Nantucket Blue (7 page)

A LOUD TEXTURED BELCH
came from the front porch. It was so specifically disgusting, I could practically taste it.

“So, you’re trying to say that there’s a truth with a capital
T
,” the guy on the porch said to his friend as he watched me approach. He was overweight, with a flat, smooched face, but he wasn’t acting like it. He was sitting there like some kind of million-dollar man. It’s not fair. Guys can embrace their fatness as a unique personality trait, but we girls have to sit on the very edge of chairs in our shorts so as not to reveal the back-of-the-leg cellulite we feel bad for having even though everyone does. Well, everyone but Jules.

“Absolutely, dude,” Fitzy said, as cool and lean as a racehorse. He was wearing ’80s-style sunglasses even though it was ten o’clock at night. “How else do you explain the commonality of instincts for good and bad across wildly divergent cultures?”

I climbed the three stairs onto the porch. There was a bottle of Jim Beam between them, a pair of empty shot glasses, and plates with sandwich remains.

“I’m Oliver,” the fat one in the Deerfield Academy shirt said with a little chin nod. Okay, so I guess this was his house.

“Uh, hi,” I said. I stuck my sweaty hands in my pockets. “I’m Cricket.”

His eyes widened, full of thoughts. “I’ve heard about you. You know a friend of mine, Jay Logan.”

“Yeah,” I said, shifting my weight, glad I’d worn my good jeans. “Is he here?”

“I know he’s anxious to see you.” Oliver laughed. “He should be here any minute. In the meantime, have at it.” He opened the door and I stepped through.

Some sort of rap music was playing.… But wait, it wasn’t rap. It was more mellow and sophisticated. And I heard un–raplike instruments. I wanted to find out who it was so that I could download it. This could be part of my summer sound track. I could add it to the Jay playlist.

Jules was right. This wasn’t a big party. There were maybe twenty people here, and from the way they were lounging, leaning in door frames, draped on the furniture, on one another, I could tell they were all friends. I felt just a little foreign, like I was from Canada, or California.

Jules was sitting on the sofa holding a beer. She was wearing a little dress, and a Jack Rogers sandal dangled from her foot. She was tan, like she’d been at the beach all day. She also looked skinny—not anorexic or anything, just a tiny bit too thin. Actually, it was kind of the perfect amount. The pounds Jules had unnecessarily dropped made her features clearer, her cheekbones elegant. She looked older, that’s what it was. Why hadn’t I noticed last night?

Her Tiffany necklace dropped over the ridge of her clavicle and sparkled off center. She tried to cross her legs, but her crossing leg fell short. She swung her head back in a laugh. It took that extra effort for her to pull it back up, like the three pounds she’d lost had gathered in the ponytail spot. She was already drunk.

“Hey, Jules,” I said as I took a seat on the sofa between her and another girl, who I recognized almost immediately as Parker Carmichael. She had long, shampoo-commercial hair. I’d seen pictures of her at Jules’s house, and Jules talked about her sometimes. She was one of those horse girls who won jumping contests and had rock-hard thighs. Also, she was one of
the
Carmichaels, the big political family. The sofa felt a little snug for three people, but it was the only place to sit.

“Hey,” Jules said, and took another sip of beer. She made eye contact with Parker, then flapped her hand around to introduce us. “Parker, Cricket; Cricket, Parker.”

“Hi,” we said at the same time with zero enthusiasm.

“So, is Zack here?” I asked, filling the awkward silence.

“Still working,” Jules said, and wrinkled her brow. “How’d you get here?”

“I rode my bike,” I said, and shrugged, sensing that I was the only one who’d arrived on two wheels. I’d worn sneakers because I always wore sneakers when I rode a bike. It was the safe thing to do. But all the other girls had delicate shoes and pedicured feet. My dirty white Converses didn’t match the rest of me, which was kind of dressed up. And I was still a little sweaty. My bangs were sticking to my forehead. I felt the opposite of drunk. “So, where can I get a beer?”

“Kitchen,” Jules said, not even looking at me. She stood up, put a hand on her hip. “Hey, where’s Ginny? Is she on the trampoline?” she asked no one in particular.

“I think she’s with Fitzy,” Parker said. “Showing him those bodacious ta-tas.” Parker and Jules burst into laughter.

