All The Glory (12 page)

“Yes. I’m your friend.”

“Even though I’ve been a dick to you for most of our lives.”

I sighed. It seemed like I was doing a lot of that, but it couldn’t be helped. This was a very frustrating situation.

“Jason, I think we’ve already determined that you’ve been acting like most guys in your situation would and that I’m okay with that. Stop beating yourself up about it, okay? It’s getting annoying if you want the truth.”

He laughed kind of bitterly as he stared at his hands in his lap. “I do want the truth.”

I leaned over in my chair, trying to get his attention.

He finally rewarded me by twisting his head to the side a little. We stared at each other.

“I’ll make you a deal,” I said, my heartbeat quickening for some reason.

“Okay.”

“From now on and forever, we swear to always tell each other the truth.”

His eyes searched mine. He looked desperate, like he had something more to lose in this bargain than I did. I couldn’t figure out why he’d feel that way when the deal was mutual and he’d already sworn up and down he’d told me the truth about the coach. At least not then.

“What if we can’t tell each other the truth?” he asked. “What if you don’t want to tell me something because it’s better for me not to know it?”

“That’s fine. Then I won’t say it at all. But I won’t blow sunshine up your ass, either.”

“So this is the no-sunshine-up-the-ass deal?”

“Yes. That’s exactly what it is.” I held out my hand for him to shake. “Are you in?” My fingers weren’t trembling, thank all that is holy, even though my insides were a mess.

He turned more fully around so he was facing me, his hand coming out to envelop mine.

I remember very clearly how warm his skin was, his hand so large it swallowed mine whole. I could see bruises and scabs from a fight on his knuckles, and I realized I was striking a bargain with the hand that had killed our high school football coach. I held on anyway, even though it felt like my heart was going to explode with all the craziness.

“I swear I will not blow sunshine up your ass,” Jason said.

“And I swear I will not blow sunshine up your ass either,” I said, feeling like one of the most momentous things I’ve ever done was happening in that moment.

“I didn’t want to mention it before, but you have some salad in your teeth.” Jason kept holding onto my hand, staring me in the eye, not even blinking as he delivered that line.

I pulled my hand away and leaned back. “You are such a dick.”

He started laughing so hard, he rolled backwards and then fell off the end of his bed at my feet.

I stood and left the room in a fake-huff, looking for the bathroom he had gestured to earlier. Embarrassment doesn’t even begin to cover what I was feeling as I pictured myself smiling over and over with a green tooth.

“I’m just kidding!” he yelled.

I found the bathroom and locked myself in. Leaning with my back against the door, I realized that Jason and I really were on the road to being friends.

At first I was smiling so hard my face was hurting, but then I realized that my new friend was being put on trial for murder and facing the death penalty. My smile disappeared and I felt like crying instead.

Chapter Twenty-One

WHEN I FINALLY GOT UP the nerve to go back to Jason’s room, his dad was there standing outside the doorway. I was really glad that green stuff in the teeth thing was total b.s., otherwise I would have had a hard time smiling at him ever again.

“I think it’s time we call it a night,” he said. He gestured towards the stairs. “Can I walk you home?”

Jason’s expression turned into something resembling a storm cloud. “She came in over the back fence to avoid the press. Maybe she should go back out the same way.”

I shook my head, looking at Jason’s dad. “No, don’t be silly. I’ll go out the front door.”

Truth
.

Jason and I had dedicated ourselves to the truth. That meant I had to stop hiding who I was and what I was doing from everyone, not just him.

I walked towards the stairs before I could second-guess myself.

As I went down to the front door, I thought of all the ways I could break the news to my parents about what I was doing. In my mind, the best-case scenario was engaging them in this casual conversation where I explained everything, after asking them to sit with me in the living room. We’d be mature adults, just discussing me hanging out with a murderer like we were talking about the weather.

“I’m going to be spending some time with Jason,”
I’d say.

“Do you mean the boy who killed your high school football coach?”
my mother would ask, smiling with her hands folded in her lap.

