Rolling Dice (32 page)

I find Ricky waiting to use the bathroom and ask if he’s seen any of the girls, but he slurs that he hasn’t, so I start looking through the various rooms.

Suddenly hands close over my eyes and I jump out of my skin, my heart going crazy.

“Guess who.”

“Um …” I rack my brain. The voice is familiar, but I can’t think … I push the hands off and turn around. “Justin. Hi.” My voice sounds clipped and irritable.

“What’re you doing, all on your own?”

“I can’t find anybody,” I explain. “Have you seen Tiffany anywhere?”

He shakes his head and shrugs his shoulders. “Not for an hour or something.”

“Never mind.”

“Where’s your boyfriend?” he asks, not impolitely.

“I don’t know.”

“Oh dear.” He looks genuinely concerned for me. “Trouble in paradise?”

“That’s none of your business,” I snap, trying to step around him, but he steps with me.

“Is everything okay?”

“Not really.” I don’t know why I’m telling him, of all people—but he seems sincere, and I’m fed up with saying “I’m fine.”

“Do you want to talk about it? Impartial ears to listen here, if you want.”

I shake my head. “Thanks anyway.”

He gives me a halfhearted smile, and lightly clips his finger under my chin. “Chin up.”

Before I can muster a laugh to go with my smile, we’re both caught off guard by someone very loudly and very pointedly clearing their throat.

I turn and see Tiffany; she’s looking between Justin and me with an icy cool glint in her eyes. I try not to gulp.

“Tiffany! Where have you been all night?” I walk over to her, breezing past Justin. “I’ve been looking everywhere for you.”

“Well, you can’t have been looking very hard,” she retorts.

I just smile blankly at her. She regards me a moment longer before turning away and saying, “Justin, sweetie, could you get me a drink please?”

“Uh, sure thing.” He shoots me another smile and a wave as he disappears back downstairs.

Immediately Tiffany wants to know: “What happened with you and Bryce? He told me you freaked out on him and left.”

“I didn’t. He was being a tool and we had a fight, and
then
I left.”

“Oh. Right. Okay.”

She’s not the same bubbly person I’m used to seeing at parties. This is the side of
Tiffany I do my best to ignore: the part that tells me I should ditch the Converse, that I should try and make more of an effort with my appearance (if I “want to make the most of” myself), and that my taste in music is appalling.

Maybe, I tell myself, she’s just being this way because of the whole thing with Bryce—I mean, they
have
been friends for years, and she’s only known me a couple of months. If I’ve upset Bryce, or at least put him in a bad mood, she’d have every right to be annoyed with me on principle. Yeah. That’s probably it.

But she most definitely doesn’t look happy with me right now—so I make a smooth and unhurried escape to the nearest bathroom, which happens to be in the bedroom to my right.

Once I’m in there, I lock the door. I don’t bother with the light. There’s a small window that lets in the faint glow of a streetlight, though, and the shadows fall across my face when I see myself in the mirror over the sink.

I run the faucet and wash my hands for no reason at all. The water’s warm against my skin. I consider splashing it over my face, but I spent so long on my makeup I don’t want to ruin it now.

I find myself thinking about Bryce.

Should I give him another chance? I mean, he is so sweet and nice, and he makes me feel like the old me didn’t even exist and—

No.
I’m going to break up with him
, I decide.
I don’t have to put up with him acting like that. I don’t want to, either. I’ll tell him tomorrow, when he’s not drunk or mad at me and will definitely remember that we’re officially over
.

I don’t want to stop being friends, but who knows how awkward it will make things between us? I hope everything will be okay. I don’t want it to affect my friendship with any of the rest of them—that’s what worries me most. But I won’t stay with him just because of the others.

I think of Tiffany too—how she turned on me so suddenly like that. The accusing looks she gave me and Justin, like we’d been caught kissing or something. I wonder if Bryce told her I was “cozied up” with Justin at the dance, and now she’s just looking for things where they don’t exist.

I know Tiffany can be exactly like some of the girls who used to bully me back in Maine—but I was so happy she took me under her wing, I ignored it. And it isn’t like she doesn’t have any redeeming qualities: she’s smart, even if she doesn’t boast about it, and she’s funny, and when she isn’t being horrible, she’s pretty nice.

