Gwen went to the woods. She knew exactly where they would be, it was Ivy’s favorite spot. Gwen thought Jake and Ivy would still BE there. But instead Ivy was ALONE. She was ALONE and HIGH with LEAVES in her HAIR, and when she saw Gwen she just said, GWEN, LISTEN, I WAS ONLY EVER TRYING TO PROTECT YOU.
Once upon a time, there was a girl named Gwen who went into the woods and did something terrible by accident, but even if she could, she wouldn’t take it back.
Xavier
Xavier sat on the curb outside the hotel alone in the warm, soft dark and tried to picture it. He tried to remember stumbling into those woods, her terrified eyes, her desperate gasps for breath, her body sinking to the ground. The anger he surely must have felt. But all he could see was darkness, like black smoke. All he could feel was the blunted dreamlike terror that he knew hadn’t even fully hit him yet, but was coming.
There was relief in forgetting, but Xavier did not deserve to forget.
Sasha had not wanted to let him go outside alone. He knew she was scared of what he might do: throw himself in front of a car or leap off the roof. “I promise I won’t do anything stupid,” he said. And he wouldn’t. He would face whatever was coming for him now.
Sasha had let him borrow her phone. He took it out, dialed the number, it rang only once, and there she was.
“Hello?” He heard his mother’s voice as though for the first time in his life.
“Mom?” he said. “It’s me, from Sasha’s phone.” He stood up. There was another car in the parking lot now.
“Oh, Xavier,” she said. His sweet mom, who he knew was so happy to hear from him, even though she would never be able to open up enough to say it. “Are you and Sasha having fun?” Xavier thought she sounded off, then realized it wasn’t her who was different. It was him.
“Yeah . . . we’re having . . . it’s good,” he said. She was probably starting to worry by now, and wish he’d come home. She was probably telling herself to just be glad he was out of bed, having a nice time. This is the thing that hurt Xavier the most.
“Please let her mother and her boyfriend know that we’re happy to chip in to pay for you, for meals and things. Whatever fun activities you’re doing . . .” She tried so hard, to do what was good and what was right. “And please will you thank them for me and Dad?”
“I will,” he said. “How are you doing over there?”
“We’re good,” she said. “Your father is making kebabs tonight.”
There was a shuffling sound in the background.
“I love you,” Xavier said.
There was a beat of silence. Xavier knew his parents loved him, but it wasn’t something they usually said out loud. Wasn’t something they ever said, really.
“I love you, too,” she said. “When are you coming back?”
“Soon, Mom,” he said. “I have to go now, though.”
He hung up the phone and started to cry.
I sat in the parking lot, SAT AND SAT for HOURS and HOURS. SAT in that PARKING LOT of THE MERMAID HIDEAWAY MOTEL, waiting and waiting for someone, but I was not sure WHO. I was not sure if they were even HERE. I had been there now for HOURS just THINKING and THINKING with NO BREAK AT ALL.
My STOMACH HURT because for days I had been eating MOSTLY REST-STOP TAFFY and NO ACTUAL FOOD. I did not know how LONG I would WAIT, because “IVY” had not answered me in a very long time. And had not posted a new picture since first thing that morning and now it was night. I went inside and some creep at the desk stared at me. DO YOU WANT A ROOM? he asked. NO THANK YOU, I said. I AM WAITING FOR SOMEONE, and he said, WHO? and I said, I AM WAITING FOR IVY!
Just joking. I did not say that. I JUST WENT BACK OUTSIDE AND GOT INTO THE CAR.
I did not tell him who I HOPED I could be waiting for. I barely even told MYSELF. But we all have HOPES don’t we—there is nothing wrong with HOPING, IS THERE?
Even at my very sickest, I have always known I’m not actually crazy. I’m maybe TOO SANE, if anything. But I WILL ADMIT something, I will ADMIT IT NOW: when I got that VERY FIRST text from “IVY,” for one quarter of one half of one tenth of a second, I actually wondered if I was. Crazy. Because I know for sure only a few things in life, but one of them is this: DEAD GIRLS DON’T TEXT BACK.
