by Cyn Balog
“I know.” I’d pieced the story together. He’d been kind of like me for years. His father was the religious one. And then his dad died. He and his mom went though some rough months. Then they started going to church more. He hadn’t said as much, but it was clear that whatever support he’d gotten from Jesus had saved them. How could I dis anything that had such a positive influence on him?
It wasn’t bad. He didn’t talk about religion unless somehow it was brought up, and he never pushed me. But he managed to get me to church a lot more. I’d go with him and his mother, and gradually I learned all the prayers and hymns so I wouldn’t look like a fool around him. And whatever his beliefs were, no one could deny that he was a fine product. Where Kane was always a little sneaky and devious, Declan would go out of his way to help people, just because.
When we got to the Renaissance Hyatt, where the prom was, he cut the engine and looked at me. “You look like you’d rather die than go in there.”
I nodded. It wasn’t only those safety pins that were keeping my dress from puddling on the ground, or that my ankle felt like a sausage wrapped in an Ace bandage. I liked hanging out in the playhouse. I liked doing homework on his bed. I liked huddling on the curb next to him as we watched Kane shoot hoops. Somewhere along the line, I’d stopped being social. It was so much easier, the two of us.
Declan leaned over and kissed me on the cheek, then said, “I told you there’d be a surprise, right?” He motioned to the front of the hotel, which was ablaze with lights. Extravagantly dressed bodies were hurrying to the revolving doors, disappearing inside. “It’s in there.”
I nodded nervously. I knew what it was. It was tradition for couples to rent hotel rooms for the night. They’d tell their parents it was a “group thing,” but it wasn’t really. All the girls were talking about it. Many of them were holding out to be stripped of their virginity tonight, because nothing says romance like losing it on the same night as ten dozen other girls. A guy would always get the room on the sly, then present his date with the key card as a “surprise.” I don’t know when it became a tradition, but despite being one of the more suck-tastic Deer Hills High traditions out there, it had nearly overshadowed the whole prom event.
“Okay.” I pulled open the door and tottered out, but before my injured foot could find the pavement, he was there. He scooped me up into his arms, bumped the door closed with his elbow, and carried me across the parking lot. I forced a smile. “My hero.”
Embarrassingly enough, everyone turned as we approached. People cheered at our grand entrance. When we were inside the lush lobby, Declan set me down and bowed shyly. “Are you all right to walk?” he asked me.
I nodded. These were not my people—they were all a year older, so I barely knew them. No way was I causing any more of a scene. I looked around for Kane. “Where do you think he is?”
Declan read my mind. “Hanging from the chandelier, probably.”
Right. We headed down to the ballroom, Declan stopping every so often to chat with one of his friends. I hardly knew anyone. I settled down into one of the chairs, Declan next to me. He propped my foot on his knee for a moment. He looked a little nervous. He kept looking up at the stage, where the DJ was spinning loud dance music. Then he leaned in and said, “You’ll be okay if I leave for a while?”
I nodded, and he zoomed off in the direction of the lobby. I knew he’d be back in a few minutes with that key card.
Except then the lights dimmed, leaving one bright spotlight on the stage. Suddenly, Declan stepped into the center of it and started strumming his guitar.
I don’t know what the song was. Definitely old-time, something from the fifties, maybe, but he added his own little rockabilly spin on it and sang without his eyes leaving mine. Pretty soon, everyone was staring at me, clapping along and smiling.
When it ended, he jumped from the stage, slid over to me on his knees, grabbed my hands, and gave me a kiss. Everyone cheered.
My jaw was resting on the floor. My first attempts at speaking failed. Finally, as people started to peel their eyes away from us and the applause subsided, I whispered, “That was your surprise?”
After that, I relaxed. My ankle felt better too, so we managed to dance. The food was good, and his friends were silly. Kane never showed up, but I managed to talk to a bunch of girls who didn’t make me feel like the outsider. When the party started to wind down, Declan took me to the revolving doors, and I wavered on my feet. “Um…” I started.
But it was midnight. The party was over, and we were going home. Like any good boy and girl were supposed to do.
Maybe I’d been caught up in the moment. Maybe it was the way he sang to me. But I didn’t want to leave. I watched the others, maybe a little wistfully, hitting the up button for the elevator.
Declan was oblivious. When we got to the truck, he opened the passenger side door and I climbed in. When he kissed me and fastened my seat belt, he asked, “Something wrong?”
“No, I…” I couldn’t tell him. “Nothing.”
“You look like it’s something,” he said as he climbed in next to me.
“Are we going home?” I asked.
He rested his hands on his thighs. “Why? Do you want to go somewhere else?”
I shrugged.
He started up the truck and pulled out, then turned onto the road leading us toward home. I said, “Weird we didn’t see Kane there.”
He laughed. “You mean, not weird, knowing Kane.”
I tittered along with him. “Did you see that? A lot of people were doing that. Getting rooms, I mean.”
He nodded. Then he strained to see out the window. “What way you think is fastest? Route 1 or the turnpike?”
