My buzz fades a degree. “That’s not true.”
“I can spot ’em a mile away.” Brad spits when he talks. I never noticed that before. All this liquor must have elevated me to a heightened state of awareness. “You can tell ’em by their shoes. Nuns, too,” he says as an afterthought.
A weird, tiny silence. Suddenly I’m glad I shelled out beaucoup bucks for my gorgeous, ultra-feminine footwear. Glad I left my ancient Frye boots at home.
Susan kicks Brad’s shin. “Shut up, retard.” She aims a lighter kick at her brother, who’s busy nuzzling my neck. “Hey, Dev? Since Mom and Dad’ll be gone all weekend, let’s all go back to our place.” Leaning back into Jake, she notices my surreptitious glance at Devon’s watch. “What’s the matter, Shawna? Don’t tell me you have a curfew.”
“C’mon, babe,” Devon whispers. I shiver as his lips move urgently toward my collarbone. “It’s early yet.”
I think for a moment, feeling pressured, but can’t come up with a good reason not to go to the Connollys’. So I nod, and settle back to enjoy Devon’s kisses.
37
“We’re done with you.” Jake thrusts bills at the sullen driver. As Susan, Paige, and I start down the walk, he pulls the other guys aside. “Wait, I need you to come with me to, um, pick up the stuff.”
“What stuff?” I yelp, nearly losing my spiky footing.
Devon says hastily, “It’s a surprise. We’ll be right back,” and sprints off with the others toward Jake’s Mustang.
Outraged, I lag back. “I am so not doing any drugs tonight.”
Paige titters. “Who said anything about drugs?”
I deliver her a duh look as Susan pushes me toward the door. “Get real. Jake’s brother works in a bar and he promised us a keg. God, what a party pooper you turned out to be.”
Smarting, I shake her off, then follow them inside. Up in Susan’s room, Paige halts. “Oh, no. I don’t feel so good.” She flees to the adjoining bathroom and slams the door. I hear dainty retching, followed by multiple flushes.
Susan rolls her eyes. “I knew she’d do that. She does it every time.”
With an exaggerated sigh, she draws a slender book out of her bookcase. She holds it up, flashing a familiar cover:
SUSIE AND SHAWNA AND THE HALLOWEEN HORROR
by Deborah Connolly
Photographs by Sonia Sorenson
“Remember,” she says dreamily, stroking the title, “when we used to be best friends? What the hell happened, Shawna?”
Aside from the fact that she called me a lesbian? That she chose Paige over me? That she, inexplicably, turned into a self-centered bitch?
So why do I still miss her?
Susan sets the book down on the bedspread. “It’s so weird. I mean, we were, like, famous. If our moms had stayed friends, they could’ve written a thousand more books.” She giggles. “Can you picture it? Susie and Shawna at the Snow Ball. Susie and Shawna Get Blitzed in a Limo. Susie and Shawna—”
I marvel that Susan, like me, makes up these silly titles, too. “Why do you get top billing?”
“Well, my mom wrote the book.”
“There wouldn’t be a book if my mom hadn’t taken the pictures.”
“Who cares? It’s like, so over.”
“I do,” I say softly.
Paige pokes her blotchy face out of the bathroom, and moans, “Oh-h, God. I’m soooo sick. Can I, like, just take a nap?”
She stumbles toward the bed, but Susan whirls her back around. “Oh, no, no, no. You’re not gonna puke on my bed again.” With an apologetic glance, she propels Paige toward the door. “Let’s go downstairs and find some safe little hole for you. God, I wish those guys’d get back!”
I wave them off, smiling at Paige’s twisted feet and flailing arms. Poor Paige. Looks like the winged monkey’s grounded for the rest of the night.
While I freshen up in Susan’s bathroom, I hear the guys come back. Music drifts up from downstairs, and I hear Susan and Jake laughing about something, and then—
“Hey.”
I whirl around as Devon steps close to the bathroom door. “You scared me.” My heart whaps the back of my throat like hummingbird wings.
“Sorry.”
“So, did you guys get a keg?”
