hallway that dead-ended. I turned around to run but boom, there she was.

  Bill put her hands up and cowered. “I come in peace.”

  “What do you want?” I said.

  “Can we talk?” Bill said.

  I said again, “What do you want?”

  “Things are getting crazy,” she said. “For a while, you and I were trending—”

  “Stop acting like you’re surprised. You created this monster,” I said.

  Bill said, “Actually, it only really took off after Sloane’s old posts got bumped up—”

  “What do you want, Bill?” I said. “Or are you just here to give me a progress report on my garbage fire of a junior year?”

  “I have an idea about how we can stop this,” Bill said. “Stop all the social media hate.” She paused for applause.

  “Well?” I was interested enough not to walk away.

  “I think we should write something. Together,” Bill said. “A she said–she said.”

  “‘Why is it a girl-versus-girl thing?’ ‘Guy gets a pass when he was the one cheating?’” I said. “Does that sound like the articles you had in mind?”

  “Plus a little something about love triangles,” Bill said. “Why they happen—”

  “Love triangles happen because people get confused about their feelings for the partner they already have,” I said. “High school is hundreds of people at peak horniness spending eight hours a day together while being told that absolutely no way can they have sex. There’s going to be confusion.”

  “Hey, now I’m worried your half will be better than mine,” Bill said.

  “Number one, if I ever did write it, it would certainly be better than yours,” I said. “But number two, I would never write it because it’s a cliché.”

  “It’s a cliché? You’re a cliché,” Bill said. “First Henry, then Digby—”

&
nbsp; “I’m not getting into this with you because even though I hate your guts and want to punch you directly in the face, we are both better than this conversation,” I said. And then I realized what she’d been implying. “Wait. Are you telling me that you could stop my cybertorture if I agree to write this thing with you?”

  Bill looked shifty when she said, “I think so.”

  “You ‘think so’?” I came to my senses. She was full of it. “Dream on, Bill. You might’ve kicked off this nightmare, but you can’t do squat now.” I laughed in her face. “I bet you need to write something to remind people you were involved in the first place.” I turned and walked away. “Why am I even talking to you?”

  * * *

  • • •

  Having made it through the school day, I went to the mall to go to work. Or at least, I tried to. The sickening feeling of reality shifting faster than I could handle got even more intense when I arrived to find the bookstore was shut. I got some of my frustration out by kicking the metal grate pulled down over the glass doors. Actually, it felt so nice I kicked it twice. On the second kick, I noticed a flyer for one of the Japanese restaurants in the mall tucked in the slats. The small fish on the logo was circled in red pen.

  It felt like a Digby thing. I looked around me, fully expecting to see him standing off to the side with an obnoxious smirk on his face, watching me to see how long I’d take to get whatever joke the fish in the circle was supposedly telling. But he wasn’t there. And then I realized the circled fish was probably a message from Fisher.

  I got to the Japanese restaurant and found Fisher sitting at the bar. Except the long-haired book-loving secondhand bookstore manager hippie I’d known was gone. This Fisher had a new, high and tight haircut and wore a fitted golf shirt over khakis. This Fisher looked like the kind of guy the Digby family would’ve hired to negotiate with Sally’s kidnappers.

  “The store didn’t open today?” I said.

  “I didn’t think you’d want to run the place on your own,” Fisher said. “Greg gets promoted to manager starting tomorrow.”