She was living in bad society . . . and was fast brushing the innocent bloom from her nature by a premature acquaintance with the darker side of life.
—Little Women
Meg was supposed to be dancing around our makeshift Maypole with a crown of flowers, but the streamers hung limp as the next wave of buses spewed high school students onto the yellowed grass. Probably she was doing something to her face before the afternoon performances. Of the two of us, I was way more in need of freshening up, but someone had to help prep the set for the next scene.
Backstage, David was straightening the cardboard “tower” we had wired to the front of a ladder, with fake stones drawn in black Magic Marker. This was the major set piece for the play the March sisters perform on Christmas afternoon. Luckily for us, it was supposed to look cheesy.
“Hey,” I said.
“Hey,” he echoed. It almost sounded teasing, which would have been enough encouragement for me to attempt a joke, if I’d been able to think of anything besides How’s it hanging?
I was still drawing a blank when Mom hurried up to us. “Have you seen Meg?”
“You could ask Hudson.” David bent to pick up a piece of tape that had fallen onto the stage.
I frowned at the top of his head. “Why?”
“I think he went off with them.”
“Them who?” I looked from him to my mother.
“Her friends,” she sighed.
“Is that why she’s not pole dancing?”
“Jo, please.” Mom held up a hand.
“Do you want me to go look for them?” David asked.
Mom pulled her watch out of a pocket. She never wore it on performance days due to the infamous Marmee-has-a-Fitbit incident. “We’ll give her five minutes.” She glanced at me. “You better get changed.”
I did need time to squeeze into my villain pants; there was a lot of friction involved. Amy and Beth soon joined me in the dressing area, all of us scrambling to trade our life-size American Girl–doll dresses for the more flamboyant scene 2 costumes. When I emerged, David looked up from the prop table, blinking hard.
“Go ahead. Feast your eyes.” Holding my arms out to the sides, I did a slow rotation.
“What are those pants even made of?”
“Pleather. The miracle fabric.” I squatted a few times, knowing the farting sound would entertain him.
“Ooh la la,” said Andrea’s voice. “Very glam rock.”
Hudson was there too, the pair of them taking in my puffy shirt, skintight pants, and long black curls—and also how close I was standing to David.
“It’s my Captain Hook cosplay,” I said, stepping away.
Hudson gave my legs another up-and-down glance, like he couldn’t help himself. I flexed my quads.
“Do you know where Meg is?” There was an unfamiliar edge to David’s question, like he blamed Hudson for her absence, even though Meg had no trouble disappearing without help.
He shrugged. “She was around here somewhere.”
“Maybe she wanted to show her friends the bridge?” Mom said as she joined us.
Right. Because they would care so much about our DIY landscaping projects.
“I was at the bridge.” Beth gave Mom a regretful shrug. “I didn’t see her.”
Amy edged slightly in front of Beth, spreading her elbows to take up more space. “Meg’s probably in her room. That’s where she always is.”
“Did you text her?” Andrea asked.
“No phones on show day.” Amy gave a virtuous little smile.
“I’ll go,” I sighed, before Mom could ask.
At the back door I passed Laurie, who was on his way in. “Uh, JoJo? Stage is that way.”
“No Meg.” Squinting against the sudden brightness, I stepped outside. Although I would never admit it to Amy, I had decided to follow her suggestion and check the house first.
“Meg!” I yelled as the screen door slammed behind me. She didn’t answer, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t there. Sometimes you had to poke her to get a response.
I shouted her name again while pounding up the stairs. If she was asleep, might as well start the waking-up process now. The flower crown had been abandoned halfway to the second floor.
A muffled thump sounded as I stepped onto the landing. I paused to identify the source, but there was only silence.
“Meg,” I said a third time, banging on her bedroom door. It popped open, because like every door, window, and person in this house, it was a little warped. My eyes flew to the unmade bed. That was where I expected to see my sister, so at first I didn’t register the cluster of bodies splayed out on the floor.
