He doesn’t say anything. He just looks at her that way he does, his face so open, so not afraid of any of the things Erin finds so terrifying.
“I’m not a project,” Erin says. “You’re never going to change me. I’m never going to be normal. I’m autistic. I want to stay autistic.”
“I don’t want to change you.”
“Then what do you want?” she shouts. Spot presses his body against her legs.
Erin doesn’t understand what’s going on. Why is Otis looking at her like this? Why is he being so nice to her? Why are they standing face-to-face like this? She doesn’t know what she’s supposed to say now, what she’s supposed to do with her body, if she’s supposed to look him in the eyes, and if so, for how long? Most of all, she doesn’t understand why Otis likes her, why she likes him, why all this is happening when she promised herself she’d never let it.
“Do you want me to leave?” Otis says gently.
“No. Yes. I don’t know,” Erin says. She takes a deep breath. She sits down on her bed. “I need space. Sometimes I just need space.”
“Whatever you want is okay.”
“If I ask you to leave, it doesn’t mean I don’t like you.”
“Okay.”
“Because I do,” Erin says. “Like you.”
“I like you, too.”
“Okay.”
“Okay.”
“Now will you leave?”
It is after midnight when Otis sneaks back out of the house. Erin knows she will not sleep tonight. She knows there is no hope of guessing what Data would do in a situation like this.
She texts Rosina and Grace: EMERGENCY! Cancel all after-school plans. We need Grace’s parents’ car.
Erin turns off her whale songs and gets on the computer. She has work to do. This is no time for being underwater. This is no time for being mad at her best friend. Some things are just too big to be afraid of.
ROSINA.
It’s Monday, and Margot, Elise, and Trista are back from suspension, and everybody’s treating them like war heroes, even though all that happened was they basically got a vacation from school. Margot’s prancing through the halls like she’s an even bigger deal than she thought she was before, Elise can’t stop smiling and giving high fives, and even little Trista (hair stripped of purple and back to its natural brown) looks like she’s walking taller.
Rosina knows she should be happy for them. She should be happy for all the Nowhere Girls, including herself. Slatterly was trying to send a warning with the girls’ suspensions, but it totally backfired. They’re martyrs now, proof of the cause’s righteousness. The Nowhere Girls are more popular than ever. It’s like no one’s even scared of Slatterly anymore.
No one but Rosina. Fearless, fierce Rosina. She wants to punch the irony of this in its face.
Rosina has no more chances. Apart from school and her shifts at the restaurant, she is on house arrest. If she gets in any more trouble at school, she will be expelled. If she gets in any more trouble, period, she is no longer her mother’s daughter. That’s what Mami said: No serás mi hija. Rosina’s fought the world so hard, she fought her way out of her family.
She fell asleep in Abuelita’s bed last night, unsure whether her grandmother heard the latest screaming match with Mom, if she had any idea what it was about, if she knows what Rosina’s been accused of, or if she slept through the whole thing. All Rosina knows is Abuelita’s skinny arms held her close as she cried, her frail body surprising with its warmth. She shushed Rosina to sleep like a baby, calling her Alicia, her dead daughter’s name.
There is no fucking way Rosina is letting anyone at this stupid school see her cry right now. She punches a locker with her fist. Her eyes dry up as her knuckles burn.
“What’d that locker do to you?” she hears Erin say behind her.
Rosina sucks up the pain and spins around. Erin immediately shoves a stapled stack of papers in her face.
“I need you to review this packet by the end of the day,” Erin says.
“I thought you weren’t talking to me,” Rosina says.
“I am calling a temporary cease-fire.”
“Wait a minute,” Rosina says. “First tell me what’s going on. What the hell was that text about last night?”
“No time,” Erin says. “I’ll explain on the car ride there.”
“On the car ride where?”
“Fir City.”
“Why do you want to go to Fir City?”
“Read the packet.”
“I have to be at work at five,” Rosina says. “I can’t get in trouble anymore.”
