Call It What You Want

by Brigid Kemmerer

  “Of course.” A pause. “I’m just surprised.”

  Me too. But I don’t say that.

  I told Owen that Connor isn’t the type to get physical, but I feel like he’d make an exception in my case.

  Mom is still hovering in the doorway. “You look upset.”

  I glance at her. “I’m okay.”

  “You haven’t mentioned how your meeting with the school psychologist went.”

  I turn away—but that leaves me looking back at myself in the mirror. That’s almost worse. My eyes are full of self-censure. “It was fine.”

  “I really appreciate you doing this, Rob. I know it will be difficult at first, but I think talking—”

  “Mom.”

  She raises her hands. “Sorry, sorry. But I do appreciate you keeping your word. You’ve been running every morning, you made an appointment—”

  “Mom.” I grab my keys and wallet from the top of my dresser before I can watch myself flinch. “I really need to go.”

  She doesn’t move from the doorway, though, so I need to stop in front of her.

  “You haven’t gone out on a Saturday since it happened,” she says. She straightens the collar of my shirt. “I don’t want to jinx it, but … I’m glad you’re getting back to your old self.”

  Since it happened. I hate how we always talk around everything. As if my father isn’t lying in bed in the room next door, staring at a darkened ceiling.

  As if going to a party means everything is back to the way it was.

  As if I’ll ever be my old self again.

  Do I even want to be?

  “We’ll get through this,” she says softly.

  Maybe we’re both deluded. I do know I can’t douse her hope any more effectively than I can my own, no matter how unrealistic it is.

  “I know,” I say more gently. “I really do need to go. I’m picking some people up.”

  “People?” Her eyebrows go up.

  Great. Now she sounds even more excited. “Just some friends from school. I won’t be too late.”

  “Am I a bad mother if I tell you to be as late as you want?”

  My steps almost falter. “You’re not a bad mother,” I call back.

  I’m a bad son.

  I can’t remember the last time I picked up girls for a party, but I’m having the most bizarre sense of déjà vu.

  Maegan told me to park on the street and text her when I got to her house. She and her sister must have been waiting by the door, because they come out immediately. It’s pitch-dark outside, but they’re both in skintight jeans and tops that catch a little sparkle from the distant streetlight. Samantha is practically skipping across the lawn in the heeled boots she’s wearing, while Maegan follows more sedately, her arms wrapped around her midsection.

  When they climb into the Jeep, cold air swirls in with them, carrying girlish scents of vanilla and oranges. I could close my eyes and imagine it’s a year ago. Connor in the back seat with Lexi, Callie up front with me. Connor would be half-lit already, because he really did have connections, while I usually stayed straight sober because I never wanted to disappoint my father.

  Samantha claps me on the shoulder from the back seat, and my brain returns to the present day. “Thanks for going,” she says, leaning forward to all but whisper it in my ear. Her blond hair is a cascade of curls falling over one shoulder, and dark red lipstick makes her look five years older than she is. Her eyes are dark-lined and heavy-lidded. Athlete Samantha is gone, leaving Bombshell Samantha in her place.

  Maegan climbs into the front seat beside me, her eyes trained on the windshield, a soft blush on her cheeks, though I can’t tell if that’s makeup or reserve. Her brown hair is curled as well, her eyes lined with green and gold. I don’t know her well enough to know if she goes out like this usually, or if Samantha got to her, but she never looks like this at school. A lace maroon top clings to her curves, with a silver necklace dropping a green pendant right at the start of her cleavage.

  Her hands rest on her thighs, picking at a flaw in the denim. She’s nervous.

  I think of the way she brushed her fingers over mine and want to do the same thing.

  “Hey,” she says shyly. Her eyes shift my way. “Thanks for driving.” A pause. “You could have backed out.”

  You’re kind. And honest. And thoughtful. She’s all those things. Not me.

  “He’s not backing out,” says Samantha. I cast my eyes at the rearview mirror. She’s applying lip gloss, using a little hand-held mirror.

