Lost King

by Piper Lennox

  Breathless, I turned and faced her again. She was probably right.

  But all I could think of was the boy I’d spent the last few hours with, up above it all in his quiet corner of this modern palace. How could that not be real?

  How could that boy have done this?

  “It’s got to be a misunderstanding.” I stumbled back to the door, barging through before she could stop me.

  “Theo?” I called, once again amazed at how the crowd now moved like I was royalty, all the way to the kitchen.

  He was still screaming at people to leave. Most ignored him. A few guys kept shoving him, laughing when he’d stumble hard against the cabinets or appliances. He was too drunk to fight back.

  “Theo.” I stood in front of him and waited until his dazed, bloodshot eyes met mine.

  Ask him.

  But before I could get the words out, I noticed something snaking from his pocket.

  A long, black wire.

  Paige was at my side again, begging me to leave with her. Just go. Fuck Theo, she said. Fuck these kids. Fuck everybody.

  I drew away, my drunkenness intensifying as I leaned hard on the island and reached for the wire.

  Theo, even more drunk, was too slow to stop me.

  The kitchen went dead silent when I yanked the wire from his pocket, holding it up in front of my face.

  The webcam spun back and forth in my shaking grip.

  “Oooh!” someone heckled, and suddenly bodies were moving again, taunts and insults flooding the kitchen. Cell phones extended into the air.

  Theo looked around. His face paled. I thought of his adorable, overblown reaction to his own blood, and how much I’d loved doctoring him: this boy I thought was so, so different from the others.

  “Get out of here,” he slurred at me. He shoved himself off from the fridge and turned me roughly by the shoulder. “Go.”

  “Don’t fucking touch me,” I seethed, but I wasn’t even sure who it was meant for: Theo, shoving me to the foyer; Paige, dragging me to the open glass wall that led to the deck; or the seemingly hundreds of hands on me, each pawing and pinching and attached to a laughing face.

  Somehow, I managed to run, even though the crowd was back to being a brick wall. I plowed through them all, shoving whoever I had to, until a blast of cold air hit my face.

  I was back on the front porch.

  Footsteps echoed in the foyer. I ran until I was out of view behind some bushes.

  “Let’s go,” I heard someone laugh. “She’s long gone.”

  “Shouldn’t we find her, get her a cab?” a girl asked. “She was pretty wasted.”

  “She’ll be fine.”

  The voices faded. Bodies milled back into the house, and the party went on.

  “She’ll be fine.”

  I stumbled to the driveway and pressed myself close to the house. Deeper into the shadows. Right where I belonged.

  My muscles ached. Every ounce of alcohol I’d consumed was now in my head, and I couldn’t stay upright anymore.

  I was far from fine.

  The next thing I knew, Callum was there.

  “Why do you do this to yourself, Ruby?” He sounded angry. He looked murderous.

  His heartbeat was wild underneath his shirt, ready to fuel revenge.

  But his touch, the brush of his thumbs wiping away tears I hadn’t even felt, was kind. Impossibly sweet.

  The only thing in this world I could trust.

  “We can report it. We have to fucking report it.”

  Callum paced back and forth in my tiny bedroom of the rancher Mom and I rented with two other maids every year. I stared at his feet, wondering how long it would take to wear a trail in the pale blue carpet.

  He was livid. I was numb.

  “These sites won’t take it down just because we email them.” I looked at the tabs open on his computer.

  Chubby Girl Takes Cumshot to Eye

  Fat Slut Takes a Load to the Face

  Big Girl Gets Surprise Facial

  And these were just the ones Paige sent me, explaining in her email that Theo had posted videos of her to the same sites, once upon a time.

  “Good news is, none are linked to your name,” she wrote. “Bad news is…Lord only knows how many more copies exist. Or where.”

  Oddly, the only one I cared about at that moment was Theo’s. It felt like a head vampire thing—like if I could destroy the source, the copies would turn to dust.

