“Just be careful,” my mom says. “Take care of yourself.” She stares into my face and takes a deep breath. “So, is it about time we had that sex talk?”
“Mom!” I blurt out the word, caught off guard.
“Well, Luke sure is handsome these days…and the way he was looking at you. Oh, Layla, am I too late?”
“Well, they gave us that talk in sixth or seventh grade at school, I think…”
“Layla.”
“Mom.” I lower my gaze and decide to go ahead, painful but quick. Like tearing off a bandage. “Yes, mom. When Luke and I were away together, all the closeness we shared before came right back, and I decided…he was the one.”
“Oh, no,” my mom says, covering her open mouth with her hands. I don’t know what to do with this reaction or her subsequent staring, so I sit and wait, feeling empty. Then, she reaches out to hug me to her. “I didn’t mean to say that. It’s just…this isn’t easy. You’ve gone and grown up while I was looking the other way.”
My confusion turns to sadness. We used to be pretty good at this talking thing, once upon a time, before the world crumbled around my dad and her.
“Wait, though,” she says, pulling back from me, wiping tears from her face. “I can’t approve of this. You know that.”
“I get it. No more sneaking into my room. He’s only ever come here to talk, though, just so we’re clear.”
“Good. If he comes over again, he comes in through the front door. No bedroom anymore, at all. And…as for the other, I don’t know what to say, except I should take you to the doctor…and you need to be careful…and safe. And if you have any questions…”
“I know: I can ask you.”
“Actually, I was going to direct you to the internet, but…”
We both laugh, and my mom goes quiet, watching my face. While her eyes are on me, I try not to think of how I haven’t checked my calendar for the little starred reminder by one of its dates. There have been so many things going on since Luke and I came home that maybe it’s genuinely slipped my mind, or maybe it’s something I’ve been avoiding. I’ve always been pretty regular, month after month, and it’s not something I’ve ever had to worry about in the past. But now? I still don’t know when my period is due.
Luke and I were careful, so it shouldn’t be a concern. Other than the fact that nothing’s foolproof.
“Layla, are you sure about this?” My mom’s question breaks through my thoughts. “I mean, if you have to sneak around so people won’t judge, is that really a commitment?”
“We’re figuring that out, I think.”
“And what about the fact that you hated him not too long ago? Didn’t he beat up Evan?”
“No. I mean, yes. He did hit Evan, but it turns out Evan was talking trash about me, so not so bad, in a certain light.” I never told her about how Luke knocked me down in the hallway and failed to help me pick up my things. Thank goodness. That would have been a lot more difficult to explain.
“Layla, if he’s got some kind of violent streak…”
“He doesn’t.”
“But his father has a bad temper.”
“I know, but that isn’t Luke’s fault.”
“Of course not, but you know what they say about apples falling from trees. He could’ve picked up bad habits from his dad.”
“He’s better than that. Mom, I promise you…he’s a good guy.”
“Well, even if the other stuff is true…good guys don’t make girls hide their relationships.”
Twenty-Three
The Deep End
Luke stops at my locker Wednesday morning while there’s a lull in the hall traffic. “How’d it go with your mom last night?”
“Lots of questions.” I don’t say what they were.
“So, front door from now on?” he asks, guessing at my mom’s new regulations, and I nod in reply. He glances around the hallway. “Okay. Sorry if I caused any trouble.”
“Not your fault,” I say. “Well, not entirely.”
He gives me a half-smile, holding my gaze. I’m about to tell him what I never got the chance to say last night—that my cell phone’s back, courtesy of Jared as a favor to my mom—when his friends start walking toward us, traveling in their usual, borderline-obnoxious, bigger-than-life style. Luke steps back, lifts his Spanish book, tips it at me, and says, “Thanks for your help.”
I narrow my eyes at him, and he frowns, dropping his gaze, just before turning away.
“What was that about?” Nina asks, coming up behind me.
