All You Never Wanted (22 page)

“Let me deal with it alone. We don’t need
brunch
to figure ourselves out. If you’re moving on, that’s cool. Maybe I am, too. Okay?”

“Okay.”

“Come find me later if you want. I’ll be around.”

“Okay.”

He is now gentle on the door he has just abused. Opening it and disappearing through it. The barest click as it shuts behind him.

Alex is still thinking about running after him, even as her hand reaches into her pocket for her phone.

I had an ear on the bell all night. Paranoid. I needed to be chill but prepared. So far, so good. Not as many randoms as I was scared would happen. But dread was always on my shoulder. Every chime, and I’d cut upstairs from the rec room quick as Arthur’s jet-drive motorboat.

This time, I saw that Joshua himself had opened the front door.

And there she was. The last person I wanted to see tonight, Gabby Ferrell. I ducked her like a sniper. Snap around the corner and up the stairs to the second floor. The way tonight was going, Alex wouldn’t think twice about sending Gabby straight up and siccing her on me.

My speeding feet made choices and my brain played catch-up. Wild how crowded the place had become—transformed to unrecognizable, like when Greenwich holds its graduation party in South Meadow. I closed myself up in the linen closet, allowing a thin chink of light to keep an eye out as I worked through my next move.

Confront Gabby head-on? Text Joshua an order to toss her from the premises, ASAP? Wait her out from inside this closet? Suck it up and apologize?

Minutes later, I was still stuck. My single bong hit wasn’t helping my sense of time. Then I saw Alex and Joshua heading
down the hall toward Alex’s room. Their footfalls quick and silent. Half of me wanted to burst from the closet for just a minute or two of kid-sis gloating.
How d’you like the party now, Alex?
My blast invite to 26 Round Hill Manor had turned into a flash mob.

But from the way Alex and Joshua were walking, from the precise click of her bedroom door shutting behind them, they were obviously on a mission.

What if they were talking about me? What if Joshua was telling Alex I kissed him? He’d better not make it sound like it was all me.

My breath was hot and fast. And then, what if Alex got angry? Really
really
angry?

Then—
boom!

What the …? Earthquake? Downstairs was instant confusion. Kids were running, shrieking. My body went icy. But if it was an earthquake, weren’t you supposed to do exactly what I’d already done and go hide in a closet?

Or was that hurricanes? No, twisters.

Unless that noise was a bomb.

Oh my God. A bomb! Then what?

What to do what to do. I stuck to doing nothing. Next, a hard pounding against Alex’s wall. Not a friendly noise. Then Alex’s door opened and Joshua whipped past. His boots landing tight punches down the carpeted stairs.

What had gone down between those two? And what was my sister doing now? Was she okay?

I had to know.

A minute later—crouched at Alex’s door with one ear flattened against it to hear if she was crying or on the phone or having
a breakdown, debating whether to knock—she found me. Her voice jumped me to a stand.

“Why, Theodora Parrott. I’ve been looking for you.” Her words against the back of my neck turned it prickly. I stood and faced her.

“Oh. Hey, Gabby. Glad you could make it.”

“Me, too. It’s time to deal with this, Thea.”

“Deal with what?”

“You know what. In front of Gavin and Saskia. You need to answer for what you did.” Her voice was wobbling. She caught a breath and started again. “I’m not letting you drown me in this … this
cesspool
of your polluted mind.”

“Get out of my house, Gabby. Nobody invited you.”

“Not till you apologize.”

“I can’t believe you’re threatening me.”

“It’s time somebody did.”

I wasn’t thinking right. I hadn’t been thinking right all day, and I sure wasn’t when I shoved right up in her face and cracked my hand as hard as I could across her cheek. Shocking us both.

It was like she’d been in training for it, the way she came back at me. A two-handed lunge wrapped tight across my shoulders. Pinning my arms. Taking us both down with such bone-crushing force that blinky, yawning partygoers hanging on the stairs limp as clothes on a line suddenly found the energy to push forward and check us out.

Gabby was solidly bigger than me. Plus she had more juice in her to fight, to win, to prove something. And even while I was blindsided by shock and pain, I was spinning inside that other sensation, too. Like my broken finger that wasn’t mine, I was
gasping on behalf of this other girl. A girl who’d gotten herself lost in a smear of charcoal eyeliner and a dress that smelled like mothballs. Who was I anymore? Did anybody care? Did I?

