CHAPTER

Fifteen

CLAIRE

The next morning stretches out long and empty.

Claire doesn’t tell Grammy what happened with Julie. It’s not any of Grammy’s business. It’s no one’s business but hers.

Anytime the memory starts to resurface, Claire pushes it away and thinks about Josh instead. It’s hard to think about him, though. It’s been so long since she’s seen him that his face is half-blurred in her mind, and she can’t remember what his voice sounds like. She used to get warm whenever she thought of him. Now she doesn’t. His memory is flat and pleasant and completely unremarkable.

Julie keeps trickling back into Claire’s thoughts. She thinks about Julie’s movie room, and playing SNES, and going to the beach, and eating pizza at the Pirate’s Den. She thinks about the first time she and Julie played Ms. Pac-Man together. When one memory gets in, the others follow, like a flood.

That afternoon, during the hottest part of the day, Claire goes outside and turns the sprinkler on and stretches out underneath its spray of water in her bathing suit. It’s the only thing she can think to do in the heat. She stares up at the bleached sky and listens to the cicadas as the water falls in rhythmic bursts across her skin. The grass prickles against the back of her body. She thinks about the kiss.

It wasn’t Claire’s first kiss—that honor belongs to Ethan Cosgrove, a boy who asked her to homecoming two years ago. Their lips brushed across each other in the front seat of the station wagon his parents let him borrow for the evening. The kiss had made Claire’s whole body light up, but at the same time she felt like she was taking part in some complicated rite of passage, and everything about the evening—the awkward swaying beneath Christmas lights, the itchy fabric of her dress, the unfamiliar shellac of hairspray in her hair—had all been elements of that rite, a lead-up to the kiss.

The kiss with Julie was different.

The kiss with Julie was like the beach last night, dark and laced with shimmers of danger and moonlight. The kiss with Julie was something pure, something Claire isn’t sure she understands.

Because she’s straight. She can’t love a girl.

Can she?

The sprinkler tch-tch-tchs its way across Claire. The drops of water catch in the sunlight and form rainbows that flicker in and out of existence like images on a breaking-down projector. Those rainbows feel like Julie’s kiss. They’re beautiful and strange and Claire can’t quite grasp on to them.

It doesn’t matter anyway. Claire shoved Julie away in her confusion, and now she hasn’t heard from her. Every time she passes the phone she wills it to ring, even though she hasn’t decided what she’s going to say to Julie.

Another cascade of water from the sprinkler. It’s warm as bathwater from the sun, but when the sea breeze kicks in Claire almost feels cool. She settles deeper into the grass, lets the haze of heat overtake her. There’s no point in thinking about Julie. There’s no point in thinking about anything.

“Oh my God, what are you doing?”

It takes Claire a moment to place the voice.

“Audrey?” She pushes herself up on her elbows and cranes her head back. Audrey stands on the patio and waves.

“Haven’t seen you in a while!” she calls out. “Thought I’d say hi.”

“Yeah.” Claire slumps back down on the lawn. The sprinkler makes another pass in her direction. The thought of dealing with Audrey Duchesne right now exhausts her.

“Anyway, what is this? A sprinkler?” Audrey walks across the yard. Claire drops her head and watches her approach sideways.

“Yeah,” she says. “I was hot.”

“Right, no AC.” Audrey laughs. Her hair glints in the sun. It hurts Claire’s eyes. “I came over to talk about the Stargazer’s Masquerade. When I called, Mrs. Sudek said you were available to chat.”

The cicadas’ rattle swells when Audrey says Stargazer’s Masquerade. Claire forces herself to sit up. “Yeah,” she says. “I’m not sure I want to go.”

Audrey’s face darkens like a storm cloud. “What? Why not?”

“I don’t know, I just—” Claire watches the water from the sprinkler. I just don’t want to go without Julie. Why is she thinking that way? “Aren’t you going to go with Lawrence Reyes anyway?”

Audrey laughs. “Well, of course, but I still want you to come with us! A double date.”

“I don’t have a date.”

