Genuine Fraud

by E. Lockhart

  “They’re not,” said Immie. “Snakes are trying to get by, like everyone else.”

  “Not the biting ones,” he said. “They’re vicious.”

  “Snakes bite when they’re scared,” said Immie, leaning forward in the backseat. “They bite if they need to protect themselves.”

  “Or if they need to eat,” said the driver. “They probably bite something once a day. I hate snakes.”

  “It’s a lot nicer for a mouse to die from a rattlesnake bite than, say, to be caught by a cat. Cats play with their prey,” said Immie. “They bat it around, let it escape, and then catch it again.”

  “Cats are assholes, then,” the driver said.

  Jule laughed.

  They stopped in front of the hotel. Immie paid the driver in American dollars. “I stand by the snakes,” said Imogen. “I like them. Thanks for the ride.”

  The driver pulled their suitcases out of the trunk and drove away.

  “You wouldn’t like a snake if you met one,” said Jule.

  “Yes, I would. I would love the snake and make a pet of it. I would twine it around my neck like jewelry.”

  “A venomous snake?”

  “Sure. I’m here with you, aren’t I?” Imogen slung her arm around Jule. “I’ll feed you delicious mice and other kinds of snake snacks, and I’ll let you rest on my shoulders. Every once in a while, when it’s absolutely necessary, you can squeeze my enemies to death while naked. ’Kay?”

  “Snakes are always naked,” said Jule.

  “You’re a special snake. Most of the time you’ll wear clothes.”

  Immie walked ahead into the hotel lobby, pulling both her suitcases behind her.

  The hotel was glamorous in a touristy way, very turquoise. It had greenery and bright flowers everywhere. Jule and Imogen had rooms next to each other. There were two different pools and a beach that spread out in a long white arch with a dock at the far end. The menu was all fish and tropical fruits.

  After unpacking, they met for dinner. Immie looked fresh and grateful to be eating such a gorgeous meal. She showed no trace of grief or guilt. Just existing.

  Later they walked down the road to a place the Internet described as an expat bar. The counter was a wraparound, with the bartender in the center. They sat on wicker stools. Immie ordered Kahlúa and cream, while Jule got a Diet Coke with vanilla syrup. The people were talkative. Imogen took up with an old white guy in a Hawaiian shirt. He told them he’d lived on Culebra for twenty-two years.

  “I had a little marijuana business,” the guy said. “I used to grow it in my walk-in closet with lights and then sell it. It was Portland. You wouldn’t think anyone there would care. But the cops busted me, and when I was out on bail I took a flight to Miami. From there I got a boat over to PR, then from there took the ferry here.” He gestured to the bartender for another beer.

  “You’re on the lam?” asked Immie.

  He snorted. “Think of it this way: I didn’t believe that what I did should have been a criminal offense and so I didn’t deserve the consequences that were coming my way. I relocated. I’m not running. Everyone here knows me. They don’t know the name on my passport, is all.”

  “And what is that name?” asked Jule.

  “I’m not telling you.” He laughed. “Just like I don’t tell them. Nobody bothers about stuff like that here.”

  “What do you do for a living?” Jule asked.

  “There’s a lot of Americans and rich Puerto Ricans who own vacation homes here. I take care of their houses for them. They pay in cash. Security, arranging for repairs, that kinda thing.”

  “What about your family?” Immie asked.

  “Don’t have much. I got a lady friend here. My brother knows where I am. He’s come to visit me once or twice.”

  Imogen wrinkled her forehead. “Do you ever want to go back?”

  The man shook his head. “I never think about it. You stay away long enough, there doesn’t seem like much to go back for.”

  They spent the next three days sitting by the enormous curving pool, surrounded by umbrellas and turquoise lounge chairs. Jule was twined around Imogen’s neck. They read. Imogen watched YouTube videos on cooking techniques. Jule worked out in the gym. Imogen got spa treatments. They swam and walked on the beach.

