New Girl (32 page)

I stared back at him. Daring him.

A small line appeared between his eyebrows. His grip tightened slightly on me. Our breath in the air mingled with the steam, and I was surprised to find I was practically whispering. “It’s been a while since we…”

“I know. Believe me, I know.”

My heart started pounding hard as soon as he kissed me. He pulled me on top of him as he sat down on the bench under the water. The steam gathered around us, and the jets shot out ferocious bubbles that covered the sounds of our breathing with their loud simmering hum.

I was afraid every second that he was going to stop. I didn’t want him to. For once, I wanted him to
please
just kiss me. I didn’t want him to pull away and shake his head or to apologize or to make up an excuse and disappear. But he didn’t. His arms wrapped strongly around my back, and then he unsnapped my bra with an effortless twist. He ran his hands around my ribs, constantly pulling me closer. He didn’t care if anyone saw. Neither did I.

But even so, I was very glad we were alone.

“Do you want to go back into the party?” Max asked.

It was half an hour later. I looked at him and immediately saw what he was feeling. No, he hadn’t pulled away from me this time, but he was about to now.

“Whatever you want to do.”

“She gave you a key for a room, right?”

I fumbled in the wad that was my jeans to find the pocket that had the card. “Yep. Room 402.”

“You want to go hang out there?”

“Sure.”

He followed me up the stairs, past the noisy party, and into 402. Once inside, I sat down on the end of one of the two full-size beds and stared at the pattern on the floor.

He reached into his pocket and pulled out some change. “You want chips?”

There was a tension between us that I couldn’t quite lay my finger on.

“If you’re going.”

I sat in silence while he walked down the hall to the vending machines. Max returned a few minutes later with two bags of chips. One of them was sour cream and onion, my favorite. He knew that much about me.

He handed it to me, but I didn’t open it.

“What’s wrong, Max?”

He sat down next to me. “Nothing.”

“I feel like this…whatever we’ve been has been really hard for you. But why did you continue on with me, if you only ever thought of…Becca?”

Maybe it was the alcohol. Maybe it was the fact that finals were a stone’s throw away and I’d never see Manderley again. Maybe it was the fact that I had finally hit my limit.

“I’m with you because I like you.”

“No,” I said, and shook my head, “you don’t. Every time we touch I know you’re comparing me to her and thinking about her. I know you think about her constantly. I know you can hardly
stand
being around me because I pale so much in comparison. Which is
bullshit
because there is nothing wrong with me. I don’t care how perfect she was or whatever, I’m pretty damn good, too.”

He said nothing for a moment, and stared down at the design on the carpet, his expression very serious. Without looking at me, he responded.

“You’re the best thing that ever happened to me. And I feel like I squandered my chance with you.”

“Don’t just say that because you feel bad, seriously I’ve had enough of—”

“I’m
not
. I— You’re just amazing.” He shook his head. “There’s no way for me to tell you exactly how much you’ve meant to me. This just makes me hate her so much more.”

“Hate who?”

He paused. “Becca.”

“Hate her? What do you mean
hate
her? I get that you weren’t as in love as everyone thought, but—”

“No, I really grew to hate her.”

I didn’t know what to say. “I had no idea.”

“She was just a girl. Just someone to hook up with and have fun with. But somehow my life became all about her trying to find happiness. Through that whole year, she just got more and more unhappy. I felt bad then for not loving her. Even though she didn’t love me. I just wanted to be able to give her the admiration she wanted. But I didn’t. And that night…I screamed at her. I was at the end of my rope. I was frustrated. I was angry. If she’s dead…I don’t know. I accept some kind of responsibility for it. I’ve felt guilty forever. I was one of the last people to talk to her.”

“But she’s been spotted, right? So I mean, there’s hope.”

He waved away the suggestion. “I don’t know. There are a lot of blonde girls that could look like her.”

“But Dana…”

“Dana’s practically a nut job. She doesn’t want people to stop looking.”

“The Facebook update, there was that.”

“Someone could have hacked it. Some kind of prank or something.” He shrugged. “I don’t know. I just feel bad. She was really unhappy in the end.”

We were there for a few minutes, both of us thinking and saying nothing, just being together and alone in the quiet room listening to the quiet hotel sounds around us.

