Little Black Lies (17 page)

Carling yanks open the back door. “Guess he got dumped. No big surprise. Would you date a guy whose scalp hadn't been scrubbed in, like, five years?”

Poor Noah. We pile into the back of the car. There's no way he knows who I am right now. And if I can exit the car as inconspicuously as I get in—head down, hair pouring over my face—he won't have a clue I was ever here.

The Bentley isn't as pristine on the inside as it is on the outside. The leather seats are creased flat from wear, and the carpeting is so thin in spots you can see the metal flooring. Not only does the car look depressed, it feels it. Gone is the excitement of a forbidden party. Gone is the feeling it was the four of us against the strobe-lit, adolescent underworld.

Once the car pulls into traffic and Noah is safely separated from us by the divider, Sloane turns on Carling. “You had no right to make out with Ned.”

Carling cracks up. “Ned! I had to make out, just once in my life, with a guy named Ned. Anyway, I was being funny. Wasn't I being funny, Izz?”

“Funniest ever.”

“He actually believed you were a guy,” Carling explains to Sloane. “I totally had him going.”

“Maybe I don't want my future boyfriends thinking I'm a guy—not for a single second,” says Sloane. “Call me crazy, but picturing the girl you have the hots for with chest hair and chin stubble is a
slight
turnoff.”

Carling laughs so hard she collapses sideways on the seat, her head landing in Isabella's lap. “I didn't tell him about your chest hair, Sloaney. It's important to leave some things to the imagination.”

Isabella joins in the laughter. “It was pure genius.”

Sloane crosses her arms and stares out the window.

“Come on,” says Carling, nudging Sloane's leg. “I gave him
your
number, not mine.”

“Why would he call? He thinks I'm a man!”

“He'll call because he thinks he's calling me. Then”—Carling holds out her hands as if performing magic—“ta-da, it's you he's talking to. You tell him I'm a bitch who goes after all your boyfriends, that I'm mentally unstable, and everyone's happy. Feel free to trash me as much as you want. I can take it.”

“Tell Noah to take me home,” says Sloane. “I'm not in the mood to stay over.”

“You have to,” pleads Carling. “Leo was a total jerk to me tonight. Didn't come near me once at the party. I think he wants to break up with me.”

“He did break up with you,” I mumble, tracing my lower lip with my finger and watching the city lights race by.

“What?” says Carling.

I sit up taller. “I just said he kind of broke up with you, didn't he?”

“He was just cranky because of the T thing. I swear, the guy is so sensitive. He's like a girl. Doesn't matter. I'll call him when we get to my place. He'll come over, I'll seduce him, and all will be well.”

I can feel the anger rise up from my gut and spread across my chest and down my arms, where it curls my fingers into fists. The thought of Leo in Carling's bedroom tonight makes me sick. I squeeze my hands shut tighter, if only to curb my instinct to slap her. “I don't know about that,” I say. “He's pretty angry.”

Isabella stares at me. “How would you know, London? Are you and Leo trading secrets in the changing room again?”

He won't go to Carling. Not after our kiss. “No. I just meant he seemed upset, that's all.”

Carling yawns, completely indifferent to what Leo might or might not be feeling, thoroughly confident that if she wants him later, he'll be there. I've never had that kind of confidence in my life. “Even with Leo coming, I still need you guys. I'll need someone to talk to after.”

“Can't,” says Sloane.

“Actually, I'm tired too,” says Isabella in a shocking and unprecedented lack of Carling support. Though, from the circles under her eyes, I'm guessing she's telling the truth.

“London?” asks Carling.

“No!” Isabella says quickly. Her eyes dart back and forth between me and Carling. “If we all don't stay over, no one stays over. Right, Carling?”

“Whatever,” says Carling. “It won't be any fun without Sloaney and Izz anyway. Let's all go home and we'll do the sleepover next weekend. I'll tell the Dreaded One to drop you guys off at home instead.”

Bad plan. I can't be dropped off at my apartment. I can't let the girls watch me walk through the cracked glass door of my building and wonder why my neurosurgeon father works for no pay. In the next few seconds, I need to come up with a proper home. Someplace befitting the daughter of a brain surgeon.

There's a cul-de-sac in a leafy area at the edge of Brookline not far from my building. I've seen it while out walking. It's full of homes so massive several families could live in them. The driveways are always littered with expensive cars and most of the properties have either indoor pools or tennis courts. One has both. It's set back from the road, nearly obscured by overgrown bushes out front. An old woman lives there, alone, from what I've seen. The street is called Hemlock Crescent and the house is number 151. I know this because the little address sign out by the road keeps falling over and I've watched the owner set it straight on several occasions.

