Chapter Twenty-Eight

Saturday morning, I put on my slip dress and some capri leggings and get ready to go to Disneyland.

Also along for the sober outing are Talia, Jade, Emmy, and a few fellow patients I don’t know very well.

And Wade.

And Adam as chaperone. His look is almost festive in shorts and a bright shirt with crazy graphics all over it, but one glance at him and I can tell he’s not in the best mood.

“You, huh?” I say, coming up beside him as we gather in the drive.

“Yeah, me.” His eyes slide over to mine, then away. “I drew the short straw.”

“Are you kidding? Disneyland wouldn’t be considered the short straw by most people.”

“I’m not most people. Not right now, I’m not.”

“So, you don’t like it in general, or you just don’t want to go…today?”

“There’s no point talking about this, Lola.”

“I’m not talking about—”

“You promised.”

“Sure, but—”

“Lola,” he says in a warning voice.

“Okay, fine,” I grumble. “I was just…making conversation. You don’t have to read something into everything. I’m going to keep my promise, but you need to chill out.”

His shoulders slump, and he swears under his breath.

“I’m sorry,” he says after a few tense, silent moments. “I mean it. This is just…challenging.”

“It’s all right. I know. I’ll just…” I back away, eyes on his. “I’ll do my own thing today, okay? That work for you?”

“Yeah,” he says with a sad smile. “You do that.”

I join Talia and listen to her chatter while waiting for the bus, but I’m not really hearing a word she says because I’m thinking about how this thing with Adam feels like a breakup. All the pain of a breakup but with none of the fun of ever having the relationship. How much does that suck?

But the fact is, he means business. The thing we have, or could have—he’s not doing it.

Mr. Irritating Principles.

Mr. Freaking Nobility.

So what’s left for me is to jettison the crappy, woeful, pathetic thoughts, forget about him, and have a good time today.

Because I am going to Disneyland and nothing is allowed to ruin that.

Exactly.

Dr. Koch arrives and announces himself as the second chaperone, which seems odd. I’d have thought being a chaperone was far outside his job description and it’s not like he’s hands-on normally. Not to mention he’s far too busy a man to be able to drop everything to spend the day at Disneyland.

But whatever. Maybe he’s a Disney fanatic and this is his excuse to go.

Not my business.

We get on the small bus and I follow Talia to the back. Wade’s hand brushes my bare leg as I pass and what I feel…is the urge to look at Adam to see if he noticed.

Wade touches me and I think of Adam.

Not good.

Especially not good since my chances with Wade currently look much better than my chances with Adam.

“You are going to get somewhere alone with that boy today,” Talia murmurs.

“What boy?”

“Oh, don’t pretend.”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” I say, although of course I do, because she’s looking right at him.

Despite the various romantic tensions, once we get to Disneyland, I’m thrilled. We wander Main Street and then take a carriage ride, the earthy smell of horses mixing with the scents of popcorn, candy, marigolds, and hopeful morning air.

I breathe it all in and let myself feel like a kid again. Even Adam seems to relax a bit, though I feel him watching any time Wade comes near me, which is often.

It doesn’t piss me off—his being rather obviously jealous of Wade—in fact, I like it.

Of course it doesn’t take long before someone recognizes Wade, even though he’s in a baseball hat and sunglasses, and the next thing I know, he and Dr. Koch are posing for giggling tween girls and a couple of families in front of Walt Disney’s old apartment. Then some guy in head-to-toe khaki recognizes me, which doesn’t happen all that often unless I’m with one of my parents or at an event, and I get pulled into the photo op, too. The three of us stand smiling for strangers while the rest of the group wait, looking bored and annoyed, and I think of Dr. Koch and all those photos on his wall and realize this is probably a good part of the reason he’s along as a chaperone today—the freaking photo op. And it makes him feel famous.

Any second I’m expecting him to whip out his own camera and start taking selfies, but he restrains himself, and soon Adam comes to help move everybody along. After that, Wade uses a bit of the pocket money we’ve all been allowed to bring for the day, and he buys a Mickey Mouse hat and bigger sunglasses, which disguise him better. But clearly Disneyland isn’t an easy place to try to be anonymous.

