Chapter 18 Jane
Jane
The clock in the dash of Blair’s Mercedes reads five past midnight.
Great.
One thing I always try to do is make curfew, even though I break each and every other one of Mom’s rules: no smoking, no drinking, no fooling around with boys, etc. But I do my best to meet curfew so she can’t have one obvious thing to hold against me.
I’m praying she’s already asleep.
I have Blair drop me a little ways from the house, to keep the noise to a minimum.
Pa’s truck is nowhere in sight. Humph.
I creep up the steps, tiptoe across the porch. Creak open the front door.
My shoulders sag.
Mom’s sitting at the kitchen table, reading the Farmers’ Almanac.
In the light of the lone bulb hanging above her, her face looks older, solemn. I almost feel a pang of pity for her, there all alone with that dreary book, but then her expression sours at the sight of me.
It’s like she can smell the booze from there. The cigarettes, the weed, the cologne of the boys who got close enough to me to flirt.
Her eyes skewer me, giving me the same once-over she gave me before I left.
I tug my skirt down.
“You’re late.” She shakes her head, trains her gaze back to the pages now in her lap.
“Not my fault. I tried to get Blair to leave earlier, but—”
“I was starting to get worried.”
“It’s only five minutes, Mom.”
She whistles out a sigh.
“Where’s Pa?” I ask, trying to change the subject. And to provoke her. “Why isn’t he home?”
She closes the book, narrows her eyes at me. “Your father is out. You know he needs to find new clients.”
Ah, so that’s what she’s calling it.
I can’t help it—it’s the alcohol and my own spitefulness—but the corners of my lips lift into a grin.
“What?” Mom spits out, her voice strained.
I recompose my face, turning it into a blank mask. “Nothing.” I drop my eyes to the floor, then head for the ladder that leads to the loft, swerving around her on my way.
I can feel her stare lighting into the back of me.
I wince in pain as I mount the bottom rung of the ladder—my leg is still a mess—but I force myself to climb.
I’m halfway up when her voice slithers across the room, icy cold, mean. “I can smell tobacco smoke on you. I don’t know who you think you’re foolin’; I can also smell boy all over you.”
I pause, then keep pulling myself up.
If only Mom knew half the shit I’ve done with Luke.
She, of course, thinks you need to be married before you give yourself away, but I often wonder: For her, was it the chicken or the egg with Pa?
She was eighteen when she got pregnant with Julia.
They’ve always told us they were already married, but other than a single photo of Mom and Pa in church clothes, standing outside a small chapel in Minnesota, there are no wedding pictures, no documentation.
No actual wedding date on the back of the photo.
I slide under my quilt.
Julia’s in her bed, across the loft, asleep. Or pretending to be. I’m sure she heard everything that just went down with Mom.
Whatever.
Moonlight trickles through the high window, streaking shadows across the quilt.
Other than dealing with Mom just now, I had fun tonight.
As soon as Blair pulled out of our drive, Stacy lit up a joint in the back seat, passed it up to me. “You smoke?”
I’d smoked weed a few times with Luke, but I don’t really like how fuzzy-headed and paranoid it makes me feel.
“Absolutely,” I said, pinching the hot paper between my fingers, taking a stinging drag, wanting to look cool.
“Woo-hoo!” Blair hooted in approval, slapping me a high five.
The Circles, she explained as she drove us there, are a cluster of empty streets in the middle of a forest. A developer intended to build a subdivision out there but lost funding, so now it’s party central for teens.
Even though there are streetlights, it’s tucked so far back into the woods, no one from the highway can see in, tell what we’re up to.
We poured out of the car, pot smoke trailing after us. About a dozen kids from school were already there. A boom box sitting on Tommy Fields’s truck bed was blaring Guns N’ Roses, “Sweet Child O’ Mine.”
Blair sauntered over, and the two made out, right in front of everyone. Tommy is Blair’s boyfriend. Tall, dark hair, strong. Star quarterback.
Stacy handed me a Solo cup filled with something red.
“It’s so good,” she gushed. “But strong. It’s Hunch Punch. Basically Hawaiian Punch with Everclear.”
I took a sip; it tasted like a cherry Jolly Rancher. I gulped it down.
Even though it’s summer, a bonfire was burning in a trash can, throwing out sparks.
Then, from across the flames, I felt her stare. Noticed her eyeing me with a wicked grin.
Nellie.
I never actually met her in school. We were in the same trig class, but no one ever introduced us, and each time I tried to catch her eye, she’d be glaring at me.
So I’d started to glare back.
And tonight, she was giving me the same dirty look she always does.
What the hell?
I’d always thought it was because she’s the richest girl in town and probably the most stuck-up. I thought she was looking down on me.
What I learned tonight, though, is that that’s not it at all; she’s just strange.
But what made my head spin even more as she shot daggers into me with her bizarro stare is that she was leaning against the hood of her red bimmer.
A red bimmer that could’ve been the one that ran me and Cookie off the road.
I actually lifted my hand, tried to give her a wave across the bonfire, but she rolled her eyes, then pulled a long drag off her cigarette.
I couldn’t help it—getting people to like me is my superpower, and I just had to find out if it was her who’d caused my accident—so I walked over to her. “Hey, so you’re Nellie, right?”
She laughed. “Duh.”
Okay.
I felt Stacy and Blair’s eyes on us, felt them drawing closer.
“Well, I’m Jane.” I stuck out my hand for her to shake it.
