Frenzy

by V. J. Chambers

  “I guess you can keep it,” she said, shrugging. “I guess Cori’s not coming back.”

  CHAPTER TWO

  “You doing okay, honey?” said my mother’s voice over the phone.

  “I’m fine, Mom,” I said, rolling my eyes at Jill, who was holding up shirts for my approval.

  “I’m sorry I couldn’t come out to help you move in today,” said my mother.

  “It’s okay,” I said.

  Jill held up a blue sparkly number in one hand and a fitted Imagine Dragons t-shirt in the other.

  I shrugged at her.

  “I really wanted to come along,” said my mother. “But I couldn’t make it up out of bed this morning. I really couldn’t.”

  “I know, Mom. Dad told me.” I held up a finger at Jill and disappeared around the partition to sit down on my bed. “It’s really okay. Dad and Lauren got me settled in fine.”

  Truthfully, my father had been quiet and my sister had been useless. She’d carried maybe three light bags out of the car. My father had gotten the rest of the heavy stuff, and he’d deposited most of it into the room wordlessly. Of course, my father really wasn’t much of a talker on his best days.

  “I’m thinking I’ll be better in a few weeks,” said my mother. “I’ll comedown to see you. We’ll go shopping or something. Have a real girls’ day out.”

  “That sounds nice,” I said. Even though it didn’t. Not really. I had never liked shopping with my mother. She took it way too seriously. For my mother, there were the “right” clothes to wear and the “wrong” ones. Heaven help me if I picked out the wrong ones.

  But if it meant that my mother got up and left the house, I’d be happy about it. She was pretty much always depressed. And she’d been even more depressed since the thing with Heidi, which was all my fault.

  “Are you sure that you like that school, honey?”

  “I’m sure, Mom.”

  “Well, maybe after you’re there for a week or so, you’ll change your mind,” she said. “It’s only that your father and I always thought you’d go somewhere a little bit more prestigious. After all, sweetheart, you left Princeton. We thought you might at least consider Rutgers or—”

  “Are we doing this again, Mom?”

  “Doing what again?”

  “You know what.” I chewed on my thumbnail, frustrated. “You know that I wanted to get away from all of it, didn’t you? You know that I wanted a fresh start.”

  “Fresh, sure, honey. But how are you going to start anything in a hole-in-the-wall place like Keene College?”

  I sighed. “Never mind. You don’t listen to anything that I say.”

  “Don’t be angry.” My mother’s voice had gotten quiet. It was so easy to upset her badly these days. Too easy.

  “I’m not angry,” I said.

  “It’s only that I wonder sometimes,” said my mother. “What would happen if you went to Duncan and told him you were sorry, sweetie?”

  “Mom, please—”

  “Did you ever apologize to him?”

  “Yes, I did,” I said. “I don’t want to talk about this.”

  “What did he say?”

  “He said it didn’t matter,” I said. “He said that Heidi was gone, and nothing I said did anything to change that, so it didn’t matter.”

  “Well, maybe if you tried again. Maybe now that some time has passed.”

  “Mom, Duncan hates me. He’s always going to hate me. I’ve come to terms with that. You need to come to terms with it too.”

  She let out an audible breath on the other end of the line, but she didn’t say anything.

  We were both quiet.

  I guessed it would be easier for my mom to come to terms with everything if her life hadn’t been turned inside out and upside down as well. She and Duncan’s mom had been good friends for years and years. After what I’d done, the Kennedys stopped speaking to our entire family. Duncan and I broke up. Mom and Mrs. Kennedy stopped meeting at the club for tennis and cocktails.

  Mom had never been exactly strong. She couldn’t handle it.

  I guess it was all too much for her.

  I knew how that felt. It often felt like too much for me too.

  That was why I’d come here. Because there wasn’t too much in this little public college that anyone could get into. There wasn’t much of anything here at all. That was what I needed. Simplicity.

  “You don’t know that Duncan hates you,” said my mother.

  “He told me,” I said. “It was kind of a big factor in our breakup.”