“I left my purse in the other room,” I said.

“Let’s go get it. I kind of want a beer anyway.”

We walked out of the room and across the hall. The party had died down for the most part. Some people were passed out, and others were still drinking. I looked outside and saw that Johnny was making out with some girl. For a moment I wondered if it was Dana, but then I saw blond hair.

“There you guys are!” Cam exclaimed, taking a gulp from his beer.

There was a movement on the couch, and I saw that Dana was lying down. She looked around and her eyes caught on Johnny. She stood and crept to the balcony door. It was like watching a zombie rise from a grave.

She slid it open, with much struggle. She was obviously very drunk.

“Johnny…” she said.

He turned, and let go of the girl. It was Susan. The Becca look-alike.

“Dana’s already puked,” Blake said, as she walked up next to us.

“Really?”

She nodded and looked concerned as she walked to the other side of the room. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen her this bad. She’s like…weird drunk. She looks like she’s on something else. But Ricky swears he didn’t give her any pills or anything.”

“That’s good,” I said.

“Johnny, why’d you…” Dana leaned on the door frame and then slid down onto the ground. Her skirt came up past her underwear. She was too wasted to care.

Johnny came over to her and fixed her skirt. “Come on now, Dana, get up.” The way he spoke to her was gentle and kind. I remembered his feelings for her, and wondered if they were still there.

“Johnny, I’ve love you, ’n you doe c-care.”

She couldn’t form words. Her eyes were out of focus. I wondered if she even knew she was conscious.

“I didn’t mean to, you know,” she said. “I didn’t… It wasn’t… I didn’t mean to. I just didn’t mean to, you know.”

“Stand up, sweetie, come on. Please.”

“Don’t call me
that.
” Her face contorted, and she started to cry. The room was silent as we all watched her. She was weeping now, like a person does when they are alone. “I just wanted you and you didn’t—and then
she
took you, and then, then her, too, and now Susan, too. Why did you do it?”

She smacked his hands as he tried to get her to stand up. My face went red as she shifted her unfocused gaze to me.

“And why did you?” She pointed to me. “You could have had anyone…but you had to do it with him. Why did you have to do it with
Johnny?
”

“M-me?”

“Why did you have to hook up with him? Johnny is the only one I wanted. And you…you
had
to…”

She tried to breathe, but couldn’t stop crying enough to do it quietly.

“I didn’t, Dana. If you mean me…I never did anything with Johnny.” Everyone’s gazes shifted to me.

“You didn’t? You did. You said you did, you were talking about it with Blake, you said so. In the bathroom.”

I shook my head. “No, no, no, no, no. I never did anything with Johnny. I never said I did. And I won’t.”

“She did. Becca did.” She nodded, her head moving in huge motions. “She did that. She knew I liked him. She knew everything. But she did it anyway.”

Everyone seemed to be waiting for me to respond. “Um,” I said. “I’m not actually Becca, you know…and I’m sure she didn’t know. Or she wasn’t trying to hurt you. Maybe she just…couldn’t help it or something.”

“But he loved her. You loved her.” She pointed to him. “And then she got pregnant. It was your baby. She was pregnant. When I found out…when I found out she’d been hooking up with you, it made so much more sense.”

Now we all looked to Johnny. The color was gone from his face. “Why do you think that?”

“She told me. She knew. And that night…the last night. That’s when you said you’d have been with me—” she pointed lazily at herself “—if she hadn’t messed it up. And then she said she wanted to be with you
still.
Still
is the operative,” she said, stumbling over it, “word there. You guys were hooking up all along. And the baby was yours.”

No one said anything. I looked at Max. He was as pale as Johnny. He reached for my hand, and held it hard.

“I didn’t mean to do it,” said Dana, who was now lying flat on her back. “I didn’t mean to.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

IT WAS THE LAST NIGHT OF THE SCHOOL YEAR
. Some people had already gone home, but Becca was at the boathouse with Max and most everyone else. Including Johnny.

A few weeks had passed, and Johnny had not tried to rekindle anything with her. It was killing her. She had to talk to him tonight. Had to tell him about the baby. Had to ask him what he wanted her to do.

