Throwaway Girls

by Andrea Contos

  St. Francis born and bred.

  I drop his hand because I’m not really a hand-holding kind of girl. “So listen, you’re gonna have to be less like you in there.”

  He fumbles for a response, so I say, “Everyone is going to know you don’t go to Walton if you walk in there acting normal. You need to tone it down. Be less … ‘future Senate candidate.’ Look down a lot and slump or something. Be a guy that’s forgettable.”

  He stops so fast I’m two steps ahead and have to spin to face him.

  He looks at me and bursts into laughter. “Caroline. They’re not going to think we go to Walton, and that’s not my fault.”

  “You’re saying it’s mine?”

  He nudges me to walk with him. “Some people are ponds. Or puddles. Fun to splash in but all it takes is a sunny day or two and everything goes dry.”

  I don’t know where he’s going with this, but I’m grateful for the mask of darkness and the distraction of movement. “So I’m fun to splash in?”

  “Just wait.” His footsteps echo as we cross a driveway, his shoes mottled in shades of brown from the wet grass. “Now other people, most people, are lakes. You’ve got your big lakes and your little lakes” — he tries and fails for a country accent because Jake speaks with lines and corners, not slopes and rolls — “but you can go for a swim in those. Stretch out your muscles, maybe build a dock and a lake house. Really, a lake is the perfect size.”

  Voices from the party float in the silence and I stifle the urge to sprint toward the promise of diversion.

  He knocks me with his elbow. “I’m making you uncomfortable.”

  “Yes.”

  “Do you want me to finish?”

  “Well, you have to now or I’ll spend my whole life wondering if I’m a puddle, or a lake, or the fucking boat dock.”

  His mouth quirks at the corner but drops before it can transform into a full smile. “You’re not a puddle. Or a pond or a lake, Caroline. You’re the goddamn ocean.”

  I can’t help it. I am utterly powerless to stop the way my legs snap into action, driving me across another driveway. “Great, so I’m full of terrifying creatures and cause massive amounts of destruction?”

  He smothers me into a side hug, pressing me into the warmth of his body, and he slows me down but doesn’t stop me. “Relax, Caroline. I’m not asking you to have my babies, I’m just saying you’re … complicated.”

  “Seriously, Jake, I can’t even tell if you’re insulting or complimenting me right now.”

  Shadowy figures gain definition and whispers rise to murmurs as we get closer to the party.

  “I’m just saying you don’t exactly blend in either. I’ve known you for years and I feel like there are four other sides of you that I’ve barely gotten a glimpse of.”

  He’s not supposed to see that far. No one is.

  If he can see, others can too, and everything I’ve been waiting for — everything my entire life’s been constructed around — seems like a fairy tale ending I should’ve known was a lie.

  My feet leave the ground, and it’s not until I hear Jake’s warning that I realize there are strange arms caged around my ribs. My elbows are pinned but my legs aren’t, and I slam my heel into the shin of whatever asshole is holding me. He yelps and his arms spring free, but before I can take my first full breath, Jake has me shielded against him, looking not at all forgettable.

  The three guys in front of him back away, their hands raised, palms out. They look familiar — not from Walton social media, but not St. Francis either.

  The middle one says, “Chill, dude, we were just having fun.”

  It’s followed by a string of mumbles I can’t hear as they walk away, and Jake’s expression matches mine.

  I sigh. “We’re not gonna blend in.”

  “Nope.”

  Then I guess it’s time to go be the ocean and destroy some shit.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  A plastic cup gets shoved into my hand the moment I spring free from the mass of bodies at the front door. Jake and I may not blend, but maybe everyone is too drunk to care.

  The steady thump of bass vibrates through my legs and rattles the pictures on the walls, and my eyes water from the sticky beer-and-weed-laden heat.

  Jake grabs the cup from my hand and passes it off to some guy splayed on the couch. The guy’s pupils are bigger than my head and the blunt in his hand lets off a smoke screen that twists to join the haze at the ceiling.

