In my classes and in the hallway when I passed from room to room, I noticed how the girls kept their distance, and in class, I saw them looking at me and passing notes. But no one said anything. When I entered the cafeteria at lunch time, however, I found Janet, Lorraine, and Betty waiting anxiously, their eyes sparkling with glee.
"You're kind of cozy with Grandpa today," Betty teased immediately. "Any special reason?" She swung her eyes toward her friends.
"Cozy? I don't know what you mean," I replied. I stepped toward the counter to get a container of milk, but I caught the way they traded smiles and glances as they moved behind me in the lunch line.
"We heard you've taken Laura's place in more ways than one," Janet whispered in my ear. It made the hairs on my neck stick up.
"What?" I turned to confront them.
"You're still carrying her notebook," Lorraine pointed out, "and you wear her clothes."
"You sleep in her room, use her things," Betty recited.
"And whatever she did with Cary, you're doing," Janet concluded.
I felt the blood rush so quickly to my face, my cheeks burned.
"Whatever she did with Cary? What's that supposed to mean?" I demanded.
"You know." Betty rolled her eyes.
"I don't know because my mind isn't in the gutter. What are you saying? Who told you these things?"
"Who else, but the eyewitness?" Betty said with the firmness of a prosecutor. She nodded toward Adam Jackson who had come in with his crowd of buddies. He strutted across the cafeteria, his shoulders back, his face full of himself when he glanced my way. I saw a wicked, twisted smile take shape on those perfect lips.
"Eyewitness?"
"No sense pretending with us anymore," Lorraine said stepping closer to me. "Adam told us what he found you two doing on the beach last night."
"He did what?"
"He said he was riding in his motorboat, saw the bonfire and pulled up before you two had a chance to make it look innocent," Betty detailed.
"He told you that?"
"Surprised he told?" Janet asked.
"He described how you begged him not to, and promised him something good if he didn't," Betty added.
"Is that what you did back in coal country, bribed boys with your body?" Lorraine asked.
I tried to speak, but the words choked in my throat. I shook my head instead. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Cary watching with concern. He looked as if he was about to get up. Panic nailed my feet to the floor, but I knew I had to do something and fast, otherwise there would be a terrible scene in front of the whole student body.
"Those are lies," I finally said. "The real truth is he's just angry at me for not doing what he wanted me to do on the beach last night. Really!"
"Really?" Betty quipped. "Is that why you and Grandpa are like two peas in a pod today? Practically holding hands? If he were any closer to you, he'd be under your dress."
"It's disgusting," Janet followed. "You're first cousins, aren't you?"
"The Logans give the Cape a bad name," Lorraine declared. The other two nodded.
"What are you waiting for?" Betty said, shifting her eyes toward Cary. "He's waiting for you. The two of you can hold hands under the table. Or do whatever else you do."
The three laughed and moved ahead to get their food. The moment they did, other girls gathered around them to feed on the-gossip like chickens in a pen.
I felt my heart pounding. Everyone was looking at me, waiting to see what I was going to do. Cary was still watching from the table where he sat with his two friends, an expression of deep concern on his face. I hesitated. If I went to him, all these tongues would surely cluck, but sitting with the girls today was like putting myself in a Roman Coliseum. They would eat me alive.
"Aren't you going to sit with him?" Janet asked nodding in Cary's direction as she carried her tray past me.
Theresa was walking by with her friends.
"I promised Theresa I would sit with her today," I said loud enough for her to hear. She turned with a look of surprise, but lost it quickly when she saw the expression on my face and the three witches from Macbeth closing in. She waited for me to join her.
"Thanks," I whispered. "I especially don't want to sit with them today. All they want to do is make fun of Cary and me," I explained.
"Oh." She wore a knowing look.
When we were at the table and had taken our sandwiches from our bags, I leaned closer to her. "Why did you say 'oh,' like that?" I asked. "Did you hear dirty gossip, too?"
"There's never a bad day's catch when it comes to dirty gossip around here," she said, "especially when it's about Cary Logan. He and Laura were often the hot topic around here."