My stomach is tight and my eyes are burning. I turn to her mostly to avoid seeing Luke pal around with his friends. “I couldn’t tell you if I tried.”
♦ ♦ ♦
Luke catches me just before I head into Spanish class.
“I’m sorry…about earlier.”
“Are you?” I glance around the hall. “I guess it’s safe to say so, now that your friends are out of earshot.”
“Don’t. It’s not that. It’s Marissa. She’s gone off the deep end a little more than usual, and I didn’t want word getting back to her about anything between us.”
“Why do you care so much about what she thinks?”
“It’s not what she thinks. It’s just…she’s kind of a mess. She seems harsh sometimes, I know, but she’s really fragile. Super insecure.”
“Could’ve fooled me.”
“You don’t know her.”
“Well, maybe you don’t, either.” He stares at me, waiting for more, so I continue. “The girl practically has fangs, Luke. Do you know how she treats people?”
“I know she can be rough, but—”
“No, never mind. Forget all the times she’s said nasty things or messed with me, had her friends join in. I don’t feel like hearing you defend her. Maybe it would be easier for you and Marissa if we stopped this, here and now. Things can go back to the way they were and you two can carry on your dysfunctional relationship in peace.”
“That’s not what I want at all.” He reaches out for me and I push his hand back, forcing him to remember.
Two cheerleaders come around the corner. Their eyes go over Luke’s back, and their expressions harden as they settle on my face.
“I have no interest in any of this,” I say, turning away from him to head into the classroom.
I don’t look at him once during Spanish. What would be the point? I skip lunch and head to the library, mostly because I don’t feel like seeing him or Marissa.
Evan finds me there, instead.
“Hey, Layls,” he says, coming up behind me as I struggle with a make-up assignment at one of the tables.
He puts his hand on the back of my chair and bends too close, peering at my notebook. “Spanish? Isn’t that the class you have with Captain Football?”
“I don’t know who you mean,” I tell him, still writing, “and don’t call me, ‘Layls.’”
“Ooh, touchy. Guess you’re upset about all those rumors. I understand.”
“What rumors?” I don’t look up at him, but I can’t help that my pen has stopped moving.
“People are saying while you and the Jock King were away, you know…”
“I don’t know.”
“Come on, Layla. They’re saying you two kept each other warm. You know…effed each other’s brains out,” he says, leaning to whisper into my ear.
I want to slap him, but I’m too shocked to move.
“I mean, I’d totally cheat on that Marissa chick with you, too, but we both know those phony football and cheerleader types fit together. And we also know you’re not an easy piece of ass. Right?”
I can’t speak. I’m too angry, too upset. Too busy doubting myself: what happened in the cabin had to be about caring and true affection. It couldn’t have been two people using one another to feel less lonely. Could it? With the way things are between Luke and me at present, what does that say about what we shared?
“Layla,” Evan says, leaning close, reaching out to
take my hand in his. “I can help. If you and I are together, all those rumors will just die off. Things’ll go back to the way they’re supposed to be.”
I stare at him, trying to process everything he’s said, until movement in the hallway beyond the library’s glass wall catches my eye. My head jerks up.
It’s Marissa. She’s holding up her phone, its screen directed at Evan and me as I snake my hand from his grasp. The shock in my face must be impressive, because watching my reaction, her glare turns into a smile. The second expression is about a billion times more menacing than the first.
♦ ♦ ♦
I don’t see Luke for the rest of the day, and even after the final bell rings and I try to call his cell, he doesn’t answer. Since I’m the one who added my name to his contacts, I’m certain he knows it’s me.
I stop calling after the third attempt.
Maybe Evan’s right. Or at least, maybe I don’t know Luke as well as I thought I did.
I get into my car, cursing under my breath, but before I can push the key into the ignition, someone’s knocking on the window.
I lean over to see who it is, though I can already guess by his torso. I know his torso, better than I know his mind. What does that tell me?