“Yes, that’s the one.”

“Be careful, sweetie. And make sure you do your homework too,”
my father would say, before shifting his attention back to the television.

Yeaaahhhh, right. And then monkeys flew out of butts everywhere.

It took only two seconds after walking out of Jason’s front door for me to realize I was living in a seriously naive fantasy world. Monkeys do not fly out of butts, and my parents were not going to be one bit happy about what I’d been up to.

Microphones were shoved in my face, and the front porch was lit up like a theater stage with all the lights.

“Are you Jason’s sister? Are you Jason’s girlfriend? Are you a friend of the family? What did Jason say to you? Did he confess to you? Did you talk about the murder?”

The ridiculously harsh and way-too-personal questions went on and on. I blocked out the rest of them to maintain my sanity. It was way too tempting to shout something back at them, even though I knew people like this would feel no shame at anything I said.

“Excuse us! Please move!” Mr. Bradley yelled, holding up one arm to shield my face while putting the other around my back and urging me on.

I held my arms up in front of me, trying to see past the bright lights.
 
I couldn’t see any faces, I could only hear voices. They were getting more demanding with every passing second. Panic welled up in my chest and made me feel like I was going to suffocate from it. People pushed against me and crowded me. The air was getting too thin.

“Sorry about this,” Mr. Bradley said under his breath, just before a microphone hit me in the face.

“Ow!” I yelled, tasting blood on my lip. I was in shock that someone had been so desperate they’d do something like that, even if it was an accident.

“Oh, for crying out loud!” Mr. Bradley yelled, stopping us in our tracks. He turned me around to look at my face. “You’re bleeding,” he said, his face contorting into one of extreme anger. He looked out into the crowd of reporters. Tons of pictures were taken, flashes going off and shutters whining.
Chick-eh, chick-eh, chick-eh…

“Don’t you people have any respect for anyone?”

“Who is she, Bradley? Family member?”

Chick-eh, chick-eh, chick-eh…
More pictures. Those people were vultures.

He shook his head in disgust and looked back at me. “Are you sure you want to go this way?”

I nodded. “Just point me in the right direction and I’ll start running.” I looked down at my feet. “Got my speed-racers on.”

He glanced down and then back up again, looking like he was going to say something about my shoes, but instead he grabbed me into a big bear hug. His words came right into my ear as he leaned down and squeezed. “Thank you so much, Katy. You’re an angel.”

He let me go and then shoved a couple people out of the way to clear a path for me.

I took off running for my house and didn’t stop until I was inside with the door locked behind me. My breath was coming in gasps, and I knew my face was white from fear and exhaustion. That was the most exercise I’d gotten in years. Cottage cheese be gone!

My father heard the door slam and turned around. As soon as he took in my appearance, his expression went from mildly curious to concerned.

He jumped up from the couch and came to me, yelling, “Marjorie!”

The doorbell rang.

My dad put his hand on my arm and leaned over towards the front door handle.

“Don’t answer it!” I yelled, right in his face.

He froze in place, blinking rapidly as he slowly stood up straight.

I tried to calm my tone down so he wouldn’t go ballistic on me. “Just … leave it.” I put my hand on the door to keep him from opening it. “It’s some reporters.”

He let his hand fall away from the handle and pulled his shoulders back. “Are you telling me that some reporter did this to you?” He pointed at my lip.

My mother came around from behind him and stared at me. “You’re bleeding.” She looked from me to my father, a questioning expression frozen on her face.

I held up my hands like two stop signs, trying to stave off the inevitable … the massive ass-chewing that was about to turn my butt-cheeks into two bloody stumps.

Okay, bad visual, but you get what I’m saying.

“I can explain everything. Let’s just go sit down and talk about it.”

The doorbell rang again. And again and again.

I was trying to get my parents to calm down and be reasonable, but every time that damn doorbell rang, it intensified their suspicion and worry. It filled me with a rage that I cannot explain. Even after all these months of looking back on it, I don’t understand why I didn’t just let that bell ring.

I swung around and grabbed the door, hauling it open.