I stay in the bathroom another few minutes, taking deep breaths and trying hard not to think too much. I just have to get through the rest of this night; I can sort my mind out tomorrow.
Just this one night
.

After what must be ages but doesn’t feel like very long at all, I turn the doorknob and let myself out.

And nothing
—nothing
—can prepare me for what I walk in on.

There are two people on the bed, and my first instinct is to avert my eyes and plug my ears. But I don’t look away before I recognize him.

“Bryce?”

It comes out as some kind of mangled croak, between a whisper and a cry of shock. I clap my hand over my mouth, wishing I hadn’t said anything at all. I start to back toward the bedroom door, but it’s too late: they heard me.

“Madison?” he says, sounding as horrified as I feel. “Fuck. Madison—”

He begins to scramble up off the girl on the bed and pulls his underpants and jeans back up, tripping a little because they’re caught around his ankles. I’m still backing up to the door, unable to do anything other than open and close my mouth, entirely speechless.

I flinch when the door suddenly presses up against my back. In a flash, I spin around and fumble to yank the handle open and get out of there.

“Madison! Madison, wait a sec!”

I want to scream and yell at him, ask him how long this has been going on behind my back, break down in tears. I can’t. I seem physically incapable of anything but getting away from him. I trip down the stairs, bumping into people, until I make it to the front door. It’s open. Good. The music—and the noise of people laughing and shouting and singing and chatting—is drowned out completely by the roaring in my ears.

But I still hear him calling after me.

“Madison! Just hold on a minute!
Madison!
”

I stumble down the driveway. I just make it to the end when he runs past and stops in front of me, blocking my path. The buttons on his shirt are askew, and his jeans aren’t buttoned up. Raindrops land on him and trickle down his face.

“Madison … Please, I can explain. Just give me a minute, Mainstream, please. I swear, it’s not what it looks like …”

All I can do is wonder how he thinks he’ll ever be able to talk his way out of this.

I feel numb. Numb, and kind of sick. But mostly numb. I’m dazed, as though I’m in a dream. My legs are moving, but the movement isn’t a conscious one, and my mind feels detached from my body. I’m moving—but I have no idea where I’m going.

Away. Just get out of here
.

I can’t call Mom; she’ll freak out. I can’t call Dad—he’ll tell Mom.

So my legs, despite feeling stiff and leaden, keep moving.

My knees buckle as I walk, though, and my feet wobble with every step I take. It’s the heels, I realize; so I take off my shoes and carry them instead. The rough sidewalk hurts, but at least I can walk now.

Oh, and it’s raining.

Not even a drizzle, or a shower. Nope. Instead, it’s a torrential downpour, and the raindrops ricochet off the sidewalk like bullets and blur the streetlights so that amber smudges light my way.

I’m soaked to the bone, but too numb to really care about something that right now seems such an insignificant fact.

Madison … Please, I can explain. Just give me a minute, Mainstream, please. I swear, it’s not what it looks like …

Bryce’s words fill my head and I can’t get rid of them.
It’s not what it looks like
. Ha. I wonder what he’d have said if I’d given him time to explain himself.
It’s not what it looks like …
What a load of complete and utter
bull
.

And suddenly I want to laugh, because I’m such an idiot.

I don’t know where my legs are taking me until I’ve rung the doorbell.

As the ding-dong noise fades, I begin to ebb back to reality. My clothes are sticking to me, my hair is plastered to my forehead. And then I notice that my entire body is quivering—little spasms, from my cheeks to my fingers to my knees—and my feet are so cold and sore that I can barely even feel them anymore.

I can’t tell if the water running down my face is just the rain, or if I’m crying.

The door opens a crack; there’s a scuffling kind of noise, and a heavy panting, a bark, then—

“Gellman, sit!”

Dwight’s face and a shoulder appear in the space where he opened the door. The second his eyes light on me, they darken and he frowns. I begin to think that maybe this wasn’t such a good idea; that maybe I should’ve just called Mom and dealt with her freaking out. This guy hates me; I don’t know what I was doing coming here. I don’t need his pity; I don’t need an “I told you so”; I don’t—

I need a friend
.

