He emerges from Derek’s room with some blankets and sheets, and trades the bedding for Jess’s phone. “Hi, Mom,” he says. “Yes, she’s here. Yes, everything’s fine. I’ll take her to the train in the morning.”
Back in Justin’s room, Angie perches on the edge of the bed, scrolling through something on her phone. She glances up when Jess returns with the sheets and pockets her phone. “I’ll sleep on the floor,” Angie says. “I’m not supposed to be here, anyway.”
“Don’t be stupid. You’re sleeping on the bed. I’ll sleep on the floor.” Jess pulls off Justin’s quilt and peels off his sheets, dumping them in a pile in the corner. She grabs the clean bottom sheet and shakes it out over the mattress. The fabric flies up, hiding Angie for a moment, and when it floats down she’s holding the other end of it and giving Jess an odd look, almost as if she were embarrassed. “What?” Jess asks.
Angie looks away and tucks in the sheet. “Nothing.”
—
Jess lies on her stomach on Justin’s floor, one blanket beneath her and one on top, reading the Yellow Empress comic. It’s late, but she’s wide-awake and supremely aware of Angie lying in the twin bed right next to her. She tries to focus on the comic instead of on Angie’s breathing. The art is intricate and lush; Erin Mei Tan has drawn every embroidered detail of the empress’s golden robes. It’s the kind of comic that reveals more of itself every time you read it.
Angie rolls to the edge of the bed and hangs her head over the side. “How is it?”
Jess glances up at her. “It’s good. I’ve read them before but it’s cool to see it all collected together. It’s . . . different.”
“What do you mean?”
“It feels bigger than most comics. There’s a big landscape. It’s not just focused on one city, like Gotham, you know? It’s set all over China.”
Angie throws the quilt off and joins Jess on the floor, lying on her stomach on top of the blanket. Jess scoots over to make room, but there isn’t much room to give, so Angie is touching her all along her right side. Angie’s only wearing a white T-shirt borrowed from Justin over her underwear. It’s blue, printed with white bowling pins.
“Go back to the beginning,” Angie says. “I want to read it.”
Jess flips back a few pages and lets Angie read in silence. Jess lies down on her side, pillowing her head on her bent arm. She is still wearing her long-sleeved tee, but she took off her jeans beneath the blanket. She tries not to look at the curve of Angie’s ass, at the way the light turns her bare legs golden.
“Are you staring at my bowling pins?” Angie asks, her gaze still focused on the comic.
Jess flushes. “What? No.”
“Let me under.” Angie wriggles beneath the blanket. “I’m cold.”
Jess doesn’t say a word. She doesn’t move, and she doesn’t breathe as Angie flips through the pages of Yellow Empress. Angie’s legs slide against hers. They’re smooth and soft, and they raise tiny electric shocks all over Jess’s skin.
Angie tucks her hair behind her ear. Her eyes flicker to Jess. “You’re watching me read.”
“No I’m not,” Jess lies.
The desk lamp that Jess angled over the comic book now spotlights Angie, the red highlights in her brown hair, the shine of her lips as she licks them. Her leg moves again, her thigh skimming Jess’s. Skin to skin, they hold still.
This isn’t a mistake, an accidental brushing of hands. This isn’t a tentative flirtation. This is on purpose. Jess feels the decisiveness of Angie’s thigh with every shallow breath and each thudding heartbeat.
Angie leans toward her. At first Jess doesn’t understand. She freezes when Angie’s lips brush against hers. They’re so soft, like nothing else Jess has ever felt. She has never kissed anyone before. She doesn’t know how to do it, how to move her shoulder out of the way between them, how to kiss her back without banging their front teeth together. But Angie does. She presses against Jess, and they’re already lying down so there’s nowhere to go but closer. The floor is a hard plane beneath Jess’s back. It’s a shock to feel Angie’s breasts against her arm, and then against her chest.
