Cold Hard Truth

by Anne Greenwood Brown

  “I was going to go to your house, throw you over my shoulder, and bring you here in your raggedy SpongeBob pajama pants.”

  “You wouldn’t have dared.”

  “Oh, I would have dared.”

  He pulled Emmie closer, as if he couldn’t get close enough. She felt every hard line of him against the softness of her body.

  “I suppose it would be indecent to pick you up here,” he said. “You could wrap yourself around me like you did at the library. I can’t stop thinking about that.”

  “Probably not a smart idea. There’s not much keeping this dress up. Best not to get too jostled.”

  Max’s eyes glanced down to the top of her dress again. “Interesting.”

  Emmie pressed her face against his chest, and finally felt a wave of comfort come over her. The same one she’d felt when they’d sat together on the library steps. She could almost imagine their jigsaw snapping together. She trusted Max. She’d forgotten what it felt like to trust someone else.

  With Nick, vigilance was her constant emotion because it didn’t take much for Nick to overreact. Once, a convenience store clerk called her sweetheart, and Nick broke his nose.

  I don’t like other people dirtying up what’s mine.

  Nick, he didn’t touch me. He was only being nice.

  Nice? Are you saying you wanted that fucker to touch you?

  No! No.

  I didn’t think so. Nobody touches you, but me.

  Emmie could still feel the searing pain in her scalp when Nick had yanked her back by the hair. After that night, she was quiet. She tiptoed around Nick as if he were a sleeping jackal, but with Max…

  With Max, her brain was full of racket. Her heart and her stomach were in constant tango step, sometimes changing places and forgetting where they originally belonged. Strange that she was feeling weightless and floaty and thinking about their next kiss, especially since a minute ago her heart had been breaking with the weight of Max’s grief.

  She shoved her own happy feelings down out of respect for Jade and hoped Max was doing okay. Jade had to be hard to get over.

  Though Emmie hated to admit it, she’d gone online to check out Jade’s picture. There was the perfectly coiffed Facebook profile picture, and even one with her and Max. Jade was smiling at the camera, while Max’s head was turned, looking at her adoringly. That one had pinched a little because Emmie understood she and Jade couldn’t have been more different.

  In fact, Emmie understood that she was different than pretty much everything in Max’s world. Clearly she was the perfect distraction from his grief, from everything he didn’t want to think about. But was that it? Did she only serve a temporary purpose?

  “What are you thinking about?” Max asked. He stroked the back of her hair gently, as if he was afraid she might break in his arms.

  “Nothing,” Emmie said, turning her head away.

  “Liar,” Max said with a tone of amusement.

  “Fine,” Emmie said, looking up at him. “I was actually wondering if you were thinking about last year’s dance.” It was a risk, but she couldn’t help herself. She needed to know how he was doing. If he needed to get out of here, that was fine with her.

  Max released his hold on her just enough so he could lean back and look at her face. “Where is that coming from?”

  “I know you and Jade came together last year. It’s got to be tough being here without her.”

  “Emmie,” he said on an exhale. Then he looked away for a second. When Max turned back, his face was resolute. “Yes. It’s tough. It’s sad. It’s not fair. And it makes me mad. But this. Us.” He gestured with his index finger, back and forth between his and Emmie’s chests. “This is separate from any of that. Right now. With you. I’m happy. Please stop thinking about everything else.”

  Emmie exhaled. He was okay. Things were going to be okay. Max bent down and pressed his lips to Emmie’s neck, right below her ear. Then with one arm wrapped around her, he lifted her up just enough to kiss her mouth, but not so much that she had any fear of losing her dress.

  Her hands moved up his chest to the sides of his neck. Her fingers clenched in his hair, and she felt a sudden jolt of enthusiasm in her chest as he held her closer, deepening the kiss.

  “Get a room, Shepherd,” some guy yelled. Emmie pulled away from Max and looked to see who it was. It was his friend with the nose splint. It looked like it hurt when he laughed. Jordy and Brock shook their heads, saying, “Shut up, Chris.”