“I’ll get you one.”

Claire closes her eyes. “I’m just not sure I want to go, okay?”

“Did you not get Abigail Sudek’s dress?”

Audrey’s voice is close, right in Claire’s ear. But Audrey herself is still several feet away, out of range of the sprinkler.

“The dress,” Claire says, feeling dazed.

“Your costume,” Audrey says brightly.

“It won’t fit.”

“Have you tried it on?”

Claire shakes her head. The dress is hanging on the back of her closet door. Every morning it swishes past her as she pulls out her day’s clothes.

“We should do that right now.”

Claire doesn’t say anything. She really doesn’t want to go through the humiliation of not even being able to pull the dress over her hips.

“Come on,” Audrey says, and she actually stamps her foot in the grass. “You can’t just lie outside all day.”

“Pretty sure I can,” Claire says.

The sprinkler tosses water over her again.

“But it’s the Stargazer’s Masquerade,” Audrey says, and her voice has a strange, reverberating timbre to it. “You need to try on that dress.”

Claire’s thoughts blur. The water on her skin feels too cold, despite the sun blazing overhead.

“Fine,” she says. “But it’s not going to fit.”

“We’ll see,” Audrey says in a singsong.

Claire sighs and pushes herself up. She shakes out her hair and brushes the flecks of grass off her skin. The cicadas buzz, and for a wild, stupid moment Claire wishes a monster would come ambling through the yard, so she could have the excuse of calling up the exterminator. Of calling up Julie.

But the yard remains empty.

“I’m so excited to see how it’s going to look on you,” Audrey says.

“You’re going to be disappointed.” Claire hops up onto the patio, drops of water trailing after her. “Nothing made for a hundred-pound woman in a corset is going to fit me.”

Audrey just smiles at that, and something in her smile gives Claire a chill.

When they go inside, Grammy’s awake from her afternoon nap and has the TV on—Claire recognizes As the World Turns. Grammy glances up as Claire and Audrey traipse through the living room.

“Hello, Audrey,” she says, her voice flat and measured.

“Hey, Mrs. Sudek!” Audrey throws her arm around Claire’s shoulder and Claire has to resist the urge to shrug it off. “We’re trying on Claire’s costume for the Stargazer’s Masquerade.”

“Ah yes. Well, have fun.” Grammy turns back to the TV. She doesn’t ask about the costume itself. Maybe she saw the dress hanging in the closet.

Claire grabs a towel out of the bathroom before going into her bedroom. Audrey plops down on her bed, making herself at home. The sight of it rubs Claire raw.

“So where is it?” Audrey asks.

“In my closet.” Claire rubs the water out of her hair and then pulls the closet door open. The dress flutters.

Audrey breaks into a huge grin. “It’s just beautiful, isn’t it! Oh, that color will go perfectly with your skin tone.”

“Right.” Claire pulls the dress off the hanger and holds it up to her body. The dress is tiny. She smooths it down against her stomach.

“Put it on!” Audrey cries.

“Over my swimsuit?” Claire stiffens with irritation. She feels like Audrey’s trying to embarrass her. She has to see that there’s no way the dress is going to fit.

“Yeah, just to see how it’ll look. Then we can start talking about hair and makeup.”

It bothers Claire that Audrey’s talking about the dance as if Claire has agreed to go—which she hasn’t—but she sighs and tosses the dress onto the bed.

“Help me undo the buttons,” she says. Attempting to try it on is probably the only way to get Audrey to shut up.

“Awesome!” Audrey hunches over the dress. Together they undo the dozens of tiny buttons running in a line down the back of the dress. Then Claire picks it up and pulls it over her head. She expects it to catch on her boobs so that she’s left standing with a mass of century-old silk draped over her head. But to her surprise the dress slides down over her waist and hips, settling into place with a sigh.

“What the—” Claire turns in place, trying to make sense of this miraculous fit.

“Told you!” Audrey jumps up from the bed and grabs Claire by the shoulders and sets her into place. “Let’s do up the buttons. Just to get a sense.”