  Jake’s voice rumbles in my ear. “Don’t drink anything.”

  It’s the perfect opening to ask him about whether his dad might be able to help with the glass from Chrystal’s trailer, a subject I’ve been avoiding all night.

  But it’s way too loud in here. I grab hold of his coat and weave through the crowd, past a girl I recognize from Snapchat. I put on my picture-day smile and yell, “Hey, Melissa!”

  Her wave halts when she sees me, probably because she has no idea who I am. But when I smile at the girl next to her, I get a genuine one in response. I don’t have the slightest idea why, but I make a mental note to track her down once she separates from Melissa.

  The kitchen is as overloaded as the living room, but a wall blocks the speakers so I don’t have to shout.

  I grab two beers and crack them open. “So I’ve been thinking … about the glass?”

  Jake finishes his swallow. “That glass?”

  “One and only. So …” The sides of the can bow inward from the force of my fingers. “I was thinking since your dad’s a judge, maybe he knows someone who could test it?”

  He rocks backward, eyes wide, and I have to chug a swallow of lukewarm, watery beer so I don’t back down.

  “Yeah, maybe. I don’t —” His gaze snags on a group of girls who are clearly ogling him, but he’s so distracted he doesn’t even smile back. “I can’t tell him the truth.”

  I snort beer up my nose and my nasal passages are on fire. I try to deflect Jake’s apologies, but I’m too busy wheezing, and then a girl hands me a scratchy brown napkin so at least I can wipe the snot from my face. “No. You absolutely cannot tell him the truth.”

  He frowns and pulls me into the corner next to a couple practically dry-humping on a kitchen chair. “I wasn’t saying I was going to. I just have to think of a story for why I’m asking my dad to” — his voice drops to a whisper — “run a drug test on a random glass.”

  “Fair point. Okay, so …”

  We stare at each other until inspiration strikes. “Tell him a girl you know thinks a guy might have been trying to drug her at a party!”

  “And she doesn’t go to the cops why?”

  “You’re such a guy. She doesn’t go to the cops because they suck and because rape culture, Jake. They won’t believe her, or won’t care, or they’ll tell her no crime has been committed and there’s no way to prove it was him, and run along now, little girl, and don’t wear such tight shirts and you’ll have less to worry about.”

  “That’s kinda harsh.”

  “Yeah, it is, but not for the reasons you’re thinking. Your dad will do anything for you, you know that. It’ll work. Do you think it’ll work?”

  His mouth twists into a frown. “I’ll make it work.”

  I get two seconds to revel in my victory before he says, “Oh, shit.” And then, “Hey, Preston.”

  There is no way Preston Ashcroft is at a Walton party.

  Except then a voice says, “Didn’t expect to see you here,” and it’s definitely Preston.

  I could leave. He’s only seen the back of my head and Jake did ambush me with the meeting with his dad.

  “Caroline?”

  Everyone at St. Francis will know everything about this in less than an hour.

  I turn slowly, hoping he’ll disappear by the time I make it around.

 
He looks ridiculous in normal clothes. There are still lines from where the cheap sweatshirt he’s wearing was folded in the store, and he forgot to mess the overly gelled swoop out of his hair.

  I say, “What are you doing here?” because I might as well ask him before he asks me.

  He almost looks offended, but then his true nature takes over and he ignores my question, leaning in close, yeasty-sweet beer coating his words. “So you know my brother is on the task force for Madison’s case, right?”

  I can hear Jake sighing behind me.

  “Yeah, so they traced that burner cell she had, the one she used to call Mr. McCormack on the night he kidnapped —”

  “Mr. McCormack did not kidnap Madison.”

  My voice is too loud, too sharp, and Preston’s head cocks to one side. “You know, I never believed the shit people said about you two, but …”

  I am going to kill him. “Preston, if the cops couldn’t get a confession out of me, believe me when I say you won’t either. Probably because I am not fucking Mr. McCormack. Is that clear enough for you?”

