Chapter 34 – Presley
PRESLEY
Two Days Later
When the doctor came in and told us they were going to let Ariel go home from the hospital, I suddenly realized we didn’t have a plan. Ink had been staying with us at my house since we returned from vacation, but I wasn’t sure if we still needed him to, or if he even wanted to.
“Okay, we’ve got things to do,” Mom said, interrupting my thoughts. “I’ll make a list of everything we need and have it delivered to your house.”
“Hold on. What are you talking about?”
“Ariel’s going home,” she said simply.
“Explain more, Mom,” I said and reached for my coffee, which was required to interpret Alice-speak so early in the day.
“Your dad and I will need clothes and the essentials. Ink will, too. We’ll need groceries. We should also get pillows, ice packs, and over-the-counter pain relievers.”
“Knock, knock,” Dice said. “Breakfast is here.”
I got up to take the bags of food from him. “Perfect timing.”
“I can’t tell how you meant that.”
“I meant it in a good way,” I smiled.
Thankfully, Mom waited until we were almost finished with breakfast before she brought up her plans again.
“Who’s staying where?” I asked.
“I thought we’d all stay at your house—me, you, Ariel, your dad, Ink, and Nora.”
“Mom, I don’t have enough beds for everyone,” I said. “Even if I did, I don’t have enough room for us to be comfortable.”
“Oh,” she said. “I assumed it would be easier to have everyone in one place but didn’t consider the size of said place.”
“You could stay on the farm,” Dice suggested. “We have a few empty houses available. One is near Ink’s house.”
“Oh, I don’t know,” Mom said. “I want to be close to Presley and Ariel.”
“You can be,” Dice said. “Presley and Ariel stay with Ink at his house. You and Eugene stay at the house near Ink’s. And Nora can keep staying with Daphne and me.”
“That sounds perfect!” Mom exclaimed.
“Almost,” Ariel said. “What about Sir Pickles?”
“We can continue to have someone check on him and feed him, or we can move him to Ink’s house,” Dice said.
“You’re making me look bad,” Ink grumbled jokingly.
“I’m filling in for you like you did for me when I was in the hospital,” Dice said. “Unless you want them to think your silence is because you’re an asshole and not because you have a brain injury.”
“This shit sucks,” Ink complained. He’d been experiencing expected post-concussion symptoms, but he found the memory problems and inability to focus to be the most frustrating.
“Yeah,” Ariel agreed. “I tried to text Kaeli, but I couldn’t type the words I wanted without thinking about how to spell each one. I finally gave up.”
“You could use speech-to-text or send a voice message,” my mom suggested.
“My grandmother is giving me technology advice. Mom, is this really happening? Am I hallucinating?”
“Don’t start,” I said with a smile. Between Ink and Ariel, I’d been subjected to countless head trauma and brain injury jokes. It seemed to be how they were coping with the trauma.
“Did we make a decision about where everyone is staying?” Eugene asked.
“I vote for Dice’s plan,” Ink said. “And bring the shitty dragon.”
Mom clapped her hands together excitedly. “That reminds me. One second,” she said and rummaged through her bag, pulling out a T-shirt. “I had our shirts made! What do you think?”
It took the rest of the day to get home from the hospital and get everyone settled, including Sir Pickles. I was beyond exhausted, but there were several things Ariel wanted to know, and I had a few questions for her as well.
“Can we talk about Elsie now?” Ariel asked.
“Yes,” I nodded, swallowing the bite of pizza in my mouth. “What do you want to know?”
“Everything.”
“Elsie asked you to pick her up and come inside because she wanted to drug you. Calvin and his friends sold drugs for Calvin’s father.
Every so often, Calvin, Leon, and Willy would have a party.
The people who worked for them and owed them money could bring girls to the party to clear their debt,” I explained.
“They called them Pay with Pussy parties.”
Ariel inhaled deeply and held it for a few seconds. “What a rotten cunt!”
Ink snapped his fingers and pointed proudly. “That’s right.”
“Why would she do that? No, I know why. Because she’s a rotten cunt. But why me? I never did anything to her. I didn’t even know her. We had a science project together. And we got an A.”
“If there’s a reason why, we’ll probably never know it,” I said. “But I think it can be simplified in one statement: she’s a bad person with no regard for anyone or anything other than herself.”
