by Olivia Samms
“Of course.” I help him sit in the car, wrap the safety belt around his sore ribs, and buckle him up, and then run around to the other side of the car and jump in. “Whew.” I wipe my face with my hands, fluff my hands through my hair. “You should probably let your parents know where you are.”
“Yeah, I know. I’ll tell them I’m with you, studying or something, but nothing else. Believe me, they don’t want to know. They never want to know the truth about me. It’ll be easier for them, for me, if I hide out for a while. I’ll sleep on the floor. I won’t be a problem, I promise.”
I pull out onto the street, my windshield wipers working hard. “You’re not going to sleep on the floor. You know I have a queen bed.”
“Perfect.” He laughs. Stops, holds his side in pain. “Oh, shit, but Zac . . . he’s your neighbor. What if he sees me?”
“He’s not going to see you; don’t worry. I don’t think he’s ever stepped foot in my yard.” And he better not. “But you need to know, it’s pretty tense at my house. My mom and I aren’t talking. I was actually about to go to your house, before you called from the hospital.”
“Yeah, right. The two of you don’t know how not to talk.”
“It’s a rule I just made up. I don’t want to talk to her again for the rest of my life.”
“I’ll believe it when I see it. What are you going to say, or not say, about bringing home a pulverized pal?” he asks.
“The truth. That a douche bag phony asshole jerk beat you up.”
“Well, that’s one way of putting it.”
“Are you sure you don’t need a heating pad for your ribs?” my mom asks, propping Chris up with a third pillow, covering him with yet another blanket.
I stand at my bathroom sink, brushing my teeth. “He’s going to die of heatstroke, Mom. Stop covering him! They said ice. Where’s Dad by the way?”
“Working late again. How about I make us some hot tea.” She tucks in the side of the quilt.
I spit in the sink. “For chrissakes, leave him alone. He’s fine.”
Chris, looking stiff and uncomfortable, sits straight up at a ninety-degree angle in my bed, listening to the two of us bicker. “I’m really okay, thank you. And thanks for letting me stay here.”
“You’re always welcome. You know that. And hopefully under better circumstances next time.” She stands at the door of my room, like she’s waiting for an invitation to jump on the bed.
“It’s late, Mom. I think Chris should get some sleep.” I gently pull one of the pillows out from behind him and untuck the quilt.
“Well, he’s not going to school in the morning, that’s for sure. He’ll stay here; I’ll take care of him. I’m free, don’t have anything planned.” She darts her eyes at me.
“But I have to get up for school, so would you mind leaving, please?”
“Okay. Good night.” She starts to close the door, then pokes her head back in. “I’m down the hall if you need anything.”
“Mom.”
Door closed. I switch off the light. The almost full moon shines through the thick clouds, casting a filtered, hazy, almost spooky glow through the window and into my room—perfect for a scary-story sleepover. But the scary story tonight happens to be real.
“I think you made her day, getting beat up. I guess it’s good to bring in a busted-up buddy now and then to ease the tension in a dysfunctional family.”
“Tell me about dysfunctional families . . . mine can trump yours any day.”
I plop down on the bed with him.
“Easy, Bea.” He winces.
“Oh, sorry.” I slowly sit up, lean against the headboard. “It’ll get better, your family, when you get out of the house, go to school. You’ll see.”
“Yeah, I guess. I’d hate to have to lie to my parents the rest of my life.” He gingerly rolls to his side, faces me. “By the way, I told ya so.”
“Told me what?”
“There’s no silent treatment going on between you two.”
I fold my arms. “Well, there should be.”
“Why, what happened, anyway?”
“She’s fooling around on my dad, Chris. There’s another guy. A stupid-looking dude with a moustache.”
“No. No way.”
“Yes way. It pisses me off, and I feel so bad for my dad. I don’t think he has any idea.”
“Well, that sucks.”
I scooch down under the covers, cuddle up next to him. Our faces are inches apart.
“This is kind of fun,” he says.
“Fun? You’ve been beaten to a pulp, my mom is having an affair, and you find this fun?”
“Having a sleepover with you.”
