Until There Was You(25)
“Who’s that?”
“You know. Everyone calls her Anne Frank? Kinda weird-looking, looks like she’s in fifth grade. Her parents own that grubby German restaurant?”
“Are you kidding? Her? Why?”
“No clue. Hey, do you have any hairspray? I love your earrings, by the way.”
It was the comment about Guten Tag that started the tears. Her parents’ restaurant was not grubby. It was immaculate. Did those twits know how hard it was to clean that place? Did they have any clue how many hours Stacia put into the restaurant, because of course a cleaning service wasn’t enough, and the Osterhagens themselves polished those steins, scoured the bathrooms, dusted the Hummel figurines and the broken antler on the mounted moose head she’d named Glubby when she was three?
Well, she wasn’t about to give the mean girls—or Rick—or Liam—the satisfaction of seeing her picked up in front of the Whitfield Mansion. The bathrooms were directly across from the kitchen, and she slipped in through the doors, ignoring the looks from the staff, and simply walked out the back.
It was raining. It might’ve been May, but the temperature was in the low fifties, and before long, her teeth started to chatter. The mansion’s long driveway was bordered by woods thick with dripping pines. Dreading the idea that people coming to the prom would see her, soaked, dress ruined, hair and makeup a joke, Posey chose the woods. Her shoes—her first pair of heels—sank into the muddy ground, and she twisted her ankle more than once. The now-sodden gown flopped around her legs like a dying bird, making her skin raw. How much had her parents spent on this night? Four hundred dollars, maybe, for her gown and shoes and special-order bra, her hair, the necklace and bracelet her dad had given her just last night? They’d been so proud, so excited…and now look.
A car turned into the mansion driveway, and without further thought, Posey leaped behind a tree and crouched down, hating herself for doing it, unable not to. Hiding in the woods in a ruined prom dress, all because Rick Balin had dumped her.
And Rick, she knew with absolute certainty, would never have done that without Liam Murphy first planting the idea.
Nothing but a bag of bones. Built like a ten-year-old boy.
There was a 7-11 on the main road, about a mile from Whitfield Mansion’s entrance. By the time she reached the store, she was shuddering with cold. She fished a quarter out of her purse and deposited it in the pay phone outside and called her brother.
“Henry?” she whispered when he answered. “Don’t tell Mom and Dad, but I need you to come get me. And can you bring me some dry clothes?” Then she started to cry in earnest.
She hid in the potato chip section, dripping onto the floor, until Henry came. Then she changed in the 7-11 bathroom, and her brother took her out to a diner two towns over, and she sobbed out the whole story over a hamburger club with extra fries, from her love for Liam to the comment about Guten Tag’s cleanliness. For once, Henry’s lack of conversational skills was a blessing.
“I’m sorry, Posey,” was all he said. But he reminded the waitress that she’d need extra mayo on the side and didn’t protest when she told him they needed to stay out till past eleven, knowing that Max and Stacia wouldn’t be able to stay awake that long no matter what.
“You can’t tell Mom and Dad, okay?” Posey asked as they pulled in front of their house. Their parents’ windows were dark.
“Okay,” he said. Then he hugged her—such a rare event—and waited till she was showered and in bed before going to bed himself, just in case she needed anything. The next morning, she told her parents she’d had a great time, but ended up with a headache, and called Henry to come get her just before the end of the night. They bought it.
Emma called that same day. “I told everyone I was really disappointed you’d gotten sick,” she said, her voice horribly kind. “I told them what a great friend you’ve been, and it was just crappy luck that you got one of your migraines. But also that you were totally cool about Rick and Jess. You were only in it for the dress anyway, right?”
Posey understood. Emma was using her popularity as a shield, and if anyone was going to make fun of Posey, they’d suffer her disapproval. Not that anyone would really believe the story. But back at school, no one openly made fun of Posey, and though she’d been dreading hearing echoes of Liam’s words, she wasn’t subjected to them again. She stopped going to Sweetie Sue’s for ice cream, because she just didn’t want to see the pity in Emma’s eyes.
She didn’t see Liam until five days after the prom, at the restaurant, where for the first time ever, he initiated conversation. “Heard you got sick at the prom.”
Why would he talk to her now? “Yeah.”
“You okay now?”
“I’m fine.” Her voice was calm and cool.
Then she packed her books, told her parents she’d see them at home. For the last month of her sophomore year, she told her mom she was better able to do her homework back at the house. She found herself studying harder, raising her hand more often, walking through the halls with an edge she hadn’t had before. She barely saw Liam, and that August, he left for California.
That moment when she’d crouched behind the tree…it did something to her, something that made her grow up and toughen up. But one question throbbed in her brain for a long, long time. Why? Why would Liam say something so hateful? How could he—who had tamed a stray and starving cat—be so cruel to a girl who had only ever wanted to be his friend?