Social Lives (33 page)

He let out a long sigh as his eyes lingered on her face. “Come, madam,” he said, already feeling sad that the moment had to be cut short by their approaching tee time. “Let's get you a collared shirt, and with it, a golden pass to do anything you please at the Wilshire Country Club.”

Sara gave him a quizzical smile. “Even cheat on the golf course?”

“Yes. You could practically fornicate on the eighteenth green—as long as you left your shirt on. Your
collared
shirt.”

Sara found this hysterical. “Okay, now
that
is not an image I wanted in my head.”

They laughed then, like two little children making potty talk on the playground, and it was, for both of them, nothing short of liberating. Sara let it fill her up, let it replace the judgments she had begun to weigh against herself. And yet she knew there would be a price to pay for this moment of pleasure, like the hangover after a night of martinis. Somewhere inside her, she could feel that it was all wrong—her rapidly forming bond with Barlow, and Barlow himself. But she could also feel the smile across her face, the one Nick had not been able to inspire. And for now, a smile was what she needed most.

 

 

 

 

 

“T
AKE IT EASY
,” B
RETT
said, grabbing the joint from Cait's fingertips. “I only have one.” Placing it gently between his lips, he could feel the heat as he took a long drag.

“Shit.” It was close to gone, burning his fingers, so he let it fall to the ground before squashing it into the frozen snow on the south side of the pool house. “What the fuck, Cait. You smoked the whole damned thing.”

Brett's friend Reed, who had tagged along for another school break, was leaning against the glass wall, staring up at the sky.

“Whatever.” Cait felt the buzz in her head as she exhaled. The air was cold, bone-chilling, and it held the smoke like a thick white cloud against the black sky surrounding them. She lifted her phone close to her face and hit a key to get it back to life. There were no new messages.

“What—expecting the president to call? Give it a rest.”

This was torture. Her parents were in Florida, two of the three nannies had flown home to Poland for the holidays, and that left Cait and the guys to do as they pleased. There was a two-day window—that was it. She'd waited as long as she could, but maybe it hadn't been long enough. Maybe she seemed too anxious. Still, she had explained it all in the text message, the message he had asked her to send. Mommy and Daddy Dearest would be home in less
than two days. It was now or never. She'd sent the text at four o'clock. It was already past seven.

“I'm going inside.”

Brett sighed and looked her over. “Wait.” He took a piece of gum from his back pocket and handed it to his little sister. Then he leaned in and smelled her hair. “You're good. Just don't get too close to Marta.”

Cait took the gum and popped it in her mouth. “Thanks.”

“No problem.”

With her hands in her coat pockets, Cait turned toward the house. She didn't feel any better stoned than she had sober, and now her lungs ached from the cold air and hot smoke.

As her walk turned to a run to combat the freezing air, she heard her own thoughts about herself.
Pathetic. Idiot. Slut.
She had let these words into her head the night she'd climbed over that divide and into Kyle's lap. The night she'd felt his hands on her hips, against her skin, and his mouth on hers. But in the short time since that night, the heat inside her had become an omnipotent power, reducing her reservations to nothing more than theoretical exercises.
If I don't text him . . . if I don't meet him . . . if I don't . . .
The night she felt him want her for the first time,
really
want her, the decision was made.

Her chat with TF had given her pause, but that was all it had done.
Remember what happened to me
, TF had said again.
They can act like you are their lifeblood in those moments, then never need to see you again. They aren't like us, Cbow.
Cait had argued politely, told TF that there was no chance what she'd felt in the car that night wasn't real, that it would be nothing short of superhuman to fake that kind of passion. Maybe with words or token acts of affection like a hug or a small kiss. But how could a person lie with their entire body? At some point, it all seemed involuntary, like a sneeze or cough. The way he moaned so deeply, the way he pulled her into him, against him, all the while kissing her that way—it had been fluid, natural, like his body had just taken the reins and was riding off with both of them. How could that be faked? He would have to be a monster.

TF had taken a moment to respond. But then she did, saying simply,
He doesn't need to be a monster to do that. Just a guy.
The words had left Cait confounded because if she couldn't believe in this, in what happened between her and Kyle in that car, then she was certain she would be lost forever in an
abyss of chaos. Wasn't that all the world was, if a person couldn't make sense of the most obvious things? If she couldn't trust her most primal instincts, about herself and the people around her? Utter chaos, and Cait could not believe that would be her fate.

Up the stairs she ran, straight to her room and into the shower to feel warm again, and to rid herself of the sickly sweet odor that had clung to her hair and clothing. She left the phone on the edge of the sink, and she focused on the silence, even through the pounding of the water against the shower walls, waiting for it to be broken by her ringtone. She dried off and checked the phone in case she'd missed the sound when the water had covered her ears while she rinsed the shampoo. Nothing.

She got dressed, blew out her hair, and finally plopped on her bed to hold herself in her own arms until she knew the answer to the question that was rising to the surface.
Will he call?
Eight o'clock came and went. Then eight thirty. She went downstairs and raided the liquor cabinet, pouring herself a glass of vodka, mixing it with a Diet Coke and some ice, then chugging it down. She could hear the guys down the hall in the game room on the Wii. The rest of the house was quiet, the little ones long since asleep, Marta probably in her room sneaking a call to her boyfriend—the one her parents didn't know about.

