Handcuffs (20 page)

I’m pretty sure that posting those pictures of me violates some right of privacy or something. Only, to fight something like that you have to have lawyers, and parents who can hire lawyers. Parents who would then become aware that their beloved daughter was close to naked in a hot tub with a young man that they despise. And really, Mom and Dad don’t need to see something like that, not again, not after what they saw in the study. I’m already scared that they’ll never trust me again. One more thing and my dad’s hair will go completely gray.

I have a horrible thought. What if the staff at Allenville saw those pics? I know for sure that Mr. Dawson and Ms. Miller read the blog, I could tell from the things they said in the melting locker-slush interrogation. Oh my God. What if they not only saw the pictures but also saw the thousand-dollar-reward story? What if they think it’s true? I can’t think about it right now. I won’t.

I’m resolved. I’m going to go totally vigilante on their asses. If Marion Henessy thinks I’m going to let her ruin my entire high school experience because my sister didn’t want to date Kyle (and who would, really?) and didn’t want him peering in her window (again, no potential takers) and sneaking around following her (do I even need to say this?) . . . I’m ready to stop this BS, and to get two thousand dollars. Robin Hood style. Take from the rich and give to the, um, not so rich.

The Burbery Coffee House is about ten minutes from school and not far from the computer place where Kyle works (looked it up in the Yellow Pages). It’s kind of grungy, with wooden tables that seem a little bit soaked-into, if you know what I mean. The lighting is dim, from chipped probably fake Tiffany lamps.

Kyle is sitting at a table by himself drinking what
looks
like a plain coffee. In a coffeehouse! I’m not much of a coffee drinker, but I know you’re supposed to choose some exotic flavor like amaretto and get skim milk and whipped cream and chocolate shavings. I plan to add every sweet thing I can think of so that I won’t have to taste the coffee. If I stay here long enough to order, that is. I have three dollars in quarters clanking around in my pocket, taken from Dad’s bureau where he always empties his pockets.

He’s sitting at a table for two. A tiny two-seater where, if I pull my chair all the way under the table, I imagine our knees will touch. An intimate little table. I don’t like this.

Today Kyle Henessy looks like the kind of person who would sit alone in a coffeehouse. The stained glass from the overhead lamp illuminates half of his face with purple, casting dramatic shadows on his sharp cheekbones and making it hard for me to see his eyes.

“Parker,” he greets me, standing and shaking my hand. He has a surprisingly firm handshake, for a deranged binocular-carrying weirdo, I mean. “It’s nice to see you.” He has a thoughtful voice, wistful.

I stand there flabbergasted, not sure what to say to him. We have a long history, what with our families and all, but it isn’t exactly a friendly history. Prescott vs. Henessy and all that.

“I think I know why you’re here. It was wrong of Marion to post those pictures of you on the blog. I’ve already talked to her about it, and they’ve been deleted.” Then why did you take them? I want to say. Why give her more ammunition against me? Instead, I thank him. I mean, he did just say that he made her take the pictures down. How am I supposed to react?

I’m totally on edge. Here is this guy who used to be like an older brother to me who has been recast in the role of sexual predator. I don’t know how to treat him, and it makes me nervous. I feel my leg shaking under the table, with this tip-tap reflex thing that I can’t control.

“I wish—I wish you could talk to Marion about . . . these things.” He stammers a little here, and for a second I can see him as a gawky overeager boy who took my sister to a dance in middle school and stepped all over her feet. I always felt a little sorry for Kyle. I suddenly remember how when I was younger I kind of wished he would forget about Paige and focus his attention on me. It seemed like a great thing, the unquestioning adoration. Now I’m not so sure.

We are the only people in this place. I can’t help wondering how it stays in business.

“Well, the thing is,” I begin. I feel I might need to explain myself a little bit. “Marion doesn’t talk to me. She won’t. She names Barbies after me and torches them. She’s always writing about me. We aren’t friends anymore.”

“She does seem angry at you. It isn’t like you had anything to do with”—he pauses and looks around—“the situation. But everything has been hard on her.”

“No, I didn’t have anything to do with it. I’m glad somebody realizes that,” I say too forcefully.

“I don’t mind meeting with you, but I’m supposed to be at work, and there’s the, the restraining order.” He chokes
restraining order
out like it’s a dirty word, which it certainly is in our house.

“I’m sorry that you’re missing work. You must have a pretty important job.”

“Not really. Why would you think that?”

Because my sister is green with envy that you make so much money? I feel bad about wasting his time, and that’s dumb. Sure, I could just e-mail his sister and tell her to leave me alone, but that would ruin my plans to blackmail him. I know I’m a hypocrite; I don’t want to waste his time, but I do want to steal from him. I feel guilty, but also weirdly powerful.

“I don’t know. You do things with computers, right?”

“Yeah.” He smiles, and the corners of his eyes crinkle up. He looks kind of old.

A waitress wearing jeans and a tight Abercrombie T-shirt comes and takes my order. At the Starbucks on my side of town you have to go to the counter to order, but this place is kind of old-fashioned.

“You want something, darlin’?” she asks.

Kyle Henessy looks at me and raises his eyebrows almost in challenge.

“I’ll have a plain coffee too. With cream,” I tell her, suddenly chickening out of my fancy order.

“So, um, how is your sister?” His voice is very, very soft now, and sad. I guess I would be sad too if I were a total nerd who got rejected via the police by some girl I thought I loved, even if the girl turned out to be completely shallow and self-centered. Paige kissed him on Valentine’s Day when they were in the seventh grade. She told me about it too. Maybe that’s when the whole obsession started, who knows? A kiss doesn’t mean much to Paige, but it probably meant a lot to Kyle, with his quiet voice and sad eyes.

