Ballads of Suburbia (23 page)

S
CHOOL STARTED AGAIN IMMEDIATELY AFTER
N
EW
Year's, the last week of classes before finals. I played sick for the first three days, buying myself time to recover physically and emotionally. It was one thing to tell myself to pretend my fight with Christian had never happened, another to actually do it. Mom insisted I return to school on Thursday, reminding me how disappointed she'd been with the C's on my last report card. She wanted me as prepared as possible for my finals.

One “final” I definitely wouldn't be passing was swimming. I had no desire to swim midwinter as it was, but with five-day-old bruises to conceal, wearing a bathing suit-even the conservatively cut, sixties-style numbers the school issued-was exceedingly inconvenient. I'd take an F if I had to and reassure Mom that gym grades didn't count toward your GPA. I couldn't risk exposing my bruises, especially since Cass was in my class.

We were required to change into our gym uniforms when opting out of swimming. As I painstakingly tugged my navy blue shirt over my long underwear, the bruises on my chest aching when I lifted my arms, Cass approached. She looked as ridiculous as everyone in the standard mauve swimming getup, maybe more so because the color pink made her so uncomfortable she walked around stiff as a bodybuilder.

Cass raised her eyebrows, asking, “Not swimming the day of the final?”

“I've been out sick. Still not well enough,” I replied in a scratchy whisper, faking a sore throat.

“That's why you haven't been returning my phone calls?”

Her tone was suspicious, but I ignored it and rose to help her with her hair like I always did. Cass's dreadlocks hung halfway down her back, a nightmare for her to cram into a swimming cap. As I twisted sections of hair into small buns, I explained, “I haven't really been able to talk on the phone. Not even to Christian.”

It was true; I'd pretended to be sleeping whenever he called and insisted to Liam that neither Christian nor Maya should come over because I felt so crappy.

Cass cut right to the chase, as was her nature. “Well, I was calling because I was worried. What happened with you and Christian on New Year's? I saw him take you upstairs. I had to herd Mary and Jessica away from the bathroom. I think they were about to put their plastic cups to the door to listen.”

I forced a sickly sounding chuckle, but gave myself away by nervously dropping her half-coiled hair. “You didn't stand out there and listen, did you?”

“No, I just hung around to see if you were okay. You don't remember us talking after you came out? You were a little incoherent. Also a little tearstained.” Concern peppered her voice.

I searched the haze for my encounter with her. Had she been right outside the door? In Shelly's room, where I'd retreated for shots? In the basement, where I'd danced around with my second bottle of champagne? Most important, what lie had I told her?

“Honestly, I don't remember. Didn't I explain then? I can barely talk now,” I croaked, pointing at my throat.

“You just said Christian took you in there to puke. But I talked
to Adrian later and he said Christian dragged you off after seeing the two of you together. Did you and Christian fight over that?”

I hurriedly rewound her hair. “Yeah, kind of. But it wasn't a big deal.”

As I snapped the bathing cap over Cass's head, my shirtsleeve slipped upward, exposing my bruised skin. She snatched my wrist and held it between us. “That's a big deal.”

I tore my arm away, surveying for potential gapers, but everyone was too busy concealing their own bodily imperfections as they changed. “It's not a big deal.”

“Kara, if Christian's doing this to you…”

“He's not.” I refused to meet Cass's eyes, turning back to my locker as I lied, “I slipped in the snow, landed on my wrist.”

“Are you sure that's what happened?” Cass addressed me calmly, too much like someone with an agenda, fishing for details.

I spun around, abandoning the sore-throat act to retort, “Are you Jessica now? On the hunt for gossip? Or did Adrian put you up to this? Well, you can tell him that Christian and I are fine. He's
not
going to come between us.”

“Kara, I was just worried about you,” Cass said, looking as serious as someone in a bathing suit and cap could. “I don't give a shit about your relationship with Adrian. I thought I heard you and Christian fighting in the bathroom and now you have this bruised wrist-”

“Christian and I are fine. Maybe you didn't see us dancing together at the end of the night. But we were. Everything's fine.”

Cass persisted, reaching for my wrist again and asking, “When did you slip?”

“Just drop it!” I screeched. I'd spent three days in bed trying to get my act together, so I could smile at Christian and kiss him and hold his hand like I would have to at lunch the next period. If Cass made me relive New Year's Eve, it would all fall
apart. “Don't you have a drug-addicted boyfriend and a crazy mom to deal with? Don't invent problems for me just to escape your own.” I shoved Cass away, pushing a little harder than I intended, causing her to bang her shoulder into the lockers.

