The Accidental Bad Girl

by Maxine Kaplan

  She looked great. That was something easy to forget about Ellie: She was very pretty. Her voice was barbed and discordant, and her eyes hard and suspicious, but if she was looking away and keeping her mouth shut, Ellie’s face had a baby-doll sweetness: heart-shaped lips, button nose, rosy cheeks. And that night she had let her ash-brown hair out, keeping the natural curls, rather than employing the aggressive straightening that usually made her look so severe.

  She went to the sink and started washing her hands. “How’s business, Kendall?” she asked.

  I joined her by the mirror and pretended to examine my hair. “I’m not sure what business you’re referring to, El,” I said, keeping my voice as even as possible.

  “The business with the girl in the painted-on dress,” Ellie said, turning to me.

  “Oh, that business!” I slapped my forehead and turned to face her. “You mean my business. So sorry. You can understand why I wouldn’t assume that.”

  Ellie glowered at me, pursing her lips with something that looked like disapproval. Disappointment. I couldn’t take that from Ellie, of all people, so I added, “But I’ll tell Maddie that you liked her dress.”

  Her eyelashes were so long that when her eyes narrowed, they cast little shadows across her cheekbones. “Do,” she said crisply. She slipped past me, muttering as she went, “And tell Mason Frye that I like his dress, too.”

  I looked down at the red dress and tugged up the neckline. It was very low.

  Mason scooped me up as soon as I left the bathroom and spent the next hour introducing me to a merry-go-round of kids styled to look like grown-ups. I stayed on autopilot throughout. My grin and slink were like body armor at this point: I could move freely under the skin of the girl in the photograph.

  I felt itchy from my encounter with Ellie in the bathroom. I had never had to be the girl in the photograph with any of my classmates, to say nothing of people who used to sleep over at my house (Grant excepted). I didn’t like the feeling that I had been ignoring how I might be looking at school. It scared me. And Ellie was the last person I wanted to be able to frighten me.

  Ellie and I had always known just where to press each other. Actually, Ellie had always known exactly where to press anybody, a kind of mean girl superpower. Thinking about it now, I realized that the time we had fought in the hallway, she had purposefully pushed me into a rage with the crack about the liquor store—she knew about the bourbon bottle hidden in my bedroom. It was retaliation. I had surprised her when I zeroed in on her feelings for Audrey. She had thought that was hidden.

  Mason led me back to the bar. I ordered and quickly downed a shot of whiskey. I still didn’t like to think about Ellie’s face when I’d said the thing about her and the girls’ locker room. It made me feel small and sad.

  I looked across the room, and Ellie vanished from my mind. Because, in a corner by a window, Grant was hanging over Simone, grinning and chatting at her like a freight train—chatting at her, not with her, because from what I could tell, Simone was answering in one-word sentences, if at all. She was looking away from him, her back straight as an iron rod, her face totally immobile.

  “Give me a minute,” I said to Mason, leaving his side to try to find an angle where I could see her better. She looked like she was walking away from Grant, but a cater-waiter blocked my view.

  By the time he moved, Simone had her back pressed against the wall and was white as salt. Burke had joined Grant, and the two were flanking her, arms around each other’s shoulders in jovial camaraderie, laughing and gesturing at Simone.

  No. They did not get to talk to Simone.

  I lost control.

  I barreled over to the corner, steamrollering past everyone in my way, and threw myself bodily at Grant and Burke, knocking them away from Simone. Burke stumbled out of my reach, but I managed to catch Grant by the shirt collar and slammed him up against the wall, in the same space Simone had just vacated.

  “You don’t get to speak to her,” I hissed, cutting him off before he had time to speak. “And I will make you sorry someday. If it’s the last thing I do, I’ll make you sorry.”

  Grant pushed me off of him, scowling. “You crazy bitch,” he grunted, but not quietly enough. We were starting to draw an audience.

  I shoved him right back. “Yeah, I’m a crazy bitch. That’s absolutely correct. I’m a crazy bitch who knows exactly what a cowardly, sniveling, pathetic little criminal you are.”

