Page 27

She hardly heard the knock at the front door. She had one fleeting hope that Zack had come to apologize before she opened the door and Oliver Burns stood there.

“Hey, I thought I saw people coming in and out.”

Jodi nodded and crossed her arms over her stomach. “Yeah, I’m just grabbing a few things. What’s up?”

Oliver’s eyes flitted over her face, taking in her red skin and puffy eyes. When he didn’t ask, Jodi felt such gratitude. Zack would have asked. Zack wouldn’t have let it go.

“So, I got a call from Calloway this morning. I guess somebody broke into the shop and opened a bunch of paint cans?” he said. Jodi felt her chest relax. “She says it doesn’t look like they fucked up anything, but she wants us to go check it out.”

“That was me,” she sighed. “I went in there during the dance and worked.”

Oliver’s brows shot up. “Oookay. Did you… It’s kind of a mess, Jodi—”

“Yeah, I’m sorry. I had to leave quickly.” She looked away from him. “I can go in today and close the paint, salvage what I can of the brushes.”

He nodded slowly, looking her over.

Don’t ask. Don’t ask.

“Cool.” He shrugged. “Do you want a ride over there?”

Jodi thought about the fifty other screenshots on the flash drive. The amount of people she wanted to ignore right now, and the weight of the decisions she had to make.

“That would be great.”

She changed into some old paint clothes and met Oliver out at the curb. His beat-up car chugged them toward school as they sat in silence. When she got into the lab and saw the footprints in paint, the spray of gray over the tables, the ecstasy of last night washed over her again, followed by the devastation. Her heels still lay under one of the tables.

Oliver didn’t say a word as they capped the paint cans, scrubbed out the brushes, and took rags to the walls and tables that had gotten messy with Jodi and Julian’s paint fight. He didn’t ask what kind of mess this was or why she left it.

After half an hour had passed, she looked up from the lab table and watched Oliver’s back as he stood at the sink.

“Did I Thrash you freshman year?”

He continued like he hadn’t heard her. Then his voice lilted to her. “I thought you didn’t believe in that word.”

“You told the investigators that you were Thrashed. They told me the examples you gave them, like Paige’s hair at homecoming and Lucy’s pool party—”

“Oh, that was nice of them.”

“Did Julian and Zack say something to you?”

“They didn’t have to. It’s always the lack of attention with people like them.” He turned off the water and grabbed a towel to squeeze the brushes dry. “I believe you when you say that Zack has no idea what’s going on… ever. But it was pretty clear after Halloween freshman year that I was no longer welcome.”

Jodi’s brows furrowed. “Halloween?”

He looked up at her. “You don’t remember?”

She searched her memory. It was a party at a bowling alley. It was actually Jodi’s idea. They’d gone as the Ninja Turtles—the girls in spandex, Zack in a green suit, and Julian as a side character Jodi had never heard of. It was probably Jodi’s favorite Halloween since high school started. There were about twenty other kids from school there.

“Were you not invited?” Jodi asked hesitantly.

Oliver’s lips curved into a cruel smile. “I was. I was there. There were six to a lane, and I joined yours. And when I came back from the bathroom, the game had started, and there were only five names on the screen. The Thrashers only.”

Jodi’s heart pounded in her throat, choking her. “Oliver…”

“And you don’t even remember me being there, Jodi. So there’s your answer.”

She wanted to fight the idea that she was to blame. She wanted to ask if he made an effort to say hi. She wanted to blame him for not speaking up about it. But she bit her tongue and accepted the hit.

“I was really distracted that night. And I didn’t think about you. I’m sorry.”

Oliver chuckled. “Well, don’t apologize three years later. And you weren’t distracted. You were pretty focused on Zack—on how to be special to him. You’ve always had your focus there.”

She nodded, swallowing back tears. “Yeah. Yeah, that’s always been the case.”

“It’s whatever. In the past.” He dropped the clean brushes back into the brush jar. “We’re friends now.”

She felt her chest warm, hearing him acknowledge it. Jodi grabbed her forgotten shoes from last night and fiddled with the buckle as she tried to form the question she wanted to ask.