“This is more important than work,” Erin says. “We have to help Cheyenne.”
“Who’s Cheyenne?”
“A girl that Eric Jordan and Spencer Klimpt raped two nights ago.”
“Shit,” Rosina says. “No. You’re lying. This can’t be happening.” But Rosina knows Erin does not lie.
“Otis Goldberg overheard them talking about it at the Quick Stop. Then Eric Jordan beat up Otis Goldberg. Then Otis Goldberg told me about it. Then I texted you and Grace. Then I stayed up all night making this packet.”
Erin keeps talking as Rosina lets this sink in. She is numb because there is too much to feel.
“Cheyenne Lockett. Sophomore at Fir City High School, Fir City, Fir County, Oregon. Address is Eleven Temple Street. Here is a map and driving directions.” She flips a page. “Here is a synopsis of an article on how to best talk to a victim of sexual assault.” She flips to another page. “Here is a bulleted list of information we need in order to build a rape case that is so solid even the most apathetic and corrupt cop can’t ignore it.”
“I can’t,” Rosina says. “I can’t go after school.”
Erin looks at her. Blinks. “You are not Rosina,” she says. “Rosina would never say that. If you see the real Rosina, tell her to meet Grace and me in the parking lot immediately after school.” Then she turns and walks away.
Erin is right, Rosina thinks. She is not the real Rosina. She is someone who needs a home more than she wants to help people. She is not brave. She is not a hero.
She is scared. She is so fucking scared.
AMBER.
Mom’s new boyfriend spent the night again. Amber wakes up to the sound of him pissing in the toilet, which is about a foot away from her head, with only the thin trailer-wall partition between them. The length of time and the heaviness of the stream makes Amber think last night was at least an eight-drink night for each of them. She has this shit down to a science.
She doesn’t take a shower because she doesn’t want to chance seeing him in the hall again wearing only a towel. So far, all he’s done is look, but she knows where those looks lead. He’s no different from the others. A couple of weeks of looks, then a couple of weeks of comments when Mom’s not in earshot, then luckily by then they’re usually gone. But if they last much longer, their comments turn into touches, into grabs. And that’s when Amber starts looking for other places to sleep. It’s hard to say if those other places are much better. But at least they’re her choice.
The suspended girls are back and the school is practically throwing them a parade. But it’s not like anyone in that weird club has done anything besides sit around and talk about how much they’re changing the world, even though nothing’s really changed. They’re all patting themselves on the back for nothing. The only reason they think things are different is because they haven’t been hanging out with the boys. They’re going to be real disappointed when they end their stupid sex strike and find out guys are still assholes.
Except for one. But he’s not at school today. The seat next to Amber in Graphic Design is empty.
She’s supposed to be working on her midterm project, but she’s online looking up Web design classes at Prescott Community College. She always figured she’d start waitressing full-time at Buster’s like Mom as soon as she graduated, but maybe there are other options. Like maybe she could work part-time and get
student loans to pay for college. Maybe she could find a roommate and a cheap apartment. Maybe there are possibilities she hasn’t even thought of yet.
Otis Goldberg told her she was good at computers. She’s better than him even, and he’s one of the smartest kids in school. No one’s ever told Amber she is good at anything, except for the things she’s not exactly proud of being good at.
Amber’s started thinking about other things, too. Like maybe that Chad guy can be the last guy she ever sleeps with on the first date. She thinks maybe she can decide if she likes a guy before she has sex with him, not after.
Sometimes she walks by Otis’s house, just hoping he’ll happen to be in the front yard and she can talk to him outside of school, outside of everybody looking at her the way they do. She wants to know what it feels like to have only him looking at her, as if his look could change her, as if it could tell her who she really is. There must be something like Cinderella’s glass slipper for Amber, something that could transform her in an instant and sweep her away from this life she inherited in a cruel twist of fate—if only she could make it fit. Otis’s desire could save her. His desire could turn her into a princess. All she has to do is be wanted by the prince.