Becca also had to figure that out for herself. Every time she thought about it, she felt sick. Her parents would kill her. Seriously. They might literally disown her. She shivered whenever she thought of having to tell them. She wanted someone to lean on, someone to share the burden with. She had Dana, but she couldn’t tell Dana the whole truth.

She had to talk to him tonight.

It was still cold out, even though it was May, and rain had been pouring down in buckets for hours. Becca couldn’t drink. She didn’t know why she cared…there was no way she could keep the baby.

She tried not to let the thought into her mind that maybe having it was what she wanted.

“Hey, Ricky,” she said as she walked up to him. “Give me something.”

He raised an eyebrow. “Like
something
something?”

She nodded. “I need confidence. I need energy. I need to be—”

“I have just the right thing.” He went over to his backpack and removed a pillbox she’d only really ever seen used by old people so they could keep all of their “keep me alive” medicine straight. He pulled two yellow pills from a compartment.

She took them without hesitation. “Thanks.”

“Come talk to me for a second!” she shouted over the music at Johnny.

The world around her was getting stranger and stranger. She was fighting to stay aware, but too messed up to realize that the pills she’d been given were screwing with her.

“I can’t,” he said, not making eye contact with her.

“Come on!” She smiled, resisting the uncharacteristic and sudden urge to cry. “Just for a tiny second?”

He looked around, too, and then let her lead him. They went outside and shut the door behind them. Beyond the awning, it poured down rain.

She pulled him into the rain and kissed him. He kissed her back for a second and then pushed her away gently. “Please, Becca, don’t make this harder.”

“It doesn’t have to be hard, Johnny.” She blinked away the rain and smiled. Her face felt numb. “I want to be with you. I love you.”

It was out of her mouth before she could stop it. He stared at her. “You…what?”

“Come
on!
”

She ran out farther into the rain, her bare feet sinking into the muddy, so-cold-it-stings sand. Every sensation was heightened. The air was warm, but she was sharply aware of the cold air and the pricks of rain. She felt like she could feel every grain of sand.

He followed her, looking reluctant. “Please come back, Becca, I don’t want to play this game with you.”

“Oh, stop.” She went up to him and planted a kiss on his neck, the only part on him she could get to.

“We can’t, what if—”

“What the
fuck?
”

They both turned to see Max standing in the doorway. “Are you serious, dude?”

“No, Max, I—”

He threw open the door and ran at Johnny. He tackled him to the ground and then punched him hard in the face. Johnny tried to speak, but Max wouldn’t let him. He just cracked him hard again in the jaw. Johnny didn’t fight back. He only tried to stand and to speak.

Becca screamed at them to stop.

“Shut
up,
” said Max, standing with ease. “Just stop, for
once
in your life just shut up!”

She nodded and tried to keep her mouth shut. She was crying. She was losing her mind. Everything was heavy on her shoulders.

She ran to Max. “I’m sorry—”

She put a hand on his arm, and he whipped it off him.
“Do not,”
he shouted,
“touch me.”

He had never raised his voice to her like that. He had never sounded so furious. He went back into the boathouse. Johnny stood.

“Why didn’t you fight back?” she asked, her chest convulsing with every breath she tried to take.

“Fight
back?
I can’t fight back, I
fucked his girlfriend.
” He stared at Becca with all the rage she’d ever seen come from Johnny before, ever. “God, I’m
mad
at you. You know, before you got here, I had a best friend. And I probably would have gotten with Dana, and things would have been a lot easier. I liked her, you know. I know you say she didn’t like me, but she seems to, and you just
messed it all up.
”

Becca glanced at a movement in the door, but then saw nothing. She collapsed onto the ground. She was suddenly crying harder than she ever had in her life. She looked up at him, blinking the tears and rain out of her eyes. She tried to speak, but couldn’t.

Johnny’s face softened, and he closed the door. “I’m sorry. Just…just come inside.”

She shook her head violently. “I can’t. I can never see those p-people again. I—I—I can’t. Johnny, I’ve never felt anything like what I have with you. Please, just, just…” She was hyperventilating. “I’m begging you. I’m
begging you…
tell me we have something real… I know we do, I love you…I
love
you....”