  He laughed bitterly. “Oh, I’m the criminal? Look in the mirror, Skipper. Look at who you’re at this party with. Shit, who’s the one who sold me those pills, what, like, a week ago?”

  “Not those pills,” I growled. “I didn’t sell you the pills you gave to Burke and Pete two years ago to administer to whomever they wanted, whether they were aware of it or not, you complete asshole.” As the color drained out of his face, I turned around and saw a semicircle of spectators surrounding us, with Audrey right out front.

  I froze.

  She was standing very straight and very still, watching carefully. She ignored Grant pulling himself together in the corner and looked at me. It was the first time Audrey had looked at me like that in months, absent malice or carefully controlled rage. Or hurt, I suddenly realized. Our eyes locked, and she inclined her head toward me as if she were asking a question.

  Before I could answer, someone yelled out, “Police, this is a raid!” And all hell broke loose.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  The crowd scattered like confetti. I ran with the rest but not fast enough. Someone caught my wrists from behind and spun me against the bar.

  The cop, a broad-shouldered, dumb-looking guy, called out, “Is this the one?”

  A younger, slimmer uniform jogged up and stared at me. “Matches the description. Small, blond, red dress. Check her ID.”

  The first cop turned back to me. “Hand it over, kid.”

  My ID said that I was seventeen, but my blood alcohol level did not. I didn’t move.

  He rolled his eyes and pulled my bag off of my shoulder. He took out my wallet and flipped it open. “It’s her,” he said. “Kendall Evans.”

  The younger one smirked and pulled out cuffs. He stepped in front of the other cop and, grabbing my forearms, turned me around, pressing me down until my boobs were squashed against the bar.

  “Kendall Evans, you have the right to remain silent,” he intoned, jamming my wrists into the bracelets. “Anything you say can be used against you in a court of law . . .”

  Outside, it was bedlam: a deluge of teens in designer clothes and not enough outerwear frantically hailing cabs, with cops detaining every eighth one, seemingly by random selection. I heard Grant yelling for Audrey to call a lawyer, to get out her wallet—basically to come get him out of trouble—until one of the uniforms got annoyed and threw him against the trunk of a squad car, cuffing him and tossing him into the backseat.

  And then there was Ellie. She was leaning against a lamppost, watching me with her arms crossed. I got closer and realized she wasn’t just watching me; she was waiting for me. I caught her eye as I went by her, my arms restrained behind my back, a cop’s hand between my shoulder blades. Ellie uncrossed her arms and raised a hand in my direction. She paused, smiled, and then lowered the two middle fingers.

  Mess with the bull, you get the horns. Our gym teacher used to do that in middle school, abbreviating it with the hand gesture. We thought it was hilarious, me and Ellie.

  The cop shuffled me toward the squad car, and I craned my head around to see if she was still there. She was.

  I nodded at her through the window. Ellie and I had played the same game for a long time. We both knew the rules.

  I had never really considered the effect of losing Ellie. I thought of the picture I knew used to be tacked up on her bedroom wall. It was of me, Ellie, and Audrey, posing with our arms around each other. Audrey was, of course, in the middle, with Ellie on the right and me on the left. We were on the beach, not quite sixteen, dripping w
ith saltwater and sunshine. Audrey was pursing her lips in a mock-model pose, her eyebrows raised to the sky. Ellie was sticking out her tongue. I looked annoyed.

  I nodded at her again, and she nodded back. I had broken détente. Mutually assured destruction meant that if I exposed her biggest vulnerability, she exposed mine.

  It was almost fair.

  She stayed there the whole time, our eyes locked, as the car drove me away.

  Half an hour later, I was in an interview room, yet again. I was waiting there for a long time, alone, pacing, but eventually the beefy cop joined me.

  “What exactly am I under arrest for?” I asked before he said a word.

  “Settle down,” he said, sitting opposite me. “I just want to ask you some questions.”

  I joined him at the table. “Excellent, we have something in common: questions. Why was I targeted by name?”

  He smiled cockily. “Your friends aren’t as loyal as you think they are. One of them sold you out.”

