"What?" "Yes! You can come back and live with me!" she suggested, grabbing my hand and shaking it on the table. "Omigod! It'll be so much fun! Like it should have been!" Damn, she was sweet. She was so sweet she was spewing gumdrops. "I don't know. ..." "Come on! I'm sick of my single anyway," she said, raising her eyebrows. "Let's be roommates again." I took a deep breath and considered. Considered how simple that would be. Maybe if I did go back, I could just fly under the radar. Do my work. Be a student. Maybe there would be no more fabulous balls and flowing champagne. No more expensive gifts and spa treatments. Maybe when I graduated, I wouldn't have the support of the Billings Girls and all their connections behind me. But at least there would be no drama. No drama. I liked the sound of that. "Maybe," I said finally, not wanting to get her hopes up too high. "Yes! This is going to be so totally beyond amazing!" Constance jumped out of her seat and hugged me across the table. I rolled my eyes but smiled. I'd forgotten who I was talking to. With Constance, she'd get her hopes up as high as she wanted, thank you very much.
* * *
It was a beautiful day. Warm for December. I didn't even need a hat as I stood on the circle in front of Bradwell, waiting for my father to arrive. The campus was silent, everyone sequestered in their classrooms, taking their exams. All of them together, struggling through, heading for the finish line and their fabulous vacations. Me out here alone, waiting for the station wagon, the long ride home.
I turned and looked up at the buildings around the circle. They seemed smaller than before. Maybe because I knew what went on inside those walls now. Knew it wasn't all honor and truth and excellence. It was sad, really, how much my view of this place had changed. I remembered that first day when we had pulled up here. Remembered how sophisticated and intelligent everyone had looked. How privileged I'd felt just to be here. I remembered meeting Constance and how I'd thought we could never be friends--that her incessant talking would drive me insane. How wrong I had been about her. I remembered Thomas, his knowing eyes, his self- assuredness, his sexy smile. And seeing the girls through the window at Bradwell. Noelle. Ariana. Kiran. Taylor. How exotic they had seemed then.
A tear slipped down my cheek and I quickly wiped it away.I heard the chug of my father's car as it turned up the hill down below. And suddenly I couldn't wait to get out of here. I picked up my backpack and shouldered it. That was when I heard the footsteps pounding behind me. I turned around and Josh grabbed me up in his arms. "I caught you. Thank God," he said, squeezing me hard. Squeezing out a few extra tears. I was relieved and anguished all at once. Wanted him to keep on holding me forever and also to just let me go. "Josh, I. . . your test--"
"Who cares? Are you okay? I heard you were leaving and I--are you okay?" He was grasping me all over. My shoulders, then my elbows, then my hips. Like he was checking to see if any parts of me were broken. His hands landed, finally, on my cheeks, cupping my face. His face was ruddy from the run, his blue eyes bright. His curly blond hair danced in the breeze. "Are you okay?" he repeated. "I'm fine," I told him, my heart bursting. "I'm totally fine." "I've been trying to call you over and over and over, but--" "My phone was off," I said. "Why?" "I don't know." I didn't anymore. That decision made zero sense to me now. "I just thought if you didn't call then I'd . . . I'm sorry. It's just been--"
"I know. I'm sorry." He held me close and then let me go and looked at me again. "You don't have to talk about it if you don't want to," he said. I exhaled. "Thanks. I can't. Not. . . yet." "I'm glad I got here in time," he said. "I had to say goodbye to you." I held his hand and listened to the approach of my father's car. I couldn't speak. Had no idea what to say. "Reed, I'm so sorry for what happened at the party. I was still kind of raw, you know? From everything that had happened. But I know I can't tell you what to do . . . who to hang out with." He squeezed my hand. "I just . . . didn't want you to leave without telling you that." The Subaru finally appeared at the top of the hill. My heart felt sick at the sight of it now. There was no time left. And so much to say.
"But maybe I can make it all up to you next semester," Josh said. I looked up at him. Looked him dead in the eye. After all that had happened, after all that had been revealed, there was no hint of I-told-you-so, not the tiniest glimmer of I-was-right in Josh's eyes. There was just concern and caring and something else even deeper than that. My heart pounded erratically. "But Josh... I'm not coming back." All the color seeped right out of him. "What?" The Subaru turned onto the circle. No time. No time. "I can't come back here. I can't. It's all wrong," I railed, desperation welling inside of me. "It's just too much. I can't . . . I can't. . . ." Josh grabbed me and hugged me. "Don't say that," he said into my ear. "Do not say that. You don't have to decide anything right now. Go home. Think about it over break. Just don't--"
I pulled away from him. It was the hardest thing I'd ever done in my life. "I've already made my decision. I'm sorry." "But Reed, I lo--" "Don't!" I blurted. My heart was in my throat. The last guy who'd said that to me had gotten killed for it. "Just don't." Josh stared at me. The hurt and betrayal in his eyes were almost more than I could take. My father stopped the car with a squeal of the brakes. God love him, he didn't get right out.
"This is goodbye," I said. Then I leaned in and kissed him firmly on the lips. Tears leaked out the corners of my eyes as my heart broke down the middle. I turned around and grabbed my laundry bag. My father took that as his cue. He got out, came around the car, and hugged me. The smell of my dad, the
feel of him, almost sent me over the edge. The last time I'd seen my dad was the day he'd dropped me off when every single thing had been different. The sob was right there at the back of my mouth, but I held it.