I'll give Carling the address, hop out of the car, and disappear behind the bushes. Noah will never see my face. Then, once the Bentley pulls out of sight, I'll walk to Brighton in the dark. Should take about half an hour if I'm not kidnapped by a passing sex fiend who stuffs me into his van, has his way with me, and kills me before chopping me up into tiny pieces, setting my hands and feet and kneecaps in cement, and dropping them one by one into the Boston Harbor. As long as that doesn't happen, it's the perfect plan.

“Where did you say you live, London?” asks Carling.

“Right in town,” I say, trying to sound bored. “One fifty-one Hemlock Crescent.”

Carling raps against the partition. “Noah?”

What happens next may blow my plan into smithereens.

The Bentley speeds toward a yellow light and the glass partition lowers behind Carling's seat. At the same time, the light turns red and the car lurches to a stop, pitching us out of our seats. Noah says, “Sorry, girls!” and looks back just as I right myself. For a moment we stare at each other, then his eyes widen with recognition and he smiles. “Hey, there …”

“It's freezing cold back here,” I say quickly, giving Noah a slight shake of my head that's meant to say
Please don't blow my cover
. “Do you think you can blast the heat?”

He looks confused. “Aren't you …?”

“Noah!” snaps Carling, obviously irritated by his attempt to communicate with the humans. For once I'm thankful for her bitchy condescension. “Change of plans,” she says. “The girls are going to their own places tonight, so we'll drop them off in this order: London, Sloaney, then Izz.”

He looks right at me, amused. “London?”

I nod, hoping I don't throw up. “Sara. But the girls call me London because I moved here from England.”

“England, huh?”

“Yup.”

Noah doesn't react. His eyes travel from me to Carling, to Izz and Sloane, and back to me. A disbelieving smile crowds his face, then, with a small laugh, he shrugs and turns around. The light turns green and he calls back, “And what would your address be, Miss London?”

“One fifty-one Hemlock Crescent.”

As the glass partition starts to rise, I can see Noah shake his head from side to side. Then he disappears from view.

The closer we get, the more I realize my plan is full of splinters and worm holes. What if the old lady in Brookline is an insomniac, peering through her front window at two in the morning? Worse, what if she forgot to let the cat in and is wandering around in her yard, calling, “Here, Puss Puss,” when we arrive? Or what if her nosy next-door neighbor sees me squatting in her bushes and calls 911? Worse still, what if the old lady drops dead, tonight of all nights, and we find the driveway bustling with emergency vehicles and weeping grandchildren? From the look of her veiny hands and sunken cheeks, it could happen at any moment.

The car coasts into the cul-de-sac and we're engulfed in trees. Suddenly the street is so thick with fallen leaves it's as if we're driving on carpeting. Noah pulls the Bentley to a stop in front of number 151 and I breathe a sigh of relief. The house is dark and the driveway free of paramedics.

Noah comes around to open the door and as I step out into the frigid night air in Sloane's thin sequined top, Sloane and Isabella peer through the doorway. Sloane nods, looking around the property. “Nice place, London. Though it looks like you could use a good gardener.”

“Yeah, well”—I glance back at the cedars that will hide me from the road—“we're not quite settled in yet. You know how moving is.”

Isabella is strangely silent, examining the house with great interest. Then, “When did you say you moved in?”

I start walking backward. “Right before school started.” I hold up my hand in a stationary wave. “Bye, guys. See you at school. And thanks … Noah, is it?”

Noah rolls his eyes and climbs back into the car.

As I make my way up the driveway, I realize hiding in the bushes is not going to work. Too many leaves have fallen; the girls are certain to see me crouching behind the branches. So I follow the driveway along the side of the house until I find a door, which, by some sort of miracle, is set in from the wall. With a final wave, I press my body into the doorway and hold my breath until the car pulls out of the street.

I completely misjudged the distance home. Hemlock Crescent is farther away than I imagined—two miles at least. At this rate, I won't be home until well after two thirty, and if one of the crackling or rustling sounds I keep hearing from the blackened bushes I pass by doesn't morph into a murderer and kill me, my father might.

Even the main streets are dark—the streetlamps are placed so far apart and throw off so little light they're practically useless. Then, just when I'm walking through an extra-longish dark patch in front of the dry cleaner and a bank, a dark car pulls up to the side of the road and stops.

It takes me a moment to realize it's the Bentley.

