Secrets of Southern Girls

by Haley Harrigan

  84

  “So…that’s what happened,” Julie says, rubbing her fingers against the rough terry cloth of the hotel towel.

  “I’m sorry,” August says. He’s on a lounge chair next to her, legs splayed, looking up at the clouds.

  She nods. “Me too. That stupid play. Can you believe I made preparing for that play my entire world? If not for that, I might have noticed the changes with Reba. Maybe things wouldn’t have been any different, but at least I could have tried.”

  She thinks back to the night of the play, to Ms. Madrie sighing dramatically and saying The show must go on! when Julie tried to tell her that she couldn’t go through with it. The truth was, Julie no longer had any interest. Juliet and her sordid saga were nothing compared to the very real situation with Reba.

  “Just nerves, dear, just nerves,” Ms. Madrie said, her face aglow with excitement. She patted Julie’s shoulder and moved on. But Julie had never been nervous about the stage.

  So she couldn’t get out of it, and there she was, in full Shakespearean garb on that January night, a reluctant Capulet.

  “Ready?” Brandon Lomax asked, in full costume himself, without glasses, strands of wavy hair falling into his face. He pushed it back nervously, but the strands fell again, undaunted. He made a surprisingly handsome Romeo, and Julie thought back to the crush Reba had on him once.

  “Of course,” Julie said with an insincere smile, but he didn’t notice.

  The Lawrence High School Drama Spectacular always brought a crowd, not just from Lawrence Mill but from Opal and Woodbrooke too. Mostly because there wasn’t anything better to do. It was no surprise when people began streaming into the old auditorium almost an hour before the play was scheduled to start. Julie watched the crowd from behind the thick, musty-smelling purple velvet curtain, surprised when Jake came in with a much younger girl. Sister, maybe? She spotted Nell too.

  Before the lights dimmed, Julie caught sight of Reba. She was hardly more than an apparition in the back of the crowded auditorium. Even more surprising was Toby, only a few seats down. She couldn’t think of why Toby would come out to watch the play. He wasn’t exactly a proud relative. Toby and Reba were both alone, but watching them, Julie could see that they were aware of each other. She could sense a strange sort of current running between them, sparking, flaring at both ends. The whole thing was off somehow, and it made Julie feel unsettled.

  Then the play began. Her lines were flawless, her movements fluid, but she couldn’t shake the weirdness of Toby and Reba, almost together. Brandon’s acting, which had never been exceptional, was startlingly accurate. He didn’t hesitate, never missed a single line, and he grew more attractive as the night went on. But she was Juliet, and he was forbidden.

  The show passed by in a blur. The only things of interest were the kisses, the times when, helplessly, she threw herself into Brandon-as-Romeo’s arms and kissed him, really kissed him and he looked startled. She told herself that it was the madness of the play, but it was a release and she knew it. All the tension, all of the worry, she tried to pass on to the poor boy through the pressure of her lips on his. Or maybe it was vengeance, but she knew Reba didn’t care. Brandon was nothing to her, not anymore. Not ever, really.

  Only Nell came to the stage to congratulate her after the show, with a huge bouquet. Jake didn’t stay, but Julie didn’t care. Maybe those kisses had seemed too real to him. She didn’t see Toby or Reba anywhere, though she looked for them after.

  Brandon didn’t mention the kisses, only smiled shyly at her when she was packing up to go home. So she must have been the one who initiated it, the make-out session out back, behind the auditorium when everyone else had gone, when they were out of costume but still in stage makeup. He didn’t ask for an explanation, and she was grateful. It didn’t go any further, and afterward, he drove her to Aunt Molly’s house and told her she was a wonderful actress.

  It was after midnight when she made it up to her room that night, the house completely dark until she switched on her bedroom light. A storm was creeping up outside—she could hear the low growl of thunder in the distance. She fell onto her bed, tired but restless after the performance. There was a bottle of whiskey hidden in her closet, and she dug beneath shoes and piles of clothes until she found it. The coppery liquid seemed to glow, but maybe it was only her relief at finding it—something to settle her frantic mind.