“Yep. Brad and Jake are cracking it open even as we speak.” He smiles, moves closer, and pulls me back into the bedroom. Cupping the back of my head, he breathes into my ear, “So, you wanna see my room next?”
My brain spins with possibilities as his mouth descends over mine, his tongue thrusting dangerously close to my windpipe. One hand traces my neck, my shoulder, the top of my breast. The other one presses insistently at the small of my back.
“Wait!” I attempt to say around a mouthful of tongue.
Okay, it’s not smart to speak with someone’s tongue in your mouth, on the off chance you might bite off a significant chunk. Luckily, this doesn’t happen; Devon retracts his tongue at the same time he pulls down the top of my dress. Instantly I curse myself for not springing for that strapless bra.
Speechless, yet oddly detached, I watch him stare at my breasts. Only LeeLee, my gym class, and my female pediatrician have ever seen these in all their so-called glory.
“Wow, Gallagher. You, you, you’re really . . .”
Small? I think bleakly.
“Pretty,” he finishes. I think he has trouble believing it himself.
I melt back to life by tiny degrees. “Shawna.”
“Huh?”
“My name is Shawna.”
“Yeah, I know . . . Shawna.”
He kisses me again, harder than ever, grasping my breasts like he’s weighing them before purchase. He flops me onto Susan’s bed and tugs my dress down farther, the weight of his body crushing me into his sister’s mattress. For a while I kiss him back, trying to enjoy it, because isn’t this what I’d wanted? How I’d secretly hoped the evening to end?
But there’s nothing to enjoy.
Yes, it’s exciting. Thrilling, too, in a dangerous way. I’ve imagined this moment a thousand times, so . . . why, why am I not having a good time?
Why do I want to jump up, all of a sudden, and run like hell?
“Susan—,” I begin helplessly, twisting my face toward the door.
“It’s okay,” he whispers. “She’s knows I’m here. She won’t come in.”
“But—”
But nothing. Devon tries to finagle a knee between my legs. My tight skirt, luckily, stops him at the gate. That’s when I decide that enough is enough, that sex with Devon Connolly is no longer a part of tonight’s plan. “Stop.”
“What?”
“Just stop it, okay?”
Devon stops. And waits. And keeps his hands on my breasts in case I change my mind.
Breathing hard, I say it out loud. “I don’t think I want to do this.”
“You’re kidding. Why not?”
“. . . I guess I’m not ready?”
“What do you mean, not ready? I have a condom, I swear. I’d never do it without.”
“It’s not that. I’m just not ready,” I repeat helplessly.
“When? When will you be ready?”
“I don’t know, but . . .” I sigh. “It’s not gonna be tonight.”
I dreamed of this moment, of having somebody want me like this. But now I can’t do it, because I don’t want him. I feel nothing. Just sweaty, and yes, scared.
Devon rolls off me. His fly gapes open. I have to force myself not to look. “I knew it.”
“Knew what?”
“That you weren’t gonna let me.”
“Well, that’s funny. I didn’t know it myself till, like, one second ago.”
Devon gazes down longingly at my breasts. “Man, what a waste.”
I yank the top of my dress up, annoyance blossoming into full-blown anger. “Trust me, Devon. They’ll never go to waste.”
“Ri-ight. I bet you and that girlfriend of yours put them to very good use.�
�� He smiles as I freeze. “Oh, don’t look so shocked. I mean, it’s no secret about your mom, so, whatever.”
“What,” I whisper, “are you talking about?”
“You and that Velez chick? Feeling each other up at the mall? Everybody knows how you two hang all over each other.”
“You’re crazy!”
“Then prove me wrong.” He smiles that slow sexy smile that used to melt my insides. “Take your clothes off. You want to, right?”
Oh. My. God.
“Not with you,” I squeak out. “Not if you put a gun to my head.”
Unceremoniously, he stuffs his package back into his perfectly creased pants. “Huh, Sue was right about you. You’re a lez. Like your mom.”
Out he charges, leaving me rigid and stunned, with what feels like a burning rash creeping from my chest to my face. I snatch up my coat and my purse with shaky hands, and stumble downstairs. Halfway there, I catch a pointy heel on the carpet and almost land on my head. Gritting my teeth, I hop the rest of the way down, then halt awkwardly at the bottom as fire shoots through my left ankle.