So when I got that very first message from “IVY,” I stared at my phone and thought, HOW CAN THIS BE? Because she was first DEAD, yet then somehow GONE and now TEXTING?? AND THAT IS JUST NOT HOW THAT WORKS.
Is there a CHANCE I was WRONG about EVERYTHING, maybe she is not even DEAD?
But look, I am no stranger to a DEAD BODY. I was there when my mom died. And also there for the months and months when she was teetering on the edge between dead and alive, so let me tell you: I CAN TELL THE GODDAMNED DIFFERENCE.
So WHO were those messages FROM? I asked myself. And then I thought MAYBE the person who had MADE IT SEEM like someone was DEAD was SENDING TEXTS, was the same as the person who convinced me that ANYTHING MEANT ANYTHING, which is an even BIGGER MAGIC TRICK when you really think about it.
Maybe he came back and saw what was out there in the woods and panicked, took her phone and ran? At first, I was not sure I even wanted to believe that. Because even though I AM a monster, I know that HE is NOT ONE. But then I thought WELL, MAYBE ANYONE can do ANYTHING if they have THE VERY RIGHT REASONS.
So WHO was I WAITING for? I WAS NOT EVEN SURE.
I sat there IN MY CAR, figuring if they came outside, I would see them. I would SEE whoever it WAS and would KNOW. I looked down at my phone. I read through all the text messages Ivy and I had ever sent. The ones from after. The ones from BEFORE. And I started to feel something in my chest that I really did not want to feel at all, SO THEN I STOPPED READING. And right at that moment, I looked up and saw someone walk outside the hotel. Tall and powerful with a swoop of blue at the top.
He sat down on the curb.
I unrolled my window to make sure. JUST TO MAKE SURE.
I could smell the trees and feel the air on my skin and in my lungs and the blood inside me racing around and going into and out of my POUNDING, POUNDING HEART. I could feel FUCKING EVERYTHING.
I got out. I walked toward him.
And suddenly it was like every bad thing that had ever happened before in my life did not matter. Every bad thing I had ever done, every regret I ever had LIFTED, because everything had led me THERE to that moment thousands of miles from home in a near-empty parking lot in the HOT DARK.
I saw who it was, and I knew who it was, and just like that, I understood everything.
Xavier
Xavier didn’t hear the car door slam, didn’t hear her footsteps, didn’t hear her at all until she was right in front of him, staring down. He looked up.
Gwen’s eyes were open so wide. For a moment, they just watched each other. She looked like she had not slept in a very long time. He knew he should probably be very surprised to see her, but he also knew maybe he would never be surprised by anything again. A dinosaur could walk out, stomp them all to death. A thirty-foot wave could sweep them all away. It wouldn’t somehow feel any different than what had already happened.
The thing was, what was he supposed to do now that she was here, standing in front of him, looking down like he might have answers?
He wished Sasha would come outside and tell him what to do. But no, he did not get that luxury. He did not deserve it.
He was going to have to tell Gwen himself.
Oh God, he was going to have to tell her what he had done.
“Listen—” he started.
But she cut him off. “It was you,” she said, halfway between asking and telling. She was shaking her head slowly.
And Xavier realized then that somehow she already knew her best friend was dead—and that Xavier had done it. How did she know? He did not wonder why. He did not wonder how. Because nothing in this entire world made sense or ever had or ever would. But he understood at least that much.
“Yes,” Xavier said. He wanted to qualify it with
something. He wanted to say that he didn’t even remember, and that he was sorry. How he was so, so, so fucking sorry. But the words didn’t mean enough. Nothing meant anything. “It was me,” he said. “I did it.”
She shook her head again. Her mouth was a perfect round O.
“All along, it never even occurred to me to think, or dream . . .” Her face started to transform bit by bit. The corners of her mouth curled up into an expression that made so little sense, Xavier could not even tell what it was at first. A smile. She was smiling. Her smile spread and spread.
She crouched down beside him on the curb where he sat. She reached one hand up and touched his cheek. He could barely feel it. What was happening? “It all makes sense now,” she said.
She leaned toward him. Leaned in close. She smelled like sweat and unwashed skin and sour breath. She raised her hand to her lips and tipped her head to the side.
