Chapter Forty-Six
“Did you find it?” Veeta asked, nothing but a soft voice in the dark.
“Not yet, but they have to have one,” Kate said. “It’s a real game of ‘What’s in the box?’ over here, though. I don’t think there’s a surface Juliette hasn’t hit.”
“Blame the fucking ocean,” Juliette said miserably. “For being so bouncy and stupid. And Clayton, blame that son of a bitch. He did all the murders, and now he’s going to get away with them because I let him go. Do you even know how to use a flare gun if you find it?”
“I went to the shooting range when I was writing Loretta book two,” Kate said, her voice muffled as she presumably searched beneath something.
“Did you actually hit the target?”
There was a long pause, followed by a bump. “That’s not important. Flare guns don’t require precise aim.”
Juliette groaned. “We’re dead.”
“Well, you’re not exactly helping!” Kate huffed. “Other than turning the entire boat into a biohazard zone.”
“I told you to blame the ocean!”
“Both of you, enough,” Veeta said, with authority. “It’s bad enough I’m going to die on the ocean like my naani predicted and everything smells like vomit. I don’t want to go down with the sounds of your bickering clogging up the rest of my senses.”
“What’s a naani?” Kate whispered.
“Their grandmother,” Juliette said.
“Your grandmother predicted your death?” Kate said. “That’s stone-cold.”
“None of this would have happened if you would have just told us your plans from the beginning,” Veeta said, their voice reproving.
“I can’t do that,” Juliette said.
“Why not?” Kate demanded.
“I just can’t,” Juliette said through her teeth, trying to keep more than her words in. “I told you, I work better alone.”
“That is bullshit,” Veeta said matter-of-factly.
“Excuse me?” Juliette asked, shock temporarily suppressing her nausea.
“That’s a bullshit excuse, and since we’re all about to die together out on the open ocean because you insisted on playing emotional Rambo, the least you can do is tell us why you refuse to let us help.”
“I don’t want to talk about it,” Juliette said sullenly.
“It seems only fair that you talk about it,” Kate reasoned. “Seeing as how we’re all going to die. Mainly because of you.”
“Kate,” Juliette said in warning.
“Right, I’ll keep looking for the flare gun.”
“This is why I didn’t want to let you in on it,” Juliette said, exasperated. “I didn’t want anybody dying, or getting kidnapped, or getting hurt because of me. I can handle it on my own.”
“Clearly not,” Veeta said.
“Seriously, Juliette,” Kate said, her voice muffled as she continued her search. “What the hell happened to make you this distrustful of everyone, even good-hearted people who only have your best interests in mind?”
Juliette groaned. She was going to have to reveal her whole tragic and embarrassing backstory now, wasn’t she?
Frankly, she would have preferred dying alone on the stupid ocean to having to bare her soul like this, to Kate Valentine and her former intern of all people.
But, since it was basically her fault they were trapped on the boat and going to die together, she did owe them that much.
Juliette sighed. “My parents are Bill and Nora Winters.”
“Is that supposed to mean something to us?” Veeta asked.
Juliette’s next sigh only got gustier and angstier. “The Parenting a Prodigy doctors.”
“What are the parenting prodigy doctors?” Veeta asked, but Kate gasped in shock and recognition.
“How to Raise a Prodigy!” Kate whispered in excitement. “I remember them! But wait, their daughter’s name wasn’t Juliette, it was—”
“Anna,” Juliette said flatly. “Juliette is my middle name. Anna is my first name.”
Kate clapped her hands together in delight. “You’re Angelic Anna?”
“I literally can’t imagine anyone using the term angelic to describe you,” Veeta said. “I need an explanation. Please.”
Juliette fought against the rising wave of nausea that she was pretty sure was no longer caused by the swaying motion of the boat.