  When Emmie turned back toward Max, she was surprised to find him still staring into her face. It was if he’d never even heard his friend calling his name. Max’s hand moved from her waist to the nape of her neck, and his fingers brushed gently through her curls. “Have I ever told you how much I love your hair?”

  Emmie choked, hearing Nick in her head. You’d look way hotter if your hair was straight. “No. You haven’t told me that.”

  He bent his head and spoke into her ear so she could hear him better over the music. “It’s awesome. You would have made the perfect eighties rocker chick. Like that girl in that Whitesnake video.” He pulled back and looked at her with a wry smile. “Have you ever seen it?”

  “Are you serious?” she asked.

  “I can’t be the first person to tell you that.”

  At that point, Emmie’s jaw literally dropped. Then she shook her head. “Would you please stop talking now?”

  “Okay. But only because you know I’m right.”

  The song ended, and Emmie hated to pull away. Max must have felt the same way because he still held her, even through the long pause while the DJ figured out what song would keep everyone on the floor.

  Emmie didn’t know if Max was really doing as well as he said, or if he was just as good at hiding his wounds as she was with hers. Either way, she was glad to be whatever comfort she could be for him. She wondered if he knew that he gave her back just as much.

  “Bathroom break,” Lindsey said, grabbing Emmie’s elbow and pulling her out of Max’s arms.

  Emmie glanced back at him with alarm, and Max yelled, “Hey!”

  “Relax, Shepherd,” Quinn said. “We’ll have her back to you in no time.”

  Lindsey dragged Emmie off the dance floor, and Quinn trotted behind, saying, “We want the scoop now. The real scoop. Max won’t tell the guys anything.”

  As Emmie tripped along the hallway—dragged by Lindsey and followed closely by Quinn—she didn’t know if Max’s secrecy was a good thing or a bad thing. If he was as into her as she thought he was, as much as she was into him, he would have talked. Right? But then, how much had she really told Marissa?

  Quinn laughed and gave Emmie and Lindsey a friendly shove into the bathroom. The door swung shut behind them. Lindsey pulled lipstick out of her bag and leaned into the mirror.

  Emmie’s eyebrows shot up, and she looked at Lindsey while Quinn ran into one of the stalls. What was she supposed to say now?

  “First question. Was that the first time he’s kissed you?” Lindsey asked.

  “No?” Emmie said, as if her answer was a question. And there was a question in it. Presumably these girls had met Jade. How would they feel about Max kissing someone new? Would they think it was too soon?

  “Holy wow,” Quinn said from the stall.

  Lindsey squealed with excitement. “I knew it!”

  Emmie smiled despite herself.

  “Thank God, that’s all I can say about that,” Quinn called out. “Max has been making himself miserable for too long.”

  “Absolutely,” Lindsey added, dropping her lipstick into her bag. She turned around and checked the back of her dress in the full-length mirror.

  “That’s not fair,” Emmie said. “He’s been through hell.”

  “True,” Quinn added. She flushed, exited the stall, and went to the sink. “Doesn’t mean we’re not glad someone’s finally snapped him out of his funk.”

  “Maybe he’ll even remember to comb his hair one of these days,�
�� Lindsey said. She gave Emmie a little eyebrow raise that made her think Max’s hair was some kind of inside joke with his friends.

  “I thought he made it look like that on purpose,” Emmie said. She always liked his tousled, I-just-rolled-out-of-bed look.

  Quinn and Lindsey exchanged a look, then laughed.

  “I don’t know,” Quinn said. “Jade kept him pretty much on point. If she could see that mop now, she’d just…” Quinn’s voice trailed off, and no one wanted to finish that sentence.

  “Don’t listen to us,” Lindsey said. “It’s good that he’s with you. Don’t let anyone tell you different.”

  “Especially that stupid bastard himself,” Quinn added, opening the bathroom door and holding it open for the other two to exit.

  When they were halfway back to where they’d left the guys, Lindsey and Quinn ran off in one direction to catch up with their boyfriends. Emmie spotted Max in the opposite direction…talking to Katie.