“It wasn’t only you,” Ink added. “Elsie’s sister, Chloe, is the one who helped me escape from Calvin’s house. Chloe was there because of Elsie. I don’t remember the details, but I know Chloe wasn’t there willingly, and they were using her phone to communicate—Elsie and Calvin.”
“So Elsie called me from Chloe’s phone?” Ariel asked in confusion.
“No, Elsie called you from Tripp’s phone.”
“Who?”
“Tripp Reynolds,” Ink said. “No Nuts’s little brother.”
“Who is No Nuts?” Ariel asked.
“Calvin,” I said and cleared my throat. “When Chloe helped Ink escape and ran to get help, Tripp Reynolds, Calvin’s brother, saw her and picked her up.
He brought her to the clubhouse, and they told Phoenix everything.
Tripp said he found text messages from his phone to Chloe’s discussing the plan to attack you.
She was trying to use you to make peace with Calvin after what happened the first time she invited you to one of their parties. ”
“But I left school early on Friday. There’s no way she could’ve known that,” Ariel said. “And I went home a different way than I usually do.”
“You’re right,” Ink said. “They let the air out of your tire earlier in the day. They were planning to follow you when you left school and grab you when you pulled over. They passed you on their way to the school, which was right before I got there.”
Ariel slowly shook her head and looked down at her lap. “This makes me not want to help people anymore. If I would’ve said no when Elsie text me, none of this would have happened. None of it.”
I recognized the importance of what she said and took a moment to choose my words carefully. “If you tried to help an injured animal and it bit you, would you stop helping injured animals? Or would you be more cautious next time?”
“I’d be more cautious next time,” she said knowingly.
“I was going to save this for later, but now seems appropriate. How do you feel about therapy?”
“Yes, please,” Ariel agreed instantly. “Don’t look at me like that. I don’t want to turn out like the idiots in this story. I’ll deal with my trauma and become a functional adult, thank you very much.”
“You make me prouder every day.”
“I try,” she grinned.
“How’s your head?” I asked. “Are you good for a few questions?”
“Yeah, I think I’m okay right now. My head hurts, but it’s tolerable.”
“What happened with Jake?” I asked bluntly. I didn’t see any reason to beat around the bush.
Ariel visibly swallowed, and I watched my sweet, tender-hearted daughter harden herself.
“Jake and I have spent a lot of time together recently. I thought we liked each other or whatever. Then he told me he couldn’t be in a relationship.
Okay, fine. Being friends is cool. Being sent a video of Jake sucking some girl’s face isn’t cool. ”
“Oh, honey,” I said. I wanted to say more, but knew she needed to finish while she was composed.
“It’s fine. I mean, it’s not, but I just didn’t want to see him.
He didn’t do anything wrong, but it still hurt my feelings.
That’s the real reason I left early. I was so upset and knew I would have to face him.
When Mrs. Kiefer said I could leave early, I jumped at the chance to avoid him.
That’s why he wasn’t with me. And that’s why I haven’t wanted to see him. ”
“Oh no,” Ink said slowly, reaching for his phone. “I need my other brain. This one’s sparking but not firing. Please enjoy this momentary intermission.”
Minutes later, Dice walked into the living room. “What can I remember for you?”
“Hold on,” I said, stopping Ink before he inadvertently blurted Ariel’s personal business to Dice.
“It’s fine, Mom,” Ariel said. “They’re sharing a brain.”
“Ariel said something about a video being sent to Jake. I mean, a video of Jake was sent to Ariel.”
“The video of Jake kissing an AI bot?” Dice asked.
“That’s right,” Ink said. “The video is fake.”
“You’re sure?” Ariel asked hesitantly.
“The video Byte found on No Nuts’s phone was one hundred percent fake,” Dice said confidently.
“I wonder if it was the same one sent to me.”
“Not sure, but that would explain why there was an AI video of Jake on No Nuts’s phone.”
“I got a screenshot of the video from Byte. Here,” Ink said, handing his phone to Ariel.
“Yep. That’s it,” Ariel said and promptly tossed the phone back to Ink. “And you’re sure it’s fake?” she asked again.
“Yes,” Dice answered. “There’s no doubt.”
Ariel narrowed her eyes and glared at Ink. “Why didn’t you tell me before now?” she nearly shouted with a hint of playfulness hidden in her tone.
Ink narrowed his eyes and glared at Dice. “Well?” he said expectantly.
“Because we didn’t know anyone sent a video of Jake to Ariel until just now,” Dice explained.
“Right,” they said at the same time. “Brain injury.”