Chapter Ten

Green with Envy

 

 

 

Monday after lunch, as Lexi carved a path through the crowded hallway, splashes of red flickered past. And black. Twelve-thirty and she’d just gotten that it was yet another school spirit day. Like wearing Cherry Grove’s colors was going to make Peter smile down from heaven. How stupid. And morbid.

She caught her reflection in the floor-to-ceiling window. An uninspired gray V-neck and Old Navy jeans.

No red. No black.

Like she cared.

The usual swarming mixture of people milled around the main offices. Kids wanting passes because they were late coming back from lunch, teachers complaining about the photocopier being broken, delivery guys trying to wheel the giant cart of juice and Gatorade bottles through the crowd. There were even some parents, probably wanting to check on their kids, make sure nothing had happened to them.

Lexi slid in behind three Goths creeping along the walls and tried to blend into the lunchtime chaos. The last thing she wanted was for somebody to spot her on her way in to see Mrs. Howell, one of the counselors.

Kids in class were already avoiding her. Except for Zoë, the boosters were hardly talking to her at all. And worse than that, Jazz had broken down and told her parents about sneaking out of the house. So they’d taken her phone away and sent her, and several weeks’ worth of schoolwork, to stay with her grandparents in Montreal.

Lexi reached the inside of the office. The counselor’s door stood open, so Lexi dashed in without knocking. Mrs. Howell’s head jerked up, a smile crossing her face when their gazes connected.

“Hi, Lexi. I’m glad you came.” The counselor took off her glasses, closed the file she’d been reading and laid it on top of an overflowing pile. “When I send for students, I’m not always sure they’ll come.”

Lexi dropped into the infamous Head-Shrinking Seat, the chair right across from Mrs. Howell. “I didn’t know I had a choice.” Instead of making eye contact, she looked around, checking out the collection of photographs circling the room. Obviously Mrs. Howell had been all over the world. One photograph was of a group standing in the middle of what looked like a market in some exotic country. The people in the group all looked like total tourists, cameras hanging from their necks and giant hats plopped on their heads. Beside that one was a shot taken on a boat, loads of sunshine brightening the water in the background. There were several more, and even a picture of Mrs. Howell on a camel in front of a pyramid.

“Must to be nice to run away from home on a regular basis.”

The woman smiled but the change in her face was faint, a smile to show understanding, not happiness. “Before becoming a school counselor I taught social studies. I’ve always suffered from a bad case of wanderlust.” She leaned back in her chair. “Maybe I should’ve been a hobo instead of a school counselor.”

Lexi sucked in a deep breath, stared down at her boring Nikes. Her heart thumped and her hands felt weirdly sweaty. Maybe those other kids, the ones who didn’t show up when she sent for them, had the right idea. She leaned forward. “I don’t really have anything to talk about so maybe I should just get going.”

Another of those faint smiles was followed by, “Please stay. I’m glad you came.” Then she slipped over and gently shut the door. “A lot has happened in your life lately.”

A dead guy and a stepfather back from God knows where probably qualified as ‘a lot’. And those were only the things everyone knew about. That night with Monica, parked by the old Westerville field, throwing Jon’s bike into the dumpster. Lexi winced. She wasn’t going to think about the video camera and all that. “I don’t see what there is to talk about, you probably know everything, it’s all in the news.” And the rest, like that she’d been with Peter on Friday, was now buzzing through the halls. Thanks to Monica, no doubt. The cops were going to find out eventually, so now she was just waiting for them to come to her.

The woman steepled her fingers and tipped her head, looking at her with warm brown eyes. Her gaze wasn’t pitying, just thoughtful. “Why don’t you tell me how you feel about what happened? I don’t know that.”

“How should I feel?” Panic had melted away most of her precious control. Her confidence was falling away too. “Sad? Ashamed? Guilty? I’m so confused I can’t feel anything.”

“Is there any one emotion that stands out?”

Lexi stayed silent and tried to swallow away the lump in her throat.

Mrs. Howell lowered her chin, and her clear crystal chandelier earrings jangled. “Do you blame yourself for what happened?”

Blame.

Now there was a loaded word.

Lexi looked at the beige-carpeted floor. She had to keep herself together. No matter what. “I haven’t tried to figure out how I feel.” That was the truth. “I feel numb, you know? I hardly knew him. Now he’s dead. If Zeke killed Peter, that means I just missed walking in on one guy killing another.” She crossed her leg over her knee and stared picking at the worn sole of her sneaker. “Everyone’s started calling me the black widow. The guys I had on my auction list made me take them off—like it’s some kind of joke. I don’t think it’s funny.”

Mrs. Howell opened her mouth but snapped it shut when a rumble of commotion came from the hall outside. Once it quieted, she said, “No. It’s not funny.”

Lexi squeezed her legs closer. “And no one knows how Peter died. It’s under investigation. Zeke says he didn’t have anything to do with it. We shouldn’t assume he’s lying. Innocent until proven guilty, right?” From out of nowhere, tears welled in her eyes and her fingers started to tingle.

