How We Roll

  “Yes,” Quinn said, her voice muffled by the sleeping bag jammed into her face. “You, too.”

  “And you must be Quinn’s dad,” Mrs. D’Arcy said, releasing Quinn and reaching out a hand that looked just like Ivy’s, tan with lots of rings. “Hawahya? I’m Caroline D’Arcy.”

  “Phil McAvoy,” Quinn’s dad said.

  Quinn could tell it was killing him not to say vos noscere.

  “The girls are in the kitchen, Quinn,” Ivy’s mom said. “They’ll be thrilled to see you.”

  Quinn said goodbye to her dad. She carried her backpack and sleeping bag through the hall.

  Ivy, Carmen, and Lissa were gathered at a wooden table in the D’Arcys’ kitchen. They were all wearing pointy yellow hats and digging their fingers into a tube of cookie dough.

  “Quinn!” Lissa said when she saw Quinn standing in the doorway. “You made it!”

  “I made it.”

  “Hey, Quinn,” Carmen said, waggling her cookie-doughed fingers in the air.

  “Hey.”

  “Good,” Ivy said. “You brought a sleeping bag.” She pointed to a door. “You can throw your stuff in the basement.”

  Quinn headed downstairs. The D’Arcys’ basement wasn’t very big—nothing like Paige’s—but it had soft green carpet and movie posters everywhere, which was pretty cool. Quinn dumped her sleeping bag and backpack in the pile of other sleeping bags and backpacks and headed back up.

  “You need a hat,” Ivy said, springing from her chair and grabbing a pointy yellow hat off the counter.

  “I didn’t know it was your birthday,” Quinn said.

  “It’s not.”

  “It’s tradition,” Carmen explained. “We’ve been doing it forevah.”

  And Ivy said, “First one to take off her hat has to do a dare. Last time it was Liss and we made her run around the block naked.”

  “Don’t remind me,” Lissa said. “Some old dude was out walking his dog. His eyes about popped out of his head.”

  “Gross,” Quinn said.

  “Take it from me,” Lissa said. “Keep your hat on.”

  Quinn hooked the elastic strap under her chin and perched the hat on her head. Gently. Ten pieces of wig tape, but still. She wasn’t taking any chances.

  “Cookie dough?” Ivy held up a blob on her finger.

  “Sure.” Quinn helped herself to the blob. She pulled out a chair.

  The four of them ate cookie dough until there was nothing left. They plowed through a bag of Cool Ranch Doritos. They drained a liter of Mountain Dew.

  Then Lissa unzipped her duffel bag. She held up a box with her skinny white arms. “It’s Ouija time.”

  “Oh my gawd, yes,” Ivy said.

  “Let the spirits be moved,” Carmen said.

  Quinn hadn’t seen a Ouija board since fifth grade. She thought maybe this was a joke, but Ivy was actually walking around unplugging the toaster and the coffeemaker to avoid any “electrical disturbances with the spirit realm.” Carmen was pulling incense and votive candles out of a paper bag, lighting them with the same kind of lighter Quinn’s dad had used for their fireplace in Boulder.

  Now, in the 85 percent darkness of Ivy’s kitchen, Quinn watched Lissa place the Ouija board on the table. It looked just the way Quinn remembered. The letters of the alphabet in two arced rows over a straight line of numbers. The words YES and NO in the top corners. GOOD BYE at the bottom.

  “Who should we summon?” Ivy said.

  “Grandma Rosa?” Lissa said.

  Ivy shook her head. “I’m sick of Grandma Rosa. No offense, Carm.”

  “None taken.”

  “She made the best tostones.”

  “I know she did.”

  Quinn had to ask. “What are tostones?”

  “They’re fried plantains,” Carmen explained. “Served with this pickled hot peppah sauce. I could eat some right now.”

  “Me, too,” Ivy said.

  “What about that girl?” Lissa said, laying her fingers on the Ouija board.

  “What girl?”

  “When you guys were in third grade. Before I moved here. That skiing accident. What was her name? Andrea? Angela?”

  “Allison Mercury,” Ivy said.

  “Oh yeah,” Carmen said. “I forgot about Allison Mercury.”

  “How could you forget about Allison Mercury? She’s the reason our mothahs are obsessed with helmets.”