"Why?"
"There are other brothers and sisters here, dozens," she continued gesturing at the students in the cafeteria, "but none of them behaved as if they had invisible handcuffs tying them together. Anyone will tell you, so it's not like I'm letting a two-pound lobster out of the trap. If Cary could have followed her into the girls' room, I think he would have."
"Wasn't that all just an exaggeration?"
"No. They came to school together, they sat next to each other in every class, they sat with each other at lunch time, they sat with each other in the library, they left school together. The first time I saw Laura at a school party, she came with Cary," Theresa added, "and even danced with him. She danced with a couple of other boys, but she danced with her brother first."
"Maybe he thought she was too shy and just wanted to make her comfortable, or maybe he was too shy," I said. There had to be a hundred other reasons besides the one she was suggesting.
Theresa snorted.
"Well, she did have a boyfriend, didn't she?" I pointed out.
She bit into her sandwich and then shook her head. "You really are like a stranger to your own family, aren't you?"
"Yes," I admitted.
"When Laura started to see Robert Royce, it was a comedy show for these gossips. Cary would sit by himself or with those nerdy friends across the cafeteria and glare at Laura and Robert. He plodded through the hallways with a chin down to his ankles. The other boys started teasing him and he got into a few fights."
I looked across the cafeteria at him and saw he was still staring at me with deep concern. My heart beat in triple time. Had he heard the stories about us?
"So now that Laura's gone, they just picked up on you," Theresa said.
"With someone else's help," I added glaring across the cafeteria at Adam. He was obviously elaborating on his lies, gesturing emphatically and nodding in Cary's direction.
"They don't ever stop. They'd eat each other to the bone if they could. But Cary and Laura," Theresa said, "they gave them something to chew on." She shook her head again. "It was as if they didn't care, as if they thought no one could touch them with nasty words and looks. I couldnt understand it."
"Your father works with my uncle and with Cary, what does he think?"
She pulled back a moment and gazed at me indignantly. Then she calmed and sat forward again. "He doesn't talk about the Logans except to say they are hardworking people," she remarked with an andthat's-that tone.
"I don't know which one of them first suggested it," I said, nodding at Janet, Lorraine, and Betty, "but they implied that Cary had something to do with Laura and Robert's accident. They made it sound as if he deliberately put them in harm's way."
"Some people think that," Theresa said.
"Do you?"
She ate for a while and then she sighed. "Look, I didn't exactly hang out with Laura Logan or Robert Royce. Laura was always polite and nice to me and I liked her, but she sat on one side of the world and I sat on another one. Cary . . . he sat somewhere in outer space. I'm not swearing for anyone, but I'm not spreading any gossip, so stop asking all these questions."
She paused and turned completely to me so her back was to her friends. Then, in a low voice, she added, "Just like the rest of the bravas here, I mind m
y own business. What happens in the homes of the rich and famous isn't my concern. My daddy taught me that was the best way to stay out of trouble. Now don't you go telling anyone I said anything else, either," she warned with cold ebony eyes.
"I wouldn't do that."
"Good." Theresa turned back to her food.
I had barely touched mine. Was no one on our side? I gazed at Cary again. He looked so lost and lonely. In my put-away heart, I thought it wasn't fair. It wasn't fair what they were saying about him and me and what had happened to him.
I nibbled my sandwich, my stomach feeling like a tight drum. Theresa talked to her friends for a while and then gazed at me. The hard shell she had formed over herself cracked a bit.
"Look, it doesn't make sense that Cary would do something that would hurt Laura just to get at Robert Royce, does it?" she asked me,
"So? Don't let them drive you nuts about it. The trouble with them," she said, nodding at Janet, Lorraine, and Betty and their friends, "is they have nothing real in their lives so they make up soap operas. Maybe I'm not as rich as they are and I don't live in as nice a house, but I'm not anxious to trade places."
I smiled. "I don't blame you," I said.
Her smile widened. "Just ignore them and maybe they'll get bored or start on someone else," she suggested.