People think Amber’s dumb, but she knows some things about people. Like how they get used to the way people look at them, how someone starts it and then everybody follows, and then before you know it, everybody looks at you that way, including yourself, and no one can remember where it started, and no one cares, and there’s nothing you can do about it.
But then maybe someone looks at you a little different. And maybe you start thinking you can be someone beside who you’ve always been, ever since Uncle Seth started looking at you when you were ten, when his eyes traced your body and told you who you are—not a princess anymore, not someone allowed to dream—when he started to do more than look, and then that’s all anyone ever did, all they ever wanted, and you were branded, like your body was made out of red flashing lights that told everybody the one thing it was good for, and their eyes told you who you are, and their eyes told your story.
But then one day, you stopped to think, What do I want? You stopped to think, Maybe I can tell my own story.
The only reason Otis Goldberg would ever miss school is because he’s sick. He’s that kind of person. So here Amber is now, ringing the doorbell of his house. She’s supposed to be in third period, but who is she kidding? Amber is not the kind of person whose life is going to be changed one way or another by how well she does in Math Fundamentals.
Otis will never know how much he’s done for her, but she can thank him. If he’s sick, she knows she can make him feel better. She knows she can’t do many things, but she can do that.
The door opens and Amber almost screams.
“Oh,” Otis says through cracked, bruised lips. “Hi, Amber.”
One of his eyes is swollen completely shut. He’s holding an ice pack on his side.
“I fell off my bike,” he says. “I’m not very coordinated.”
“I thought you were sick,” Amber manages to say. “I came to see how you were doing.”
It’s hard to tell if he smiles, because his mouth can’t move much. But Amber thinks she sees it in his one good eye, the way it crinkles at the side.
“Do you want to come in?” he says. “I’m watching a documentary about squid.”
His house is nice. It’s like TV-show nice. It’s obvious a real family lives here. Amber sits by Otis on the couch, and he doesn’t even seem to notice that she chose the spot in the middle, right next to him.
“Where are your parents?” she says.
“Both at work,” he says. “It was nice of you to come check on me.”
“I was worried about you.” Amber scoots closer so their legs are touching. She stares at him, waiting for him to meet her eyes so she can give him the look, but his eyes are on the TV.
“I never realized the ocean was so cool,” he says. “My interests have always been with history and current events and figuring out why people do things, but I guess science can be pretty fascinating too.”
“Oh, really?” Amber says. Guys love it when you act interested in what they’re saying.
“Yeah, like this Humboldt squid is supposed to be as smart as a dog. And it doesn’t even have a spine!”
Otis is different, yes. But he is still a boy, and as far as Amber knows, he is a boy who likes girls. He speaks the language of boys. It is a language Amber knows. It is the thing she does well. People act like this is something to be ashamed of. But when you get right down to it, everybody’s playing the same games.
Amber leans over Otis and grabs the remote control from the side table. She presses her breasts against his chest, just briefly, just long enough to make him gasp. She turns the TV off. She places her hand softly on his unbruised cheek. “Does it hurt?” she whispers.
He opens his mouth but no sound comes out. His eyes are wide. He is still trying to figure out what she is doing. Amber thinks he must not be used to girls like her, girls who speak his body’s language, girls who know what he wants.
She leans in closer. She can feel his chest breathing against hers. Amber’s lips are close to his ear, her hand on his knee, his thigh, inside, higher. She knows exactly what boys want. What men want. They have taught her.
“Stop,” he says, springing up so quickly Amber falls backward on the couch. “What are you doing?”
“I like you, Otis,” she says. “Don’t you like me?” She reaches for him but he backs away.
“As a friend,” he says. “I like you as a friend. That’s it.”
“I can be more than a friend.”
“I’m not interested in you that way, Amber.”
“It’s okay, Otis,” Amber says. “It’s not like I need you to call me your girlfriend or anything. We can have fun, that’s all. We can have a good time.”
