They Wish They Were Us(82)

But we didn’t talk about any of it the next day. I never told them about Jake or how Adam saved me. How could I? Shaila was dead by then. There were bigger things to not discuss.

Still, Jake’s words seared into my brain. Aren’t you going to thank me?

As if I owed him some chunk of myself. As if he was entitled to a prize for locking me in a closet with a bottle of something sketchy.

The memory makes my insides crumble and my head pound. What if Adam hadn’t found me? I tried desperately not to obsess over the possibilities, over the fear and the blurry reality of what had and had not happened.

That day after initiation, while we were supposed to be grieving, there was one thought I couldn’t get out of my head: Why did the boys have the power? Why did they make the rules while we dealt with the consequences?

A montage of pops flashed through my brain. Adam and Jake calling out directions. Tina and Rachel standing on the sidelines, cheering and whooping along. They seemed in control, but they never were. Moments flickered in my brain as I remembered all the times the boys took advantage. Humiliating Nikki during the Show. Acting like we were being so dramatic when Shaila almost drank herself to death. It happened all over again this year. Robert zeroing in on Sierra. My own brother laughing at her during Road Rally. The boys always spoke in code when we were present, a secret language not meant for us. We were always kept in the dark.

It spread like a virus to Derek Garry and to Robert. Then passed along to boys like Topher Gardner and, now, my brother.

Had we stood by and let this transformation take place?

Shaila’s death should have signaled the end. I wonder if every class thought their initiation would be the last, though. We’ll keep them safe. We’ll make everything okay. We’ll stop this. But we didn’t. We were complicit in the sick, twisted games we played with each other. Prove it, we taunted. Prove you’re a Player.

And the worst part is that it felt good, really good, to have someone else endure what we did. That next year, when we were sophomores, Nikki, Marla, and I did all the bitch work to set up for initiation, driving out to Derek Garry’s Hamptons house the night before, filled with adrenaline. We made vats of neon pink Player Punch, stoked the bonfire, and squealed with excitement when the freshmen showed up blindfolded, shaking, and scared. Robert, Henry, and Quentin had one job: get ice.

And when the Toastmaster, Fieldston Carter, called out the final pops, I stood back as they shouted out assignments: Spend the whole day naked in the sun. Get on all fours and let the seniors walk you on a leash for the rest of the night.

I smiled as we chugged beer until we forgot our reality, that this was the night that killed Shaila only a year before. It’s only now I realize I thought I was still on the chopping block. I thought I was up for grabs.

We did it again last year, too, convinced we were only juniors, not quite at the top. That’s why I kept telling myself, This year will be different. I tried to push the guilt away, to keep it from eating me alive. But now I know that’s a lie, too. Initiation will go on as planned. Jared will complete his horrific transformation. Unless something happens. Something big.

Rachel clears her throat and I’m back in the dingy downtown coffee shop. “We were wrong,” she says. Her red-rimmed eyes are wet, threatening to spill over. Her mouth crumples. “To go along with everything. To let it happen.”

“Why do we do it?” I say.

“It’s easy to convince yourself of something if you just pretend it’s the truth.”

We sit in silence as our lattes grow cold.

Finally she speaks. “So you’re really out?”

I think of Weingarten, of Brown, of what I can do to really protect Jared. There’s still time for him. “I need to know what happened to Shaila,” I say firmly.

Rachel nods and leans in so our foreheads almost touch. “I want you to know something. The Players . . . all that bullshit. That’s not who I am anymore.” She looks me dead in the eye. “It’s not who you are either.”

She’s right. That Jill would never have responded to Rachel’s text back in the fall. She never would have agreed to meet Graham or go talk to Kara. She would have clapped along with everyone else at the Show and cheered when Jared laughed at Sierra during Road Rally. She never would have found herself being threatened in the headmaster’s office. That Jill would have graduated with a 96 average and a hole in her heart.

This one will not.





TWENTY-TWO





I NEED YOU.

Those three words are better than any, better than I miss you or even I love you. They send a rumbling sensation through my body, starting at my toes and ending at the tips of my split ends. And today, on the first Saturday in May, they come from Adam in the form of a text.

Big Keith hated my latest. He says I’m slacking.

The sun streams through my window, hitting my bed, and I squint to read his words again. I didn’t even know he was home. He must have just ended the semester.

Want me to come over? I type.

Yes.

My heart is heavy, filled with a desperate need to make Adam feel better. It’s the best distraction right now. Rachel and I have been going over file after file in Shaila’s case for the last few days and I’m exhausted. And, after what I owe him, I can’t imagine ever saying no.

I take a quick shower, pull on a coral-colored sundress and my jean jacket, and drive the route I know by heart. I roll the windows down and crank up Stevie Nicks’s first solo album. A warm breeze floats through the car. This used to be my favorite season in Gold Coast. Those few weeks just after everything thaws for good but before the heat becomes oppressive. It used to feel like the only time of year when everything bubbles with possibilities. Now the weather just reminds me of losing Shaila.