“Whatever,” I dismiss him. “There’s also the small matter of settling valedictorian. And, I mean, there’s all the people.”
“Yeah, I’m super unconcerned about them, to say the least.”
“What about me?” I say. “I can’t be this once school starts again. All boats and screwing around. I have a plan. Will you even want me then?”
He hides his face in his arm. “It’s so nice here. Do we have to talk about this right now?”
“I’m just saying, it’s going to be different.” I turn my head to the side to look at him. “Have you read it yet?”
“Read what?” he asks, shading his eyes to look back at me.
“Surely you know what I’m talking about.”
“No idea.”
“The Scarlet Letter.”
He laughs. “No.”
“Of course not,” I say, irritation coating my voice.
“You weren’t serious about that.” He doesn’t say it like it’s a question, but more like I couldn’t possibly have been.
“I just don’t see why it’s so difficult for you,” I tell him, my voice doing that lilting thing it does when I’m annoyed. “It’s only one thing. It wouldn’t even take you that long—it’s not like anything’s hard for you.”
He still sounds amused. “Why do you care so much about The Scarlet Letter? Was it, like, transcendent for you?”
“I don’t even like The Scarlet Letter,” I tell him. “I don’t know, it’s the principle of the matter. That I work so hard and yet, somehow you’re still beating me. That fucking Hester Prynne was humiliated for doing exactly what the men did and everyone turned on her.” I flex my leg and then straighten it. “This is what school’s going to be like.”
“Hester Prynne figured it out and we will, too,” he answers, not a care in the world. “That’s what people like us do. We rise to the top.” I’ve heard those words before, only it was Mom saying them.
“What time is it?” I ask Jackson a second later, still annoyed.
“Almost four,” he returns, lazily.
“What?” I sit straight up. “I had practice at three. I thought we had plenty of time.”
Jackson doesn’t sit all the way up, instead angling himself against the bow. “Well, you’re not going to make it now. It’s at least a half-hour ride back to the marina.”
“Shit,” I say, running my hands through my hair. “I don’t know the last time I missed a practice. And I didn’t even tell anyone. Lia doesn’t have any idea where I am. I’m going to have to pretend I was sick and, like, fell asleep or something.”
Jackson is watching me with that infuriatingly calm look. “Is it that bad?”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean that you missed one practice. All summer. Don’t the other girls go on vacation and stuff? Aren’t they out sick sometimes?”
“It doesn’t matter what other girls do,” I say. “People are expecting me.”
“It’s one practice, Nell,” he replies. He sits all the way up and turns so he’s facing me, his bare feet against the floor of the boat. “Remember when you got those scores for the class rankings? And that caused a panic attack?”
I frown at him. “Vividly.”
“This is why. You treat everything like it’s the end of the world.”
“Don’t condescend to me,” I snap.
He sighs, falling back against the edge of the boat dramatically.
“Seriously, don’t be like that,” I say to him. “Like I’m your annoying girlfriend.”
“You’re not my annoying girlfriend. You’re my annoying obsession. It’s, like, a hundred times more tragic.”
I grab a bottled water from its cup holder and sip it furiously. “Fine,” I finally say, screwing the top back on. “It’s fine.”
“Seems like it.”
“What does that mean?” I ask. “About me being an obsession.”
He gives me a look, all eyes and straight lips.
“What?” I say.
“You’re the one who used to ask me about all the girls I dated. Why it didn’t last. I always thought it would eventually. It would stick.
“This isn’t that,” he says. “This is goddamn consuming.”
“How?” I ask, curious.
“Like I’ll never get enough. Like if I go a day without seeing you, then what was even the point of the day? Like if I’m not breathing the same air as you in any given moment, then something’s wrong. I feel like I’ve been drunk for two months straight. I don’t even know what it would mean to sober up anymore.”
I sit back so I’m facing him the same way he’s facing me. “That doesn’t sound like love. That sounds dangerous.” The word is thick against my tongue.
He puts his hand against my cheek in the way he is wont to do. “It feels dangerous.”
We watch each other. A beat and then two. A steady wave rocks the boat and we both just hold on.
33
It’s another hour before we make our way back to the marina. Jackson is steering into his dock when I notice the man standing there waiting for us.
It’s his dad.
Mr. Hart waits until Jackson docks the boat with help from another boat hand. Once everything is secure, Jackson walks over to him. I stand behind at a safe distance.
“Where have you been?” Mr. Hart asks, his voice deadly calm.
“Out for a nice leisure ride,” Jackson says. He’s doing his fake-confident voice now. The one he uses as armor against the outside world.
“You took the boat without my permission,” Mr. Hart says. Everything about him looks cold to me. He’s in a pair of business slacks but his button-down is untucked and the sleeves are rolled up. His hands are in his pockets as if this is some casual conversation.
“Yes, that is correct,” Jackson says.
“I was going to take an important business partner out on the boat,” Mr. Hart continues. “And you knew that.”
Jackson snaps. “Knew I was forgetting something.” I feel heat building in my face. This day hadn’t been about us or making up for the way Mrs. Hart treated me—it was about pissing off his dad. Every time I think we’ve finally finished with all the bullshit … I can’t believe he’s put me in the middle of this.
