How to Break a Boy

by Laurie Devore

  “I’m allergic to peanut butter!” one of the freshmen yells, panicked.

  “We’ll see about that,” Adrienne says as Anna places the jar in her hand.

  Without thinking about it, I run forward and put myself between Adrienne and the girl. “Enough,” I say.

  Adrienne rolls her eyes. “What are you doing, O?”

  “You heard her,” I say, my voice steady. “She’s allergic.”

  Adrienne pulls out a clump of peanut butter with her finger. “It’s not like she’s going to die.”

  “How do you know that?” I challenge.

  “Oh, so this is what you’re going to do now, huh? That’s hilarious. Come on!” she says. All of a sudden she’s trying to lunge past me, but I grab her shoulders and shove her back. The plastic jar falls to the ground; everyone goes silent. Adrienne stares at me.

  I bend down and pick up the jar, chucking it across the playground. Close enough to lean near Adrienne’s ear, I whisper, “What the fuck is wrong with you?” I turn on my heel and walk past Whit. “We’re leaving,” I tell him.

  “Jesus, I was kidding!” Adrienne says, laughing still. Then her laugh catches for a minute. “She’s not that good in bed, you know!” she yells for everyone to hear. I stop in my tracks. “I mean, you probably already do know. But that’s what Ethan said. He prefers me a lot, he said.”

  In my head, I beg him not to, but Whit turns around anyway.

  “You think you have a lot of power, don’t you? Screaming at cheerleaders, threatening them with sexual assault and deathly allergic reactions. Do you think you’re important to anyone who matters? Do you think anyone out here isn’t waiting to watch you self-destruct? They all saw the texts. You’re living on borrowed time. And getting with Ethan Masters? Everyone knows a desperate move when they see one.” There it is—everything I’ve always thought about us, about me and Adrienne, in those angry words. I’ve been waiting so long for someone to finally say them.

  He said them to Adrienne.

  That’s terrifying. Everyone knows that’s terrifying, but he isn’t scared.

  Adrienne’s face darkens. “Nice try.” She flips her hair over her shoulder. “Watch your back, golfer boy.”

  Whit waves a careless hand, turns, and continues the walk to his car. “Come on,” he says as he brushes past me.

  Back in the Jeep, I lean back against the seat with a sigh. “You shouldn’t have done that.”

  “I don’t like her,” he says.

  I twist my head to the side. “The feeling’s mutual.”

  He looks over, as if weighing his words for a moment. “I’m not sure I like you, Olivia.”

  He was on my side for a minute. Defending me. I thought—“Oh.”

  The car starts under his hands. “I’m not trying to be a jackass.…”

  “Well, you’re failing at it,” I say, pushing a loose strand of hair out of my eye. “Is it the uniform? Or just everything about me?”

  He doesn’t bother to deny it. “How can you let that shit happen? Those girls are fourteen and we’re out there, staring at them in their underwear. It’s sick.”

  “It’s like a bathing suit,” I brush him off.

  “That shit with Daniel Smith was wrong. And disgusting.”

  “You were there, too. You didn’t stop it.”

  “Exactly,” he replies quickly. “I’m not some superhero or something. I don’t know what to say. I’d rather not put myself in those situations.”

  “So don’t. But just because you’re not there doesn’t mean it’s not happening. That’s what’s so great about you, Whit—you think you can live above it all. At least you could do something to stop it.”

  He turns to look at me, incredulous. “You mean stop you?” He shakes his head, eyes back toward the road. “And everything you do—it’s so fake. Like, there’s not even a real version of you.” He puts on a blinker to turn onto the street.

  “What would you know about what’s real? Trust me, you wouldn’t want to know the real me.” I glance at him out of the corner of my eye, tell myself not to cry. “You’d hate her even more than the fake me.”

  “I don’t hate you,” he says. I can hear in his voice how much he regrets starting this conversation. “You’re just—is it worth it?” There’s a genuine question in there. I’m reminded of how he looked at me that first day, when he bandaged my hand. He wants to know something about me, about what I think.

  I shake my head. “You don’t understand, Whit. I have to be this to be somebody. It’s how I made my mark—it’s the only power I have. The only way to not be another nobody in Buckley.