  Quinn, who had been listening in silence, watching the candle flames flicker, had no choice but to ask. “Who’s Allison Mercury?”

  Carmen locked eyes with Quinn across the table. “She was in fourth grade when we were in third. She went skiing at Berkshire East and skied into a tree and hit her head. She was in a coma for three days and then she died.”

  “That’s awful,” Quinn said.

  “I know,” Carmen said. “Her family moved away right aftah.”

  “We should summon her spirit and see how she’s doing,” Lissa said.

  Everyone agreed, and it was decided that Ivy and Carmen should do the summoning because, “back in the day,” Ivy’s cousin Bobby had been friends with Allison’s brother Kai, and because Carmen had gone to Sunday school with Allison at St. Margaret’s.

  They rearranged the seating at the table so that Ivy and Carmen could sit across from each other with their fingers on the board.

  “Allison Mercury,” Ivy said softly. “Are you out there?”

  “Allison Mercury,” Carmen said. Her voice was deep like a preacher’s. “We summon your spirit. Can you hear us?”

  Quinn knew it was silly. She didn’t believe in spirits. She knew that it was Ivy and Carmen who were making the little plastic thingy move toward YES. But there was something about the candles flickering in the dark and the silence of Ivy’s kitchen that made the little hairs on Quinn’s arms stand at attention.

  “We see that you are here, Allison,” Carmen intoned. “We can feel your presence.”

  “Hello, Allison,” Ivy said.

  “Hello, Allison,” Carmen said.

  And Lissa whispered, “Ask her how her head is.”

  Quinn could feel a snort rising in her throat. Then her phone pinged, saving her. She had meant to put it on silent earlier, but while everyone else was silencing their phones she had been adjusting the hat on her head because she felt like the elastic was pulling on some of Guinevere’s hairs. Maybe she was paranoid, but she didn’t want to chance it.

  Her phone pinged again.

  “Whose cell is that?” Carmen looked around the table. “It’s killing the mood.”

  “Sorry,” Quinn murmured. She reached into the pocket of her shirt to pull her phone out.

  Instagram now

  gulls24qb sent you a direct message.

  She tried to press the button to power down, but she wasn’t fast enough.

  “Do you have a direct message from Nick Strout?” Ivy said, grabbing the phone out of Quinn’s hand.

  “Hey.” Quinn reached out to grab it back, but Ivy stood up. Her fingers flew across the screen.

  “‘Largest gathering of people dressed as Mahatma Gandhi. Most live rattlesnakes in your mouth.’ What is this? It sounds kinky.”

  “Give it back,” Quinn said, reaching for the phone again, but Ivy danced away.

  “Are you getting kinky with my ex-boyfriend?”

  The Ouija board was forgotten. Allison Mercury was forgotten. Everyone was staring at Quinn.

  “Let me see that,” Carmen said, and Ivy slid the phone across the table, too fast for Quinn to intercept.

  She knew it wasn’t the same as John Kugler ripping the Colorado Rockies cap off her head and all the eighth-grade boys playing keep-away. She knew it, and yet this felt the same. This felt, just for a moment, like her scalp was shining in the light and everyone was laughing.

  “Give it back!” Quinn said, a lot louder than she’d intended.

  “Sheesh,” Carmen said, handing over the phone. “Take it easy.”

  Q
uinn lowered her voice. “There’s nothing kinky about those messages. It’s just this stupid thing we were doing. Sending Guinness World Records back and forth.”

  “Why?” Carmen said.

  “I don’t know. We were bored in study hall one day.” Quinn glanced at Ivy. She had that look on her face again, like she’d sucked on a lemon.

  “Did I do something wrong?”

  Ivy shrugged. “What would you have done wrong?”

  “Do you not want me hanging out with Nick in study hall?”

  “You can hang out with anyone you want,” Ivy said. “It’s a free country.”

  Quinn was getting a pit in her stomach. She didn’t like the edge in Ivy’s voice. Apparently no one did, because Carmen blurted out, “Study hall’s the worst.”

  And Lissa said, “The worst.”

  “It’s not like anyone actually studies,” Carmen said. “So what’s the point?”

  “There is no point,” Lissa said.

  Quinn slipped her phone back in her pocket.

  “Hey, Ive,” Carmen said. “What time is it?”