  He looked a little distracted as he glanced around, but Katie claimed his focus by wrapping her hand around his upper arm. Emmie watched. Wondering. Should she walk up to him? Should she watch?

  Whatever Katie said made Max bow his head and laugh a little. Katie laughed too then, more animated than Max, even throwing her head back. Her hand was still on him.

  It was so painfully obvious that Katie was flirting, but what was more annoying to Emmie was that Max seemed oblivious. What was with that whole speech he gave her only a moment ago? But this. Us. This is separate from any of that. Right now. With you. I’m happy.

  Emmie was not going to let herself feel special one minute and pathetic the next. She was not going to be that girl. And she refused to believe that Max was that guy who would do anything to make her feel that way. Yes, he was obviously dense as a rock if he couldn’t see how hard-core Katie was in flirting with him, but she decided that was a consequence of having a Y chromosome. She couldn’t fault him for that.

  When the first few beats of Rihanna’s “Work” started playing, Emmie marched up to Max. She insinuated herself between him and Katie, whom she put her back to. Then she arched one eyebrow at Max. “Let’s dance,” she said.

  “Ah,” Max said, instantly focusing all his attention on Emmie. “I like it when you boss me around.”

  “Cut the shit, Shepherd,” she said, grabbing his tie and leading him like a dog back onto the dance floor. Internally, she sighed and thought, Quinn might be right. You may be a stupid bastard, but you’re my stupid bastard for now.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  MIXED MESSAGES

  When the dance wound down, Emmie caught up with Marissa, Sarah, and Olivia as they were heading to the parking lot. “Hey! You guys! Wait up!”

  “Hey, yourself,” Marissa said, looking down the hall behind Emmie. “Where’s Max?”

  Emmie couldn’t help but smile at hearing his name. “He went out to warm up his car, but I wanted to catch you guys. Elizabeth Wannamaker invited us over for an after-party, and I want you to come too.”

  Marissa and Olivia exchanged a look, then Marissa sighed dramatically. “I’m like the shell, being dragged around by the singing snail.”

  Emmie had about enough with the whole singing-snail thing. “Would you please stop it? If you don’t want to go to the party, we don’t have to. I don’t care either way.” Which was a bit of a lie. Emmie was riding a new emotional high. In fact, she couldn’t remember the last time she’d felt so happy. She wanted the evening to stretch as long as she could stretch it. But.

  If Marissa didn’t want to go, they wouldn’t go. They’d come together, and she wasn’t going to bail on her at the end.

  “We?” Marissa asked.

  “Yeah. In fact,” Emmie continued, “I’ll tell Max that we’re going to go get something to eat. I feel ready to kill whoever designed these shoes anyway. I wish it were summer so I could go barefoot.”

  “Are you kidding?” Sarah asked, eyebrows raised in near heartbreak. Sarah was always a little slow on the uptake, and her expression suggested she thought this was one of those times.

  “Yeah,” Marissa said, looking equally stricken. “Geez, Em. I was only joking. When else would I ever get invited to Elizabeth Wannamaker’s house?”

  Emmie blinked twice. “I thought…I mean…Since when would you care?”

  “Well,” Marissa said, a small smile spreading across her lips, “Max’s friend Chris is going to be there, right?”

  Emmie stepped to her left as a herd of couples pushed past them on their way to the exits. “Yes?” Emmie said, turning the answer into a question. Marissa liked Chris? Had they ever even spoken?

  “Plus, I have an idea for a research project,” Marissa said. When neither Sarah nor Emmie seemed to understand what she was saying, she added, “For my sociology project. I’ve finally come up with a topic. I got an idea listening to a couple of Elizabeth’s friends talking in the bathroom. I’m going to tally how many times one of the girls calls another girl a slut or a whore—”

  “Or a ratchet,” Olivia added helpfully.

  “And then I’m going to correlate the data to time and the amount of alcohol consumed.”

  “And this is going to prove what?” Emmie asked. Marissa was brilliant, but Emmie didn’t see any of this translating into academic credit.

  “Thesis: Misogyny is not a natural characteristic of the human condition but is promoted—even among women—by artif icial conditions.”

