“Oh.” I pressed my lips together, nodded. My warped reflection glinted off his glasses. Two tiny splats of me.
“I’m sorry.” He moved his head and my mirror images winked out. “I’m sorry for all this misunderstanding.”
Of course he was sorry. So was Joey. So was my dad.
“You’re okay?” he asked me.
I made myself shrug. Like it didn’t matter. Like it didn’t hurt at all.
• • •
As I walked down the hallway, a self-portrait formed in my head. I knew exactly how hurt and anger looked. My face long and pale. Blank eyes. A slash for a mouth. All my features blaring in stark light.
Once outside, the sun beat down on me, hardening my anger like an oven bakes clay. The bus sat shuddering by the curb. I was about to board, but a hand on my arm held me back.
“Tera, wait.” It was Haley, her eyes wide and blinking.
“I can’t talk,” I said. “I’ll miss the bus.”
“But I met with that lawyer guy. Herman Liebowitz.” She studied my face. “Did he call you?”
The bus released its brakes in an ear-splitting hiss. “No,” I said. “Not since last week.”
“Oh.” She looked confused. “He was supposed to call you.”
“Well, he didn’t.”
The bus engine roared to life. The door rattled shut. “Wait!” I knocked on the glass, but the huge tires were already inching away from the curb. My arm dropped to my side. Shit.
Haley dangled the keys to her mom’s Audi. “I can give you a ride.”
“I don’t want a ride,” I snapped. “I want to know why I had to miss the bus. What did you tell the lawyer?” I knew Dad was guilty, but I still didn’t think he had done anything to Haley. He always avoided her, called her a snotty little bitch. And he knew she was a huge blabbermouth. “Did you lie to him? What did you tell him?”
Haley’s face paled. She shook her head. “I don’t want to talk about it.”
Of course she didn’t. I had missed the bus so she could have her moment of drama. Sweat trickled down my neck. “Why are you doing this, Haley?”
“Huh?” That innocent blink again.
“Is it so everyone can see how nice you are to talk to someone like me?”
Her eyes narrowed. “Why are you being such a bitch? All I wanted was to help you.”
We were starting to draw an audience, but I didn’t care. I was sick of her phony sweetness, sick of everyone adoring her because she was pretty and drove a nice car and had normal parents.
“Did my dad actually do something to you, Haley? I’m sure everyone wants to hear so they can feel sorry for you.”
“Stop it. I’m trying to help you.”
“Trying to help by making sure the entire school knows? I saw what you posted on the school forum. ‘Don’t study at Tera’s house because her dad’s a child molester.’” My laugh sounded hollow. “Ever since we were kids, you’ve pretended to help me, but all you really want is to stab me in the back.”
The whole time I was spouting off, she just stared at me like I was crazy. Like she felt sorry for me.
Her boyfriend Sam peeled away from the stunned circle of kids who had stopped to listen. He put his hand on Haley’s shoulder, murmured in her ear. “Let’s go.”
That seemed to shake her. She let him lead her away.
And then she stopped and turned back, her face crumbling. “You have no idea what you’re talking about,” she told me. She was crying. Real tears. “Honestly, you have no idea.”
CHAPTER 30
When I got home from school, Herman Liebowitz called the house. I knew who it was from the caller ID.
Mom answered it from her bedroom before I could grab it in the kitchen. She was already talking when I lifted it to my ear.
“She’s not here,” Mom was saying. “And please stop calling. If she wanted to talk to you, she’d call you. She has your number.”
A pause. “You are aware, Ms. Waters, that I can have your daughter subpoenaed? I’d rather not do that, so if I could please just talk to her.”
“I’m here,” I said into the phone. “Mom, it’s okay. You can hang up.”
“I’m not hanging up.”
“Am I speaking to Tera Waters?” the lawyer said.
I liked how composed he sounded even with Mom barking at him. “Yes,” I said. “I’m Tera.”
“I’m wondering if you can come to my office tomorrow morning to speak with me. I have something I’d like to show you, before your father’s trial gets under way.”
