Rebel, Bully, Geek, Pariah (17 page)

“How much do you think those drugs are worth?” he said, deliberately changing the subject.

“Why?” Andi asked. “You think we'll get a reward if they're worth a lot?”

York leaned back with his hands on the floor behind him. “I was just curious. But a reward wouldn't suck.”

“Our reward will be not getting arrested,” Boston said with a pointed look at me.

Back off, dude.

“I bet it's thousands of dollars,” York mused.

Mama used to hand over hundred-dollar bills for stacks of ten tiny bags filled with the sandy brown substance—one hit each. The heroin was the easiest to identify, because it always came in those semisheer envelopes stamped with colorful logos that could fit in the palm of your hand. I know, because I palmed one once when I was five, and Mama lost her shit over it. She started keep
ing all her drugs in locked drawers after that. It wasn't quitting, but I guess it was something.

Other drugs were trickier to name. They came in bags or vials of powder or pills. I had a hard time telling the difference between ecstasy and acid or cocaine and crushed-up pharmaceuticals, and I had no idea what meth looked like, because Mama never let me near it, except that once.

I tried to picture how many of those itty-bitty ten-dollar envelopes just one of the bricks of heroin we had could fill up. And how many bricks were there? Fifteen? Twenty? The calculations rapidly exceeded the limits of my mental math, and I gasped inwardly.

Not thousands of dollars. More like a million.

 

BEFORE

THE LINE OUTSIDE Mrs. Doyle's classroom after school was ten students deep, all of them no doubt there for the same reason I was—to explain why they hadn't done their geometry homework. I hoped the others wouldn't wear out her sympathy before I could tell her I'd attended an emergency NA meeting with Mama last night. That excuse had served me well freshman year, but the sophomore teachers seemed to have less patience with my family drama.

I decided to avoid the line and spend a couple of minutes in the bathroom across the hall instead. I practiced my story in the mirror, wishing I could work up a tear or two—even just watery eyes—to really drive it home. When that failed, I folded myself inside a stall, enjoying the quiet in here for once. No girls gossiping or trading lip gloss or generally moving in pairs the way they all seemed to do—just me and a fresh roll and the scrawl of Sharpies on the stall door.

Most of the door graffiti had been edited, with comical results.

A faded “Jessica loves BJ” now had the word “giving” inserted after “loves” and an “s” added to “BJ.”

Someone had also crossed the word “freshman” out of a large “Freshman Barbies were here!” proclamation and changed it to “Sophomore.” Below that, a red marker corrected the text once again, turning “Sophomore Barbies” into “Sophomore Sluts.”

I flushed and pushed through the stall door. That's what happened when you let yourself be seen. If even the girls we were all supposed to like the most were hated, what hope was there for the rest of us?

Back out in the hall, the line outside Mrs. Doyle's door had disappeared, and my footsteps echoed down the empty corridor. School was creepy after hours—too dim, too quiet. I could hear the hum of every pipe in the wall, the discord of the intro-level concert band practicing a floor below. I could even hear the last student in line in Mrs. Doyle's room pleading his case.

“But if I don't test out of geometry, I can't take precalc until next year.”

“And that's still a grade ahead of—”

“You don't understand!” the boy cut off Mrs. Doyle. “This messes up my whole timeline. I need calculus on my transcripts next year!”

He sounded like he might be crying. Damn, why couldn't I do that?

“I
do
understand—”

“That means I need to be in precalc now!”

“Calm down.” Mrs. Doyle's words were soothing, but I could hear tension simmering underneath. “I told you at the start of the year that you could only take the bypass test once.”

“But it's not my fault. It's my O-C—”

“I'm aware.”

“They made me sit with the window on my left. The practice tests were in study hall, with the windows on the right.”

Mrs. Doyle sighed. “And that issue is something that will not be accommodated at the college level. Just take the time now to get a handle on this—”

“I've
got
a handle on it,” the boy interrupted. “I was just distracted by the—”

“By the windows, I know. Look, even if I let you take the test a second time, and even if you pass, you would be starting precalculus months behind the other students, and I don't want to set you up to fail.”