Angie doesn’t stop. Her hair hangs down over the two of them in a cascade, blocking out the light and tickling Jess’s cheek. Her mouth is warm and insistent. She tastes like the toothpaste she rubbed over her teeth before they went to bed. Jess hesitantly touches Angie’s back, skimming her fingers across her shoulder blades. Angie trembles, and Jess feels it deep in her bones, an answering shiver as if they were connected by the breath they exchange.
Abruptly, Angie pulls back. The suddenness of it leaves Jess gasping. She blinks, dazed.
“I’m sorry,” Angie mumbles.
“What—”
“I’m sorry.” Angie scrambles away from Jess, the blanket falling off the two of them. She wipes a hand over her eyes, leaving a damp trail on her cheek.
Jess raises herself up on her elbow, her heart hammering. “What’s wrong?”
“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have—I shouldn’t. I’m so sorry.” Angie gets to her feet and climbs back into the twin bed, lying down with her back to Jess.
Jess rises to her knees. The air is cold on her bare legs. “Angie, what’s wrong?”
Angie’s shoulders tremble, but she doesn’t turn around.
“Did I do something? What’s wrong?”
In a broken voice, Angie whispers, “Everything.”
—
Jess lies awake in the dark, her body rigid. She listens to Angie’s irregular breathing and knows that Angie’s not asleep either.
Jess waits until there are no sounds from the common room, until she’s certain that her brother is asleep. Then she quietly peels off the blanket and pulls on her jeans and socks, pocketing her phone. Angie doesn’t say a word as Jess gets up and leaves.
She tiptoes past the couch where Justin is sleeping. She goes into the bathroom and shuts the door, locking it before she feels for the light switch. The fluorescents bathe the room in cold white light. In the mirror she is hollow eyed and startled looking, her mouth a plum-colored slash that doesn’t look like it’s ever kissed anyone.
She backs into the corner, where the door meets the wall. She slides down to the floor, wrapping her arms around her knees. She leans her head against the towel hanging from the towel bar above her. It’s slightly damp. She turns her face into it, grimacing, her body shuddering silently as she cries.
Everything.
Later, she takes out her phone and sets the alarm for five in the morning, making sure it’s set only to vibrate. She pulls the towel down and balls it into a makeshift pillow. She curls up on the cold tile floor and closes her eyes against the fluorescent lights. The bathroom smells faintly of Lysol and toothpaste.
AT FIVE IN THE MORNING JESS WAKES UP TO THE vibration of her phone in her pocket. She blinks in the harsh bathroom light, then gets to her feet. She avoids looking at herself in the mirror. She turns off the light and pads softly across the common room, past her still sleeping brother, and back into his bedroom.
Angie is breathing evenly now. Jess lies down on the floor and pulls the blanket over herself, fully dressed. She closes her eyes and waits until she hears her brother’s alarm go off. Then she gets up, folds the blankets, and carries them out to the common room.
Justin is sitting up on the couch, looking sleepy. “Morning,” he mumbles.
“Hey,” Jess answers. She takes a seat on the other end of the couch, dropping the blankets between them. She checks the time on her phone. “We have to go soon, right?”
He blinks at Jess. “Yeah. Soon.” He points to her phone and adds, “You need to fix your cracked screen. It’s not going to last much longer.”
“Are you going to pay for it?” Jess asks.
He rubs his eyes. “I’ll see if I can find someone who’ll do it for you.”
<
br /> When Angie emerges from his room, she doesn’t look at Jess as she heads to the bathroom. Her hair is mashed down on one side, her face a little puffy. Jess doesn’t know if Justin notices that she and Angie barely talk to each other that morning, but when he leaves them at North Station, he hugs only Jess. “Take care,” he says.
Angie stands to one side awkwardly. “Thanks for letting us stay with you,” she says.
Because of the overnight snow, some of the trains still aren’t running, including the train to West Bedford. Instead, there’s a bus. Jess and Angie climb on board and take two seats beside each other; Angie sits by the window and Jess takes the aisle. Jess puts in her earbuds, but discovers that her phone is dead. She leaves the earbuds in, and Angie says nothing until they’re almost at West Bedford.
“I’ll wait to get out last,” she says.
“Why?”