“Is this about Haley Sweeney? About what she told you?”
“Who?” I heard papers shuffling. “No, it’s nothing to do with her. Will you come?”
Mom breathed into the phone.
“What time?” I asked.
“You can come before school, I’ll be here. Say seven o’clock?”
“That’s fine. Let me get your address.”
I scribbled down his directions and told him I’d see him in the morning.
Mom came into the kitchen. “At least let me go with you.”
“Do you know what it’s about?”
Mom crossed her arms over her chest. “He probably wants you to testify.”
“He said he had something to show me.”
“I don’t know anything about that. Will you let me go with you? In case you need me?”
I studied her face. The way her eyes pleaded. “Yeah, okay,” I said. I couldn’t imagine what she could do for me, but I’d let her play at being a good mom. She definitely needed the practice.
• • •
And still my day wasn’t over. I had to work that evening. With Joey. I dreaded having to see him, deal with him.
The first hour of work passed slowly. Joey hadn’t clocked in yet. I filled the salad bar and stood around the server station, waiting for customers. No tables came in, but the phone kept ringing for carryout orders.
After I keyed in yet another carryout order, I wandered back to the prep table to see if Cam needed help. He’d already seen the order and was smearing sauce onto a circle of dough. He dropped the ladle into the tub and picked up a handful of cheese with his gloved hand.
“You need any help?” I asked. “It’s dead out there.”
He smiled. “Do you think you could scratch my ear?”
“Sure.”
And that’s what I was doing when Joey came past—scratching Cam’s ear.
Joey stopped in his tracks. A mean little smile curled his lips. “Scratching an itch, Tera?” He made a jerking-off motion with his hand. “Keep practicing. You’re not that good at it.”
A flush crept up my neck. I suddenly felt very small.
Joey kept walking. Cam followed him with his eyes. “What the hell? What was that about?”
It was about me not wanting to have a threesome at his uncle’s party. A fucking tease, he had called me. But I couldn’t explain that to Cam. “I have no idea,” I said.
Sadie clocked in a few minutes later. “How’re you doing?” she asked me. “Is Joey being an asshole?”
I shrugged.
“Because if he’s being an asshole, I’ll kick his ass.”
We started to get busy then. A bunch of tables came in at the same time, and I was hurrying so much that I made a mistake typing in an order. I didn’t notice the mistake on the ticket until after I’d brought out their drinks. By then the pizza was made and ready for the oven.
And of course it was Joey, not Cam, who’d made the order. Cam smiled at me as he scooped up a handful of pepperoni. I tried to smile back.
“Hey, Joey?” I said.
Joey’s eyes shifted to me.
“That pizza with the green pepper is actually supposed to be mushroom.”
Joey used the sauce ladle to point to the monitor above his head. “It says green pepper.”
“I know. I’m sorry. I messed up.”
He tossed the ladle back into the sauce tub. “Maybe you should s
pend more time doing your job and less time stalking me.”
“I’m not stalking you.”
Cam kept laying down pieces of pepperoni like the job required every bit of his concentration.
“You think I haven’t noticed the way you follow me around?” Joey tilted the botched pizza into the garbage. “I hate to break it to you, but I sampled your goods, and I’m not paying.”
My ears burned. I wanted to walk away and hide my face, but I made myself stand there and look at him as though he hadn’t just cut me in half. It was one thing to let my dad manipulate me, but I was done letting this jerk-off make me feel bad about myself. I did enough of that on my own.
I was trying to think of something to say—something that would show him he couldn’t hurt me—when Mr. Barnes hurried past with a tub of dirty dishes. “Tera, I just sat two tables in your section. You need to move it along.”
“Okay,” I said. I knew I should stay and finish this, but I was glad for an excuse to leave. “Be right there.”
Joey laughed. “Hey, Tera. Two at the same time—just like the other night.”
I whirled on him. “Stop it! What did I ever do to you?”