“There is no way—”

“It’s totally fitting.”

And it is. Audrey’s fingers brush against Claire’s back as she slips each one into place.

“This is impossible,” Claire says. “You saw when I held it up to me. It was half my size!”

“It must have just looked small,” Audrey says.

Claire doesn’t answer, only stares over at her vanity as Audrey finishes up the buttons. She knows it didn’t just look too small. It was too small.

“There!” Audrey steps back. “I didn’t button up all of them, but this should be enough to give you a general idea.”

Claire lifts up her skirts and walks over to the vanity mirror. She can only see part of herself, her waist and hips. The dress skims over her silhouette, not too tight and not too big.

“You look amazing,” Audrey says, her voice gushing with delight. “You’ll have the best costume there! I’m thinking of going as a hippie, so we can be like, young ladies through the ages.”

Claire bends down, trying to catch more of a glimpse of herself in the mirror. The bodice of the dress fits as well as the rest of it, and the fabric shimmers as if threaded through with silver. Despite her damp hair and the nights of fitful sleep and her current lack of makeup, in the dress Claire’s skin seems to glow. She gathers up her hair and piles it on top of her head and for a moment she doesn’t even recognize herself.

“This is going to be so much fun!” Audrey’s face appears alongside Claire’s in the mirror. The illusion shatters, and Claire drops her hair. “Now we’ll just have to get you a date! Don’t worry, though, I have a plan.”

“What?” Claire straightens up and looks at Audrey. “No, that’s really not necessary.”

“Don’t be silly.” Audrey claps her hands together. “He’s a trainee with the sheriff’s office named Christopher. He’s dreamy, although not as dreamy as Lawrence, of course.” She giggles. “I’m planning to meet up with him and Lawrence later tonight, if you want to come.”

“I still haven’t decided if I want to go to the dance at all.”

“Of course you want to go!” Audrey takes Claire’s hand and twirls her around. The dress flares out at the waist, the fabric stirring up a soft breeze in the hot room. “Look at you! When else will you have an opportunity to wear a dress like this?”

Claire doesn’t have an answer to that. Audrey lets go of her hand and Claire sits down in front of her vanity. Claire stares at the glass, then lifts one shoulder as coquettishly as she can. A pretty dress and a date with a boy. Her thoughts are fuzzy with the promise of normalcy.

“I’ll go with you tonight,” Claire says. “And meet this guy. And then I’ll let you know.”

Audrey floats in the mirror behind her, and when Claire says that, Andrey’s whole face erupts into a dazzling smile.

Audrey promised to pick Claire up around ten o’clock. Grammy usually goes to bed long before then, but tonight she stays up, the glow from the TV casting long, eerie shadows across the living room. She’s thin enough that Claire thinks she can see her skull beneath her skin.

“I hope you girls have fun,” she says when Scattergories goes to commercial break.

Claire looks over at her. “You’re not worried about me going out drinking? It’s so late.”

“You’ll be with Audrey.”

Claire sighs. They sit in silence until the doorbell rings. Claire jumps up to answer it, aware of Grammy leaning out of her chair to peer into the foyer.

Audrey stands outside, bathed in yellow porch light, dressed in a lime-green minidress, body shimmer sparkling on her collarbone. Claire smiles at her, but really she’s thinking about the night that Julie knocked on her window and they stayed up late reading the letters Abigail had written Javier.

She shouldn’t think about Julie. Audrey’s taking her to meet a boy, a perfect way to prove to herself that she’s completely normal, and that the daydreams about the kiss are just an ordinary part of growing up.

“Ready to go?” Audrey asks.

Claire nods, even if she isn’t so sure.

“Have fun!” Grammy calls out from the living room.

“We will!” Audrey calls back.

Claire feels like plans are being made over her head.

She and Audrey go outside and climb into Audrey’s car. Claire isn’t sure where they’re going exactly, only that they’re meeting Julie’s cousin, Lawrence. She really hopes Julie hasn’t told him what happened.