  She poured the whiskey into the cap to take shots, hadn’t mastered drinking straight from the bottle like Toby. The heat of the alcohol was soothing, and she felt herself finally beginning to unwind. She was on her second shot when she heard the groan of a car cranking. She pulled herself, curious, from the hard mattress to her window and pulled aside the blinds. When her own reflection glared back at her, she snapped off the overhead light so she could see out into the darkness. It was Mr. McLeod’s black truck, headlights off, backing slowly out of the garage next door.

  What would Mr. McLeod be doing out so late? She pressed her face to the window, imagining dozens of dramatic scenarios. Mr. McLeod having an affair. Attending a secret poker game. The worst: Reba taking her daddy’s truck out to meet the boy. Surely she hadn’t grown that desperate. In the bed of the truck, Julie could see a plastic gasoline container sliding around, dull red under the streetlights as the truck drove away.

  She didn’t move from the window, and she wasn’t sure why. Waiting for Mr. McLeod’s return, she guessed, or for some clue as to where he’d gone. Nothing happened for more than an hour. She sipped shot after shot of the whiskey until more than half the bottle was gone, flipped through magazines, doodled strange designs on sheets of notebook paper. But she didn’t leave the window. She couldn’t begin to explain what she was doing, why she was sitting there in the dark, watching, riveted. An observer. A spy. She was tired and her muscles felt so relaxed. Her eyes were closing, yet she couldn’t convince herself to move to the bed, to sleep. Wait, a lonely, persistent voice in her head kept saying, and she couldn’t drown it out with alcohol. Wait.

  But it wasn’t Mr. McLeod she saw. Instead, there was movement in Reba’s room. A light went on, then off again, and suddenly, there she was, her light-colored oversize sweater too visible against the dark shrubbery as she slipped out the window. A jagged shard of lightning illuminated the sky. Reba held something flat—a book maybe—to her chest as she walked quickly away from the house, sticking to the shadows. And then she disappeared completely into the night.

  It was the strangest thing, but moments after she watched Reba go, Julie heard the door to Toby’s bedroom click open, heard his footsteps in the hall and on the stairs, and then the sound of the front door opening and closing.

  85

  “Jules came here,” Toby says, his cell phone jammed against his ear. He’s pacing back and forth across the gallery. He hasn’t bothered opening up shop today. He doesn’t feel like it. Fuck it. “She said Reba had a diary. Did you know Reba had a diary?”

  He can hear Nell sigh on the other end of the phone. “Yeah, I knew. Jules got it from me.”

  The room keeps wanting to spin around him, won’t come to a goddamned standstill long enough for anything to make any kind of sense. “Why didn’t you tell me? All these years… You know how I felt about her… Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “I should have just tossed out the damned thing,” Nell says. “It wasn’t good stuff, not for you, and not for Jules, and not for August. I never should have given her that book, but I saw right quick that she wasn’t leaving without it.”

  “Why?” His eyes are wet. “How could you keep it from me?”

  “Toby…Toby, listen to me. You’re better off without it. If you asked Julie right now…I bet she’d tell you that she was better off without it.”

  “Was there ever a baby?” His voice is rising; he can’t seem to help it. “Was she ever really pregnant?”

  Nell’s silence tells him every
thing he needs to know. He hangs up the phone. He can’t remember ever hanging up on Nell before. She betrayed him, he thinks. So did Reba. Maybe. He can’t even tell anymore what’s betrayal and what’s loyalty. He doesn’t have a clue who knows best, only that he sure as hell doesn’t.

  The night Reba died. If he hadn’t been such a fool, such an idiot, so impatient, then things might have been different. He should never have followed her. He’d have been pissed, really pissed, to know that she lied about the kid…but it wouldn’t have changed the way he felt about her.