  “Maybe he’s changed his mind,” said my mother.

  “Why don’t you call Carol?” I asked her. “This isn’t about Duncan and me. This is about you. Tell Carol that I’m not around anymore, and that I won’t be home for months. Maybe she’ll consent to making a tennis date.”

  “Don’t be silly, honey,” said my mother. “You know how hard it is for me to leave the house these days.”

  Right. She was depressed.

  It was my fault.

  “Okay, Mom,” I said. “I’m sorry.”

  “I miss you, honey.”

  “I miss you too.”

  “I love you.”

  “I love you too.”

  “Take care of yourself. And if you want to come home, just call your father. I’m sure that there’s still time to get you into a different school if you want it. We might have to wait until fall, but that would only put you a year behind, and that hardly makes a difference, you know?”

  “I don’t want to go to another school.”

  “Well, if you change your mind, let us know, sweetie.”

  I sighed. “Okay, Mom.”

  “Okay.”

  We said our goodbyes and hung up. I went back around the partition to Jill’s side of the room.

  Jill was yanking the Imagine Dragons t-shirt over her head. “Was that your mom?”

  “Sure was,” I said. “Sorry.”

  Her head popped out of the shirt. “No worries. Yours sounds just as annoying as mine.”

  I couldn’t help but smile.

  * * *

  Jill’s boyfriend was named Parker. He had short-cropped hair and sensitive eyes. He hadn’t bothered to shave recently, and his chin was sort of shaggy. I might have thought he was a little bit cute, but I told myself not to be all up on Jill’s man and immediately squelched my attraction.

  “You the new roommate?” he said by way of greeting.

  Jill bounced over to him, now in a sequined white top. “She’s cool, Parker. She’s coming with us.”

  He raised his eyebrows at her. “I thought you were pissed.”

  “I got over it,” said Jill.

  He nodded slowly. “Right.”

  She wrapped her arms around his waist and smiled up at him.

  He kissed her forehead. “Well, if you’re happy, I’m happy.”

  “Totally happy.” She grabbed him by the chin and pulled him down to kiss his lips. The kiss deepened.

  I turned away, feeling embarrassed. When I’d been with Duncan, he and I had engaged in lots of public displays of affection. I hadn’t realized how awkward we must have been making everyone else feel. I ducked back onto my side of the room to snatch up my coat and purse.

  Then—on impulse—I opened up the drawer of my desk and took out the bulging envelope of cash. I shoved it in inside my purse. Jill had said that if I found anything here, I could keep it. She probably hadn’t meant that I should keep two thousand dollars in cash, of course, but it wasn’t like Cori was around to say anything.

  Was that weird?

  Would someone really run off and leave an envelope of money?

  “Did you know Cori?” said Parker.

  “No,” I said, peeking around the partition. The two of them were no longer all over each other. “I’m new.”

  “New is cool,” he said. “I guess.”

  “Was Cori, um, rich?” I said.

  He shrugged. “Not really, why do you
ask?”

  Because I wondered why she had so much cash under her mattress and didn’t bother to bring it along when she left. “No reason. Guess I kind of wonder about her a little. I’m staying in her room. Sleeping in her bed. All of that.”

  “Yeah.” Parker looked at his shoes.

  “It’s kind of convoluted,” said Jill, pulling a fake string of pearls over her head. “See, Parker used to date Cori. But she cheated on him all the time, so he dumped her.”

  Parker coughed. “Tell everyone my business, Jill. It’s fine. My life’s an open book.”

  “She’s not everyone,” said Jill.

  “I’m sorry,” I said.

  “She’s my new roommate,” said Jill.

  “Yeah, well, Cori was your roommate,” said Parker.

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” said Jill.

  He shook his head. “Nothing.”

  Jill put her hands on her hips.

  “Just… you know, you wouldn’t want to tell Cori everything, you know? She wasn’t exactly good at keeping secrets.”

  “I won’t say anything,” I said. “I’m not Cori.”

  He looked me up and down. “No, you are not.”

  I shoved my hands into my pockets. “I guess you hate her, huh?”