Two girls who wore their hair in matching, expertly disheveled buns stared at us as they exited the locker room. “Wow, and I thought
you
had issues,” one joked to the other.

Tears burned in Cass's brown eyes and I knew it wasn't because of her shoulder. She shook off that injury, winding her arm around like she was about to throw a softball…or punch me, which I definitely would have deserved. I'd gone too far, hurting her terribly in my attempt to protect myself.

“I'm sorry,” I whispered, but Cass had already started walking away, trying to look dignified in her pink suit with three dreadlocks still hanging out of her cap.

I watched her go, then changed back in to my regular clothes, went to the nurse's office, and asked to be sent home.

I
RETURNED TO SCHOOL FOR MY FIRST
full day on Friday-full except for gym class. Unable to face Cass, I hid in the girls' bathroom. Aside from that, I robotically went through the motions of my usual routine.

I held Christian's hand in the halls and kissed him as we parted for class. I did it quickly with my eyes partially open, so I wouldn't imagine his hands at my throat. His touch was gentle as it had always been, though. His fingers delicately grazed the small of my back when he pulled out my chair at our lunch table or opened the car door for me as we left school.

He drove us to Punk Rock Denny's and I watched Maya and Liam in the rearview mirror. Maya smiled and Liam laughed hysterically as Christian did an imitation of a teacher we all loathed. I realized that no one in my family had ever been able to make Liam laugh that way.
That's why you have to make things with Christian work,
I reminded myself.

We took our regular booth in the smokiest part of the smoking section. I sat beside Christian and forced myself not to flinch when he draped his arm across my shoulders. We smoked and drank coffee for a few hours before putting in our customary dinner order: burgers for Maya and Christian, Grand Slam for Liam, and fries and a side salad for me. We talked about the usual
things as we ate-how much school sucked or whatever band ruled. My participation was minimal, but no one seemed concerned, probably attributing it to me being “sick.”

After dinner, Christian brought up Florida. He was the most obsessed with the escaping-to-Florida fantasy, always planning exactly how it could be pulled off. “We should skip finals and go to Florida,” he said. “We could live on the beach and I could play guitar for spare change. Liam could do skate tricks and Maya could draw pictures.”

I waited for him to mention what I could do, but he didn't, so I piped up, “What would I do to make money, give blow jobs in the changing rooms on the beach?”

This brought the light conversation to a grinding halt. I'd meant it as a joke, but hadn't been able to pull it off because I pictured Christian blocking the bathroom door, drunkenly demanding,
“Are you a whore like they say you are?”

Christian's head swiveled toward me in slow motion. When our eyes met, I could tell he was remembering the same moment. He laughed awkwardly and said, “That's funny, Kara.”

An uncomfortable silence descended. Maya nodded at me and then jerked her chin in the direction of the bathroom.
Yes
, I thought,
time for drinks. That will help me regroup.
When Maya and I were bored at Denny's we locked ourselves in the handicap stall and passed a fifth of whiskey or tequila or whatever Maya had in her bag until things got fun again.

This time, things did not get fun again.

I rested my butt on the toilet paper dispenser attached to the tiled wall. She leaned against the tan divider that separated our stall from the next. There wasn't much space between us-enough for a wheelchair to fit through-but we could've been in different rooms. We didn't speak, didn't look at each other, our fingers didn't even touch as we handed off the bottle of whiskey. I focused on consuming the right amount-enough to block the
memories so I could do a better job of acting normal, but not too much. I couldn't risk getting wasted and losing my cool.

Little did I know, Maya was fortifying herself for a confrontation. As I brought the bottle to my lips for my fourth and final swig, she caustically remarked, “I don't know if you said the blow-job thing to test Christian, but he's forgiven you for what you did on New Year's. If you love him anywhere near as much as he loves you, just let it go and move on.”

I spit whiskey into the toilet. “He's forgiven
me
for what
I
did. What did he say happened?”

Maya met my gaze, her gunmetal gray eyes cold. “You don't even remember? He said you were fucked-up, but wow.”

“What did he say?” I reiterated through tightly clenched teeth. Had I dreamt the part where Christian said to forget everything that had happened? Was I wrong to assume that he meant it would stay between us?

