Mixed Bags (8 page)

“Hey, THere’s FOOD
in the cooler if anyone’s hungry,” said DJ when she noticed that Taylor and Harry were both more than halfway through their second alcoholic beverage now. “You big drinkers might want to put something solid in your tummies to offset that booze.”

“Thanks,
Mom,
” sniped Taylor, taking a long swig as if to prove she was totally unconcerned.

Just the same, DJ went ahead and got some of the food items out, arranging them on the blanket so that everyone could easily help themselves. The guys seemed to appreciate this, although Eliza and Taylor seemed uninterested in eating as they sipped their wine coolers and acted silly. Or maybe they were more obsessed with weight than DJ realized. Whatever. DJ wasn’t going to force them to eat. After all, what difference did it make to her? They were her grandmother’s responsibility, not hers.

Still, she felt a little worried. And it bugged her to feel like this. She didn’t want to get stuck playing the “mom” role with the Carter House girls. Like how fair was that? Even so, she was also thinking about Kriti. She’d been gone nearly an hour by now, and DJ had no idea where she was or if she was okay. She wondered if someone should go out looking for her.

DJ was about to mention her concern to the others, but suddenly realized that this would only risk Taylor making another “mom” joke at DJ’s expense. Maybe she could talk Conner into looking for Kriti. Better yet, maybe she and Conner could both go to search for their missing friend. That would also be a good escape from Taylor and her endless jabs. DJ suspected Taylor’s nastiness might grow even worse under the influence of alcohol. DJ remembered hearing that people’s true personalities came out when they were wasted. She hated to imagine how mean someone like Taylor might get, and DJ definitely did not want to be in that girl’s line of fire.

DJ was mentally preparing a strategy for getting Conner and her away from the others, as she removed a large bowl of pasta salad from the cooler (more of those forbidden carbs that her grandmother had been warning Clara to avoid). But just as she stood, she observed Taylor bent over and fishing around in DJ’s new Hermès bag. What was up with that?

“Hey, Taylor,” said DJ trying not to sound as irate as she felt for this invasion of privacy, “what’re you doing?”

“Getting my cigarettes, if you don’t mind,” snapped Taylor. “I know you
think
you’re my mom, but hopefully you’re not getting on my case for smoking now. There seems to be plenty of air to go around out here.”

“You’ve got the
wrong
bag,” said DJ as she retrieved some plates and silverware from the picnic basket, setting them out by the salad.

“That’s right.” Eliza nodded, pointing to the purse. “That’s DJ’s bag, Taylor. You must have made a Freudian slip. You just
wished
the Hermès was yours.” Eliza threw back her head and laughed.

DJ had to laugh too. This joke was totally on Taylor. Then, just as DJ was setting a veggie platter on the blanket, she heard Taylor starting to snicker loudly. DJ glanced over to see what was so amusing, and Taylor still had her hands inside DJ’s Hermès bag.

“Taylor!” DJ was aggravated now. “Give it up, will you? I guarantee that you will not find any cigarettes in
my
bag. Okay?”

But Taylor just smiled—she smiled in a way that DJ, in hindsight, would describe as
purely evil.
“Oh, but I did find something else, DJ—something even more interesting—especially from a goody-goody girl like you.” Then Taylor removed something small from the Hermès bag and held it up. From where she was standing, DJ couldn’t see what was in Taylor’s hand, but the others were starting to laugh now. Not loudly, but more of an embarrassed kind of laugh—sort of like an uncomfortable titter.

“Huh?” DJ went closer now, peering at whatever Taylor was holding up and acting so pleased about. The shiny items in her hands looked like tiny foil packets, like maybe they were samples of gum or candy or something. “What are those?” asked DJ.

“Condoms, of course!” exploded Taylor as she shook the shiny objects in front of DJ’s face. “You really do come prepared for everything, don’t you, DJ?” She looked toward the boys now. “My question is who did you plan to use these with?”

DJ felt her cheeks grow instantly hot as she stared at those totally foreign objects. “Those are
not mine
!” she hissed at Taylor.

“No, no, of course, they’re not.” Taylor was using her low seductive voice now. “I’m sure that’s why they were in the pocket of your Hermès bag, because they are most definitely
not yours.
”

“They’re
not!
” DJ reached over and snatched her bag away from Taylor.