“West is going to trade in her car,” I say. Why did I say that?

He takes a long slow sip of his coffee. So long and so slow that by the time he’s done sipping the waitress has delivered mine.

“Don’t ever be alone with West,” he tells me, looking at me with his sad eyes. Now that I’m used to the purple light and the shadows, I can see how blue they are. I never trust people with blue eyes. So he thinks perfect West is really an asshole, I can tell by his voice. But then he’d have to think that; West stole Paige away and married her. If he had a West voodoo doll he’d totally be sticking pins in it and torching it.

I surreptitiously rip open four sugar packets at once and pour them into the glazed earthenware mug. I tip in one creamer and wonder how many I can use without looking like a lameoid. When I look back at Kyle Henessy his mouth is twitching like he’s trying not to laugh at me.

“Well, Parker Prescott, it’s neat to see how you’ve grown up. Do you remember when we went to the Bahamas? I guess that was the last time our families went on a trip together, after all the yearly family trips.” He pauses, and I suppose we’re both meant to be reflecting on the Bahamas. Bright sun and open air would be a welcome change from this place. “Look, I’ve been, um, totally over your sister for months. I mean, it’s been nearly a year. In twelve days the legal order will be over. I have other things going on now.” Twelve days! He knows down to the minute when the restraining order will end. This is going to be easier than I thought. He said it fast and nervous, like forcing himself to say he isn’t infatuated with Paige is going to convince me. He can’t even say her name. Obsession is a scary thing.

“I didn’t come here to talk to you about Paige. You were the one who brought her up.” I don’t want him thinking of me, linking me to his obsession with Paige when he gets the anonymous e-mail asking for money.

“I know. I know. You came to talk about those pictures, but I already took care of them. So why are we drinking coffee together when we aren’t supposed to be within fifty feet of one another?”

I take a sip of my coffee. It needs way more sugar and more creamer, too. And chocolate shavings wouldn’t hurt.

“If you were a different sort of girl I might think you were here because you aren’t allowed to be here. Because I’m a person who is forbidden to you.”

I don’t want him linking me to the blog, either. Because I’m going to try to get him to take it down so that my life can go back to normal. But not here and now. Later, after I have his money.

Kyle Henessy’s saying this about being forbidden makes me uncomfortable, but I have to ask. “What sort of girl do you think I am?”

“Marion says you’re classy. You were always a nice little girl.”

Marion Henessy says I’m classy? Um, what?

“That’s not what she says about me on the blog. I mean, have you seen those pictures?” Of course he’s seen them. He took them—right? Still, I can’t help asking and waiting for his response. Here’s a guy who’s in college and making big money, completely removed from the stupid artificial world of high school. What does he think about all this high school drama crap?

“Yeah, I saw the pictures.”

Is he blushing? Oh my God, he is totally blushing. Suddenly my stomach clenches up. He
must’ve
taken the pictures. He saw me in my wet underwear, which means almost naked, without the little black boxes that Marion so thoughtfully inserted. Is he blushing because he watched me, or because he really studied those pictures? I suddenly feel like I ought to get out of this place.

“So, I have to go. Do you know what time it is? My parents are expecting me home. I’m supposed to be kind of grounded.”

“Really? What for?” Like it’s any of his business. Like I’m going to tell him that I got grounded for letting my boyfriend—ex-boyfriend—handcuff me to my dad’s black leather office chair and then getting caught that way.

“They don’t like my boyfriend,” I say. Which is true. Let him interpret it how he wants.

“Parker.” He puts his hand over mine as I start to put a few quarters on the table. “Hey, I’ll pay for the coffee.” He smiles, only now the purple light makes him look truly sinister, and his hand is still on mine. “Don’t let, um, don’t let your parents decide who you are going to date. They don’t have very good judgment. Or that’s how it seems to me.”

Part of me wants to ask what he means by that; the other part wants to laugh, because either way, he’s paying for the coffee. This encounter is going to cost him big-time. All of me wants to get out of here. I stand up and take three steps, wanting to be sure I can get beyond his reach before I turn and say,

“Thank you for taking care of the pictures, and for the coffee. The Bahamas, that was a lot of fun, I think.” I walk really fast out into the blinding light of late afternoon. I’m so freaked out and so seriously vision impaired that I bump into a couple walking into the coffee place. I tell them I’m sorry and walk away quickly, reaching into my purse and cursing to myself because I don’t have my sunglasses. Blackmailers really
should
have sunglasses.

26

W
hen I get home the Volkswagen is in the driveway. Somebody, presumably West, has put an ugly yellow bumper sticker on it. I can’t read what it says from here but I’m guessing it says something really stupid. I see West climb out of the car and walk toward the house. He stops and kicks at some rocks, so I catch up and am practically right behind him. He goes up the sidewalk and into the house ahead of me, not bothering to hold the door. It’s like I’m invisible. The door slams about ten seconds before I get there and I have to fumble to open it because I have my stack of books in one hand and my cell phone in the other. I have fourteen missed calls. I don’t have fourteen friends. I snap the cell shut and put it in my pocket so that I can open the door.

I try to think of something hateful to say to him, but by the time I get through the door, I’m just happy that I have good balance, because my cell phone starts ringing and I almost drop all my books and papers on the floor trying to retrieve it from my pocket and flip it open with one hand. Great, all that effort for a dropped call. I throw my stuff on the couch and head for the refrigerator.