Finally, we make our way to the rides, and soon we’ve blasted through Space Mountain, the Matterhorn, Astro Orbitor, Alice in Wonderland, and a bunch of others. We get soaked on Splash Mountain and then dry off while watching the lunchtime parade. We switch who we sit with constantly so I end up riding with everyone, except Adam, because we are mutually avoiding each other.

There are tourists, characters, princesses large and small. Talia gets a kiss on the cheek from Peter Pan and Jade buys (and puts on!) a pair of purple fairy wings.

Later, Wade wins a tiny elephant and gives it to me.

Adam gives me a look as I tuck it into my purse.

“What?” I say.

“Nothing.” He shrugs. “Didn’t know you liked elephants.”

“It’s just a stuffed animal.”

“I know.”

“It’s not an inpatient, not an outpatient, not anybody’s mentor…”

“Lola.”

“So I can keep it if I want to. Sleep with it in my bed, even…”

He shakes his head and walks away.

“I’m just making a joke,” I call after him.

“Oh, I’m laughing,” he says.

In the afternoon we split up briefly, with Wade, Talia, and me going with Dr. Koch and some others to It’s A Small World, and everyone else going with Adam to yet another roller coaster. The next thing I know, Wade has accidentally-on-purpose gotten us on a different boat from the rest of the group.

We grab the backseat, and right away he takes my hand. At first I let it happen because I’m surprised. And then I continue to let it happen because, well, it’s not like I’m immune to him. He is sexy and charming and sweet. His hand feels warm and solid and weirdly comforting. He smells good. He’s Wade Miller. He’s my first crush, someone I thought I loved, maybe did love, maybe could still love, once I purge myself of this Adam business. So I let him hold my hand.

I listen to the music and watch the animated dolls singing and dancing and feel him there beside me in the semidarkness.

“Carlyle?” he murmurs as we pass mermaids gurgling a wordless version of the famous song.

“Yes?”

“Come closer.”

“Closer?” I say, trying not to sound panicked. “Dr. Koch is right in front of us.”

“I know,” he says, sliding over so his side is right up against mine.

Ahead, Dr. Koch and Talia’s boat turns a corner. The second they are out of sight, Wade seizes me by the shoulders. Crap, he’s going to kiss me. What flashes through my mind as it’s about to happen is how ironic this is, how sad, how ridiculous it is that Wade Miller is about to kiss me right at the moment when all I can think about is someone else. Such a waste. And yet if it could lessen the ache of knowing I can never have Adam, maybe it wouldn’t be a waste, not a total one.

He bends in and I know it’s coming, and I let it happen. He leans in and kisses me like he means business, and I kiss him back.

God, I always, always wanted to be kissed by this boy—really kissed.

And now I am.

In the background, there are Polynesian steel drums playing, and it’s dark and perfect and romantic, and he’s a good kisser, not too aggressive, not dead-fish-smooshy like Trevor, just enough of the good things and none of the bad.

It’s all perfect, except…

He’s not Adam.

It doesn’t feel bad; it just doesn’t feel good, or right.

I pull away just as we round the corner back to North America.

“You are so hot,” he says into my ear, still sitting as close to me as he possibly can.

“You are too, Wade. Undeniably. But, um…this might not be a great idea right now. I mean, we really shouldn’t be—”

The conversation is cut off because the ride ends and we immediately rejoin the rest of the group. I don’t get the sense that Wade understood, or even heard what I said, because he doesn’t back off at all. Instead he stays right next to me, or behind me, constantly finding what he thinks are subtle ways to touch me—on my arm, my leg, the small of my back. I try moving away, but every time, he follows. I can’t even look at Adam, and it seems that in order to shake Wade I’m going to have to tell him more forcefully, more directly, which needs to happen in a private conversation—I don’t want to humiliate the guy, much less risk anyone, especially Adam, finding out I just let him kiss me.

More rides. More Wade. I’m not having a good time anymore.

“Wade, don’t,” I whisper/hiss at him as we’re getting belted into a roller coaster and he’s putting a hand on my thigh and squeezing. “We signed papers saying we wouldn’t fraternize, and I don’t want either of us to get in trouble.”

Wade laughs. It’s almost a nasty laugh. And then he says, “You think Koch is going to care if we get involved? He won’t. He’s a yes-man. World is full of ’em. He’ll probably be delighted by two famous people getting together at his rehab center…as long as we promise him an invite to our wedding.”

