She rolled over. Her chest was rising and falling like it was her that had just run stadiums. “Oh, I guess it’s okay when you do this stuff because you’re Cassidy Hyde.”
“I don’t do any of that.” I wiped sweat from my forehead. But of course I remembered the boy behind the video recorder in Dearborn, red light blinking in my face, and wondered if she was a little bit right.
“That’s not what I heard.” She scooted off the foot of the bed. From the floor she grabbed a pair of flannel pajama bottoms and a sweatshirt. She pulled the sweatshirt over her head and immediately looked less like a cyborg had taken over her body. “You must be pleased now that you have Mom and Dad convinced that you’re back to being Miss Perfect.” She tugged on the pants. “But it’s not easy being Miss Perfect’s baby sister, okay? You could at least invite me to one of those parties or something. We are related, you know, and we do go to the same high school.”
My throat tightened. I wasn’t sure I wanted my sister near a party ever. Especially not now.
She waited for a few seconds for me to respond. When I didn’t, her shoulders sagged and she moved for the door.
“You’ll thank me later,” I called after her. But she was already down the hallway and I wasn’t sure if she heard.
I shook my head and slid off the side of the bed. I’d left my purse on my nightstand after church. Honor was right about one thing. The relief I felt seeing my parents’ faces now that they believed I was back to being the old Cassidy left me feeling a hundred pounds lighter. Better than any Gwyneth Paltrow juice fast. And besides, they didn’t just believe it was true, it was true.
I felt strong again, functional, vibrant. The leftover effects of my run still hummed through me like a tuning fork. My sister was just naive. What did she know about the world? Nothing.
I unzipped the top of my purse, fished out the ziplock bag, popped the other half of the tablet into my mouth, then swallowed.
SIX
Marcy
If everyone’s life was a story, then any given night was a scene waiting to be played out. Sure, those boys had momentarily stolen the show, but I was returning to take back the narrative. Surprise. I sure hoped they liked twist endings.
I’d left my car on a side street and now stood at the end of a wide lane. Lamps lit the redbrick street of fraternity row and I hugged the iron fences that hemmed in large colonial homes where I passed a boy with his arm draped casually over his girlfriend’s shoulder. Her oversized sorority T-shirt hung down to mid-thigh. The boy gave me a slight nod as I slipped by and I wondered how well I blended in with the college students. Did I look young to the couple the way I should have looked young—too young—to those boys that night?
I supposed it didn’t matter anymore. Not when I could already taste the coppery, metallic tang of revenge on my tongue. I studied the letters on each of the houses, searching for the funny-looking B and a symbol that resembled either a deformed W or a misshapen trident.
I went by three houses before I spotted it. A two-story house with white columns framing a porch. A sheet hung out of one of the second-story windows. It was painted with neon-green letters to announce a Monday night throwback rave mixer, whatever that was. It sounded pointless and barbaric. So basically, exactly what I’d expect. On the untended lawn was a long table, strewn with red plastic cups.
This was it. Beta Psi.
The fraternity from California’s and Short One’s T-shirts. Heat crept up my neck and burned my ears as I took in the evidence of the days and nights of merriment they’d enjoyed in the weeks since they’d stolen from me what was only mine to give. The one with the long hair who’d told me to chill out—California—and Short One—the boy who’d hid behind the blinking red light of the camera, watching. Funny how the pair of them had given me the clues I needed to track the group. A couple shirts and Greek letters. Not funny ha-ha, mind you. At least not for them.
I hated them both. Hovering outside the iron gate, I watched and listened. It was a Sunday night and the volume of campus life had been turned down to a dull hum of activity that seemed to take place behind closed doors.
Shadows moved beyond the orange glow of the Beta Psi windows. The gate creaked as I opened it. I didn’t flinch. Cautiously, I crossed the lawn to one of the windows on the lower floor. I wore all black down to my Converse. My hair was slicked into a low ponytail.
