Off the Rails (2 page)

“Did you open it?”

Tia has a webcam fixed on my kitchen?

“You got a red envelope in the mail, right? Did you open it?” Her voice was frantic, shrill even.

Madison frowned. It took a lot to make Tia lose it.

Some freak had gone retro and sprinkled some microscopic nastiness into envelopes? Smallpox? Anthrax? Madison loosened her grip on the red paper and held the envelope as far away from herself as possible. “Yeah, I got it.”

“But you didn’t open it? Right? Good. Don’t. Meet me at The Vine. Bring the envelope.”

Okay. So the envelope was not contagious.

Back to the webcam. “Is this being filmed for a new
Mission Impossible
? Because I am not going to work with Tom Cruise. He’s way too old and way too short. Unless I’m going to be the tough bitch that kicks his ass. Then I’m in.”

“No comment.”

“You say that too often. You sure you aren’t a publicist?”

“Whatever. Bye.”

* * * *

The Vine was deserted for once. Even the stools in front of the counter that were usually filled with wannabe intellectuals were vacant, not a single University of Cincinnati student in sight. Everyone was probably at home, enjoying a hot and dirty Valentine’s Day fuck—or was too embarrassed to show their I-don’t-have-anyone-to-have-sex-with face.

Tia was already curled into one of the deep-cushioned, orange couches that filled the back corners of the coffee house. On the low table in front of her sat a mostly empty coffee with cream, a full, black coffee and a red envelope. Close inspection confirmed Tia’s unfortunate red envelope had Tia’s address. The script was the same, and so was the unrevealing post office box return addy. All in all, the envelope had a weird, shredded look, as though somebody thought it might be their day pass away from a mental institution, but it turned out to be an extension of their stay instead. If the envelope could talk it would say “
I was naughty
.”

Tia pointed to the black coffee. “You gotta save your cash, now that you’re, ya know, back on the job market. This one’s on me.”

Madison picked it up and took a sip. Obviously, the official
I’m outta this lousy place
Facebook post had been read and reviewed.

“That Mr. Thornton is a loser. You’ll find something better.”

Madison dropped into the extra wide chair across from the couch. “Yeah. Whatever. It’s not like I wanted to spend my life answering calls about insurance.”

‘Nuf said.

Gesturing toward the area behind Tia’s shoulder, Madison asked, “What time is the crew arriving and do I have to share a trailer with Tom? And please, no children on the set.”

“Get over it.” She smirked and tossed one booted leg over the other. “Tom’s not coming, and you’re not going to be the new badass spy.”

Madison slipped her envelope out of her backpack and set it on the arm of the chair. “At first, when you were freaking out, I thought somebody was sending around a mail-order plague, and you were calling to save my life by warning me not to open it.”

Tia downed the last of her coffee and set her mug on the table with a heavy thump. “It is a plague of sorts.”

“A valentine plague?”

“That’s the catch. It has nothing to do with Valentine’s Day. Those bitches fooled everyone, I’ll bet. Open it.” She waved a hand at the envelope. “You’ll see what I mean.”

Madison grabbed the envelope, and after again failing to get her fingernail under the flap, pulled a pen from her backpack and poked at the sleek red paper until a minuscule piece started to give up the fight and concede to the idea that it was actually designed to be opened. By the time she could see the card inside, also red, she’d pretty well torn the shit out of the envelope. If Tia’s envelope had been naughty, hers had been downright bad.

The nauseatingly familiar crest of Indian Creek High School sat square in the middle of the front of the card. Inside, the details for a five year reunion.

“What the hell? Who has a five year reunion?”

“Snotty assholes who want to throw their I’m-rich-and-perfect lives in our faces.”

Madison swallowed against the truth of her own life. “I can’t go to this! I don’t have a job! What the hell am I going to say? ‘Oh, yeah, I remember I said I was going to be famous, doing musicals on Broadway and gigs on Bourbon Street, but I decided to be a laid off loser instead.’ Shit.”

“You don’t have to tell anybody you—”

Madison cut Tia off with a sulky, evil-eyed scowl. “That’s easy for you to say. Everybody sees that stuff about you in the paper all the time.”

“It’s only the
Post,
” Tia protested in a small voice.