  Imogen drank a lot. She had waiters bringing her margaritas poolside. But she didn’t seem sad. The magic feeling of their initial escape from Martha’s Vineyard threaded itself through the days. As far as Jule could tell, they were triumphant. This was the life Imogen described herself as wanting, free of ambition and expectations, with nobody to please and nobody to disappoint. The two of them just existed, and the days were slow and tasted of coconut.

  Late on the fourth night, Jule and Immie sat with their feet in the hot tub, just as they had so many nights at Immie’s house on the Vineyard. “Maybe I should go back to New York,” said Imogen thoughtfully. “I should see my parents.” They had eaten dinner a while ago. She had a margarita in a plastic cup with a lid and a straw.

  “No, don’t,” said Jule. “Stay here with me.”

  “That guy in the bar the other night? He said the longer you don’t go back, the less there is to go back to.” Imogen stood, then, and pulled off her shirt and shorts. She wore a gunmetal one-piece with a gold hoop at the chest and a deep plunge. She sank her body slowly into the hot tub. “I don’t want there to be nothing left. With my mom and dad. But I also hate being there. They just—they make me so sad. Last time I was home, did I tell you this? About winter break?”

  “No.”

  “I left school and I was so glad to get away. I had failed political science. Brooke and Vivian were squabbling all the time. Isaac had dumped me. And when I got home, my dad was way more sick than I’d expected. My mom was in tears all the time. My stupid pregnancy scare and friendship drama and boyfriend problems and bad grades—it was all too trivial to even mention. My dad was shriveled into himself, breathing from his oxygen tank. The kitchen table was covered in pill bottles. One day he clutched my arm and whispered, ‘Bring your old man a babka.’ ”

  “What’s a babka?”

  “You never had babka? It’s like a cinnamon roll times forty.”

  “Did you bring him one?”

  “I went out and bought six babkas, and gave him one every day till winter break was over. It gave me something to do for him, when there wasn’t anything, really, to do….Then the morning I left, while my mom was driving me up to Vassar, I got hit with dread. I didn’t want to see Vivian. Or Brooke. Or Isaac. College seemed pointless, like a finishing school where I was going to learn to be the kind of daughter my mother wanted me to be. Or the kind of girl Isaac wanted me to be. But not what I wanted to be, at all. As soon as she left, I called a taxi and went to the Vineyard.”

  “Why there?”

  “An escape. We had been on vacation there when I was little. After the first couple days I let my phone go dead. I didn’t want to answer to anybody. I know that must sound selfish, but I had to do something radical. With my dad that sick, I hadn’t talked to anyone about my problems. The only way I could figure myself out was to try what life was like away. Without all those other people wanting things from me, being disappointed in me. And then I just stayed. I had been living in the hotel for a month when I realized I wasn’t going back. I emailed my parents that I was okay, and I rented the house.”

  “How did they react?”

  “A thousand billion emails and texts. ‘Please come home, just for a couple days. We’ll pay for the plane.’ ‘Your father wants to know why you don’t return his calls.’ That kind of thing. My dad’s dialysis prevented them from coming to the Vineyard, but they were literally harassing me.” Immie sighed. “I blocked their texts. I stopped thinking about them. It felt like magic, just switching those thoughts off. Being able not to think about them saved me, somehow. I might be a terrible person, but it was so nice, Jule, not to feel guilty anymore.”

  “I don’t t
hink you’re a terrible person,” Jule said. “You wanted to change your life. You had to do something extreme to become the person you’re becoming.”

  “Exactly.” Immie touched Jule’s knee with her wet hand. “Now, what about you?” It was Imogen’s usual pattern, to talk in a long ramble until she had thoroughly sorted through an idea, then, tired, to ask a question.

  “I’m not going back,” said Jule. “Not ever.”

  “It’s that bad back home?” Immie asked, searching Jule’s face.

  Jule thought for a bright second then that someone could love her, and that she could love herself and deserve it all. Immie would understand anything Jule said just now. Anything.

  “We’re the same,” she ventured. “I don’t want to be that person I was, growing up. I want to be the me who’s here, now. With you.” It was as true a statement as she knew how to make.

  Immie leaned over and kissed her cheek. “Families are effed up the world over.”