“I don't fail!”

“I understand you're disappointed—”

“I'm not disappointed, I'm pissed off !”

I slumped against the wall outside Mrs. Doyle's door. This kid couldn't have picked any other day to cuss out a teacher?

“And I'm done!” Mrs. Doyle snapped. “Out!”

Yep, that did it. The little overachiever in there had broken Mrs. Doyle, and now I had no chance. I hitched my backpack over my shoulder and slipped quietly past the door, vowing to come back tomorrow with a better excuse than “My mom's addiction ate my homework.”

 

22

I KEPT MY mouth shut about the value of the drugs, afraid if I told the rest of them, they'd not only pressure me to be their mouthpiece but also disappear the second I took the fall. Grandma would have flushed it all straight down the toilet, no matter how much it was worth or how much we needed it as evidence. Aunt Ellen wouldn't have touched it. She'd leave it all right where it was and draw the police a map. Then she'd blame Mama, because somehow, to Ellen, everything was always Mama's fault.

For a long time I agreed with her. It was easier that way. Trouble making friends?
Well, her mom's a drug addict, you know.
Not doing homework?
Who can blame her, with the mother always away.
Everyone pointed the finger at Mama, and I'd just learned to point in the same direction.

Now I wasn't sure who to blame.

“I can't sleep,” York groaned, punching a pillow into shape.

“Me, neither,” Boston said.

Andi stared past me toward the cabin's back wall of glass, overlooking the lake. “Let's go swimming.”

I snorted.

Yeah, right—we'll just take a dip in the middle of all this. Totally normal.

York shared my derision. “We're not getting in the lake in the middle of the night, wacko.”

But Boston sat up straight, his interest piqued. “Hmm.”

“Oh, come on!” York shoved his brother's shoulder. “Stay focused.”

Boston ignored him and got to his feet. “What if it's our last chance to swim before we're locked up?”

“We're not getting locked up,” I said, more out of habit at this point than conviction.

Boston shrugged. “Still better than sitting around in here freaking out.”

“I'm not freaking out,” York said.

I am.

“But you're not sleeping, either,” Andi pointed out, and she stood up next to Boston. “Do these people have any spare swimsuits?”

Boston frowned. “Oh. No, Mom took all of that home with their laundry.”

Well, that settles that.

Andi clapped once and rubbed her hands together. “Skinny-dipping it is, then!”

I opened my mouth to protest, but suddenly York was up off the floor, standing with the other two crazies. His eyes slid
to me, curled up in the chair. “Maybe a swim would help clear our heads.”

Boston gaped at him. “Really? But you never go in the—”

“Shut it,” York said. “One more word, and you'll end up like my car keys—at the bottom of the river.”

Boston's jaw closed with a snap.

Then they all turned to me, waiting for their fourth. I wanted to tell them to go on without me, but I could see in their eyes the same feeling I had in my gut—that it was an all-of-us-or-none-of-us kind of night. I'd always been one of the none. Tonight, I couldn't deny it felt good to be part of the all.

“Fine,” I grumbled. “But I'm keeping my underwear on.”

The lake was surprisingly cold, despite the steamy summer air. Goose bumps erupted all over my body the instant my feet touched the water, making all my arm hair stand on end like the prickles of a startled porcupine. I shivered and crossed my arms over my chest. I wished I was wearing something cuter than gray grandma panties and a plain beige bra. The moon had done me a small favor by hiding behind a cloud so no one could get a good look at my ugly undies and hat hair, but that cloud was moving, and in a second, both the moon and I would be exposed.

Get in the water
, I commanded my body, but the goose bumps prickled in protest.

“What are you waiting for?” Andi shouted from farther out in the lake. She had done a running jump off the end of the dock
and resurfaced screaming and laughing all at once, her wild hair spraying water. Now she was splashing around like a mermaid, totally at ease.

