“Miss Deville.” Mrs. Plumley pushes her glasses up her nose and tips her head back so as to look at me better. “Thank you for coming.”
“I’ll be waiting,” Nokosi says ominously so I shut the office door in his face, laughing when his glaring eyes continue staring at me through the glass panel in the heavy door.
I wipe my face with the back of my hands, using my phone screen to check for streaks of makeup. I’m good.
“Your attention, Miss Deville.”
“You wanted to see me?” I ask, turning back to face her.
“I still don’t have your records.”
“Oh, those,” I wet my lips. “I have them coming, I swear. I’ll bring them in the next few days.”
“You must, it’s extremely important I have them.”
“No sweat, Mrs. P. I promise. It’s taken a bit of time because of how many schools I’ve attended.”
She nods, her face softens with understanding. “It’s hard being under the control of parents who have jobs that take us to many places. I was an army brat myself. We were always moving. You seem to be adjusting well enough to life at Lakeside prep.”
I shrug both shoulders. “I do my best to fit in.”
“Your schoolwork has been exemplary, and your teachers have no complaints.”
“I’m glad to hear it, Mrs. P. It’s nice to have you who understands too.”
“I do.” She looks honored, likely because she relates to me and she probably doesn’t get that very often. “Well, off you go. Please don’t forget your records.”
I dip my chin and turn to pull the door open but Nokosi already has it pushed to a full ninety-degree angle.
He nods politely at the desk lady and takes my hand in his.
“When I said you should just escort me everywhere, I didn’t mean it,” I whisper, smiling wryly at him.
He ignores me and continues on his way, despite the fact he’s now going to be late. His class is on the other side of the building.
We kiss at the door to mine, deep but brief, and I watch his ass as he saunters away, a dreamy smile on my face.
“Please don’t take that,” I whisper at Willow who is about to stuff the dark blue nail polish into her pocket.
She rolls her eyes to me and pouts petulantly, making her thick lower lip pointed and cute. “But it’s so much fun.”
“I know it is and I get it. You know I do. I’m not opposed to a bit of five-finger discount, but I’ve decided I want us to stay and can’t have the cops sniffing around me over a shoplifting accusation.”
She drops the bottle onto the floor, it doesn’t break but it does clatter loud enough to draw the eyes of the bored-looking college student running the store while reading a magazine.
“Sorry,” I say, bending down to pick up the polish and put it back on its plastic shelf. When I stand to my full height I glare at my sister. “Was that necessary?”
She ignores me and moves to the bags, touching the chain handle of one. “This would make a great weapon.”
Anything can be a weapon if you’re sadistic enough and my sister definitely is.
I watch her pick up a blue thong in the underwear section and stick it down her pants.
Groaning, I move around her, grabbing her arm as I go. We dump the foundations, nail polishes, and new eyeliners we’ve chosen, as well as a bottle of pink hair dye for me. My sister wants to stay a mundane brown. I don’t care.
The girl scans our items and pops them into a paper bag with a handle. I carry them, and as soon as we’re outside and out of eyeshot, my sister adds two bottles of nail polish, two new thongs, and a pair of socks with giraffes on them.
“You’re incorrigible.”
“And you’re out of order making decisions for both of us without consulting me. As if I want to spend my last days on earth watching you suck face with that boy.”
“He’s not just any boy, Willow. I wish you’d be happy for me.”
She narrows her eyes, making the jade green look as though it’s glowing. “He’s going to hurt you.”
“And I’ll have you to comfort me when he does. Just like old times, back before… before everything happened.”
“You mean before we were raped,” she replies on a hiss.
I look away, feeling my cheeks heat with rage that makes my arms and hands shake. “They got what was coming to them.” I wet my lips and climb into Mom’s car. “But we can move past it. I want to move past it. I want to live again, be happy, finish the school year and go to prom.”
“And what about me?”
“Not everything has to be about you and the fact you’re dying. If anything, you should want me to find happiness before you die, so I’m not alone when you go.”
She stares ahead but I see something flicker in her eyes, a realization perhaps, compassion maybe. Who knows? When it comes to Willow, she rarely thinks about anyone but herself. She never has.
My memories have been coming and going, some things I can remember as though they happened yesterday, such as when Willow and I used to play pranks on our neighbor and steal pears from their tree in the garden. They didn’t mind, they had way too many to eat anyway.
But a lot of memories, such as the rape and things since then, are hazy, foggy. It’s like I know the details, I know they happened, but I can’t quite recall the images.
“Would you at least consider staying here? Letting me be happy?” I ask my sister, placing my hand over hers on her lap.
She looks away and pulls her hand from under mine. “He’ll dump you. Men like him never stick around.”
“You’re wrong. He cares about me. I can tell.” Putting the car in gear I peel out of our parking spot and head home with a trunk full of groceries and the things we need.
And my bitch of a sister snoozing beside me.
Willow
“Shhhhh,” I say, giggling as Nokosi lifts the metal barrel and carries it out of the garage. He grunts with each step but that’s unsurprising because it looks really fucking heavy.
“What’s in here? A dead body?”
“It was here when we moved in so maybe,” I reply, dragging my eyes from the top of his bulging shoulders to his ass. He really does have a great ass.
“Did you just check me out?” Nok asks, smirking at me over his shoulder. I fight the urge to grunt at him, sneer at him, grab his handsome face and push my thumbs into his eyes until he stops wriggling.
Instead I just shrug. “My sister has good taste.”
He laughs and carefully places the barrel behind the garage. Only making a little bit of noise.
“What if she wants to use the garage before we’re done?”
“She won’t, I’ll make sure of it,” I state, looking around the near-empty garage space when we reenter.
I start sweeping the floor with a heavy broom, but apparently, I’m taking too long because Nokosi snatches the broom from me and nods to a chair in the corner.
“Sit down,” he insists. “I got this.”
Chivalrous… a redeeming quality for the most part. Doesn’t make me stop hating him though.