  “And at some point along the way, I realized I was really damn good at being this person. I was close to being the best. Don’t you like being the best? At golf? It’s not like there’s so much more value in that than what I do.”

  I’ve now managed to really offend him. “You’ve got to be kidding me,” he scoffs. “At least I have something to be proud of.”

  “But to them—to Buckley—you aren’t worth their time or their thoughts. They hate you.” We hate you, I don’t say. I don’t want to be a part of that—a part of Buckley. “You think you’re better than everyone else.”

  “Well, fuck them.”

  I almost laugh. “They respect me,” I keep on. I like the idea that he hates them as much as I do. Them and their tiny box of a world. So I keep talking. “I guess the truth is I always thought this whole thing—Buckley and this version of me—was temporary. I thought I could do whatever I wanted because I would leave here someday. Because this isn’t the real world. I was only pretending to be this person.”

  “Pretending?” he repeats, shifting his fingers across the leather of the steering wheel. “But you’re miserable.”

  The words hit me very hard in that moment. It’s not that I don’t know it, but to hear it verbalized is powerful. I laugh, but I’m stifling a cry. “I am miserable.” Whit stares straight ahead as if purposely not looking at me, his face as clear as he can keep it. “God, I am so miserable,” I say it again out loud, giving in to it. I have to admit it’s over. The nights laughing at others’ misfortune and the days of whispering with my best friends and the simple act of not allowing myself to feel so damn much. The way it was—all of it—is over. I watch as Buckley flies past. The one-story homes and broken-down little shops and the road that goes on forever, out of Buckley.

  “I have to stop her,” I say, the words becoming true as I hear them. “Adrienne. I can’t let her keep doing this. I can’t be a part of this bullshit anymore.”

  “So don’t,” Whit says, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.

  “Don’t you get it?” I demand of him. “It’s like I said; even if you’re not there, it’s still happening. We have to stop her. From hurting those girls and everyone else.”

  “And you,” Whit supplies, glancing over at me. “Right?”

  Me. It’s such a simple concept. I have to save myself. “You’re still going to help me?” I ask, surprised.

  His eyes close for half a minute when we stop at a red light. Finally, he says, “Yes.”

  I nod. “Why?” I can’t help but ask.

  He doesn’t look at me. “Because you’re so fucking sad, I don’t know what else to do.”

  We drive in silence for a moment. The radio clock says it’s nearly eleven. Instinctively, I reach out and flip the radio over to AM.

  “What are you doing?” Whit asks me.

  Tongue between my teeth, I adjust the station. “Do me a favor?”

  He cuts his eyes at me.

  I go for my best do-something face. “Please.”

  Sighing, he leans back in his seat. “What?”

  “Drive out of town.” I run my thumb over the radio. “I’m not sure what channel picks it up. We always had one of those knobs we just twirled.”

  “Out of town?” he repeats.

  “Out to the highway. It’s not that far.” It occurs to me as I say it
that I may not get my way from him. I’m not used to that. “I’ll get you gas money,” I offer in a last-ditch attempt.

  “I don’t want it,” he tells me, putting on his blinker to turn toward the highway. “Just stop asking me for favors.”

  I keep all my possible replies to myself, enjoying the feel of the night air through the open window, the bright-lit sky.

  “Out near Brown Creek, there’s this little dirt road. Out to a big field. You see?” I point ahead to where an overgrown willow shades the path. “Your Jeep should be fine.”

  Whit makes the turn, his car creeping over the ground. We’re pitched into darkness as the trees blot out the sky. “The trees break up over there. We’ll get it then.”

  “Get what?” he asks.

  “It’s just—” I bite my lip. “Can you just drive?”

  “Fine.”

  As the trees begin to clear, I continue my ministrations with the radio. The signal begins to come in, clearer and clearer until I hear the music. “Stop!” I tell him.

  Whit puts on the brakes, shifts into park. “What?” he asks again.

  I shush him, listening as the man in the radio speaks. “… a new band from Brooklyn, lead singer Marks says their sound is a mix of new pop and alternative. Here’s Cronix with ‘Lose That.’” A frenzied beat starts up, a violin cranking up in the background. It’s instantly both fun and terrible, and all the tension releases from my stomach as I listen. I can practically hear it leave my body.