My brain froze. What had I stumbled into—orgy? Drug den? Satanic cult? I flicked through the slideshow of potential horrors before registering that they were all lying around listening to whiny music on someone’s phone. The most exciting thing in the room was the half-eaten bag of Cool Ranch Doritos.
“You’re late.” My annoyance at having to track Meg down was compounded by the fact that she hadn’t acknowledged my presence. “Let’s go.”
Instead of springing up with an apology, my sister tipped her head back against the bed. Ashley (or possibly Not Ashley; it was dim with the curtains drawn) giggled.
“Meggy,” she whispered, “your sister’s freaking out.”
Meg yawned. Her hair was unbraided, and she’d shucked off her dress. Her legs were bare beneath the hem of her cotton slip. “I’m not coming.”
“Uh, yes you are.”
She extended a languid arm, her wrist limp. “I can’t.”
“You’re not gushing blood, so get up.” I grabbed her by the arm and tried to pull her upright. Meg flopped like a coat falling from a hanger.
“Oh my gosh!” Her friends fluttered around her, gasping and clucking while shooting me dirty looks.
“Go away,” Meg mumbled against my stomach.
“What is wrong with you?” As if in answer, something rolled out from under the bed with a hollow rattle. I stared at the empty bottle, trying to sound out the label. It occurred to me that the too-sweet grapey scent filling the air wasn’t from one of Meg’s skin elixirs.
Another bottle joined the first. This one hadn’t been drained completely. A trail of liquid fizzed onto the rug. “You’re in here getting drunk?”
This provoked another round of laughter, like I was both slow on the uptake and hopelessly naïve. They thought my reaction was, Oh no! Underage drinking!
When what I really meant was: Nobody gets to tap out in the middle of school tours. If I have to suffer, the rest of you better be right beside me in the trenches. And, okay, maybe a sliver of my brain was scandalized. She was supposed to be Meg Freaking March, not a Gossip Girl reject.
“We don’t have time for this.” I spoke directly to my sister, ignoring her friends. “You need to get up, now.”
Her chin tipped up, and her eyes drifted closed as she stuck out her tongue.
“I’m serious, Meg.”
“Oooh, she’s serious.” Ashley pretended her hands were shaking with fear. These were the people my sister had chosen over David? How were we even related?
“Come on, Meg.” I tried for sincerity this time, letting a pleading note enter my voice. “Mom’s counting on you.”
“I guess she’ll just have to make the best of it.”
It was one of our mother’s favorite sayings, delivered with a sneer that left my usual level of rudeness in the shade.
“Meg.”
Rolling onto her stomach, my sister flipped me off. Downstairs, the grandfather clock chimed, distracting me from the giggling of Meg’s friends. It was even later than I thought.
“Christopher freaking Columbus.” Things were so bad, I was cursing in Little Women.
In the space between my sister’s bedroom and the barn, I made the leap from shock to resignation. Meg had crossed a line I’d never dreamed of putting a toe over, but there was no time to bitch and moan. We had a show to survive.
“Can we skip her parts?” I asked in a low voice as Mom, Amy, and Beth huddled up around me.
Amy frowned. “That won’t make any sense.”
Because the plot was so full of logic right now. “It’s not like we have someone else who—” I broke off, glancing behind me. David must have been watching, because he immediately set down the fake chains he was showing to Laurie and hurried over.
“What do you need?” he asked.
Mom and I exchanged a look. Could we? Should we? She dipped her chin in the universal sign for We’ll make it work. “The wings should fit.”
“On it.” Amy snapped her fingers.
“I’ll help,” Beth volunteered, following her.
Andrea ambled closer. “Everything okay?”
“Fine.” My mother’s spine was a steel pole. I flashed a thumbs-up, which probably didn’t contribute much to Mission Pretend Everything’s Normal. “We’ll be on in two minutes,” Mom added, with a smile that said Go sit down. She waited until Andrea was gone to exhale.
“Here goes nothing,” she muttered.
Weird. I was pretty sure that was my line.