“Seriously, they got so big this year,” Jules said. “I’ve got to go get another look at them.” She staggered forward, but her foot caught on the carpet. I leaped to catch her, but not fast enough. She fell backward and landed on the floor with her dress around her waist. Parker was nearly dry-heaving with laughter. Jules was laughing so hard she couldn’t even sit up. She pounded the floor with her fists. I yanked her dress down over her freckled thighs.

“Nice thong,” Parker said. “Leopard print.” Now a couple of guys leaned in from the kitchen. Since when did Jules wear animal-print underwear? Or thongs? We’d read an article in one of those magazines about thongs and fecal matter, which had scared, well, the shit out of us.

“My bodacious cha-cha,” Jules said, laughing so hard she was drooling.

“Jules, you need some water,” I whispered. “You’re really wasted.”

“That’s some good police work, Captain Cricket,” Jules said, slapping me on the knee, then using her grip on my leg to hoist herself up. Parker rode a fresh wave of laughter and wiped tears from her eyes.

“Whatever,” I said, stinging, and made my way to the kitchen to find a beer. This was an old house. It had wooden walls, low ceilings, and small, old furniture. There was a group of guys at the table. They had men’s voices and men’s hands. They were concentrating on a card game. Poker, I think.

“Do you have a bottle opener?” I asked, a cold beer in my hand.

“It’s a twist-off,” one of them said without even looking at me.

“Oh. Thanks.” I twisted the top off and wondered what my next move would be now that I had the beer. I was about to make my way back out to the front porch when I saw that Jay had arrived. He looked gorgeous, with a new haircut and a tan that had a little bit of sunburn in it. He had such a nice body. He didn’t have a girl butt or anything, but unlike a lot of guys, he actually had one, and you could totally see it in his jeans. And he wasn’t too tall, just the most perfect height for kissing on my tiptoes.

Also, he had muscles. I bet when he was in his lifeguard bathing suit, he had those diagonal lines that go from his hips down to his you know what. I almost called out to him, but I thought it would be better if he noticed me first, so I pretended to read the calendar that was hanging on the wall, figuring he’d definitely be coming this way for a beer. I was so excited to see Jay walking toward me, but when he saw me, he looked away with disgust, and moved past me to get a beer.

“Hi, Jay,” I said, biting my lip to try to restrain a smile. He didn’t seem to hear me. “Jay?”

“Don’t talk to me, bitch,” he said.

I was so stunned I couldn’t move. I had never been called “bitch” before. With anger behind it, that word has knuckles. It has nails. Jay grabbed two beers and stepped past me, careful that not even our shirts brushed.

“Wait,” I said, finding my voice and following him down the hallway toward the back door. “What is this about?”

He turned around so fast that I jumped a little. “You think my brother’s a loser?” His face was red. His eyes were hard. He was squeezing the beers so tightly I thought the bottles might break.

“No,” I said. My heart was pounding. My cheeks burned. Jules had told him that I’d said his brother was a loser for having a DUI and working at the bagel shop. He was looking at me with such intensity I couldn’t lie. “I mean, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it.”

“Who says shit like that?” He glared at me like I was lower than dirt. I looked at the floor, grabbed my stomach. I felt dizzy and sick. I opened my mouth to speak, but nothing came out. He took a step backward and shook his head. “You know what? Forget it. I don’t care what you think. I don’t even want to bother getting angry at someone like you. It’s not worth my time.” He turned around and kicked open the back door with his foot. It slammed shut behind him.

“CAN WE TALK?”
I asked Jules. “Outside.”

“Whoa. Sure.” She stood, straightened her dress, and followed me out the door.

“Someone’s in trouble,” Parker sang, slapping her knees.

Jules turned to face her. “If I get killed out there, her name is Cricket Thompson and she’s like, a really fast runner. So you may need to hop into the Jeep if you want to catch her. They call her ‘Wheels’ back in Provy.”

I led us to the top of the driveway, where I thought we’d be out of earshot.

“You told Jay what I said about his brother?” I asked.

“It just kind of came out,” she said.

“But I didn’t actually mean it. You know I was joking. I like him, Jules. I really like him. You know that.”

“You have to admit, it was a really mean thing to say,” Jules said.

“But I was saying it to
you
. In private. I wasn’t trying to be mean. You say mean things all the time. How could you tell him something like that?”

