Underneath Everything

by Marcy Beller Paul

  The faint music from the dining-room-turned-dance floor cranks way up, or at least it does in my head. A vibrating bass beat. Dizzying fades. The same words from different mouths around the circle, like lyrics over an endless loop of electronic music: I never. I never. I never.

  Then hers.

  At first I think it’s in my head. Because isn’t that how it’s always been? A whisper in my ear. A pulse beneath my skin. A murmur in my sleep. The feeling of a forgotten dream.

  Jolene.

  But no. There she is, directly across the island from me—slender arm outstretched, shot of whiskey suspended between her thumb and middle finger. She extends the glass in my direction—an air toast—before she speaks.

  “I never got tied up.”

  I lock eyes with Jolene. She lowers her lashes and curves her lips into a sly, knowing smile.

  Eyes go wide around the circle, gazes volleying from Jolene to me. Waiting. It’s not the naked break-in or the backflip off a cabana roof they were expecting.

  It’s better.

  We’re better than real.

  I’ve guarded my memory of that afternoon for so long—locked it in an airtight case and shoved it into the darkest recesses of my safest place. But now that it’s out there in the air, not just between me and Jolene, but on display at Bella’s party, where it can live and breathe and everyone can see it, I feel . . . good.

  I raise my glass to Jolene’s. She tilts her chin and gives me a thin smile before our glasses clink. We throw back our heads and drink.

  The liquor burns my throat and warms my chest. It lights me up again. Like the whiskey is kindling and I’m the fire, throwing sparks.

  The Hurleys and their girls clap and cheer.

  I wipe my lips with the back of my wrist and slide my glass across the counter.

  “Tell me again why I haven’t seen you at one of these things in so long?” Cal shakes his head like it’s a shame and upends the bottle, but the brown liquor that’s left barely fills my glass halfway. I make the whiskey disappear. Cal reaches beneath the counter and produces a pitcher of beer. Red plastic cups appear in front of us. Like magic.

  They need us, Jolene said. And now I believe her.

  Because as the game rolls on, the “I nevers” come fast, the beer goes down faster, and the laughter is manic; the circle spins like a compass, but it always stops on us.

  Because they’re playing for fun, and we’re playing for each other. We’re trading lines back and forth, the same way we have for years. We’re used to this. The only difference is, tonight we have an audience.

  First me: “I never got slapped.”

  Jolene purses her lips. Swigs.

  Then her: “I never got suffocated.”

  I open my throat. Gulp.

  With each piece of our past that’s set free, I tip my cup to my lips and drink. And drink and drink and drink. Until there is only me and Jolene. Swimming, circling, submerged in a place that drowns out hollers and whistles and winks. Until I can swallow and breathe simultaneously, like the fish Jolene always knew I could be, if she pushed me.

  My turn again. “I never felt like I wasn’t real.”

  Jolene tosses her hair. The auburn streak underneath floats in the air for a second and catches a spotlight from the disco ball in the dining room before falling to her shoulder and settling on her sweater. My sweater. She lifts her cup to drink. The bottom blocks her face. I can’t see her again until she claps the red plastic on the counter and licks the foam off her top lip.

  When Jolene’s up again, and she has everyone’s attention, she lengthens her neck, like a cat stretching in the sun. “I never ran away from everyone. I never disappeared.”

  I feel the edges of my vision contract, go black, expand again. And then I laugh. If I could have disappeared back then, I would have—gathered up all my dark, scarred parts and folded in on myself until there was nothing left. But I don’t want that anymore. I want to be here. I want to slice open the memories, peel back the skin, and let them bleed out in front of everyone.

  I coat my throat with flat beer, let the voices recede and circle back to me. “I never wished someone would save me.”

  Jolene doesn’t bother with beer this time.

  “I never wished someone would love me,” she says, her voice clear and cool over the slurs and shouts of the kitchen crowd.

  Another part of me unearthed, released.

  My eyes are locked on Jolene, but I don’t need to see the rest of the faces in the circle to know they’re looking at me. I can feel their eyes stuck to my body like a harsh August heat.

  I breathe in the humid stink of the kitchen and breathe it out again.