He starts to say, “What the hell do you—” but then he seems to really see me, and notice the state I’m in, because he falls silent.

The next second he throws the door wide open and drags me inside. “Jesus, Madison, what were you thinking? Are you crazy? You could get hypothermia or something. Are you okay?”

I can hear a video game. Through the small open crack of the lounge door I stare at the flickering lights.

Dwight follows my gaze once he’s restrained the mass of shaggy blond fur that is Gellman from jumping on me. “The guys are over. Kind of like a nerds’ after-party.” There’s an emphasis on
nerds’
that sends a pang of guilt through my system. It hurts.

But it’s good—that I can at least feel guilty. Because it means that I’m not completely heartless, that there is something left of me.

“Madison.”

I drag my eyes back to his face. For the first time in a long while, he meets my gaze steadily. I blink. I can’t seem to do anything else. So I blink again.

“Madison,” he says again, and steps closer. He lowers his voice, sounding so soft and sad and worried. “Dice. What happened?”

And I say, “I’m dripping all over the welcome mat.”

Dwight takes me by the hand to pull me upstairs. He leads me into the bathroom and sets the shower on hot; the room turns steamy in a minute.

“There are clean towels right there,” he says, pointing to a rail near the door. “I’ll leave some clothes by the door for you. If you dump yours outside, I’ll toss them in the dryer.” His voice is still so soft. Like he really cares. Not like he hates my guts.

I nod in answer to him, because I don’t trust my voice right now. He closes the door behind him, and when I hear his footsteps disappear down the hallway, I peel off my clothes.
My limbs are reluctant to cooperate. It seems to take forever before I actually step into the shower.

And how long I stand in the shower is a mystery to me. My mind is chaos. Billions of thoughts rage through it, but not a single one of them is coherent. I want to shut them all out. It’s too loud.

The shower helps me feel a bit better physically. I ache, and my feet are killing me, but I’m no longer shaking and numb and I feel refreshed. I wrap the towel securely around me before poking my head out the door.

My sodden after-party outfit has been replaced by a red flannel shirt and a pair of grey sweatpants with a drawstring. I’m glad I had enough sense left to keep my underwear in here. I put it on the floor near the radiator, and it’s almost completely dry now.

I put the clothes on and leave my hair dripping slowly down the back of my neck. I check in the mirror to check that I’ve washed away all of my makeup and don’t look like some cousin of Frankenstein’s monster.

Only then do I venture out of the bathroom and cautiously make my way down the stairs. I’m glad Dwight’s house doesn’t have that giveaway creaking step.

Although it does have a giveaway barking dog.

Gellman pads over to me as I reach the bottom of the staircase. My knees click when I bend to scratch his ears. He looks up at me, tongue lolling out of the side of his mouth, fixing me with those gorgeous big black eyes, and almost managing to make me smile.

“Madison?”

I jump when Dwight says my name. Gellman turns his head too, and barks again. I stare at Dwight. I open my mouth to say something, but nothing comes out. I can’t find the right words. I don’t know what I can say. There’s so much I need to say.

He pulls the family room door closed a bit. Nodding upstairs, he says, “Come on.”

“But …” My throat hurts. My voice doesn’t sound like it belongs to me. “You can’t … Your friends …”

“They’ll understand. Come on.”

I cast another look at the flickering lights coming from the TV. I bet Andy and Carter are in there. Maybe a few other people Dwight hangs out with too. I don’t know. I don’t want to find out, either. I can’t deal with anybody else right now.

So I follow Dwight up the staircase once again.

When we get to his room, he snaps on the light and pushes the door closed, but doesn’t shut it completely. I stand there looking around.

It’s neater than I thought a teenage boy’s room would be, but messier than I’d have expected of Dwight. There are a couple of T-shirts and socks and boxes of video games strewn around the place, and there’s an open can of soda on the desk beside his computer. There’s a bookcase that’s overflowing with all kinds of books, and gadgets and gizmos—like a remote-controlled metal bug, and a model WWII Spitfire, and one of those Newton’s cradles—and a shelf with trophies, which I go and inspect.