I see Paige sprawled across a chair, bare legs dangling limply over the arm. Susan, Jake, and Brad, lined up elbow to elbow on the sofa, stare at me with three pairs of knowing eyes. Devon’s nowhere in sight. I’m not even sure he came downstairs.
Susan jumps up, a flurry of cotton candy pink. “Omigod, what? What happened?”
If this were anyone but Susan, I’d suspect they really cared.
I kick open the front door with my one good foot—“Ask your brother!”—and lunge into the cold night. Dark houses pass in a hazy blur as I limp home on my throbbing ankle.
Why did he have to ruin it?
Why did I have to ruin it? Of course he thought I’d have sex with him. I’ve been lusting over him for weeks. So why didn’t I just do it?
I don’t know, I don’t know. Because he turned me off?
How could Devon Connolly turn me off?
Dad, buried in his study, doesn’t hear me come in. Charles, never a barker, doesn’t give me away. I let him out quietly, then wipe his paws and carry him upstairs, where I shed dress number twenty and leave it in an obnoxious blue pile. Then I roll up under the covers and cry into Charles’s fur.
Tonight, Pathetic Shawna wins.
38
“Get up!”
I scream into the pillow when LeeLee rips off my comforter. It’s after three p.m. and my room smells like dog pee. Poor Charles.
“I’ve been calling you all day! Are you hungover?” She bounces onto the bed. “Well, how’d it go? Dígame!”
“It was . . .” A nightmare. “It was . . .” Worse than a nightmare. Because it really happened.
“What?”
I hug my sheet to my chin. “You were right. I should’ve stayed home.”
“Oh, God. They didn’t do the pig blood thing, did they?”
“No!” I shriek.
“Well, what happened?”
“He just wanted to have sex. He like, expected it.” I rub my eyes hard. My fingertips come away caked with mascara and sleep guck.
“And you’re surprised because . . . ?” When I fling an arm over my forehead, LeeLee asks in alarm, “You, um, didn’t do it, did you?”
“No, LeeLee. I didn’t do it.”
“Why not?” When I snort, she adds, “You’re hot for him, right? I thought you wanted to have sex with him.”
“I did. I mean, I thought I did. But when he . . .” I try to remember how I felt last night when Devon tried to shove his knee between my legs. “Well, when he tried it, it was . . . I don’t know. Gross or something.”
“Gross?”
“No, gross is the wrong word. I can’t explain it. I just wanted him off of me. So of course now he thinks I’m a lesbian, right? Because what other reason could I have not to have sex with him?”
LeeLee blinks. “He said that?”
“Yes, and that’s not all. You’re gay, too, didn’t you know? Yep. We’re a couple.”
“Oh, c’mon. He just wanted to piss you off.”
“He was serious,” I say miserably. “They all think we’re gay.”
“Who ‘all’—Paige and Susan? Who cares what those skanks think?”
“Maybe you don’t. But I do not want to finish up high school with everyone thinking I’m gay.”
“Why?” she asks evenly. “Because it’s not true?”
“Yes! Because it’s—not—true.”
“So if it were true, would that make it any better?”
“Stop it, LeeLee. Stop analyzing everything. I’m not a dyke and neither are you. So what’s the point in discussing ifs?”
“You sure like to throw that word around lately,” she notes after a moment.
“Sorry you’re offended by my politically incorrect choice of words,” I snap back. “But I’m having a meltdown here, okay?”
LeeLee makes a face and pats my knee. “Look, why don’t you get up and, ya know, break down and wash your face? We can go to the movies or something. My treat for a change.”
“No. I just want to stay here and . ..” Sigh. Be depressed.
“Okay. Well . . . sorry the ball was such a bust.” She chortles at that. “Busted ball! Get it?”
I get it. “Watch the puddle,” I say loudly as she almost plants a foot into Charles’s mistake. LeeLee steers around it and dashes off with a wave.
Charles flaps his tail, his expression a mix of hope and resentment as I haul myself out of bed. I scrub up the mess off the rug and the mess off my face and lug him downstairs to let him out for the first time in sixteen hours.