  He leans away, hands raised. “Okay, okay. I’m just saying, her cell pinged to the tower that’s a few miles from Higgins Lake.”

  He seems to think that proves something, but I have no idea what. I don’t even know where Higgins Lake is.

  Jake’s voice rumbles over my head. “Which side?”

  Preston gives him a look that’s as confused as I feel, and Jake rolls his eyes. “Which side of Higgins Lake? It’s fucking huge, and there’s the high side with the cliffs, that the power company owns, and the low side that’s kinda shi —”

  He drops his voice to a whisper, despite the thumping bass rattling the walls. “The side that’s not great.”

  Preston starts talking, about how it’s not an exact science, about how it can actually take up to a dozen tower pings to get an accurate reading. About how cell towers reroute calls when they’re busy and Madison may have made the call from hundreds of miles away.

  I’m trying to summon the outrage Jake seems to feel when he says, “So what you’re saying is it’s all bullshit and proves absolutely nothing,” but I’m too distracted. The reason Higgins Lake sounds so familiar is balanced on the tip of my tongue, but I can’t get it to fall into place.

  And then it does.

  A flash of recollection — me, huddled in the passenger seat of my dad’s car while driving through West Virginia, my fingers clenched around a bottle of pills, the sign for Higgins Lake flashing by the window.

  So much of that day is a blur, and so much is astoundingly clear — like how two years ago, I found a body near there, and now Madison may be missing from the same place.

  My beer can thuds to the table and my body goes cold.

  Preston says, “It’s not bullshit though, dude. Because guess what? Turns out Mr. McCormack has spent a lot of time in the old West VA. Sorry, Caroline, but things don’t look good for your boy.”

  My name snaps me back to attention, and it’s impossible to miss the irritation in Jake’s voice as he says, “Yeah, because spending time in a state someone may or may not have made a phone call from is basically an open and shut case, Preston.”

  Jake’s defending Mr. McCormack and nothing makes sense anymore.

  Preston says, “Get this, dude. There’s talk of the FBI joining the case because it’s interstate now. The Bentleys have been pushing for it, but my brother says the higher-ups are arguing about it. Plus, Madison’s eighteen, and the FBI can’t investigate everything. My brother also …”

  I leave before I have to listen to any more.

  Almost everyone is congregated in the backyard, and the cold chills the sweat on my skin. I can almost force myself to stop thinking that maybe, if I hadn’t forgotten about that girl two years ago, if I hadn’t done exactly what the cops told me to and gone about my life like hers didn’t matter, Madison might be home right now. And if the FBI aren’t getting involved now, they probably never will. The cavalry isn’t coming. This is all on me.

  But Jake is right. Preston’s big reveal is bullshit if Madison could’ve been hundreds of miles away when she made that call. Plus, there’s nothing actually linking Madison to the girl I found — and right now, there’s only one I can save.

  That goal just got infinitely harder now that people have seen me talking to Preston, and soon everyone will know I was at a party with Jake.

  The only upside is that if Mom does hear about it, she’ll be so focused on Jake she’ll ignore the rest.

  People clump in circles, laughter and occasional shouts mixing with mentions of class, practice, exams and who’s hooking up with who. In many ways, it’s the same as a party with kids from St. Francis.

  A bonfire rages in the middle of an endless backyard that fades into a dark forest, and the smoke gusts and billows over the shadowed bodies standing nearby. Someone tosses in a plastic cup and the flames jump in a protest, reaching for a guy who leaps away and ends up face-first in the grass.

  The friends surrounding him burst into drunken laughter. Those are my people.

  I force my breathing to slow and head their way.

  My fingers fumble over the pack of Madison’s cigarettes as I wrestle them from my jacket pocket. I’m close enough to the fire for the heat to breathe over my skin, and the conversation between the crew dies.

