White Lies (15 page)

“Why'd you do that?” Katrina said to Jack as they watched the truck disappear into the trees.

He looked at her. “Do what?”

“Tell him it's just us here? We should have told him we're having some friends over.”

“You heard him talk. He's a crazy bastard. He might have told us to go to hell. Besides, what does it matter? He's never going to know if we have people over or not. And we're not a bunch of rowdy college kids throwing some big bender. I'll keep an eye on everybody. Afterward I'll make sure the cabin is spotless before we leave.”

What he said made sense. Despite his assurances, however, a bad premonition had stolen over her, sending a chill down her spine. She eyed him speculatively.

“It's no big deal,” he insisted.

“I don't like it, that's all.”

“What's not to like? Look around. Smell the air.”

“It's just another lie,” she said, and she almost wanted to laugh. She felt like someone waist deep in quicksand. The more she struggled to free herself, the deeper she sank.

“You're worrying too much,” Jack told her, taking her hand. “Everything is going to be fine.”

Katrina hoped he was right.

It was seven thirty p.m. and the sun was dipping behind the mountains in the west, throwing long, scarlet streaks across the sky. The yellow school bus bumped and chugged its way down a back road bordered by towering aspen and moss-covered maple trees. Inside it the atmosphere was buzzing and upbeat and expectant. The female teachers were lumped up by the driver, gossiping and chatting about whatever women gossiped and chatted about on buses. Dolly had a guitar and sometimes she would strum a few chords and get everyone singing. The men were grouped together in the middle of the bus, separated from the women, like they were at a high school dance and afraid of catching cooties. They were telling ribald jokes and popping beer cans, each trying to get a word in over the other. Big Bob was winning, commanding the most attention as usual as he reminisced over past ice-fishing trips to Lake Wenatchee.

Zach was sitting at the very back of the bus, watching all this with an odd combination of contempt and envy. It was the feeling you got when you were looking at something from the outside in. He didn't fit in with them, didn't really want to, to be honest, but still felt a mild longing. He would have felt better if the not fitting in was his decision, not theirs. But whatever. They were all a bunch of country, go-nowhere hicks. He didn't want to hang out with them anyway. He cracked open his sixth Beck's and took a swallow. Cold and good. He'd had four before he left his house—no way was he getting on a bus with thirty people stone sober; he'd likely have one of his panic attacks inside of five minutes—and then two more on the road, including this one.

He thought again about the phone conversation with Katrina earlier this morning. He'd been walloped by the fact she really did have a cabin. When he'd hung up, he'd been embarrassed as well—so embarrassed he'd considered not coming tonight. He'd felt how Donald Trump likely felt when the president released his birth certificate. Still, he decided to come because he couldn't not come. His obsession with Katrina didn't end because it turned out she hadn't been lying. In fact, that only made his obsession stronger—because it meant she hadn't kicked him out of the car because she thought he was a drunk and a freak. She'd genuinely taken him as far as she could.

Did that mean it was time to finally bury the hatchet? Yes, he thought it did. Maybe then they could even become friends. And maybe if they became friends, they could become more than friends—

In the middle of the bus, Graham Douglas stood and started making his way down the aisle toward the back. He was grabbing each seat for balance, resembling someone wading through waist-deep water. He took the seat across from Zach, leaned forward, unzipped his pants, and pissed into an empty beer bottle. “There's no toilet on this thing, man,” he said to Zach without looking at him. “What the fuck do they expect you to do? Piss out the window?” He did up his pants, stuffed the full bottle in the crack where the seat met the side of the bus, then reached across the aisle and snagged one of Zach's Beck's.

Graham worked with Monica in the Music Department and was one of the more popular teachers at the school. He sang in some garage band that apparently played the occasional gig around the state. He was older than Zach, maybe twenty-six or seven, and with his red afro, mustache, and muttonchops he was one of the ugliest fuckers Zach knew. He dressed like he was from the seventies as well, with tie-dye shirts and bell-bottoms. Zach always thought he looked like he'd just stepped out of the Fleetwood Mac lineup. He twisted the cap off the beer, took a swig, and said, “How dope is tonight going to be, Zachy-boy? Bob-O brought a
couple fishing rods. See if we can't catch some pike. You fish, Zachy-boy?”