  “Video quality is shit.” Callum hit Play on the open tab again, looking like he wanted to sharpen his laptop to a point and stab Theo in the gut. “That’s good, at least. No one can tell it’s you.”

  I nodded. My face only appeared once or twice, and it was way too pixelated and fleeting to identify me. Even Theo’s was pretty blurry, thanks to a crappy camera and crappier placement.

  “If we fight it,” I told Callum, “that’ll reveal too much info. But if we ignore it—”

  “Then that bastard gets away with this,” he fumed, and threw one of my library books across the room, straight into my mirror.

  I settled my stomach with a long drink of Gatorade, warm from the trunk of his car. “But so will I.”

  Callum’s eyes snapped to my face. He looked at me the same way he had last night, the entire drive back here: with a burning, furious protectiveness.

  “If we let this go,” I finished, “it’ll go away.” Slowly, I reached out and shut the laptop. “No one has to know that’s me.”

  His bottom teeth dragged across his lip as he shut his eyes.

  Eventually, he nodded.

  It turned out not to matter that my face wasn’t in the video Theo posted, though. It was in every last video from his friends’ cell phones. Shell-shocked chubby girl, cum dripping down her face, Theo nowhere in sight.

  Those made their rounds on social media, shared until they were untraceable, and swiftly attracted the attention of my mother’s clients.

  A week later, she was fired by every last one of them. The company she’d been with for decades, that she’d helped build from nothing, sent her packing the following Monday.

  I lost my place at the private school she’d worked like hell to get me into. Not that it saddened me much; kids there were as shitty as anywhere else. At least I’d be able to blend in at public school. But on principle, it still hurt. My education was the main reason my mother slaved away like she did.

  We couldn’t make our rent on the house in the Bays, or the one in Hightstown. We lived in our car for two nights until my aunt, working as a server on a cruise line, could FedEx us a spare key to her condo in Edison.

  Through it all, my mother never blamed me.

  Like Callum, she was furious for me.

  I told her I didn’t know the boy in the video. That I didn’t even remember his face, or where I’d been that night. I said I was hopping parties, all over town. It would’ve been laughable in any other context: oh, yes, I was just swimming in invitations.

  Court was the last thing I wanted. Parading details in front of strangers was bad enough, but I also knew it wouldn’t matter against the team of mega-lawyers the Durhams would hire.

  If I fought him in court, I would lose. It was that simple. People like us didn’t get justice against people like them.

  Still, I figured we should lawyer up, if only to get some clout behind our takedown emails.

  When I gave my mom the business card of Paige’s uncle, she shook her head. “No way in hell we’re trusting one of those people.”

  I thought she meant lawyers, but soon realized it was because of his link to someone, anyone, in the Hamptons. They were all evil now, in her mind.

  Maybe I should have shared that opinion, but I was grateful to Paige. She spent weeks emailing me updates and support, with the repeated offer that I could talk to her anytime I needed a friend.

  I thanked her, but eventually stopped writing back. It wasn’t because I didn’t trust her. I just wanted to forget.

  With
the help of a pro bono lawyer in Jersey, we did get most of the main videos taken down, along with the cell phone shots of my face.

  Videos of my confrontation with Theo in the kitchen, however, remained. They floated around more lazily than the others, limited to Hamptons kids’ group chats and some tertiary cliques, according to one of Paige’s unanswered updates.

  Foolish as it sounded, I wanted those videos gone the most.

  Ultimately, I knew I had no real options. The video wasn’t pornographic. There was no invasion of privacy, and no proof of defamation. All versions of it were shaky, five- to ten-second clips that barely caught anyone’s face.

  But the audio…that was crystal-clear.

  His slurred, husky voice ordering me to leave still made me sick to my stomach. I wanted the moment destroyed.

  On the other hand, like I often reminded Callum…I also wanted it forgotten. And I couldn’t have both.

