Page 25 of What Happened to Lucy Vale

Eight

Rachel

O n Tuesday, Lucy came home flush with excitement, bouncing her backpack on her shoulders as she trotted, breathless, from the bus stop.

Rachel was sitting on the porch, lost in old reporting, trying to get her hands on an image of the mother and daughter who’d come before her.

And then there was Lucy, bounding like a puppy up the newly laid walk, cleaving through the muddle of the past.

“You won’t believe it,” Lucy said, dropping cross-legged next to her backpack and pulling out her laptop. “Admin has gone fascist. All because of a stupid T-shirt.”

“What are you talking about?” Rachel said, setting aside her reading. Still, she felt the Faradays skirting like a black spot at the edges of her vision, calling her attention back to something huge and bright and terrible, something so large it could not be looked at directly. “What T-shirt?”

“Bailey’s T-shirt,” Lucy said. Her face was white with heavy pancake makeup and her eyes lidded with thick, dark eyeliner.

It was Come as You Aren’t Day. The night before, Lucy had spent an hour debating all the things that she wasn’t: an athlete, a cheerleader, a beauty queen, a band geek.

But finally she’d determined to go emo. She still had the wardrobe and makeup, Lucy pointed out. Besides, it would be a kind of trick.

Come as you aren’t anymore , she’d said.

Rachel could hardly stand to see her daughter morph back into the sullen, pale replica who, for two years, had seemed to swallow her daughter whole.

At the same time, Lucy was delighted to wear her old clothes and posture like a costume.

I can’t believe I thought this was actually okay, she said.

I look like a Halloween prank. Rachel had forced a smile that felt more like a grimace. It was still too painful to be funny.

What she wanted to say was, I thought I almost lost you .

“Who’s Bailey again?” Rachel asked, her fingers fidgeting toward her notebook.

Lucy gave her an incredulous look. “Bailey Lawrence? She’s captain of the dance team. As a sophomore. She has like four thousand followers on TikTok.”

“And what was so wrong with her T-shirt?”

“Savannah and Mia wore them too. It was from an old Madonna tour. It said ‘Like a Virgin’ on the front.”

It took Rachel a beat to get it: come as you aren’t, a virgin. She made a face.

“It was a joke,” Lucy said quickly. “Mia’s definitely a virgin.”

“What about Bailey and Savannah?” Rachel asked.

Lucy gave her a stern look. “Mom,” she said. “Don’t slut-shame.”

“I’m not slut-shaming. I’m just asking,” Rachel said. Then: “Why? Are they sluts?”

“They’re legends,” Lucy said. “And their T-shirts were funny . But Admin freaked out. Now they’re saying the whole dance team can’t perform at First Meet. They said team members had violated Woodward’s code of conduct.”

She passed her laptop to Rachel. The student portal now included a two-page bullet point list of student infractions. Rachel scanned them quickly, amused.

“You can’t have gum in class?” she asked.

“You can’t chew gum in class,” Lucy corrected her. She stood up, then leaned over her mother, letting her sleek ponytail swing down over one shoulder. “They’ve gone totally insane. See? No improper use of waste receptacles. What does that even mean?”

“Maybe they’re trying to promote recycling,” Rachel said mildly. Most of the rules didn’t seem that objectionable: no phones in class, no using the bathrooms for selfies, no vulgar language, no bullying. The usual stuff.

“Wait until you see the new dress code,” Lucy said, reaching over her mother’s hand to scroll the keypad. “You’ll lose your shit.”

“Lucy.”

“Sorry,” she said, not sounding sorry at all. “But seriously. Read it.” She nudged the computer screen a little closer on Rachel’s lap.

Rachel quickly scanned the dress code. Shorts, skirts, and dresses must be no more than four inches above the knee. No translucent items of any kind. No slogans promoting violence or sexual activity. No “spaghetti strap” or strapless tank tops. No midriff-bearing shirts. Appropriate undergarments.

“It’s a little extreme,” Rachel admitted. “Especially the part about undergarments.”

“It’s more than extreme.” Lucy yanked back her laptop and glared at the screen with such a punishing intensity that Rachel almost laughed. “It’s completely sexist. These rules only apply to girls .”

Rachel felt a little shock; she hadn’t noticed. “Let me see that,” she said and read the list again more carefully. Lucy was right. Other than the prohibition against graphic T-shirts, the rules only applied to traditionally feminine clothing.

She thought then of something she’d just read about Nina Faraday, a comment from one of the sheriff’s lieutenants who’d defended the investigation of her disappearance against charges of indifference.

Look, as far as we know, Nina’s off somewhere with some secret boyfriend. She wouldn’t be the first.

Rachel wondered what he had meant to say. The first what ? The first girl to go missing because of her bad decisions? The first girl to cause headaches for the sheriff’s department? The first girl who wasn’t worth chasing down?

Rachel handed back the computer, slightly repelled by the idea of Mrs. Steeler-Cox hovering behind the font, keystroking her way into Lucy’s closet and onto her body. Onto her undergarments , even.

Things changed, she thought, and then they didn’t. They moved the way that drowning people tread water: temporarily and without real hope.

“Savannah says we should sue,” Lucy said. “Do you know that Steeler-Cox told Bailey that her leggings were too tight last week? She said that Bailey might give people the wrong idea . That’s sexual harassment.”

“We’re not going to sue,” Rachel said, exasperated. “For God’s sake, Lucy. We moved here for a fresh start. Just ignore it. Wear what you want.”

“Wear what I want,” Lucy repeated slowly. Then: “Are you sure about that?”

Her eyes were bright, sparking with the kind of energy she got when she had landed on a new cause or a new passion. Like miniature police lights were flashing a warning somewhere deep inside her.

Rachel knew then that she’d been somehow outmaneuvered.

“Why?” she asked warily. “What did you have in mind?”