  I hold the moment.

  Not because I can’t think of a response, but because the response is so easy. It comes to me ready, willing. Like it’s already been written. Which is actually sort of true. The line isn’t mine; someone gave it to me. The same person I was thinking of when I made that wish, who my sophomore self hoped in her deepest, secret heart would love her, because she had no idea there’d be someone else—that there already was—someone who’d inhabit her heart, seep through her skin, curl up and take residence, poisoning her for everyone else. Even him. Especially him.

  Hudson.

  I say it to Jolene, because he said it to me. “I never begged my boyfriend to love me.”

  Jolene’s eyes go wide. The tendons in her neck rise into ropes, and the corners of her lips pinch.

  I’m afraid, for a second, that I’ve crossed a line—stepped into some invisible division.

  Then I blink, and her lashes are lowered again, her neck smooth and slender, her lips imperceptibly curved in that Mona Lisa smirk.

  But I can still see the other face underneath. The strand of auburn hair stuck to the sweat on her neck, the coiled tension cloaked in the posed slope of her shoulder, the flash of fire hidden in her half-lidded eyes.

  One version of Jolene set over the other, like a piece of tracing paper. Or a double exposure.

  I blink and blink and blink, but the two images won’t line up exactly.

  The effect is haunting. Disorienting.

  I press my palms on the granite counter for balance, but when I shift my weight, the corner of my boot skids on something slippery and the room spins.

  CHAPTER 35

  I FLAIL FOR something stable. Instead I connect with soft, supple skin.

  “The twins love you, babe, but show some restraint.” Bella flashes me a big, lip-lined grin. Then I realize where my hand is, and take it out of her cleavage.

  “Bells, I—”

  “Oh, don’t worry about them.” Bella waves one hand in front of her chest and lifts a champagne glass to her lips with the other. “They like the attention.” She takes in the cups, the circle, the crowd. Then she sidles up next to me and rests the twins on the granite, between her elbows. “What are we playing?”

  “We’re playing I Never.” Cal twirls his pointer finger in front of him like he’s mixing an imaginary drink. “Those two,” he says, wagging his finger back and forth between me and Jolene, “have got their own game going on.”

  I turn back to Jolene, who looks serene. Like she’s in this pristine, shimmering sphere while the rest of us are dirty, drunk, dim.

  Maybe it’s because she lines up again—one face, one expression. There’s no overlay of thin rustling paper pinching her lips and roping her throat, just solid lines and strong strokes.

  She stares back at me, still as a portrait.

  “But you know me,” Cal says, flashing Bella a million-dollar grin. “I’m game for anything.” He brushes the same lock of black hair off his eyes and lifts the pitcher like it’s evidence.

  “Ladies first,” Bella tells Cal, her doe eyes big and serious. Then she turns to us, and her hands fly forward, wrists bent, hands flexed, like two stop signs. “Okay. I was mad at you, Jolene, I’ll admit it. But let’s just agree here and now that we’re all friends again. It’s senior year,
and we promised we’d be amazing things; and I can’t take any more fighting.” Bella tips her stiff waves of hair toward Jolene first and then to me. “I can do it. Can you two?”

  “Of course,” Jolene says—animated once again. She leans onto her forearms and drapes her hair on the granite, lifting her body over the counter in Bella’s direction. “For you.”

  “Yeah,” I agree. But Bella’s already squealing.

  “Yay!” Bella takes another sip of champagne. Imprints of lips overlap on the glass rim. “I’ve been wait-ing for this!” Bella separates each syllable into its own song and does a little dance in her stilettos. “I’m in!”

  Cal hands a cup to Bella, and the game picks up again; but I have a hard time keeping track of whose turn it is, and when. At some point the original girls switch out and two more take their place. Then the Hurleys are gone too, replaced by more boys in hats, like they’re a renewable resource.

  Then Jolene is next to me—her chin skimming my shoulder, her fingers on my forearm—and everything’s okay again. Maybe nothing was ever wrong. Because her head is on my chest. My cheek is on her neck. We’re curling into each other.

  What do you want to be, Mattie?

  I want to be loved.