  “You can,” Maegan says, a little more firmly. “If you want.” She hesitates, and her voice softens. “You don’t have to put yourself through hell because Sam wants to get out of the house.”

  My eyes flick down her form again, and the part of my brain that is very much not a gentleman wishes we were going somewhere more private—and leaving her sister here on the lawn.

  “Don’t let her fool you,” says Samantha. “She’s trying to back out.”

  That snaps my eyes back to Maegan’s face. “You don’t want to go?”

  “No one wants me there,” she says. Her cheeks redden, and she looks away from me. “I know a lot of people think I’m some kind of rebel, but I’m not—I’m not a party person.”

  “We don’t have to go. No one wants me there, either.”

  “If we keep sitting here, Mom is going to get suspicious,” says Samantha.

  I put the car into gear and roll away from the curb. I was jittery before, but now that’s doubled.

  “It’s a party,” says Samantha. “Not a funeral. Listen to some music, drink some beer—I guarantee that after an hour no one will even care who you are.”

  “More like thirty minutes,” I say under my breath.

  “Really?” Maegan murmurs at my side.

  I shrug and hit the turn signal as we roll to a stop at the end of her street. “Yeah.” The first hour, I’ll need to lay low if I don’t want to be fair game for Connor and the rest of his crowd. There’s no Mr. Kipple around to keep everyone in line at the Tunstall house. But after that first hour, everyone will be too drunk to care who shows up.

  “So let’s go,” says Samantha.

  I wait for Maegan to say a word of protest. I haven’t pulled away from the stop sign yet.

  I hold her eyes. She holds mine.

  She doesn’t say a word.

  I sigh. Off we go.

  Connor lives in a McMansion on the other side of Highland, a huge brick-front colonial with white pillars supporting the front roof. His yard is four acres of meticulous landscaping, complete with a long driveway, a four-car garage, and a swimming pool. Spotlights line the front of the house, tastefully aimed up at the brick, creating cones of light and darkness. Cars already line his driveway, but the last thing I want is to get trapped here, so we park on the road to walk up.

  Everyone at this party probably has Lexi’s credit card number.

  I doubt anyone needs it.

  The instant I have the thought, I regret it. When Owen gave Sharona Fains the forty dollars, I judged him for not knowing why she needed it, and here I’m doing the same thing, just in reverse.

  Samantha glances over her shoulder, because Maegan and I are ambling along like we’re heading to our execution. “Come on, guys. It’s freezing.”

  “Go ahead,” Maegan calls. “We’re coming.”

  Samantha turns and jogs across the lawn.

  “I don’t know why she wanted to come so badly,” Maegan says. “She’s been throwing up all day.”

  “I thought about doing the same thing.”

  Maegan catches my hand and draws me to a stop. “Should we wait for her in the car?”

  The words aren’t meant to be suggestive, but my brain hears it that way anyway. I have to force my gaze to stay north of her neck. “We can,” I say. “If you want.”

  “What do you want?” she says, then bites a shiver through her teeth.

  “I want to burn this house down.” I wish I had a
coat to offer her.

  She looks startled. “Do you really?”

  “Why? Want to help?”

  “Sure. Maybe I could one-up my reputation from cheating to arson.”

  Her voice is self-deprecating, and I frown. “Can I ask you something?”

  Her eyes meet mine. “Of course.”

  “Why did you do it at all?”

  Her eyes flare wide. “What are you talking about?”

  “You’re in a bunch of AP classes. You were shocked when I suggested splitting up the homework the other day. It’s not like you needed to cheat on the SATs. I mean … I don’t get it.”

  She swallows and looks away. “That’s the problem. I don’t know if I even get it.”

  “Someone said they had to scrap the scores of everyone in the room.”