She was pawing at me. Pulling at my hair and scratching me up the arm with her fingernails so deep and rough I saw blood bead my skin.

When we fell, I took the hit as her body forced the air from my lungs.

Then,
crack!
The object whistled sharp past my ear to hit the wall as we both ducked and Gabby screamed—her ambush on me paused as I scrabbled away and checked out the weapon in question.

Alex’s tissue-box holder.

And Alex herself. Standing above us. Watchful and ferocious. Not crying. Not breaking down. Not fragile.

“Enough.” Her voice was calm as a piano teacher’s. But her presence plus the tissue box had done its job. “I’m calling your parents, Gabby.” Holding up her cell phone.

“What? Why?” Now Gabby scooted a good yard away from me—as if I’d been the problem. Like it’d been her, not me, who’d just taken the monster beat-down. “Call who?”

I rolled up to sit cross-legged. Wincing. Ooch. What the hell had she done to my ribs?

“To come get you,” answered Alex. “You’re drunk and you’re trying to kill my sister. I’d like you to leave. And I’m guessing you need a ride home. Am I right?”

“No no no.” Gabby hopped up to a stand, palms up. “Don’t call them. I’ll find a ride. Don’t. Please.”

Palmer’s guy, Russ, was coming up the stairs. Russ was small
and slight and quiet, but he was steadfastly the type who stepped forward, not back. “Hey, Alex,” he said. “I think you better come down and see what happened out here. With the whale.”

“Yeah, okay—and Russ? Will you drive Gabby home?”

“Sure, easy.”

“I can take care of myself.” Had to hand it to the girl, she had nerve. Three minutes ago, she’d been psycho. Now she was daintily smoothing her hair, her T-shirt. “You don’t need to get anyone else involved.” She dared to cut her eyes at me. “It was your sister who started this whole thing, anyway.”

Whatever Alex was actually thinking about that, she wasn’t giving Gabby access to it. “Thea. You okay?” she asked.

“Sure,” I lied. I felt like I’d been beaten with a stick. A dozen sticks. “Just some scratches.”

Alex, my rescuer. It made me want to be rescued again and again. Were we good now? Was I forgiven? But as I got to my feet and Alex slipped past me—following Russ, whose hand on Gabby’s wrist was as sure as iron cuffs—her fingers touched the scoop collar of my lace dress.

I looked down. A rip. A bad one. Threads curling like whiskers. My heart sank.

“Take that off,” she said softly. “There are consequences to every single thing you do. And you are doing stupid things.”

“At least I’m making decisions,” I answered. “At least I’m not sitting in my car, stuck in the driveway.” It was a cheap shot. I just wanted her to turn around. “Why does it always have to be your way?” I called after her. Loud. “Why don’t you care about me anymore?” Loud and pathetic. But she kept on moving.

Down the stairs, away from me. I’d been flicked off. Dismissed.

The fight had brought a crowd. Nobody I recognized in the faceless mass I’d invite-blasted into Camelot. Who had killed my party in one way, but had killed Alex’s party worse. An empty victory all around.

I leaned over the stair rail. Blinking blindly into the lights of the chandelier prisms. “You make me worse!” I shouted to Alex. The music drowning my words. “You make everything worse when you ignore it! Do you realize? What you’re doing?” She was already out the front door. Although I had a hundred more things to say.

If she’d just turned around, I’d have said different things.

“What’s wrong with you people?” I wheeled on them. Their faces dumb as puddings. “I can make all of you leave if I want, okay? This whole entire house and everything in it is mine.
Mine
.”

They were watching, enjoying themselves. Spectators. And my stomach was heaving. I was definitely going to throw up.

My room was way at the end of the hall. When we moved in, I’d chosen it because it felt most private. As I beelined there now, it seemed like exile.

I opened the door into an empty room, but something was wrong. I could feel the phantom presence of kids. People had been here, messing around. Rummaging through my things. Snooping, filching.

Fine. Take it. Take everything.

I was too tired to care.

I’d rarely felt so bad, and bed never felt so good. I sank into it
and flattened my pillow over my head. Glittering shards of light, a chaotic afterimpression of the chandelier prisms, shot past my closed eyelids. The room spun; I dropped a foot to the floor, the old trick. I must have dozed off … When I woke up again, it felt later, sort of.