But it wasn't going to be that way for a while, and they were just getting started building their fire of pain. While Theresa and I spoke, neither of us had noticed that notes were being passed from table to table in the cafeteria. At each table they reached, everyone quickly stopped talking and leaned in to read the slander. Soon, the girls at Theresa's table grew curious and one of them got hold of one of the notes. She read it and passed it down to Theresa.
Printed on the slip of paper was: Incest is best. Just ask Cary and Melody.
I felt as if my lower body had evaporated. I had no legs. I would never be able to get up from the table. The cafeteria was buzzing with loud chatter and laughter. My heart was pounding so hard, I thought I could hear it drumming over the noise.
"Bitches," Theresa muttered. Her friends nodded. Again, everyone's eyes were on me. I shifted my gaze slowly toward Cary. Someone had tossed one of the notes over to his table. After he read it, he crumbled it in his fist and turned to me. I shook my head to say, "Don't pay it any mind. Ignore it," but I could see he was fuming.
"Cary!" I called when he stood up. His gaze was fixed on Adam Jackson across the cafeteria. "Oh no," I muttered.
"Don't get in his way," Theresa warned me. "I've seen him pull up a net full of ten-pounders as if it were a net full of nothing more than balloons."
"This is just what they want," I wailed. Cary's determined strut across the room silenced the cafeteria. The lines in his face were taut and his shoulders were raised. One of the teacher monitors, Mr. Pepper, looked up from his newspaper curiously as Cary marched past him.
I got up as Cary rounded the table beside Adam Jackson's. Adam sat there, smirking, his arms folded over his chest.
"Careful," Theresa said touching my arm as I started after him.
"You spread a bunch of filthy lies about us today, didn't you?" Cary accused, loud enough for everyone to hear.
"Hey, if you're embarrassed by the truth, don't blame me," Adam said.
"What's going on there?" Mr. Pepper called. If he moved any slower, I thought, he'd make a turtle look like a cheetah.
Cary didn't waste words. His whole body had turned into a fist--it was that tight. He reached across the table and grabbed Adam at his collar and literally lifted him from his seat and pulled him over the table, knocking trays of food everywhere.
Adam struggled to break free of Cary's grip, but it was as firm and rigid as lockjaw. Adam looked like a fish out of water, twisting and turning, flailing about, kicking up his feet and swinging his arms wildly.
Cary turned him over and pinned his arms to the table. Everyone drew back. Mr. Pepper finally put on some steam and reached the table, shouting. "Stop that this instant! Cary Logan. . . Stop!"
Cary ignored him. He gazed down into Adam's terrified face.
"Tell them the truth! Tell them!" he screamed. "Was there anything between me and Melody? Was there?"
"Cary Logan, let him go," Mr. Pepper cried, but he didn't touch Cary. It was as if Cary were on fire and Mr. Pepper knew he would burn his hands. "Go get the principal," he shouted at one of the nearby students, who reluctantly turned, disappointed he would miss the action.
"The truth!" Cary screamed down at Adam and raised his fist over his face. To Adam, it must have looked as if a sledgehammer were about to fall on his precious hand-some visage.
"All right. Nothing happened. Nothing happened! I made it all up. Satisfied?"
Cary relaxed and Adam sat up quickly, now indignant and embarrassed. He started to say something, but when Cary turned back to him, he shrank quickly.
"Mr. Logan, you march yourself right down to the principal's office this instant, you hear?" Mr. Pepper said.
Cary didn't acknowledge him. He looked at me. "You all right?" he asked.
I wasn't sure I had any breath in my lungs. I nodded, reserving my words.
"If anyone else bothers you, tell me later," he said loudly. Then, moving like a prisoner condemned to the gallows, he marched ahead of Mr. Pepper toward the door.
The moment he left, the cafeteria burst into a storm of chatter.
"Satisfied with yourselves now?" I asked Janet, Lorraine, and Betty as I reached their table on the way back to Theresa's. They were too frightened to reply. "Adam Jackson invited me to meet him on the beach last night. I made the mistake of doing so and he tried to rape me," I told them. Their eyes bulged. "He talked me into drinking vodka and cranberry juice and got me drunk."