“Don’t test me right now,” Mr. Hart says. “I should’ve called the police and reported it stolen.”
“Well, that certainly would’ve added an additional twist to the soap opera we are all currently living,” Jackson tells him, his voice about one octave from complete joy. “Exactly how long have you been waiting out here to make this as dramatic as possible? Or should I say,” he continues, looking over his dad’s rumpled clothes, “how long have you been waiting at the bar?”
“You are an ungrateful brat,” his dad says. I think he wants to slap him and is reining himself in.
“At least we agree on something.”
“I can’t believe you’d ruin a business opportunity for our whole family for your flavor of the week.”
“I beg your pardon,” I say. That he thinks he can treat me like that tells me everything I need to know. If your average net worth doesn’t have the proper number of zeroes behind it, you might as well be another decoration on the wall to them. If you’re a female, you’re an accessory.
I’m not something to be had.
“That flavor of the week is my girlfriend, and I need you to apologize to her.”
Mr. Hart sneers. “So you’ve found another slut. Like there’s any teenage boy in America as rich as you that can’t get some desperate girl to screw him.”
I move forward but Jackson puts his arm up to hold me back. “I think you have a bit more respect for the Beckers than that, don’t you, Dad?” he asks.
His dad’s eyes go to me then, looking closely. I feel my heart pounding. I don’t know what I was going to do. Probably not go off and hit him, but I’d at least like to have had my chance.
“If you’d like to apologize, I have a name,”
I say. “I don’t usually go by ‘slut.’”
“I’m sorry, Nell.” This comes from Jackson. He should be so sorry. I’m not done with him, either.
But Mr. Hart has somehow shot straight up into apoplectic. “Get out of my sight,” he tells us, jabbing a finger into Jackson’s chest. “The next time you pull a stunt like this, I’m enrolling you in military school.”
Jackson clasps his fingers around mine and leads me away. I’m shaking so hard, I can barely put one foot in front of the other to get away from him. When we’re safely in Jackson’s truck, I don’t even know why, but I lose it. I put my face into my hands and start crying.
“Nell,” he says, his hand rubbing slow circles on my back. “I’m so sorry.”
“How can he just … degrade me like that?” I hear myself saying. “I am so many fucking things, but all he sees is a slut. All he sees is something for a man to stick his dick into.”
“Nell,” he tries.
“And you.” I turn to him, pointing. “You used me in one of your schemes against him. You knew what would happen if you took that boat and you did it anyway. You used me and to what end? So you could have your little moment of victory. You … You treated me the same way he did.”
“I never meant to do any of that. I’m sorry,” he pleads. “Look, yes, I wanted to piss him off, but I didn’t think he would turn on you like that. I wanted to be with you before anything else.”
“You are such a liar,” I tell him. My hands are still shaking. “You always have been. ‘I thought you respected the Beckers.’ You knew exactly what would happen.”
“Nell. Come on, we are so far past that.”
I shake my head. “I’m not a pawn in your game, Jackson. I am the goddamn game.”
“I know,” he says. “I’m sorry. I fucked up.”
I don’t look at him, staring straight ahead out the front window, trying to become steel again. They’re nothing but words. Nothing but empty words from men who have to assure themselves exactly how much power they have.
“Take me home,” I tell him. “Just take me home.”
34
I’m coming over.
Lia had sent me that text right after volleyball practice.
When I walk into my house, she’s sitting on the couch, watching TV with Dad.
“Hello,” he says to me when I walk in. I feel both of their eyes on my skin, slowly turning red from too much sun. “Did you have a nice day?” he asks.
I shrink under his withering glare. “The boat ran out of gas,” I lie.
“People are counting on you, Nell. If something comes up, you need to let them know.”
“I called your mom,” Lia says, throwing her hands up in defeat. “I didn’t know where you were. I was worried.”
I swallow. “Thanks for being worried. You don’t have to apologize,” I tell her.
“Your mom is not happy with you,” Dad says. “You need to talk to her when she gets home. She’s working late and then going to book club.”
I put my fingers against my temples as if holding my head in place, a ghost of a tremor still living under my skin. “Can everyone just give me a break right now? I’m sorry but … I can’t.” I’m barely keeping it together, after the scene with Mr. Hart.
“I need to talk to you,” Lia tells me, standing up from the couch. “Thanks for entertaining me, Mr. Becker.”
“You’re always welcome,” he tells her.
“Let’s go out back. There’s finally a breeze,” I say. We walk through the kitchen, through the screened porch, and out into the backyard where a wooden swing still hangs from the big willow tree.
Lia’s barely been over at all this summer, I realize. Even though we’ve always spent more time at her place than mine, it’s the first summer I can remember when we haven’t gotten giggly in my room and run outside, pushing each other on the swing, standing on the wooden slat like we are brave.
The swing looks awfully lonely now.
I sit down in the grass, lying back and staring up at the fading sunlight, the stars fighting to take control of the sky. She lies in the opposite direction, our heads perfectly in line. We’ve done this more times than I can remember.
“I covered for you,” she says. She glances over at me. “What happened to you? You look like shit.”
