by Callie Hart
While Wren’s been buying up bars and houses off-campus, I’ve been investing my money wisely. All of the various inheritances I’ve come into over the years have been put into the stock market. I’ve made a decent return on every penny. If my old man thinks cutting me off will have me crawling back to Surrey with my tail tucked between my legs, then he has another thing coming.
The remaining calls are from a number I don’t recognize. The caller ID reads: Uncle Bob’s Retrofit & Repair. I let it go to voicemail the first two times, but the caller doesn’t leave a message. The third time my phone rings, Pax thumps the Charger’s steering wheel, his teeth bared. “Fuck’s sake. Just answer it, man, or I’m gonna throw the damn thing out of the window. The incessant vibrating’s giving me a migraine.”
I roll my eyes, but I also take him seriously; Pax doesn’t make threats unless he plans on following through with them. “Yes?”
“Dashiell.” The cool voice on the other end of the line makes my hand throb unexpectedly. My body remembers the owner of that voice before I piece together who it belongs to. And then I remember.
“Oh. Great. You.”
“Me,” Alderman agrees. “Uncle Bob. Your friendly local car mechanic, calling with a reminder that your oil change is shortly due.”
“Well. As much I’d love to chat, Uncle Bob, I actually really don’t. I’d rather cut out my own tongue than have another conversation with you—”
“It’s done,” he says, sighing loudly.
I frown. “What do you mean, it’s done?”
Alderman tuts. “And here I was, under the impression that you were an astute seventeen-year-old.”
“Eighteen.”
“Congratulations,” Alderman says. “You made it to another birthday without accidentally killing yourself.”
“Is there a purpose to any of this, or did you just wanna call to hurl abuse at me?”
“I called because I wanted to make sure we’re still on the same page, now that Carina’s circumstances have changed.”
Alderman doesn’t say anything. I wait. After a long, tense silence filled with huffing, he speaks. “I’m sure you know exactly what I’m talking about. I just got off the phone with Carrie. I told her that her name was cleared. The problem in Alabama is no longer an issue for her. Her record’s sealed. She’ll be in no trouble if she gets pulled over by the cops—”
I lean forward, ignoring Pax’s nosy ass expression. “Wait, what?”
“Why are you even bothering?” Alderman growls. “She just told me she was at a party with a boy. Do you expect me to believe that the boy wasn’t you?”
“I’ve been in Boston all evening at a charity event. Carrie and I—” I cut myself off when I remember that Pax is sitting right next to me. He knew we were together at the end, though, and he’s astute enough to have pieced together the fact that we broke up shortly after that. “Carrie and I stopped seeing each other just like I promised. That’s all there is to it.”
Alderman laughs dryly down the phone. “Yeah. Alright, kid.” His voice drips with sarcasm; I think he suspects that I’m lying to him to avoid a beat-down. “Anyway. I wanted to thank you for giving me the space to figure things out for her when she needed it. Now that things have changed for Carrie, I suppose I wouldn’t have much to say if you were to start seeing her again.”
You have got to be kidding me. I wish I knew where this fucker lived. I’d show up on his doorstep and kick his fucking teeth out. “Now it’s okay for me to see her?”
He grunts. “I’ve met you. I know what kind of kid you are. Better the devil you know. Plus, you’ve met me, too. You know what’ll happen to you if you treat her badly.”
I’m about to have an embolism. “I’ve already treated her badly! You had me, ‘thoroughly and irrevocably break her heart.’ That’s what you said, remember?”
On the other end of the phone, Alderman laughs. “That’s right. I did, didn’t I. Make it up to her. Buy her flowers. Take her on a weekend away. You’re a resourceful guy, Lovett. I’m sure you’ll figure it out.”
Why do people keep saying that! I’m not a resourceful guy. I’m a pissed off guy with a splitting headache and the overwhelming urge to causing lasting physical harm. I clench my jaw, exhaling harshly down my nose.
“Don’t call me again.” When I hang up the phone, Pax stares at me, waiting for an explanation. “What?” I snap.
