A Twist of Hate (10 page)

              “If there’s anything I can do to help,” David began, his fingertips dancing over the place on his cheek that Siobhan had kissed, “just, um, let me know. I’ll be outside.” He pointed over his shoulder. “Right outside. I have to, to get my, uh, my script…or…or…. I’ll be right outside.” He fled.

              Mr. Cleese returned with Camden, Brian and two overexcited crewmembers. Camden pushed his way through the crowded office and cupped Siobhan’s face. “Are you alright?”

              Dropping her gaze, she wriggled free of his hold. “If one more person asks me that, I’ll scream.”

              “We all care a great deal for you, Siobhan,” Mr. Cleese said earnestly. “Are you certain that you’re alright?”

              “I just want to get through rehearsal. I appreciate your concern but I really am fine.” The glassy sheen in her eyes and the tension in her shoulders belied her words. “Can we just forget about Michael Littlefield?”

Chapter Six

“He hated what he could never be. He wanted to destroy what he couldn’t have. It was as sick and as simple as that.”

—Brian Livingston,
Newsline

              Flawless.

              No other word adequately described Prescott’s production of
The Glass Menagerie
. David, Courtney, Brian, and Ann turned in performances so brilliant, they dulled the bitter pall Michael had cast upon the evening. Siobhan left immediately after Mr. Cleese dismissed them, still insisting she was fine. Her car was gone by the time Camden, who was hitching a ride with Brian, reached the parking lot.

              “What the hell is Michael’s problem?” Camden asked as Brian began the short drive to Camden’s house. “He said I bailed on him tonight.”

              “Did you?”

              “No. Yes. I don’t know. He expects me to save his ass every time he messes up. I couldn’t do it tonight. It wouldn’t have been fair to everyone else. Siobhan was a lot more gracious with him than he deserved, and he went after her for it. He actually put his hands on her. I’m the one he should be mad at.”

              “Michael’s feelings toward you are way more complicated than that, Cam.”

              “Why? I’ve never done anything to him.”

              “When Michael read Siobhan’s bio in the New Student Orientation packet, he couldn’t stop talking about how he planned to take her to the best restaurant in town, and how jealous Chrissie would be when she saw him with Siobhan,” Brian recalled. “But after we met her in person, he changed. He didn’t talk about her like she was a princess he wanted to court. He talked about her like she was prey instead of a person, and he was going on a big game hunt.”

              “He never says anything to me about Siobhan, other than, you know, the usual stuff he says about pretty girls.”

              “Whatever Michael’s got for Siobhan is getting bigger. It’s like a seed was planted with this play. It’s become our own little shop of horrors, only instead of a man-eating plant we’ve got a people-hating pervert.”

              “I’m the one he should be mad at,” Camden said. “I don’t understand why he targeted Siobhan.”

              “So he could hurt both of you.”

              “Wanna explain?” Camden grumbled.

              “Do you think I’m a well-adjusted person? That I know the difference between right and wrong, that I have empathy for others?”

              “You’re not as weird as you could be, having two psychiatrists for parents,” Camden generously acknowledged, “but what has that got to do with Michael?”

              “I have a good life and I know it,” Brian said. “I have awesome parents and a great sister. I go to a great school, I have a cute girlfriend, a reliable set of wheels and at least one good friend—that would be you. But when Courtney told me you and Siobhan were a couple, I was jealous.”

              “My life is a Freudian case study,” Camden said. “All those things you have are things I’ve always wanted. I’ve envied you. What’s so great about my wooden life?”

              “You have something I want. You have something Michael wants. Some
one
, I should say.”

              Camden mused on Brian’s admission. “But Michael doesn’t want Siobhan. He can’t stand her. She’s strong. She’s smart. She doesn’t put up with his shit. And she’s black. She’s everything he hates.”

              “He hates those things about her, but does he really hate
her
? Love and hate are one coin, man.”