“Yeah, right.” Taylor was laughing even harder now. “You are full of surprises, DJ. Just when I thought you were such a—”

“I swear, they’re not mine,” insisted DJ. “You probably planted them there, Taylor. Just to embarrass me. I’m sure you’ve got plenty of those things in your purse.” She reached for Taylor’s bag now, ready to prove her point and clear her name in front of Conner and the others.

“Go ahead and look all you want,” said Taylor in a totally unconcerned voice. “And while you’re at it, could you toss me my cigarettes? That’s all I was looking for anyway. Sorry to expose your little secrets.”

DJ knew it would be futile to look in Taylor’s bag. Taylor was not that careless. If this was a setup, she’d probably made sure to have nothing incriminating in her bag. So DJ tossed the bag at Taylor, throwing it so hard that a strap flew up and hit Taylor in the chin.

“Ouch!” shouted Taylor with narrowed eyes. “You don’t need to get violent.”

DJ looked helplessly at Eliza now. “Tell Taylor that those things weren’t mine,” she commanded her.

“Why should I tell her that?” Eliza’s brow creased with a slightly wounded expression.

“Because they must’ve been yours. You’re the one who gave me that bag in the first place, Eliza. So, obviously, they must be yours,
right
?” DJ felt more desperate than ever.

Eliza just shook her head. “I hardly think so, DJ. Good grief, talk about looking a gift horse in the mouth. And to think I thought we were friends.”

“Well, they must be your mom’s then, Eliza. You said she bought this bag in France originally. Maybe she put them in the bag and—”

“You should watch what you insinuate about other people’s mothers,” warned Eliza. “A person might get offended.”

DJ knew that her face was flaming red now. She couldn’t remember ever feeling this totally degraded before. If this morning’s tennis match had seemed bad, this was worse. Way, way worse. She so didn’t want Conner to see her like this. And, more than that, she didn’t want to look at him either. She couldn’t imagine looking into his eyes now. All she wanted was to get away—far, far away. So, with the detestable Hermès bag still in her hands, she turned her back to the group, who had now grown quiet and, feeling like she was doing a bad Kriti imitation, she headed down the beach in the same direction that Kriti had stomped off. As she hurried away, she had no doubts that her “friends” would soon be making fun of her behind her back too.

After a few minutes, DJ was torn between the desire to get even and simply to get away. She even considered calling her dad on her cell phone, begging him to take her back, promising him that she’d do whatever it took. Maybe Jan and the twins weren’t so horrible after all. They might’ve been demanding, but they had never humiliated her before. At least not intentionally. Cleaning house, doing laundry, even changing smelly diapers—what were those chores compared to feeling this miserable?

She wasn’t sure how long or how far she had walked, but she did realize that she’d reached a part of the beach that seemed fairly uninhabited. On one hand, it was a relief to be away from the others, but on the other hand, it was a little unnerving too. What if she ran into some kind of pervert? She was just about to turn back when she saw someone quite a way down the beach. At first she thought it was a child, but then she realized it was Kriti, slowly walking toward her. For no rational reason, DJ’s heart went out to Kriti just then. She felt terrible for not standing up for Kriti earlier. Maybe it was simply the sort of empathy that is born from a similar experience. But DJ began to walk faster, waving and calling out Kriti’s name.

“What are you doing?” asked Kriti when they finally met.

“Running away from home,” said DJ.

“Huh?”

“Taylor just managed to totally humiliate me.”

“How?”

So DJ told her the whole skanky, sordid story. Ironically, it didn’t seem quite as bad when she said it all out loud. In fact, she almost expected Kriti to laugh. But she didn’t.

“Taylor is wicked mean,” said Kriti.

DJ nodded. “I’ll say.”

“I was thinking about calling my parents and asking to come home,” admitted Kriti.

“Me too.”

“Really?” Kriti frowned. “But isn’t the Carter House sort of like your home? I mean isn’t Mrs. Carter your grandmother?”

“No and yes. She’s my grandmother, but the Carter House doesn’t really feel like home.”

“Where is your home?”

DJ realized that Kriti didn’t really know much about her, so she told her the shortened version of her mother’s death and how it hadn’t worked out so great with her dad and his new wife and twin girls. “Still, I was just thinking I might be willing to go back and play nanny now. It would be better than being tortured by Taylor.”