  So I let the clips live on, without mentioning them to my mother or the lawyer, and focused on the rest. Little by little, we cleansed the internet of my drunken mistake. Life slowly crawled onward.

  I knew, like a deadly and persistent tumor, that night would never truly be gone. But we could get the bulk of it. With enough grace and luck, I’d survive.

  At first, I coped by staying silent. Letting everyone else’s outrage and disbelief eclipse my own was the only thing I could bear to do, because I knew if I let mine out...I would never be able to cage it again.

  Then the daydreams started.

  It helped, imagining all the ways I could exact revenge on Theo Durham. Most of my fantasies involved stealing his money, initially. Callum liked joining in. We’d joke about robbing Theo blind through some kind of scam.

  “Blackmail,” he’d smirk. “Guy like that’s gotta have secrets.”

  “I’m sure he does. But guys like that also guard them with the best defense money can buy.”

  We joked about getting Hale and Cill and all Callum’s connections together, cornering Theo in a dark parking lot, and beating him up. We joked about framing him for something. Stealing his car. A million little ways to ruin his life.

  It helped. But the memories still hurt.

  As my anger settled into a fossilized lump in my stomach—no longer flaring or disrupting my daily life, but always there—the fantasies faded. Revenge was still tempting; I just also knew life had to go on. No point getting stuck in the past.

  Then Mom got sick, and everything changed again.

  Returning to the Hamptons this year was never my first choice. Just the only one I really had. Waiting tables wasn’t cutting it. Staying in Jersey wasn’t cutting it.

  And, truth be told, I wasn’t a great waitress. I forgot to put in salads before entrées. Drink refills slipped my mind. At least once a week, I dropped a pitcher of lemonade or entire tray of food.

  But cleaning houses: that, I knew I could do. I’d done it practically my whole life. I was good at cleaning messes, not preventing them.

  Mom thought it was a horrible idea. “Nothing but bad memories waiting for you,” she huffed at dinner, the night I announced my plans. “Not to mention all the severed connections. Everyone out there knows you’re my kid.”

  “I don’t look anything like I used to,” I pointed out. “And I won’t be using Jacobs. I’ll go by Paulsen.”

  “Except on your tax forms.”

  “Which,” Aunt Thalia piped up, “only HR is permitted to see, and they won’t tell anyone. They won’t even notice.” She winked at me, telling Mom, “It’ll be fine, Serena. You’re overreacting.”

  I smiled and nudged her shin with my foot as thanks. I think she just wanted one less mouth at this table for a while, but still.

  “You’ll be all alone out there,” Mom added. She was starting to sound desperate, and it broke my heart.

  “Frankie and Hale and all those guys are still out there. And Callum just moved there permanently, too.”

  “Oof,” Aunt Thalia snickered, while Mom rubbed her temples and said, “That’s supposed to make me feel better?”

  I bypassed this. “Callum’s helping his brother run their dad’s landscaping business. They said I can help winterize pools, if housekeeping slows down in the off-season.” I stabbed into my salad, then pointed some wilted spinach leaves her way. “Which means more money. Which we need.”

  “We’re doing fine.”

  Aunt Thalia drew a breath, like she wanted to debate this. Mom shut her up with a glare.

  I knew I’d won the argument, though. There was no reason for me not to go, and no way my mother could stop me.

  She was, unfortunately, very right about one thing.

  As soon as I got there, memories swooped down and picked my carcass clean. The rage I’d kept quiet like a stowaway took over, every time I had to drive past Theo’s house.

  Every time I looked at the bay.

  Every single time I had to give someone a fake last name, just so they’d deign to let me scrub their toilets.

  So, no: I never actually planned for revenge. But the anger did.

  He ruined a life already so close to rock bottom, I could count the pebbles in between the boulders. He broke my heart.

  And not just the part that held some silly summer crush for him. He destroyed the part that dared to hope for acceptance, and friends, and a life better than what I was born into.

  The longer I was in the Hamptons, the more my anger woke from its slumber...and the more frequent those daydreams became.

