Unspeakable Things(48)

Andrea was Lynn’s cousin, the girl I hadn’t recognized on the skating floor. Andrea attended school in Kimball, same place Mom taught English but in a different grade. She’d haughtily informed us that her trendy hairstyle would find our tiny town sometime soon. It was longer and feathered in front but short and tight to her scalp in back, with a leftover braid, like a rope tossed down her neck to rescue some tiny mouse caught in her shirt. I marveled at the courage it would take to wear your hair that different.

They were talking about Evie.

“No, it’s true!” Lynn said, trying to convince Andrea. “She goes to the playground all by herself. It’s her and sometimes a few farm kids show up. They have playtime.”

Heidi jumped in. She’d crimped her hair exactly as Lynn had. “I biked by and saw it. Evie’s mom knits on their front porch and watches from her house across the playground. Creeper peeper.”

“But not the real Peeping Tom!” Barb squealed. She was in seventh grade with me, Lynn, and Heidi, but I didn’t know her very well. She was a town kid, like Lynn and Heidi.

Lynn’s mom had picked up three Jimmy’s pepperoni pizzas for us and two liters of 7UP, which we’d wolfed down while The Secret of NIMH played on the VCR. I kept trying to watch it, but everyone else wanted to talk, so I eventually gave up. Lynn said we’d watch Swamp Thing later, and I hoped she meant we’d actually pay attention to it.

“I heard you saw the Peeping Tom,” Barb said to Lynn. “Like, laid eyes on his wee-wee.”

The giggles were fierce. As the last girl to the party, I still hadn’t found where I fit. I wasn’t built to be the quiet one, but Barb had taken the role of funny. That was usually my bit, but she’d arrived first. That left me mostly lurking in the background, but Lynn had liked my present the best, so that was something. My necklace was around her neck. It was so pretty.

Lynn hugged herself. “I think so. I heard a knocking.” She pointed toward the small basement window. If there was a fire, we’d barely be able to squeeze out of it. “Tanya and I were watching TV. I thought maybe it was Colby, from next door?”

This sent a thrill through the crowd, at least the four of us from Lilydale. Colby was a high schooler, the star of the baseball team, and he resembled David Hasselhoff if you squinted.

“I pulled aside the curtain, and it looked like someone was holding a water balloon out there, really close to the window? It was nighttime, so I couldn’t really see clearly. But the balloon squirted, and I screamed, and my dad ran downstairs. I told him what I saw and he charged out there, but he didn’t see anyone. He called the police. They took a report.”

It felt good to know someone that something had happened to, to be privy to her secret. “That must have been scary,” I said.

Lynn tossed her hair over her shoulder. “I guess. Hey, your parents still have those parties? My parents said freaky sex stuff happens there.”

My cheeks burned.

Heidi hopped on. “Yeah, maybe your dad is the Peeping Tom!”

“He’s not!”

“Jeez, Cassie, Heidi’s kidding,” Lynn said, sounding truly shocked. “Lay off. I just wanted to know about the parties is all.”

“They have people over sometimes. Just like you have people over right now.” Except not like that at all. “Hey, I sat next to Evie in the lunchroom the last week of school. She was making flyers for her playdates!”

Saying that out loud, turning the heat back to Evie, made something slither-bump between my heart and stomach. Besides not being here to defend herself, I thought she was genuinely nice. The last day of school, I’d overheard Mr. Kinchelhoe tell her that she wrote with a flair and flourish all her own. Evie had swallowed that like it belonged to her and went right back to whatever she was working on. Then, later that day, I was walking behind her as she told a fifth grader in outdated bell-bottoms that he wore them with “a flair and a flourish” all his own.

I liked that a whole lot about Evie, how she passed on her treasures.

“That’s crazy,” Andrea said, shaking her head. “But you almost can’t blame her, what with all the kidnapping happening here.”

Lynn bristled. “It’s not all the kidnapping. It’s just some of the Hollow boys getting too rough, that’s what my dad says.”

That’s what Sergeant Bauer had said last night, too. The last thing I was gonna do was tell these girls he’d been at my house, though, that one of those freaky sex parties had taken place last night.

“That’s not what my dad says,” Andrea countered. “He says there’s something bad happening here.”

Us four Lilydale kids exchanged glances. The Peeping Tom, Dad’s parties, Chester the Molester, the curfew siren—it was gross, but it was our gross.

“It’s not dangerous at all,” Lynn said, raising her chin. “I go out after curfew all the time. I even had a cigarette with Colby two nights ago, way after nine thirty.”

“No way!” Barb exclaimed.

A trill of excitement bubbled up in my belly, and I hesitated with my cup of 7UP halfway to my mouth. “What was it like?”

Lynn shrugged. “Gnarly. But I think Colby’s going to kiss me.”

We all paused to drink that in. Being kissed by a high school boy. Imagine. I took a swallow of my pop, certain it was what champagne tasted like.