“Becca, please, calm down.”

She was shaking so bad she couldn’t move. She let out a pathetic moan over the thunderous waves and the pounding rain. Blood was pulsing through her body. She couldn’t feel okay.

“Something is—is really wrong, I can’t…breathe....”

“You’re probably just having a panic attack. Just try to breathe. You’ll be okay.” He ran his hand over her hair. “It’s okay.”

“I can’t—please, Johnny, I can’t— I’m going to lose it—please…”

JOHNNY

He’d never seen her like this. She was weak and miserable. She’d always been so strong and sure of herself. It had been nearly impossible to stay away from her these past few months, but he’d thought it was for the best. He’d never have imagined that she’d be anything but okay.

She was laboring to breathe. Johnny had his arm wrapped around her tightly but then slowly unwound it. “I’ll be right back.” He stood and ran into the boathouse.

“Ricky, come here.”

Ricky followed Johnny. “What’s up, dude?”

“Do you have Xanax or something? Something to calm a person down?”

“Sure.” He went to his box and grabbed a pill. “Wait, who is this for?”

He didn’t want to say who it was really for. That’d make her feel even worse when she found out. “Uh, me. I’m just feeling all panicky for some reason tonight.”

“All right, all right.”

“Thanks.” Johnny patted him on the shoulder and was set to go back outside.

“Whoa, dude, only girls don’t pay. Thirty bucks.”

“Dammit,” Johnny said under his breath. He pulled out his wallet and threw it at him. He ran outside, to find Becca lying in the wet sand, being rained on. She was still crying. Her blond hair was clinging to her face, and she looked like she had no idea where she was.

“Becca, take this, it’ll make you feel better.”

She shook her head. “Nothing, it’s not… No, I can’t.”

Her breathing was still labored, and she looked like she might pass out at any second.

He put the pill on the tip of his tongue and leaned over her body. He kissed her. She kissed him back.

Damn, he’d really missed that.

He pushed the pill into her mouth with his tongue. She seemed too out of it to notice. He picked her up, and carried her up the stairs and all the way to her room.

DANA

It was hours later, and Dana was drunk. She’d heard that Max and Johnny had fought over Becca.

Fucking great.

Dana had done everything in her power to stop herself from freaking out. And she hadn’t. She hadn’t been anything but good about it all so far. She lay in her bed, silently seething at the girl in the bed only a few feet from her.

Becca had everything. Dana didn’t need
everything.
All she’d wanted was Johnny. And Becca had
of course
gone and taken that, too.

Suddenly there was a movement in the dark. Becca was standing up and walking…to the door? She opened it. And then shut it behind her. She was in her white slip—the one Dana had always admired.

I can’t let this go,
Dana thought.
I have to talk to her, even if it’s in the bathroom while she gets sick.

She put on a jacket and ran out into the hall. But Becca was gone. She looked in the bathrooms and in the dining hall before stepping out of the door and looking out in the rain. She saw Becca’s white slip catch the light of one of the lights along the field. She was walking down to the boathouse.

Dana wondered with a pang if this person who she’d never been anything but nice to was going to meet Johnny. She wouldn’t say anything, then. She’d just wait until they were both together and then she could confront them both. That was better anyway.

Dana followed her silently. She stepped down the stairs, as quietly as she could. Once on the sand, she looked around for Becca, but only caught a silver glint, in the sand, by her feet. Bending down to pick it up, she saw it was the locket from Max. Why…?

She hadn’t heard the door to the boathouse open. She squinted, and saw that Becca was at the end of the dock. She opened her mouth to yell her name, but something stopped her.

What was Becca doing?

BECCA

The necklace had felt heavy on her skin. The locket was heavy with holding all the lies she’d told just to be happy. Ignoring the pain that ensued when she ripped it from her neck, she let it fall to the sand.

She now stood on the waterlogged wood. This was her end. It had to be. She couldn’t even think about anything else. The baby in her stomach (how was that even
real?
), whatever drug Ricky had given her was now making her thoughts turn to mush. She felt rippling with electrical currents, but she also felt she might fall asleep at any moment. She couldn’t stop clenching and unclenching her hands. Her eyes were foggy and her mouth felt dry.