“Wedding?” I push his hand away.

“I’m just illustrating a point—no ring yet, Carlyle.” He puts his hand back.

“I’m not really famous. But even if that’s the case about Dr. Koch, I think we should…at least wait until we’re both out of the program to—”

“I didn’t think you were such a worrier. Come on,” he says, and slides his hand farther up my thigh as we go on a huge ramp to a terrifying height, from which the roller coaster is about to drop us. The rest of that conversation is lost in screaming and yelling, and Wade removes his hand to hang on to the seat bar instead.

Finally, we all get coffees and then find a grassy hill to sit on. I wait to see where Wade is sitting and then sit with Talia instead. Then I meet Adam’s eyes and wish I hadn’t. He’s, well, his expression is a lot of things, but pleasant isn’t one of them. Wade gets up from his spot and comes to sit as close as he can get to me, and Adam turns away.

I can’t get rid of him and I can’t explain to Adam that I am, in fact, trying to get rid of him. I want to scream.

Meanwhile Dr. Koch, who has been texting constantly and isn’t the most engaged of chaperones, wanders off to take a phone call.

That leaves Adam with ten of us. Then one of the guys urgently has to go to the bathroom, which is a problem because no one is allowed to go unchaperoned, even to the bathroom, lest they run off and try to score some drugs or whatever. (As if.)

“Adam, dude, I’m going to shit my pants!”

Adam looks from him to us, then makes a decision.

“Can I trust you guys?”

We all nod.

“Dr. Koch is around the corner and I’ll be right back. All of you stay right here.”

We all nod. They go. Everyone is chill, lying on the grass and chatting, drinking their lattes, looking at the sky or whatever.

Wade nudges me, points up the hill a bit, where no one else is sitting.

I shake my head.

He gets up and goes anyway. Talia kicks me and hisses, “Go—when will you have a better chance?”

I’m about to enlighten her on the real situation when I realize it is a good chance—a good chance to tell Wade I’m not into it. I’ll tell him gently but firmly, and we can go back to being friends and he’ll hopefully stop trying to feel me up at every opportunity.

I join him on the hill.

“Listen,” I say as I’m sitting down, “I want to talk to you—”

“I know,” he says, and now he’s all boyish and excited. “We’ve found each other after all this time, and I’m crazy about you and I can’t believe it.”

“Well, I—”

“I know—maybe we should talk in private,” he says, then jerks his head to the rise of the hill. We could be over it and out of sight in about three seconds.

“I don’t know…”

“Just for a couple of minutes. No one will even notice.” He starts sliding backward up the hill, then does a very athletic back roll kind of thing, landing on his feet and managing to keep his Mickey hat on at the same time, then sprinting to the top of the hill and vanishing.

“Shit,” I mutter, then follow him over the hill and down into a small copse of trees where he grabs me, pulls me close, and then backs me into a tree.

“I’m all yours, baby,” he says. “The situation sucks and I know we haven’t spent a lot of time together, but you are the perfect girl for me, I can tell.”

He lunges in to kiss me again, and I turn my head away.

“Wade, wait.”

“I know, I know, we’ll go back in a minute.”

“No! I mean, yes, we should, but…I’m trying to say this nicely—I don’t want to do this.”

“What?”

“I don’t want to do this with you. It doesn’t…feel right.”

“Like from a moralistic perspective? You get religion all of a sudden, or what? I seem to remember you kissing me the very first time I saw you here. You weren’t too worried about the rules then. Besides, I thought you liked me. I know you did.”

“I do. I did. I still do, but not…I had a crush on you for a long time, Wade, and I always cared about you, but…I’m not sure this feels right, now that it’s happening.”

“Too fast?”

“Maybe…?”

“We can go slower.”

“No, I don’t think we should ‘go’ at all.”

“Are you…not attracted to me?”

“You’re completely attractive, Wade. I just don’t want to do it. It might have seemed like a good idea to me at one point, but it doesn’t anymore.”

“Okay,” he says, raising his hands, palms forward, and backing away. “You know you’re missing out, right? I might not be so willing when you change your mind…”

“I’ll take the risk.”

“Because it’s not like I can’t get a girl. I can get almost any girl,” he says, and in that moment I see how little there is left of the Wade I used to know.