  But that night, the night she died, he’d decided he wasn’t putting up with it anymore. He wasn’t going to stand by while she went out to meet the boy again. He’d offered her his help, and she’d seemed grateful, seemed almost as though she liked him, not just the things he did to her. That night in her bedroom, his arms around her… Well, things had seemed different. Like they were a real couple or something.

  He’d turned completely soft. Why else would he have followed her to the play? He’d wanted to sit next to her, but he knew she’d get pissed. Maybe he’d been imagining it, but he would swear he could feel the heat radiating off her, even from two seats away. She’d known he was there, and he could feel her wanting him. And it didn’t matter whether that was his kid or not—he wanted her too, and it had been all he could do to sit there in the dark theater and not move closer, not put his hands on her. After the play, she’d walked past him and let her hand brush against his. She had been close enough that he could smell her shampoo, and he’d almost lost it then, almost grabbed her up in his arms and kissed her and let everyone know that this was real, damn it.

  But he hadn’t. He’d lost his nerve, hadn’t wanted to upset her. Hadn’t wanted to push her away again. So he’d gone home, done a line of coke because he thought he would work on his paintings, but instead he sat in front of his window and watched hers for what felt like hours. He wanted to go to her, climb through her bedroom window, and make love to her between those white sheets. He saw her old man’s truck leave the driveway, and that was weird. Not his business, though. Reba was his business, and he couldn’t believe it when he saw her climbing out the window. For a moment, he expected to hear her knocking at his door, but no—she headed off toward the woods, and he felt like punching something.

  He had no idea what she really felt for the other boy, for August, but it wasn’t the same as what she felt for him. The thing between them was stronger, was different from anything Toby had ever felt in his entire life. After the other night, the way she’d drifted to sleep in his arms, he’d been stupid enough to think that she would get rid of the boy. What was the point of being with August, anyway? The kid wasn’t brave enough to stand up and say he might be the father of Reba’s baby, and Reba sure as hell wasn’t going to drag him into it.

  But there she went, off into the night to meet him again. No more, Toby thought, as he jumped up and pulled on his shoes and rushed out the door.

  He shakes his head, trying to bring himself back to the present. He’d thought he was going to make her choose, issue some kind of ultimatum. He can’t stand to think of it now. Frustrated, he hurls his cell across the gallery. Damned phone doesn’t even give him the satisfaction of smashing properly; only the battery and battery cover drop out from the back. He stands there staring at the useless thing, in pieces.

  86

  REBA’S DIARY, 1998

  I feel a certain sense of finality. No matter what, this is the last time I will meet August in the dark.

  This book is the only way to give him the truest truth, to give him words I’ll never be able to say. Everything is here, from the beginning, when things were still soft and sweet. How everything started with Toby. How I became this villain. The intricate web of lies, with me at the center like a sadistic spider. Worst of all, that the baby is no more than a deception made on a whim, woven into existence in my own imagination.

  He’ll never speak to me again. Why would he? And though I don’t like the idea of him hating me, don’t want to sully those lovely memories of the two of us together before things grew so complicated, I also feel an overwhelming sense of relief. Giving August this diary feels right in a way that nothing has in the longest time. He will hate me, but he will be safe—safe from my daddy’s rage, safe from my own rampant dishonesty.

  So, August, when you read this, I hope that maybe you’ll understand, even if only a little bit. You’re more than this, and you deserve better than some silly Southern girl making a mess of your heart. And because of that, it feels good to let you go.

  87

  August listens to Julie, talking about the play, talking about what happened after…

  But he remembers his own side of things. Sitting in his room, waiting. Remembers the light—not too bright, hardly more than the flicker of a candle’s flame, but it was enough to see him clearly, if his mother or father or sister had walked in. What would he have said? He thought, then, that maybe Reba had been right and they should run, and he thought of packing a bag and taking her away. They could go to Virginia. He had family there.