  “No,” he said. “Not at all. I wish she was still here, in fact.”

  Jill hugged herself. “Me too.”

  “Well,” I said, “maybe she’ll come back. If she wants her old room, I’ll have to turn it over to her.”

  “No, you won’t,” said Jill. “You’re already a better roommate than she was.”

  “Cori had issues,” said Parker. “She wasn’t a bad person or anything, but she didn’t seem to understand that sometimes the things she did hurt other people, you know?”

  I nodded. “Jill said something like that.”

  “If she was here, she’d totally have pills for us, though,” Parker said.

  “We’ll get them at the party, I swear,” said Jill.

  “Pills?” I said.

  “Yeah,” said Parker. “Well, I guess they were kind of gel caps, right? They were filled with molly.”

  Jill giggled. “Oh my gosh. Your name is Molly.”

  “Is it?” said Parker, grinning.

  I nodded. “Yeah, that’s true.”

  “So do you like to do molly, Molly?” said Parker.

  “Molly is ecstasy, right?” I said.

  “That’s a ‘no.’” Parker laughed.

  “It’s not?” I said.

  He laughed again. “No, I meant that you obviously didn’t do it if you didn’t know what it was called. But, um, yeah, ecstasy is like molly. I mean, they’re both MDMA. But ecstasy is usually in a pill form, and it might be cut with a lot of other weird stuff. Molly’s a powder. It’s supposed to be pure.”

  “Oh,” I said. “Um, I never did the powder stuff. I did take a pill once with my ex, but the people we were with said they thought we got bad pills. It made me… hyper mostly. But they said there was supposed to be this body buzz thing. That didn’t happen.”

  “So, that mean you’re game?” said Parker. “You gonna roll with us tonight?”

  I took a deep breath. “I don’t know.”

  “You should,” said Jill.

  “It’s just that I don’t know anyone except you guys, and the thought of getting all fucked up on something, being in a weird place… I’m not sure.”

  “Oh, no, it won’t be like that at all,” said Jill. “It’ll be really chill. If you take it, it makes it so much easier to meet people. And practically everybody at the party will be on it. The whole place will be one huge cuddle puddle. You’ll see.”

  “I don’t know,” I said again.

  * * *

  “So, Cori’s really gone?” said a girl. Jill had just told me her name, but I’d forgotten it.

  I was standing inside the basement of Guy Bancroft’s house, which was about six blocks away from our dorm. The brisk walk had kept me from getting too cold in the frosty night, but I was glad to be inside where it was warm. I had stripped out of my coat, and I clutched it, looking around at my surroundings.

  The basement was filled with people my age, most of them standing in small groups talking. At the front of the room, there was a raised stage area. A drum set was set up and a few microphones. That was right. Jill had said something about a band.

  “Yeah, I guess,” said Jill. “They moved Molly in, so she must be.”

  “Whoa, crazy,” said the girl. “I was hoping to buy some stuff from her tonight.”

  Jill shrugged.

  The girl offered me her hand. “Hey, I’m Sarah.”

  “Molly,” I said.

  “What’s your major?”

  “Um, I’m actually undecided.”

  “Oh,” she said.

  “What about you?” I said.

  “Music,” she said. “Piano performance concentration.”

  “Wow,” I said.

  She shrugged. “It was nice to meet you.”

  I nodded.

  Sarah melted into the crowd.

  Parker massaged Jill’s shoulders, pressing up against her from behind. “We need to find someone who’s got molly.”

  She looked up at him. “Chill out, we just got here.”

  “And weed,” he said. “I want some weed. I can’t stand rolling without weed.”

  “Chill out,” she ordered. She grinned at me. “I swear to god, we’re not like junkie fiends or something. I mean, I don’t even know if you can be a junkie with a drug that’s not heroin—”

  “You can,” said Parker. “And even if we are junkies, we’re cool, you know.”

  “I’m not judging,” I said.

  “We’re not junkies.” Jill glared at him. She pointed at a rack of coats on the far wall. “We can put our coats over there.” We made our way over and hung them up.