I saw from Janet's expression that she believed me. Maybe she had had a similar experience.
"Cary arrived just in time and drove Adam away. He literally tore him off me," I told them. "This is his revenge and you and your mean gossip helped him. Now Cary's in bad trouble. Thanks a lot." I turned on my heel and went back to Theresa.
"That Adam Jackson better watch his step or Cary's going to make him fish bait," she said.
"He'll only get himself into more trouble and it's all my fault," I wailed. I plopped into my seat just as the bell rang. The sea of chatter flowed out of the cafeteria with the students. The teachers in the afternoon classes would have a hard time keeping their attention today, I thought. I waited until most everyone was out before getting up to follow. Theresa lingered behind with me.
"What will they do to him?"
"Probably suspend him again," she said.
I felt just dreadful. I sat half dead in my seat in all my classes, barely listening, never answering a question. I couldn't wait for the day to end, and when it did, I found Cary waiting for me outside, his hands in his pockets, his head down, pacing back and forth like a caged animal. The moment he saw me, he perked up.
"You all right?" he asked quickly.
"Yes, but what happened?"
"I got two days vacation," he said.
"Oh Cary, near the end of the year when you need the review for your tests? This is horrible."
"It doesn't matter," he said.
"Yes it does. I'm not going to let the principal do this to you. It's not fair. He should see the nasty notes that were passed around."
"He saw them. It didn't make any difference. He told me I didn't have a right to lose my temper and take things into my own hands."
"He's right," I said.
"I told him it hadn't happened to his family so he could say that."
"What did he say?" I asked, shocked at his courage.
"He stuttered a bit and then said that wasn't the point. But don't worry. I'll walk you to school anyway and be here for you afterward and if Adam Jackson or anyone bothers you--"
"I won't tell you," I said. "You'd . . . you'd turn them into fish bait," I declared, using Theresa's language. He nodded, pleased wit
h the description.
"Exactly, and they know it."
We started away.
"I appreciate your protecting me, Cary, but I hate to see you get into trouble."
I saw a smile take form on his lips.
"How can you be happy?" I asked him.
"This is the way it used to be between me and Laura," he said softly. Then he lost his smile. "Until Robert stepped into her life."
I said nothing. We walked on, each chased by troubled thoughts.
Cary didn't have to tell Aunt Sara and Uncle Jacob what had happened at school. The principal had called and told Aunt Sara before we returned home. Uncle Jacob was still down at the dock and didn't know yet, however, and Aunt Sara was visibly shaken just with the thought of what would happen once he found out. She wrung her hands and shook her head in despair.
"Don't worry, Ma. tell him myself. I'll go down to the dock now," Cary said.
"How did this happen, Cary? You haven't been in any trouble for a long time, and it's so close to graduation."
I was about to take the blame, but Cary spoke first. "This boy was saying ugly, disgusting things about us and our family around the school, Ma. I did what I had to do."
"Why was he doing that?"
"Because he's a shark who needs to be harpooned, and that's all there is to say." Cary glared at me with eyes of warning.
"Oh Melody, was it dreadful for you, too?"
"Yes, Aunt Sara. I'm sorry Cary's in trouble, but the other boy was at fault."
She sighed.
"What are we going to do? All this happens on the day we're going to your grandparents for dinner. Don't mention anything about this to them," she told us fearfully.
"I won't if you won't," Cary promised. He winked at me and went up to change his clothes.
May, who had learned only bits and pieces about everything, was desperate to know what had caused all the commotion. Neither Cary nor I had told her much on the way home since neither of us was in the mood to talk. I explained it to her as best I could, leaving out the nasty details of the rumors.
She signed back that she was sorry Cary was in trouble again. It had always made Laura sad and it made her sadder still, she said. In her large, shadowed brown eyes lingered more dark secrets and sufferings than a child her age should know, I thought. And with her handicap, most of them remained trapped in her heart.