"Hey, kiddo," my father said, touching my face with his glove. "You okay?" He looked over at Josh, as if wondering if he'd have to kick some ass. "=I'm fine," I replied. "Let's just go." Without another word, he threw all my stuff in the car and slammed the door. I looked out the window at Josh. He hadn't moved an inch. He just stood there, staring at me, his eyes swimming, his jaw clenched. I touched the window with my fingertips. Still, he didn't move.The car lurched forward and then pulled away. I looked back once and instantly regretted it. Josh stood there, alone, with those imposing buildings rising up behind him. He loved me. And I was never going to see him again. This was the last image I would have of him, burned into my brain.
I turned around and faced forward. As the car dipped down the hill, I fought the urge to look back again, to see Easton for one last time. I didn't need to see it. It didn't matter. It was over. This chapter of my life was closed Christmas Day. I sat on the curb in front of Wendy's, watching my brother and his friends pop lame-ass tricks on their skateboards in the parking lot. Jen O'Connell and Melissa Pilotowski smoked cigarettes and attempted to peel the numbers off the drive-through menu with a plastic knife they'd found in the bushes. Overhead, the sky was gray, but there was no snow on the ground, no snow in the forecast. Nothing to soften the square blandness of this crusty town. I took a deep breath and looked toward the town center, at the decorations I'd so looked forward to seeing. Their lights were extinguished now, being that it was daylight. The cheap, plastic- covered wires, the tinsel... it all just looked depressing now. A white, mud-splashed Croton police car turned into the parking lot. One whoop of the siren. The window rolled down. It was John Foley. He'd graduated from Croton High two years ago, second to last in his class. Now he was one of Croton's finest.
"All right, kids. Let's move it along," he said. "You got it, Johnny Fo!" my brother said, lining up for another rail slide. "I mean now, Brennan," John said. "Not after you break your neck.""Oh, you mean now. Like now now?" Scott said, earning some laughter from his boys. "Sorry. I misunderstood." Then he did the slide anyway, dropped down in front of me, and laughed. "Come on, loser. Let's go wake up Mom and force-feed her some Yuletide ham steak."
Yes. This was my life. I let Scott yank me to my feet by my wrist, then waved goodbye to the others before we headed for home. Adam Robinson, my ex- boyfriend, and Larry Shale fell into step with us. They lived on the next block. "So, what're you guys doing tomorrow?" Adam asked. "Wanna go to the mall?" Right. The mall on the day after Christmas to fight all the bargain shoppers. So what I wanted to do. "Reed?" he asked hopefully.
I was saved from answering by the trill of my cell phone. The one thing Noelle had given me that I had not trashed or stashed. The caller I.D. read RESTRICTED number. Color me intrigued. "Sorry. I have to take this," I said. "Oh, yeah. She's very important now," Scott joked. I stopped and waited for them to get ahead of me, then answered the phone. "Hello?" "Hey, Glass-licker." My heart thumped extra hard. "Noelle." "Got it in one. I always knew you were smart."
My mouth hung open. John Foley rolled by ever so slowly in his black-and-white car, eyeing me like he thought I might suddenly start shooting up the Wal-Mart. I started walking again and he zoomed off.
"What's . . . what's up?" I asked, because I couldn't choose just one of the thousands of questions crowding my mind. "What's up is I hear you're not going back to Easton," she said. My grip on the phone tightened so hard I thought it might shatter. "How did you hear that where you are? Where are you, by the way? " "They decided I was a flight risk, so I'm in what they call a juvenile rehabilitation center until my lawyer can figure out some kind of plea," Noelle said, sounding bored by it all. "They don't even have TiVo here." I laughed. Couldn't help it. This was all too bizarre.
"But enough about my lovely vacay. What are you thinking? Are you going to stay in Crass-ton and become a fry cook or something?" I stared at my feet as I walked. "There's no point in going back to Easton." "No point? No point in getting a world-class education that millions of kids across the country would kill for?" she asked. There was a pause. "Dear God, I think I'm turning into my mother." "It just doesn't feel right there," I said. "Oh, and it feels right there? Hanging out with the same lame- ass people in some parking lot somewhere?" Dear God. She really did know everything. "Reed, Easton is not the place you think it is," Noelle said. "It's not the place we made it for you."
The serious tone of her voice brought a lump to my throat. I tried hard to swallow it down. "You can still have all the things you went there for. An Ivy League education. A scholarship. A real life." I looked around at the Stop and Shop with the bird's nest built into the curve of the first S, the droppings splattered all over. I looked at the beat-up Ford in the parking lot with the orange FOR SALE sign in the window. I looked toward downtown and beyond, where Croton High sat like a giant, rotting gray mushroom atop a hill of brown grass. "You're better than that place you came from, Reed," Noelle said quietly in my ear. "Trust me on this. I know better when I see it."
There was a warmth growing inside my chest that surprised me. Up ahead, my brother and his friends turned the corner. They didn't look back. "Noelle, I appreciate what you're saying. I do. But--" "Don't let our mistakes screw up your life," Noelle said. I took a deep breath and blew it out. "And besides, if you don't go back there, that plastic robot Cheyenne is going to take over, and if that happens, Billings is going right downhill." I laughed. "Promise me you'll go back, Reed," Noelle said, her voice full. "I kept saying I was going to protect you, and I did a pretty heinous job of it. This is me trying to make up for that. Go back to Easton. You can have the life you've always wanted." I held my breath. Closed my eyes. Saw Billings House as it was the first time I walked through the doors. Saw Natasha and Rose and London and Vienna and Cheyenne. Saw Easton. Saw Constance. Saw Dash. Saw Josh. Josh. The warmth inside of me grew. When I saw these things, I saw home. When I opened my eyes, I saw Croton. I knew where I wanted to be. "Okay, Noelle," I said, smiling. "I'll go back." "Promise," she said. "I promise."