Best Friends Never

by Isabelle Drake

  “I think I’ll do something real, just to show you I can.”

  Monica paused, stopping to give her a more serious once-over. “You’d be surprised how exciting it is, doing something just to prove to yourself you can. And it’s such a rush when it works out.”

  Monica started to leave, but Lexi grabbed her arm.

  “What do you think will happen to Ash?”

  “Who the hell cares?”

  Lexi squeezed her fingers around Monica’s wrist. “Ash tried to frame Z.”

  “If he’d been able to hold himself together, it would’ve worked. He always did crack at the worst possible time.” Monica smirked so hard it was a snarl. “Guess that’s why he was never his dad’s favorite.” She yanked her arm free and left.

  * * * *

  “I saved a copy on my hard drive. Here’s yours.” Zeke held out a tiny flash drive. “Best video you ever made.”

  Lexi took the drive. “Thanks.”

  “Glad to do it.”

  “Sorry about what happened to you. That crap Monica pulled was nasty.”

  He shrugged. “Thanks for believing me about not making those other ones, in the bathroom.” He grinned and Lexi saw a flash of that side of Z that had caught her attention before everything went to hell. “I should’ve seen it coming,” he said.

  “I bet Ash feels the same way.”

  “He didn’t kill Jon, you know,” he said.

  Lexi let out a slow breath. “Or Peter. I haven’t quite figured how she did it, but I know she did both of them.”

  “That’s pretty extreme, just to shut me up about the video.”

  Tracing the edge of the drive with her fingernail, she added, “And to prove she could do it.”

  “That’s epically wrong.”

  He was right, of course, that it was wrong to do something that twisted just to prove you could get away with it. But Lexi was starting to see what Monica meant about doing something real. Guess the trick was to define ‘real’ the right way.

  “Putting this out there might screw you up, too.”

  “I know. But I’m done with secrets and lies.”

  Zeke pointed to the flash drive. “They won’t be able to use that in court.”

  “I know.” Lexi dropped the flash drive into her bag. “It’s a start, though, and sooner or later the cops will figure it all out, then that girl will finally get what’s coming.”

  Also available from Finch Books:

  River Girl

  RE Whaley

  Excerpt

  Chapter One

  There has to be some mistake.

  That’s the first thought that pops into my mind as I wait outside the busy airport terminal. The morning in Vancouver is warmer than the night was in Boston when I boarded my flight to Canada. Sweat dampens my back and seeps into my shirt. The trip has gone smoothly until now. Fiona, the tour guide from the rafting company, isn’t here to pick me up.

  Vancouver looks a little like Boston. If most of British Columbia looks like this, then maybe this trip won’t be so hard after all. I’m kind of here to challenge myself anyway. My younger sister, Samantha, should have been here instead of me—until she took her own life, and I took her place on this trip.

  I’ve learned to surround myself with a hard shell, and inside that shell Sam’s death is the tender part—something I can’t talk about. Completing what would have been Sam’s journey is the only way I can break the shell and move past what happened to her. That’s what I’ve come to believe. Then I can regain the normal life I once had and messed up.

  With my luggage weighing me down, I head to the security booth and explain my situation to the guard there. He shrugs and suggests I ask the man hailing taxis for incoming travelers.

  “Do you know if there is—or was—a woman my age from a company called River Tours waiting to pick me up? My name’s Pauline,” I tell the man, who wears a dark red uniform and cap with gold piping.

  “Sorry, miss, I haven’t seen anyone like that.” He rushes off to help an older, bag-laden woman open a cab door.

  “But, sir…” He runs to help another traveler, and I check my phone. Should I call Mom and tell her what’s happening? No, I can’t do that. At twenty-one years old, I’m determined not to depend so much on my parents. I know Fiona through Sam, but I don’t have her number. I’ll call the tour company and let them know what’s going on, risk getting Fiona into trouble with her employer.

