by Pintip Dunn
As soon as the words leave his mouth, the tips of his ears turn red, and he drops his gaze.
My stomach flutters like a dozen moths are trapped inside. Does he mean it? Or is he just being polite? I mean, I certainly noticed his looks. How could I not? But I’m not used to boys complimenting me, much less boys who are really cute and really nice.
And for some reason, when Liam says it, I don’t feel like scrubbing my skin with a Brillo Pad, the way I did when the guys downstairs were checking me out. I feel . . . good.
“If it were any other night, you’d be disappointed,” I say, trying to sound casual. Trying to act as though hot guys tell me I look pretty every day. “I had a rough day and wanted to get out of my head.”
“Same. Some idiot doctored the hotline flyers with the wrong phone number, so I spent all afternoon replacing every last one of those suckers.”
“You did? I could kiss you!” I blurt out and then flush. Oh god. Why did I say that? Stupid, stupid, stupid.
But he takes a step forward, as if he doesn’t think I’m stupid at all. And he’s got this crooked, dimpled smile on his face—oh god, that dimple!—as if he might make my words come true....
My pulse skitters in a million directions. “That was my number on the posters,” I babble. “My phone’s been ringing nonstop since this morning.”
This stops his forward motion. “Why would someone do this to you?”
I lift my shoulders, trying to smile. Not sure if I should be kicking myself for ruining the moment. “Oh, you know. The usual harassment. Nothing more.” I aim for light and bouncy, like an inflatable ball at the beach. But the stress of the day punctures a hole in my voice, and the ball fizzles to the ground.
He wouldn’t understand. He couldn’t. He’s probably never been teased a day in his life, much less bullied. And yet, his eyes are soft. “People can be so cruel. Sometimes, they don’t even realize how cruel they’re being.”
“What would you know about it?” I mutter.
“I know more than you think,” he says quietly.
We look at each other, and the air crackles with electricity. My every nerve ending comes alive, and he shifts so that his face is hovering above mine. I have time to think, maybe I haven’t killed the moment, after all . . .
. . . and then I hear a disturbingly familiar voice through the wooden door.
“I know she came up here . . . I saw her . . .” Tommy says.
I freeze and stumble away from Liam. Are they talking about me?
“Look, dude, this is ridiculous,” another voice rasps. Justin Blake. It has to be. “You don’t owe her anything.”
“Like hell I don’t!” Tommy’s voice rises. “She deserves to know . . .”
He trails off, and try as I might, I can’t hear anything else. What? I want to scream. What do I deserve to know?
“CeCe, are you okay?” Liam asks.
I snap my eyes back to his face, rubbing the goose bumps that have sprung up along my arm. The voices outside wouldn’t have meant anything to him. Maybe he didn’t even hear them. “Listen, I’m really sorry, but I’ve got to go. There’s something I have to do.”
“Take my hoodie. You look cold.” He peels his jacket off his arms and hands it to me.
I fumble with the soft cotton, and my hand gets caught in the sleeve. Let’s face it. I’m not the kind of girl to whom guys rush around lending their jackets. Stick their tongues through their fingers and simulate gross sexual acts, yes. Do something chivalrous, no.
Without a word, Liam takes the hoodie and helps me slide my arms through. The jacket settles on my shoulders like a flannel blanket, enveloping me with his musky scent, and his hands tighten, just briefly, on my shoulders.
“Thanks, Liam. I appreciate it.”
“I’ll see you soon?”
His eyes hold mine an instant longer than necessary. They’re pale blue, like the sky on those winter mornings when it tries to reflect the snow. Appealing, by any objective measure. But now that I’ve spent some time with him, I suspect there’s much more to Liam than his looks.
Something I think I like. Something I want to get to know a lot better. But not now. Now, I’m focused on one thing and one thing only. Tracking down the person I’ve been avoiding for the last six months.
Tommy Farrow.
Chapter 10
I trudge through the mud, my sneakers getting wetter and squishier with every step. Thank the stars I have Liam’s hoodie, but now I wish I’d thought to wear leggings or tights underneath the dress. The long stems of grass tickle my naked calves, and the wind gusts against my thighs.