Otis tries to back away, but his legs knock against the coffee table. He is trapped.
“I’m in love with someone else,” he says. “I don’t want to be with you.”
Amber sees something dark in his eyes. He is looking at her like she never thought he could—with pity.
“Who’s the lucky girl?” she says. She can feel herself harden. She can feel herself turn. She is becoming the other Amber—the bitch, the one everyone hates.
“Erin DeLillo,” he says, with a completely straight face.
“You can’t be serious,” Amber laughs.
“I am very serious.”
“So that’s your thing, then?” she says. “Some guys like big tits, some guys like black girls. I guess your thing is retards.”
“Don’t you dare call her that,” he snaps. “She’s smarter than both of us combined.”
“No, it’s cool. I get it. I’m not your type. You can only get it up for retards.”
“What is wrong with you?” The look on his face reminds Amber who she is, who she’s always been, who she always will be. Amber was wrong about Otis. He’s nothing special. He’s just like the rest of them.
“Leave,” he says. “You need to leave right now.”
She feels a sick satisfaction as she walks away, a comfortable inevitability settling in her stomach. The universe is in order. She knocked him off his pedestal. He’s no prince. He’s no different from the others, the innumerable, uncountable others. He is one more who says “What is wrong with you?” and looks at her with disgust and tells her to leave.
Amber doesn’t bother closing the front door behind her. She keeps walking even though she doesn’t know where she’s going.
Amber can’t believe how stupid she was. How stupid to think things could change, that someone like Otis could like her, that she could ever be friends with those girls, that there was a place for her in their stupid secret club. Fuck Erin for getting the only good guy in the school, and fuck her little weirdo friends. Fuck that Mexican dyke and that fat bitch Grace, who thinks she’s so smart. Fuck Grace for tricking
Amber into coming to that meeting. Fuck those girls for starting this whole thing in the first place.
If things had just stayed the way they were, Amber never would have made a fool of herself with Otis. She wouldn’t have even considered it. She would have just kept doing what she was doing. Maybe it wasn’t perfect, maybe it wasn’t a great life, but at least she didn’t think about it, at least no one told her the lie that she deserved better. Amber never should have been so stupid to believe it.
That’s the worst part. Being tricked into hope, and then having it stolen away.
It’s those girls’ faults. Amber wants them to hurt. She wants them to hurt as much as she does. And she knows just what to do to make them hurt.
GRACE.
Grace barely got any information out of Erin at lunch before the security guard broke them apart. Something about Otis overhearing Spencer and Eric at the Quick Stop. Something about a girl in Fir City who needs their help.
Before Grace knew even that much, when all she had was Erin’s middle-of-the-night text message to go on, she told Mom she needed the car after school because she had to help a friend. It would have been so easy to tell her then, to tell her everything, but that would make Mom complicit. It could ruin her. So Grace looked Mom in the eye and said she couldn’t tell her why she needed the car. She said, “I need you to trust me.”
Mom looked in her eyes for a few moments and then nodded. She didn’t ask any questions. Who knows what was going through her mind, what she thought Grace could be doing. Helping someone move? Driving a friend to a clinic for an abortion? What could possibly be so serious to warrant a secret, but also her permission?
God, Grace prays. Please don’t let me abuse her trust. Please let this be worth it.
It’s the middle of sixth period and Grace can’t sit still. She’s wandering the halls carrying her Spanish class hall pass—a nearly two-foot-long rubber chicken with “El Pase de Pasillo de Señor Barry!” written on it in blue Sharpie.
When she turns the corner into the main hall, she sees two policemen walking through the front door in full cop regalia—bulletproof vests, walkie-talkies, billy clubs, Tasers, guns. Grace watches, frozen, as they enter the main office, then walks quickly to catch up as soon as they’re inside. She leans against the wall next to the open door so she can see the front desk, just barely, without them seeing her.