“Oh.” I had no idea. I tried to look like I was helping. “I don’t know. Go Route 1. No tolls.”
He pulled onto Route 1. “Yeah. There won’t be traffic this time of night anyway.”
I decided to try again. “My parents aren’t expecting me home until later. I told them people stay out all night. So we could do something. I mean, I told them I would be with you, so they said all I’d have to do is text.”
He looked at me. “Well, what’s open now? You want to go to the diner?”
I was perfectly sated by the dry chicken française and stringy green beans with almonds. I shook my head but shrugged, as I hadn’t an idea in my mind that didn’t involve the hotel.
We ended up at this dead-end road some kids go to that overlooks the reservoir. It’s all trees, and the living sounds of the forest come up close to you so that they’re nearly inside your head. You can watch the lights of the airplanes landing at the airport across the way, the control tower in the distance. In the moonlight, the water looked like a knife of fine silver.
He said, “I know what you were thinking.”
I looked at him.
“I figured you probably already knew,” he said, wrapping his long fingers around the steering wheel. “I’m waiting for marriage. I want to find the person I want to spend the rest of my life with. So you don’t have to worry.”
I blinked. “Oh. I…”
“It feels like you could be that person.” He reached over and took my hand. “I’ve never felt this way about anyone, Hail.”
I leaned back in the leather seat, making it rip out an unladylike squeak. I cringed.
“I want our first time to be really special. Not something we do because Deer High tradition says so.” He smiled. “That’s stupid.”
My stomach dropped. Our first time.
Maybe he meant the first time for him and me together.
But I didn’t think that.
All I saw was me. The sinner. A sin that grew and spread with every second that ticked by without me setting the record straight.
I nodded. “Yeah. Of course. Right,” I said shortly.
He looked up at th
e dark sky for a moment, at a streak of red making its way to the runway. My hand had gone cold in his. I pulled it away and pointed my eyes to the passenger’s side window, pretending to be interested in something in the darkness. I hated that I could see his reflection in the glass.
I waited a few minutes, trying to make it seem like I was fine and dandy, never better. But fifteen minutes later, when he asked me what I wanted to do next, I told him I was tired and ready to go home.
Saturday, February 23
The cheap beer is plentiful, the music loud, the lights low.
Recipe for disaster.
Kane knows I don’t want to be here. I’m not sure if he was expecting the party to be good for me. But it’s heading in an unhealthy direction.
Even I can tell that, and I’m not all here.
“What’s your name?” Random Guy asks over the earsplitting music. He’s one of Luisa’s brother Erich’s friends, I think, visiting from Penn State. He’s cute—through beer goggles, at least.
I shake my head, pretend I can’t hear him. He wants to know my name as much as I want to know his. His real motive, from the way he keeps looking down at my boobs, is to get into my pants. I tilt back my head and take another swig of my beer, then lean over and kiss his ear and give him doe eyes, the universal party language for “Let’s get out of here.”
He obliges. He takes my hand, and we stumble through the sea of bodies in the kitchen, up the mansion’s sweeping staircase. For a second I forget where I am, but then I see a picture on the wall of Luisa and Kane in their junior prom best. Sure, she wants me here. Kane is so full of bullshit. The second she saw me, she walked in the other direction and hasn’t glanced at me since. Kane might have come over to say hi, if it weren’t for Luisa constantly corralling him. Javier and Nina didn’t show, so I’ve spent the night drinking, then playing Asshole with a bunch of Erich’s friends. After that, the night gets hazy.
As we stagger up the stairs, Random Guy’s behind me. I have a hard time believing he only has two hands, because he’s all over my front, like octopus tentacles. When we get to the landing, I remember which door used to be the guest bedroom and pull him in there. I laugh as I kiss him, and these are truly sloppy kisses, the way I thought kisses were before I knew better. But I don’t care. I don’t care that he tastes like cigarettes and his tongue is like a bulldozer trying to excavate my mouth. To show him I mean business, I pull his shirt out of his pants before he can even get the door closed.
His eyes widen. I don’t think he expected so much from the quiet high school senior.
But I’m probably not like any quiet high school senior he’s ever met.
When we come downstairs, the party is winding down. Luisa is sitting at the dining room table, glued to Kane’s side. His eyes rise to meet mine. He puts his beer down and starts to get up. I take Random Guy by the hand and lead him outside into the frigid night.
“It’s balls cold out here,” he mutters when I plop on the porch swing, sitting on my hands. I motion for him to sit next to me, tell him I’ll keep him warm, when he says, “I need another beer.”
Then he gets up and leaves me alone.
Not that it matters. He was boring company anyway.
I contemplate how long it’ll take to walk home. Luisa lives on the other side of town. Probably five miles. I left my coat inside, but I feel warm enough.
I’m game.
I start to push off the swing as the screen door opens and Kane steps out. “Not so fast.”
I sigh. “Leave me alone, Kane. If you’re not with me, you’re against me. And I am happy the way I am.”
“So who is this new you? Because I’m pretty sure I saw the new-and-improved Hailey making out with at least three different guys in there.”
I stare at him. I thought they were all the same guy. Not that it matters. “I never said I was improved.”