I unlock the door and Luke drops into the passenger seat without a word. He sits there, his jaw clenched, and waits.
“Marissa told you what she saw,” I say.
He doesn’t look at me. “She told me what she saw, and when I didn’t believe her, she showed me a picture. Then, I had no choice.”
I don’t want to think about how that moment felt. If I’d seen a photo of Marissa holding his hand while he gazed at her…no, I don’t want to think about that, either. Those types of pictures shouldn’t happen, ever.
“I’m really sorry you had to see that, Luke,” I say. “If it helps, I can tell you it’s not what it looked like.”
His gaze touches mine briefly. It’s long enough to witness the shadows in his eyes. “That’s the truth?”
“Yes.”
“Can you tell me what it was, then?”
“Well, to start, there was nothing mutual about it. Mostly, it was me being stunned while Evan told me I should get back together with him, so the rumors about you and I ‘effing our brains out’ would die off. People seem to think you cheated on Marissa with me, Luke. Do you know that?”
He turns to me and the darkness has spread throughout his features. “She’s saying I didn’t break up with her before we left. That’s why I was weird this morning. I’ve been trying to talk to her, but all she’ll say is I’m a liar and a cheater. And now, I can’t even remember what I said before I left for the ski trip. I know I wanted to be away from her, for all of this to be finished finally…”
“She’s manipulating you, Luke. Can’t you see that? She’s playing mind games to keep you trapped, and from what I’ve glimpsed of your relationship troubles in the past, I’d guess she’s been at it for a while.”
He rubs a hand over his forehead and I want to hug him, rescue him, make everything all better.
“Luke.” I shift toward him, touching his arm. He responds instantly, his face lifting to mine, his hand reaching out to cup my head, tangle in my hair; then he’s telling me how much he misses me, kissing me so that I can only breathe in gasps.
One of his hands has moved under my shirt and the other has slid behind my back to draw me forward, like he’s hoping to guide me into his lap, when I realize I’m going to have to act as the voice of reason. It takes time to pry myself away from him, to fight off every impulse telling me to stay in his arms and say to hell with the rest of the world, but we’re in the parking lot, at school, surrounded by windows—slightly fogged windows, yes, but an abundance of transparency just the same.
When I resist, his kisses stop, his touches stop. “I’m sorry,” he says, his voice rough. He lets go of me and slumps against the seat, breathless, his head tipped back.
“This is so wrong,” he says. “I just want to be with you—that’s all I want—but I know the problems it’ll cause and how much people suck and…I fucking hate it.” He turns his face to mine. “Can we go back to the cabin? No, the underworld; it’s warmer there.”
Before I can figure out how to reply, the text notification sounds on my phone. It dings again and then again. “Maybe I should check that.”
Luke nods as I lift my cell and scroll through the messages, all from Nina.
“So much for escaping anything,” I say.
“What?”
I hold my phone up for Luke, so he can read Nina’s texts.
It’s EVERYWHERE.
Call me!
Luke takes my phone, scrolling back through the messages to the image that preceded them. His eyes widen. Though a little difficult to discern at first glance, it’s a shot of us kissing in my car, taken only a few minutes ago. It’s pretty obvious whose tongues are in whose mouths and, if you look closely, you can see my shirt is raised, right where Luke’s arm disappears beneath it.
I guess the cheating rumors about us are on their way to becoming fact, regardless of whether or not they’re founded on the truth.
Twenty-Four
Assembled Sordidness
By Thursday morning, the glares I’ve received ever since Luke and I first returned from the mountains have sharpened; hackles are raised. I’m a slut, a blackmailer, a witch. A vamp, too, which I’d almost appreciate as clever if it weren’t directed at me, and also, inaccurate. I’ve lost track of the rest and, anyway, it depends on who’s throwing the barbs, and how they imagine I’ve made Luke succumb to my seductions.