“My parents were—well, technically still are—child development psychologists. When I was six years old, they published a book called How to Raise a Prodigy, as Kate so helpfully recalled. Part of their Parenting a Prodigy series. The books that gave parents the false impression that every child, including their own precious angel, could excel as a prodigy if they only used the right psychological approach to child-rearing. If you want to blame someone for the current generation of assholes who believe themselves to be the next Steve Jobs, blame my parents. I certainly do.”
“That doesn’t sound so bad,” Veeta said. “I mean, you’re very good at a lot of things. Perhaps they had a point.”
“Oh, I am really good at most things,” Juliette conceded modestly.
“And it was helpful, for a time. I was a ballet prodigy by seven, I joined Mensa at nine, and I was running half-marathons with my mother by the time I turned ten. I was their model, the proof that their methods worked. They would trot me out to every TV appearance, every speaking gig, every parenting conference. I lived on the road more than I did in a home the first decade of my life. And I played my part. I really was very good at everything.”
“Brag,” Kate muttered under her breath.
“I was very good at everything,” Juliette repeated emphatically, “until I wasn’t.
By the time I turned twelve, I was tired of being used as a prop in my parents’ speaking circuits.
I was tired of them writing about every aspect of our lives.
I was tired of feeling judged and prodded and held up to a standard that felt more and more impossible every year.
And so, I started to act out. I rebelled.
I quit dancing, my grades started dropping, and I refused to go on any more speaking tours.
I was difficult, moody, disrespectful, and—”
“A normal teenager?” Veeta helpfully interjected.
Juliette huffed a laugh. “Well, like most things, I was really good at that, too. When I turned thirteen, everything blew up with my parents. I told them they couldn’t write any more books about me.
I was done with the speaking engagements, the blog updates, everything.
And, shockingly, they agreed. They told me they would stop writing the books, and for the first time in my life my parents paid attention to me.
Not the me they were molding for public consumption, but the real me.
They listened to what I wanted, they did what I asked, they let me quit all the music lessons and dance competitions, I had time for school clubs for the first time.
I joined the track team. I finally made friends because I was in school long enough to actually learn their names.
For the first time, I felt good. Happy. Fulfilled. ”
She paused, swallowing back the bile, pressing her face against whatever cool surface she could find. This was the hard part to get out, what came next. “I thought … I was finally good enough for my parents. Turned out, it was all just research for the next project.”
“Noooooooo,” Kate let out in one long whoosh.
“When I was sixteen,” Juliette said, making her voice as dead as possible, “my parents came out with a book titled How to Survive Life with Your Hormonal Teenager.”
“Nooooooo,” Kate and Veeta groaned in unison.
“Yep,” Juliette said, willing herself to stay dead inside despite the molten core of shame bubbling up within her.
It had been over a decade since she let herself touch these memories, and shockingly, they were still as raw now as they had been when she first experienced them.
Her parents, of course, would say that was the re-grieving process, and she should let herself sit with these repressed emotions.
But considering they were the source of such terrible emotions, they could chew glass.
“The book was all about how”—she choked on the next word—“how … terrible of a teenager I was, and what parents could do about their moody, sexually curious, insecure, mortified-by-the-indignities-of-existence teen. And it became a sensation. Of course it did, because people love embarrassing stories. That would have been bad enough, trust me, but it got worse.”
“I’m afraid to ask how it could get worse,” Kate asked.
“I had a rival at school. Juniper Kensington.” Now, intoning Juniper’s name, Juliette couldn’t keep her voice flat anymore.
Her words twisted in disgust. “Juniper and I were always competing for the same things. Solos on the dance team, fastest times on the track, club leadership positions, the same boys. She was my greatest competition in school, and obviously I wiped the floor with her. By the time I was elected president of the Honor Society, Juniper despised me. And somehow, she found out about my parents’ book even before I did.
I found out about it because she made copies of the most embarrassing passages in the book and distributed them around the school.
We’re talking acne, masturbation, body hair, marathon crying sessions, period disasters. My parents left it all on the pages.”
“That … absolute … bitch,” Kate breathed.