  I pat my pockets, cigarette dangling from my mouth and the vague sweetness of tobacco taunting my taste buds. When I look up and pull the cigarette from my lips, they’re all staring. “Anybody bring a lighter that’s a little less deadly?”

  I have to point to the fire before recognition lights their faces. The tallest one digs into his pockets and brandishes a blue Bic.

  Of course he has to light my cigarette, cupping his hand around the flame as his palm lights up the color of dawn.

  I breathe deep, letting the smoke work its way into my lungs.

  Sorry, Aubrey.

  He says, “You go to Walton?”

  “Transferred this year.”

  “You don’t look familiar.”

  The whole pack moves a step in and I have to rock into my heels to stop myself from retreating.

  Never show fear.

  This is a fundamental difference between Walton people and St. Francis people — one of the many reasons why Jake will never fit in and I only barely can after years of exposure to this side of town.

  St. Francis people know bullies and mean girls and popularity and social status. They know how to use subtle words and sugar-coated hints of smiles to tell a person when they’re not welcome. When they don’t belong.

  But in this crowd, the suspicion — the wariness — runs deeper. It’s born from growing up watching — always watching — for the signals that something is not what it seems. It’s not teachable. It’s learned. Hour by hour, day by day, lifetime by lifetime. It’s learned by knowing safety is not guaranteed and survival is something you fight for.

  It’s a lesson the kids at St. Francis don’t know they need, until one of their own goes missing and the force of it upends them.

  Here’s the thing St. Francis ought to teach: none of us are safe — some just have better odds.

  I hold the guy’s gaze because guilty people look away, but I make myself small, shy. “I keep to myself. Hard to make friends senior year.”

  One of the guys twists his baseball hat around as he takes a stumbling step forward, and I put more distance between us, the fire singeing the back of my legs.

  Baseball Hat’s words slur. “I would’ve been your friend.”

  There is no difference between Walton and St. Francis here — drunk guys are asshats at all ends of the class spectrum.

  Voices rise behind his back but I can’t see why, and since the fire’s nearly melting my jeans, it’s time to throw out the Hail Mary. “There is this one g
irl that’s nice to me. I was hoping she’d be here. Sydney Hatton?”

  Three of them erupt in a chorus of jeers and playful shoves, all fixated on the fourth member of the squad. It’s hard to tell from the way the flames dance against his pale skin, but I think he’s blushing.

  He shrugs off his friends and says, “We hooked up a couple times,” without meeting my eyes.

  Jake’s voice rises from the crowd behind their backs, and the entire party seems to turn toward the same point.

  I hold #4’s gaze to keep him focused. “Do you still talk to her?”

  “Nah.”

  “Any idea where I could find her?” I’m pushing this too fast. There’s nothing natural about the flow of this conversation, but if Sydney is missing, this guy doesn’t seem to know it. And Jake is starting to draw the crowd.

  The guy nods toward my right hand, and I have to glance to it before I feel the sting of the cigarette against my knuckles. I drop what’s left on the ground and grind it out with my shoe while he tells me Sydney’s got a new boyfriend now — one that doesn’t like her going to school.

  But then the mob behind him erupts and I shove myself into the herd of people. I know what a fist connecting to someone’s face sounds like, and I pray Jake is on the giving end.

  I get stuck two rows back, pinned between two massive guys whose combined pressure crushes my ribs and rakes against my tattoo. I wiggle and kick until I pop free to a roar of deafening cheers. The inner row is locked tight, held by the press of connected bodies, so I drop to the grass that soaks through the knees of my jeans and crawl my way in.

  When Jake hits the ground at the same instant, I’m in a perfect position to see the surprise on his face.

  He expected a fair fight; instead he got a pile-on and a sucker punch from the guy who grabbed me earlier.

  His name pops into my head as I scramble forward — Dexter Uttley, second-string defenseman for Hargrove-Phillips. Jake decimated his entire team in their last game — three goals and two assists. And Jake sat the last quarter.

  Dexter must be pissed that Jake didn’t even recognize him.