Joey pretended not to hear me. He leaned closer to Cam. “You should have seen her the other night, going at it, with me and this other guy. At the same time. I can’t remember the guy’s name.” He looked over at me, his lips curled up in a smug little smile. I was losing this battle, and he knew it. “Did you catch his name, Tera, before you started taking your clothes off for him?”
“You’re such a complete and total dick! Why don’t you tell Cam what really happened?”
Cam grabbed a fistful of mushrooms. “I don’t think I should be hearing this.”
“You definitely need to hear this,” Joey said. “You first, Tera.” The way he lounged against the table, the way he talked down to Cam and me—even the way he smirked—reminded me so much of my dad.
“He’s pissed,” I said, “because I wouldn’t have sex with him and his sleazy uncle.”
Cam dropped a pile of mushrooms on his pizza.
“But tell him the whole thing,” Joey said, folding his arms over his chest. “I thought she liked older men. I thought for sure she’d taken her clothes off for her dad.”
“You’re such an asshole.” I wanted to hit him, scratch his eyes out. Instead I clenched my pen inside my apron pocket. I clenched it so hard that my fingers hurt. “Just stop talking.”
He looked amused, holding up his hands in a helpless gesture. “What am I doing?”
“You know exactly what you’re doing! Trying to pretend I’m some kind of slut because of what my dad did.” I couldn’t hold back my anger any longer, and I hurled my pen at him. It bounced off his apron and fell to the floor. “What my dad did has nothing to do with who I am!”
Mr. Barnes came rushing toward us, his face tight with anger. “What are you guys doing back here? We have customers!”
Joey waved his arm at the prep station, his face a picture of innocence. “I’m right where I’m supposed to be. She’s the one throwing things.”
With Mr. Barnes standing there, I saw my chance. I knew I couldn’t keep up with Joey’s verbal attacks. And I knew I couldn’t claw that smug smile off his face.
“Joey’s right,” I said to Mr. Barnes. “I’m the one who should be in the dining room.”
Joey smirked. Cam seemed engrossed in the stainless-steel surface of the prep table.
“But I think Joey would rather be out there bussing tables,” I said. “There’s more money in it. Isn’t that right, Joey?”
Joey’s sneer froze on his face. That was all the encouragement I needed to keep going.
“Did you ever notice how eager he is to help out in the dining room?” I asked Mr. Barnes. “He moves pretty fast when it comes to snatching things off tables.”
And now his cocky grin started melting away.
Mr. Barnes’s eyes flitted from me to Joey and back to me. “What are you talking about, Tera? Did you see something?”
“I saw him take something from a table,” I said.
Joey rubbed the back of his neck. “She’s full of shit.”
I shrugged, like he might have a point. “And did you know he drinks beer all night from the tap?”
Mr. Barnes looked furious. “We’ll talk about this later. Right now we’re in the middle of dinner rush, and I need all of you to get back to work.”
Before I headed to the dining room, I tried to catch Cam’s eye. I needed to know if I’d just ruined whatever friendship we had.
Cam didn’t see me. He was kneeling on the floor picking up my pen. He stood and held it out. “You dropped this.”
My hand shook as I took it from him. “Thanks.”
“Do you need anything?” he asked, always with that shy politeness.
Tears of relief welled up behind my eyes. Relief because he was still being nice to me after all he’d heard. “I’m good,” I said.
And then I went back to work.
• • •
After the dinner rush, Mr. Barnes called Joey back to his office. Cam, Sadie, and I huddled near the prep table, hoping to listen in, but Mr. Barnes had made sure to shut his door.
Sadie peered at my face. “I know you hate him. And you have every right to. But tell me for real. You saw him stealing tips from the tables?”
“I saw him take something from your table,” I said. It didn’t seem to matter that I wasn’t sure what he’d taken. They assumed it was money. I let them assume.
“Do you think he’ll get fired?” Cam asked.
“If Mr. Barnes doesn’t fire him,” Sadie said, “then I quit. I’m not working with someone who steals from me.”