  When she looks back at me, stars glitter in her eyes, and I realize it’s because tears sit there, waiting. “I know. They all had to take it again. I have to take it again. I just—Samantha had just gotten her big scholarship. Everyone was celebrating. There was … there was so much pressure. For once, I wanted to be the one who succeeded. I wanted to be the one who came home with a big success that my parents were celebrating. When I think back on that day, it feels like a dream. I’d been up all night studying, and then they put me next to Randall Briggs. He already had a flipping fifteen hundred! I was so tired, and I needed a good score. I didn’t mean to screw it up for everyone else. I didn’t.”

  “Oh, Maegan.” I don’t even know how to finish that.

  “Please don’t. Please don’t pity me. I don’t deserve it. I know what I did was wrong.”

  I stare down at her and let out a breath. “I think you should stop punishing yourself.”

  “You should stop punishing yourself,” she says. “You’re the one who didn’t do anything wrong. These were your friends. Your father—what you went through …” She takes a breath. “They shouldn’t have turned their backs on you.”

  Maegan wouldn’t have turned her back on me. I’m sure of it. “They all think I’m a criminal.”

  “Well, they all think I’m a cheater.”

  “You’re not a cheater.”

  “Yeah, Rob. I was. Once.”

  “One mistake doesn’t define you.”

  She sniffs and carefully swipes at her eyes. “You’re going to wreck all of Sam’s handiwork.”

  That makes me smile. I want to touch her so badly that my hand aches, but I still can’t tell if she feels the same way or if she’s saying these things out of kindness.

  “You look very pretty,” I say instead.

  That blush blooms on her cheeks again. “Thanks. You look …” Her blush deepens. “Never mind.”

  “Oh, now you need to tell me.”

  She sobers. “I almost said you look like the old Rob Lachlan.”

  That makes me wonder what the new Rob Lachlan looks like. “I wish I felt like him.”

  Feet swish through the grass nearby, undercutting a low murmur of conversation. A guy and a girl stride across the yard behind Maegan. The guy is carrying two six-packs of something in a red carton. He glances at us dismissively—just another couple having a discussion or an argument or whatever—but does a double take when his eyes land on my face.

  “Rob. Wow.” It’s Zach Poco. I should have brought Owen.

  My defenses snap into place like a brick wall assembling in a cartoon. I can almost hear the stones clinking together. “Hey,” I say.

  I barely recognize the girl he’s with, but her eyes widen, then go from me to Maegan and back.

  For a breath of time, I wonder if Zach is going to cop an attitude like Connor.

  But then he shifts a six-pack under the opposite arm and extends a hand. “Hey, man. Haven’t seen you in a while.”

  We literally go to the same school and cross paths at least once a day, but okay. I can play this game because it’s preferable to the alternative. I grasp his hand and do the awkward pull that’s not really a handshake and not really a hug.

  “You know Lily?” he says, nodding to the girl with him.

  “No. Hi,” I say. “This is Maegan.”

  “Hey,” says Zach. “You guys going in?”

  I look at Maegan. “You ready?”

  Her eyes say she’s ready to bolt. But there must be some of her sister in her, because instead of dragging me to the car, she straightens and says, “Sure. Let’s go.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  Maegan

  Rob leads me through the front door into a wall of darkness and sound and writhing bodies. The smell of beer hangs in the air, thick and almost sickly sweet. None of the house lights are on in the main foyer or the large room beyond, but light shines from a side hallway, offering enough illumination so we don’t run into anyone. The music is all-encompassing, bass pulsing the floor. The house is massive, but I can’t get a handle on the layout in the dark. People are everywhere, but I barely recognize half of them. Shadow cloaks every face, and I’m pretty sure we’ve already lost the couple Rob knew from the front lawn.

  A few people glance our way as we move through the foyer, but no one stops us, and no one says anything. Eyes flick over my face and either lose interest or skip down my body.

  I draw closer to Rob, tense. I’m not sure what I expect to happen. Armed guards with barely restrained Dobermans? No one is paying any attention to us.