He breathes out. “So what? I saw you pulling that loser upstairs. You fuck him?”
I glare at him. “Not that it’s any of your business, but what did you think would happen when you invited me here? That I’d fit back in with these people again? It’s not happening. I’m Mental Girl. I can’t sit around Luisa and smile while she discusses her complexion woes at length as if they matter. I don’t care who’s doing who or what the latest gossip is. It’s all so trivial, it makes me want to rip my ears off.”
He buries his hands in the pockets of his coat and looks up at the icicles descending from the storm drain.
“I’m going home,” I say.
“Walking? No way.”
“I have legs. Why not?”
His hand latches on to my elbow. He shakes his head, then peels off his pea coat and drops it on my shoulders. “You seem to think I didn’t care. That this is easy for me,” he says more softly. “That’s far from the truth, Hail. I’m not against you. You’re not alone, all right? You’re not the only one who was close to him.”
“I feel like I am,” I mutter, slumping back onto the swing. “Otherwise, you would know it too.”
He sits next to me, making the swing rock. “Know what?”
“That this is all wrong. All this time, I’ve felt like he was in my head, whispering to me to look closer. But it wasn’t until your mom gave me that picture that I knew for sure.”
He closes his eyes.
“You’re hiding something from me.”
He stands quickly, exhaling heavily, then leans against the railing and crosses his arms. “Yeah, I am.”
“Who are you protecting?”
“Jesus, Hail!” He shakes his head and stares down at the ground for a long time. Then he mumbles, “That picture was nothing. I’d cheated, okay? On Luisa. And some crazy girl was trying to get me to pay for it.”
I stare at him, my mouth open slightly. “That didn’t look like your skin. It looked like Declan’s. And how did—”
He looks back at the door, as if he expects Luisa to come through it at any moment. “It was me,” he says under his breath. “And you know Declan. Always trying to make peace. He thought he could help diffuse the situation.”
I nod slowly, testing out the theory. It’s a lie. I know that with certainty. One thing Declan and I both lived for was discussing Kane’s romantic pursuits. His love life was like a train wreck. Declan would’ve told me about this.
Kane rubs his arms through his sweater and breathes out a white cloud. “Can you drop it now?”
I start to nod, because I know that’s what he wants. Suddenly, the door flies open and Luisa appears behind the screen, silhouetted in the warm orange light from inside. “Oh, there you are,” she says sweetly to Kane. I can’t see her features, but in the ensuing silence, the already frigid temperature drops another ten degrees.
Kane whirls, and his stony face transforms into an appeasing smile. “Just needed some fresh air.”
If her eyes were claws, they would’ve ripped me to pieces. Starting to close the door, she says, her voice still sweet but clipped with frustration, “This party can’t spill outside. I have neighbors who will complain.”
Sure, she wanted me here.
Kane gives me apologetic look, then starts to go inside, his eyes beckoning me to follow him. I start to when I catch a look on his face. Fear? Anger? Something in between.
It tells me all I need to know.
Whatever he won’t tell me, Declan died because of it.
193 Days Before
I didn’t think I could change Declan. I didn’t want to.
Well, most of the time.
Declan’s room was at the front of the house, overlooking the overhang for the porch. In the Fox Court domino-house floor plan, his room was the same as mine. But because the Weeks family had a rose trellis, I could climb up and meet him outside his window, where we’d crawl up to the roof. If you were really feeling adventurous, you could climb
to the back of the house, where Kane’s room was, but I never did that, because I valued my own neck too much.
Sometimes, when his mom and stepdad were gone, and we had the house to ourselves, we’d go into his room and wrestle under the sheets. Wrestling was his way of copping feels in places he considered off-limits. I knew he liked it. I knew from the way his hands would hesitate and he’d let out a groan, and from the way his erection pressed against me. When things got too heavy, he’d pull off the covers, scoot to the edge of the bed, and pick up his guitar.
Hair wild and snapping with static, he’d play me a song until he got lost in the music. But I didn’t have it bad for music the way he did. I had it bad for him. Him, and nothing else. He was my thing. And the way he looked there, with his face flushed and his shirt undone, just made me want him more.
I’d fan my face, take deep, measured breaths, but the second the song stopped, I wanted him more than ever. His skin against me. His mouth on mine. I wanted all of him.
He set his guitar down and climbed back toward me, pinning my arms over my head and kissing me.
This. Was. Maddening. What was virginity, anyway? Just a stupid social construct that meant nothing in the grand scheme of things. Sex was good, natural. Not having my virginity didn’t make me any less worthy of him. But I hated feeling like it meant everything to him, like if he knew what I’d done with Kane, he’d hate me. I tensed and closed my eyes.
“What?” Declan asked, blinking in surprise.
“I don’t know if I can take this much more,” I said to him. “I mean, if you and I… We could. No one would know. It’s just us.”
He shook his head. I knew what he was thinking. His God would know.
Forget it. I sat up, straightened my hair, fastened the buttons that had come undone on my blouse. I opened the door to the hallway. I needed air.