“Jesus fucking Christ, man. What did you do to Mendoza? I’ve been wondering why she’s been giving you stink eye for the better part of a year.”
“None of your fucking business.”
“Who was that?”
“Also none of your fucking business.”
Pax scowls, giving me a dangerous look. “Fine, fucker. As soon as we get back to the house, I’ll beat it out of you.”
“We’re not going back to the house.”
“Hell yes, we are. I have to get out of this suit.”
I pull the school directory up on my phone. I’m already looking for the contact number of someone who’ll be able to give me the information that I need. I select Presley Whitton Chase, hit the call button, and then I hold the phone to Pax’s mouth. He flinches away from it, swatting it away. “What the fuck, man!”
“Play nice and ask the pretty redhead where she is, Davis. We’re going to another party.”
The concept of murder isn’t so abhorrent. Not when you’ve had an hour to stew over something and you’ve really let your imagination take over. We pull up to the bro-infested party and I’m ready to kill. I’ve pictured the scene we’ll find inside: Carrie, wearing next to nothing, grinding up against some frat boy’s dick. Carrie, straddling some dude with a bad haircut, making out with him like she hasn’t gotten laid in months. Carrie, pinned to a bed while some jock and his friends take turns on her.
The fictional scenarios grow darker with each new rendition. I have a very loose grip on myself when Pax kills the Charger’s engine and I burst out of the car.
“Whoa! Slow down, fuckhead.” Pax grabs my arm, yanking me back. “I get the feeling that we’re about to break a few bones over here. Normally I’m okay with that, but I’m gonna need some more information this time, asshole. Who are we beating? And why did I just have to flirt with the redhead to find this place?”
I set my jaw, glaring at him. I think about hitting him, just belting him as hard as I can and running inside, but then I cool down a little. For once, he hasn’t done anything to deserve my ire. He’s rolled with the punches—first Wren bailing, then me losing my temper with my father and demanding we leave, and now this. It’s reasonable that he might want to know what the fuck is going on. I just…I can’t bring myself to tell him.
I pinch the bridge of my nose. “Look. Please. I don’t ask for much. Can you just come inside and follow my lead?”
“No explanation? None whatsoever?”
I shake my head.
He flares his nostrils, and I think he’s going to be stubborn—when isn’t he stubborn?—but then the sharpness in his eyes disappears and he shrugs. “Alright. Fair enough. S’pose I don’t have anything better to do.”
God love him. I’m gonna owe the bastard for this. Inside the contemporary, sleek house that Presley directed us to, the party is in full swing. We’re definitely in the right place. Red solo cups. Collegiate football jerseys. Bad fucking music. There are people everywhere, and I don’t recognize a single one.
“I take it we’re looking for Carrie,” Pax says. “You might as well at least confirm that.”
I nod reluctantly.
“Okay. We find the redhead, we find Mendoza, right?” Before I can agree with his logic, he cups his hands around his mouth and screams, “PRESLEY!”
The music thumps on, but across the living room, a sea of people stop their conversations and gape at us. Pax has been splashed all over billboards from Times Square to Tokyo. He’s aggressively walked down some of the most famous catwalks in the world. He does not give a shit when
people look at him. I, on the other hand, am fairly averse to the experience. I wince under the weight of all those eyes, but my friend grins, yelling at the top of his voice again. “PRESLEY MARIA WITTON CHASE! WHERE THE FUCK ARE YOU?”
The strangers in the living room exchange confused looks. Presley Maria Witton Chase isn’t a name a person forgets once they hear it…but no one here seems to have heard it. And then there’s a tall guy coming toward us in a navy-blue bomber jacket, and he’s smiling, and his hair is fucking perfect, and I just know that this is the prick Carina has gone and fallen in love with.
“Hey guys.” He grins at us both. “It’s Pax, right? Pres described you a little before she left.”
“She’s gone?” Pax looks irritated.
“Yeah, she went this weird shade of green when she realized who she was talking to, and then she started hyperventilating. She actually had a bit of a meltdown.” The guy with the perfect chocolate waves and the perfect chocolate eyes laughs. “I felt bad for her, so I drove her back to the school. She was a little tipsy. Started crying. For real, I don’t think she’s even gonna remember most of this tomorrow.”
