Taking Flight (14 page)

She was surprised to see Cammie with me, obviously, and after a quick explanation from me about how I still apparently needed a babysitter, Maddie grudgingly agreed to let Cammie come along. I wasn’t sure how much Maddie’d understood my request to come over beyond realizing I was coming on to her, but it was clear I’d at least gotten the bare minimum across, and there was an air of sexual tension overlaying the already-present awkwardness caused by Cammie’s presence, which only made things even more uncomfortable.

I rode in the passenger’s seat alongside Maddie, and Cammie sat in the back, staring out a window as we drove past several admittedly nice houses and then turned into what I assumed to be one of Collinsville’s richest neighborhoods. The houses were large and the neighborhood was gated, and I was even a little reminded of my own home in Los Angeles. It was a welcome change from the Marshall’s farm, and one I probably should’ve anticipated, given that Maddie’s father was the principal of the only high school in Collinsville.

We pulled into the driveway of a three-story brick house with two garages, one of which Maddie parked inside. Once we’d all gotten out of the car, she gave Cammie and me a brief tour before we settled at her dining room table with our Physics notebooks. Neither of her parents were home.

Studying was tedious with Cammie around. Whereas I was only looking to pass our test, Cammie wanted to ace it, and so we had to work on thoroughly covering every little part of the material in order to meet her standards. I guess that worked in my favor, overall, but given that the current situation wasn’t one I wanted to be in in the first place, lengthening the time it took to study was an especially unwelcome idea.

After the first two chapters had been covered, we took a snack break, and Cammie went to the bathroom, leaving Maddie and I alone in the kitchen. Immediately, Maddie rolled her eyes at me.

“I can’t believe she’s in my house.”

“Sorry.” If she wanted a Cammie bashing session, I couldn’t participate. I felt badly about what I’d said earlier, like Cammie’d been snippy and I’d just been downright mean. “I made a mistake. I thought her dad would cut me some slack.”

“I get it.” She let out a heavy sigh, and I thought of how hard Cammie’d tried to discourage me from getting anywhere near Maddie.

I looked at her. “So am I ever gonna get to know why you and Cammie don’t get along?”

Maddie chuckled a little, to my surprise. “Oh, God. That’s all on her. I mean… she’s not my favorite person, but I don’t care if you hang out with her. Her friends suck, though.”

“I figured they would,” I said. She kept going.

“My freshman year was when I told everyone… you know…” She tilted her head in my direction, a knowing smile on her face, and continued, “All of her little cheerleader friends gave me so much shit for it. Cammie didn’t tease me or anything, but she didn’t ever say a word to stop them.”

“Did you expect her to?” It was hard to believe she would, given what I’d learned about Cammie so far, but then again, they’d been in school together for a long time. Maddie probably knew her better than I did.

“Yeah, actually.” She shrugged. “Maybe that was my mistake.” Then she looked over at me. “But everyone that mattered was eventually okay with it, which is rare in Collinsville, so I guess I’m lucky anyway.” She cleared her throat, a knowing look in her eyes. “So how were your parents? Assuming you aren’t just a curious straight girl, of course.”

I laughed. “Yeah… no. They were fine.”

“That must’ve been nice. My dad was cool; Mom took a while, though.”

“Well, they were lacking in other areas,” I admitted vaguely. Our conversation was interrupted by the sound of a toilet flushing down the hallway, and Maddie let out a sigh.

“Great. Back to work. Guess I’ll have to get you alone some other time.”

She smirked at me as she brushed past me to leave the kitchen, and I grinned at her back, pleased.

“I guess you will.”

*   *   *

David, I could tell, sensed I was upset with him when he came to pick Cammie and me up from Maddie’s house. I didn’t talk much with him in the car, and Cammie spent most of the drive clammed up as well, and so when we got home, it was unsurprising that she immediately went up to her room and that David pulled me aside for another pseudo-therapy session.