              “Okay…”

              “Michael has a monster attraction to a girl he wants to hate. You saw him with her tonight. It was intimate, full-body contact. He’s being pulled into two very different, very strong directions. To make things worse, you, the one person he’s always wanted to be, are the one who’s got her.

              “I think jealousy is the opposite of love,” Brian continued. “When you love someone, you’re happy, not jealous, when that person has something or someone that makes them happy. Hate is the opposite of happiness. You can’t be happy if you’re busy hating. It’s a complex equation that adds up to one sorry Michael Littlefield.”

              “I should have seen the meltdown coming,” Camden sighed. “I’ve had so much on my mind this year, first college applications and football playoffs, then midterms, the winter musical, finals, the play—”

              “Siobhan.”

              Her name invariably brought a smile to Camden’s face. “We’re getting married.”

              Brian stomped on the brake pedal to stop himself crashing into the car in front of him.

              “She doesn’t think I’m serious,” Camden added.

              “You’re always serious. That must have been one hell of a kiss last night.”

              Camden brought his thumb to his mouth, hiding a smile.

              “This is a tacky question, the kind a guy like Michael would ask, but what was it like? To kiss her.”

              “Only a guy like Michael would answer that question.”

              “You’re right. I shouldn’t even be thinking about it.”

              “I kissed Siobhan and something really cold, really deep inside my heart just melted,” Camden began. “I got drunk on emotions I didn’t know I had. It killed me a little to leave her at the end of the night. It was just one kiss, but man, I’m
still
kissed. I always thought Romeo and Juliet were a couple of dumb impulsive kids. People don’t just fall in love overnight.”

              “No, sometimes it takes a whole three and a half weeks.”

              “She’s the possible in impossible.”

              “She’s a one-woman civilization,” Brian said.

              “What?”

              “She’s got a little bit of everything,” Brian explained. “She’s independent, intelligent and creative. She never asks anyone for help, yet she’s the first person to offer help if you need it. Have you noticed that there’s nothing she can’t do once she decides to do it?”

              “Do you think of her as being black?”

              “That’s one-drop talk. I think it’s funny that people are still defined by blood, as if you can measure ethnicity in percentages. When I went to Boston, I attended one of my dad’s lectures at Boston University.  He spoke to the first-year medical students about race and the misconceptions people have about each other. One of the things he said really stuck out in my mind. He said that black blood must be awfully strong if one drop of it can make a person of mixed ancestry entirely black. He was using humor to deal with a sensitive topic, but he brought up a good point. And when you think about who came up with the one-drop rule, and why, you really see that it was more about economics than anything else.”

              “Siobhan considers herself biracial,” Camden said. “She doesn’t think one cancels out the other.”

              “There’s something to be said for a varied gene pool. Siobhan is proof. When my parents first met her, they thought she was Hispanic or from Northern Italy. My dad says she ‘won’t come into the full flower of her beauty’ until she’s in her twenties. Can you imagine Siobhan being more beautiful? That would be like Christopher Daley being more rich.

              “I never think about her color,” Brian continued, “other than how pretty it is. I don’t think of Courtney as being peach, or you as being sort of beige.”

              “Beige?”

              Brian laughed. “Siobhan’s skin color is just another gorgeous feature. Like her eyes. And her smile. And her hair.”

              “I never thought about it either, until tonight,” Camden said. “Michael made it a point.”

              “Remember last spring break in Cancun? Michael got that second-degree sunburn chasing girls who’d tanned darker than Siobhan.”

              “I wanted to hurt him tonight.”

              “You did. His nose might be broken. I see he gave you a pretty nasty scratch.”

              “He always scratches and pulls hair.” Camden touched the tender stripe of redness just below his right ear. “When we were kids, we used to fight at least once a week over the dumbest things. Michael would start it, then end up crying and running home when he couldn’t beat me or get his way. He doesn’t have fingernails. He’s got talons, like an iguana.”

              “Siobhan can take him, and he knows it,” Brian said. “That’s why he nabbed her from behind.”

