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“You should be, Jessica.” She closed the magazine and looked up at me. “I told her how excited I was that you and Liam were dating. She looked at me like I was an idiot—and then I mentioned prom. Do you know what she did then?”

I shook my head.

“She laughed.”

“Oh, Mom?—”

“How could you lie to me like that, Jessica? To my face? And after I helped you with your dress and everything? Do I deserve that?” Now that she was looking at me, I could see that she’d been crying.

“Mom,” I sank down on the carpet. “I’m so sorry.”

“How can I ever believe anything you tell me again?”

“You can mom. You can. I’m a good kid, really.”

“I want to believe that, but how can I?” She was holding back tears. “Why, Jessica? Why would you lie to me?”

I crawled closer to her, placatingly. I hated sad-mom so much worse than angry-mom. Angry-mom you could just get angry back at, sad-mom made you wish that you had died. “I was afraid you wouldn’t let me go otherwise.”

“Who’d you wind up going with?”

“The boy who picked me up.”

“So he lied to me too?”

“Because I told him to. It was all me.”

There were still tears swimming in her eyes at my betrayal. “Why? You’ve got two more years to go, Jessica. Why this year? What was so important?” Unsaid:That it was more important than being truthful with me?

My heart crumbled. “I just—I just—” I said, unable to honestly explain. “I had to be there. I didn’t want to miss anything.” It was just as true as it sounded bad.

She bent over and started sobbing.

“Oh, Momma,” I said, trying to get under her to see her face, putting my head down on her knee. “I’m so sorry, Momma—I didn’t mean to—I just—I’m so so sorry.”

“I just don’t know what to do with you sometimes, sweetheart,” she said, her voice cracking. That she still somehow loved me, kept making it worse. “You’re so smart. I know that. And then you go and do something so dumb.” She gathered herself for a moment, then started brushing the hair back from my face with her hand, and I could smell the nicotine on her fingers. “That boy—are you still seeing him?”

“No. He just wanted to have a prom date was all. We’re just friends. Like I’m just friends with Liam, too.”

“I suppose that’s for the best,” she said in a far-away voice, wavering with her disappointment in me.

I grabbed hold of her knees in an awkward hug, clinging. Everything’d been so hard since the night of that party. I’d been freaking hit by lightning two weeks ago! And ever since then I’d had to lie and spin—I’d killed a dog and kissed Darius—and seen all those pictures—and then this weekend’s worth of whore-slut-texts and getting hit in the halls, and what’d happened to my poor old backpack—the amount of shit I’d had to put up with,literally—I knew Lacey had it harder, but that didn’t stop me from hurting too. I finally let it all go, sobbing helplessly into my mother’s lap.

“Oh, baby. I know. I remember.” She pet my hair back as I blubbered on her knees until I reached the end of it. “It’s so hard your age. All the hormones and everything seems like it’s so important—but the truth is, it’s not, baby, it just seems that way.”

And that was where she was wrong. It was important. It had to be or all of this was for nothing. I lifted my head up and wiped my eyes. “I know,” I said agreeing, well aware I was lying to my mother all over again. I sniffled, half-real, and half-for-dramatic effect. “Momma, what now?”

She contemplated me and I could see myself so clearly in her face. “Well, now I know two things. That Sasha Lewis is a bitch, and that Liam made the biggest mistake of his life, not asking you to prom. And also that you’re now grounded forever.” She pointed at the fridge. “Go get me another beer, and then get to your room and do homework or something, okay?”

I nodded, hang-dog, and went to retrieve another can.

When Allie came home she knew something was up, from the way the residual tension in the living room mixed with the ambient tears. She veered from needing too much attention, proof that life was going on and that things would be okay, to needing too little, as if understanding that bouncing on the fragile truce my mother and I now shared might break it.

I hid in my room for most of the evening, minus Allie’s interruptions and when she brought me a PB&J, until I heard a knock at 6:30.

“I’m going now,” my mother said, as she came inside. “I told Allie to keep an eye on you.”

“Awesome.” That’d mean being subjected to an evening of my sister’s demands.