Dangerous Girls

“But how?” I shrug helplessly. “It’s not like I can just turn my brain off.”

“Here.” Elise steps in closer to me, and takes something from the pocket of her cheerleader skirt. A tiny plastic sachet; two little white pills. She holds her palm out to me.

I hesitate.

“They’re my mom’s,” she adds. “Prescription, nothing crazy, but they’ll calm you down. Like a few glasses of wine, but . . . smoother.”

“You take them?” I ask, frowning. She’s never told me; I’ve never seen.

Elise shrugs, almost bashful. “Not often. Sometimes. When I don’t want to deal with . . . feeling, like this.”

“Are you okay?” I ask, suddenly shameful. “I know I’ve been wrapped up in Tate, and this whole thing—”

“Hey, this is a big deal for you. I’m fine.” Elise pulls me into a hug. “Promise.”

I stay for a moment in the safety of her arms, catching a breath of her perfume, the light spices of her shampoo. Then she pulls back, pressing the sachet into my hand. “It’ll relax you. Trust me,” she adds with a knowing look, “you’re going to want to be relaxed.”

I pause another moment, feeling painfully self-conscious. My brain has been buzzing all night, caught up in the plan that feels like an inevitability now, whether I could take it back or not. I know what I feel, and what I want—Tate, always Tate—but I’m still frozen on the edge of the drop, waiting. For what, I don’t even know. Something to push me over, someone to tell me this is the right decision. Fall. Be his. Let it consume you.

Maybe this is my push.

I take the packet and slip it into my pocket.

• • •

They drop us off at Tate’s house: the stucco building dark behind the wrought-iron gates. His parents are in DC for some charity fund-raiser, and we have the place to ourselves.

“They texted.” Tate grins, unlocking the front door and quickly tapping in the security code. “They won’t be back until Monday.”

“So no tiptoeing out at three in the morning?” I follow him inside.

He laughs, pulling me in for a quick kiss. “Nope. I can even make you breakfast in bed, if you want.”

“You mean, cold cereal in bed,” I kiss him back, relaxing into his touch like a drug, but he pulls away, already leading me through the foyer and up the wide staircase toward his room. He stops me in the hall.

“One minute,” he says, full of excitement. “Wait here.”

He disappears down the hall into his bedroom, leaving me to loiter nervously on the plush red carpet. My heart is beating like crazy, knowing what’s to come. I almost wish we hadn’t planned it—that I’d just whispered “now” some other night, when I was already caught up in the breathless grasping of hands and lips and hot skin against mine. This is so deliberate, slow, and sobering.

I take the sachet from my skirt pocket, considering it, but before I can open it, Tate calls to me. “Ready.” He beckons me to the bedroom door. I quickly tuck the pills away, take a deep breath, and step inside.

The room has been transformed. Instead of his sports trophies and sailing paraphernalia, the desk and mantle are lit with tiny candles, flickering golden in the dark. He’s playing a mix on low, a song I remember from one of our first dates, and there’s even a rose lying on the pillow of his freshly made bed.

“What do you think?” He takes my hands, looking almost nervous. “Is it okay? I want this to be perfect for you.”

My fear melts away. Not because of the props, the clichéd movie scene he’s made here, but because of the earnest look on his face, hopeful and true. This is just so Tate: to try his hardest to make everything perfect. He always wants to be the good guy, and although I don’t need this—the candles and the music—I love him for wanting to give them to me all the same.

He’ll always do the right thing by me. He’ll never let me down.

“It’s perfect,” I reassure him, feeling my blood start to sing. Desire and love and an unfamiliar sparkle in my veins. I’m done waiting. I want this.

I reach up to kiss his mouth, and give him everything.

WAITING

Lamar comes to visit me the week after I lose the bail hearing. We sit in the visitors’ room, with the scratched Plexiglass partition between us, speaking through the handsets like a sad, twisted version of kids playing telephone.

“How are you doing?” he asks me, concern clear on his face. I can’t think how I must look to him, with my unwashed hair and baggy orange jumpsuit. I won’t tell him the truth—about the unbearable wretchedness echoing through every minute of my days—so I don’t even try.

“Okay, I guess.” I’m glad he’s here, but surprised, too. I’ve been expecting Chelsea, even Mel. But Lamar has always been the solid one: quiet and true in his way.

“Don’t tell me they’ve got you running laps in the yard, and working sewing footballs or something.” He’s trying to sound casual, like we’re hanging out in a coffee shop or on the front lawn at school, and not in a prison block with two armed guards keeping watch over our every move.

I manage a weak smile for him. “Nope, just sitting around, waiting.”

“Same here,” he jokes, but his body is folded tensely onto the cheap plastic chair. “My mom’s already on me to do something constructive with my time. A project.”

“You mean a ‘What I Did on Spring Break’ essay?” I quip, but my words are hollow. “You should have deferred college for a year. You could write a killer application essay now.”

“Right,” Lamar agrees. “Killer.”

The word sits between us. My stomach drops. “I didn’t mean—”

“I know. It’s okay.” He looks away, his dark eyes darting nervously around the long room. There are two other visitors: a burly tattooed guy, murmuring through the handset, and a cluster of young kids, climbing over their grandmother and pressing their palms to the divider as their mother weeps on my side of the screen. The scene is depressing and bleak, and I wish with everything I am to be anywhere but here.

“Thank you,” I say quietly, trying to keep my voice from breaking. “For coming. I know you didn’t have to, and you’re the only one who’s been.”

Lamar looks away. “The others wanted to,” he says quickly, “but you know what our parents are like. And with the prison . . .”