Before I reached the glass, I lowered myself into a crouch so that my head wouldn’t clear the sill. The sound of a boy’s voice floated through the panes too quiet to make out what he was saying, but when he was finished, a chorus of male voices joined him, chanting a mix of jumbled words in unison.
While they chanted, I latched my fingers to the windowsill and pulled my nose over the bottom ledge. Inside, a group of boys sat in folding chairs listening intently to the boy at the podium. I dove back under the window to hide from view.
I knew about the weekly meetings of fraternities and sororities. I’d heard about them. The memory felt fresh, but I couldn’t remember how or why, when I tried to place it.
Squatting outside of the Beta Psi house, I felt like a sitting duck, so I left my post there and rounded the building to wait on the side. Pizza boxes and beer cans piled waist-high around me. I leaned against the cool brick, loitering at the corner so that I could see the moment anyone from inside the house left. I pictured the Beta Psi T-shirts again and prayed to the gods I didn’t believe existed that I’d be right. That they would be here.
I felt at home in the shadows. My fingers found the knife blade in my hoodie. I turned the hilt over and over again in my hand, wondering which ones would scream when I found them and which ones would go wide-eyed but wordlessly. The images formed in my mind like a delicious fantasy to be savored.
Meanwhile, the night ticked on and I lost track of how much time had passed. Five minutes? Ten? Fifteen? I was as still and immovable as the house. As I waited, I began to hum softly and then the song came back to me. Each line in bloody succession.
“Hide and seek, hide and seek,” I crooned as though in lullaby. “In the dark, they all will shriek.…” The words left a smile.
The song formed and re-formed itself in my head, weaving me into a trance. “Seek and hide, seek and hide, count the nights until they’ve died.…” Until the door to Beta Psi opened. The first few boys trickled out, laughing and calling into the dark after one another. The hairs on the back of my neck bristled. My grip tightened around the thin knife hilt.
“Hide and seek, hide and seek,” I hummed the words softly, observing.
And then there he was. Short One. He was walking out with California, a backpack slung over one shoulder. I held my breath, waiting. Were the others inside? Would Circus Master, with his devilish, lopsided sneer, be making an appearance or were there only these two?
As Short One and California turned left out of the gate, I realized I had to make a decision. At a spot still within the house’s shadow, I hopped the fence into another fraternity’s yard. Trees dappled the moonlight, shifting and stirring to create eerie shapes on the ground. I kept my eye trained on the two boys like a sniper rifle.
They chatted easily between each other as they strolled down the sidewalk and I felt the heat creeping up again, rising in me like fire up a stake. The more I saw how unperturbed they were, the more I wanted to watch them burn. California jumped up and touched a lamp at the top of a post. On the next one, Short One tried to copy and missed.
Two out of five, I told myself. Two out of five wasn’t bad. I waited for them to pass the fraternity whose lawn I now found myself occupying and then I exited the identical iron gate and fell in step behind the pair. Two out of five was good, I tried telling myself again. My heart rate sped up.
I would follow them until they turned off somewhere unpopulated. Somewhere like where they’d taken me. My vision swam with red. I studied the back of Short One’s neck and imagined the silky feel of his blood coating my fingers.
Easy, I
warned internally. I had to be careful. Couldn’t mess up. If I messed up, I might not get another chance. I might miss the other three. And that would never do.
To calm myself, I sang the song in my head. Seek and hide, seek and hide, count the nights …
We turned left again at the end of the road and I recognized the twinkling lights of the dormitory buildings sparkling in front of us. The window of opportunity was shrinking. Now was the time. I was sliding the knife out of my pocket and tightening my fist around the hilt when a squeal came from the direction of one of the sorority houses and a streak of tan legs and blond hair shot across the street and wrapped its way around California.
My scalp tingled. I seethed through my teeth and quickened my stride.