“I know things now,” she said softly, thinking about Zack, about Julian. “Things I didn’t know before, when I was questioned.”

She checked in with him. He tilted his head at her, and his magenta hair fell into his eyes. He shook it back with a flick and sighed.

“Well, you can stay quiet, like a good little Thrasher. You aren’t fighting for your own innocence, so it’s not like you have a reason to trade information.”

Hearing him say it was like a warm breeze washing over her. I could .

“Or,” she prompted.

“ Or…” He smiled at his shoes.

She took a deep breath, thinking it over. Sending Zack to jail. Giving Julian up to the investigators.

“What do you know about Reagan seeing Lucy throw the bottle?” she asked.

“I think it’s bullshit. But she does live on the street where it happened, so… I dunno.”

Jodi picked at one of her cuticles and said, “Someone told me Emily was obsessed with me at the end. That it wasn’t about Zack anymore.”

“Ohhhh yeah.” Oliver laughed, grabbing his keys. “That’s definitely true.”

She stared after him as he headed toward the exit. “How… Why? I don’t get it.”

He pushed open the door and stopped to wait for her. “That’s your problem, Jodi. You’ve always thought there’s someone more special, more deserving. Zack Thrasher’s life, his comfort, his happiness—it’s always been more important to you than anyone else’s.”

She followed him out and let her mind race as she sat in his car. He pulled out of the parking lot, and just as he flicked his blinker to turn left, she said, “Can you take me to Zack’s house?”

Charity Thrasher let her in with a curious expression, explaining that Zack was probably still asleep.

“That’s fine. Can I just hang out by the pool?”

She took one look at Jodi’s paint-smeared sweats, oversize T-shirt, and determined face, and sent her outside with a smile. Jodi watched the water move in the pool, focusing on what she’d come to say. Ten minutes later, when the back door slid open and Zack’s tousled head appeared, he nodded to the pool house and followed her inside.

He looked like shit. Surprisingly. Dark circles under his eyes and puffy skin. She wondered if he’d drunk himself into a coma on her account.

She didn’t sit on the comfortable couches that had been a second bed to her for all these years. She stood in the center of the room and watched him cross his arms in front of his chest.

“You told me,” she said, “on the night you were arrested. You told me you didn’t do it.”

His eyes flicked away.

“You cried. I held you as you cried, because you were innocent, because you were afraid.”

“I am innocent,” he said, gaze snapping back. “I didn’t rape her. We had sex—or started to—” Jodi swallowed thickly. “And it was consensual. I don’t deserve to go to jail for it.”

She cleared her throat. “You can’t pretend you didn’t know it wasn’t legal, Zack.”

“Oh, and we don’t do anything illegal, you and me, right?” His voice was crisp and direct. His eyes narrowed. “McKinley Park after curfew. Driving without a license?”

“Are you really turning the things I do for you—for you —back on me? Driving drunk is also illegal, but I didn’t see you volunteering to stay sober—”

“Whatever.” He waved his hand, like she was a buzzing fly. “What do you want?”

The dismissal was like an arrow to her chest.

“I’d like Emily Mills to still be alive,” she snapped. “Can you do that? I’d like not to be dragged into a courtroom to testify against everyone I love. I’d really like to have the three thousand dollars I spent on a lawyer for all this back—”

“What the fuck, Jodi? Like—Jesus.” His hand raked through his hair. “If you want money, I can give you money.”

She flinched, like he’d slapped her. His expression was irritated, quizzical. She waited for him to realize what he’d said, what he’d ignored, but it never happened.

She inhaled deeply, pulling her thoughts together.

“I came over to give us a chance to talk about this. But I don’t think we’re ready. So I’m giving you a heads-up that I’m not lying anymore—about anything . If I’m asked about this under oath, I’m telling the truth.”

His eyes widened as she moved toward the door, pacing around him.

“Are you serious? You really think I should go to jail for—”

Jodi spun back to him. “Why did you sleep with her?” she yelled. “Zack, did you like her?”

“No! I mean, she was fine. I never hated her like you all did.”

“But did you have feelings for her?”

