“I’m sorry about today,” he says again. “I should have told you.” I can’t help thinking Hudson knows, somehow, about the note. Or that I took Jolene home. I can’t help feeling guilty, like I should be the one coming clean. But even so, I don’t speak. He’d get angry. He’d see me differently. And that’s something I can’t risk right now. I need to be the girl he sees. I need to know she exists.
“Told me what?”
“Hold on,” he says, turning away from me. “Music.” He walks toward the huge black stereo sunk into the corner of the thick carpet, reaches down into what looks like a lake of circular silver fish, and plucks a disc from the middle. He slips it into the tray and presses play. While it spins, he takes my hand—the one Jolene grabbed under the library table—and leads me to the bed. He sits down on the green flannel sheet, leans back against the wall, rests his elbows on the fraying knees of his jeans, and faces me.
Then the deep voice sings from his speakers, the one that was playing in the car at the reservation. It’s so intimate—like there’s another person in the room.
And then there is.
“I didn’t want to talk about Jolene,” he says.
So it was about her after all.
“It’s okay,” I say. But it’s not. I’ve been working so hard to shut her out, and now she’s here again. I feel this building pressure inside me, like my blood is trying to burst out of my skin. But it’s not me who caved and said her name, I remind myself; it’s Hudson.
“You keep saying that.” He rips a white string from the hole in his jeans. “But it’s not. I just need to say this so you don’t think—so you understand why sometimes I . . . stop.”
Hudson won’t look at me. His eyes are glued to his fingers, the soft, twisted thread they roll back and forth. His hair hangs loose in dark waves around his face.
“It’s okay,” I say again. I’m not sure whether I’m saying it for him or for me, but either way, it seems like the right—the only—thing to say. Especially when my heart is thudding and my blood is buzzing. Now that Hudson’s talking about Jolene, I want to know everything.
“I left her. But there are some things that won’t go away.” The piece of thread drops from his fingers, drifts to the bed. He palms the knees of his jeans. “When we were . . . together . . . I always had to be the one to . . . start.” He flicks his eyes up to me. I nod. It’s okay. He rests his elbows on his knees, hangs his hands between them, and weaves his fingers together. “But then once we were . . . into it . . . she’d get really into it. Once she bit me.”
I let out a quick huff of breath. Hudson presses his lips together.
“Sorry, I’m okay. It’s— I’m listening,” I tell him.
Hudson readjusts his elbows on his knees, leans forward. The bed squeaks. “So she’d get really into things, but then if I did too, she’d freak out.”
“Freak out how?”
Hudson shrugs. And I think he’s going to stop telling me, which makes the buzz inside me grow loud and big. But then he speaks. And I’m relieved.
“She’d stop my hand, yell at me, tell me I was going too fast. Or that just because we were together once didn’t give me permission to do anything she didn’t want.” He blinks a few times, licks his lips. “I mean, shit. It’s not like I ever . . . At the end she’d only touch me in public anyway. It was like— You know what?” He looks up. “You don’t need to hear this. I just wanted to explain. Why I’m not always sure, you know, what I should do. With you. I know you’re not her. It’s just . . .”
Hudson’s shoulders hunch forward. He nods, but not to the beat of the music. It’s like he’s in pain. But it’s not his fault. Jolene. She does this to people.
She’s done it to me.
I take his hand and fit our fingers together. His skin is three shades darker than mine, even in the winter, except for the thin line circling his finger where he used to wear Jolene’s ring. That pale strip matches mine exactly.
“She tied me up once,” I say. Hudson’s head jerks up, and his body rocks backward, like the words I’ve stored for so long have an actual force. “She tied my wrists and legs together and taped my mouth. And I let her. It was supposed to be a game, but—” I stop for a breath and the words stop too. Then something covers my mouth—the tape—no, his lips, strong against mine, sealing us together. He eases me onto the bed. My head hums and my blood pulses. I breathe into him, and he breathes back, until I think maybe he’s breathing for me, or I’m breathing for him, or we’re the same person. Then his tongue finds mine. We taste and test the new secrets between us, teasing them back and forth until they’re ours. Until she’s ours, instead of us being hers.