  I lift my chin. My lips brush the lobe of Jolene’s ear. She laughs at something Bella says and leans into me the slightest bit.

  My skin pricks with adrenaline, the energy that was inside, pushing its way through my pores, to the surface. Turning my insides out, so everybody can see:

  I want to be loved.

  There’s no order to the game anymore. Just drinking and shouting and more drinking.

  “I never kissed a girl!” someone says. Is it me?

  Jolene and I click our cups together and drink.

  “Oh no you don’t,” Bella chimes in, catching the back of my neck. “I’m not going to be left out at my own party!” She smashes our mouths together. When she pulls away, her lips are half lined, and mine feel sticky.

  Bella lifts her cup again. “I never liked it!”

  We laugh into our beer.

  We drink. As the beer flows down my throat, a sweet ache rushes up. This is how it should have been. All of us, together. The only thing that’s missing is Kris. Even though she would have hated this.

  Jolene pushes a hair out of my eyes with her middle finger and trails it lightly along my hairline. For a second her eyes flick up and above me, but before I can turn around to see what she’s looking at, she’s raising her cup again. She’s talking.

  “I never slept with a girl.”

  Shouts erupt around us. The house tilts, rights itself.

  “Sleepovers, people! Deal with it!” Bella drinks.

  We join her.

  “I never slept with a boy.”

  It’s hard to tell who’s talking anymore. All the voices are so familiar, so similar. Saying things we all did. And then.

  Red cups. Wet lips. Mine. Moving.

  “I never slept with Hudson.”

  “Watch what you say.”

  Hudson. He’s here! I said his name and he appeared! I think. It definitely looks like him—black thermal worn thin, flannel unbuttoned, dark hair pulled back, except for the strands that always seem to escape. I reach out to tuck them behind his ear, but my aim is off. My hand heads straight for his chest, but it never connects. Hudson catches it, a tight grip on my wrist. That’s when I look at his face, which is the only thing in the room that isn’t spinning, swimming.

  It’s his eyes that bring me back to the surface—a cool, cerulean blue. They pull me up from a deep, dark place, gasping. And changed.

  I pry my wrist away from him and stumble backward, into Jolene’s palms. She props me up.

  “I’ve watched long enough, don’t you think? I’m sick of watching,” I tell him.

  “It’s not their business.” His lips barely move when he speaks.

  “It’s my business. And I’m tired of hiding.” I raise my cup again, and a surge streaks through me, soaks my skin. Or maybe that’s beer. My neck is wet. So is my sweater. Jolene’s sweater. “I never slept with Hudson!”

  “You’ve never slept with anyone.” Kris grabs my cup and takes a long swallow, then makes a face. “This is warm and flat, by the way.”

  I stare at her and wonder if I’m hallucinating. Can combining weed and beer do that? Because, Kris. At Bella’s party. Standing shoulder to shoulder with Hudson? That doesn’t happen. I squeeze my eyes shut, but that makes the room spin again, so I open them. But it’s still happening: Hudson, Kris, Jolene, Bella, me, the party.

  Bella bends at the knees and lets out a squee. “You totally came!” She stands tippy-toe on her stilettoes and throws her arms around Kris. “We’re all here!”

  Now that Bella has confirmed this is actually happening, I feel another surge stun me; but it’s not the frantic energy this time, aching to get loose. And it’s not the beer. It’s Kris. It’s everything we’ve been through and everything we haven’t. It’s drives in the reservation and Trivial Pursuit games and HaFTAs and Top Tens. It’s her lying to me.

  “Yes! You’re here!” I announce. Ponytails and hat brims swivel in my peripheral vision. Chatter stops in the kitchen. But the quiet only makes me talk louder. “You never come to parties!” I grab Jolene’s cup off the counter, shove it into Kris’s cable-knit sweater, then sweep my arm in an arc across the room. “I never come to parties!”

  Every red cup in the kitchen rises.

  Kris crosses her arms. Hudson’s hands curl into fists beneath his unbuttoned cuffs. Jolene’s fingers press into the soft skin of my waist. I can feel her fingernails through the thin knit of the sweater. I can feel everyone watching. Their stares have a texture and weight I can wear. My skin pulses with it.