But her arms stayed lashed to her chest as she studied me coolly with her swimming pool–blue eyes. She worked the cigarette between her fingers, which were sticking out of black lace Madonna gloves. Her eyes popped when they got to my bandage.
“What’s wrong with your leg?” she asked. Not with concern. Almost mocking me.
“I got thrown from my horse—”
“Oh my god! So that was actually you? You actually like, ride…a horse?” That same wicked grin curdled across her mouth.
“Yeah, I actually do,” I replied, my pulse throbbing in my temples. “But hey, nice car.” I jerked my chin at her bimmer. “Thanks a lot for running me off the road earlier, nearly killing me.”
“What?” she sneered. “Like it’s my fault you can’t control your horse.”
Unbelievable.
“You caused this?” Blair said to Nellie. She and Stacy were standing next to me by then.
Nellie just scoffed.
“Well, of course you did. Little psycho.”
“Yeah, like sorry, whatever.” Nellie snickered. “Maybe you should get a car instead. I don’t know where you’re from, but this is an actual modern town.”
“Shut up, Nellie!” Blair shot back. “Jane’s awesome, and her farm is also supercool. I just picked her up out there, and there’s all this amazing stuff—”
“Oh, Blair, you’re so full of shit!” Nellie practically shrieked. “You hate the outdoors unless it’s Miller’s Hole or waterskiing,” she said, her hands flailing around her, “or this. You were the biggest scaredy cat at summer camp, jumping at every bug—”
“Okaaaay.” Blair rolled her eyes, turned to me. “Don’t worry about Nellie.” She flipped her blond hair over her shoulder. “She’s just jealous.”
She looped her arm through mine and turned to walk away, so I followed. After a few steps, she said, loud enough for Nellie to hear, “And…weird.”
After my second cup of Hunch Punch, I ducked into the woods to pee. I heard a loud rumble, looked up to see a Ford Bronco crawling toward the party.
A guy hopped out of the driver’s seat. Seeing him up close, I recognized him right away as Dustin Reeves. Nellie’s boyfriend. I’d met him at the swimming hole night before last. He kind of gave me the creeps.
He spotted me and staggered over, clearly already drunk. Unlike Tommy, or Luke, Dustin is not exactly handsome. He’s oafish. Tall. A rich mama’s boy, kinda pudgy, with teeth like a shark’s. But trying desperately to look cool in his Metallica T-shirt.
My heart drummed in my chest. We weren’t out of sight of the rest of the party but far enough away to make me feel uncomfortable.
“Damn, girl, how’d that happen?” he asked, pointing at my leg. Laughing. His eyes moving over me as if they were devouring me. I felt squeamish.
“An accident,” I said, keeping my tone neutral, not wanting to bring Nellie’s name up, get into it with him.
“Looks bad. Seriously, what happened, huh?” His alligator grin grew wider, uglier.
But I kept my face as still as a stone.
From across the bonfire, I could feel Nellie’s stare again.
Great, I thought. Now she thinks I’m hitting on her hideous boyfriend.
“Later,” I said to Dustin, then stomped off.
In the car ride home, I asked Blair and Stacy what they thought Nellie has against me.
“Against you?” Blair scoffed. “More like against the whole world. Don’t take that shit personally; she’s just a bitch.”
“Total bitch.”
“But she almost ran me off the road today.”
“She’d do that to any of us. She’s a monster.”
But a tiny part of me felt sorry for her for some reason. Probably because she seems like such a misfit, even though she’s the richest girl in town.
Blair steered with one hand, hotboxed a joint with the other. “She’s, like, a freak. But because her family has all this money, we have to hang out with her. But she’s just…”
“Twisted!” Stacy chimed in, leaning in from the back between mine and Blair’s seats. “Should I tell her about the playhouse incident?”
“Totally!” Blair laughed.
“So get this. And this is just one example of Nellie’s weirdness. When we were like seven or something, my parents had this brand-new playhouse built for me. Like, it was awesome. Almost as big, no offense, as your house.”
My face burned with embarrassment.
“And Nellie comes over one day to play and brings this Easy-Bake Oven thingy she just got. Like, her parents spoil her rotten. Even more than mine and Blair’s do.
Anyway, I kind of fell in love with the toy.
And she accidentally left it behind. I know this was mean of me, but when she came over the next day to get it, I told her it was mine and that she couldn’t have it back. ”
“Boom!” Blair shouted. “That was enough to make her explode.”
“But the thing is, she didn’t. Not right away.
When I wouldn’t give it back, she gave me the most evil stare and stormed out.
That night, my parents shook me awake. There were all these red lights outside and sirens blaring because my playhouse had caught fire and was burning down!
The little bitch set my playhouse on fire! ”
“They could never prove it, of course,” Blair said, shaking her head dramatically, “but we all knew it was Nellie. So, like, just don’t mess with her. Like I said, we have to be friends with her, because that’s how this town works, but…fuck…”
I slunk down in my seat, feeling unsettled, and watched as the pine trees pulsed past by window.
Later
How the hell did it come to this?
I hear a twig snap and whip my head around, terrified that someone is watching me, or even worse, that someone saw me. Saw what I did.
But then I see a rabbit jolt from the forest, and breathe a huge sigh of relief.
I never imagined in a million years that when I woke up this morning, I would kill someone today. I was just going about my ordinary life.
But that’s not really true, is it? Nothing about my life has been ordinary these past few weeks.