“So every morning she used to get these giant frozen coffees from the Starbucks, right? I mean, they were huge. I’m pretty sure they were the only thing she ever consumed. I can’t remember seeing her eat. I’m pretty sure they were her bitch fuel. Anyway, so I started buying the exact drinks she got and putting them in her locker. So she’d open her locker and they’d just spill over all her shit. Wow, that sounds so much worse when I say it out loud. It was funny that week when every time after lunch she’d open her locker and one would come flying out at her. She never figured it out.”
I had to admit it was pretty good.
“And you know what? I bet that girl is probably screwing some ridiculously hot guy at some awesome college in Florida or something. Bitch,” she said.
“Or maybe she got knocked up the summer after high school and her parents made her marry him and she had a super ugly baby and she waits tables at a horrible diner and her boss is always grabbing her ass, but she can’t say anything because she can’t afford to lose her job because her baby daddy is an alcoholic who just sits in his recliner and drinks all day.”
She stared at me as if I’d grown an extra head and then burst out laughing.
“Girl, you have a hell of an imagination. You should be a writer.” She wasn’t the first person who’d said that to me. In English, Greg had written comments on my first few prompts that were all positive, and he’d singled me out more than once for recognition. Of course I’d turned into a human fireball every time, and I wished he’d stop doing it.
And because Hannah had told me about one of her little secrets, I decided to share one of mine.
“Hold on a sec.” My laptop was in my room, so I grabbed it and turned it on, clicking on to the internet browser and pulling up my blog. I handed the computer to Hannah without saying anything.
“Okay,” she said, scrolling through my blog. “What is this?”
“It’s mine. My blog. This is my secret identity. My name is Joscelyn Archer and I’m a music blogger.”
Her eyes went wide and she stared at the blog more intently.
“No shit, this is yours? Oh, my God.” I watched her eyes race over my latest album review and then she clicked on some of the tabs and looked at some other things. I waited for the verdict.
“This is so freaking awesome! Why didn’t you tell me about this?”
I shrugged.
“I don’t know. I guess it was just such a personal thing that I was putting out there. I didn’t mind sharing it with strangers because they would never know me or meet me, but sharing it with people I know is something different. What if they thought it was weird? And what if I was bad at it? I mean, I get sucky comments from strangers, but it would be awful if one of my friends or something said it. I don’t know.” I tried to take the laptop away as I felt my ears getting red.
Hannah wouldn’t let me have it.
“No way. You shared this with me and I’m going to take it all in. I told you that you were a good writer, and you are. You’re really, really good. Why are you not an English major?”
Shit. I didn’t know showing her my blog would lead to a rehash of things I didn’t want to talk about.
“Because I don’t fancy working in food service for the rest of my life or ending up living in a refrigerator box on the street.”
Hannah smacked me on the arm.
“You would never end up in a box on the street. Hello? Do you see where you are living right now? Your sister and all her friends would never let that happen. You have a whole f**king houseful of people that care about you and you can’t even see it.”
What was that about?
“I’m not ungrateful. Do I seem ungrateful?”
She sighed and gave my computer back.
“No, that’s not what I meant. That was just my little jealousy monster rearing his incredibly ugly head. Just forget it.”
“You have people who care about you. I care about you,” I said, putting my arm around her. “Once again, I totally sounded like I was into you. But you knew what I meant, right?”
“Totally. And I care about you, too.”
We shared a completely not awkward hug and then started laughing.
“So, a frat party, huh? Did you ever think that the best revenge is living well? I read that somewhere, and I think it would work in this situation. We’ll get you a killer dress and the ladies of Yellowfield House can make you up and then we can go and you can shove it in their faces. If they think they got to you, they win. If you show them you don’t give a shit, then you win,” I said.
She shrugged one shoulder.
“It’s not as good as dumping buckets of pig’s blood on them.” Thinking about Carrie reminded me that Stephen King lived right down the street. I told Hannah and I thought her eyeballs were going to fall out of her head.
“I knew he lived in Bangor, but I didn’t know where.”
“Yeah, we can drive by or something sometime. We could even creepily walk by. But we’d probably get arrested. He’s got security cameras and stuff.”
We both walked back up the stairs and found everyone sitting in the living room, pretending they weren’t waiting for us—except Renee and Paul.
“We didn’t kill each other, and we didn’t devolve into a girl fight of hair-pulling and eye-gouging, if anyone was worried about that,” Hannah said, slinging her arm over my shoulder. “See? All good.”
Everyone seemed to sigh in relief.
“But I think I owe your sister an apology, so I’m going to go do that,” Hannah said, heading for the stairs as if she’d been in the house a hundred times.
I didn’t know if that was a good idea, but I wasn’t going to stop her.
I sat down on the couch next to Taylor, and she leaned her head on my shoulder.
“You know, I’ve never been to a frat party, either. I was a bit curious about the experience, as well.”
Hunter made a grumbling noise.
“What, you don’t think I can defend myself against a few drunk frat guys? I defended myself pretty good against you,” she said.
His eyes narrowed and he pointed at her. “Touché, Missy. Touché.”
Dusty seemed to be watching me. Why hadn’t he gone home yet?
“I’m going to go check on them,” he said suddenly, popping to his feet. “I’m not sure who my money would be on in a fight between Hannah and Renee.” He jogged up the stairs, his pants sliding lower and lower. One of these days I was going to ask him how they stayed up. But he’d make some weird comment and then I’d blush and that wouldn’t be fun. I didn’t need to give him any more fuel.