“So your dad doesn’t see me.”
“Oh. Right.”
When the bus stops outside the train station, Jess gets up, and Angie says, “I’m really sorry.”
Passengers are already pushing their way down the aisle. Their row is up next. Jess sees her dad’s car outside the window in the parking lot. There’s no time for her to respond. She steps into the aisle.
SCHOOL IS CANCELED BECAUSE OF THE SNOW. AT HOME, Jess goes upstairs to her room and plugs in her phone, waiting for it to turn on.
The phone dings as a text comes in. Jess picks it up eagerly, but it’s not from Angie. It’s from Emily.
Somebody posted a video of you from the party. What’s going on?
Jess texts back: What video?
A moment later Emily sends a link to a jerky phone video taken during Margot’s party. Jess sits on the edge of her bed to watch it. It’s startling to see the living room in Marblehead with its white sofa and giant TV. It looks so much more average than Jess remembers. A bunch of people cluster together on the sofa—almost everyone at the party. The sound is tinny, but the person who’s shooting the video says clearly, “Move in closer, Noah.” Margot, who is sitting on one end of the sofa, waves at someone off-screen. Angie walks in front of the camera and perches on the edge of the couch beside Margot. Her arm snakes around Angie’s waist and tugs her closer, and then the phone bounces, and in the background Jess sees herself standing against the wall across the room, watching the people on the couch.
Someone has edited the video. It slows down to linger on Jess. She’s holding a red plastic cup, and her face is flushed, her cheeks almost as red as the cup. She’s scowling at the group on the sofa, eyebrows drawn together in one thick, unattractive line. She takes a slow-motion sip out of the cup, and a dribble of cranberry liquid leaks out over her chin. She doesn’t seem to notice. She stands there like a slob.
And then the speed of the video increases again, and the camera cuts Jess out of the frame as it’s propped up on a table. Ryan emerges from behind the camera. She approaches the group on the sofa, and because there isn’t any room left, she lies down across everyone’s laps, her silver dress bunching up on her thighs. Angie tries to scoot out of the way as Ryan’s bare feet touch her knees. Everyone smiles, though Angie’s smile looks a little forced. Then the video ends and loops back to the beginning.
Below the video, which was posted by someone called lexyling, is a string of comments from people Jess doesn’t know. At least some of them seem to be Peebs.
sarahoy: Azn chick at the back has a hate on for Ryan. You can tell by her eyes.
Jaden34: Who is she???
Calliery: West Bed student. Heard she comes to Brooke for arts exchange program
Jaden34: Why is she at M’s party?
Calliery: She’s friends with M’s gf
sarahoy: Heard from Noah she threatened Ryan.
Calliery: Yep she waved a gun at her!!!
Jaden34: What r the cops doing they need to arrest her
lexyling: U guys don’t know shit
Jaden34: @lexyling why do you know anything?
lexyling: I know Ryan’s family
sarahoy: really???
lexyling: Asian girl totally flipped out at Ryan, threw bottles at her and everything. Ryan was so freaked out!!
janeser: ryan was a bitch
sarahoy: @janeser so disrespectful stfu
Jaden34: So why aren’t the cops arresting her? WTF?
lexyling: They need EVIDENCE not just rumors but I heard they are getting some
Jess’s hand clenches around her phone. The crack lengthens another quarter inch. She keeps reading.
sarahoy: Like what?
lexyling: I can’t say
Jaden34: Bullshit. Tell us
janeser: ur a liar if u don’t tell
lexyling: It’s info that only Ryan’s family knows, I can’t tell, but there is some
Calliery: Who r u @lexyling? I know everyone who was at that party and nobody’s talking. Who r u?
There’s no further response from lexyling. When Jess googles the username, she doesn’t find anything except for the account used to make these comments. There’s no photo attached; only a generic gray person icon. She watches the video again, even though it makes her nauseated to see how ugly she looks. She pauses on her face, examining the sneer on it, the droplets of cranberry juice on her chin like thinned-out blood.