“He said that he caught you on the front porch making out with Adrian at midnight. He pulled you away and brought you upstairs.”

I didn't remember being “brought.” I remembered being dragged. I touched my left wrist, digging into the bruises. Should I show them to Maya? But she explained them away with her next sentence.

“He said you were majorly wasted, stumbling up the stairs. He practically had to drag you…”

Not practically.
I closed my eyes, remembering being thrown into the bathroom. The bruises on my tailbone. I lifted the back of my shirt. Ready to turn and show her.

“You were falling all over the place, really banging yourself up. He worried that Adrian had given you something a lot stronger than booze. He tried to ask you what was going on and you showed him these hickeys all over your chest.”

My eyes shot open. Maya's face was twisted in disgust like
someone had forced her to eat shit. She grabbed the bottle of whiskey from my fist, glaring at me while she drank.

“Not hickeys…and that was later when we danced,” I stammered, remembering how he held me close and peered down my shirt. Yes, those marks had looked like hickeys. I'd noticed that myself the next day, but he knew. “He knew—”

She interrupted, “I know. You danced at the end of the night and you promised him never again. You guys decided to forget it had happened. He loves you so much and just wanted to forgive you…”

I slammed my head backward against the tile, trying to destroy the memory of the soft look in Christian's eyes when
he'd
said to
me, “Never again. Let's forget this happened.”

I hit my head again, cursing myself for being so stupid. Christian had known it would come out. And while I was trying to pull myself together so I could fake it for the sake of our friends, our makeshift little family, he was covering his ass so that when everything fell apart,
I
would be the one to lose them. I angrily snatched the whiskey from Maya, demanding, “When did he tell you this?” before taking a swig.

“I stopped by to see him on New Year's Day. I knew that Liam had talked to you about Adrian and was worried that you might break up with Christian-”

“Whoa!” I exclaimed. “Why didn't you call me?”

Maya wrenched the bottle back. “Because you weren't the one getting hurt.”

“Oh my god.” I started to cackle. “Oh my god.”

“But before I could even explain to Christian why I was there, he burst into tears and told me about your fight and how determined he was to stay with you.” Maya mimicked Christian: “‘I love her so much, Maya. She's the only girl in the world for me.'” She pounded her fist against the stall wall, shaking it. “Why would you throw away love like that for someone like Adrian,
Kara? And if you're going to, just break up with Christian instead of faking sick to go off and do heroin with Adrian!”

“What? Where'd you get that idea?”

“Oh, come on! You're asleep every time we call. More like strung out…”

I couldn't believe it. I'd been in bed trying to get strong, to get past this for Liam and Maya, and I'd played right into Christian's hands. I pushed myself off the wall, fumbling for the lock on the stall door. “You're right. I'll go break up with good, honorable Christian. And then I'm off to get high with Adrian. That's what I do.”

“Kara.” Maya's voice softened. I felt her hand on my shoulder. “Please, I want to help you. I don't want to see you become a drug addict.”

I turned back to her, sobbing. “I'm not a drug addict!” I took a deep breath, hoping desperately that despite being fed Christian's lies for six days, she'd believe me. “Christian really hurt me on New Year's Eve. Like
hurt me
hurt me. These are not hickeys.” I yanked my shirt down to the top of my bra, revealing the stretch of bruises across my chest.

Maya's face froze in an expression I would have expected from a disapproving parent: her lips tightened into a straight line, brow wrinkled, eyes dark. She quickly knocked my hands away so the bruises were hidden once more. “That is seriously fucked-up, Kara. You're accusing Christian of abusing you? He would never hurt anyone. Especially not you, he loves you.”

My mouth dropped open. “Maya, he tried to choke me. Remember that night in Scoville when he grabbed Mary? It was like that, but worse because I have this stupid ring around my neck.” I pounded it against my chest to demonstrate how the bruises formed. Pain rippled through me, but I didn't wince. Pain gave me the strength to do what I should have done on New Year's Eve.

I put my thumb through the ring and tugged, snapping the thin gold chain. The chain skidded across the bathroom floor and I stomped on it as I stormed out, Maya trailing me.

Our booth was just a few feet away from the bathroom. I marched up to Christian and whipped the ring at his chest, snarling, “You can have this back. Give it to Maya. She loves you so much she doesn't care what you do. Even to her best friend.”