Madison lifted one eyebrow. “Have you seen what you drive? Have you seen where you live? Your life will totally make them all jealous.”

“You don’t see me throwing all of
your
successes in
your
face. What about that show in Chicago? You left me here all last summer—by myself—and I didn’t give you a hard time.”

“One show does not a career make,” Madison replied, staring into her coffee.

“Your dad is a great guy, but don’t quote him. He doesn’t know what the hell he’s talking about.”

“He knows I’m an unemployed singer-slash-actress. Again.” Wincing at the whining tone in her own voice, Madison took a quick sip. “Why couldn’t they just Facebook us like normal people?”

Tia pointed to the tattered red paper. “Probably trying to be impressive.”

Madison scoffed as she poked at the shreds. “That really worked.”

Tia pushed herself out of the cushions, grabbed her empty mug, and went to get a refill. With her gone, Madison was left alone, adrift in her personal cloud of gloom and self-pity.

Snippets of conversations and Facebook posts played through her mind. If she had a remote to switch them off, she would have. But she didn’t. So she had to stew on the highlights of other people’s successes.

Karen Williams just got married—at the Terrace Park Country Club—and they moved to Hyde Park, around the corner from the cemetery. They’re staying in the pool house until the remodel is done…

Did you hear about Kitty Carter? She moved to L.A. Her mom says she’s about to do a movie…

Marilyn Goodwin is the perfect stay-at-home mom! Her two year old is the youngest member of MENSA…

There were more, and they all ran together into a disturbing blur of great career-great husband-great babies-great career-great husband-great babies. Even in the new millennium, that stuff still mattered.

“Shut up and drink your coffee.”

“I’m not saying anything.”

“You’re about to.”

Madison ignored the motherly frown on Tia’s face. “So? I can talk. This is a free country.” But she did clam up for a few minutes, and they drank in silence until the obvious solution popped into Madison’s head.

“We don’t have to go. We could not go. We’ll just not go. There. Problem solved.”

Tia gaped across her coffee mug. “The pact?”

Madison feigned ignorance of one of too many drunken bathroom scenarios. Pretending she didn’t remember the fall of their senior year, hiding in the back stall of the girl’s bathroom while everyone else basked in the artificial beauty of the Fall Harvest Homecoming Dance while listening to the ever-perfect homecoming queen Sandra Williams sing jazz so amazingly, even the loser freshmen listened. Amazing Sandra stood on the stage, belting out
Dream a Little Dream of Me
like she was Ella Fitzgerald or some shit.

Madison was also pretending she didn’t remember swearing drunkenly that they’d come back and show up all of those bitches. They’d make it big and arrive at the reunion in a limo, wearing…Versace? Dolce & Gabbana? Calvin Klein? Whatever it was that rich people wore. Anyway, the end result had been a pact. The one that Madison was pretending she didn’t remember.

“I have two words for you.
Drew Campbell
.”

Him
.

The only high school guy she’d had a serious thing for. Blond hair, blue eyes, killer body—and a glasses-wearing, calculator-toting, trivia-tournament-playing geek. Something about watching him think, the way he got that far off look in his eyes, had sparked the dirtiest daydreams.

Shit. Even after five years, she still wanted to fuck him. And then talk to him, get inside his head and see what went on in there. Then fuck him again. Madison’s pussy was getting hot and wet just thinking about it. “Do you think he has a girlfriend? What if he’s married?” Not that she wanted to do a three-way. Did she? Maybe if the other girl was hot. But not hotter than her. “What do you think she looks like?”

“Who?”

“His girlfriend. Or
wife
.”

“Facebook him. See what he’s up to.”

Madison winced, shaking her head. It was really so wrong, creaming for a guy who hardly even knew you existed. And if she saw him, she was absolutely going to make a complete fool of herself. Again.

No way.

“We’re not going.” Madison set her mug down and folded her arms. “I don’t think—”

“Stop thinking.” Tia picked up her phone and tapped in the date. “There. We’re going. Deal with it.”

Madison grabbed her invitation and stuffed it back into her backpack. She left the envelope remains on the table. Two months. Eight weeks. Not much time to deal.

Chapter Two

Drunk Girls on South Beach

Tia waved one of too many Labatts in the vivid Florida sunlight. “Wat iz za rezin we came here, Madsen? To da beech?”