The lights and the microphones were there, along with all the obnoxious questions. I picked out the one that I heard most clearly, the one that bothered me more than the others.

“Are you Jason’s girlfriend?”

It bothered me because I wasn’t his girlfriend, and I didn’t want people thinking that was why I was going over there visiting him. Not because I was embarrassed, though. The truth was, I still considered Jason as being out of my league, even though he was a criminal now. I hated to think about what that said about my confidence level or self-respect or whatever; it was what it was and no amount of common sense was going to change things for me. At least not then.

“No!” I yelled out at the sea of reporters, my voice causing everyone to go instantly quiet. All I could hear now were the sounds of camera shutters going off.

Chick-eh, chick-eh, chick-eh…Chick-eh, chick-eh, chick-eh…

The flashes made it impossible to see who was invading my privacy. “I’m Jason’s
friend!
He used to have a lot of them, but they’ve all disappeared. Funny, isn’t it, how when times get tough, you find out who your real friends are?” I realized I was getting all preachy and that was just lame. I’d probably already said too much. “Now you have your answer, so you can leave me and my family
alone!”
I slammed the door in their faces. Or at least, I tried to slam the door in their faces, but there was a foot in the way.

I banged the door several times, but this stupid reporter’s shoe was stopping me.

My father shoved me to the side and pulled the door open again.

There was a guy standing there, the same cheesedick who’d been slow to leave Mr. Baumgarten’s backyard. He held his camera up and took a picture of my father’s enraged face.

Chick-eh.

My mom and I watched in shock as my father cocked his right arm back and punched the guy right in the gut.

My dad. The resource specialist at the local community college. That’s a librarian in case you didn’t know. He totally kicked that guy’s ass with one punch.

When the cheesedick leaned over gasping for air, his camera went down and out, extending into our foyer.

I snatched it out of his hands and yelled, “Shut the door!” at my dad.

He did exactly as I ordered, and
that
is how we ended up locked inside our house with a paparazzi’s camera, and me standing there with a whole lot of explaining to do.

Chapter Twenty-Two

THAT WHOLE VISION I HAD of my parents and me sitting down and discussing the situation like rational adults? Yeah. That was some kind of weird-ass fantasy.

The yelling started before I even passed the threshold into the living room.

“What the hell is going on?!” my father screamed, following behind me.

“Not so loud, honey, there’s still reporters out there.” My mom rushed over to make sure the blinds were tightly closed. She removed the tie-backs for the drapes and closed them too, something that made both my father and me stop freaking out for a second.

My mom never did that. Curtains were for show, she said, not to actually be used. Those tiebacks had probably only ever been touched twice in all the years they’d been there, once when they were put up and today.

“Can we just sit down and discuss this rationally?” I asked, trying to sound super mature. I put the camera down on the small table near the entrance to the family room.

“How about you just start explaining yourself. Did I hear that reporter ask you what you were doing at
Jason’s
house?” My father’s face was beet red.

“I thought you were out running,” my mom said, sounding kind of lost.

My father snorted. “Yeah, right. Because she’s a runner.”

“Hey!” my mother and I yelled at the same time.

My father shook his head and then mussed up his hair. “Sorry. Sorry, that was uncalled for …” He turned around and around, like he was trying to get his bearings.

“I think we all should sit down,” said my mother the peacemaker. “Let’s discuss this and figure out what we’re going to do with all these wolves at the door.”

I walked around the couch and took the armchair facing the coffee table, to the left of the sofa. My parents came over and sat side by side, both of them staring at me.

“So …,” I started, wondering how much I should say and how much I could get away with withholding. I decided
not much
, when the look on my father’s face told me I’d better not mess around.

“I … uh … was over at Jason’s house, and when I tried to leave, I kind of got surrounded by those press guys and someone bumped me on the mouth with a microphone. No bigiddy.”

“No bigiddy? No
bigiddy?
” My father’s volume increased with every word. “That’s called battery, Katy, and it’s not even my biggest concern if you can believe that!”