“I’m curious, DJ.” Kriti frowned. “What does your grandmother think of these things? Underage drinking…smoking…lying…meanness…and other forms of wayward behavior.”

DJ tried not to cringe at the “wayward behavior” thing. Kriti sounded as if she were quoting her parents. “Well, as you know, my grandmother has rules.”

“I know about the rules. I signed the contract, DJ.”

“So you’re asking if she enforces her rules.”

“Exactly.”

DJ shrugged. “The truth is, I don’t know.”

Kriti slowly nodded. “I thought as much.”

“Does that worry you?”

Kriti seemed to consider this. “It does make me feel a little insecure, but I do know that all I need to do is call my parents and they will rescue me.”

“Do you feel like you need to be rescued?”

“I wasn’t sure,” she confessed. “I was prepared to come back to the group and discover that everyone was inebriated. In that case, I would call my parents. I know they would not allow me to ride with a drunk driver.”

“Do you drive?”

She shook her head. “No.”

“Well, I do. And I don’t plan to let Eliza drive home. And I suspect Conner will drive for Harry.”

“Conner didn’t imbibe?”

“No. He took a little sample of beer and didn’t like it. He and I were only drinking soda.”

Kriti almost smiled now. “That is a relief.”

Now DJ put an arm around Kriti’s shoulders. “I’m sorry, Kriti. I should’ve stood up for you. But I was falling for the old peer-pressure thing.”

Now Kriti did smile. “Thank you, DJ. I appreciate that.”

DJ sighed and looked up at the sky. Her best guess was that it was about three o’clock and probably too soon to talk everyone into going home. Besides that, it was an absolutely gorgeous day, not nearly as hot as yesterday. “So, what do we do now?”

Kriti shrugged. “I’m not sure that I want to go back yet.”

“Me either.” Then DJ remembered something. “Do you know how to play volleyball?”

Kriti brightened. “I was on the team in middle school.”

“There was a game going on somewhere up there,” DJ said as she pointed.

“I don’t think they were playing when I walked by, but I noticed the net.”

“Should we go see if they take walk-ons?”

Kriti grinned. “Sounds fun.”

So they walked back up to where two teams were playing. One team, a little short-handed, only had three players—two guys and a girl. The other team had four, and three of them were fairly athletic-looking guys. Kriti and DJ just stood and watched for a couple of minutes, but it looked like the small team was getting soundly beaten.

“Need any more players?” called out DJ.

“Sure,” said a dark-haired girl on the team of three. She had just missed a low shot and was brushing sand off her hands. “Maybe we won’t have to work so hard.”

A guy on the team of four yelled, “We get the tall chick.”

“No way,” said the dark-haired girl. “You guys are already creaming us.”

“How about if you take both of us in a package deal?” suggested DJ. “It’ll be uneven whichever way you cut it, and it looks like your team is already behind.”

“Yeah,” said one of the jocks on the team of four. “We’re doing just fine the way we are. You losers can take both the chicks.”

“Thanks a lot,” yelled the dark-haired girl as she waved DJ and Kriti to her side of the net. “I’m Leah,” she told them, quickly introducing everyone around.

They repositioned themselves and soon started playing again. And it wasn’t long before DJ could tell that the team of four was regretting this small rearrangement. All the players seemed surprised at how well both DJ and Kriti played. In fact, DJ was surprised that, for a half-pint, Kriti was a real fireball. After a few minutes, the tables turned, and the underdog team made a comeback, winning the last two games out of three. To show their appreciation, Leah insisted that DJ and Kriti stay for a soda. “Are you from around here?” she asked.

DJ explained that they had both recently moved to Crescent Cove and would be attending high school there in town.

“That’s cool,” said Leah. “Except that we’ll be rivals. We go to JFK High, and Crescent is one of the schools in our conference.”

“One of our most competitive schools,” said a guy named Luke.

“Usually, we’re in the playoffs together,” said Leah.

“Then maybe we’ll see you at some games,” said DJ.

“Volleyball?” asked the girl with a slight frown.

“Yeah,” said DJ. “If I make the cut.”

Leah laughed. “You’ll make the cut.”

“How about you, Kriti?” asked DJ.

Kriti sort of shrugged. “I’m pretty short.”