  “It’s a game, Kris. Come on! Have a little fun! We never do anything!”

  Another wave of red cups.

  “We never do this.” Kris’s voice is quiet and clipped in the hush of the kitchen.

  “You don’t. I do.” I throw back my head and chug to prove it.

  “So now you’re lying too?”

  “Nope,” I say. “That’s your department.”

  “You’ve never had sex.” She’s so sure. With her pursed lips and cocked hip. She’s so sure I would have told her. But she shouldn’t be.

  I drink again.

  Kris’s lips peel apart and hang open. Then she clamps her mouth shut again and shakes her head.

  “Fuck this.” Hudson is a blur of dark hair and flannel as he shoves his way past the keg and through the packed living room. But isn’t that how he’s always been? Even when he was right in front of me? Even when I was touching him? Not so much a person as an idea. An apparition. A vision of what could have been. Who I could have been.

  But not who I am.

  When I step forward, out of Jolene’s hold, every open mouth and roving eye in the kitchen follows me. They’ve eaten all my secrets, but they’re still hungry. They want what comes next, and I’m going to give it to them.

  I lean into Kris. “I never ran away from everything I was afraid of.” Sip. “I never showed up at school each day wishing I was somewhere else.” Sip. “I never thought I was too good for everyone, including my boyfriend.” The peach in Kris’s cheeks deepens, shifts to crimson. Not all at once but in rippling bits. I lean closer, until my lower lip hits her ear. “I never lied to my best friend.”

  Kris doesn’t move.

  “Come on now, Kris. You should be drinking. You know the rules, right? If you’ve done the thing . . .” I place two fingers on the bottom of her cup and flick it up.

  She jerks away from me. “We’re not best friends.”

  It’s what we always said, but not the way we always said it—with a laugh in the backs of our throats and a shared history etched across our memories. With a confidence so deep, so sure, it drilled down to our cores.

  No. When Kris says we’re not best friends, I don’t hear any of those things. The words are
flat. Empty.

  And this makes me angrier than anything.

  We’re not best friends.

  “Exactly.” I slam my cup on the counter and turn around.

  Jolene is waiting. She snakes her arm around my waist. We make our exit together, hair and hips swinging through the white living room toward the dark, dense forest of the dance floor. But before we become a part of it, I hear a shout—three words thrown at my back, barely audible over the roar of the speakers—and unlike the last thing she said, this sounds exactly like the Kris I remember.

  “Who are you?”

  CHAPTER 36

  THE MUSIC VIBRATES through my boots to the soles of my feet. It rattles my chest and takes over my head. My entire body thrums with it, as if now that I’ve let everything go—cut open my dark heart and exposed the stained and shameful things I hid there for so long—a physical space has been created inside me.

  I’m light. My feet leave the wood floor and I’m airborne, over and over again. My hair swings in wet strings around me. The guy with the striped shirt—the one who smoked me up—is here too. He says something to me, but I can’t hear him. We’re right in front of a speaker. I shrug my shoulders and laugh. I think he shrugs too, but it’s hard to tell in the flash of the strobe light. His movements seem separated. Choppy. Like a robot’s. Which makes me laugh so hard, my eyes crinkle at the sides, my chin rises, and my neck comes unhinged. My head lands on something soft and hard at the same time: smooth yarn, solid bone. I’m surrounded by dark hair and cinnamon.

  Because I’m light, but not empty. Open, but not alone.

  Jolene sways behind me, her hands on my hips. The lit ball hung from the ceiling spins, and we’re covered in tiny white dots. Like strung lights. Or stars. And for a second we’re outside. We’re the sky on a summer night. It reminds me of something. But Jolene spins me around and I forget, because she’s laughing and we’re dancing.

  And I’m thinking, THIS. This is what I’ve been missing.

  Then the song switches. The thumping stops. A few soaring notes fill the room. They float over us. And we wait with heavy breaths and nodding heads.

  When the bass kicks in again, so do we. For a second it’s like we’re all suspended. Then our feet hit the floor, and the dining room explodes in a fit of waving arms and flying knees.