  Someone else approached us. “Hey, Jill!”

  Jill smiled. “Hi, Neil.”

  “Is Cori here?” said Neil. “I was hoping to try to buy some stuff from her.”

  “Cori left,” said Jill. “She ran off at the beginning of break. I have a new roommate.”

  Neil turned to look at me. “Oh. Nice to meet you. I’m Neil.”

  “Molly,” I said.

  He snorted. “Really? You don’t happen to sell any molly, do you, Molly?”

  I shook my head. “Sorry.” Okay, that was going to get old really fast.

  “Too bad,” said Neil. “Catch you later.” He disappeared into the crowd.

  “So, um,” I said, “was Cori a drug dealer?”

  “Yeah, kind of,” said Parker.

  I nodded. Well, I guess that explained why there was a big envelope of cash in her room. It must be from selling drugs. And maybe she made lots of money selling drugs. Maybe she had tons of envelopes bulging with cash.. Maybe that was why she’d left one behind.

  “It wasn’t exactly like that,” said Jill. “She wasn’t, like, out there trying to make money.”

  “Sure, she was,” said Parker.

  “She was helping people out,” said Jill. She turned to me. “She kind of fell into it. At the beginning of last semester, people would ask her if she knew where she got her drugs, and she’d go back to the guys she got them from and get more. She wasn’t really selling drugs. Not at first. She was, you know, just like running to the 7-Eleven to pick up beer for people.”

  “Except it wasn’t beer,” said Parker. “It was molly. And it wasn’t 7-Eleven. It was dealers.”

  “You’d have to know her to understand,” said Jill. “She didn’t meant to get started doing it, but one thing led to another, and then before she knew it.”

  “Bullshit,” said Parker. “You never want to give her enough credit. She knew exactly what she was doing.”

  Jill narrowed her eyes. “You know what? We don’t have to talk about Cori every second of every day. Let’s just drop it.”

  Ooh. It was probably my bad
for bringing it up, wasn’t it?

  * * *

  “Actually, wait a second,” I called after the guy. What had Parker called him? Levi? “Levi!”

  Levi turned. He sauntered back to me. Levi was gorgeous—sparkling eyes, defined muscles under his clingy sweater, a dazzling smile. But he also didn’t seem like the sharpest tool in the shed. Parker and Jill knew him, and they’d just forked over money to buy ecstasy from him. I’d declined, feeling a little wary. Now, however, I realized that I didn’t want to be the only sober person at this party.

  “Yeah?” He grinned at me. “What up?”

  “Uh, I changed my mind,” I said.

  Levi moved closer. The band had started playing, and it was harder to hear down in the basement now. They were some kind of funk band. The lead singer had a big ‘fro and a voice like James Brown. Plus, it was getting more and more crowded as more people pushed their way inside. I’d probably lost track of Jill and Parker now, but I’d have to find them in a minute.

  “What?” said Levi.

  “I want to buy some,” I said.

  He gestured to his ear. “I can’t hear you.”

  I raised my voice. “I want to buy some!”

  “Okay, okay. Chill out, girl.” He was still grinning. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a plastic bag. Inside were lots and lots of gel caps. Each filled with white powder. “It’s twenty.”

  I nodded. I opened up my purse, took out the envelope, and peeled off a twenty.

  Levi snatched my wrist. “What the fuck?”

  I looked up at him. His dumb stoner look was completely wiped off of his face. Instead, he looked furious.

  I shrank from him, frightened by the hard look in his eyes.

  “Come with me.” Levi dragged me across the room, up the stairs. We emerged into a living room with tapestries covering the couches and incense burning on the coffee table. I could still hear the band downstairs.

  “Let go of me,” I said to him. “You can’t drag me away from—”

  “Where’d you get that envelope?” His face was deadly serious. His grip tightened on my wrist.

  I winced. “I found it.”

  “You found it?” He leaned close. “You find it on Cori? You do something to her?”

  “No,” I said. “Let go of me!”

  “I don’t think so.”