“Yeah, okay, that part is fun. But we should try it again, without the drama next time—I’d prefer ghost stories and s’mores.”
“You know, Bea. We could get an apartment, live together, after my freshman year.”
I sigh. “We could, and I’d be up for that. But Chris, you’re going to meet new people—your whole life will probably change. And that’s fine. It is. We’ll always be close—forever, I know it. Don’t worry about me, okay?”
“Okay, but I do.” His smile fades. “My pain pills are in my jeans pocket, you know.”
I lift my head, look across the room at his pants draped over the back of a chair. “I know. I saw them.”
“You’re cool with it?”
I gently entwine my fingers around his hand. “Life is weird.”
“How so?”
“Even when things get scary messy—you getting beat up by that jerk . . .” And everything that’s happened with Junior. “You’re handed a moment like this. Just the two of us, in this room. The moon shining in. It’s so peaceful.”
“That sounds rather sappy. So un-Bea-like.”
“Shut up. I’m just grateful that I’m here to help you, and that you asked me to. It wouldn’t have happened if I were messed up—we wouldn’t have this moment. So, yeah, Chris, that’s a long way of saying I’m cool with the pills in your pocket. Good night.” I kiss him on the cheek, roll over, lace up the imaginary boxing gloves, and say a prayer for Annie.
But I don’t sleep. I hear the minutes ticking by, Chris’s light snores. I’m afraid to move, disturb him, and my mind keeps switching on and off, flashing between the image of Junior, lying in that hospital bed, and then to that asshole Zac, and what he did to Chris.
And the letters I-S-P-Y . . . What was Junior trying to tell me? ISPY, I SPY, I spy . . . Oh my god . . . The tattoo on the coach’s Adam’s apple—an eye spying . . . of course. Junior wanted me to know, confirmed my hunch—it’s Coach Credos—no doubt about it.
I slowly, silently slip out from under the covers, tiptoe to my closet, close the door. It’s only eleven thirty; he should be up. I dial his number. But I get Sergeant Daniels’s message instead and whisper into the phone:
Me: It’s the coach, Dan, I’m positive. I saw Junior at the hospital and drew the truth out of him . . . the coach’s eye tattoo—it’s what he was thinking about—what he wanted me to know.
12 hours
55 minutes
“Mr. Pogen? You need help passing out the graded tests?”
“Sure, Beatrice, that would be nice.” He hands me the stack.
I shuffle through the pile, pull out Zac’s and Chris’s, and stuff them in my purse. “Um, I’ll take Chris’s home to him. He’s not feeling well today.” I shoot a deadly glance toward the asshole.
“That’d be nice, thank you. Now remember, class, don’t forget to bring this when we take the final. Use it—it’s all there—everything you need to know. And those of you who didn’t do so well, please redo the work at home. If you need help, come see me. I want you all to be prepared.”
“Uh, I didn’t get mine back,” Zac utters, his big, lunky body squeezed into a desk. Sometimes I wish he’d get stuck in one and have to walk around the school wearing it like a wooden tutu.
“Oh, that’s odd. Beatrice? Was it in t
he stack?”
“Nope, didn’t see it,” I lie.
“Well, meet me after class, Zac. I’ll have a look around. By the way, you didn’t do too well. We’ll have to make sure you’re up to speed for the final.”
The class snickers. Zac’s face morphs into the swollen red hive-y thing again—he’s so not fooling anyone.
And he won’t ever again.
It came to me the moment I woke in the morning and looked at Chris’s innocent face—his bandaged head. How to take Zac down . . .
I had to let go of the Reyna/Roxanne she-wolf evisceration. It was a juicy fantasy that I wallowed around in for a while. I also considered calling Johnny and Archie, asking them to meet up with him in a dark alley somewhere as mean thugs, and scare the crap out of him—not hurt him, but tap into their gangsta mojo. They would love to do that, I’m sure, and Zac would’ve probably pooped his pants on the spot. But I can’t risk getting them in trouble with the coach, and there’s no way I’d stoop to his level, using violence as an answer.