“Oh, honey,” she said. “I’m sorry. Your face—you look so confused. I should explain. . . . Xavier, the person you were texting with, it wasn’t her, it wasn’t Ivy. . . .” She paused. Xavier felt like maybe something was wrong with his brain and he’d forgotten what words meant, because he did not understand at all. Gwen kept going.
“Obviously she didn’t tell you about me, just like she didn’t tell me about you. It would have driven her insane, her best friend and her boyfriend. In some fucked-up way, it makes sense, right? I guess she would rather . . .”—Gwen paused—“would have rather you thought she was going to cheat than have you know you connected with her best friend in a way you’d never connected with her.”
Xavier was stuck in a dream. He could not understand any of the words she was saying, or why she was smiling when her best friend was dead. Why was she reaching out her hand toward the person who had killed her?
“I was so angry at her in those woods,” Gwen said. “I mean so angry, but now I realize I should be grateful that this is where we ended up.”
He could not understand why she was then wrapping her arms around him, and he wanted to pull away, but he could not get his body to move at all.
She leaned back. Her face was changing. She was starting to look scared. “Please say something,” she said. “I know this is a lot to take in, but just please say you’re not mad at me. You have to understand, it was an accident, honestly, and the thing with your hairs in her hand . . . When I did that . . . I was just trying to make a story look true! And I had her house key and her brush was right there and there was so much blue in it. . . . I had no idea you were Jake. It never even occurred to me. I’m so sorry. But please don’t be mad. We’re the same, you and me . . . and we’re in this together now. . . .”
She was staring at him. He realized that she wanted something from him, and that she was very desperate to get it. She had a hand on each of his shoulders, and still nothing made any sense. “I just need to know though: Why did you move her? And why all the texting?”
He felt, in the back of his head, something uncurling. Making him realize that he understood even less than he thought he did.
“Were you trying to protect me? But you didn’t know it was me. Did you? Remember what you said right at the beginning? About how in a parallel world maybe we are already in love? Well, maybe you could think about that, how happy we are, how . . .” Her words were coming faster and faster, she sounded like she was running out of air.
Running out of air.
“Holy shit,” Gwen said. She pulled away. She was looking at something behind him. Xavier turned. There was Sasha, raising her hand to her lips.
Gwen stood.
Sasha opened her mouth. When she spoke, her voice was a whisper. “But parallel worlds are no kinder than this one. . . .”
Time slowed down. Gwen and Sasha stared at each other. They stepped in closer.
Sasha
I reached for something to steady myself, grasped at the air. The world kept shifting and shifting and spinning, and there was nothing I nor anyone could do to stop it.
We stayed there like that, eyes locked. I understood then, just what had happened. We had shared something impossible and unimaginable, dangerous and destructive, shared something no one else on earth would ever truly understand.
And right then, against all reason, for one single moment, as I looked at her, the only thing in my head and in my heart was this:
You made me feel less alone.
There was the sound of crying—Xavier was crying. I turned away.
Xavier hadn’t killed her.
He hadn’t done anything I thought he had.
And Gwen had done it all.
And everything came flooding back: Why we were there, how we had gotten there, what I thought had happened, what had actually happened. What we hadn’t done, and what we had.
What both of us fucking had.
And what I had to do next.
I was TEETERING on the EDGE of what was HAPPENING, and I could NOT really BEAR it, it was TOO MUCH to BEAR. I HAD MADE A HORRIBLE FUCKING MISTAKE. I HAD MADE SO MANY. AND NOW I NEEDED HELP.
But there was no one to help.
MOTHERS lift CARS if their CHILD is TRAPPED UNDERNEATH. If someone TRULY LOVES you, they will DO ANYTHING to KEEP YOU SAFE. I was the kid trapped under the car, but I was also the mother too. I HAD TO BE. Because there was no one on earth who could save me, who would try, who would want to. NO ONE EXCEPT FOR ME.
