59. Harper
Chapter 59
Harper
I wake up in the back seat of a car. Memories reluctantly flow back into my mind as I push onto my elbows. “How long was I out for?”
But the car is empty. My stomach twists with panic, then nausea. I barely get the back door open in time before I spew a week’s worth of stomach contents onto the road.
“Glad I didn’t park closer,” Jude says. The front door opens, the Impala creaking a little as he sits. “Make sure you get it all out. I already have to foot the panel beating bill, I don’t want to have to get the car detailed too.”
I manage a strained, “Fuck you,” but that only makes Jude bark out a bitter laugh.
“Yeah, I’m not regretting this at all,” he mutters to himself. “Should have watched to see what they’d do to you.”
At the mention of the guys by the lake, I retch another few times just for the hell of it.When I finally drag myself back into the car, Jude hands me a napkin and a cup of coffee. “Thank you.”
“For the coffee, or for saving your sorry ass?” He looks at me in the rearview mirror and then looks away. “You’re welcome.”
I finally get a chance to take in our surroundings while I sip my coffee. We’re parked way in the back of the Liberation Diner’s lot. It’s dark outside—a glance at the Impala’s console shows it’s nine o’clock.
From my aching head, I’m guessing I was out for a good three or four hours. I take another sip of coffee and then drag my backpack closer so I can get my aspirin bottle out.
Idiot that I am, it’s only after a piece of glass slices open my hand that I remember I broke the bottles inside. Which also explains why my lap is wet. I hiss, whipping my hand free and staring aghast at the white flesh peeking through my sliced open skin.
“What now?” Jude turns in his seat and does a double-take when he sees the blood gushing from my cut. “Shit, Harper, what the fuck did you do?”
He grabs my backpack from me and shoves his hand inside. I yell out, “Careful!” just in time. He slowly retracts his arm, frowning at me.
“Broken glass,” I manage. I have my wrist in a death grip, hoping it will somehow stem the bleeding.
Jude lifts the bag and watches a drip of alcohol fall to the Impala’s carpet. “Christ.” He grabs the rest of the napkins he got with the coffee, snatching my hand and pressing the wadded-up tissues against the cut.
I grit my teeth, squeezing my eyes shut in pain. But Jude keeps applying pressure to the cut until my flesh starts aching.
“You might need stitches,” he says with a sigh. “This time of night, we’d have to go to the church clinic?—”
“I’m fine!” I try to pull my hand away, but Jude holds on tight.
“No you’re not, Harper.” When I look up, it’s obvious he’s not talking about my wound anymore. “And neither am I.”
We stare at each other for the longest time. Then it’s as if he comes to. With a shake of his head, he looks down at my hand and slowly peels away the wadded-up napkins.
A sullen ooze of blood creeps out of the cut, but it’s definitely not gushing like before. He presses the napkins back and takes hold of my other hand, forcing me to apply pressure.
“Let’s get home. We can use the first aid kit there to patch you up.”
“I don’t want to,” I whisper.
“We don’t have a choice.” He stares at me in the rearview mirror as he locks his seatbelt into place. “Harper, if we tell them everything, if we come clean, then maybe...”
…Then maybe he won’t be expelled. But what about me? He ruined my reputation with that video. I’ll never be able to show my face at Cinderhart again. He might get his life back, but mine is over.But that’s not the only reason. When I was sitting on that rock out at the lake, I kept replaying the conversation I had with my mom in the pool house. Even after all this time, her words still cut like knives.
“She hates me,” I mumble as Jude puts the car into gear.
He pulls into Cinderhart’s main road without looking back. “Who?”
“My mother.”
He sighs and shrugs his shoulder like he’s trying to work out a stiff muscle. “No she doesn’t.”
“She probably wishes I was dead.”
Jude laughs. “Why would you say that?”
I look out the window. It takes me a minute or two to muster up enough courage before I can tell him the things my mother accused me of.
There’s a heavy silence after that, like Jude’s surprised my life is even shittier than he’d imagined. “Then she’s a really good actress,” he finally says, “because she was in a fucking state when she found out you were missing.”
“She was?”
He shrugs. “Wayne too.” He sounds tired now. “They even tried calling the sheriff to report you missing.”
We pull up to Dearth Manor’s gate a moment later. He takes something out of his pocket, and the glow from my cell phone fills the cabin.
There’s no point in getting angry. As soon as he’s opened the manor’s gates with my smart home app, he hands the phone to me.
“You left this behind.”
“On purpose.”
The Impala’s engine grumbles quietly as he parks the Impala in the drive. We sit there in the quiet, in the dark, for a full minute before he turns in his seat to look at me.
“I told them about your drinking,” he says.
I’m not surprised. I’m not even angry.
“How did they take it?”
“Your mother thought I was lying.”
I let out a rueful huff of a laugh. Jude rubs his fingertips over his eyelids before latching onto me again. “If you tell them about the meth, then I’ll say I lied about the drinking.”
Which is worse? Them knowing that I day drink at school, or that I purposefully drugged Jude to get him kicked off the football team?
Either way, I’m fucked. Either way, Jude wins.
I slump back in my seat, nursing my injured hand against my chest. “And if I own up to both?” I ask, a sad smile on my face. “What will you do then?”
“You’d do that?” he murmurs, shocked and incredulous.
I shrug. “Sure. What have I got to lose?”