She closes the video and drops her head into her hands, the phone pressed against her temple. She swallows. Her skin is hot, her heart racing.
She calls Emily.
“What’s going on?” Jess demands when Emily answers. “Who are these people and where did they get this video?”
“Are you okay?” Emily asks.
“No! This is fucked up. Who posted the video? Who’s lexyling?”
“I don’t know, but probably Margot or one of her friends under a fake name. She’s used sock puppets before.”
“You think it’s Margot?”
“Maybe.” Emily sounds wary. “Why does it matter? I thought it was all just a bunch of BS.”
“Of course it’s a bunch of BS!” Jess is so agitated she jumps up, but the phone is still plugged in and the cord yanks her back down to the bed. “I just—she’s saying shit about me.”
Emily says tersely, “Welcome to my life. You just have to ride it out.”
“Do you know who the other people are? Sarahoy or this Jaden person?”
“I don’t know. I’m not like an internet detective.”
“Can you find out? I have no idea who any of them are. Don’t you know any of them?”
“I know who janeser is,” Emily admits.
“Who?”
“Me. I’m janeser. I don’t know who the other people are. Probably Brookies.”
Jess’s phone beeps in her ear and she pulls it away to see that Angie is calling. “I have to go,” she says. “Please tell me if you figure out who they are, okay? Especially lexyling.” Jess doesn’t wait for her to answer before switching to Angie’s call. “Angie?”
“What’s going on?” Angie asks immediately. “Courtney texted me a link to some video—”
“Courtney? How did she get this?”
“I don’t know, but I don’t think that’s the main problem here,” Angie says. “I guess you’ve seen it too.”
“Yeah, Emily told me.”
“Well, maybe I should ask Margot—”
“No,” Jess cuts her off. “Don’t ask her anything.”
“Why not? Maybe she knows these commenters and can get them to stop. I don’t like what they’re saying about you.” Angie sounds indignant.
“You don’t like it? How do you think I feel?” Jess snaps.
Angie exhales. “Jess. I’m sorry. Let me help.”
Jess grits her teeth. “No. I’ve got it. I’ll deal with it.” She hangs up before Angie can respond.
/> LIEUTENANT GRIFFIN IS STANDING WITH KIM WATSON IN the hallway outside Studio B at Pearson Brooke. Jess sees him as she comes up the stairs with the other Arts Exchange students. As Kim waves them into the studio, she says, “Jess, hang back for a minute, please.”
Jess shifts her backpack on her shoulder and eyes the detective. “What’s going on?”
Griffin takes a couple of steps toward Jess and extends his hand. “Hello, Jess.”
She looks at his hand for a second, and then reaches out with her own. “Hi,” she says.
“Lieutenant Griffin would like to see some of your Kestrel comics,” Kim explains. “I told him that I wouldn’t show them to him without your permission. Would you be all right with that?” Kim’s face is blandly neutral; she doesn’t even smile encouragingly. “I’ll be with you the whole time,” Kim continues when Jess doesn’t answer. “And if you’re uncomfortable with anything, you can let me know.”
“I thought it would help me get to know you a little better,” Griffin says. “Since you’re a key witness.”
Jess glances behind him down the hallway. “Where’s your partner?” she asks.
“Detective Lieutenant Cardoni had something else to follow up on,” Griffin says.
“I was thinking that we could take your portfolio into the lounge,” Kim says, “so we don’t disturb the other students. It shouldn’t take long—just a few minutes.”
“I guess,” Jess says grudgingly.
“Great,” Griffin says. “I really appreciate it.”
They walk through Studio B and past the other students to the storage room, where Jess takes her portfolio off the shelf and carries it into the lounge. The most recent exhibit has been removed, and the room is now a long blank wall facing the floor-to-ceiling windows. One folding table stands at the far end, and Jess sets her comics down on the beige plastic surface. When she opens the portfolio, the color printouts seem to leap out in screaming contrast.
“Wow, this is cool,” Griffin says, sounding overly enthusiastic.
“I’ll wait over there,” Kim says, pointing to a bench in front of the windows. “Let me know if you need anything.”