Tommy wasn’t inside the cabin. Not the kitchen, where opened bags of chips and someone’s platform sandal lay strewn across the counter. Or the living room, where a girl was removing her choker, glasses, and retainer in preparation for a handstand. Or even the darkened den, where people stopped being individuals and broke down into body parts—an ass to grab, a pelvis to grind.
That leaves only one option. The bonfire next to the lake.
The moon shines overhead, and clumps of people hover around the flames. Out here, away from the music, the geese chatter nosily to each other, unaware the nighttime belongs to their human neighbors.
I see Tommy immediately, his hair curling at the nape of his neck. As always, the questions slither into my brain and refuse to leave. Did my mother wrap her fingers around those curls as she kissed him? Breathe in the scent of his hair as she pressed her bare breasts against his back?
He faces the fire, his hands shoved into his pockets, deep in conversation with someone hidden behind his broad shoulders.
I straighten my spine and walk toward him. My toes slosh in my sneakers in the same way that my stomach tilts from side to side. Am I really going to do this? Confront the boy who drove my mother to suicide?
The kaleidoscope of emotions hits me at once. The crawl-into-a-hole despair of what my mother did. The white-hot rage that she abandoned me. Even the deep, pervasive knowledge that she will never yank the comforter off my bed, when I’ve hit the snooze button too many times, ever again.
I let the emotions override the doubt, and before I know it, I’m tapping Tommy Farrow on the very shoulder my mother may have nibbled.
He turns, and the features of his companion come into focus.
Good god, it’s Mackenzie freaking Myers. Why is she talking to him? I thought she couldn’t stand him.
Her eyebrows shoot into her widow’s peak, and her mouth hangs open. Looking at the gap between her front teeth, I realize: She could say the very same thing about me.
Before either of us can speak, Tommy grabs my hand. “I’ve been looking for you everywhere,” he says, not using my name. Does he even remember it? One thing’s for sure. I’m the “she” to whom he was referring. There’s something he wants to tell me. Something I deserve to know.
“Can we go someplace quiet to talk?” I ask.
“There’s nothing I’d like more,” he slurs. Without another glance at Mackenzie, no good-bye, nothing, he pulls me from the bonfire.
Mackenzie’s eyes blaze. But she’s not the only one who’s pissed. We haven’t gone two steps when we’re intercepted by Tommy’s watchdog.
“You don’t have to do this.” Justin spreads his legs, blocking our path. “Your mind is telling you things it doesn’t mean. Things you’ll regret in the morning. Let go of the girl, and come with me.” His voice is slow and deliberate. The kind you use to talk a suicide jumper off the ledge.
“It’s past time,” Tommy mumbles. “Almost six months past.”
Every hair on my neck stands up. I don’t care if he’s incapacitated. If he wants to talk to me, it has to be about my mother. Right?
Justin rips him from me and shoves him toward one of their brawny friends. “Get him in the car, where he can’t hurt anyone. I’ll deal with him in a minute.”
“But I need to talk to her,” Tommy whines as the friend leads him away. “I NEED TO.”
<
br /> “That’s not Tabitha, you fool!” Justin shouts after them. “It’s her daughter!”
I wrap my arms around my body, squeezing my ribs through the hoodie. Oh. Is that what this was about? Tommy wanted to talk to me . . . because he thought I was my mother?
Too late I remember I’m wearing the dress we used to share. My hair, as dark as hers in the black night, swirls around my shoulders. If she weren’t decomposing underground, I could be my mother’s much-younger twin.
Justin turns to me. His face is a grotesque puzzle that’s been put together all wrong, and I can tell he’s going to be mean. Meaner than usual. A meanness that’s been saved up, festering on a shelf.
“You girls are only good for one thing,” he rasps. “But I don’t need you around to pull my dick when I can do a better job myself.”
I flinch, and Justin laughs. It cuts me like broken glass.
“Oh, didn’t you know that’s what your mom did? It wasn’t just Tommy, you know. He’s the only one who came forward, but she used to go down the row of us guys, giving us whatever we wanted.”
“I don’t believe you,” I whisper. “That story’s ridiculous.”