  Whit, sensing something is going on here, turns the radio up a little. The song is unpolished, untamed, all made up of sounds that shouldn’t work together, all the trademarks of a debut band. It’s cathartic and primal and even when it’s bad, it’s interesting.

  It ends on a sour guitar note and the DJ is back, introducing whatever’s coming next.

  “Was that, like, your favorite band or something?” Whit asks me.

  I shake my head. “It’s Mike at Night,” I say as explanation.

  He tries to stop himself from asking, but apparently the need to know is too strong. “What?”

  “It’s a radio show from Chicago. It’s all these upstart bands that we’ve never heard of and never will.” Just talking about it makes the whole world make sense again. This hasn’t changed. “It’s, like … it’s, like, we can drive out here into the middle of nowhere and this whole other world opens up to us. Get it?”

  The next song starts in, a slower one, mournful and strange.

  “Ryan and I figured out we could get the signal a few years ago. It was an epiphany. We used to drive out and listen to it for hours. Before he moved. Dissect the songs and be a part of something, you know? A discovery. It’s stupid.” It used to bug Adrienne that I would waste Friday nights listening to shitty bands in a field with my brother. She never got it—never understood that no matter how different Ryan and I became, that time together meant everything. To Adrienne, all it meant was that my devotion to her was incomplete.

  Whit doesn’t say anything. The longer he’s silent, the more stupid it seems, the more I think of Adrienne making fun of Mike at Night. The beats of the song start pulling at all these imaginary strings in my heart that are long sore and better left hidden. “We can go. I—I wanted to see if we could still pick it up.”

  “That’s it?” he asks, turning toward me. “You made me come all the way out here, and you don’t even want to listen to it?” He sounds kind of pissed, but in a forced way. There’s something comforting about his impatience—like he’s making it okay if we stay for a while longer.

  “Can we stay?”

  He sighs.

  I lean back against my seat, close my eyes, and listen. In town, Adrienne is plotting the next move of her reign of terror. Somewhere in the distance, the creek flows over the rocks. Somewhere far away, Mike at Night picks his next song.

  I’m there and I’m here and I’ve never felt so lost in between.

  31

  The only people at the Rough House when I walk in are some regulars posted up at the bar, drinking their pathetic lives away. Ellie is behind the bar, leaning against the soda fountain.

  Claire bounces over from waiting a table, her white sneakers squeaking against the floor. “Hi!” She’s all smiles and sunshine, far from the girl trapped in the confines of Buckley High, even if the smile’s not quite in her eyes. That’s Claire—she’ll grin at everyone even if they’re waiting to tear her apart.

  “How’s tricks?” I ask.

  Claire sets her mouth thoughtfully, looking around the dark restaurant. “You tell me.” She smacks my arm. “Grab a table. I’ll take my break. Want a soda?”

  I nod.

  Claire heads for the bar, and I slide into a corner booth. From my spot, I watch her smile at Ellie, bob her head up and down, asking a question. Ellie’s face is guarded, carefully hiding emotions. But then, Ellie is always guarded. Some of the regulars watch them talk. I know they’ve heard—people never stop talking around Buckley. All I can think is that Claire’s everyone’s favorite topic of conversation, and Ellie remains hidden in plain sight behind her long brown hair.

  Claire comes back toward the table, balancing two sodas in one hand, and slides into the seat opposite me. I can’t help letting my eyes flit back over to Ellie. It doesn’t go unnoticed.

  “She’s mad at me,” Claire says, staring down into the depths of her Coke. “Because apparently everyone is going to find out about her because of me and it’s all my fault for already ruining her life and starting drama. She won’t even, like, exist in the same space as me.”

  I don’t know what to say, so I do what I do best—I don’t say anything at all.

  Claire rolls her eyes, reaching into her pocket and extracting a mini-bottle of vodka. She goes to put it in her drink, and without thinking, I stiffen. Her hand stills over her Coke.