His fingers scraped down his face. “No.”

“Then why?”

“She was there! She was there, in front of me, offering, okay? I’m not proud of it, obviously, but she was there and she was listening to me and she was…” He sighed. “She was really seeing me, okay?”

“I’ve been there,” Jodi whispered. “I’ve been listening. I’ve been seeing you for ten years , Zack. Don’t pretend you don’t know!”

He blinked at her.

“Don’t pretend you haven’t loved it—the knowledge that you can have any of us.”

He swallowed. “What are you…”

“She was there? That’s such bullshit. You had the upper hand with Emily, and you know it. I would have given anything for you to look at me—to listen to me, to see me—and think, ‘she’s here.’ I’ve been here .”

He looked out the window at the pool, and she saw his eyes moving quickly, calculating. Her own were overflowing.

“But instead, you chose to take your clothes off with someone who you barely knew. So clearly, she was giving you something I haven’t been. Clearly, you were attracted to her, or enchanted by her, or fucking something, Zack. Because she wasn’t just there. ”

The tip of his nose was red as he sniffed. “I liked being liked by her. That’s all.” He turned to Jodi. “And maybe I did know about you. About how you felt. I don’t think I really knew how I felt until I lost you.”

She rolled her eyes at his garbage clichés. “Lost me? When?”

His jaw clenched. “How long has this thing been going on with Julian?”

Breath puffed out of her in a laugh. “Like, twenty-four hours, okay? So, relax.” She shook her head. “You didn’t come after me, Zack. I—I walked home last night. And this morning, Julian was the first person on my doorstep.” His eyes narrowed, but she continued, “But even before that. You haven’t been putting me first for a long time. Probably since, like second grade, to be honest. But I’ve been putting you first every second of every day since then. I don’t want to have pieces of a person.”

“Julian isn’t the type of person to put you first, either,” he snarled.

“Yeah, but I didn’t ask him to. Like I said: twenty-four hours.”

Zack stepped forward, grabbing her hands. Jodi looked down at them.

“I can try. I can be better at putting you first,” he said. She watched him swallow, watched his eyes flicker between hers. “We could try… to be something new, too.”

Jodi stepped back. Her stomach was roiling. “This timing sucks, Zack. You didn’t feel any of this before your best friend kissed me.”

“But maybe I did!” He gripped her hands tighter. “Maybe I just didn’t want to fuck it up—”

“No.” She watched his brows furrow. “No, thank you. If that were true, I think you wouldn’t have slept with Lucy sophomore year, you wouldn’t have hooked up with that German girl last summer, you wouldn’t have pursued Kiera or any of the others. I think… I just told you I wasn’t going to lie for you anymore, and you decided you had feelings for me—”

“That’s not what I’m doing. I promise you, Jo. I… If you don’t think we should try now, then that’s fine.”

She pressed her lips together, not bothering to correct his assumption that “no” meant “not now.”

“Zack, I don’t want you to go to jail. But I’m not perjuring myself, or whatever, if they ask me something under oath. Not for anyone.” She watched his jaw click. “The Millses are actually really nice. You should consider telling the truth and letting them forgive you.”

His mind was running as she stepped around him and headed out of the pool house. His footsteps followed her solemnly as she walked straight into the Thrasher house, turned right at the doorway, and knocked on the office she’d so rarely been inside.

“What are you doing?” Zack said behind her, as his father asked, “Yes?”

Jodi turned to look at Zack. His eyes were wide and scared.

“I told you,” she said, “I’m telling the truth now.”

Zack reached for her as she pushed open the door and greeted Greg.

“I have information for Zack’s lawyer. For everyone’s lawyer, actually,” she said. “How should I get that to them?”

Greg clicked his pen and set it down. “What kind of information?”

“The journal the police have is a fake. And I can prove it.”

His brows lifted up to his hairline. She knew if she turned, she’d find Zack’s doing the same.

“How’s that?” Greg prompted.

“Well, I know for a fact that the glass bottle incident didn’t happen to Emily.”

“How?”

Her knees wobbled, but she stood her ground.

“Because it happened to me.”