  “Ohhh,” I said, folding my arms. “So, the reason you sought me out, specifically, in a room full of drunk teenagers, most of whom don’t seem to have been apprehended, was that some other teenage girl told you to. Is that right?”

  He grimaced at me.

  “What did Ellie say I was doing?” I asked.

  “Who said anything about an Ellie?”

  I smiled. “I almost got suspended from school for starting a fight with her a few weeks ago. Seriously, call my school, ask anyone. If anyone was going to spin some bullshit about me, it would be Ellie Kurtz. She’s not exactly reliable.”

  The door opened, and Rockford stepped into the room.

  “Are you Kramer?” Rockford asked the other cop, looking past him to where I sat.

  “Yeah. Who are you?”

  Rockford stepped forward into the light. He looked like shit. He was in a rumpled dress shirt, and I wouldn’t have been surprised if he hadn’t shaved or slept since I left him in the last interrogation room I was in.

  “I’m Detective Rockford from 1PP,” he said in a clipped voice. “I’m taking over this investigation. Go talk to your captain if you have a problem, but he’ll tell you the same.”

  The other cop left. Rockford shut the door behind him and turned back to me.

  “You look nice,” said Rockford, meanly, coming forward and standing on the other side of the desk. “What are you doing here, Kendall?”

  I shrugged and looked away. “You tell me. I just went to a party.”

  “As Mason Frye’s date.”

  “Having bad taste in boys isn’t a crime.”

  He slammed his hands down on the desk and then hung his head. He closed his eyes and stood still and silent for a moment. When he looked up again, his eyes were blazing, but his breath was even. “You sold drugs at this party,” he said, softly, if a little shakily. “And now, unless you do every little thing I say, you’re going to get charged for it.”

  “Wait. There were drugs at that party? I had no idea.”

  “Listen, thug junior—”

  “No, you listen,” I hissed, leaning into his face, cutting him off. “You’re not going to find a single person at that party who saw me giving anybody any drugs, let alone selling them. If Ellie says she saw me do it, she’s lying. You’re the one who’s going to have explaining to do, not me.”

  There was a knock on the door. “What!” yelled Rockford.

  The door opened, and a curly-haired woman in uniform poked her head in. “You have the underage drinker in here? Kendall Evans? She made bail.”

  I laughed out loud. I stood up and walked past Rockford, who looked ready to pull his hair out.

  “Is she really mad?” I asked the female officer as we walked out, sobering up and realizing just how pissed my mother was going to be.

  “Is who mad?”

  “My mother. She posted my bail?”

  The woman laughed. “I don’t think so, honey. That takes babies having babies to a whole new level. But she is eighteen, so she could bail you out, no trouble.”

  I turned the corner and locked eyes with Audrey, standing alone and still in the middle of the crowded police station. The cop lifted up my hands and unfastened the cuffs.

  “That’s you done, hon,” she said cheerfully. “Don’t let me see you back here.”

  She dropped my wrists, and I walked slowly toward Audrey. She held out my purse, confiscated when I had first gotten to the station. I looked down at it and then up at her.

  Audrey was rarely visibly ruffled, and this was no exception. But her brow was furrowed and her mouth turned down at the edges. She looked like she hadn’t been sleeping. She looked sad.

  I took the bag from her as gently as I could. She seemed satisfied with that and nodded at me a little. I nodded back at her, and we started to walk toward the door, side by side, her long legs slowing a little and my short ones skipping to keep up—almost as if we’d done it every day for a decade.

  “Audrey!”

  We both turned and saw Grant struggling against a cop in the doorway of a side room. “Thank god you’re here,” he called out. “Do you have my bail?”

  Audrey broke away and strode over to him, facing away from me. He relaxed as she came near, breaking into a smile.

  “Babe,” he said, relieved.

  There was a sound of sucking back saliva, and then an impressive glob of it was rolling down Grant’s gob-smacked face.

  Audrey turned back toward me, neatly scraping spit off her lips with a fingernail.

  “Let’s go,” she said. All I could do was nod.