He smirks. “Is that right?” His voice is baiting, baiting, baiting me. I’m a helpless fish, unable to avoid the lure because I can’t tell where it is. “How well did you really know your mother, CeCe? Did she tell you about her sexual fetishes?”
“I knew her well enough.” I lift my chin, but the effect’s ruined by my trembling jaw.
He reaches into his back pocket and pulls out a cell phone. “See for yourself. Apparently, your mother’s been a slut her whole life.”
He hands the phone to me, and I take it automatically. With the same sick compulsion that draws onlookers to car accidents, I look at the screen.
The Internet browser is open, with the headline “Hotties We Love” blazoned across the top. Underneath, a stunning teenager with sunset hair looks at the camera, her beauty eclipsed only by the glorious orbs of her naked breasts.
The caption proclaims: “Tabitha, at 17.”
The phone slips through my fingers and falls into the muddy grass.
“Hey! Watch it!” Justin yells.
But his words are muffled through the roar in my ears. It’s my mother, all right. There’s no mistaking the classic bone structure, those soulfully expressive eyes that used to be the last thing I saw before I went to sleep. She would croon a lullaby as she tucked me in, and I never felt safer than when I looked into those moon-drenched eyes.
I will always love you, she used to say. No matter what mistakes you make, no matter how badly you behave, I will always, always love you.
Too bad I can’t say the same about her.
“Where did you get this?” My voice breaks and crackles like the late autumn leaves.
Justin smirks. “I stumbled across it during one of my porn sessions. Imagine my surprise when I realized it was none other than our old friend, Miz Brooks.” He turns and shouts at the crowd. “If you haven’t already seen it, people, it’s www.hottieswelove.com! Go on. You know you want to.”
All around us, people pull out their phones. Tap on the keys. And stare at me.
Again. Just like those first weeks after my mom’s suicide.
Sweat drenches my body, and I sway on my feet. I can’t see anything but a long, narrow tunnel in front of me. Too bad that’s where Justin’s standing.
He fishes his phone out of the mud and wipes it against his jeans. “You wanna pose for me, CeCe? Follow in mummy’s footsteps? Your rack’s not quite as big as the old lady’s, but I’ll make a few allowances. I’m generous like that.”
The whispering increases. I’m trapped in a beehive, and the drones are closing in, surrounding me, sealing off every exit. I’m drowning in their sticky, honey-like gossip, gasping, gasping for a breath. And then, a new voice breaks in.
“Photoshop.” Sam strides between Justin and me, pushing his glasses up his nose. “Haven’t you all heard of Photoshop? This picture you’re all gawking at could be fake. All you need is a head shot of someone, and you can create any image you want.”
It’s bullshit, of course. The lines in the photo are too clean, too seamless. And I’ve seen a very similar version of those breasts before, reflected back from my own mirror. But at least Sam’s trying.
He looks Justin up and down, from the hair that flops over his forehead to his too-cool loafers. “I could go on Facebook this very second, snag a photo of this guy, and presto, you could be looking at his naked photo. Whether you’d enjoy it is a different question.”
The crowd titters. Justin’s face turns the shade of a day-old bruise. By outward appearances, the former football player should have the upper hand. Despite his bulk, he could be an Abercrombie model, while Sam’s sweatshirt is torn, and his moon-like glasses slide down his nose. But none of that matters right now.
“Come on, CeCe.” Sam holds his hand out to me. “Let’s go.”
I take his hand, and he leads me out of there, away from the sea of unblinking eyes.
Chapter 11
We stride from the bonfire, and at first the adrenaline of what Sam did propels me forward. He faced my biggest bully—and got the best of him. We’re walking away, with Justin looking like the fool, not me.
Not me. It’s always been me. How could it possibly not be me?
And then the fear settles in, wraps around my stomach, and jumps my heart forward a few beats. Because if I know Justin at all, there will be repercussions. Big ones. Ones I’m not sure I’m ready for.
“I don’t have a car,” Sam says, pulling me from my thoughts. We’ve crossed half the lawn, and more mud has mucked its way up my legs, so I feel like I’m wearing tights after all. Sludge tights. “Some knight in shiny armor, right? Whisking you off, without anywhere to take you.”