Then I fled Denny's like I'd doused it with gasoline and lit a match. Running as fast as I could in case someone snapped out of shock and followed me, I zigzagged through slushy alleys and side streets. Since I had nowhere else to go, I decided to head to Shelly's, get really wasted, and forget everything.

Bull's-eye on the intoxicated part-when I snuck in through Shelly's back door, I found her and Harlan in the kitchen setting out Jell-O shots-but so much for forgetting my situation.

“Hey, sexy,” Harlan purred. “Where's Maya and the boys?”

“I didn't know Jell-O came in purple,” I said, ignoring his question and slurping one of the wiggly, delicious creations.

“Grape,” Shelly told me, tucking her blond curls behind her ears. “Harlan made those. I made these.” She handed me a bright green shot the unnatural color of Harlan's recently dyed hair. “Apple,” she added as I swallowed it.

“Purple's stronger.” I commandeered three grape shots.

“Are the others still at Denny's or something?” Harlan was so persistent, practically as gossipy as Jessica and Mary.

“Mmm-hmm,” I agreed through another shot. After all, they probably still were. With the other two shots tucked firmly in my fists, I disappeared to the basement before Harlan could point out how weird it was that I'd arrived alone.

The outlook for avoiding interrogation downstairs was equally grim. It was only seven thirty, too early to be crowded, but ev
eryone I didn't want to see had already arrived. I spotted Adrian sitting with Quentin on a corner couch. Jessica and Mary stood at the foot of the stairs, waiting for boys to throw themselves at or girls to torture.

“What, no entourage tonight, Kara?” Jessica snarked.

“She doesn't have an entourage,” Mary corrected. “She's just Christian's groupie.”

It took all my willpower not to pound her for that. Fortunately for her, I had my hands full of shots. I strode with determination toward the source of more alcohol and found to my delight that Gonzo, lumberjack-size king of small talk, was stationed by the keg. I said hello and he poured me a beer, immediately launching into a theory about how all the early settlers in America were crazy because of this mold that grew on their bread.

“These Puritans were, like, trippin' their faces off every day when they ate!” he informed me, gesticulating wildly with his gargantuan hands.

“Cool.” I nodded, relieved that this conversation would not lead to any questions about where my “entourage” was.

After three beers and four shots, I continued to chat with Gonzo about absolutely nothing and Shelly's basement filled to the usual Friday-night capacity. Even though I stood near the keg, no one bothered me because Gonzo held my rapt attention.

Then, out of the corner of my eye, I saw Harlan descending the basement stairs. He wobbled with each step, ready to pitch forward and fall. I shoved my beer into Gonzo's hand and took off toward Harlan.

Guiding him the rest of the way down, I asked, “Dude, how many shots did you do?”

“I don't think it's the shots,” he slurred with a woozy smile. “Vicodin. Shelly told her doctor she gets bad cramps to get it.
Good stuff. Better than codeine. Want some?” He fumbled in the pockets of his oversize jeans.

“No, I don't think so.” The way I felt that evening made it tempting, but staggering, cross-eyed, unable-to-control-his-own-spit Harlan lessened the Vicodin-alcohol appeal.

His eyes suddenly widened. “Uhhmagawd!” His excitement was clear even though his words weren't. He rubbed his lips back and forth in an attempt to wake them up. Somehow it worked and he became easier to understand. “I forgot to show you something. I dyed my pubes green to match my hair!”

Before I could emit an oh-no sound of distress, his hand moved from pocket to fly and he shoved his shiny maroon boxers down to reveal the top of his crop. His pubes were indeed fluorescent green.

“Okay, I saw. Zip it up!” I squeezed my eyes shut, gesturing at his fly. But, problematically, I wasn't the only one who saw. We were near enough to the dance floor to have one of the roving lights shine on us at the worst possible moment. Conversations and dancing stopped.

Normally, it wouldn't have mattered. Everyone would have gone back to their business, writing it off as just another weird event at one of Shelly's parties: “Remember that time Harlan flashed Kara…” Maybe Mary and Jessica would have recast things: “Kara almost gave Harlan a blow job in front of everyone.” But no one else would have interpreted it that way.

No one but Christian.

He, Maya, and Liam happened to come down the stairs at precisely the wrong time. Before I could even open my eyes to make sure Harlan had zipped, Christian's voice boomed in my ear. “What the hell? Are you so pissed at me that you're gonna play with his dick in public?”