“I hope you understand why I didn’t let you go alone today,” he told me.

I did. Especially given that I’d been pretty hell-bent on hooking up with Maddie today – something that David definitely wouldn’t have approved of.

I was sure he probably wanted me to be celibate or something. Or maybe to be in a stable relationship before I had sex with anyone. Well, he wasn’t getting that, and he couldn’t keep me cooped up forever. I’d just have to wait him out. Play the game. I wouldn’t resist his demands anymore, and then when he gave me enough freedom, I could do what I wanted, to a certain extent. I just had to toe the line more carefully than I did in Los Angeles.

“I get it,” I told him simply. “I just thought you felt like you could trust me.”

“Give it time,” he said.

“Okay,” I agreed, and that was that.

Next on my list was Cammie.

I was still a little wary of her, but given that she seemed to be my go-to babysitter and that we were sharing a bedroom, I knew we needed to make peace. Maddie herself had said that Cammie hadn’t ever said anything homophobic to her, and Cammie claimed to have no problem with gay people. So even though it was still possible Cammie was lying, it was equally possible that she was actually just kind of a little too into the high school social hierarchy, and was standoffish toward Maddie because of her social status, not her actual homosexuality. That’d also explain the popular asshole of a boyfriend she had.

And while that kind of shallowness wasn’t exactly a desirable trait in a person, it was better than homophobia. I could forgive it and look past it. High school was rough; I could see the appeal of keeping an intact reputation.

As I climbed the stairs to Cammie’s room, I wondered for a moment if I’d fit all of her puzzle pieces together. If I understood her. The boyfriend, the cheerleading, the friends. None of it fit the girl I’d spent two weeks getting to know. But it did fit a girl who desperately wanted to fit in. I’d been an outcast at my old school, and so I could understand how someone who felt like an outsider would do whatever it took to avoid becoming one.

When I peered into her room, she had my mp3 player again. I raised a questioning eyebrow at her. “You gonna keep stealing that?”

“I like your Avril Lavigne songs,” she mumbled, raising a half-hearted middle finger in my direction. I hid a smile; vaguely enjoying this side of her. I liked seeing her do things her parents wouldn’t approve of.

“Do you still want to teach a prissy city girl how to ride a horse?” I asked.

She arched an eyebrow, removing the earbuds and pausing the song she’d been listening to. “What?”

I swallowed hard, shrugging my shoulders. “I was kind of a dick earlier. I thought maybe you’d get a kick out of watching me be terrified.”

I could see her struggling not to smile. “You…” she trailed off, and then shook her head abruptly. “Are you sure?”

“I need you to keep me sane,” I told her simply. “So let’s go visit your big metaphorical olive branch clearing in case we’re about to royally screw our friendship up before we’ve even gotten a chance to be friends. Okay?”

I’ll never forget the way she looked at me, then. It was in that moment that I got the first inkling that Cammie Marshall wasn’t going to just be a five-month friend. That she was going to change my life.

She looked at me like I mattered.

*   *   *

“Drug use, um… mostly pot, though. I stopped that for the most part by my senior year. No hardcore stuff; no addictions. I tried LSD once. Never again, though, Jesus. The drinking… mostly casual. I still do that, but I’m not as bad as my dad. He’s a mess; just drinks his life away. I got caught with alcohol in my locker once, but I was holding it for a friend and there was no way I was ratting her out. I only get blackout drunk sometimes. So I’m
definitely
not as bad as my dad. Although that’s not saying much.”

I paused for air, eyes on the grass between us, and then continued, “He got worse after… after my mom died. That was three months ago; she was killed in a car wreck. Your dad thinks I might have depression because I haven’t really been out of bed since she died, but I don’t know… I think I was maybe just really sad, and I think there’s a difference between that and depression. But anyway, that’s why I had the attendance stuff.