Pax narrows his eyes at the guy. “And you are? Pres’ boyfriend?”
“Oh no, man.” He laughs easily, holding out his hand to Pax, grinning like he’s Ryan fucking Gosling or something. “I’m Andre. I’m Carina’s boyfriend.”
There. What did I say? I fucking knew it. Where does he get off with this fucking boyfriend talk, though? No way they’re already serious enough to be trading boyfriend/girlfriend titles. What am I saying? I actually have no idea how serious they are, or how long they’ve been seeing each other. I know nothing about their relationship, and that is galling as fuck.
Pax turns to me, wide-eyed. “Would you look who it is?” He smirks suggestively. “Andre. Carina’s boyfriend. This is Dashiell,” he says, turning back to Andre. “Carina’s ex.”
Andre’s friendly, Labrador-level enthusiasm does not falter. He’s still beaming, unperturbed, when he offers me his outstretched hand next. “Hey, dude. Nice to meet you. I didn’t know Carrie had an ex in town. She hasn’t mentioned you.”
I shake his hand up and down, numb to my core. If this were a cartoon, the guy would have just taken a knife and spliced me open from stem to sternum; my guts would be a wet, red splat of gore at my feet. He’s completely oblivious to what he’s just done, but I am so utterly incapacitated that there’s no way I can fight this person now.
She hasn’t mentioned you.
That one sentence seals the deal.
If Carrie was still even remotely conflicted over me in any way, wouldn’t she have mentioned some past heartbreak to a new love interest? Wouldn’t my name have been mentioned in passing? But no. This sweet, seemingly nice person had no clue I even existed until a second ago, which means that I don’t matter anymore. Carrie’s moved on. She’s not in pain anymore. She’s forgotten the hurt and the upset I caused her, and she’s found someone who I already know is going to treat her right.
Andre says something about Carrie having to leave hours ago to help out a friend. He gestures over his shoulder, pointing a thumb in the direction of the keg I can see out in the back yard. “You guys want a beer? It’s pretty weak domestic shit, but I don’t mind it. There are a couple of cases of a local IPA floating around somewhere, too.”
“I love a good IPA.” Pax rubs his hands together, looking around for the cases in question, but I lay a hand on his shoulder.
“That’s really decent of you to offer, but I’m afraid we have to get going actually. We only swung by on our way home to see if Pres needed a lift.”
Andre nods. I kid you not, it looks like he’s sincerely disappointed that we’re not going to stay and hang out with him. “Aww well. Never mind. Maybe next time. Actually, hey, wait here a sec.” He ducks off down a hallway.
Pax thumps me in the arm. “Why you gotta nix hangtime with my new best friend?”
“I swear to god, I will kill you—”
Andre reappears with two bottles of beer. He presses them into our hands, nodding happily. “There you go. Two for the road. Hope I get to see ya again soon, boys. Oh, what’s up, James. Yo! Hold up! I’m coming.” He looks back to Pax and me, clapping us gently on our shoulders. “Seriously, boys. You’re welcome here anytime. Drive safe, okay?” He bounds off after his friend, disappearing into the crowd.
Pax and I look down at our beers and then look at each other. “Beating the shit out of that dude is gonna be really difficult,” Pax says, cracking open his beer. “Like, he is a dog trapped in a man’s body.”
“I know,” I say morosely. “I was thinking the exact same thing.”
44
CARRIE
TWO WEEKS LATER
I don’t have to lie anymore. About anything. I could tell the truth about my past to anyone who’ll listen and there wouldn’t be any ramifications. I’m free from all of the messed-up shit that happened back in Grove Hill. But…I still can’t bring myself to talk about it. Can’t bring myself to tell the truth in other areas of my life, either. See, once you start lying about little details, it’s surprisingly hard to stop.
