Chapter 15: Hannah Doesn’t Know

Eliana was doing her science homework on Wednesday night when the group chat lit up.

There was a gap. Eliana watched the screen.

Then nothing from Tessa.

Eliana’s phone buzzed again, but this time it was a private message.

Eliana almost smiled. She went back to the group chat and scrolled up to the first message.

Pool heater is ON.

She read it three times.

The last time she had been in that pool, she had only put her feet in. Before that, the last time she had been in any water past her ankles, the school had been on fire, and something made of flame had been tearing the surface apart in white lines while she and Lexie kicked for the shallow end.

She looked at her science homework. She had been in the middle of a problem about oxidation. Of course she had.

She typed with her thumbs.

She hit send, put the phone face down on her desk, and finished the problem. Then she did the next one. Then she sat there for a while with her pen in her hand, clicking the cap, and didn’t do the one after that.

Lexie had eaten lunch in the yearbook room every day for a week and a half, and Mika had stopped pretending it was a coincidence.

Today Mika came in late, flushed and grinning, with her camera bag bouncing against her hip. She dropped into the chair across from Lexie so hard it rolled back a foot.

“Guess who just got hired,” Mika said.

“Hired for what?”

“Vivian.” Mika put both hands flat on the table. “Vivian came up to me after third period and asked if I would shoot Melanie’s Halloween party for the account. Like, the clique account. With the eleven thousand followers.” She took a breath. “She’s paying me eighty dollars, Lexie. Eighty. For a party.”

“Damn,” Lexie said. “Eighty bucks to take pictures of Melanie’s pool. Get that bag.”

“It’s awesome!” Mika pulled her camera out of the bag and held it up like a trophy. “It’s a pool party. Saturday. Everyone’s going to be in costume, and Melanie’s backyard has those lights in the trees, and Vivian said the heater makes the water steam at night, which, from a lighting perspective…” She made a sound like a small explosion. “You’re coming.”

“No.”

“You’re coming.”

“It’s a clique party, Mika.”

“So?”

“So I’d rather eat glass.”

“You can eat glass at the party. I’ll take a picture.” Mika leaned forward. “Please. I can’t go alone. I don’t know any of those people except Vivian, and Vivian only knows me as the girl with the good camera. I need someone to stand in the corner and glare at everybody. That’s, like, your best skill.”

“It’s not a skill.”

“It’s a gift.”

Lexie picked at the edge of her sandwich. She was about to say no again, and it would have been easy, except she was already doing the math.

A pool. A crowd. Music, loud enough to dance to, probably all bass. Saturday night, after dark.

She thought about the basement. About the boy in the denim jacket walking toward the cables with his hand coming up. About what louder means further actually meant, when you were standing in the middle of it.

And Eliana would be there. In the water, probably, if that was what clique girls did at pool parties.

Eliana, who had told her, in civics, with her voice cracking, that some people spent their whole lives keeping everybody else safe.

“Lexie?”

Lexie looked up. Mika was watching her with her head tilted, not quite smiling anymore.

“Fine,” Lexie said.

Mika lit up. “Really?”

“Fine. But I’m not dressing up.”

“It’s a costume party.”

“I’ll be a punk.”

“You’re always a punk.”

“Then it’ll be really convincing.”

Mika laughed and pointed her camera at Lexie, and the shutter clicked before she could cover her face.

“Yearbook candid,” Mika said. “I’m calling it ‘Lexie, against her will.’”

On Thursday, Ms. Johnson moved them on to serving. Eliana and Lisa ended up at the same end of the court again, which nobody had planned, and which neither of them complained about.

Lisa’s serve went into the net. Eliana’s went over it, barely, and bounced off the back wall.

“Progress,” Lisa said.

“That was luck.”

“Luck is just progress you didn’t earn.” Lisa picked up another ball and turned it over in her hands without serving it. “So. Melanie’s party.”

Eliana looked at her. “How do you know about Melanie’s party?”

“Everyone knows about Melanie’s party. Ajax wants to crash it.” Lisa tossed the ball from hand to hand. “I told him he has a bio test on Monday. He told me that’s what Sunday is for. We’ll see who wins.”

“You’re not going?”

“It’s not really my crowd.” Lisa shrugged, like it didn’t bother her. Then she stopped tossing the ball. “It’s a pool party, right?”

“Yeah.”

“Halloween. At night. In the pool.”

“Yeah.”

Lisa was quiet for a second. Across the gym, Ms. Johnson blew the whistle at someone who had thrown a ball at someone else.