When he lifts himself up, my body feels too light. I think he’ll stop, and I can’t stand it. But he doesn’t stop. He traces a slow circle around my wrist. His touch is so light I want to cry. When he lets go of my wrist, he takes my hand and sits me up so we’re facing. He leans into me until our foreheads touch, then slips my shirt over my head. He lays me back down on the flannel sheets and unbuttons my jeans. I stare at the ceiling as he tugs them down past my knees, the same way I tugged at the note from Jolene.
She folded it into a triangle, just like we did in intermediate school. The only script on the outside was my name—not Mattie, but Lorraine—the one she gave me in her stories. Same way I’d call her Jane. We used to sign every note that way. I flipped the folded paper around in my hands, staring at the perfectly curved letters, then slipped my finger inside the tight triangle and pulled the tucked edge free.
Hudson slides my jeans over my feet. I kick them to the floor. He takes off his shirt. I press my palms to his chest. He breathes. I feel his heartbeat. It’s so quick. He lowers his lips to my shoulder and kisses me along my collarbone. When he reaches my bra strap, he lifts it with his index finger and lets it fall down my arm.
I unfolded the note slowly, flattening each careful fold. I pinned it against the center of my steering wheel and ran my palm over it a few times before I let myself look.
Hudson slips his arm underneath me and unhooks my bra. I run my hands through his hair, down his neck, as I move closer to him. And we kiss, but kissing is so much more when I can feel his shoulder blades and the curve of his back, the angle of his hip and the waist of his jeans. I run my fingers along the rough denim, then slip them beneath his boxers. His breath hitches, then comes back deeper. His chest moves in and out against mine.
Written in bleeding blue script across the creased sheet were the last lines Jolene had ever spoken of our poem.
Hudson’s lips brush mine before he tugs at his own jeans. Then we get rid of everything that’s left between us. For a second we are still, nothing but skin and breath thrumming on the bed.
“Do you have . . . ?”
“Yeah,” he answers. There is some fumbling in his nightstand drawer, then the rip of plastic. A few seconds later he’s holding himself above me—arms straight and shaking. His eyes, clear as sky, open wide. His eyebrows lift. He asks if I’m okay.
I say yes.
Hudson lowers himself slowly.
Two little girls all alone in the world,
who went to sleep twins
and woke up in one skin.
CHAPTER 22
JOLENE WRITES ME notes every day after that. Instead of maps, I collect folded triangles covered in blue felt-tipped pen, addressed to Lorraine. I anticipate her hand under the table, the shape of the paper in my palm, the scent of cinnamon that lingers through English and on the drive home with Bella and Kris. They talk about Jolene like she doesn’t exist, like they were friends with her long ago in a land far, far away. But they still talk about her.
Everybody does.
It’s like some kind of fucked-up social physics: now that Jolene isn’t physically on display in the hallway, the front lawn, the cafeteria—now that she only shows up for class (and barely that)—something needs to fill the space. The whispers have mated and multiplied and morphed from scraps
of speculation into full-blown stories. But her name doesn’t haunt me anymore. I don’t hear it in the squeak of my sneakers or the click of a closing classroom door. Because Jolene is with me now. She’s the crinkle and slide of the note unfolding, the careful curves of script detailing each memory. Everyone talks, but nobody knows about study hall. Nobody knows about us.
Not even Hudson.
I tell him other things about me and Jolene. Our history. Every day after school, in his arms, on his flannel sheets, I tell him whichever memory Jolene has revived for me. The scar on my palm, her mom’s necklace, the night I came over when she called at midnight.
He tells me stories too: how Jolene took care of him when no one else did—made him food when his dad didn’t come home and warmed his bed when his parents’ lay tucked and untouched. How the two of them curled up on her couch as the rest of the house echoed, empty, around them. How they streaked through the rooms, raging against their parents.
He tells me how Jolene turned sour the day he started talking to his mom again. How she made him say he loved her over and over again until the words lost meaning. And how he stayed with her too long because he promised he’d take care of her, and he wanted to be the kind of person who kept his word.
Under desks, on top of beds, from clasped hands to shared breath, the past unfolds. It flows from Jolene to me to Hudson, forming a tinted lens of shared memory that colors everything and, eventually, finds its way into the present.