  He regretted waiting so long to talk to Reba about the baby, but when she told him that night at the river, he’d been terrified. And then with Jules finding out about them at that moment… Well, he could have handled the whole thing differently.

  He thought of Reba’s family and wondered if her father would kill him after all, when he found out.

  The trophies on his dresser from his football days caught his eye, shining as they were in the soft light. Trophies used to mean something. He hadn’t wanted things to turn out this way with Reba. He hated that he was the one to put her in this position. It was his fault, really. From the beginning, it was all his fault. It was too much to think about, so instead, he imagined her smiling, the way she had when they first met.

  He was sliding into his jacket when the phone rang, shattering the silence in the house. Surely Reba wouldn’t call him at home, not unless there was some kind of emergency. It occurred to him that she might not even know his phone number. He didn’t have a phone in his bedroom, and he moved quickly to the bedroom door in an attempt to reach the living room phone before the noise woke the entire house. But he was too late—his father stood in the dark living room, phone in his hand.

  “The house,” his father said when he hung up. He was in his nightclothes, a white tee and boxer shorts, but he didn’t ask why August was fully dressed and wide awake. “The new house. It’s on fire. They’re saying arson.”

  August and his sister rode in the backseat to the new neighborhood, Megan asking sleepy, curious questions about who would want to burn down their new house. Rain sprinkled onto the windshield, and loud claps of thunder shook the car as August watched the odometer up front, thought of how each mile took him farther from the river, where he was supposed to be meeting Reba. Already it was one a.m. Already he was late.

  They could see the grayish smoke rising up from blocks away, and instead of the new house, which had been nearly finished, they saw remnants of the fire, small orange flames still flickering, even in the drizzle, and the blackened skeleton of a house. Three fire trucks crowded around the destruction, and two firefighters in full gear sprayed water onto the charred debris. There were policemen waiting to talk to August’s parents.

  One of them introduced himself. “Mr. Elliott,” he asked, “can you think of anyone who would do this intentionally?” August could, but he kept his mouth closed tightly. He thought of Mr. McLeod, of the things Reba had warned him of. He couldn’t imagine that Mr. McLeod had found out about his connection to Reba, though, and figured this must be his way of finally getting revenge on August’s dad for the promotion. He should have told, he knew it, should have done what was best for his family. But he couldn’t, kept seeing Reba’s face and knew the pain it would cause her. Because he would have had to explain how he knew.

  When no flames lingered
and only puffy clouds of smoke billowed into the night air, it was after two a.m. The policeman was asking August’s family to come to the station to file a report, and then they were climbing into the car to follow the police cruiser, all of them rain-drenched and exhausted. His mother started to cry. August touched her shoulder and mumbled something he hoped was soothing, but he felt panicked himself. He needed to get to Reba, but if Mr. McLeod would do this to August’s father because of a workplace grudge, what would he do to August when he found out that Reba was pregnant, and that the baby was his?

  He couldn’t shake the thought of Reba waiting for him in the rain. Even now, after reading the diary, it’s a mental image he can’t completely extinguish.

  88

  Julie wouldn’t have followed Reba, that night, if not for all of the questions in her mind and the whiskey making her bold. Was Reba meeting August? What if August had changed his mind about running away, and they were leaving town? And if they were, why would Toby try to stop them? He’d left too soon after Reba for it to be a coincidence.

  But maybe it was. Julie didn’t know anything anymore. She shoved shoes on her feet and ran from the room. She shouldn’t go after Reba again, she knew it, but if Reba was planning to leave, she had to find a way to stop her. And if she wasn’t, then Julie still needed to make amends. She needed Reba in her life, needed her best friend back.

  The air was cool and lightning flashed, a sharp, bright warning in the sky, but Julie ignored it, the same way she ignored the fat raindrops splashing into her hair. She was clammy, nervous, determined as she stumbled through the fields. The trees, naked without their leaves, passed in a blur. What would she do when she found Reba? What if she interrupted her with August again? Reba would be furious to know that Julie had followed her a second time.