              “He called me a coward.”

              “I heard him. We all heard him.”

              “All this could have been avoided if I’d just—”

              “This was inevitable. Michael sabotaged himself from the start. I’m just glad things came to a head before opening night. You did the right thing, Cam. You aren’t a coward. You’re a good friend.  Michael is just too dumb to see it.”

              “Would you do me a favor?” Camden asked.

              “Sure.”

              “Take me to Siobhan’s.”

***

              They climbed a trellis to the glass roof of the solarium, then creeped across the support beams to get to Siobhan’s bedroom windows. Siobhan sat at her dressing table, brushing her hair. She wore an oversized white T-shirt that swallowed her lithe figure.

              Camden knocked softly on a window pane. Siobhan jumped and turned, wielding her hairbrush like a weapon. Once she recognized her late night visitors, she put her hand over her heart and took a deep breath before going to the window.

              “Is there something wrong with the front door?” she asked after swinging open the window.

              “Yes,” Camden said as he and Brian climbed into her room. “Your dad’s on the other side of it.”

              “He’s not a monster, you know,” she said defensively. She went back to her dressing table and brushed her hair in short, angry strokes.

              “Your dad wouldn’t mind us stopping by at ten o’clock on a school night?” Camden took off his bomber jacket. Brian sat on the foot of her bed, watching her hair catch the lamp light.

              She slapped the brush down on the dresser. “Why are you here?” she asked without turning around.

              “I understand you being angry, but—”

              “I’m not angry,” she said over him. She picked up the brush, then set it back down. She sighed and massaged her right temple. “I’m…I don’t know what I am.”

              Camden gently turned her around. She kept her head bowed. When he tried to meet her gaze, she covered the right side of her face with her fingers.

              Camden gently lowered her hand. A muttered curse slipped between his clenched teeth.

              Brian ventured closer.

              Camden lightly stroked the bracelet of bruises circling Siobhan’s right wrist. He examined her left hand. A line of bruises in the shape of spatulate finger marks speckled her left inner wrist.

              Fury crackled in Camden’s eyes when they lit on the wounds she had tried to hide. He fairly shook with anger at the sight of the bright red abrasions at her right temple.

              “He caught me by surprise,” she said apologetically.

              “He assaulted you,” Camden insisted, getting louder.

              Siobhan shushed him. The last thing she wanted was her father charging in and catching two boys in her room. Her throat tightened, strangling her words. “The headmaster called and assured us the school will handle everything. I just want to go to bed and forget about it.”

              “Don’t let him get to you,” Brian said.

              “He got to you,” she countered. “That’s why you’re here, isn’t it?” She touched her fingertips to his jawline, gently keeping his face toward hers. “You look at me the way you look at those figures in the menagerie on stage. Like I’m some delicate, brittle thing that needs to be protected. I’m tougher than that. Much tougher.”

              Brian’s stomach twisted into a painful knot. He was much closer to a collapse than his one-woman civilization. “Michael won’t bother you anymore,” he stated as decisively as his voice allowed. “After what happened tonight, he’ll probably get suspended for a month, if he’s lucky.” Brian struggled with the urge to take her into his arms and hold her until she knew she was safe, and protected whether she needed it or not.

              Camden embraced her, enveloping her in the comfort of his bigger, stronger body. Her shoulders moved in the telltale way of tears. Brian had never seen her cry. He went to her and laid a gentle hand on her shoulder.

              She pulled away from Camden just enough to offer Brian a tearful smile of gratitude. “I know I shouldn’t have bolted after rehearsal, but I felt terrible, like I didn’t belong. Michael hates me. I can deal with it because it’s right in front of me in all its ugliness. But I let him make me doubt the rest of you. I wondered if you thought the same way he does. I thought I’d been fooling myself by thinking you accepted me. Thank you for coming tonight. Now I know for sure that Michael’s the one who’s wrong, not me.”