39
Monday morning, I dread school. Happily, it’s a short week because Thanksgiving is Thursday.
Devon smirks as I slip into A&P five minutes late. Head down, I slide into my seat. A folded piece of paper waits on my table.
“What’s this?” I ask Mary Therese Montgomery, who’s scouring her tape recorder buttons with a toothbrush.
She shrugs. “It was there when I got here.”
As Mr. Twohig yanks down the projector screen, I unfold the paper. A crude drawing of a naked female, a red arrow pointed to her crotch. The printed caption: EAT ME, BABY.
Swallowing the not-so-tasty surge of my thankfully light breakfast, I crumple the paper and turn around. Devon, mouth twitching, stares at Mr. Twohig with convincing fascination. I thrust the note into my bookbag, and then, behind my back, I flip Devon the finger. If anyone notices, I’ll plead insanity. Poor Shawna Gallagher, insane with grief over her dead lesbian mother, has undoubtedly lost her last grip on reality.
“Right.” Devon raps my hand, with one of my own pencils, no doubt. “You had your chance.”
Forget my perfect GPA. Forget that I aced my SATs. Forget the fact that with “MD” after my name I’ll be raking in seven figures if I join Dad’s practice.
The question is, how smart can I be for crushing on the demented twin brother of the demented Susan Connolly? Same genetic makeup. Same poisonous blood coursing through their veins.
I remember his words: Sue’s right about you. You’re a lez. Like your mom.
Suddenly I hate Susan Connolly more than I’ll ever hate Devon, no matter what he does to me, no matter what he says. How humiliating to wait for three long years, secretly hoping to become friends with her again.
Three. Stupid. Utterly Wasted Years.
40
A few days into December, as I’m IM’ing LeeLee, Mel, and Danielle all at the same time, Arye’s screen name magically reappears. Wow, he unblocked me.
Sorry for what I wrote a while back. I was bummed.
Can IMs be traced by nosy parents? My fingers falter as I write: No biggie. Did you move yet?
Him: Yeah.
He types his great-aunt Rina’s address in Cleveland Heights. I jot it down absently. It’s only a couple miles away. I could walk there if I wanted to, not that I’d want to.
Him: I’m at Heights High now.
Me: Do you like it?
Him: Duh. What do you THINK? My whole senior year is F***** up!
Sensing he’s about to go off on me again, I type in my cell phone number: Call me sometime, but DO NOT CALL MY HOUSE EVER! Unless, I think, you’re in the mood for another funeral.
Him: OK.
A short lag. I can’t think of anything intelligent to say because I’m distracted by the relentless pinging of my three other IMs.
Him: Mom wants to know if you can come for dinner tomorrow.
Dinner? With Fran? Tomorrow?
Me, obviously not thinking straight: What time?
Him: Five?
My fingers poise an inch above the keys. Dad’ll never let me. How do I get out of it? Admit my father’s a tyrant and beg for understanding?
Do I want to go?
Weirdly enough, I do. I’d like to see Schmule again, at least.
Me, rapidly, before I can change my mind: OK. Thanks.
Meantime, LeeLee, puzzled by my silence, invites me into a private room with Mel and Danielle. I plead exhaustion and sign off.
I need to think about this.
41
So, do I want to see Fran?
Probably not.
Do I want to see Arye?
I’m not sure.
But then I think again about Schmule, and the decision is made.
After school I shower, change into a nice dress, and toss a batch of cookies into the oven. Nonny’s rule: never go anywhere emptyhanded. Dad pops in, home early for once—just my luck—and sniffs the air. “Who’s baking cookies?”
“Me.”
“What’s the occasion?” He surveys the so-not-my-usual-after-school attire, then ambles into the den to mix a martini. I follow slowly. “Are you going out tonight?”
“Actually, yes.”
“Where?”
My brain revs into turbo. I could lie and say I’m headed over to LeeLee’s. But Dad’s penetrating expression stops me. I can’t lie to my dad.
Grow up, dammit. You’re seventeen years old!
Wow, Mom. I’m surprised you remember.
“Fran’s,” I say finally. “She invited me to dinner.”
Say the Word Page 9
