Chapter 63 Rae
RAE
SIX YEARS AGO
NY STATE POLICE ACCIDENT REPORT
Troop K — Poughkeepsie Barracks
Date of Incident: September 15, 2019
Vehicle 1: 2011 Honda Accord
Vehicle 2: 2018 Freightliner (commercial)
Details: Head-on collision. V1 crossed center line. Icy conditions. Both occupants of V1 pronounced dead at scene.
The mascara wand trembled in my grip, leaving a dark smudge beneath my left eyebrow that made me look like Robert Pattinson’s Batman. I swore under my breath and grabbed a cotton swab, dabbing at the damage in the cloudy mirror that had hung on my childhood bedroom wall since I was twelve.
Tyler Brennan was picking me up in twenty minutes.
The.
Tyler.
Brennan.
Needless to say, this was a very serious situation.
I changed my top for the fourth—or possibly fourteenth; who’s counting?—time, yanking off the oversized sweater that screamed trying too hard to look like I’m not trying and replacing it with a fitted burgundy henley.
Then I changed back to the sweater. Then back to the henley.
I just wanted it to be right. Tyler was the type of guy who sailed through life on good genetics and family money, the lacrosse captain who’d never once glanced my direction during four years of high school. The fact that he was glancing my direction now was a Code Red emergency.
Something had shifted since I’d come back for winter break after my first semester. We ran into each other at the mall, then, suddenly, he was sliding into my DMs, calling me “College Rae” like it was an inside joke between us, texting at 2 A.M. asking what I was thinking about.
As if he knew I was thinking about him, my phone dinged.
TYLER brENNAN (HOT GUY FROM HIGH SCHOOL)
headed ur way now. wear something sexy lol
My hands shook as I reached for the mascara again and finished my makeup.
My phone rang again as I was pulling on my jacket. Mom’s name flashed across the screen, along with her contact photo, a funny Snapchat screenshot of her from last Christmas, wearing that dumb light-up reindeer headband she was so proud of.
I was annoyed that she was blowing me up on what was clearly a huge milestone night in my life—the night I finally get rid of this virginity that’s been hanging around my neck like a chain for years—but I was still about to answer anyway. She was my mom, after all.
But then another notification slid down from the top of the screen.
TYLER brENNAN (HOT GUY FROM HIGH SCHOOL)
im outside
That settled that. I silenced Mom’s call and shoved the phone in my back pocket, grabbing my house keys from the hook by the door. My reflection caught in the hallway mirror—flushed cheeks, amateurishly applied mascara, slightly manic eyes, burgundy henley.
I hope he thinks I’m pretty.
I was halfway down the stairs when my phone pinged yet again. Jeez, what part of I didn’t answer the first time did Mom not understand?
But this time, it was Gideon.
GIDDY BABY brO
when r u picking me up???
Shit! I’d completely forgotten. Gideon was at his friend Simon’s house on the other side of town. I was supposed to grab him at nine.
My thumbs flew across the screen as I reached for the front door.
smthing came up. can Mom get you?
I didn’t wait for a response. Outside, Tyler’s headlights cut through the winter dark, and his horn gave two short, impatient honks. I hurried out to meet him.
Tyler’s car smelled like weed, cheap cologne, and Black Ice Little Trees air freshener, but it was a BMW and he was rich and hot and popular, so I assumed that’s how it was supposed to smell. Besides, it wouldn’t be very Rich, Hot, Popular Girl of me to complain about it.
He pulled away from the curb before I’d even clicked my seatbelt, one hand already migrating to my knee.
“Shiiit, Rae, you really do look different,” he said, glancing over with that lazy half-smile that had haunted my high school fantasies. “Better. Gawdamn. College looks good on you.”
I was supposed to feel flattered. I knew enough to know that. But different and better meant I’d been worse before, didn’t it?
Not that I needed reminding of that fact. Tyler had looked right through me for four straight years because I hadn’t been worth seeing.
“Thanks,” I said anyway, because that’s what rich, hot, popular girls do.
His hand edged a little higher. When he passed over a tear in my ripped jeans, I felt his clammy palm on my bare skin. “So I was thinking,” he said. “My parents are in Aspen through New Year’s. We could skip the whole dinner-and-bowling-alley thing and head back to my place instead?”
I cringed and hesitated. This wasn’t how I’d pictured tonight going. There was supposed to be a real date, some fun conversation, a real love is in the air kind of vibe before anything happened.
But insisting on that stuff had gotten me nowhere all through high school. Would a rich, hot, popular girl care about cramming shitty fettuccine down her throat before sealing the deal?
No, she would not. She’d be down with whatever.
“Sure,” I heard myself say. “Sounds fun.”
He grinned. “Sick.”
Tyler’s bedroom was bonkers. I was fairly sure the flat screen TV mounted on the wall was bigger than the bed I slept on at home.