My friends continue to stick by me, for the most part. Nina and Josie, of course, and some of the others from our group, too. Beth has been nasty, but that’s pretty much to be expected, knowing what I do about her. Evan, too, wears a permanent scowl.
Finally, I take enough notice of the gloom in his face to ask Nina why he’s so miserable. Considering that we’ve been broken up since before Christmas, he’s taking the kissing-Luke photo awfully personally.
“Oh, him?” Nina says. “Well, you’ve made a fool of him, haven’t you? Especially if he was sincere about getting back together. Of course, that’s not what he’s telling everyone. He’s saying you were leading him on, when all this time you were sleeping with the guy who jumped him in gym class. …By the way, please, please confirm, once and for all, that you are, in fact, sleeping with the guy who jumped him in gym class.”
“Nina.”
“I’ll accept that as a ‘yes.’”
“So, does everyone believe Evan?”
“No idea. Evan may not fit well into the mainstream, but we both know he’s a leader among our people. A king of freaks and weirdos. They probably figure it’s easier to go along with him than to try talking him into sanity. It’ll die down eventually, especially if he can get back inside Beth’s purple pleather pants. God, those things are ugly. Anyway, she was pissed when he was pushing her away to get back to you, but the poor thing has no self-worth. She’ll come running soon enough.”
I don’t care much about what Evan or Beth think or do, but I’m bothered that others in our group seem to have rallied against me. Which would hurt more, guilt or innocence? If I’d done what people are saying—cheated with Luke, schemed to get close to him—I could at least understand their anger, but no one seems to care that the reality of the situation might be different from what they’ve heard. Then again, people usually cling to one side of a story, when they’re all multifaceted. Why should I be surprised if they’re hanging onto the side that isn’t mine?
Josie comes to join Nina and me, cloistered as we are in one of our favorite meeting spots: the vestibule between two sets of double doors at a back corner of the school. Our very own Decompression Chamber.
“What’s going on?” she asks, giving me a sad smile, reaching out to take my hand. Her grasp is loose; my fingers slip through hers, before our arms drop back to our sides.
“Just talking about how our group is being shitty, because Evan’s a liar,” Nina answers for me.
“Oh. They suck, for sure, but I think most of it comes from the guys’ general pissiness over the locker room fight. It’s easier for them to see Evan as the victim again, especially when it’s an ‘us versus jock’ thing.”
“Never mind that Luke only hit Evan because he was talking trash about me,” I say. “Not that it matters, now that everyone in the school is doing the same thing.”
“Is that why Luke beat him up?” Nina asks. “I told you he had to have a good reason. He’s too hot not to.”
She winks at me and I find the will to laugh.
“There’s our girl, Jos,” Nina says, wrapping me up in her arms.
Josie leans in, joining the hug. “You still have Neen and me, so what more could you want?”
♦ ♦ ♦
By the end of a day filled with scowls and scandal, sneers and sordidness, what I want most is a break.
I’m not thinking clearly, so I make the mistake of following the sidewalk out to my car, rather than cutting across the parking lot, and end up passing right by the sports’ equipment shack, head down, watching my boots skim over cracks in the cement. A low rumble approaches as I near the shack—the deep verbal chaos signifying a group of males—and Luke and a bunch of other football players push through the doors, out into the open, carrying orange cones, footballs, and other sports paraphernalia. With his head turned the other way, Luke doesn’t hear me say his name, and almost walks right into me.
“Oh hey, sorry Layla,” he says, catching himself just before impact, looking like his day’s been nearly as rough as mine.
“Owens, dude, don’t bang her here…er, I mean bang into her…” one of the junior guys says, quickly, so as not to lose the opportunity.
“Shut the fuck up, Lawson.” Luke doesn’t even bother to look at the speaker.
“Go to hell,” the guy says, and walks off griping.
Another one—a freshman, maybe a sophomore—steps beside me, eyes me up and down, and says, “Wanna go to the mountains with me next time?”
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