  “Crap on a cracker,” Sarah said. “You can turn anything into an A.”

  “What can I say?” Marissa gave a little shrug. “Desperation is the mother of invention.”

  “Yeah, I don’t think that’s how the saying goes,” Emmie said with a laugh.

  “Yet,” Marissa added.

  Elizabeth Wannamaker’s parties were legendary. Her parents were executives at a big downtown advertising firm, and they traveled a lot. That left Elizabeth with a three-story house plus a finished basement—so technically four levels of Pottery Barn catalog awesomeness. Emmie was afraid to touch anything.

  Even Elizabeth’s main-floor bathroom had a tiny chandelier and magazines that were apparently chosen because their covers color-coordinated with the paint and towels. If something in this place got broken, Emmie had to imagine there’d be hell to pay.

  Out in the kitchen, there were at least ten kids sitting on the granite countertops with two cases of beer on the cherrywood floor beneath their feet. There was also a cooler full of bottled mojitos. The living room, family room, and library (the Wannamakers had a freakin’ library), were filled with kids draped over the furniture or sitting cross-legged on the floor. It was loud, and there was already a trash can filling up in the hallway.

  Two guys were leaning over the can, each taking down a beer as fast they could, the overflow running down their chins and into the plastic liner.

  But not everyone was drinking. The guys’ varsity hockey team, for example, didn’t want to risk getting caught during the season. The overall result was a high-school-party cliché that was nothing like the so-called parties Nick threw above the Gold Pedal Bike Shop.

  In contrast to those at the Wannamakers’ house, Nick’s parties were dimly lit affairs with a small group hunkered around a flat-topped metal steamer trunk that Nick had gotten at Walmart. Jimmy was always shooting up, and Angie and Frankie would arrive already high. Every party ended with three people passed out and Emmie crushed under Nick’s sweaty body on a lumpy blue mattress.

  The sudden memory sent Emmie reeling. Air caught in her throat. Her vision tunneled, and a cold trickle of dread crept up her arms. She gasped for breath and staggered backward in her high heels, catching her hand on the edge of a small table and bumping a bowl of potpourri onto the floor.

  “Emmie, you okay?” Max asked. He seemed to come out of nowhere, though he’d been there all along. He wrapped an arm around her waist.

  “Here,” he said. “Let me help you.” He bent over and lifted one of her fe
et off the ground. Emmie steadied herself by putting one hand on his back while he slipped off her shoe. And then the other. “Let’s get rid of these things.”

  As Emmie’s shoes came off, she lost several inches of height, and the world seemed to expand around her as she shrank in comparison. She felt small. And lost. She hadn’t been at the party for more than five minutes, and she already wanted to leave.

  “There,” Max said, “there’s the girl I know.”

  “I need to sit down,” she said. It was disorienting to see Max’s face in front of her while images of Nick were still at the forefront of her mind. She felt like she was in a fun house full of mirrors. Except, it wasn’t feeling very fun.

  Max led Emmie to the corner of a white leather couch. He sat next to her with his arm around her shoulders. Emmie leaned forward and tried to get the blood to flow back to her head. She needed her thoughts to clear. She didn’t need her past to ruin what should be a good time. She was at a party. A normal, uninspired party with normal stupid stuff like guys shotgunning beers and girls crying in the bathroom. She was with Max. And she was safe. She needed to settle down.

  Chris jumped over the back of the opposite-facing couch and landed with a hard bounce. Brock walked around the arm and sat down, throwing his black-socked feet up on the glass coffee table. “So!” Chris said as a type of conversation starter.

  “So,” Max said, grinning and giving Emmie’s shoulders a gentle squeeze.

  Emmie plastered a fake smile on her face while Max talked to Chris and Brock. Something about hockey, of course, and what seed they’d end up for the tournament. When Max glanced over at her, she pretended to check her texts. She didn’t really need to (she’d already seen the two from her father; it had taken quite a bit of begging for him to let her out of the house), but the phone gave Emmie a reason not to look at Max. She was afraid that if she did, he’d see right through her. And then he’d know. And then he’d leave her.