“You’ll love Christopher,” Audrey says as she starts the engine. “He’s such a sweetheart.” She glances at Claire. “He just graduated this past May, so, you know, he’ll be more mature than a high school boy.”

Claire gazes out the window as Audrey pulls onto the road. The streetlights flicker across her face. She wonders if Christopher will be anything like Josh, with his skinny build and long, dyed-black hair. She knows he’ll be nothing like Julie.

Why should he be like Julie?

Claire wraps her arms around her stomach and focuses her attention on the roar of the engine. Lawrence and Christopher. That’s totally normal, right? Two girls staying out late so they can meet up with guys. One hundred percent normal.

They drive for about ten minutes, and then Audrey pulls up to a playground next to a church. All the church lights are off except for a big spotlight focused on a cross, but a pickup truck is parked in the square lot, with two guys sitting in the back. One’s drinking from a can. The other’s Lawrence, his lanky frame familiar even in the darkness. So that’s how normal this is going to get, Claire and Audrey meeting boys to drink beer. And Grammy was worried about Julie getting Claire drunk. All she and Julie ever did was watch movies and play video games and go to the library, for God’s sake, speeding through microfilm to read about their ancestors.

And Claire looked forward to those days far more than she’s looking forward to this. Her eyes are on Lawrence. It’s only been a day. Julie probably hasn’t told him.

Audrey parks next to the pickup truck. Christopher looks nothing like Lawrence, although he is closer to Claire’s idea of a cop. He has muscular shoulders beneath his tight T-shirt, and heavily gelled hair and bland features. He lifts his can. “How’s it going?” he calls out, his voice muffled through the closed windows of Audrey’s car.

“Look at Lawrence,” Audrey says with a sigh. He’s slouched down in the bed of the truck, looking uncomfortable. He doesn’t wave at them like Christopher does. It seems odd to Claire that Lawrence is sitting in that truck while an underage trainee drinks a beer. It doesn’t fit with what Julie told her about him.

Then again, he hasn’t bothered to help with the monster attack, so maybe he isn’t the person Julie thinks he is.

Audrey bounds out of the car. Claire waits a moment, watching Audrey run up to the truck, laughter trailing out behind her. She turns to Claire and gestures for her to join them. Claire knows she can’t sit in the car forever.

She steps out into the warm night. Christopher reaches into the bed of the truck and extracts a couple of cans from some hidden cooler. He tosses them to Audrey, who catches them effortlessly. She hands one to Claire without asking if Claire wants one. Claire stares down at the can. The red-and-gold Lone Star logo stares back. Her face goes red; she feels like Audrey and Christopher are staring at her, so she pulls back the tab and takes a polite sip and manages not to make a face. But when she looks up, it’s Lawrence who’s watching her. She can’t read his expression.

“Hey, babe.” Audrey swings herself up onto the truck bed and throws her arms around Lawrence’s shoulders. He turns away from Claire and buries his face in Audrey’s neck.

“Get a room, you two.” Christopher jumps out of the truck and lands, cat-like, a few feet from Claire.

“Shut up, Christopher!” Audrey shouts back, and then she’s kissing Lawrence, her hands running down his chest. Claire looks away.

“Hey,” Christopher says. “You Claire?”

Claire turns to him and smiles, feeling like an idiot. “I am.”

“Cool.” Christopher doesn’t seem to mean this. He drains the last of his beer and tosses the can into the back of the truck. It bounces and hits Audrey in the leg.

“Hey!” she shouts, extracting herself from Lawrence. In the icy light of the cross his expression looks glazed over. Possessed. Claire feels a nervous twinge in her stomach before remembering that his glazed expression has nothing to do with ghosts or demons.

Probably.

“Stop making out,” Christopher says.

“I’ll do what I want,” Audrey says. “Isn’t that right, Lawrence?”

“Whatever you say.” Lawrence gazes at her. He doesn’t seem to be aware that Claire and Christopher are even there.

