Now she looks up. “How…?”
“The Game has been going on for a long time,” I tell her, and she sucks her lower lip into her mouth, chews it like a kid. “Tell me what happened.”
She shrugs. “I heard about the parties back when I was a freshman…”
“What parties?” I ask. She twists the sheets between her hands, and I can see her trying to swallow back the words. “You can trust me,” I say, a little more gently. “Okay? I don’t want to get you in trouble. I want to help.”
I count long seconds. In the quiet, I can hear a distant mechanical beeping.
Finally, Tatum lets out a big breath of air, and I can tell she’s made a decision. “They were supposed to be invite-only,” she says. “Special parties, you know, for the scholarship girls.”
“What about the boys?” I ask. “Were they invited?”
“Just girls,” she says, in a voice so quiet I nearly miss it.
“Who threw the parties? What were they for? Who else was invited?”
I can tell right away I’ve leaned on her too quickly. She clams up. “I don’t want to get anyone in trouble,” she says. Then: “We wanted to go. Nobody made us.”
“Okay. I get it.” I take a deep breath and slowly pull up a chair next to her bed. When she doesn’t react, I take a seat slowly. Now she’s forced to look at me. “Look, Tatum, the truth is that you are in trouble. Right? Isn’t that why you’re here?”
Suddenly, her eyes fill up: she looks so small, drowning in all those white sheets. She whispers something I can’t make out.
I lean forward, holding my breath. “What?” She’s crying now, though, and only hiccups when she tries to speak. “Take a breath, okay?”
“I just wanted a new phone.” Another sob rocks her. “My phone was such crap, but my mom…my mom said I would have to buy it myself…I thought…”
“Tatum.” I place a hand on the bed, wishing I could hug her instead. This poor kid. “Tell me about the parties.”
But suddenly, with a gasp, she goes still. Listening. Then I can hear a chorus of high-pitched voices move toward us from the hall.
“Tatum.” Now I want to reach out and shake her. “Tatum, please.”
It’s too late. The door swings open and I recognize two of the girls who pour into the room, all sunshine and smiles, as Optimum Stars. One of them is Sophie Nantes.
“We brought donuts,” Sophie says, but stops short when she sees me. It’s amazing how someone so pretty can look that ugly in an instant. “What are you doing here?” She whips around to glare at Tatum. “What’s she doing here?”
Tatum swipes her face with her forearm. “She brought flowers,” she says, as if that explains it.
Sophie tosses the bag of donuts on the counter and leans up against it. Even I feel her presence, how it works like an eclipse to stifle all the light. The other girls jostle to be the one to stand next to her.
“She was at the PowerHouse game, too, talking to Monty,” Sophie says, addressing Tatum directly. “I guess your stalker club is growing.”
Tatum looks away. I stand up, happy with this small advantage: I’m a head taller than all of them, and in better clothes. Still, Sophie’s eyes sweep me as if I’m an insect hovering too close to her picnic.
“Tatum and I were just talking about the Game,” I say. My voice sounds overloud. In my head, I could flatten them with it.
Several of the girls look at one another. Not Sophie, though. She’s too good for that.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she says coolly. Then she peels away from the counter and sits on Tatum’s bed, placing a hand gently on the IV coil flowing liquid down into Tatum’s blood.
My mouth goes dry.
“Poor Tatum,” she says, cooing. “You’re crying.”
“I’m fine,” Tatum says mechanically.
Sophie shakes her head. “Aw, honey. You can’t lie to me. I’m your best friend, remember? Tatum’s a terrible liar,” she adds, to me. “It doesn’t stop her from trying, though. She’s, like, pathological.”
She turns back to Tatum. “But we love you, anyway, no matter what.” She leans forward to stage whisper to her. “Even if you’re a slut.”
“Get away from her.” I have to ball my fists to keep them from flying at Sophie’s throat.
Sophie turns to stare at me. “You’re the one who shouldn’t be here.”
“Tatum, please.” I turn back to her, beg her to listen, to look at me. “I can help you. If you’ll tell me the truth…”
“I asked her to leave. I told her I had nothing to say.” Tatum’s hands fumble across the sheets toward Sophie, who leans over to touch her face, releasing her grip on the IV. A shiver travels through Tatum’s whole body, as if Sophie’s touch carries a current.
Even before she begins to scream, I know I’ve lost her.
“Help!” Tatum throws her voice as high as it can go. “Help! Help!”
“Tatum…” I try, one last time, to reach her. But even as I start for the bed, Sophie steps in front of me. For a long moment, her eyes hold me there. And it’s in that moment that I know who this girl is—what she is. She’s their Kaycee.
She smiles. She draws a breath. For a second, she looks as if she might apologize. “Help! Help!” She’s only inches from my face. I can smell coffee on her breath.
Like dolls animated by the sound of her voice, the other girls begin to echo her. “Help! Help! Help!”
I burst through the door. I trip, running down the hall. I push through a swarm of descending nurses, careen off the reception desk and hurtle toward escape.
—
Help.
The word keeps echoing in my head, even when the clinic is far behind me.
The sun is huge, red, terrible: like a mouth opening to swallow the horizon.
A long-haul trucker blowing toward me leans on his horn before I realize I’ve drifted into his lane. I jerk the wheel and slam on the brakes as his horn blast rolls into silence.
I pull over for a bit, just to let my heartbeat catch up.
Help, help, help.
From the bottom of my bag, my phone lets out a few insistent beeps. I’ve missed another call. I thumb over to voicemail with shaking fingers.
Ms. Williams, this is Sheriff Kahn. I was hoping you could stop down at the station today, or give me a ring back. I got a complaint from the night manager over at the U-Pack, says there was some kind of scuffle and you disobeyed his order to stop your vehicle. The pictures of the fence look pretty bad, and he’s got security video, too. I’d like to hear your side of the story.
Chapter Thirty-Six
Condor comes to the door even before I’ve knocked.
“Jesus Christ! Come in, before you beat my door down.”
Maybe I did knock. My knuckles are raw-red and sore. My throat swollen as if I’ve been screaming. My mouth tastes medicinal. Vodka. Or whiskey.
I remember a bar, dimly, but I can’t haul the image into focus.
Hours are dropping away, siphoned into darkness.
I remember seeing two calls from TJ, my dad’s friend. I remember letting my phone ring and ring, letting the sound of it drown beneath the noise of the bar.
“What happened to you?” Condor says.