Madison rolled onto her stomach and swiped at the stubborn sand stuck to her forehead. Since when was SPF 30 so stick stick sticky? “Same as everbiddy else.
Reel
life stinks. Reunion Bitches and all. And. That Mr. Thornberri. Hez an ass.” She swung her arms wide. “See? I’m havin fun anyway. He can’t stop me.”

“Yeah. Him and Harvee.” Although Tia’s effort to get up onto her elbows wasn’t successful, her swing for the SPF was. “So you’re not mad at me for callin around ‘bout Drew? You should be glad, you know, ’cause now u know he’s cominggg. By himself.”

“Now why would I be mad at you for butting into my bidnass and letting me know that reunion is goin ta be even more embarrassin’ than…” Madison forgot what she was thinking, stopped picking at the grains of sand stuck in her eyebrows, and fixed her foggy gaze on Tia. “You might not wanna use that lotion. It’s
reel
sticky.”

Tia held the bottle in front of her face and squinted. “Maybe I’ll just use it on my face. So I don’t get wrinkles.”

Madison completely gave up wiping off the thousands of grains of sand dotting her face and flopped back, giving in to the heat of the Florida sun. “Wrinkles are bad. Nobody wants ‘em.”

“Yeah. ‘Cept those wrinkle dogs.” Tia burst out laughing at her own drunken stupidity and Madison, having given up on anything making any sense, laughed until she passed out.

* * * *

Madison thumbed through her email as she leaned against the hotel bathroom door. “Tia?” she almost-yelled through the closed door. “Did I actually get an email from Drew asking me if I wanted to be on his ‘Swag ‘n’ Tag’ committee?”

“I look ridiculous,” Tia’s voice came back.

Her response was automatic. “You look fine.” Then she got back to thinking about herself. “Do you remember me saying anything about Drew? And his committee?”

“What are you talking about?”

Madison explained the email she thought she’d received, complained about, then deleted. Then deleted again from her trash.

“My face. I shouldn’t go out in public.” Tia’s voice was uncharacteristically shrill. “What if someone takes my picture? No pictures tonight. None.” Then, “I never thought about double-deleting.”

“It’s for stuff you really, really never want to see again.” She lowered her phone. “Are you ever going to come out of there? We didn’t come down here to hide in the bathroom.”

The door jerked open, but just enough so that they didn’t have to yell. “Sounds like you do want to see that email from Drew again.”

Madison frowned. She didn’t want to see it. She just wanted to know if she’d actually received it or imagined it. And if she had received it, what it actually said, rather than what she’d imagined it said. Maybe what it actually said was worse than she remembered. Maybe it was better. Reading email on the beach after drinking was obviously a dumb thing to do. “You can’t look that bad, honestly, Tia. Look at me. Do I look much better?” Madison glanced in the mirror over the cheap hotel room dresser and winced at the zebra stripes running across her boobs and down her stomach, then turned to peek in through the bathroom door. “Hello! This is South Beach! Nobody gives a shit that you have a sunburn.”

The door burst open and Madison came face-to-face with the truth of her lies. But she was a good friend, and no matter how stupid Tia looked she would not laugh.

Because if she did, she might have to go out by herself, and that was not going to happen. If she were by herself it’d be nearly impossible to make fun of the weirdoes who thought that everybody who goes to the beach during spring break wants to have sex with total strangers they’d never get within ten feet of in the regular world. And if Madison
did
start thinking she wanted to have sex with some shaggy-haired, skateboard toting idiot, Tia would put a stop to it.

What was that? Oh, right. Her friend was in the middle of a crisis.

“Go ahead. Say it,” Tia challenged. “I look like I’m wearing reverse war paint. I’m a peacenik Indian!”

“Hello? Welcome to the new millennium. People don’t say crap like that anymore.” To avoid staring at the wobbly white stripes across her friend’s face, Madison slipped into the bathroom and starting digging through her makeup bag. “Did you try some blush? Maybe you could even it out.”

Tia’s glare burned into Madison.

“That’s good! Stay mad like that. Maybe you can make your whole face get red!” She was trying to be helpful, really.

“Oh, hell.” Tia stomped over to the pile of clothes on the bed. “Let’s get dressed. If anybody gives me a hard time, you’ll have to take care of it.”