“Sorry,” she said, not meaning it
at all
, and threw her hands in the air.

“And why are you acting like this?” I asked. “Saying that thing about police work? I was trying to help you. All I’ve tried to do is help you.”

“I don’t need your help,” she said.

“You were making a fool out of yourself,” I whispered.

“No. Those are my friends. I’ve known them forever. I’ve known them longer than I’ve known you.” She crossed her arms and looked up at the sky, eyelids fluttering in frustration.

“She was just having a little fun.” It was Parker. How long had she been standing there? “Don’t you want her to have fun? Don’t you think she deserves that?”

“Of course,” I said, my voice rising. I clapped my hand to my chest. “I’m her best friend. Of course I want her to have fun.”

“Are you a lesbian?” Parker asked, her head cocked, her magazine hair shining in the moonlight.

“Oh. My. God,” I said, looking at Jules. “Jules? What the hell?”

“I want you to leave me alone, Cricket. I want you to stop bothering me.”
I was bothering her?
The worst part was that she said it in this really calm, steady, grown-up voice. “You need to get your own life.”

“Fine,” I said, shaking. “Fine. I’ll stop
bothering
you.”

“I didn’t want to have to say it. But you’re like, making me, Cricket.” Jules screwed her hands over her eyes. “I didn’t want you to come here. I told you not to come.”

It took all my strength to walk, not sprint, back down the driveway to get my bike. I felt hot, neon with pain, all lit up for everyone to see. My hands were trembling; I dropped the bike and it clanked against the drainpipe. Fitzy stood up.

“Is that chick okay?” he asked Oliver. Then called to me, “Hey, you okay?”

I waved awkwardly, not daring to speak, not risking public tears. My foot slipped twice on the pedal before I was able to push off, turn the wheels, and ride back into the night, alone.

I had wanted to be best friends with Jules since she’d come to Rosewood in the eighth grade. I’d been with the same group of girls for ten years already. I knew their handwriting, whether they chewed with their mouth open, and how they sneezed. So when on the first day of eighth grade, the social studies teacher asked us to find a partner with whom we’d be working for the next six weeks, I immediately turned to Jules, the new girl from New York.

From the moment we drew our time line, to the rap we wrote about Roger Williams, the founder of Rhode Island, I liked the way I felt around Jules—like I was tipping backward in a chair, on the edge of falling. We thought that this was the best thing about an all-girls school. You could write a rap about Rhode Island history and not worry about what guys would say or if they thought it was lame. We decided it was funny, so it was funny.

It was Jules who made me cool. I’d been just a middle-of-the-pack girl before Jules. It was she who told me I was pretty, who convinced me to grow out my hair and cut my bangs and taught me about plucking my eyebrows and what a big difference the right pair of jeans could make. It was she who laughed hardest at my stories so that the other girls started laughing, too. It was Jules who told me to try out for varsity lacrosse as a freshman. “You’re the only one in our class who’s good enough,” she’d said. And she was right. After a year of her looking at me like I was the prettiest, funniest, coolest girl in our class, I started to believe it, too.

As long as she was near me.

“AND THIS IS WHY
most Americans won’t do this job,” Liz said as I turned in disgust from the dirty toilet in the honeymoon suite. “Or Brits, for that matter.”

“But here we are,” I said. “Confronted with skid marks.”

“I can’t believe these people are on their honeymoon.” Liz shook her head and we promised each other we would never allow such things in our future marriages. “Once you let them see you pee, it’s all downhill,” she added. I nodded in agreement. I couldn’t imagine letting a guy see me pee. Disgusting. Friends, yes. Boys, never.

I used a clean rag to wipe down the sink and thought of the young couple who had been smooching all through breakfast. The man had muscles you could see through his T-shirt, and the woman had perfect white teeth. “You’d think they’d have at least closed the seat,” I said.

“Must be true love,” Liz said, and snapped on the extra-long, yellow latex gloves. “Go tackle the bedroom. I’ve got this loo, but you have to get the next.”

“Deal,” I said, and went to plug in the vacuum cleaner.

For the past week, I’d been consumed by what had happened with Jules. While I was emptying the dishwasher, vacuuming the rugs, or tucking crisp sheets under the corner of a mattress, I was reviewing the scene, obsessing over each word, slowing the fight down, trying to get a grip on it, hoping to figure out exactly where it all went wrong. I’d expected her to call me with an apology, but there hadn’t been a word.