  Ivy held up a candle so she could read the clock on the wall. “Eight thirty-seven.”

  “How long until your parents go to bed?” Lissa said.

  “I don’t know. Two hours?”

  “Two hours?” Carmen groaned. “How are we going to kill two hours?”

  “We could watch a movie,” Ivy said.

  “Oooh, yes,” Lissa said.

  “Only if it’s something good,” Carmen said. “Not like that You’re So Cupid crap we watched last time. Have you seen that one, Quinn?”

  Quinn shook her head.

  “You dodged a bullet.”

  “We should watch something scary so we don’t fall asleep,” Lissa said. “Cabin in the Woods?”

  “That wasn’t scary,” Carmen said.

  “Scream?”

  “Nah.”

  “You guys want scary?” Quinn said. Now that the tension had lifted, she felt better. “Have you ever heard of The Blair Witch Project?”

  *   *   *

  Two hours later, they were sneaking through the woods behind Ivy’s house, following the light from Ivy’s phone.

  “I can’t believe you made us watch that movie, Quinn,” Lissa said, clutching Quinn’s hand.

  “‘I’m scared to close my eyes,’” Quinn said, in her best Heather Donahue voice. And Carmen said, “‘I’m scared to open them.’”

  “It is literally pitch-black out here,” Lissa said. “Whose idea was it to walk through the woods anyway?”

  “Ivy’s,” Carmen said.

  “We’ll never make it out alive,” Lissa said.

  “Trust me,” Ivy said. “It’s a shortcut.”

  They crossed through some backyards and dashed down a few side streets before they turned a corner and Ivy said, “See? We’re already here.”

  Jason Osternek’s house was lit up like a cruise ship. Cars were parked all along the street. People were standing out on the lawn. A few were smoking cigarettes.

  “What about our hats?” Lissa said.

  “What about our hats?” Ivy said.

  “Are we still wearing them?”

  “Of course we’re still wearing them. It’s tradition.”

  “Tradition’s tradition,” Carmen said.

  “Right.” Lissa nodded. She checked her hat.

  Ivy and Carmen checked their hats. Quinn pretended to check her hat, but really she was checking Guinevere.

  “Who wants gloss?” Carmen said. She unzipped her purse under the streetlight. “I’ve got options.”

  They took a few minutes to gloss up. They checked each other’s teeth. Lissa passed out Tic Tacs.

  “All right, girls,” Ivy said finally. “Enough stalling.”

  “Let’s do this thing,” Carmen said.

  They crossed the road and walked up the sidewalk. Standing on the porch, watching Ivy ring the doorbell, Quinn suddenly felt like a trick-or-treater. When the door flew open, she had the crazy urge to laugh.

  “Nice hats!” yelled the boy who was standing in the foyer. He had a scruffy chin and a gold chain around his neck. He looked old enough to be in college.

  “Thanks!” Ivy yelled back.

  The music was so loud. Rap, not Quinn’s favorite. She could feel the bass thumping in her stomach.

  “Beer’s in the basement!” Scruffy Chin yelled. He handed Ivy four red plastic cups.

  “Thanks!” Ivy yelled again.

  She led the way down the hall, but instead of heading down to the basement, she pulled everyone into a bathroom and shut the door behind them.

  “Beer?” Lissa said. The music was muffled now, so they didn’t have to yell to be heard.

  “Of course beer,” Ivy said. “It’s a high school party.”

  “We’re not going to drink it, are we?”

  “Of course not. We’re fourteen.”

  Ivy unzipped her shoulder bag. “I’ve got OJ, apple, cran-raspberry, and passion fruit.”

  They poured juice into their cups.

  “If you need a refill,” Ivy said, “just tell me and we’ll meet back here. No one will bug you if your cup is full.”

  “Even if it’s not beer?” Lissa said.

  “Just tell them you’re drinking a cocktail,” Ivy said. “Now listen. I know from my cousin Bobby, crazy shiz happens at high school parties. We are not here to do crazy shiz. Repeat after me: we are not here to do crazy shiz.”

  “We are not here to do crazy shiz.”

  “Right,” Ivy said. “We are here to observe the crazy shiz, so when we’re seniors we know what to do.”

  “Can we flirt with cute boys?” Carmen said.

  “Flirting is encouraged,” Ivy said.