And then it came to me: Jeremy, his little brother. He’s the one who should, who has to, who will . . . take his big brother down.
“Jeremy.” I run to his locker. He stands slumped, defeated as always, pulling out books.
“What do you want?”
I hand him a stamped envelope addressed: The College Board, Office of Testing Integrity.
He studies it, front and back. “What’s this?”
“Look inside.” He pulls out the failed astronomy test.
“That’s your brother’s signature.” I point at the top of the page.
“Okay . . . what am I supposed to do with it?”
“Anything you want.”
“Huh?”
I lean in, whisper, “There’s some suspicion, rumors floating around, that maybe, perhaps, your big brother had someone else take the SAT for him.”
Oh man, I wish I had Chris’s camera—the expression on Jeremy’s face . . . priceless. His dull gray eyes widened, his slack, beardless jaw clenched, his shoulders pulled back, and I watched him suddenly grow two inches taller. “You’re shitting me.”
“I’m not. One look at his academic record, the differences with the signatures, no way they’ll ignore it—they’ll at least investigate.”
He leans his head against the top shelf of his locker and deflates a little. “But I couldn’t do that . . . no way, I couldn’t. I can’t blow his dream . . . I’m not like him.”
“But you don’t have to, you see? All he needs to know is that you possess the power, right there in your hands, to put him in his place.” I repeat this part slowly. “You’d have the power, Jeremy.”
He slowly turns his head and smiles at me, and it occurs to me that I’ve never seen his smile before. “I would, wouldn’t I?”
“You would. And, anyway, he’s not going to be able to fool Cornell University. No way will he get through a quarter, let alone a semester.”
Zac comes stalking toward us. “What you doin’ talking to her?” he asks, and then shoves the locker door hard into Jeremy’s back. He continues marching down the hall, yuk-yukking like a fool.
Jeremy’s nostrils flare, and it seems as if he taps into his superpower as he fills up his skinny body with air and shouts out, “Hey, Zachary!”
His brother whirls around, storms over. “I told you, never to talk to me here, you got that?”
“No, I got this.” He holds up the envelope. Zac snatches it from his hand, pulls out the folded test.
“So?” He shifts his weight in his size twenty sneakers.
“So, look at the address.”
He does, followed by the neck spasm thing.
“That’s your signature, right, on the test? The same signature you wrote when you signed in for the SAT?”
Zac snarls, rips the envelope, the test in half, in quarters, shoves the pieces in his pocket.
Jeremy blinks at me, like, Now what?
I pull out another stamped, addressed envelope from within the pages of my sketchbook. “I figured you’d do that. Unless you weren’t worried about Jeremy sending in your signature. But just in case, I happened to have made a copy of the test.” I hand it to Jeremy. “Oh, yeah. . . . I made a few copies, actually.”
Zac tries to snatch it again, but Jeremy, faster this time, tosses it in his locker, slams the door closed, and spins the lock.
Zac makes a guttural noise and raises a clenched fist above his brother’s head.
I step in, ready to take the blow, grab the collar of his shirt, and growl back, “You touch him or Chris, talk shit to Billy, to anyone, ever again, and I’ll take you down, you little lying prick—and you know I will.”
His fist lowers.
“Believe me, I’ll be watching you.”
8 hours
15 minutes
I knock on his office door.
“Bea. What are you doing here? I mean, not that I’m not glad to see you.”
I sit on an upholstered wingback chair across from the polished, dark wood desk. “I have to tell you something, Dad. I’ve debated, thought it over and over, but I do. I have to tell you the truth.”
He sits, his hands clasped atop his desk. “This sounds very important.”
“It is. And it’s about Mom.” Big breath. “She’s seeing someone else, Dad. She’s cheating on you.”
He cups the back of his neck, drops his head.
“I’m sorry. So sorry. But I thought you’d want to know.”
“Bea . . .”
A light knock on the door. A young woman with a brown, messy ponytail, wearing black, thick-framed glasses that teeter on the tip of her cute-as-a-button nose, comes rushing in—then stops short when she sees me. “Oh . . .”
My dad jumps up, briskly crosses over to her. “I don’t think this is a good time . . .”