CHAPTER 23
I SHOW UP for study hall the Monday before Christmas break, and there’s a printout taped to the door. It’s supposed to say: “Study Hall in the Auditorium Today. Library Closed. Heaters Broken.” Except someone has taken a black marker to it, so what’s left is: “Library Hosed. Haters Broke.”
I hug my thin sweater to my chest. It’s the one my mom gave me, the one I wore when I went to the reservation with Hudson, and it’s not warm enough.
I spin around and nearly collide with three boys talking their way into the library.
“Closed,” I say as they separate to let me through. “Auditorium.”
“Is that Hudson’s new girl?” I hear as I walk away.
Girl. As if we’re a line of interchangeable things hinged to Hudson, which replenish each season. It’s gross and sexist.
And electrifying.
To be seen. To be new.
I cut back through the crowd and skip down the stairs. I haven’t been to the auditorium for anything but assemblies since drama, first semester of junior year. Performing for people isn’t my thing, but the idea of being someone else was appealing. Especially then, when it was just me and Kris, working our invisibility.
I shove open the heavy door with my shoulder, step onto the scuffed wood stage, and take it in. The thick rippling curtains. The racks of colored spotlights floating above them. The half-painted set pieces.
Fumes of fresh wood and paint follow me as I exit stage left and walk down three shallow steps. Ms. Glick shouts instructions: check in at the front, no assigned seats, study quietly since we’re sharing the space with the cast and crew of Pippin, the school musical, which opens this week.
I check in and head straight for the back of the auditorium, beneath the balcony. It’s dark under the eave, and I like having everyone in front of me. I watch heads slant to trade secrets, and search the silhouettes for the toss of Jolene’s dark hair or the slope of her shoulder, but I don’t see either. So I scoot down the bristled velvet, balance my knees on the seat back in front of me, and settle in with some calculus. But the curves blur and the seat squeaks and it’s too dark to see and where is she?
I close my notebook as the drama crew takes the stage—a mix of black bodysuits and clownish costumes.
I should be relieved that Jolene isn’t here.
Trading notes in study hall was safe. Assigned seats and enforced silence made it that way. But here it’s different. Each chair is a choice. Every whisper takes a trip around the auditorium. Here, we could be seen.
Hudson could find out.
Kris. Even though we haven’t been hanging out as much as we used to, our friendship—it’s not unfixable. But if she found out about Jolene . . .
The damage would be permanent.
I should reopen my notebook, get a jump on my homework. I should ignore the doors and dark corners.
Instead I lean forward, rest my elbows on the seat back in front of me, and scan the audience one last time. When I don’t find her, I give up and watch the drama crew settle into some sort of formation in the center of the stage. I can barely hear what they’re saying, but I can see their faces transform from frustration to rage, their necks and elbows angle, their hands and fingers twirl as if they’re performing an endless magic trick. Then the soft sound of a piano floats in, and every mouth onstage forms into a tight O. This time their combined voices reach me. They sound like ghosts.
“Hey!” A hiss from behind me. Hot breath on my neck.
“Wha—”
“No! Don’t turn around. We can talk like this.” I lean back in my seat. These are the first sober words Jolene’s said to me since sophomore summer (everything else has been in notes and texts), but I can still tell from the lilt of her voice that she’s smiling.
“Okay.” I glue my eyes to the stage, sit stiff in my seat. There’s a group of girls a few rows up. All they’d have to do is turn around and we’d be—
“Relax.” Jolene sets her hand on my shoulder, sinks her fingertips between the wide stitches of my sweater. “It’s dark back here. No one can see.” Her skin is warm. Then it’s gone. She sweeps her hand across my hanging hair. A soft tingle travels across my scalp, down the length of my spine. And the fear goes with it.
Jolene isn’t going to give herself away. She’s been halfway hidden since Thanksgiving. I’m still not sure why; but the point is, if she’s here, it’s not to reveal herself. She’s under the balcony. She’s whispering. She doesn’t want to be seen.
She wants to be with me.
I sink into my seat.
“Your hair is so long,” she whispers.