Go. Away, I willed the girl. Stupid girl. Stupid, stupid, stupid girl. Instead of going away, she linked her hands with California’s and fell in step with him, smiling and tucking her hair behind one ear. She talked easily to Short One as well, a melody of words I couldn’t quite make out.
Meanwhile, the boys had now halved the distance between themselves and the dorms. My empty hand clenched, nails bearing down into my palm.
“Think,” I commanded myself quietly. Think, think, think. The need for revenge and for that revenge to come tonight buzzed in me like an addiction and sent my skin crawling.
I felt my instincts sharpen as we got closer to campus. I noticed the campus security golf cart parked on the side of the street, yellow light blinking. I took in the lights cascading from dorm rooms that overlooked the quad where the boys were now crossing, with me in close pursuit.
I felt them closing on the dorms. The sensation of being uncloaked shocked my system. My throat squeezed in protest as I watched my window of opportunity shrink from small to nonexistent. And when the girl’s fingers untangled themselves from California’s and she forked off in a separate direction, I experienced the moment missed like it was a cold, dead spirit moving through my body.
The girl looked casually over her shoulder. Her perfectly waxed brow furrowed and she cocked her head at me. “Can I help you?” she asked.
And then there were mere seconds between me and the moment the boys might look back, out of curiosity, and notice me. I flipped my hood up, sank my chin to my chest, and was already moving away, back into the shadows, back into the darkness, back home.
SEVEN
Cassidy
I lifted the whistle hanging on a hook outside of Coach Carlson’s door and looped the string over my head so that it hung around my neck. The metal whistle bounced off my practice uniform—a black sports bra and stretchy yoga pants that hugged my waist. I caught my reflection in the glass of Coach’s office window and noticed myself appraising what I saw there, the same way the old Cassidy would have. I’d lost some of my muscle tone since autumn and my ribs showed too prominently when I breathed. Both of these things would have to be remedied with extra conditioning. I was doing better, though. Feeling stronger, more me.
I’d taken a quiz in English and I was pretty sure I’d get an A+. My GPA could still be saved this semester. I’d even passed Ava a note in class on which I’d drawn some stupid cartoon of Ms. Minter that made her laugh. Perfect friend Cassidy to the rescue.
My hair was pulled neatly up into a high ponytail and I’d selected a peachy shade of lipstick that I’d actually remembered to apply throughout the day. As I pulled my captain’s clipboard out of its slot on the locker room door, I felt in control for the first time in weeks.
In the gym, the basketball team was running suicide drills. They had made the play-offs and in less than a week’s time, they’d begin their first tournament round for the state title. Still, maybe I’d make the girls do twice as many suicides at the end of practice today. Show the basketball players who the real athletes on campus were. This was my first semester as cheer captain and during an important time, too, what with the chase for the title and Hollow Pines’s best chance at a varsity championship in twenty-odd years. My parents had been so proud when I’d been elected on the heels of being named Homecoming queen. At one point, it had seemed impossible for my life to get any shinier. Even then, though, the threads had started to unravel, only I couldn’t have predicted, in just a few short months, how little I’d have left.
I took a deep breath and remembered who I was. I was Cassidy Hyde. And surely it wasn’t too late to catch on to the ends of those threads and sew my life back together stitch by stitch … was it?
I lifted my chin and walked briskly over toward where the other fifteen girls were stretching. When Liam reached the baseline, his eyebrows lifted at the sight of me. A bead of sweat trickled off a tuft of his sandy blond hair. I gave him a broad smile and a flirtatious wave. Okay, so it wouldn’t hurt to let the other girls think I had the eye of Hollow Pines High’s starting forward, especially not when he looked like that.
As a former chubby mathlete I knew success in high school was a matter of both real and projected image. I had been a master sculptor, chiseling the rock underneath with long runs, restrictive diets, careful wardrobe selection, and a winning personality that was one part girl next door and one part flirtatious minx until what showed through on the outside was the type of girl that could hold a town like Hollow Pines in the palm of her hand. Not too shabby, I reminded myself. Now, all I needed was a few touch-ups to the Cassidy Hyde brand before the whole sculpture crumbled.