“Hi.” I wave.
“Bea, this is Professor Williams. She’s a painting teacher here at the university. And Marcy, um, Professor Williams, this is my daughter, Beatrice.” He unbuttons the top button on his shirt, loosens his tie.
“Nice to meet you, Beatrice. I’ve heard a lot about you.” Her high cheekbones flush as she quickly places a folder on Dad’s desk. “I need to get your approval with these order forms . . . when you have time. Okay, bye. Nice meeting you.” She waves and scoots out of the room.
Dad wipes his sweaty forehead, faces me, and it looks as if he’s wearing a mask. A mask I’ve never seen before on his face. I’ve seen it on my mom’s, plenty of times—the mask of guilt. The sallow, blood-draining, empty-eyed look of guilt.
It explodes, bursts like a popped balloon, a rubber band snap. And I’m not drawing—no pen, no paper in hand. No, no, no. This can’t be true.
He kneels at my chair as if he’s in a confessional. Puts his hands on my lap. “Your mother isn’t having an affair, Beatrice.”
I shove his hands off me, then jump up. “Oh my god . . . it’s you, you’re the one?”
“Bea.” He stays in a kneeling position . . . as he should.
“All this time, I thought it was Mom who was the fraud, the phony. But I was wrong. It was you.” I have the urge to push his stupid-ass desk over as I rush past him to the door. “I’ve got to get out of here. I’ve got to get to Mom.”
“Bea. Please, come back. I can explain. . . .”
“Don’t bother,” I call back.
I find Chris and my mom in her bed, watching TV. They’re both still in pj’s and are laughing their asses off at an animal-prank show, munching on a big bowl of popcorn.
“That pug. Did you see that, what he did with that turtle? Ow, my ribs. Stop it. Turn it off. . . . It hurts too much to laugh.” Chris rolls to his side, hysterical.
“Oh, honey, be careful,” Mom says, and adjusts the ice pack underneath him. She glances up at me in the doorway. “Oh, hi, Bea.” It’s as unwelcoming a greeting as an unpopped kernel at the bottom of the bowl—the thing you spit out and discard. And I don’t blame her,
with what I’ve said, the way I’ve acted.
I sit on Chris’s side of the bed. “How you feeling, buddy?”
“Oh, man, Bea, wow . . . I finally get it.”
“What?”
“What you saw in all the drugs you took. . . . Hell, I’m in no pain. No pain at all,” he slurs. “And your mom, she’s like a goddess, she made me an omelet this morning that, no way—never have I ever tasted anything so delish.”
Enjoying my mom’s food? He’s so high.
“Hey, Mom, can we talk?”
She stands, wraps her robe tightly around her body, I’m sure bracing for another onslaught. “Go ahead.”
“I mean alone.”
“Oh, girl talk, fine, I know when I’m not wanted.” Chris scrambles off the bed. “I have to take a shower, anyway, wash my lovely half head of hair.”
“Be careful of the bandages,” Mom warns.
“I will . . . oh, and Bea, would you mind driving me home in a little bit? I’ll get my car another day, when I’m not feeling . . . whoozy.” He wobbles.
“Good idea, Chris.” I hold on to his arm and walk him to the door.
When he leaves, I close the door and rush to my mom and hug her tightly, so tightly—she stumbles backward.
“Whoa. What’s that for?”
I start bawling. “I’m sorry. I thought it was you, not Dad.”
“What are you talking about?”
“I went to his office, and that woman, the Marcy woman, came in . . .”
“Ahhh . . .” She pulls me into her even tighter, rocks me back and forth. “You found out.” I nod in her bosom. She steps back, pets my hair, takes my face in her hands. “You okay?”
“How could he?”
“Bea, he’s not a bad person.”
“How can you say that? How long has this been going on? How long have you known?”
She shrugs. “I think this Professor Williams thing has been going on for a while. . . . It may be getting pretty serious. Your dad’s been coming home later and later—sometimes he doesn’t even bother.”
I sink onto the bed. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I didn’t want to hurt you.” She hands me a box of Kleenex.