He couldn’t have cared less about any of the stuff in his house, though.
He threw his keys at a bowl and missed, kicked his shoes off without looking where they landed, and sauntered over to his parents’ bar cart as if he had every right to be there.
He splashed some Grey Goose into a coffee mug and handed it to me, keeping the rest of the bottle for himself. I took it and had a tentative sip, even though I didn’t really drink. Rich, hot, popular girls drank Grey Goose without making faces, so I drank Grey Goose without making a face.
Tyler slugged back what had to be five or six shots’ worth straight from the neck of the bottle. From there, things got a little hazy. Somehow, we ended up on his bed.
I wasn’t entirely sure how we got there. One minute, we were standing by the window; then his mouth was on mine and we were horizontal.
He wasn’t a bad kisser, but he wasn’t a good one, either. His lips were thin and chapped, but at least he didn’t choke me with his tongue. His hand slid under my henley. His fingers were cold and slightly damp against my stomach. I flinched before I could stop myself.
Relax, I scolded myself. This is what you wanted. This is the whole freaking point.
But there was a voice in my head that kept whispering, This doesn’t feel right.
I told that voice to shove it and focused on the kissing again.
He was palming my boobs through my shirt, a little too hard, but I pretended my wince was more of a moan.
He was really hot, after all, and everyone wanted to sleep with him.
If it didn’t feel good, it was probably me doing something wrong, not him.
My phone started vibrating on the nightstand. It stopped, then started again.
Tyler groaned against my mouth. “Ignore it.”
I did. His weight pressed me back into the pillows, and his hands were fumbling with the button of my jeans. When I raised my hips, he gave up on the button and just yanked them down, along with my underwear. The cold air hit my bare skin and I shivered.
Then my phone rang again.
This time, it wouldn’t stop. It just kept going, vibrating so hard it started to migrate across the nightstand toward the edge.
Tyler pulled back with an irritated huff. “Jesus Christ, turn it off.”
I looked up to see that he’d shed his pants at some point and was rolling a condom onto his erect penis. I felt hot and tight all over suddenly, but also goosebumpy and cold.
Shaking away the negative thoughts, I reached for my phone. The screen was a blur of notifications. One missed call after another. What the hell?
Mom (2)
Giddy Baby Bro
Mom (3)
Mom
Mom (4)
Mom
Unknown Number (3)
My stomach dropped through the floor. Something was wrong. I knew it instantly, the way you know in dreams before the monster appears. Cold, hard certainty.
Tyler was trying to pull me back. His lips were wet against my neck, his erection poking insistently at my thigh. “Babe, come on—”
The phone rang again.
“I need to—”
“Come on, Rae, it’s fine—” His hand found my hip, tugging me toward him.
But it wasn’t fine. Nothing was fine. I could feel it in my bones, in the hollow space behind my ribs where my heart was supposed to be beating.
I grabbed the phone with numb fingers.
CALL FROM: UNKNOWN NUMBER
My thumb missed twice before I managed to answer. “H-hello?”
At first, there was only a brief, buzzing static on the other end. Then a woman’s voice broke in.
“Is this Rae Everett?”
“Yes? May I ask who’s calling?”
“This is Officer Wilkinson with the state police. There’s been an accident. Your parents…”
I felt woozy, as if there were frames that had been stolen from the film reel of my life. It kept skipping ahead, bits missing, things not adding up.
The officer was still talking—Route 9… head-on collision… your parents… “You need to get to the hospital, ma’am.”
The phone fell from my fingers. It bounced once on the mattress, then tumbled to the carpet. I could hear the tinny voice still coming through the speaker, asking if I’m there, if I understood, if there was someone who could drive me if I was unable to drive myself.
Tyler was saying something. Or at least, his mouth was moving, though I heard none of it.
His hand on my shoulder shook me, gently at first, then harder, but I couldn’t feel it.
I couldn’t hear or feel or sense anything at all, except this vast, yawning emptiness opening up in the center of my chest, swallowing everything whole.
Three days later, I stood at the edge of two holes in the ground. The sky was gray and spitting rain. Mom would have laughed at that.
How cliché, she would have said. Couldn’t the universe do better?
But Mom wasn’t saying anything anymore.
The caskets went down one at a time. Dad first, then Mom. I watched the ropes lower them into the earth and felt nothing. Or rather, I felt everything. So much that it all canceled out.
Gideon stood beside me, not speaking or moving. He hadn’t said a word to me since the hospital. Not one word. Not when we identified the bodies or when we picked out the caskets. Not when relatives I didn’t even recognize descended on our house with casseroles and condolences.
He blamed me. He was right to.
After the last mourner finally left the wake, I stood in front of the mirror, still wearing the black mourning dress. As I did, I made myself a promise.
No boys. No sex. No love.
Love destroys. I’d learned that now.
I’d never forget it again.