After a few minutes, Joey came out of Mr. Barnes’s office. He had a vague smile on his face.
Shit, I thought. He didn’t get fired.
And then he took off his work apron, wadded it into a ball, and threw it into the garbage. I wanted to cheer.
“Hoo-ray,” Cam whispered.
Sadie, Cam, and I lined up against the prep table to watch him leave. Joey didn’t look at any of us as he walked past.
I thought of it as his walk of shame.
CHAPTER 31
The sun had barely risen over the tallest downtown buildings when Herman Liebowitz greeted my mom and me in his office the next morning. If he was surprised to see my mom with me, he was polite enough not to say anything.
“Thank you for coming,” he said.
He looked exactly how I’d pictured him. An old guy, tall and lean, with thinning white hair and wrinkled skin. I wiped my sweaty palm on my jeans before shaking his hand.
“Won’t you sit down?”
Mom and I took seats across from him at a big conference table where a file folder marked Confidential lay next to an open laptop. I assumed it was some new evidence against my dad, and suddenly I was glad Mom was there beside me. Whatever was in that folder, I didn’t want to deal with it alone.
“Can I get you something to drink?” he asked. “My girl’s not in yet, but I think I can manage to get you some coffee.”
“No, thanks,” Mom said.
I didn’t say anything. I couldn’t take my eyes off the file folder.
“Then let’s get down to business.” He folded his hands and placed them in front of him on the table. “I called you in here because I thought you should know about a key piece of evidence we found. It’s rather sensitive, and I didn’t think it was right to let you hear about it from an outside source.”
Suddenly I felt sure I knew what was in that folder. “The picture,” I murmured.
He leaned closer. “I’m sorry, what was that?”
Mom whipped her head toward me. “What are you talking about? What picture?”
I closed my eyes, trying to banish the image of me naked, posing like a dog. I’d tried so hard to forget it, but I knew it too well. Every line, every shadow.
“Miss Waters?”
&nb
sp; I opened my eyes to see Herman Liebowitz looking at me. I saw compassion, but I saw confusion, too. He didn’t know what I was talking about. So it wasn’t the photo of me naked. It was something else. Thank God it was something else.
“I’m okay.”
“I know this is difficult for you, but if there’s anything you want to tell me . . .”
“Please,” I said. “Just show me what’s in there.”
“All right.” He put his hand on the folder but didn’t open it.
“This is hard for me to say, and there’s no delicate way to put it.” He took a deep breath and opened the file folder.
Inside was a graphic novel. On its cover, a drawing of a naked child, a girl of about nine. I recognized my dad’s work right away, but it took me a moment longer to realize I was staring at my own face.
The naked girl with my face stood posing in front of a classroom. One thin arm rested on her bare hip. Her other hand held stringy hair off her shoulders. She thrust her chest out, flat as it was, and propped one of her legs on a desk. The pose was designed to give a full view of her nudity, but someone, probably Herman Liebowitz, had stuck a Post-it note over her privates. On the chalkboard behind her, I recognized my dad’s careful lettering: A Bowl Full of Cherries.
Something inside me withered and turned to dust. My throat swelled up. Tears stung my eyes but didn’t fall. Under the table, Mom grabbed my hand and held on.
A moment of silence, and then Herman Liebowitz started talking. “Your father wrote and illustrated a series of pornographic books portraying children. There are many different faces in these so-called graphic novels, but the main one is obviously based on Miss Waters, on how she looked as a child of about eight or nine.”
He cleared his throat. “There’s more inside the book that you don’t want to see. Sexual acts.” He laid his hand over the cover and looked at each of us in turn. “I’m sorry. I thought you should know.”
I stared at the girl’s face peeking out from beneath the lawyer’s liver-spotted hand. She had a sulking, pouty look, like she’d gotten in trouble. It was a face I knew well. I’d painted it enough times.
“Miss Waters? If there’s—”
“Other people saw this?” I asked.
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