Zach merely shrugged. He hated that nickname. It was a dig at him, a condescending reminder he was by far the youngest teacher at the school.

“What's wrong, Zachy-boy? Cat caught your tongue? By the way, why the hell are you sitting way back here by yourself? We're missing your deep philosophy shit. Seriously. You're a whack kid, you know that? Who else knows so much about the next stage of evolution, right?”

Graham was making fun of him. Zach would have known that even if the smug amusement wasn't written all over Graham's face. At a party last year, Zach had gotten pretty drunk and he'd somehow gotten sucked into a discussion about evolution with Henry Lee, a science teacher at the school. Zach had gone on about how human bodies were replaceable if not altogether obsolete, how the next step in evolution was going to be a hive-like interconnection of cyborgs in a metaconsciousness, a necessity step to out-compete the super-intelligent robots mankind will create à la
The Matrix
. “If you can't beat computers and robots, then join them!” he must have slurred half a dozen times. A group of teachers had formed around him, and he'd thought they were genuinely interested in what he was saying. They weren't. They'd been mocking him, egging him on, like Graham was doing now. He discovered that the following Monday at school by the looks he got, the laughing behind his back.

“Fuck off, Graham,” he said.

“Whoa, man! What's up with you? I'm telling you the real deal. We're missing you up there. After all, we got you to thank for organizing this little shi-bam, right?”

Zach felt a shot of panic. “What are you talking about?”

“The RSVP thing. That was you, wasn't it?”

“No,” he said immediately. “Why do you think that?”

“No one really knows her yet, except you. Hey, is she single?”

“Who? Katrina?”

“Does she have guns?”

“What?”

“What the hell's wrong with you, Zachy-boy? Jugs, cannons, norks, gunzagas.
Tits
, Zach. What do they call ‘em on your planet? She has a thing for suits and I haven't gotten a good look. Sexy all right. But a little prissy, if you ask me.”

Suddenly Zach felt extremely protective of Katrina. “You don't have a chance,” he said.

Graham grinned, looking a bit like a clown. “We'll see, won't we?” He patted Zach on the shoulder, then headed back to join Bob and the others in the center of the bus.

Zach watched him go, and all of a sudden he felt queasy and lightheaded. His eyes started to water and blur. He groped at the window and yanked down the upper pane of glass, letting in a sharp gust of wind. He breathed deeply and steadily, counting to ten, then twenty. He began to feel better again. He looked up the aisle. Thankfully no one had noticed his episode. They didn't know he suffered from agoraphobia and panic attacks. They would have assumed he'd drunk himself silly before the party even started again.

Assholes.

A short time later the bus shuddered to a halt. This was accompanied by a rising buzz of excited chatter. Zach peered through the window. A small log cabin was ahead of them, facing the shadowy expanse of a lake. He grabbed his six-pack of beer, which now only had three remaining in it, and his knapsack, which contained his harder booze, then followed the noisy procession off the bus. He started toward the cabin but stopped abruptly when the cabin's front door opened and Katrina appeared to greet everyone. Because right behind her was some macho-type guy with long dark hair and a big white smile. He hooked an arm around Katrina's shoulder and welcomed them all to the party.

It didn't take long for the party to get bopping. Crystal, who Katrina and Jack had picked up from the bus station earlier in the day, after meeting Charlie, cranked up Janis Joplin—cottage music, she said—as soon as the bus arrived. The teachers came inside in a wave, stuffing the fridge with beer and mixers and laying out hors d'oeuvres and other food on the kitchen table. Soon you couldn't hear yourself speak. Not surprisingly, Jack had no problem socializing with a roomful of strangers. In fact, with his hearty greetings and easygoing charm, his ability to work the room and make everyone feel welcome, he quickly became the center of attention. He was currently swapping fishing tales with Big Bob, who didn't look so big anymore standing next to Jack. Katrina already had three female teachers poke her naughtily or give her a you-sly-dog-you expression. Monica was the most blunt, saying, “My God, he's a big block of sex wearing pants,” as her eyes gobbled him up.