  Inside the terminal, I seek an escape from the day and buy an iced coffee at the kiosk. I put my luggage down, sit with my coffee in my hand in the waiting area and enjoy the air conditioning. Outside the long glass windows near me, the day is clear and sunny. Maybe I’ve gotten it wrong and I’m supposed to meet Fiona at the trip’s starting point. I sure hope not. According to the map on the tour company’s website, it’s in the middle of nowhere, and I have a lot of luggage with me. I look up the tour company number and call. It rings six times, and just when I think I’m going to get voicemail, a man answers. His voice sounds older, grandfatherly.

  “Hello?”

  “Hi—hi, this is Pauline Choice. I’m scheduled for a week-long rafting trip with Fiona. I’m waiting here at the airport, but Fiona’s not here yet. I believe she was supposed to pick me up?” I hate my girlish pitch, it makes me sound so damn young. I bring my voice down lower when he doesn’t reply right away. “Sir?”

  “Yep, we have you down with Fiona for your trip.” The man introduces himself as the owner. “I’ll reach her, then ring you back. I’ll make things right for you if need be. Sorry about this. I hope there’s no hard feelings.”

  Not yet. “It’s okay. Do you know when she might get here?”

  “I hope she’ll be there real soon. I’m very sorry about this. I’m going to give you a call back in a moment.” He sounds eager to hang up so he can figure it out. “Thank you, miss.”

  I end the call and sip my iced coffee while I wait. After a few minutes, my jingling ringtone plays. It’s the rafting company.

  “This is Miss Choice?” The voice belongs to the same guy I spoke to.

  “Yes. Hi. Any word on Fiona?”

  “I’m afraid I can’t reach her. I don’t know what’s going on. I’m so sorry about the inconvenience for you. This has never happened before, and I can assure you we’re normally very reliable.”

  He’s trying to comfort me, but whatever he’s saying doesn’t matter. Through my ears I’m only hearing that the trip might not happen. I swallow back tears and wait for him to tell me they will have to cancel the trip and give me a refund. I have to take this trip for Sam. I don’t know how I will ever turn around and head back home having done nothing in her memory.

  “But we are working on getting another guide for you to go in her place,” he says.

  “Oh, thank you.” I’m relieved, until I think of something else. “I hate to sound picky.” I pause. “I’d really prefer the guide to be a woman for obvious reasons, since we’ll be camping overnight.”

  Silence on the other end, then a sound emits from the man’s mouth as though my request won’t be an easy task for him to carry out. After a minute he speaks. “I’ll see what I can do for you. I will warn you that it could take some time for me to find a replacement, seeing as all our other guides are already out on multi-day expeditions.”

  “No problem. I’ll take a cab to get a head start and meet whoever you send there.” Without Fiona’s guidance, how will I know where to go? His voice trails off and I’m worried I’ll lose him. I bring up the tour company’s website on my phone and make him talk me through the directions.

  He speaks in a fatherly manner. “If you follow the website directions we went over, the person will meet you at the River Tours access point. There’s a sign posted on a tree. You can’t miss the sign. Good luck with getting a cab, miss.” I don’t understand why he’s wishing me good luck. In a city this size, how hard can it be?

  I get up, grab my bags and throw the plastic coffee cup in
to a nearby trash bin. I head outside into the late morning and wait for the man in the red cap to hail me a taxi. A white cab pulls up and I get in the back seat after the driver throws my luggage in the trunk.

  The driver, an older man with a snowy beard, lowers the radio volume as I get settled. “Where to, ma’am?”

  His card reader looks like it’s not working. “You don’t accept credit cards?”

  He looks back at me and an amused grin washes across his face. “Nope. Cash only. You want to stay in or get out?”

  “No, I have enough cash on me.” I think. He’ll run me dry, and I doubt I’ll see an ATM once I leave the airport in the cab.

  I look at the website directions on my phone and tell him where I need to go. After a long, uncomfortable pause, he nods, then drives out of the airport parking lot. He turns up the volume on the radio and the sound of soft country rock fills the silence around me. After what feels like a long time, the driver speaks to me again. “You going hiking or something like that?”