“Well, then you should be fine,” I say.

Though I’m really not sure he will be.

“Right. See ya then, Carlyle,” he says…and takes off.

Chapter Twenty-Nine

For a few moments, I’m frozen with indecision—Wade is an addict, he’s upset, he can’t be allowed to run off by himself. But I might not catch him anyway—I should go back, get Adam, even Dr. Koch.

With one last look at Wade’s retreating form, I run back over the hill to the group.

But there’s no group there. They’re all gone.

“Holy shit.” I look around, can’t see any of them, look back toward the hill. There’s no rendezvous plan, and no one has cells except Adam and Dr. Koch. Did they all take off, too, or are they somewhere looking for us? If so, I’m in super deep trouble.

I am in super deep trouble no matter what.

Maybe I can at least catch up with Wade…

And so I take off at a run, back up the hill and through the copse of trees and out onto the roadway…where he’s waiting for me, a smug smile on his face.

“Change your mind?”

“Pardon me?”

“I knew you wouldn’t be able to let me go.”

“No, that’s not why I’m here. We have to go back.”

“I don’t have to do anything,” he says.

“Listen! I went back and everyone was gone.”

He frowns. “That’s weird.”

“Well, either they’re looking for us, or they also took off, or somehow they decided to leave and no one noticed we were missing.”

“So,” he says, “that means we’re free. Let’s go.”

“No, we should go back to the hill and wait for them to come back.”

“Oh, fine,” he says with a heavy sigh. “You’re kind of a wet blanket, you know that?”

We go back.

Thirty minutes—thirty uncomfortable minutes at that, since we just got together and broke up all in one day—and no one from our group appears.

I am starting to feel panicked.

Wade wants to go on some more rides—ideally the big ones again. He does, then he doesn’t. I’m noticing, the more time I spend with him, how his personality kind of flips around—one minute he’s sweet and funny and normal and reasonable, the next he’s slightly aggressive, devil-may-care, unreasonable. It’s like he has a Jekyll-and-Hyde battle going on inside him, and I never noticed it before because I was never with him for a whole day.

“Fine,” he says, “you’re right—it might look bad if we went on rides. But we should at least walk around and see if we can find anyone, or go to an information booth.”

“Actually, an information booth is a good plan.”

Of course, there are still fans recognizing Wade, and we are waylaid multiple times for autographs and photos. Eventually we duck into a store where he buys himself a Mad Hatter costume, complete with hat.

“Now everyone’s just going to think you’re Johnny Depp,” I say, although this ensemble does disguise him much better. He laughs, acting more like his normal self, and hands me his Mickey Mouse hat and we slip out a different entrance and into the crowd.

A few minutes later, we find ourselves face-to-face with Talia and Jade.

Talia and Jade without the rest of the group and with two random guys in tow.

“Heyyyyy!” Talia says. “Check it out—this is Ricky and Sam and they are awesome. Ricky, Sam, our friends Lola and Wade.”

The guys, older, overly buff, and tanned the old-fashioned way, shift from side to side and give us both the thumbs-up.

“Thank God we found you!” I say, looking from Talia to Jade and back. “Where’s the rest of the group?”

Jade, although she does talk these days, just shrugs.

“Are you kidding?” Talia says. “You think you two get to be the only ones to have any fun today? Screw that, we took off. Ditched the rest of them before Adam came back. And guess what, we went crazy and flashed our boobs on Splash Mountain. Did you know its nickname is Flash Mountain? It’s right there in the photos they take—Jade, we have to go buy the photo! Two copies because our boobs look so good. And that’s how we met these sweetie pies.”

“But Talia…where’s Adam? Where’s everyone else?”

“Don’t worry, we left a note.”

“A note?”

“Yeah. On a napkin under a rock on the hill,” Talia says, and then she grabs on to one of the guys (maybe Sam?) and starts swaying against him and humming. He grabs hold of her ass with two hands, squeezes hard, and she gives a flirtatious squeal.

“Uh-oh,” Wade says under his breath.

“Oh my God,” I say and start trying to pull Talia away from him.

“No, no, no! You are not going to ruin my day,” she says, and then before I have a chance to do anything else, she grabs him and runs off.

I move to follow but suddenly the other guy is in my path. “Yo, get lost,” he says.

