Page 88 of It's One of Us
“What are you thinking about, Mom?”
Darby drags her attention to Scarlett. Her daughter is watching her, of course she is. She needs direction. She needs guidance. She needs to be told that she is safe, that she is loved.
And Darby’s just been standing here in the middle of the living room staring into space as her conscience wrestles with itself.
“What?”
“You’re lost in thought.”
“Just trying to wrap my head around all of this, sweetie.”
Darby’s phone rings, and they both jolt, nearly hitting heads in their haste to see the caller ID. It is Scarlett’s school. After what she’s just seen online, Darby is not surprised.
“Ms. Flynn? This is Dean Barker. Principal Rutger and I have just come from a conversation with the board, and we think it might be best if you keep Scarlett home for the rest of the week.”
Rage flares, incandescent inside her. “And why is that?”
“Well, Ms. Flynn, with Peyton...this is an awful situation. I’m sure you’ve seen the social media feeds. We are doing everything we can to make sure these aren’t just malicious rumors, but it’s not like we can ask the girls to stop posting. If they’ve experienced these...atrocities, they need a safe space to let out their stories. I’m afraid it’s out of our hands. Now that the police are here talking with the students, it’s become too much of a distraction. Let’s just excuse Scarlett from classes for the rest of the week, and we can reassess on Sunday night. All right?”
No. Not all right.
“Don’t you dare even think you can keep my daughter from school. She has every right to be there. Every right to be treated with dignity and respect. How dare you—”
Scarlett wrestles the phone away and pushes Darby lightly toward the kitchen. She raises the phone to her ear.
“Dean Barker? Keep your damn school. I don’t want to come back.”
She ends the call, smiles weakly at her mother, who feels herself turning various shades of red.
“What have you done? Do you know what it takes for you to go to that place? I’ve been killing myself—”
“That ‘place,’ as you call it, is full of snotty bitches, and I’m bored in my classes. I’m better off getting a GED and doing a year at JuCo, then transferring to a four-year school somewhere. It’s not the right environment for me, and now? My God, Mom. Peyton has been harassing the girls there for years. I can’t go back even if I wanted to.”
Darby feels faint. Quite literally, faint.
“We don’t know—”
“Mom, think. If what they’re saying is true, if Peyton assaulted Chastain, if he even looked sideways at one of the golden girls, then it’s all over for me there. And that’s fine. I hate them. I will not miss anything about that school.”
Scarlett marches to the fridge and pulls out a bottle of water. She offers one to Darby, who accepts gratefully. She is hungry. How is that even possible? Her son might be a murderer, and she’s thinking maybe a BLT will assuage her.
“Apple?” she asks, and Scarlett grabs one, cutting it neatly in half and removing the core, then slicing it into fourths. She takes a slice and hands the rest to Darby. They munch in sync, wash away the sticky sweetness with the water.
“Why didn’t you tell me you were unhappy, Scar?”
“What would you have done? Told me that it’s like that in high school, that friends come and go, that I will find my tribe, that I’m smart and beautiful and none of this matters. All things you as my mother have to say so I don’t lock myself in my room and refuse to ever come out again. Trust me, I’ll be better off somewhere else.”
Scarlett sits across from Darby, a small frown on her lovely face. “It’s time, don’t you think? To meet him?
“Meet who?”
“Park Bender. My donor. Our donor.”
Panic blooms inside of Darby. This is exactly what she’s always tried to avoid. “Oh, Scarlett. There’s time for that when we aren’t in the middle of a huge crisis.”
“But what if there’s not? What if we all have some sort of time bomb inside us that’s going to blow and do horrible things to people?”
Darby gives her a level look. “There’s not a time bomb inside you, honey. And I think Park Bender is having a rather bad day. He may not want company. And his poor wife, she looked terrible.”