As I approached the girls, I placed the whistle between my lips and gave it two short blows. “Gather up,” I said, putting my hands on my hips.
A few girls—Molly, Liz, and Kylie Beth—who were nearest to me stopped their stretching and looked up without moving. Paisley had been using Ava’s shoulder for balance while she held on to her shoelaces with one hand to stretch her hamstrings. She let her fingers slide from Ava’s shoulders and the two shared a look that I couldn’t read. Nobody was budging.
“Hello, lazybones.” I clapped. “Where’s your hustle? Let’s get practice started. I don’t want to be here all night.”
Erica moved to Paisley’s other side and cast nervous sideways glances. I suddenly had the feeling that I was standing on the wrong side of an electrical fence. A queasy uneasiness spread in my gut, like that time I ate movie theater nachos.
“Okay.” I folded my arms across my chest while attempting to hide the ricocheting of my heart against my ribs. “Can someone please tell me what’s going on?”
Ava, who had added rhinestones to calf-high tube socks and to a bow in her hair, cleared her throat but looked down at her sneakers.
“Paize?” I said.
Paisley’s blue eyes flitted to the ceiling for a split second, then she took a small step forward. “Fine, whatever, I volunteer as tribute.” Her fingernails were painted a frosty pink and she curled them around her narrow waist. “Look, I don’t want you to make a big deal of this or anything, but some of us have been talking.”
An icy wave tingled the roots of my hair and crawled down the length of my back. “Yeah?” I said, fighting to keep my voice steady. “Talking about what?”
Paisley was four inches shorter than me, but with the way she carried herself, like she was Napoleon, it always caught me off guard when I noticed how tiny she really was. “Well, to be honest, we think maybe you shouldn’t be captain anymore.”
I felt myself go still as glass, worried that if I made any sudden movements, I might shatter. Paisley was the only one on the whole squad looking at me. Was that how much the lot of them had already dismissed me or were they just too cowardly to say this to my face?
“And you … don’t want me to make a big deal of this…” My voice trailed. Not a big deal, I screamed inside. Not a big deal? “How long has this been going on?” I asked, keeping my internal monologue where it belonged. “The talking behind my back.” Well, most of it, anyway.
Ava lifted her chin and stared at me with her deep brown eyes. She, at least, looked genuinely stricken. “Not long,” she said quickly. “I—well, the last w
eek maybe, but—”
“We think you’ve been distracted,” Paisley interrupted so that I didn’t get to hear what lay on the other end of that “but.” “Let’s face it, cheerleading doesn’t seem like your number one priority anymore.”
I held up my hand to stop her. “And whose idea was this?” Behind me, I had the distinct sensation that the basketball players were beginning to stop and stare at the confrontation going on near this side of the gymnasium. Balls bounced and then seemed to fall idle and the squeaking of sneakers slowed. I began to sweat.
“Does it matter?” she said.
Something else was beginning to brew in the pit of my stomach. Fury. “That depends,” I responded coolly. “Was it yours?”
Paisley rolled her eyes. “This is why I told you from the start not to make a big deal about it.” I felt the other girls—more than a dozen of them, girls that I’d called my friends—crowding in on us like a pack of wolves.
“I’m not. I’m asking a simple question. Am I not allowed to ask questions?”
Beside Paisley, Ava tightened the bows around her braids.
Paisley’s eyes narrowed. “You know, you’re not the only one who’s had hard stuff happen to them this year.”
The words stung. My eyes pricked as if my cheek had been slapped. Paisley Wheelwright had no idea what I’d been through. Best friend or no, she didn’t have a clue about Dearborn. I closed my eyes and for a split second, the words of the boy with the wolflike grin came barreling through time and space to haunt me. A new toy to play with, lads … How rough do you think I can be before this one breaks?
Teen Hyde Page 5