“Uh, Sam?” I say.

“Ricky.”

“Right. Sorry, Ricky, but you don’t understand. My friend is very…fragile and she cannot be running around Disneyland with your ass-grabbing buddy.”

“She doesn’t look fragile to me,” he says with a definite leer. “She looks like she can handle herself just fine.”

I close my eyes. “Oh my God.”

“Look, man, get out of the way,” Wade says.

“Or what?”

“Or nothing. Just get out of the way.”

I glance over at Jade, who has sat down at the edge of a shallow pond and looks far too relaxed for the situation.

“Jade?” I say. “You okay?”

“All good,” she says. “Just leave her be.”

I march over, lift her sunglasses up, and stare into her eyes.

“Crap, Wade,” I say, turning to him, “I think she’s high.”

Ricky starts laughing and ambles over to us, all the while making scaredy-cat squeals and going, “Oohh nooo, she’s high! Oh, oh, it’s the big bad wolf,” in a mocking falsetto voice.

“You think it’s funny, huh?” I say.

In response he makes a particularly obscene gesture at me and then reaches for Jade.

And that’s when I kind of lose my temper…and use both hands to shove him from behind and into the fountain. He flies over the side, landing headfirst in the shallow water.

“Holy shit,” Wade shouts, and beside me, Jade giggles.

Nearby, some kind of alarm goes off. Ricky surfaces, swearing and with blood on his forehead, and from a distance I see security guards starting to run in our direction.

“Time to go,” Wade says, pulling Jade to her feet.

“I agree.”

And with that, we start running in the direction Talia went.

The next two hours are a nightmare.

Wade and I chase after Talia, who’s stoned enough that she’s not doing the greatest job hiding but still managing to disappear every time we start to get close. Meanwhile we’re still dodging security and dragging an unwilling and very slow Jade along with us.

I can’t imagine what is happening with the rest of the group—where they are, what they think has happened to us. And it keeps running in my mind, how I told Adam I wouldn’t cause any trouble. Of course I didn’t mean this, because how would I have even imagined it? But he is not going to be impressed. Not to mention, he is probably in a panic and making terrible assumptions about the kind of person I am.

By 5:00 p.m. we are sweaty, thirsty, hungry, sore, and completely stressed out. We’ve lost Talia again somewhere on Tom Sawyer Island and decide to pause and regroup. Wade and I slump on a bench and Jade sits down on the grass a few feet away, looking like she’d rather not be seen with us.

Suddenly two security guards jog in front of us, talking into walkie-talkies and looking toward the woods. They continue around and out of sight, and then we hear a distinctly Talia-like hoot coming from the same woods.

“That’s her,” I say, standing up, all exhaustion forgotten.

Wade is on his feet and running already. I dash over to Jade and pull her up.

“Come on! I think we found her.”

“Yeah, well you can all jusfuckofffff…”

“No, Jade, it’s Talia. Come on.”

I tug at her arm and she comes, but not easily. Nevertheless, we’re soon on the path after Wade.

“Know about you,” Jade mutters.

“What?”

“Knowallaboutyou…fucking fake,” she slurs. “Fuckingrichbitchfake.”

“I thought we were over this.”

“Fuckingruinmydaybitch.”

“Focus, Jade. You can call me names later.” I hear shouting erupt ahead and pick up the pace—as much as I can with Jade the deadweight along for the ride.

“She said…youwerecoming,” Jade continues, still slurring but words clear.

I stop cold. Turn to Jade.

“What?”

She squints at me and then laughs.

“What did you say? Who said I was coming?”

“You know, your”—she puts her fingers up in air quotes and says—“friend.”

“My friend?” Please no.

“Ssssydnnneyyyy. Hahahahahaaaaaaaa . Sydneyyourshittyfriend…s’true you can’trustanyone.”

I’m standing there, jaw hanging open and watching Jade sway in front of me, and I feel like someone has stuck his hands into my insides and pulled them out.

And then we hear a screech and I remember why we’re here.

“Shit—Talia! Come on, Jade.”

“No,” she says, and plops down on the ground. “I’ll wait…here. I’mgoodhere.”

“Fine. I think I’ve looked after you enough for one day,” I say, and, though the events of the day should make me know better, I leave her there.