  Jule’s words rushed out of her. “We’re each other’s family now. I am yours and you can be mine.”

  She waited. Looked at Immie.

  Imogen was supposed to say they were like sisters.

  Imogen was supposed to say they were friends for life and that yes, they were family.

  They had just talked so intimately, and Imogen was supposed to promise that she would never leave Jule like she’d just left Forrest, like she’d left her mother and her father.

  Instead, Immie smiled mildly. Then she got out of the hot tub and walked over to the pool in that gunmetal bathing suit. She smiled at the cluster of teenage boys who were horsing around in the shallow end. American boys.

  “Hey, guys. Does one of you want to get me a bag of potato chips or pretzels from the bar inside?” Immie said. “My feet are wet. I don’t want to track water in there.”

  They were wetter than she was, but one of them jumped out of the pool and toweled himself off. He was skinny and pimply but had good teeth and the kind of long, narrow body Immie liked. “At your service,” he said, with a silly bow.

  “You’re a prince among men.”

  “See?” the boy called to his friends in the pool. “I’m a prince.”

  Why did Immie have to charm everyone? They were only a pack of boys, with little to offer. But Immie did this kind of thing whenever situations became intense. She turned and shined her light on new people, people who felt lucky she had noticed them. She had done it when she ditched her friends at Greenbriar for new friends who went to the Dalton School. She had done it when she’d left her sick father and her Dalton friends to go to Vassar, and when she’d left Vassar to live on Martha’s Vineyard. She’d left Forrest and Martha’s Vineyard for Jule, but Jule wasn’t novel enough, apparently. Immie needed fresh admiration.

  The boy brought out several bags of potato chips. Imogen sat on a lounge chair, eating and asking him questions.

  Where were they from? “Maine.”

  How old were they? “Old enough! Ha ha.”

  No, really, how old? “Sixteen.”

  Imogen’s laugh echoed out across the pool. “Babies!”

  Jule stood and slid her shoes back on. There was something about those boys that made her skin crawl. She hated the way they competed to keep Imogen entertained, splashing and showing off their muscles in the pool. She didn’t want to talk to a bunch of fawning high schoolers. Let Imogen feed her ego if she needed to.

  The next morning, Jule wanted to rent a boat and go to Culebrita. That was the tiny island with the black volcanic rocks, a wildlife preserve with beaches. Immie had talked about it on their first day. You could go by water taxi, but then you had to wait for pickup. It was nicer to drive yourself, because then you could leave when you wanted to. The concierge gave Jule the phone number of a guy with a boat for rent.

  Immie saw no need for them to take themselves when someone else could do it for them. She saw no need to go to Culebrita at all. She had seen it already. And there was clear, bright water right here. And a restaurant. And two heated pools. There were people to talk to.

  But Jule couldn’t stand a day at the pool with those high school boys, lumpish little show-offs. Jule wanted to go to Culebrita and see the famous black rocks and hike up to the lighthouse.

  The boat guy said he’d meet them on the dock that extended from the far end of the beach. It was very informal. Jule and Immie walked down, and two young Puerto Rican men drove up in two small boats. Immie paid in cash. One guy showed Jule how to work the motor and how the oars fit on the edge of the boat, just in case you needed them. There was a number to call when they were done with the boat.

  Immie was sulky. She said the life jackets were cracked and the boat needed a paint job. But she got in it anyway.

  The ride across the bay took half an hour. The sun grew hot. The water was shockingly blue.

  On Culebrita, Jule and Imogen jumped into the water to push the boat onshore. Jule chose a path, and they started walking. Immie was silent.

  “Which way?” Jule asked her at a fork in the trail.

  “Whatever you want.”

  They went left. The hill was steep. After a fifteen-minute walk, Immie scraped her instep on a rock. She lifted her foot up and rested it against a tree to examine it.

  “You okay?” Jule asked.

  Immie was bleeding, but only slightly. “Yeah, fine.”

  “I wish we had a Band-Aid,” said Jule. “I should have packed some.”

  “But you didn’t, so it’s fine.”

  “Sorry.”