I tell Elodie that I slept with Andre. I don’t even know why I tell this lie, when it’s so patently far from the truth, but I guess a part of me wants it to be true. To say it out loud to see how the words feel tripping off my tongue. Elodie buys the falsehood without a second thought. She’s so caught up in her elicit relationship with Wren that she doesn’t notice the twinge of pain in my voice when I tell her that I liked having sex with him.
At the end of the month, the Riot House Boys disappear off the mountain for Wren’s birthday, and Elodie is disconsolate, though she pretends otherwise. She checks her cell phone twenty-three times within the space of an hour before I stop counting and leave her to pine over the dark lord of Riot House.
Life trudges on over the following weeks.
Mercy comes back to Wolf Hall, strutting around like she never even left, which Wren hates.
I study with Elodie and Pres.
I go on another three dates with Andre, and he tells me that he’s in love with me in the back row of the movie theatre, so sweet and heartfelt that I feel like a monster when I thank him and neglect to say it back.
One night, Mercy interrupts Elodie and I hanging out in her room—in Mara’s old room—and she reveals that Mara had a secret hiding place. A cubby in the bay window, underneath the windowsill. I knew nothing about it, but it turns out that Mara used to keep a journal, and she neglected to take it with her when she left Wolf Hall.
I convince Elodie that the diary is better off with me. I swear to her that I’m going to take it to the police. I hate lying but surrendering the diary would be catastrophic. Lord knows what’s inside it—how many broken laws Mara wrote about before she booked it for L.A.—and what the consequences of her confessions falling into the wrong hands might be.
And then…less than a week later…Doctor Fitzpatrick (sporting a very noticeable split lip) announces that we have to complete a joint assignment with another student, someone we don’t normally work with, and Dashiell Lovett declares that he wants to work with me.
The second I hear him stand up and say this, I snap out of a weird fog that I’ve been merely existing in for weeks and return to my body with a painful thump.
My ears ring—a high-pitched awful sound that blocks out all of the chatter and the scraping of chairs happening all around me.
Dash somehow appears in front of me, wearing a pressed shirt and very expensive looking shoes. His expression is unreadable as he looks down at me. His mouth twists a little when he turns his attention to my friend, sitting on the couch beside me.
“Come on. On your feet, Elodie. I need to sit next to my partner.”
“You’ll regret this.” Elodie snaps.
“Doubt it.” Oh, how I recognize the self-assured, arrogant look that Dashiell’s wearing right now. I’ve seen it a million times. I s
ee it now and I want to scream. He snipes again at Elodie—something about Wren—but I’m not listening. I’m too busy biting back that scream.
Elodie looks miserable, but she gets up and goes. I’m frozen solid as Dashiell sits down next to me on the sofa. Over the past six months, I’ve caught the odd waft of Dash’s scent on the air as we’ve passed each other in the halls—unavoidable moments where I’ve done my best to forget how much I used to live for the moments that I’d see him in the corridors of the academy—but the brief, faint hint of the familiar smell was only ever a tease, gently stirring up memories without fully resurrecting them to life.
Now, the smell of citrus, and mint, and the ocean is an olfactory assault that leaves me holding a hand to my throat and trying not to breathe. The memories don’t stir. They mutiny.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” I hiss out of the side of my mouth.
Dashiell hums speculatively. “Life just gets so boring sometimes, don’t you think? Same thing, happening day in, day out. It’s fun to mix things up a little.”
“Then why not mix it up with Damiana Lozano and leave me the hell alone. You’ve already turned my shit upside down once, asshole. And once was enough, in case you’re wondering.”
He’s silent. Around us, everyone is talking and arguing, rolling their eyes and snatching pieces of paper out of each other’s hands. It seems that no one is happy with the partners they’ve wound up with. Wren looks like he’s about to throttle Mercy with his bare hands, and over by the window, Elodie…oh, god, no. Elodie’s somehow ended up partnered with Pax.
“Don’t worry. He’s like an enema,” Dash says. “Unpleasant at the time, but you really feel alive afterwards. She’ll be fine.”
“I’m not worried about her. I’m worried about him,” I snap.
Dash laughs at this. “Yeah, I guess you’re right. She’s quite the spitfire, isn’t she?”