“Last time you were in a pool,” Lisa said, “the school was on fire.”

She didn’t say it like a joke. She said it the way she’d said I didn’t bring a camera, low, so only Eliana could hear.

Eliana didn’t know what to say to that. Everyone at school had heard her story by now. I got turned around in the smoke and ended up in the pool. People had made jokes about it. Tessa had told it at lunch like it was an adventure.

Nobody had asked if she was okay going back in the water.

Lisa had.

“Be careful,” Lisa said. “Okay?”

“Okay.”

“I mean it.”

“I know you do.” Eliana looked at the ball in her hands. “I will.”

Lisa held her eyes a moment longer. Then she nodded, once, and served. It went straight into the net again.

“Progress,” Eliana said.

Lisa laughed, and the whistle went, and they switched sides.

Emily caught up with Eliana outside the gym after PE, her hair still damp from the locker room and her bag bumping against her hip.

“Okay, I have to know,” Emily said. “What’s the duo costume? Hannah’s being so secretive.”

“We haven’t totally decided yet.”

Emily blinked. “Wait, really? Hannah said in the chat you already had one.”

“We have an idea,” Eliana said quickly. “We just haven’t, like, bought anything.”

“Oh! But I thought you already got yours.” Emily looked confused. “I saw you at the Halloween store on Monday night. The big one by the plaza. You were trying on, like, ten wigs. I almost came over to say hi, but you looked like you were having so much fun, I didn’t want to interrupt.”

Eliana slowed down.

“Monday night?”

“Mm-hm. You did a pink one, and a black one with bangs, and this long silver one that looked really good on you.” Emily laughed. “You kept looking at yourself in the mirror like you were checking yourself out.”

Eliana had been home on Monday night. She was nearly sure of it. She had been doing her homework, and then she had been lying on her bed with her phone, not texting anyone.

She would never in her life have tried on a pink wig.

“That probably wasn’t me,” Eliana said. “There are a lot of blondes in this school.”

“Oh! Maybe.” Emily didn’t seem bothered. “It was super crowded in there. Everyone’s doing their costumes last minute.” She squeezed Eliana’s arm. “Anyway, whatever you pick, you’re going to look amazing. I’m so excited for Saturday.”

“Me too,” Eliana said.

Emily waved and went the other way.

Eliana stood outside the gym for a second. Then she pushed her hair behind her ear and walked to class, and by the time she sat down, she had decided Emily was probably right. It had been crowded. It had probably been someone else.

Hannah decided the costume on Thursday night, in a private message, the way she decided most things.

Eliana was still smiling at that when the group chat buzzed.

Nobody answered her. Eliana didn’t either.

A minute later, a different chat lit up.

Eliana sat up.

Eliana didn’t know what to type to that, so she changed the subject.

Eliana put the phone face down on her desk. She was still smiling, and there was nobody around to hide it from, so she didn’t try.

Eliana told her mom about the party at dinner on Friday, and her mom put her fork down.

“Melanie’s?” her mom said. “The Halloween one?”

“Yeah. Hannah’s driving.”

“Oh, that’s wonderful.” Her mom said it like Eliana had told her she’d gotten into a good college. “Melanie’s mom is so lovely. Do you need anything? For a costume? I can take you to the store tomorrow morning.”

“Hannah’s bringing the horns. I have a red dress.”

“The one from your cousin’s wedding? That’s perfect. Oh, honey.” Her mom reached over and squeezed her hand. It was quick, and a little too tight. “I’m so glad you’re going.”

Eliana looked at her mother’s hand on hers.

She knew what that squeeze meant. It meant normal. It meant a clique party at a nice house with the right girls, and no more skipped vigils, and no more guitars in the bedroom that nobody had asked about, and no more locked doors. It meant her mother had been holding her breath for three weeks and was finally letting a little of it out.

“Me too,” Eliana said.

Across the table, her dad looked up from his plate.

“Boys going to be there?” he asked mildly.

“Probably.”

“Hm.”

That was all. He held her eyes a second longer than usual. Then he went back to his food.

Upstairs, she laid the dress out on the bed. It was a dark red slip dress with thin straps, the one she had worn exactly once, and it had pockets. That was the only reason she had bought it. Real pockets, deep enough to put your whole hand in.

She opened the BIRDIE tin on her nightstand and took out the pick.

It was warm, the way it always was now. Dark red and worn thin at the tip, with the three rings and the bolt scratched into the back.

She held it for a moment. Then she slid it into the left pocket of the dress, pushed it all the way down to the bottom, and checked twice that it wouldn’t fall out.

Just in case.