“It’s okay.” I fish my car keys out of the pocket in my dress. “I drove tonight.”
We walk to the long line of cars parked on the gravel driveway. I’m not sure why. I can’t leave yet since I’m Alisara’s ride, but at least it gets me away from the party.
We reach my car, all the way at the end, and I unlock the doors, grab some paper towels, and begin cleaning the mud off my legs. I finish an entire leg before I realize Sam’s staring. My pale flesh gleams in the moonlight, and with my foot propped on the running board, the short dress reveals more than I want of my thigh.
I stiffen, and my mom’s topless photo floats through my mind. Her sunset hair, the round, heavy breasts. So this is the way it’s going to be, even with him?
Something hot and fierce moves through my body. All I wanted from this year was to be left alone. Maybe meet a guy who likes me for me. No such luck. My mom’s in the grave, but she’s still here. Still messing things up for me.
I drop my foot to the ground. “So that’s why you stood up for me, huh?” The laugh scrapes out of my throat. “You wouldn’t be the first. Everyone says we look alike, you know. So if you’re wondering? Yeah, I can confirm that’s exactly how I look topless.”
“CeCe, I’m not interested in you like that.” His Adam’s apple jumps in his throat. “I mean, I am, but your mom has nothing to do with it . . .”
He trails off, and I yank the hoodie off my shoulders. “Go ahead. Look all you want. Apparently, my boobs are public property, since the whole world’s seen my mom’s.”
To his credit, Sam keeps his eyes on my face. “I saw the photo, but only for a second. I didn’t stare at it. I sure as hell didn’t get off on it. The only thing I thought was how it would affect you.”
The hoodie droops from my hands, and I toss it on the trunk. Sam takes off his sweatshirt, too, and throws it next to mine. I realize how warm I’ve gotten. Whether it’s from the bonfire or the confrontation with Justin, my skin’s hot and sticky. Sam probably feels the same way.
The anger flees as quickly as it came. Sam’s on my side. He didn’t do anything wrong, but I leaped to conclusions. Maybe there a
re nice guys left in this world, after all. Maybe all the nice ones, I just manage to drive away.
“Why did you help me out back there?” I mumble.
“I may be the new guy at school, but I’m not oblivious.” His voice stumbles, as if it’s on uneven ground. But like the boy on the Rollerblades, it glides brazenly, unflinchingly on. “It didn’t take long to piece together how they’ve been treating you. You don’t deserve that. Nobody does.”
I don’t say anything. I can’t. No one’s been this kind to me in ages, except maybe Alisara. In the weeks after the funeral, she would sit by my bed for hours, carrying on a monologue about who hooked up with whom and did I want to try her raspberry lipstick and how she might go to Homecoming with Brian Finnigan. Innocuous gossip in which she only had a mild interest, conveyed in hopes of drawing me out.
But even Alisara has her limits, and after a few weeks of our one-sided conversations, her visits became further and further apart until they stopped completely.
I’ve told myself I’ll be wary around Sam. He’s writing an article about my mom, and he’s determined to root out every last salacious detail. But I feel myself tipping toward him. A magnetic pull that has me teetering on the edge. Involvement. If there’s a way to be around Sam and remain detached, I haven’t figured it out.
Maybe I don’t need to. Maybe the best way to control what he finds out is to stay near him. Keep my enemies closer and all that.
Except when I look into his face, silhouetted by the moon, the last thing he feels like is my enemy.
“I can’t go anywhere because I’m Alisara’s ride.” I chew on my lips. “But could you . . . hang out with me? I don’t want to be alone right now.”
I’ve said it to myself dozens of times over the last year, in different ways, but it all adds up to the same thing. I’m so lonely. I feel alone. I miss my mom.
It’s funny how I never felt alone before. Even when I was up in my room, studying late at night with only my earbuds for company, I didn’t feel alone. I knew I could always find my mom somewhere in the house, and no matter what, she would drop whatever she was doing and have a cup of tea with me. It’s not that I sought her out often. I didn’t always agree with her advice, and most of the time, I didn’t want to hear it. But she was always there, always available. The equivalent of a teenager’s security blanket.