  Heartbreak: that was my new favorite theme.

  I didn’t want to take Theo’s money, or his health, or his good name.

  I wanted to leave a scar on his very soul: a wound he’d carry forever, like the wound I carried on mine.

  8

  Present Day

  The embossed black ink on the business card looks wet as I flip it between my fingers at the kitchen island.

  No. Absolutely not.

  I set down my cell.

  Then I look around at the massive garbage pile my house has become, and I pick it up again.

  “Bayside Home and Commercial Cleaning, how may I help you?”

  It’s a male voice, the same kid who picked up two days ago when I called to leave my message for Ruby about our date. “Hi, uh…Shawn, is it?”

  “Shane,” he corrects. “This that dude who likes Ruby?”

  “Guilty. She around?”

  “Not yet, but she should be here soon. Her biggest job just ended, and...” I hear a keyboard clacking. “...her schedule’s open the rest of today. November gets kind of slow.”

  “Good, because I’ve got a job for her.”

  “Rated R, or PG? This place keeps copies of every message I write out to the workers, you know.”

  “A cleaning job,” I clarify. Not that my head hasn’t been filled with a few R-rated scenes since our brief hookup in my Jeep, and even more X-rated ones. I think I understand now why my summer guests insist on fucking everywhere in and around my property that isn’t a bed. Just imagining it is pretty damn exciting.

  Shane gets the details of the job, typing a mile a minute. “Wow, sounds like a really big clean-up. If you want it done in one day, I can send some other team members out with her?”

  “No,” I say, too quickly. I hear him laugh. “I mean, I don’t care if it takes a few days. And I don’t want it done for me. I need someone to help me get started, that’s all.”

  “And that ‘someone’ just happens to be Ruby, and only Ruby?”

  I hesitate. “You’re not very professional, you know that?”

  Shane laughs again. “Let’s not get into who’s keeping things professional and who’s not.”

  My comeback dies on its feet. This is a real job, and I do need help…but I can’t deny it’s also a ploy to see her again.

  And I definitely can’t promise I’ll be a normal, well-behaved client.

  “Your appointment is confirmed, sir,” Shane adds, wrapping up his amusement
inside some stuffy customer-service voice. “Your Bayside associate will arrive shortly.”

  An hour later, when I’m elbow-deep in some Solo cups scattered on the island, the doorbell rings.

  I look at the television on the far wall. Ruby’s standing on my front porch in gloves, coveralls, and a backwards baseball cap, looking impatient.

  “Doorbell mic on,” I call, then listen for the beep before announcing, “It’s unlocked, Ruby. Come on in. I’m at the back of the house, in the kitchen.”

  She starts, looking around like God Himself just invited her inside. “Uh...okay.”

  The doorbell cam shuts off; the television goes blank. I hear her footsteps in the foyer.

  “Back here.”

  She turns the corner slowly, taking everything in with a strange look on her face. It’s less exploring, more...taking stock. Maybe the place looks worse than I think.

  “Hi.” I smile and sweep some cups into the garbage bag I taped at the end of the island. “Welcome to my squalor.”

  After a beat, she smiles back. “I’ve seen worse.” Setting down her supplies, she asks, “Where do you want me?”

  On every last horizontal surface of this house.

  “Living room.” I adjust myself while she’s sorting cleaning solutions into various buckets. Yeah, I want to sleep with her (I’d settle for some over-the-clothes middle-school shit, honestly), but I don’t want her thinking that’s all I’m after. “I hope it’s okay I called you.”

  “It’s my job, remember? And I did give you my card, so.” She looks up at me with another smile.

  How the actual hell she can look just as good in a jumpsuit and Bayside cap as she did dressed to the nines has got to be some kind of witchcraft. My pulse goes stupid.

  We move to the living room with some trash bags and gloves, collecting garbage from every crevice. When I reach under the sofa and find some discarded pizza crusts, we both gag. I toss them into the bag like live grenades.