I wanted to be wild and brave like Andi. I wanted to be at ease.

The first shot of moonlight hit the water as the curtain of clouds above parted. I took a deep breath, ran three long strides into the water, and dove.

The freeze of a thousand icicles stabbed me all at once, shocking my body in that crazy way that makes you feel like you're gasping even though you're holding your breath. It demanded all of my senses, stealing attention from the parts of me that were focused on fear and worry. Baptism by icy lake water.

By the time I came up for air, I was in a different place on a different night under different circumstances. I let out a
whoop
of exhilaration, and felt something more than my trapped breath release with it. I felt light for the first time all night, and it wasn't just the water buoying me.

Andi answered my cry with one of her own, and within seconds, we were both howling like wolves.

“Keep it down!” Boston called from the dock, but a second later he matched our volume with the earsplitting crack of a belly flop onto the lake.

“Ow!” Andi winced. “That sounded like it hurt.”

It did, judging by the pained look on Boston's face when he broke the surface.

“Next time,” he gasped, “cannonball.”

I laughed, and Andi waved at the shore where York was standing in his boxers, his toes barely in the water. “What are you waiting for?” she called.

“Yeah, York!” Boston cried, and his voice was mocking. “What are you waiting for?”

York flipped up both of his middle fingers in response.

“He can't swim,” Boston said as the three of us waded back into the shallows.

I raised my eyebrows. “Really?”

“Screw you,” York said. “I can swim.”

As if to prove it, he took a few tentative steps into the lake, but he froze at ankle depth. Andi and I splashed up to meet him, while Boston stubbornly stayed waist-high in the water.

“Let's see it, then,” Boston taunted.

They stared each other down in a silent face-off, as Andi and I stood on the sidelines.

“You can't, can you?” I asked.

York twitched but didn't look at me.

“How can your parents bring you to a lake every year and not teach you to swim?” I said, appalled.

Not that I'm in any position to point fingers at irresponsible parents, but still.

“They taught us,” Boston said. “But one of us had a little incident, turning upside down in a kayak, and suddenly forgot how.”

“We shouldn't have been fishing from a kayak in the first place,” York snapped back.

“It was ten years ago! Get over it!”

My head swung back and forth between the brothers, not sure who to side with.

“So, wait,” Andi said slowly. She propped a hand on her hip, where a tattoo of a three-headed snake slithered out from under her black lace thong and up her side to her rib cage. “Are you telling me all those kids you push around have to do to get away from you is jump in a pool?”

“I don't push anyone around,” York said. Then he grinned. “But if one of them did jump in a pool, I'd go in after them.”

“Come in after me, then,” Boston said, and this time his voice was inviting, almost pleading. “Just to here, where you can still stand.”

I decided then that I was with Boston.

“It's warmer once you get all the way in,” I coaxed, motioning for York to follow me deeper into the water. “It's the air that feels cold now. Look.” I held out one arm. “I have goose bumps.”

York took a few tentative steps toward me. “I can't see.”

I matched his forward steps with backward ones of my own. “Come closer, then,” I teased.

He smiled. “Oh, I see the game now, player.”

I laughed. “Come on. All of us or none of us.”

He hesitated, then step-by-step he worked his way in, so close I could almost read the cursive name inked over his heart.

Amelia? Adrienne, maybe?
I tried not to look long enough to be obvious.

We waded deeper until we were level with Boston, who smiled and glided a few feet farther away from shore.

“Don't mess with me,” York warned.

“She did it.” Boston pointed at me.

“She's cuter than you.”

They probably couldn't see me blush in the thin moonlight, but I ducked my face in the water anyway.

“Just a few more feet,” Boston coached his brother.

“If you're up to something, so help me, I will drop you.”

Boston raised his arms in a gesture of peace, then lowered them, palms up, to the water's surface in front of him. “You don't drop me, I won't drop you.”