The tinted front window slides down and Noah peers out at me. He's taken off his cap and has a serious case of crooked dreads. “I've dropped everyone off. Get in.”

I climb into the seat beside him. “Thanks. It's a long way home.”

He smiles. “Longer than you think, I bet.” He looks sideways at me and shakes his head. “You're in deep, little sis.”

I shrug.

“Eventually they'll find out.”

“Maybe. Maybe not.”

“What about Charlie? I'm guessing these girls don't know who he is.”

I say nothing.

He whistles silently. “Your dad's a good guy, you know. Pretty much lives for his daughter.”

“I know.”

“He'd be devastated if he knew she'd erased him.”

I don't have an argument, so we ride through the shadows of Brighton in silence. Finally Noah pulls up in front of the building and stops, waiting for me to get out. “Were you really supposed to be in New York for the weekend?”

“New York? Brice told me I wasn't needed.”

So Carling lied. Or Brice did. Noah doesn't turn off the car as I climb out. I peer back at him from the sidewalk. “You're not coming in?”

“I have to be back at Logan for a VIP in a couple of hours. Took a little job on the side. Don't tell Carling.”

“What about sleep?”

“I'll catch a nap in the airport parking lot.”

“Pretty messed-up way to live.”

“I guess you'd be the expert on messed-up ways to live.”

Good point. “Why do you take on other jobs when you already work for the Burnacks?”

“Need the cash.”

“I thought Brice pays you tons of money.”

He reaches for a cigarette but doesn't light up, just shakes his head, confused. “Who told you that?”

“Brice.”

Laughing softly, he stares out into the dim glow of the streetlamp. “Yeah, well. Brice lied.” I must look confused, because he adds, “That's what people do when they get desperate. But then, I don't have to tell you that, do I, Little Miss London?” He looks at me with a wink. “I think, once people have been swimming in money, they feel the need to look that way, no matter what.”

“They don't have money anymore?”

“You didn't hear it from me. Not until they've coughed up my last few paychecks.”

“And Horace?”

“Also working for free. We all are until Brice's big show opens and, hopefully, takes off.”

I think back to the trays of food. The missing piece of art. The fight over serving the expensive bottle of wine. I've been watching them in awe and the whole time, the Burnacks have been putting on a show.

Noah pulls a rumpled envelope from his pocket and places it on the seat beside me. “By the way, an animal got into the trash. I found this on the ground beside a ripped-up garbage bag.”

It's smeared with pizza sauce and one corner has been chewed away, but there's no mistaking what it is. It's my airline ticket to Paris.

I spend all day Sunday in my pj's pretending to do my homework while Dad searches the paper for possible replacement vehicles and strips all the bedsheets to wash them in bleach. It's not that we're not speaking since our conversation last night—we are. But we're doing a fairly sophisticated dance of avoiding a particular room if the other one is in it.

I can't even think of Leo's mouth without my cheeks burning. What I'm really doing in my room and have been doing since I got home last night—or early this morning—is reliving the kiss over and over in my mind from my perspective and from his. From my viewpoint, this is how it went down: it was the best five seconds of my life. Seriously. Every time I think of how gentle he was, how his breath burned like peppermint Altoids, how his tongue—soft and firm at the same time—darted out and touched my own, my knees get weak and I have to sit down and teach my lungs how to breathe, teach my heart how to beat, teach my eyes how to blink.

These feelings are going to be the end of me. Getting involved with Leo or any boy at Ant will end in social destruction for me. Saturday night made that very clear. Unless I'm willing to dig myself a bedroom behind the leafless bushes at 151 Hemlock Crescent, the only way I can survive this school is by keeping relationships at a cool distance.

Trouble is, that's now become impossible.

“He kissed you?” Mandy squeals into the phone Sunday afternoon.

“Pretty much.”

“This is the guy from the changing room? The crazy chick's boyfriend?”

“Ex,” I say. “I've wondered, about a thousand times, what it meant to him. Does he kiss just any old girl like that or does he actually like me?” I've also wondered whether it's really over with Leo and Carling or if he was just using me to get back at her somehow. More important, does he feel faint when he thinks of being with me … if he thinks of it at all?

“He might come to school wondering the same thing about you.”

“You think guys are that insecure?”

“My brother sure spends a lot of time fussing with his hair when he likes a girl.”

“But what if Leo went to see Carling last night? She was planning to have sex with him. That's got to be a big draw for any guy, whether he wants to stay with a girl or not.”