“Your dad also thinks I have intimacy issues because I haven’t really had parents for several years now and I don’t really… love anyone, I guess. I mean, I do, but… I guess I’m just not really into being… intimate. With people. Other than in the biblical sense, of course, because I
do
have a lot of sex. Or I did. Well, when I say it like that, I guess it does sound like I have intimacy issues.” I let out a short, awkward laugh, and shifted uncomfortably. Finally, I looked up at Cammie.

She chewed on her bottom lip, her gaze turned slightly upward, and then, to my surprise, she sniffed a little and reached up to wipe at her eyes. I raised both eyebrows in genuine confusion.

“Are you okay?”

She let out a watery laugh. “Jesus Christ, am
I
okay? God, your mom
just
died. No one would be okay after that.”

“I know.” I swallowed the lump in my throat. “I mean, we weren’t that close. Not since I was young. It was kind of like… maybe losing an aunt or something. I don’t know. I don’t have any aunts or uncles. I guess maybe it is different, then, since she raised me.” I swallowed another lump and fell silent, suddenly uncomfortable. I felt open and vulnerable, and I didn’t know how to respond to the fact that Cammie was doing a worse job of not crying than I was.

“Why weren’t you close?” she asked, her eyebrows furrowing. I wasn’t sure I was ready to divulge that yet. This felt so raw and genuine, exposing all of this to her. I wasn’t ready to potentially ruin it with questions about my mom’s movie star career.

“She was really into her job,” I summarized. “She worked a lot. She didn’t get really busy until I was a little older, but after that I was basically at home alone with my dad all the time.”

“Okay.” Cammie sniffed again and seemed to decide better of asking more questions about my mom. Instead, she asked, “Can I hug you?”

“Okay,” I echoed, and she got up onto her knees across from me and then scooted closer to wrap her arms around me. I leaned into her, not hugging her back, but resting my forehead on her warm shoulder. I didn’t want her to let go.

When she did, she moved to sit beside me instead, and pulled her knees up to her chest even as she grabbed my attention with her next sentence. “I know it’s not much after what you just told me, but… I’ve never told anyone the whole truth about my first time having sex.” She took a deep breath and began, “I lost my virginity to this guy named Trevor.”

I looked at her, but her eyes were closed, like she couldn’t bear to look at anything.

“You’ll meet him soon, actually. Or see him, I guess. He goes to our church. He’s nineteen. When I was a sophomore, he was a senior. Scott had just graduated back then.” She let out a breath, then shook her head and opened her eyes. “I thought he was so cool. He played basketball and he was, like, the leading scorer of our team or something like that. I don’t even remember. Anyway, he was the guy every girl wanted to date. But he picked me.”

She paused there to force a laugh, and shook her head again. “I was fifteen, and this seventeen-year-old guy with a nice car was paying attention to me. All of my friends were telling me I was so lucky. We went out on three dates or so, and after every one, they’d just spend hours grilling me on everything that had happened. Really gushing over it, you know? And after school one day, he wanted me to come with him to his house. So I told my dad I was going home with Tiffany, and I went with him. His parents weren’t home, and…” She trailed off, then shrugged her shoulders, as if she was frustrated with herself. “And he told me that I was special, and that he loved me, and that it’d be our little secret.”

“Asshole,” I murmured, and she shot me a bitter smile.

“Yeah, well, I was fifteen, and so I was actually shocked when
everyone
knew the next day that I’d ‘given it up’ after just a few dates to a guy who wasn’t even officially dating me. He lied about what we did too. Just like that, I was spending about the next year or so as the school slut.”

“But you’re not,” I reminded her. “That guy was a complete and total dick.”

“Yeah, I told myself I wasn’t for the first few weeks or so,” she murmured. “But hear something about yourself often enough and eventually you start to believe it. What are the odds that everyone else is wrong and you’re the only one that’s right, you know?”

I thought back to my high school back in Los Angeles. No one there but Caitlyn had anything nice to say about me anymore. Especially now that I’d been shipped off to Georgia to have my behavior corrected. “Yeah. I know.”