I rub my hand against my sunburnt arm. “Jackson’s dad called me a slut,” I tell her. “Well, first, his mom insinuated I wasn’t welcome in their home and then his dad called me a slut.” I feel my eyes welling up and almost tell her what happened on the boat, but I’m too embarrassed to admit it.
Lia sits up, staring back at me. “Are you kidding?”
I shake my head, unable to fully meet her eye. “Jackson dragged me right into the lion’s den. He was taunting his dad and…” I trail off. Part of me wants to take it back because I know she’ll judge me for it. I’ll lose her respect.
“Nell,” she says, “you are not a slut. And you are far better than what Jackson Hart deserves.”
“Please don’t do that.”
“Hey,” she answers, and I stare up at her, upside down and blurry through my unshed tears, “no one gets to talk to you like that. No matter who they are.”
She lies back down next to me, brushing a piece of grass from my face. “Sometimes I wonder if you even realize what you’ve gotten yourself into.”
A plane is moving through the sky, pretending to be a comet. “What does that mean?” I ask. “You think I can’t handle him myself?”
“I just think there’s things about him you don’t know.”
“Of course there are,” I tell her. “I think there’s things about you I don’t know. Is there something specific?”
“No, I just—” I feel her shift, fold one arm behind her head. “Columbus is always so uncomfortable when he talks about things Jackson does and says—and that’s his best friend, Nell. I feel like there’s more to all this weird shit with his parents than he’s letting on.”
“You always do this,” I say. “When I admit I got hurt or messed up, you infantilize me. As if I’m somehow incapable.”
“Seriously? You have, like, the most bizarre set of rules for yourself. You think too much about everything, but you always defend him. How can you not see what I do?”
“You’re such a hypocrite.” I sit up. “You and Columbus and that star-crossed bullshit? You think that’s all on the up and up?”
“That is completely different,” Lia tells me, volume rising. “It’s not even his choice. My family has already lost everything, and now you want me to throw this on top of it, too?”
“Your family hasn’t lost anything. That’s the thing with you people,” I say, taking something out on her that isn’t her fault. “You still do whatever you want and you’re still rich and the way it hurts anyone else doesn’t matter at all.” I can still feel the way Jackson was watching me in the truck earlier. Like a flip-book, it runs through my mind—all the clothes I could never afford and all the trips I could never take and opportunity after opportunity I won’t have.
I have everything I need, but as long as I know that life exists, I’ll never be enough.
Lia sits straight up, twisting around to face me. “How. Fucking. Dare you? I have been bending over backward to accommodate you despite the fact that my life is falling apart. But all I ever hear about is Nell’s volleyball and Nell’s class ranking and Nell’s rich boyfriend.”
“Lia,” I say. “Don’t.”
She gets to her feet and stands there looking down at me. “Do you know how shit I feel all the time?”
“No, because you don’t tell me. You won’t talk to me, and half the time, I wonder if you even like me. Besides,” I continue because I can’t stand to miss my kill shot. To get the win. “Imagine how Columbus feels. His parents are the good guys.”
Her face closes off, her hair bouncing behind her. “I think I need to…” She pauses to compose herself and I realize it’s because she’s about to s
tart crying. “… not talk to you for a couple of days. Which should be just fine with you, right?”
I want to take it all back, and I don’t. “Wait, Lia. I only—” I start to say, but the look on her face stops me. Because it wasn’t an accident and she knows me well enough to know it.
“I’ll see you at practice tomorrow,” she says. Then she walks around the side of the house, purposely not going back in, not having to face my family, which she is basically a member of. I curl my legs up into my body, burying my face in my knees. Take deep breaths. I start, ridiculously, running over important dates in European history in my head. I wonder if I can drown my brain in important dates in European history until I forget everything else about this terrible fucking day.
Minutes or hours pass. By the time I hear the porch door opening, it’s completely dark. “Hey, kid.” Kid—I’m always a kid to him.
“Please don’t lecture me,” I beg him. “I can’t take anymore. I can’t take anymore anything at this point.”
“Honey, the only thing I’ll ever ask you to do is not purposely hurt somebody else and to apologize if you unintentionally do. Not too much, right?”
“Simple,” I say, pressing my mouth into my knee. I look up at him. “How do you ever know when you’re wrong?”
He laughs. “You don’t. You just hope you’re not and pray like hell. That’s what my dad always said.”
I nod.
“Do you know why I hate this place?” Dad asks me.
“No,” I return, though I’ve always wondered.
“This town never gives anyone room to grow. You are who you’ll always be. I could sell a thousand million-dollar homes, but I’ll always be an upstate hick to them. We’re always going to be on the wrong side of the river. Your mom thinks she can fight it, thinks you’ll beat it. It’s a worthy cause, but it’s like hoping the Earth will reverse course on its axis.
“Some boys are always going to be revered in Cedar Woods. And that is why your mother hates that boyfriend of yours.”
I blink a couple of times. “I could be revered, too.”
Dad looks at me, tall and straight-backed. “I want you to do everything you want. But don’t forget that one day, you’re going to look back and realize what a small part of your life this was.”
Winner Take All Page 20