  Before I left, I glanced back at Grant, wiping the spit off his face with his wrist and sneering, not at Audrey, but at me. “So I’m the asshole, but your new boyfriend gets a pass? Fucking hypocrite.”

  Once outside, in the fresh chill of the air, Audrey turned to face me. Her hand twitched by her side. If we were guys, she might have stuck it out for a firm, fence-mending handshake. But we weren’t guys, we were girls, and we had hurt each other. I grabbed her hand, holding it fast by her side.

  I squeezed it, not looking at her. After a moment, she squeezed it back.

  We dropped hands and crossed the street in different directions.

  All I wanted to do then was go blank, but when I opened the front door to my house, I heard familiar voices in the kitchen: familiar voices mingling in an unfamiliar way.

  My mother and Mason were sitting across from each other at the table, each with their hands clasped around steaming mugs of tea.

  Mason noticed me first. “Kendall! I lost you at the party. I heard it got a little crazy—you make it out OK? No problems?”

  My eyes darted over to my mother, but she wasn’t looking at me. Her focus was fixed steadily on Mason.

  “I’m fine,” I answered, nodding so he would know that his business was fine, too. “What are you doing here?”

  My mom answered. “When Mr. Frye got separated from you at the party and couldn’t get you on your cell, he got worried. He said he was in the neighborhood and thought he would check in on you here.”

  “That was nice of him,” I said mechanically.

  “Wasn’t it? I thought so.” Her voice was pleasant and her mouth was smiling, but her eyes never left Mason’s face, and they were as hard as I’d ever seen them.

  Mason stood up. “Well, since Kendall’s OK, I won’t keep you anymore, Mrs. Evans.”

  “Oh, you’re not keeping me.” She began to stand as well, but he held out a hand to stop her. To my surprise, she looked at me, a question in her face—she was looking for my lead. I nodded slightly, and she sat back down.

  “No, really,” Mason said, smiling. “I do have to go. I have to meet my father.”

  “You do?” I asked, surprised.

  “Sadly, I do. But it was really nice to meet you, Mrs. Evans.” He stuck out his hand.

  “And you, Mr. Frye,” answered my mother, reaching over the table. “And thank you again for being so concerned abo
ut Kendall.”

  He smiled. “Nothing concerns me more.”

  “I’ll walk you out,” I said, breaking into their handshake. It had lasted a few seconds longer than seemed necessary.

  When we got to the front door, I followed him out onto the porch, wrapping my bare arms around my chest in the cold.

  “What the hell are you doing here?” I hissed, looking over my shoulder. “I live here. You can’t be here.”

  “Trust me, I realize that nothing about tonight has been ideal,” he said glumly. “I wouldn’t have come, except I have to ask you a favor.”

  “And it couldn’t have waited until tomorrow?”

  “No.” He pulled a manila envelope out of his inside breast pocket. “I really do have to meet my father. But he’s in Texas. So I need you to take care of something while I’m out of town.”

  I took the envelope from his offering hand. “How long are you going to be gone?”

  “Not sure. But this can’t wait any longer. I have to see him now.”

  “Are we shutting down?” I asked hopefully.

  “Far from it. I mean, yes, you won’t be making deliveries while I’m gone, but what you will be doing is ensuring that you can make more when I get back. Open it.”

  Inside were four plain white envelopes. They were addressed to different people at different addresses in the New York metropolitan area.

  “You want me to mail four letters? That’s your favor?”

  “Kiddo, I want you to hand deliver them. You are my courier, are you not? I don’t trust them in the mail.”

  I clutched them a little tighter. “What’s in them?”

  He didn’t answer. Checking his wristwatch, he said, “I’ve got to get to the airport. Where’s a good place to catch a cab around here?”

  I pointed to the left. “Go to Seventh and Ninth. If you don’t have luck there, walk down to Fifth, but you shouldn’t have a problem on a Friday night.” I was relieved at how calm my voice sounded. Clearly, I needed him to leave, so that I could open those envelopes.

  “Thanks,” he said. Then he took a step up until he was standing very close to me on the landing. There was maybe an inch between us. He leaned in, closing the gap at our chests and our skulls.