  I look up from my Kindle. “Rafting.”

  He lowers the radio volume. “You any good?”

  If I lie, he’ll probably stop asking me questions. “I’m an expert.”

  “Oh, I thought you’d have to be to do something like that.” He raises the radio’s volume then rolls down his window. “Do you mind the air?”

  “No. The fresh air might do me some good.” My eyes drift back to the page.

  “Good book?” He’s staring ahead at the road as he speaks to me.

  “Yes, very,” I say, not looking up from the text.

  My shirt billows out around me and the soft air is like a kiss against my ears and nose. After a moment or two, I pause my reading and watch the city rolling by the closed window. The tall office buildings shimmer in the sun, looking enormous and otherworldly.

  I shut off my Kindle and tuck it back into my canvas tote, which also holds my laptop. Now, the laptop seems useless to have brought along, especially since I won’t even be able to charge it out on the water, but when I’d packed it, I had hoped to get some writing done while on the trip. Maybe I can use the time away not just to recover, but, once I’ve returned home, as the basis for an essay on healing. I used to write creatively in college, and maybe I can write that essay. If I can build up the courage to actually write about how Sam’s death affected—still affects—me… How can I fit something so painful into a short essay? If I’m ever going to convey the agony I’m feeling, I’ll have to write a novel.

  Sam isn’t the first person I’ve lost. We lost Dad in a car accident when I was a freshman in high school, and she was twelve. The two of them were walking home from the organic store he managed. He was kind of a hippie. Nothing like our stepdad.

  Sam ran ahead of him out into the street and he ran after her. A driver swerved to avoid her, but hit Dad.

  They’d been arguing about going to a concert, and that’s why she ran away. Dad said she couldn’t go with her friends. Sam once told me she felt like she’d killed him.

  Our mom was a mess for a long time. The day I left for college, Sam thanked me and said she didn’t know what she would have done without me. Like I was sort of her mom for a while.

  Away at college, I wasn’t there for her as much. Sam seemed to settle into a new life with our mom and stepdad, and I thought everything was fine—until it wasn’t. When I’d returned home, the pretty, vibrant Sam had disappeared into a ghost of her former self. Our parents had hoped the rafting trip would help her. Sam had once loved adventure and the outdoors. Everyone knows high school can be hard, and I feel like I killed Sam by not being there for her. I got caught up in my own problems.

  A chill nips my skin when we leave the city and head up to the mountains. My head feels like a very strong guy is pressing it between his hands. That’s been happening on and off—mostly on—since I lost Sam.

  The city seems so close to its rural outskirts, with the vast mountains, shades of light and dark greens looming behind the grand office buildings.

  The driver speeds up and the covered bridge we ride through turns into a blur from my window. I stop keeping an eye on the meter to lean back into the torn headrest then I close my eyes. This could be the most rest I get for a while.

  Sam’s death wasn’t the start of my bad year. It made a horrible year even more awful. In fact, the whole year before her death was terrible. Because before I killed my sister, I ruined my life.

  During what should have been my final, most successful year of college as a women’s studies major, I started acting in adult films. Soft porn. Or, I should say, I appeared in one solo film for a good lump sum with the Salty Peaches’ Girls production company. But I bolted from the industry before I could turn into a genuine star.

  Dad—that is, my stepdad Frank—and Mom aren’t exactly well-off, and since I took out loans to pay for college, I was getting concerned about paying them off after I graduated. Reflecting back on it now, I seemed utterly naïve, especially since I never ended up graduating anyway.

  It all started when I spotted an ad for ‘actresses’ online, and when I went to audition, I discovered I wasn’t auditioning for some kind of theater, but the pay was unbelievably high and too good for a working-class girl to resist. I’m not perfect looking. They just thought I had a ‘sweet college girl’ look going on.

