Life and Other Inconveniences(10)

Beth snorted.

“Did he cheat on her?” I asked, wincing. I hated infidelity. My father had cheated on my mother, though it took me years to figure that out. All those “business trips” . . .

“I don’t think so,” Beth said. “More likely she cheated on him, because she could bag Derek Jeter if she wanted to. She’s that beautiful, Emma.”

“I know. I get the Christmas cards.” I heard a rattle of glassware in the background. Beth worked part-time at Noah’s, which was both the townie bar and also a place that served locally sourced kale and goat cheese. In other words, Beth knew everyone and everything. And while we saw each other only once in a while, she was still one of my closest friends. Every few years, she’d come to Chicago, and she and Calista and I would go out together, sleep at Calista’s fabulous apartment, get silly. When I visited Hope, I usually saw Beth, too. Just never in Stoningham. I was always too afraid that I’d run across Genevieve, and somehow, she’d reach through the seventeen years that had passed, like the evil queen in a Disney movie, and shatter everything.

Sort of like she was doing now . . .

I was just about to tell her about my grandmother’s call when the front door banged open and Riley stormed up the stairs, eyes red, face blotchy, shoulders tight. “Gotta run,” I said to Beth.

“Talk to you soon, babe.”

I followed Riley up the stairs. “Hey, honey,” I said.

“Not now,” she said, slamming her door.

Being able to express anger meant a child felt safe and loved, said the therapist part of my brain. The mother part didn’t care. I opened her door. “For one, that is no way to greet your mother. Don’t slam doors, especially in my face.”

“Sorry,” she muttered.

“For two, what happened, honey?”

She burst into tears. “I hate everyone!” she said, and my heart cracked. I put my arms around her and smoothed her thick red hair, panic kicking up in my chest. For a minute, I just let her cry, selfishly savoring the fact that my daughter was seeking comfort from her mommy, and I could breathe her in and hold her close.

Then she pulled back and dashed her arm across her eyes.

“What happened?” I asked again.

“They’re just . . . bitches, Mom. That’s it in a nutshell.”

“Who?”

“Annabeth and Jenna and Mikayla,” she said, her eyes welling again.

Those were her three best friends since they were teeny. Her only three friends, so far as I knew. Group friend dynamics were so hard; it was heady stuff to belong, and hell when you didn’t.

“What did they do?” I asked.

She shook her head and used Blue Bunny to wipe away her tears. “Apparently, they all went to a party this weekend. A party I wasn’t invited to. And they all . . .” She gave me a look. “They all hooked up with boys from a fraternity at Northwestern! And got drunk. Now it’s like I don’t even know them anymore. They sat there at lunch today, practically high-fiving each other because they’re not virgins anymore.”

“Are you kidding me?” Like Riley, Mikayla had started school a year early. She wasn’t even sixteen yet, and in Illinois, the age of consent was seventeen. If she’d slept with a college boy, he’d be criminally liable for statutory rape . . . and if Mikayla’s parents knew what she was up to, they could be charged with child neglect or abuse.

“They said they did it. Or they almost did it. I don’t know. That’s not the point. The point is, they’re sluts all of a sudden!”

“What did you say?”

“I said, ‘Why would you do that?’ and they just looked at me like I was a stupid little kid.”

I would have to call the girls’ mothers, of course. Which wouldn’t help Riley, but my God, if my child was being given alcohol and being taken advantage of at frat parties—raped, let’s call it what it was—I’d have the boys arrested, drawn and quartered and dragged through the streets. Then hanged, then disemboweled, then burned.

“I don’t understand why they’re doing this,” Riley said.

I took a slow breath. “Sex, you mean?”

“Everything! I didn’t know they wanted to have boyfriends or hookups or whatever! It’s like all of a sudden, no one’s talking to me, and I’m totally left behind.” She burst into fresh tears. “They’re having sex! I mean, they’re just too young! And drinking? At a frat party? They were so proud of themselves. Are they idiots?”

“Yes,” I murmured. “Most teenagers are at one point or another.”

“Last week we were friends. We had so much fun at the coffee shop the manager asked us to quiet down, we were laughing so hard! Today, they just froze me out. Talked about what they were doing this weekend and no one even looked at me, and when I reminded them that they were sleeping over here and we were going to the movies, they just kept talking like I didn’t say anything, and I wanted to get up and walk away, but I didn’t. I just sat there like an idiot.”

“Oh, sweetheart,” I said, putting my arm around her again. “I’m sorry. That must have felt horrible.” Was she not included because they knew I wouldn’t let her go? Because she wasn’t into boys yet, or maybe ever? Was this somehow my fault?