I arrive in time to find Wade, who has lost his disguise hat, rolling in the dirt with Sam and Ricky. He’s outnumbered but they’re wrecked, which means nobody’s winning the fight.

Talia huddles nearby, shaking and—surprise, surprise—naked.

I’m trying to decide whether to go to Talia or enter the fray when one of the security guards bursts into the clearing, bellows, and jumps into the fight.

I run to Talia, casting about for her clothes, and another security guard comes running through the trees followed by Adam (I have never been so happy to see him) who is, in turn, followed by some guy with a camera. The fighting intensifies and then abruptly stops. The security guys have Ricky, Sam, and Wade pinned in the dirt and Adam is helping Wade to his feet.

With Wade standing, Adam’s eyes land on me, and he rushes over.

“Jesus, Lola,” he says, and for a second it looks like he’s going to hug me. The relief in his eyes is intense, but it’s soon replaced by fury. “You’re okay?” he asks with a clenched jaw.

“Yes, but—”

“Not now.”

“Right.”

The guy with the camera is taking zillions of pictures and suddenly I realize he’s the same head-to-toe khaki guy from this morning, which means he must be a paparazzo and he might have been on us all day. Crap. He’s all over Ricky, Sam, and Wade, but it’ll only be a matter of time before he spots the naked girl, and I haven’t been able to find any of her clothes.

If I had a T-shirt I’d gladly whip it off to cover her, but all I’ve got is my slip dress, which would leave me almost naked. Instead I opt for basically sitting behind her and wrapping my arms and legs strategically, trying to cover her, warm her up, and hide both our faces at the same time.

“Get that guy out of here,” I scream at the security guards. “Get his camera and then get him the hell out.”

The guard is busy handcuffing Ricky and Sam and ignores me. But Wade and Adam both hear and start toward the paparazzo, who takes one last shot of Wade and bolts into the trees and out of sight.

“Fuck,” Adam says.

“Should we chase him down?” Wade asks.

“That’s only going to make things worse at this point,” Adam says. “Like things could get any worse.”

“You have a point,” Wade says.

Adam shakes his head and turns back toward Talia and me, then averts his eyes and swears again. I want so badly to talk to him, to explain, but it’s not the time and maybe there won’t ever be a time. This may just be too big of a disaster for us to get over, even as friends.

Meanwhile, one of the guards is unlocking another set of cuffs and coming toward Talia.

“Are you kidding me?” I say. “You’re cuffing her?”

“She’s violated a number of park rules,” the guard says. “And clearly she’s been using drugs.”

“But you don’t—”

He ignores me, hauls her to her feet, and starts putting the cuffs on her.

“At least let me find her clothing,” I say, and at that moment Adam barks out from behind us.

“Here. Got ’em.”

They let Talia get dressed as Wade and Adam stand by, looking embarrassed and horrified at the same time.

Actually, Adam doesn’t look embarrassed and horrified, he looks furious and horrified.

“Um, so where’s everyone else?” Wade asks Adam as the security guards talk on their walkie-talkies and Talia and I stand side-by-side, my arm around her waist.

“Unlike you, they stayed together. Dr. Koch took them home to Sunrise.” And then Adam’s head snaps up and he looks at me. “Hang on, where’s Jade? I heard she was with Talia.”

“Oh, sorry to scare you, she’s just down the path a bit,” I say, and my stomach clenches as I remember what she was saying to me right before all of this happened.

“This path?” Adam says.

“Uh, yeah. She’s not in the best shape, but she wasn’t going anywhere. Rather the opposite, actually.”

“All right,” says the first security guard, interrupting us. “Security van’s picking us up in five. Time to go.”

They haul Ricky and Sam to their feet and inform us that Talia, Wade, and I have to go to their holding cells, too.

“You’re under park arrest and I’ve got one more set of cuffs,” he says, and puts them on Wade.

“Great,” Adam mutters. “Fucking great.”

We take the path back toward Jade. One look at her dilated pupils and they’re going to arrest her, too, just to make sure our “sober outing” is a complete and utter disaster. And let’s not forget there’s a paparazzo sneaking around somewhere looking for a big payday. Wade Miller in handcuffs at Disneyland should do it.

But right then, we’ve got a bigger concern.

Because when we find Jade, she’s lying face-first in a pile of blood and vomit.

And she’s not breathing.