Page 16 of When We Were Reckless
“Summertime Sadness” by Lana Del Rey piped from the surround sound speakers as I stared at the deep blue swimming pool, the morning sun reflecting off the water, the same shade of blue as Jesse’s eyes.
I envisioned a girl floating in the pool. A beauty queen in a red dress, her eyes staring blankly at the night sky, face cast in shadows from a silver moon. Blood trickled from the corner of her mouth.
All around her, a party raged, the music pulsing, bodies gyrating. Nobody noticed that the girl in the swimming pool was dead. Not even the guy with summer sky eyes and disheveled brown hair. He was dancing with a blonde, slow and sensual, his hands skimming over the curves of her body, his perfect lips spewing lies.
“I love you. It’s only ever been you.”
Embracing my dark side, I spun a tale of lethal love. My fingers flew across the keyboard, and words filled up the blank pages as I completely lost myself in the story.
* * *
Later that evening, I pulled over in front of the house next to Evie’s and sent her a text. Then peered through the windshield at her house. What little of it I could see beyond the overgrown bushes and scrubby trees. The paint, once white, was peeling away to expose the gray underneath, the front porch sagging under the weight of an old sofa, the chain-link fence around her property rusting.
I wanted to whisk her away from this world and give her the kind of life she deserved. But Evie was too proud to accept help, and the one time I had offered to give her money, she refused to speak to me for two weeks. She forbade me to tell my parents or anyone else about the way she lived. It was part of our friendship pact, and if I didn’t honor her wish, I’d risk losing Evie’s friendship.
Rock meet hard place.
A few minutes later, she sauntered toward my car in cut-offs and a thin-strapped black tank top. The wedge sandals on her feet accentuated her mile-long legs.
Evie was gorgeous. Hands-down the most beautiful girl I’d ever seen in real life. Waves of raven black hair, olive skin, and jade green eyes slanted like a cat’s. We’d been best friends since sixth grade when she transferred to my middle school. I’d thought she was the coolest girl in the world and made it my mission to befriend her. At first, she’d kept me at arms-length, but as the years went on, she started to trust me enough to let me in, and I’d learned that distancing herself was a self-preservation tactic.
Too many people in Evie’s life had fucked her over and let her down. It took a lot for her to trust someone.
She slid into the passenger seat and heaved a weary sigh as she pulled the door shut. “Don’t drive past the house. My mom might throw shit at your car again.”
Not needing to be told twice and not wanting to deal with her psycho mom’s tantrums, I turned the car around and drove in the opposite direction, avoiding the potholes in the road as I took her away from her shitty run-down house in the shitty run-down neighborhood.
To say that we lived in different worlds was a massive understatement.
Her mom made her life a living hell, so I didn’t get to see her as much as I would like. When Evie wasn’t working, she looked after her baby sister, Wren, who was only two years old. So whenever she got some free time, I wanted to make her life just a little bit better. But I knew her limits, and I could only push them so far.
“We’re going for tacos,” I told her a little while later as we cruised the winding roads with the summer breeze whipping our hair around, music blasting from the speakers. It was the golden hour, the limestone cliffs and rolling green hills bathed in a warm glow. It made me wish I was a cinematographer to capture this on film and use it as a backdrop for our life story.
“And then we’re going to hang out at the pool and do each other’s nails, watch movies and eat ice cream.”
“Sounds like heaven. Have I told you lately that I love you?”
“It’s been a while. I was starting to worry that the honeymoon was over.”
She laughed. “Never. You’re my one true love.” She kicked off her shoes and planted her bare feet on the dash, her right arm hanging out the window to capture the warm breeze. Her toenails were painted black cherry, like her lips.
“So, what’s been going on with you?” she asked. “I feel like we haven’t talked in ages. Tell me everything.”
I’d called Evie after the Jesse incident, but she was dealing with her mom’s junkie boyfriend and trying to keep him away from Wren. So I hadn’t even told her what happened. Evie had real-life problems, the kind of problems I’d never had to deal with. She’d been forced to grow up faster and become tougher than I’d ever had to be.
On the way to the taco place, I filled her in on the Jesse drama. When I finished talking, she smacked my arm.
“Ow. What was that for?”
“What’s wrong with you? Why didn’t you tell me?” She sounded hurt. As if I’d purposefully kept something important from her.
“You were dealing with—”
“I’m always dealing with something, Quinn. But that’s no excuse. You need to tell me shit like that. I’m your best friend.”
“I know you are. That’s why I haven’t told anyone else.”
“Next time something important happens in your life, don’t keep it to yourself.” She chewed on her lip, thinking about the story I’d told her. “What a fucking asshole. How could he say those things to you?”