Katrina bit back a smile and thought she was the luckiest woman in the room that night. For something she'd been dreading all week, it seemed the party might just turn out okay after all, and she was amazed to find she was even having fun.

Crystal made her way over holding two drinks. She handed one to Katrina. “Vodka soda with lime,” she said. She bore a striking resemblance to Katrina, even though she had brown hair and chestnut-colored eyes. Katrina had always thought this. So did most other people who knew them both. It was likely the shape of their faces, which were both hearts with pointed chins. The biggest difference between the two of them was Katrina was thin while Crystal was more on the plus side. Crystal called herself plump—not
fat, she would acknowledge, but plump, like a cute baby, a little too soft around the thighs and hips and waist to feel comfortable in a bikini. Katrina always assumed this negative self-image Crystal lugged around was one of the reasons she had become such a recluse after their parents' death, and why she now had an aversion to college, where image was paramount.

She sipped her drink. “Not bad. I hope you're not going to drop out of school and take up bartending?”

“No,” Crystal said. “But it doesn't sound like a bad idea.”

“It's just going to take a couple weeks to adjust. Once it does, you'll have a fantastic time.”

“I know. But I can't say I'm going to miss it this weekend. This cabin is awesome.”

Katrina gave her a stern look. She and Jack had already explained to Crystal everything that had happened to lead Katrina to rent out the cabin and pass it off as her own. They'd warned her not to say a word about it, to anyone. She'd seemed intrigued by the subterfuge and had promised to keep it a secret.

“Okay. Okay,” Crystal added. “Don't worry. I get it. So where's this crazy Zach guy anyway?”

Katrina had been wondering that herself. She'd glimpsed him briefly out by the bus when everyone had arrived, but then she'd been swept up in a mob of greetings and had completely forgotten about him. She looked around the room and spotted him through one of the front windows, outside, standing on the porch. “There,” she said, nodding.

Crystal's eyes widened. “You didn't tell me he was so good looking.”

“He's not,” Katrina said flatly.

“Sure he is. He looks like—I don't know. Someone famous.”

Wasn't that what she had thought too? A young Rod Stewart or Ronnie Woods? “Don't even think about it, Chris. He's not your type.” Watching Zach, Katrina realized she should go have a word with him. After all, she'd pulled off this grand scheme mainly for his benefit. It was important to see whether he was buying it or not. She said, “I'm going to go talk to him for a second.”

“Can I come?”

“Listen, Chris. You're to stay away from him. Don't even talk to him. Got it?”

“Why?” she said saucily. “Is he
dangerous?
”

“You heard me.”

Crystal seemed as if she was about to protest, but she merely took a sip of her drink and shrugged. Katrina went outside and joined Zach on the porch. He was wearing jeans and a long-sleeved shirt. A cigarette was parked in the corner of his mouth, a beer bottle in his hand. The sixty-watt lightbulb dangling a pull chain glowed in the dark above him, attracting a fury of moths.

“Hi, Zach,” she said. “I didn't know you smoked.”

He glanced sidelong at her, shrugged.

“What are you doing out here—”

“Who's the Indian?”

She blinked, surprised by his directness. “His name is Jack Reeves. He's half Ojibwa.”

“Looks like he just escaped from jail.” He flicked the cigarette away into the night, then turned toward her for the first time. Sharp shadows hollowed out his cheeks and blacked out his eyes, making the orbits appear to be two dark pits. “Are you dating him?”

“I don't know if that's any of your business, Zach.”

“He looks like he rapes little boys.”

“That's enough, Zach,” she said, realizing it was a mistake to come out here.

“What about me?”

“What about you?”

“Would you ever date me?”

The comment rocked her.
Date you?
She couldn't have been more astonished if someone had told her she had a twin sister. She'd been under the very clear impression that he
hated
her, not
liked
her. But now that the question had been raised, it took on a reality very quickly, and she realized maybe it shouldn't be such a shock; maybe it had been staring her in the face the past few days, and she just hadn't been looking. After all, those two emotions—
like and hate—were probably more interchangeable than any other two. How many guys had she despised when she was younger after they'd broken her heart? How many guys had she felt bitterness toward because they were out of her league?