Still, Audrey threads her arm around Lawrence’s waist and then pulls him over to the edge of the truck bed. He jumps off first and helps her down, and then together they stumble over to the swing set. Christopher looks at Claire. For a moment Claire is afraid he wants her to squeeze his waist like that, but he just sips at his beer and says, “You going to that dance thing?”

“What? Oh. Yeah, probably.” Did she decide to go to the dance after trying on the dress? Claire can’t remember. It’s frustrating how fuzzy her memory has been this summer.

“You should come. They’ll be there.” He gestures with his beer can at Lawrence, who has settled into one of the swings. “Lawrence is a cool guy, even if Audrey’s got him whipped.” Another drink. Claire doesn’t know how to respond, but she doesn’t have to. Christopher ambles over to the swing set without waiting for a reply.

Claire surreptitiously sets her beer can next to the truck’s tire and follows him.

Audrey swings back and forth, her hair streaking out behind her. Lawrence gives up on the swing and leans up against the structural pole instead, watching Audrey. It’s weird to think that this is the guy Julie claimed was so dependable, the guy she said would help them with the monsters. He seems so ordinary to Claire. So typical. Nothing like Julie.

His expression’s still glazed, and with a start Claire is reminded of a hypnotist show she saw on TV once. The audience volunteer had the same expression.

It’s a weird way of thinking about it, but it’s the only one that works: He’s hypnotized by Audrey sliding back and forth like a comet through the gloomy night air. Even Christopher watches her with that same softened expression. It’s like they aren’t really here at all.

Audrey leaps off the swing. She lands in a crouch in the grass, and Lawrence gives a whoop and a holler and a round of applause. She stands up with her arms over her head like an Olympic gymnast. Claire feels like she’s watching some sort of mating ritual that she doesn’t understand.

Josh and his mix tapes, that made sense to her. Julie kissing her in the dunes—that made sense too.

She shakes her head to make the thought go away. It doesn’t. She had expected her summer to be more like this, and been pleased that it hadn’t—that she’d met Julie instead. And now she’s trapped in her own expectation.

She feels a jolt of understanding. That’s why this whole thing feels so off: It’s exactly what she imagined Indianola teenagers to be like. Drinking, pickup trucks, blandly handsome older boys. It’s all here. And Audrey is acting like she’s already drunk, even though Claire knows she’s only had one beer.

Despite the lingering heat, Claire shivers. She wants to go home. This just doesn’t feel right.

“Claire! Come swing with me!” Audrey materializes at Claire’s side and drags her over to the swing set. Claire feels dizzy. Christopher and Lawrence stand next to each other. Lawrence still isn’t drinking, but Christopher moves with mechanical precision. An arm lifts, an arm drops.

“No.” Claire pulls away, shaking her head. Audrey tilts her head at her.

“What’s wrong?” she says. “Isn’t this what you wanted to do?”

A chill ripples down Claire’s spine. She shakes her head again. “No, I don’t really—my grandma’s going to be so angry if I’m home late.”

“You know she doesn’t mind! Not as long as you’re with me.” Audrey grabs for Claire’s hand again, but Claire snatches it away at the last moment.

“I’m tired,” she says. “It’s been a long day.”

Audrey doesn’t move. Her expression hardens into a cold, stiff mask. It’s just the moonlight, Claire tells herself. She just looks like that in the moonlight.

“Everyone okay?” Lawrence shouts.

“Fine.” Audrey drags out the word. She blinks and her whole face changes and she’s back to being the bubbly, pretty cheerleader. “Everything’s fine. Claire is kind of tired, so I’m going to take her home.”

“Aw, too bad,” says Christopher. “You just got here.”

It doesn’t sound like he really means it. Claire doesn’t care. She’s not sure Christopher or Lawrence care about anything.

Audrey walks over to the car. Her hair swish-swishes against her back and it’s the loudest sound in the playground and Claire doesn’t know why. Lawrence lifts his hand in a wave and then Christopher does the same. She can’t stand to look at them.

“See you at the dance,” Christopher says.

“Sure.” She keeps her head down. Audrey’s car engine turns on and headlights flood across the parking lot. Her escape.