  At the time, my reasoning went something like this—some girls I knew of on campus worked as escorts for sugar daddies. By doing porn, at least I wouldn’t be going quite as far as breaking the state law. Now I don’t even feel sorry for myself about how stupid I was about the whole thing.

  I managed to pull off my secret life until my perfect boyfriend Seth spilled my big secret and my entire life became newsworthy on campus. Most people at school didn’t even know or care about who I was before then I was just the campus porn star.

  Violated. That’s how I felt when a website created by Seth’s fraternity started streaming my video. Everything worsened from that point on, and I felt forced to leave the school.

  I quit the ‘business’ cold. The production company didn’t like me quitting. They were expecting me to shoot several sequels. With my smallish boobs, who knew I’d be such a big hit? At one time I was afraid they would sue me, but they haven’t contacted me.

  I never thought of porn as a long-term career anyhow. Now I work as a freelance writer whenever I can. I performed under a false name, Penelope—the name of my childhood pet, a small terrier mix— and Peaks, the first street I lived on.

  Even now I worry about my cover being blown. I can’t put a photo on my LinkedIn profile. One film, and I’m infamous online. Penelope Peaks, the Campus Porn Queen. If a potential employer Googles me and somehow makes the connection with my film, I can forget about ever getting hired for something other than a blow job.

  At home I’ve been struggling to get by, and I hate having to ask my parents for money. I feel like I’ve failed life. I’m even more in debt, because I still owe tuition money, even though I didn’t graduate. Mom and Frank don’t know why I left school exactly. All they know is that I’m back living at home with them, inhabiting the bedroom across the hall from what had been Sam’s room. I suspect they think I couldn’t hack it in the real world and that’s why I came crawling back to them.

  “Ma’am? Excuse me, ma’am?”

  Who is this man calling me ma’am? My arms shake as I open my eyes. I’m in a cab. In Canada. The rafting trip. Something’s different than when I began the drive. The scenery outside is still. I sit up and see that the driver has parked the cab at the side of the road. I lean across the seat and angle my body toward him. “Is something wrong, sir?”

  “Well…” Then silence. I don’t like the sheepish look on his face.

  I check my phone. We’ve been on the road for over an hour, and all I see around me are enormous pine trees, and more huge pine trees. We’re in the middle of nowhere.

  The driver scratches his long, fluffy white beard. “I know I sai
d I would take you all the way, but I’ve decided it’s too far out of my route for just the one fare.”

  I’m being kicked out of the cab? “Wait a second. You decided this now?” I’m doing all I can not to rip that damn Santa Claus beard off his face.

  “Back in the city, I could be making multiple fares. You know how long it’ll take me to get back to the city if I keep going? I’m sorry, it’s—”

  “Excuse me?” I cut him short. If he’s dropping some sort of hint that money’s an issue and he’ll finish the trip if I pay him more, he’s already taking me for a lot and I can’t offer him more. “Am I hearing this right? You won’t take me any farther?”

  Not facing me, his voice is muffled. “Yes, that’s right. I’m, uh, very sorry, miss.”

  Heat rises to my face as I put my hand to my forehead and shake my head. “But that’s not what you said when you agreed to take me in the first place. Some people might consider this a clear violation of business ethics. How would the owners of your company feel if they knew you abandoned me?”

  Up in front of me, I hear him swallow. His back is to me. “They wouldn’t like it. I’m sorry, but…” He still won’t face me. Or he can’t face me. “I changed my mind. I didn’t realize how far out it is.” He shrugs.

  Maybe I can reason with him. I try to remain calm. “How much farther is it?”

  He glances at his dashboard. “More than a couple miles down this road.”

  “That doesn’t sound too far. Can you please finish driving me there?”

  He shakes his head as he peeks back at me, avoiding my gaze. “The road is too muddy.” He’s already made his decision. I try my best not to weep openly in front of this strange guy, but my courage softens and soon the tears flow. The driver gets out before me.