“I know. I let it grow,” I say to the stage, which has just transformed from a bland set of black-and-white benches to lush greens, high pinks, and a random tree.
“It looks awesome,” she says. I can’t help smiling. “I always liked it like that.” A second later my hair falls flat and something squeaks. It must be her seat. I sink farther into mine and wait for a story, a memory, whatever she would have written in her note today. But she doesn’t say anything. I wait a little longer. And just when I’m about to tell a story of my own, I hear her voice again from behind me, but this time it’s farther away. “Does he love it?”
My body goes rigid. We’ve never talked about Hudson. We’ve never talked about anything. Not since I saw them kiss at her locker. I feel like I’m cheating, but I’m not even sure who I’m cheating on. Hudson or Jolene? Obviously Hudson wouldn’t want me here with Jolene, but I doubt Jolene wants me with Hudson, either. And I haven’t told her what Hudson’s been saying about her. The stories. Especially not the one that won’t leave me, the one I’ve started hearing in her voice instead of his: Jolene begging over and over again, Tell me you love me.
I sit up and stare straight ahead. All the set pieces have been cleared. The stage is naked. Three girls in black bodysuits—smiles plastic, elbows bent—emerge from behind the right curtain in a triangle formation. They inch toward center stage like injured figure skaters: one foot swerving left and right, while the other drags behind them.
“He doesn’t hate it,” I say, brushing my hair back, taking care to keep my voice casual. Vague. Neutral.
Neither of us says anything for a few minutes. The sounds of the auditorium bounce around us—dares and protests and laughs and lines and songs—but none of it compares to the thick air between me and Jolene, the thing that’s been between us all along.
Hudson.
“He always wanted me to cut mine,” s
he says finally. “But I can see why he’d like yours this way.”
I shut my eyes tight. What does that mean?
Another part of me laughs, answers: You know exactly what it means.
“Then again, Hudson wanted me to do a lot of things,” she says, her fingers in my hair again. I imagine the things Hudson wanted her to do. Then I try to unimagine them. He’s with me, I remind myself. Not Jolene.
She sweeps my hair up off my neck and twists it into a bun. The tension tugs at my temples. “And I’m glad I didn’t change for him. He said he loved me, but obviously he didn’t. He didn’t take me home from Bella’s party.”
My throat feels as tight as my scalp. Hudson might be with me, but he’s never said he loves me. Then again, he said he loved Jolene, and he left her to fend for herself when she was dead drunk at Bella’s.
Jolene pats her fingertips down my neck, the way we used to give the chills in intermediate school, then leans so far forward in her seat that our cheeks meet and whispers, “You’re too good for him, you know.”
My hair falls loose against my neck. My cheek goes cold. She’s not touching me anymore, but her words swirl and swell in my chest.
I still think the label “best friend” is empty, but when Jolene says stuff like that, I remember why I used to call her mine.
I turn around—forgetting for a second who might see us—but before I can twist completely in my seat, I’m blinded. I shield my eyes with my hand. My arm is hit with high heat. Hot pink. I blink. By then the spotlights have spun to other parts of the auditorium, coloring them pink and green. A voice yells, “Cut the gels!” and it’s dark again. I blink a few more times, and when I can finally see something other than a faintly flashing disk, I twist around to find Jolene; but all I see is a bouncing, squeaking seat. The only trace of her is a smudge of clear lip gloss on my cheek.
I face forward again. The strange dancers are gone, but the stage is full of actors costumed in carnival colors. They bow, beckon, smile, lick their lips. A couple of them drag something. A set piece. Large. Dark. It’s not until they stop at center stage, behind a lone boy dressed in drab rags, that I get a good look at it. The set piece stands taller than the boy. It’s black. Curtained, like an upright coffin. It’s presented to the boy with twirled wrists and upturned palms. The cast whispers. Smiles. Hisses. Or maybe that’s the sound of something burning? It smells like smoke, but nobody seems to notice. Especially not the boy. He touches the black wood, tests the box, as the chorus coos behind him. They want him to go in. They want it so badly. And he wants to go too, I think. But instead he turns to the audience and starts to sing. His voice sounds fragile at first, like it might break. But it doesn’t.
Underneath Everything Page 15