  “It’s not your fault,” said Immie.

  “I mean, I’m sorry it happened to you.”

  “Leave it,” Imogen said, and continued walking up the hill. Cresting it, they arrived at the black rocks.

  They were different than Jule expected. More beautiful. Almost frightening. They were dark and slippery. Water flowed in and around them, making pools that looked warm in the sun. Some of the rocks were covered with soft green algae.

  There was no one else around.

  Immie stripped down to her bathing suit and slid into the largest pool without a word. She was tan and wore a black bikini with a string around the neck.

  Jule felt like a thick, masculine person suddenly. The muscles she worked so hard on seemed oafish, and the pale blue suit she’d worn all summer tacky.

  “Is it warm?” she asked, about the shallow pool.

  “Pretty warm,” said Immie. She was bent over, splashing water up her arms and across the back of her neck. Jule was annoyed with Immie for sulking. After all, it wasn’t her fault that Imogen had scraped her foot. All Jule was guilty of was saying she wanted to rent a boat and see Culebrita.

  Immie was a spoiled child who pouted when she didn’t get her way. It was one of her limitations. No one ever said no to Imogen Sokoloff.

  “Shall we go up to the lighthouse?” Jule asked. It was the highest point on the island.

  “We can.”

  Jule wanted Immie to show enthusiasm. But Immie wouldn’t.

  “Is your foot okay?”

  “Probably.”

  “Do you want to walk up to the lighthouse?”

  “I could.”

  “But do you want to?”

  “What do you want me to say, Jule? ‘Oh, it is my dream to see a lighthouse’? On the Vineyard I saw an effing lighthouse every single day of my life. You want me to say I am dying to hike up there with my bloody foot in this crazy heat to see a tiny building that looks like a million tiny buildings I’ve seen a million times before? Is that what you want?”

  “No.”

  “What do you want, then?”

  “I was just asking.”

  “I want to go back to the hotel.”

  “But we just got here.”

  Imogen climbed out of the water and pulled on her clothes, shoving her feet into her sandals. “Can we please go back? I want to call Forrest. My phone doesn’t work here.”

  Jule dried her legs off and put on her s
hoes. “Why do you want to call Forrest?”

  “Because he’s my boyfriend and I miss him,” said Immie. “What did you think? That I broke up with him?”

  “I didn’t think anything.”

  “I didn’t break up with him. I came to Culebra for a break, is all.”

  Jule shouldered the bag they were sharing. “You want to go back, let’s go back.”

  Jule felt drained of all the joy she’d felt the past few days. Everything seemed hot and ordinary.

  They had pulled the boat pretty far onshore, and when they returned to the beach they had to push it across the sand. Then they jumped in and dislodged the oars from the rack, using them to guide the boat into water deep enough that it began to float and they could start the motor.

  Imogen didn’t speak much.

  Jule started the engine and pointed toward Culebra, which was visible in the distance.

  Immie sat at the front end of the boat, her profile dramatic against the sea. Jule looked at her and felt a surge of affection. Immie was beautiful, and in her beauty you could see that she was kind. Good to animals. The type of friend who brings you coffee made just the way you like it, buys you flowers, gives you books, and bakes you muffins. No one knew how to have fun like Immie. She drew people to her; everyone loved her. She had a kind of power—money, enthusiasm, independence—that glowed around her. And here Jule was, out on the sea, this crazy turquoise sea, with this rare, unique human being.

  Nothing of their quarrel mattered. It was fatigue, that was all. People argued in the best friendships. It was part of being real with one another.

  Jule cut the engine. The sea was very quiet. There was not another boat anywhere on the horizon.

  “Everything okay?” Imogen asked.

  “I’m sorry I made us rent this stupid boat.”

  “It’s okay. But listen, please. I’m going back to the Vineyard to be with Forrest tomorrow morning.”

  Jule felt dizzy. “How come?”

  “I told you, I miss him. I feel bad about the way I left. I was upset about…” Immie paused, hesitant to put it into words. “About what happened with the cleaner. And about how Forrest handled it. But I shouldn’t have run away. I run away too much.”