  We make it to the edge of the large room at the back. The family room? Living room? I can’t tell, and in a house this big, it might be called something pretentious, like a great room. Windows take up most of the back wall, beyond which I can see a sprawling patio and a covered pool, all lined with flaming tiki torches. A few classmates are braving the cold to chat on the patio, but in here, everyone is dancing.

  Then I spot Samantha, in the center of the crowd, because of course. She’s dancing with two boys, all but pressed between them. Her eyes are closed, and she’s lost to the beat and the movement. I want to roll my eyes, but at the same time, I’m glad we came. Maybe she really did need this.

  Rob leans down close to speak over the music. He’s never been this close to me before, and he smells like spices and warmth and every dirty thought I’ve ever had.

  Then I realize he’s asked, “Do you want anything?” and he’s waiting for an answer.

  I want you to keep breathing against my neck like that.

  “No,” I say quickly. “I’m fine.”

  “You sure?” His hand finds my waist, and I’m sure it’s to keep me from moving away, but my world narrows down to the feeling of his palm against the half inch of skin between my shirt and jeans. “I never drink,” he says. “So you can. If you want. I’ll be okay to drive later.”

  I never drink either, but I’m so keyed up about his hand and his breath and the heady scent of his neck that I’m nodding without thinking about it.

  “Okay,” he says. “I’ll be right back.” He vanishes, leaving me there against the wall, bodies shifting all around me.

  I’m about ready to melt into the floor. This is ridiculous.

  Samantha appears in front of me. There’s a red cup in her hand. “Where did Rob go?” She sounds both curious and demanding.

  “To get me something to drink.” I home in on the plastic cup she’s holding, and realize her breath is too sweet. “You’re drinking?”

  “Oh stop. It’s Coke. I need something to keep me from puking.”

  A boy shifts through the crowd to stop beside us. He’s tall with light hair and he’s vaguely familiar, but I can’t place him. “Hey, Samantha,” he calls over the music. “I didn’t expect to see you here.”

  She blinks at him. “Um. Hi.”

  “Craig.” He hesitates, and any confidence slides out of his expression. “Ah … from Taco Taco.”

  “Hi, Craig,” I say.

  He gives me a kind smile. “Hi.” He looks back at my sister and runs a hand through his hair. “Do you … ah, would you like to dance?”

  “M
aybe a little later?” Sam hooks her arm through mine. “I was going to dance with my sister.”

  She hauls me into the throng of dancing people.

  I’m not a great dancer, but I can hold my own. “You’re kind of rude to him,” I say to her.

  “He’s too nice, Megs.”

  “Sure, that’s what you’ve got too many of.” I roll my eyes. “Nice boys.”

  “What?” she calls over the music.

  “Never mind.” We move to the beat, and it starts to pull some of the tension out of my body. No one knows me here. No one cares who I am.

  They know who Rob is, though.

  The instant I have the thought, the worry comes roaring back. He went alone to get me a drink. I shouldn’t have let him go by himself.

  But then Samantha smiles and takes me by the shoulders and turns me around. Rob is pushing through the dancers, and I all but end up walking straight into him. I have to put a hand on his chest to steady myself.

  Hi, Rob.

  I haven’t had a sip, but I feel like I’m already drunk.

  He presses a closed can of ice-cold beer into my free hand. He leans down to talk. “Is this okay?”

  “Yeah. Of course.” I don’t really want it, but I also don’t want to reject it after he went to get it for me.

  “I was going to open it for you, but I know girls are sometimes particular about that.”

  He smells so good that I can barely register what he’s saying. “Oh. Yeah. Thanks.” I quickly snap the top and take a deep swallow. I’m already warm from dancing, and the beer goes down easily. Too easily.

  Rob’s eyebrows go up.

  Samantha whoops from behind me, but then reaches out to take it from me. “You need to be hot and dancing,” she calls, then starts dancing away, taking the beer with her. “Not unconscious on the floor.”

  Now I’m blushing. I hope he can’t tell.

  Rob moves closer. We’re kind of moving to the music, but not dancing. Not touching. He leans in. “It’s nice that Sam looks out for you.”