And I started to piece together WHY they had DONE some very CONFUSING THINGS. It was because SOMEHOW, both of them thought certain other things had ACTUALLY HAPPENED though I did not yet understand HOW. And Sasha was holding a phone, fingers starting to dial. Nine, then one, about to press the other FINAL ONE. And I felt a rush and my entire body was overtaken by quiet calm:
Even though NOTHING MATTERED, I still cared about what happened. MAYBE I CARED ABOUT MYSELF MORE THAN I THOUGHT.
I told Sasha to stop dialing.
And she stopped. Of course she did.
I may be stupid ABOUT MOST THINGS, it turned out. And there were MANY THINGS I did not understand yet, would not fully grasp until later, but even in that moment I knew this: I knew how much Sasha loved Xavier, how much Xavier loved her back. It was obvious since that very first night I saw them at Sloe Joe’s, before everything that was going to happen happened. And I knew love made them weak. I knew it made them willing to do anything. Just like it had made me.
Soon I would understand more of their secrets, and they would understand more of mine. But not this one, not ever this one:
When my EYES met JAKE’S, the real Jake’s, I felt something deep in my heart. The feelings I had before when we first started writing and kept writing and kept writing, THEY WERE ALL STILL THERE, and if she had wanted to try, to try to do everything we said, everything we promised to each other late at night, even now that I knew who she actually was . . . I would have tried it. Even after everything.
That is my secret. I have many now. I will never be free of them. But maybe that is the worst one of all. She turned away first. Jake turned away first. But if she hadn’t turned away?
I think I never would have.
Xavier
Everything after that happened so fast.
Xavier could barely breathe, and then that was all he could do, terror and grief and relief swirling together inside of him.
Ivy was dead.
He hadn’t killed her.
But she was still dead.
There they were, the three of them, so very far from home. So much had led up to this moment that he didn’t understand yet, wouldn’t understand for a long time. Only one thing was clear: This wasn’t over. Maybe it never would be.
Time slowed down. Then sped up.
And the bubble popped and the trance was broken. And Xavier was crying, because it was all really, truly starting to sink in. The Ivy Xavier had known was not on this planet anymore. She was a mix of dark and light, of sweet and terrible, of flawed and perfect. There would never be anyone quite like her ever ag
ain. And she was gone.
But the three of them were still there. Gwen and Sasha had inched closer, then stepped back. Sasha’s hands were curled into tight, dirty fists, and Gwen’s face had changed, like a door had snapped shut behind her eyes.
And she shook her head, slowly, blinking, as though she was just then figuring something out. Gwen turned toward Xavier. Her voice sounded totally different than before. “When you said ‘it was me, I did it,’ you really did believe . . .”
Sasha reached out and took the phone from Xavier’s hand. “It doesn’t matter now,” Sasha said quickly. She started to dial. The 9, then the 1, then before she dialed the last 1 . . .
“No, I guess it actually doesn’t,” Gwen said. “But unless you want your friend to go to jail for a very long time, I’d put the phone down. . . .”
Sasha froze. “He didn’t do anything.”
“So what? The important thing is what it seems like. And you of all people should fucking know that. Anything can look true.” Gwen shrugged. “Besides, you pretended to be her and moved her body. Neither of you are getting out of this. Guess we’re all in this together now. So what are we going to do about it?”
Xavier felt himself starting to sink. He didn’t care what happened to him. Not really, not anymore. But as Sasha and Gwen circled each other, one thought stood out in Xavier’s mind. One thing he couldn’t forget and never would: Sasha had only ever wanted to protect him. She had done a lot of crazy things, some truly crazy things and he so desperately wished that she hadn’t, but he understood why.
When you love someone, you will do anything to keep them safe.
And now it was his turn.
“Listen,” Xavier said as he stood. His slow brain switched back on, and started working very quickly. They looked up at him, like they were surprised to hear his voice at all. He knew what they had to do. It was obvious and easy and insane and terrible. It was not a perfect plan, and maybe it wouldn’t work, and it certainly wouldn’t work forever. But it was their only chance and maybe it had been Sasha’s plan all along. Maybe that’s why she’d been texting as Ivy, updating Instagram as Ivy. Maybe. They hadn’t discussed it, and now he knew they never would. It would work far better now with Gwen than it ever could have without her. Gwen was the final missing piece.
Bad Girls with Perfect Faces Page 16