“You'll know when you see him again,” Mandy says. “Tomorrow at school. Like it or not, the expression on his face will tell you what you need to know.”

“Right. You're right. He'll either turn the other way as if it didn't happen or he'll smile.”

“And then the real trouble starts. He learns who you are.”

I can't think that far ahead, so I change the subject. “Any word from Eddie?”

“Just that his wretch of a fiancée is going to make her bridesmaids wear burnt orange. Can you picture it?”

“I can smell the rotten pumpkins.”

“I miss him so much, Sara. I don't know if I'll ever get over him.”

“You will. And I'm going to help you. Starting with our movie next Saturday.
When Harry Met Sally
is on. Nine o'clock. And I've decided we should both have the same snacks. Black licorice, sour cream and onion chips, and Diet Coke.”

“I can't be alone that night. If you forget to call, you know I'll drive out to our hotel and spy on them. And then I'll see that the room is dark and I'll know they're doing it….” She starts choking back sobs.

“Don't think that way for a second. I'll keep you busy the whole night.”

“No cancelling to study this time, promise?”

“Cross my heart.”

It's the first week of November, so Monday morning is Grub Day. Standing in front of my locker in my Docs and jeans, I fumble with my combination. There's a lot of murmuring going on in the hallways, a lot of shocked faces. Like a fast-spreading brush fire, a hot piece of gossip is burning across the student body. I lean closer to the two girls whispering a few lockers down and can just make out what they're saying.

“I heard she jumped on the T tracks,” says the one with super-short bangs as she stuffs a violin case into her locker. “And then he dumped her.”

Her friend says, “I heard he refused to save her because she made out with an interior designer at the warehouse party.”

“Whatever happened, one thing's definite. Leo dumped her good. I saw her begging him to take her back this morning, on the second-floor landing. You know, on
the
sofa.”

“So Leo, he said no when Carling begged?”

“His exact words were, ‘This time, Carling, you don't get what you want. You get what you need.'”

They walk away.

I want to believe it. I need to believe it. But do I dare?

I tug my locker door open, drop my backpack inside, and try to compose myself. I'll be sitting behind Carling in about three minutes and I need to drum up some genuine sympathy. A pair of narrow shoes appears beneath my locker door. I peer around it to find Isabella leaning against the wall, her mouth all knotted to one side.

“Hey,” I say, hoping my thoughts aren't visible.

“Have a good rest of the weekend?”

“Sure.”

“Get enough sleep?”

What is she up to? “I did. And you?”

She ignores me. “Did you hear about Carling and Leo? He actually dumped her.”

I duck my head inside my locker and allow myself a smile. So it's true. So many emotions are swirling through my head, I've become top-heavy and can no longer stand up straight. Concern and embarrassment about Carling's begging. Pride for Leo, for refusing to take her crap anymore. Newfound respect for the universe for giving Carling Burnack a consequence for all the havoc she wreaked on Saturday night. And, yes, a bit of sorrow for the pain she must be going through right now. But, sweeping away all of these feelings, mostly I feel pure joy because Leo Reiser is officially single.

“Yeah,” I say. “Pretty shocking.”

“Did you get in trouble for getting home so late?”

“I was quiet.”

“Cool.” She hugs her books to her abdomen and blinks. As usual, her nails are filed into paper-thin ovals. On her index finger is a flat gold ring with the initials
IEL
. I wonder what the
E
stands for. Encyclopedia of Horrors? She says, “I've been thinking about where you live….”

No
.
Don't think about where I live. I forbid you to think about where I live
. “Why?”

“It's just kind of weird. I never saw a
FOR SALE
sign in front of that house. Or anybody moving in or out.”

My heart starts to thump in all the wrong places. My throat. My upper arms. My stomach. What were the odds anybody had ever noticed that street? Why couldn't I have picked the next cul-de-sac over? Or the one after that? I try to shrug but my shoulders don't move. “What can I say? We're speedy movers.”

“Really.” She narrows her eyes and watches me.

“Really.”

“What makes it even weirder is my old housekeeper rents out the basement. Has lived there for years. She's still in touch with my mother. You'd think she'd have mentioned something as big as moving, wouldn't you?”

For a moment I consider saying we have a housekeeper tenant in the basement, but quickly realize it won't work. “I wouldn't know.”

“I'll have to mention it to my mother.” Isabella shifts her books to her right arm. “Something about you smells funny, London.”

I slam my locker and walk away as if my life isn't crumbling into too many dusty pieces to count. “Then keep your nose out of my business, Latini.”