  “Can we kiss them?” Lissa said.

  “If the opportunity presents,” Ivy said, “yes.”

  Everyone looked at Quinn.

  “Why are you looking at me?”

  “Two words.” Carmen waggled her eyebrows. “Tommy and Strout.”

  Before Quinn could protest, Ivy opened the bathroom door. Eminem blared. A river of bodies engulfed them.

  Ivy and Carmen and Lissa and Quinn followed the current down to the basement. It wasn’t deafening down there, but the music was still loud enough for people to be dancing—if you could call it dancing. Mostly what they were doing was grinding on each other while holding their red plastic cups in the air. A few girls were lounging on a couch. There was a keg of beer in one corner with a bunch of boys standing around it. Quinn didn’t see Tommy or Nick anywhere.

  “Oh my gawd!” said one of the couch loungers, waving her red plastic cup. “There are children here.”

  And her friend, a girl with streaky blond hair, said, “When’s pin the tail on the donkey? When are the sack races?”

  “Where’s the balloon man?”

  “Where are the cupcakes?”

  They were cracking themselves up.

  “I’m rethinking the hats,” Ivy murmured.

  “Thank you,” Lissa murmured back. “Can we take them off now?”

  “In a sec. Keep walking.”

  They followed Ivy to an empty patch of wall.

  “Just to be clear,” Carmen said, “I won’t have to do a dare if I take this off?”

  “No one will have to do a dare,” Ivy said. “We’ll take them off at the same time. One … two … three.”

  Ivy, Carmen, and Lissa removed their hats. Quinn took a sip of juice.

  Everyone looked at her.

  “You’re keeping it on?” Ivy said.

  “Yeah,” Quinn said.

  “Why?”

  Quinn shrugged. “I like it.”

  The truth was, she felt like an idiot and the elastic was digging into her chin, but there was no way she was taking this pointy yellow hat off in the middle of all these people. She could just picture it, Guinevere getting caught on a staple, veering off to the side like a skidding car.


  “I respect that,” Carmen said.

  They stood against the wall, sipping their juice. Over by the keg, some guy was standing on his hands, drinking beer out of the hose.

  Ivy nudged Quinn’s arm. “Did you ever see a party like this?”

  “Only on TV.”

  The last party Quinn had gone to was that One Stupid Night, when she’d been wearing an equally strange hat that Ethan Hess had ripped off her head in front of everyone. But Quinn didn’t want to think about that right now, and luckily she didn’t have to because her phone was vibrating in her pocket.

  How are you, honey? Are you having a good time at your sleepover? xoxo, Mom

  Quinn felt a twinge of guilt as she texted back. Having a gr8 time. Thx. Will c u tmrw.

  “Cute hat.”

  Quinn looked up from her phone, and bam, there was Tommy Strout, holding his red plastic cup.

  “Hi,” she said.

  “Hi.” Tommy’s hair was dark and damp. His eyelashes were ridiculous. His smile was slow and beautiful. “Nick told me you might be coming tonight. I’m glad you made it.”

  “You are?” she said.

  “I am.”

  Quinn could smell the beer on his breath, but she didn’t mind. Tommy Strout was a perfect specimen of high school boy. If Quinn were a perfect specimen of high school girl, she might reach out and grab his face right now, pull it toward her, and kiss him on the mouth. But she wasn’t. Quinn was nowhere near perfect. Nothing she was wearing—not the hat, not the wig, not the lip gloss, not the tight white shirt Ivy had lent her for tonight—felt like her. Quinn wondered what Tommy would do if she took off her “cute hat” right now and Guinevere came with it. She bet it would knock the smile right off his face.

  Quinn glanced around the basement for Ivy and Carmen and Lissa. She didn’t see any of them.

  “Looking for Nick?” Tommy said.

  “Yeah,” Quinn said. Even though she hadn’t been looking for him, the thought of seeing Nick made Quinn breathe easier. If anyone would be less comfortable than she was right now, it would be him.

  “He’s not here,” Tommy said.

  “He’s not?”

  Tommy shook his head. “But we live two streets over. Fifty-Four Chestnut. The front door’s unlocked if you want to go say hi.”

  “Really?”

  “Sure.”

  “What about your parents?”

  “They go to bed early. Nick’s in the den. First room on the left when you walk in.”