  “Oh my God, I’m so sorry, Olivia. I wasn’t even—” She hides the bottle so quickly, she almost knocks the saltshaker off the table. “I didn’t mean—”

  “It’s fine,” I say, fighting to keep my voice even. The image of Mom pulling the empty mini-bottle from its hiding place in Ryan’s bookcase hits me so suddenly, such a punch in the gut, that I don’t know how to react. The last time I saw him, he couldn’t do anything without a drink in his hand. “But … are you okay?”

  She shrugs, looking guilty. “People have expectations, you know? I’m Claire and that’s what they expect. Happy and content and that Claire Barber smile. If I act differently, it will just be worse.” She pauses for a minute. “But I guess I don’t know how to be what they want right now.”

  I push the saltshaker over.

  “I’m not an alcoholic or anything,” she says defensively.

  I shake my head. “I’m not delicate. If you want to drink, whatever. It’s none of my business.”

  “I don’t need to,” she says, taking a sip from her Coke. “Obviously. Have you talked to Adrienne since initiation? She was kind of pissed.”

  I shake my head again. It’s Sunday. Our day. The three of us always meet at the Rough House for lunch, to chat through the weekend’s events. Who hooked up on Friday and whose mom was drunk at the football game and if we should go to that party one of Michaela’s friends is having next weekend. I tried to get out of it again, but Claire begged me. I’m not sure what I’m going to say to Adrienne, but this has to be the last time, and it’s only for Claire’s sake.

  Claire is waiting for me to force some words out, to explain who that girl was on Friday night, but it’s so hard to think of any, much less say them. Everything out of my mouth is a lie. And if it’s not, it’ll fuck things up that much worse.

  I don’t know what makes me more pathetic: being this selfish or knowing how selfish I am and not doing anything to change it. “I was with Whit,” I say easily. “Some things are just going to be different now, you know.”

  “Do I?” she asks. “Nobody knows about you and Whit.”

  “I’m sorry I didn’t tell
you,” I say. I hate lying to Claire about this. It seems worse after everything, another betrayal in a box I’m trying to dump out, not reload. But this one’s for the greater good. “It just kind of happened. With everything going on with Ryan and then the texts. Whit was there.”

  Claire processes that for a moment and then her face clears, as if it had never bothered her at all. “It’s fine, of course. It was … kind of shocking, is all.”

  “I’m too dumb for him, right? That’s what everyone’s saying.”

  She blushes. “Shut up.” Then she shrugs, as if to throw that shameful thought away. She holds up her phone for me to see. “Anyway, I was bored and looking through all of his accounts. You two are really discreet. How long has this been going on?”

  I open my mouth, a lie already forming there when someone interrupts me.

  “Well, hey there, Miss Claire.” Both of our heads snap up at the same time. It’s Mr. Simmons, a Rough House regular who runs on 70 percent beer at all times. He leans against the end of our table in a NASCAR baseball cap and a flannel shirt, a putrid smell emanating from him. He is every ugly part of Buckley. Mom would die.

  Claire smiles brightly, not the least bit stymied. “Hey, Mr. Simmons! Is Ellie treating you right up there?”

  “Ellie always treats me right.” He smiles, revealing a missing molar in the back of his mouth. Word has it that Mr. Simmons served a stint in Vietnam but got a bad reputation hiding from the action. Doesn’t really seem fair to me for him to get blamed for a time when he was probably just a scared kid. But that’s how it goes, I guess. You get the reputation you get. “This your girlfriend?” Mr. Simmons asks, leering at me. “That’s the word around town.”

  Claire’s smile falters, but she doesn’t turn away. “This is my friend Olivia. And I—I have a boyfriend. You know Alex Cox.” Her voice grows softer and softer, weighed down under the eyes of Mr. Simmons and everyone watching at the bar. Ellie stands, wiping the same glass down over and over again, her knuckles tight. I want her to do something, even though I know how unfair that is.

  “That better be right, Claire. A girl like you’s too pretty to be actin’ like that.” He laughs because it’s funny, just so funny. I want to tell him to go away, but I don’t know what Claire wants me to do. She’s shaking her head at me like she’s worried I’ll make it worse. It’s a fairly accurate assessment. I can’t resist escalating things, and if I get her fired, she’ll never forgive me.