Even the nanny has a boyfriend
. And by nine, there was still no message. Her head was spinning after the second vodka and Diet Coke, her self-restraint gone. But she still had her wits about her. She rushed to the game room, where the two stoned boneheads were battling some assassin with their strapped-on wrist wands, standing in front of the TV, swinging their arms about and yelling at each other. Cait stopped for a second to reconsider. They hated Kyle Conrad. But they were also stoned, and they were guys, which meant they would take everything she did and said at face value. They would be easy to manipulate.

“Hey,” she said, standing behind them.

“Hey.” They answered in unison but did not turn around from the TV.

“I need a favor. Can you pause it?”

Reed was on a roll. His guy was about to defeat the assassin in level five. Then, and only then, could they pause the game without losing the hour's worth of effort they had invested. It was the cornerstone of the addiction—the built-in penalties of stopping a game.

“One sec . . . Yeah! Yeah!” Brett was yelling, cheering on his buddy and ignoring his sister. “That's what I'm talking about! Die, you mother. . . .”

Cait focused her energy on standing without swaying, which was all her body wanted to do at the moment. When Brett finally turned around, she managed a sober stance.

“I need a favor,” she said.

Brett pulled off the Wii controller strap and looked at his sister. He'd said there was only one joint, the one he'd shared with her by the pool house, but from his red, glassy eyes, she could see he'd been lying. No matter. His state of inebriation would only make things easier.

“Can you check around and see what's happening in town, parties and stuff?”

“You going out?” Reed asked, joining the conversation.

Cait shook her head. “No. Just checking for a friend. She hooked up with Kyle last week, and now he's blowing her off, too.” Her face was steady and entirely believable. It was easy to lie when she needed to.

“Fuck! That guy is such a prick. Is that why you kept checking your phone?” Brett asked, fully sold on the story.

“Yeah. She said she'd let me know what happened. I just got a text. She hasn't heard from him.”

“Prick!” Reed echoed the sentiment. “I'll find the little weenie.”

Cait gave him half a smile. “Thanks.”

He left then to get his phone, leaving Cait and Brett alone in the room.

“Wanna play?” Brett asked, still revved up from the assassination moments before.

Cait gave him her
as if
look and he nodded.

“TV?”

“Sure.”

They moved to the couch that sat a few feet from the wall-sized high-def screen, and Brett switched off the Wii. “So . . . are you okay with your friend and Kyle and all that bullshit?”

Cait kept her eyes on the screen as Brett flipped channels. “Yeah, fine. He's a prick.”

Brett paused for a moment, his fingers clicking on the remote. “ 'Cause, you know, over Thanksgiving, you were still pretty hung up.”

“Yeah.” That was all she said, and Brett knew not to push it. No need to rub her face in the fact that he had been right about the guy she had blown in the school hallway.

They settled on an HBO rerun until Reed came bounding in a few minutes later, his face glowing with accomplishment, his eyes red from the pot.

“He's over on River Street. Victoria Lawson is having a party.”

The room went quiet. Brett looked at Cait, who looked at Reed. Reed was watching the TV. “Maybe we should crash!”

No one answered. Cait held it in as long as she could, but the tears came on, violently and with the added force of the lingering pot and more recent vodka. She said nothing, but ran from the room.

“Cait!” Brett yelled after her. He was slow to respond, but his mind was quick to read what had just happened, and after a slight hesitation he was on his feet.

“What the fuck?” Reed was confused as he stood in the doorway, watching Brett chase his sister down the hallway toward the garage.

Cait was racing, her intent clear, her purpose driven by disbelief and despair. Her world was crashing in around her, and she had one impulse—to get the hell out of there, away from the words she'd just heard spoken, away from the guy who'd spoken them and the brother who now knew she was far too weak to be over a guy like Kyle. And, mostly, away from her life. She needed to fly, and fly fast, if there was any chance of outrunning herself.

The keys were hanging on the antique brass hook near the door, and she grabbed them.

“Cait!” She heard Brett yell from down the hall. He was gaining on her.

The garage door pulled open as he finally caught up, but she locked the doors to her father's Corvette.

“Cait! Stop!” He was pounding on the driver's-side window, watching tears stream down her face. Her eyes were on fire.

When the door cleared, Cait peeled out of the garage, spun the wheel, and kicked it into first, then shifted to second, third, and fourth before she was halfway down the driveway.

Running behind her because it was all he could think to do, Brett kept yelling, “
Cait!
” He couldn't see the car, and looking back on it when he was sober, he would remember that this was because she had forgotten the lights.
His lungs were wheezing, his legs burning as he ran into the cold night air, chasing after only a sound as the car cleared the lighting given off by the house.

Still, he kept running until he heard another sound, the distinctive screech of wheels on pavement, and then the hard, cold bang as the car crashed. Then came the worst sound of all.

The silence.