The biggest question in my mind was…why? Why had Jules told Jay what I’d said about his brother? If she didn’t want to hang out with me for some crime too great to be named, if I was
bothering
her, fine, okay. But to go and ruin my chance with Jay?

I tried to picture the moment she’d done it. Had she exaggerated my comment for a crowd, or had she said it to him with a sisterly pat on the arm, her voice low and dripping with concern, like,
Oh, Jay, this is something you should
know
? I put the blanket the couple had left in a tangled heap on the floor back on the bed, but decided to vacuum around the clothes that were strewn everywhere. Was true love really this messy? Wait a second, I thought as I picked up a still-damp towel with my thumb and forefinger and dropped it in the laundry bag. Had Jules been flirting with Jay? Oh my god, why hadn’t I thought of that earlier?

This wave of anger, just like every other, was dragged back out to sea when I remembered that her mother had died. Her
mother
.
Died.
Even though she drove me crazy sometimes, the thought of losing my own mother made me feel like I had a dry cleaning bag over my head. But still. What the hell had I done except try to be good, except offer to help, except try to be there for my best friend at the worst moment of her life?

I switched on the TV to give my mind a break. Liz said it was fine as long as Gavin was out and we kept the volume way down. I thought I’d stumbled onto some local Nantucket channel when I saw Bradley Lucas standing in front of a big Nantucket house. Isn’t that nice of Mr. Lucas, lending his talent to the local station, I thought as I bent to find the switch on the vacuum. But after a few seconds I realized this was no local TV station, but CNN. This was national news. As the shot widened, I saw other news vans in the background and a small crowd of people.

A banner ran at the bottom announcing the death of William “Boaty” Carmichael, the Massachusetts senator whose family vacationed here. He was famous for his boyish good looks and his weird nickname. He was also Parker’s uncle. He was around my parents’ age, with a baby face and blond curly hair. I remembered during one election season when my mother was driving me home from an away lacrosse game, somewhere near Boston. We passed a sign with Boaty Carmichael’s picture on it.

“I’d vote for him,” I said, prying some dirt from my cleats. “He’s so handsome.”

“That’s no reason to elect a person,” my mother said, a look of horror on her face. She saw a clump of dirt that had fallen from my cleat and added, “Stop that. This is my car, not a stable.”

“I still think he’s cute,” I said, releasing my foot to the floor and tossing the hunk of dirt out the window.

“Really, Cricket? I’m sending you to an all-girls’ school and you think it’s a good idea to vote for a man
based on
looks
? Do you know anything about him? About his policies?” She stepped on the accelerator.

“Mom!” I said, gripping the door as the driver of a silver minivan slammed on her brakes to avoid hitting us. “That was a stop sign.”

Now I looked at the clip of him on the TV, shaking hands with the less handsome people of the world. He looked like such a great guy the way he made eye contact, smiling so vigorously his curls shook. As he leaned in to listen to a liver-spotted old lady, his blues eyes crinkled with friendliness.

“Liz, come here,” I said.

“What happened?” Liz looked around the room to see if I’d broken or spilled something.

“On the TV. Senator Carmichael died. Heart attack.”

“You’re kidding,” she said, and grabbed the remote off the quilt. She turned up the volume. “They’re out by the family compound. Poor Boaty.”

“You knew him?” With her swagger and that accent, Liz seemed capable of knowing senators, of knowing anyone she wanted to.

“He came here at least once a summer. Big muffin fan. Rhubarb was his favorite.” She shook her head. “What a shame. He has those two small children.” As if on cue, an old clip of the young family flashed on the screen, probably from the night he’d been elected. They were all dressed up and waving on a stage. I could see bits of Parker in them. I could see her toothy smile, the high cheekbones, and the big round eyes, all of which made the family seem part of a Disney movie. The Carmichael family possessed features that should have added up to beauty but somehow fell short. All except Boaty.

Now Parker and Jules would be more bonded than ever. I felt like curling up in the bed, pulling the sheets over my head, and taking a nap. And then I remembered that this was probably where the honeymooners were having sex all night long, so I leaned forward and put my head in my hands.

“Don’t take it so hard,” Liz said, patting my back. “His brother will surely take his place.”