Quieter, for sure.

A cough. I blinked and rolled over.

He was in my armchair. His pale hair, almost silvery. Enchanted prince. My heart was in free fall. “Hey, you.”

“Hey you back. Heard you got in a catfight. You look all right to me.”

I struggled to sit. That hurt and that hurt and
that
hurt. Gabby had rearranged me pretty bad. “You should see her. How long have you been here?”

“Ten, fifteen minutes?” Joshua yawned. “Maybe twenty. I got tired of kicking kids out of the house. Decided to catch a night nap. And I couldn’t find another room.”

“Sorry about that. The party got out of hand. Quiet now, though. Nice work.”

“Quiet, but the place is pretty trashed.”

“I’m good at apologizing.”

“Thee, I gotta break it to you. I don’t see how you and your sis are going to find an excuse nearly good enough for your mom and King Art. Where is she, by the way? I’ve been looking everywhere. Her car’s here. I know she didn’t leave.”

Aha. So that’s why Joshua was in my room. He’d been waiting to ask me where Alex was.

Perfect, just perfect. Why did I keep falling for this?

“Who cares?” I coughed and my ribs creaked in painful
protest. I snapped on the lamp and cringed. My eyes weren’t ready. I threw a scarf over the lampshade and the room turned pink and glowing.

“I care. Sort of.” Joshua wagged his head. Nonchalant, but I knew better. “We’re fighting.” He was drunk, I realized. And stoned, probably. “Might be our last fight.”

“You’ll work it out. Probably just a whaddaya call it. A
losing streak
.”

“Might be. Might be game over. Things were said.”

“For real?”

He stretched his legs. Flexing his quads as he re-crossed his forearms. A lot of muscle and all for me, but the pose felt kind of reflexive, too. It made me wonder how intentionally Joshua ever did anything.

“I hope that doesn’t mean that we can’t be friends,” I said. Probably too cornball, but so what. “We have so much fun together.” There. That was as much as I dared to reference our kiss. But I couldn’t tell if Joshua had regretted it. Of course not while it was happening—guys never regret the
while
—but afterward. I know I’d felt the sting of something. Deceit, maybe. Or coming on too strong.

Especially since the second after the kiss, he’d stepped away from me.
Alex​Alex​Alex
written all over his face.

I wished I knew what he was thinking now.

“You know what I wish?” he asked, almost as if he’d heard my thought. His arms flexing upward like he was trying out some manly yoga move. “I wish I could make another one of you.”

“Another
me
?”

“No. Yes. I mean, a third Parrott sister.”

“Shut up.”

“I’m not kidding.” His fingers twisted the air. Molding and shaping this phantom girl. “I’d take all those beautiful things in Alexandra. Her dreaminess, her eyes. Then I’d add your fun. Between the two of you is the perfect Parrott. And you know what?” He blew out a deep breath of longing. Twined one final curve through the air and dropped his hand. “I’d marry that girl.”

“Gia,” I said. “You could name her Gia.”

“Nice.”

I smiled. The third, perfect, impossible sister. He didn’t even realize what a jerk he was. Because he never did. He was staring at my legs and I could almost hear him rejecting them. Alex’s legs were longer. Runner’s legs. But he’d take my own legs’ puppy-dog skills for trotting behind him wherever he went. As if I had a choice. Sometimes I felt like Joshua was in complete charge of me. Operating me by remote control.

It was easier to think of him that way. It saved me from thinking about making my own decisions. It saved me from growing up.

But I hated him for it, too. I couldn’t help it. The third sister! What a weasely thought. I wished he hadn’t said it out loud. It made me feel almost deadly toward him. Even as I asked him the next thing.

“Joshua? Lie down next to me?”

“Nah.” He rubbed his hands briskly over his face as if to organize himself from the inside out. Somehow this only made him look messier. “Bad idea.” He stood and began to pace my room. Peering out the windows. “Lawn’s wrecked,” he commented. “You got an F for crowd control, Thee.”

“If Alex hadn’t split up the party, I wouldn’t have had to
invite so many kids. She put me up to it. All I ever wanted was for Alex to see me as her equal.” Too confessional, too late. I’d put it out there. “She doesn’t see it, but people like me.”

“You give Alex a lot of power.” He paused by my bookshelf, where all my old nerdy middle school awards were lined up. “Too much. We both do.”