She tried to shut down her wild thoughts, but the cracks in her strength were too wide, and the spiral of emotions seeped through. “I do feel like it’s my fault.”

“Just because you found Peter doesn’t make it your fault.”

That was easy for her to say. She didn’t have to deal with the stares and whispers. And knowing that she hadn’t spoken up when she should have. But that didn’t really matter now that he was dead. Right?

“How’re your parents handling it? Are they helping you through?”

Lexi’s face flashed with heat. She wiped her eyes with the back of her hand, pulled her legs to her chest and wrapped her arms around her calves. Everything that’d happened in the past ten days had left her weak, drained. She didn’t have the energy to fight.

So there they were. The memories that always came back when she was weak.

Her dad’s funeral.

The annoying way people kept saying over and over how sorry they were. Like that was going to help.

Her mom, spending whole days crying on the couch. Lexi, doing everything she could to get her mom up and moving. Just talking her into doing simple things, like making dinner, had been difficult. But at least she’d felt needed.

Then Dale.

Showing up right about the time she and her mom were getting back on their feet and learning to be a family with just the two of them. And so she wasn’t needed anymore. That closeness that’d brought her and her mom together during those months after her father’s death, that was gone for good.

The counselor prompted her again. “You mom and dad?”

Lexi set her chin on her knee. “After my mom got married…”

Mrs. Howell leaned forward, setting her hands in her lap. “Your stepfather?”

Lexi’s eyes focused on the present. Instead of her memories, she saw the school counselor, gazing softly at her.

Sympathy was something people rarely felt for Lexi. She wouldn’t let them. So she opened her mouth to say there was nothing to tell about her stepdad, but truth tumbled out instead. “He gets between me and my mom. He turned her against me.”

As soon as the words were out, Lexi braced herself for Mrs. Howell’s disbelief, but instead the woman leaned back again and said, “Tell me more.”

Part of Lexi wanted to clam up. But another part, the part that had been worn down and wrung out, thought what the hell.

The second part won.

She lifted her chin. “He has this way of making everything my fault, making me look like a complete loser. And my mom believes him, listens to everything he says.” Lexi dropped her feet to the floor and squared her shoulders. “My mom may be stupid enough to still want him around, but I’m not. I wish he’d leave for good. I hate him hanging around trying to pretend he cares about us.”

Mrs. Howell slipped out of her chair and came around to stand near Lexi. “Does your mom know how you feel?”

She’d tried to tell her. Before that, she’d hinted that she hated Dale, but she’d never explained why. She shook her head, understanding for the first time that what she feared most was if she came right out and told her mom what she thought that her mom would take his side. Pick him over her.

The lunch bell shattered the comfortable balance between them, startling Lexi and bringing her back to reality.

She’d opened up, and it scared her. “I better go.”

“Wait—Lexi.” The woman lightly touched Lexi’s arm. “Let me help.”

“There’s nothing you can do. Peter’s not going to come back to life.” Lexi got up and backed away. Not from the woman’s offer of help, but from the pain threatening to break loose and tear apart what little control she had left. “I don’t need any help.”

Mrs. Howell took a step forward. “Sometimes just talking helps. I’d love to listen. We can meet again if you like. I’m sure your mom would want to talk too. You should try it, let her know how you feel.”

For a split second, Lexi believed her. Maybe her mom would listen, start to understand that Dale wasn’t the man she claimed him to be. But years of practice made her snuff out that ray of hope. Believing someone cared, waiting for help. That was a joke with no punchline.

Lexi told the counselor if she wanted to come back, she’d make an appointment. Then she mumbled thanks and left, slipping out the door quickly and without looking back. Sure, for a few seconds it had felt good to put her feelings into words, tell somehow else a tiny bit of what she was thinking. But that didn’t mean she had to open herself up for more pain.

Out in the main office, she locked gazes with a familiar pair of eyes. Monica. One of the do-gooder volunteers sorting out yearbook orders.

The other girl looked odd.

Where was the contempt? The constant reminder of their ‘friendship’?

Then she realized, it was the way Monica had looked at her when they’d been out together, cruising the streets of Cherry Grove—and beyond. It had been a wild, fearless couple of months. Lexi stalled, mesmerized the other girl’s face, caught up in the good parts of those days. Then a guy coming out of one of the other counselor offices bumped into her as he headed for the door. The jolt snapped Lexi out of her confusion and she tore herself away from the once familiar connection she’d shared with Monica. She rushed out of the office, pushing the whole scene out of her head.

No more letting Monica get the best of her, and no way was she going to talk with Mrs. Howell again.

Jazz. She needed Jazz. But that wasn’t going to happen. Her parents had made it clear they were cut off.

Ash.

Think about him.

Steady. Kind. Understanding. Sincere and honest. He was more than she’d ever imagined. If she thought about him, she might make it through the day without falling apart.