A Twist of Hate (13 page)

              The initial pain of their union shocked Siobhan. That pain was intense, yet so brief it seemed not to have been at all once Camden’s careful, deliberate ease of movement became urgent and demanding. Control and maturity fell to inexperience. Swept into a swell of passion and the headiness sensation that came with it, they clung to each other, falling, but falling together. The tears spilled in the aftermath of their dizzying experience were not of remorse or regret but of joy and discovery. Gentle kisses, tender caresses, and quiet laughter vanquished the tears and sheltered them from thoughts of anything but each other.

Chapter Seven

“Brian was like, ‘You don’t know what I’m going through.’ I was like, ‘Then tell me. I’ll help you.” He was all like, “Leave me alone, you’re stupid, I don’t need you!’ I was like, ‘Fine!’”

—Courtney Miller,
Newsline

              “You look different.”

              “Do I?” Camden replied innocently, fastening his seatbelt. “Different how?”

              “Like you had the best night of your life.” Brian gave him a wary side eye.

              Camden turned toward the window, but not before Brian caught his revealing smile.

              “You didn’t,” Brian gasped. “Oh, man, you did. Well?”

              “It’s unseemly to kiss and tell.”

              “Screw that! Tell. You know all about me and Courtney.”

              A flicker of memory brought Brian’s tale of his first time to Camden’s mind. It had been so distressing, he had spent hours discussing it with Camden. Brian and Courtney planned it for weeks. Courtney told her parents she was spending the weekend with Chrissie Abernathy at a resort in Lake of the Ozarks. Brian told his parents the complete truth: that he was spending the weekend in Chicago with Courtney, and that they planned to consummate their relationship.

              Courtney had begun taking birth control pills five weeks in advance. Brian’s parents had given him a carton of condoms and a sheaf of pamphlets on AIDS, pelvic inflammatory disease, chlamydia, genital warts, teen pregnancy, and abstinence. Brian and Courtney had anticipated two nights at the Millenium, and three days shopping, dining, and visiting museums.

              The days had been great. The nights—not so great. The first night had seen the deed accomplished early, ending with Courtney crying in his arms. They tried it again the second night. There had been no tears afterwards, but to Courtney’s disappointment, Brian had been the only one to experience the much anticipated shattering of the earth.

              Judging from Camden’s demeanor, his night with Siobhan had been nothing less than—

              “Biblical,” Camden said. “It was like speaking a language only we understood. I feel like I could pluck stars right from the sky with my bare hands when I’m with her. What did I do to deserve her? She’s the most awesome thing that’s ever happened to me.”

              “That’s the sex talking.”

              “No. It’s her. We were in the shower this morning, and she looked up at me, and blinked water from her eyes, and…no one’s ever looked at me like they wanted or needed me before. I almost started bawling like a baby right there in front of her.”

              “Then it’s a good thing you had the shower to hide your tears,” Brian muttered. “I’m sorry,” he added hastily. I shouldn’t have said that.”
It’s just the jealousy talking,
he told himself.

              “I guess that was a little more than you wanted to know,” Camden said, a little self-conscious.

              “No, it’s fine. I’m a good listener. That’s what friends are for.” Brian turned on the radio, and they rode the rest of the way to school without speaking, both thinking about Camden’s night.

***

              Siobhan’s Friday schedule began with two free periods and an optional AP French lab. Her first class didn’t start until 10:05 am. She left the house before her father, but she didn’t accompany him to his meeting with the headmaster.

              Mr. Curran walked into Mr. Edwards’s stately office. He figured the scrawny redhead glowering at him with bloodshot eyes was Michael Littlefield. The woman sitting next to him, crying wetly into a crumpled tissue, had to be his mother—Elvira, according to the Prescott directory. She was the mousiest woman Mr. Curran had ever seen. Her hair, complexion, and dress were the same bland shade of washed out gray. He took the chair beside hers and offered her his handkerchief. She hesitated for only an instant before accepting it. With a weak smile, she pressed it to her eyes.

              Mr. Cleese had traded his usual attire of jeans and short-sleeves for a jacket and tie. He related the events of the previous night with the impassivity of a court stenographer. Mrs. Littlefield presented nothing to defend her son. Mr. Edwards allowed Michael to speak for himself.

              “This is ridiculous,” Michael began, his pointed chin high in defiance. His head throbbed and the light worsened the ache between his temples. He was hungover, and his back ached from the cold night he’d spent huddled in a corner of his treehouse. “I pushed her. That’s all. It was an accident.”

              “My daughter’s injuries prove otherwise,” Mr. Curran stated, slanting a glance at Michael. “She was blitz attacked and subsequently restrained.”

              “I strongly disagree with Mr. Littlefield’s statement,” said Mr. Cleese.

              “What about Camden?” Michael erupted. “Why isn’t he getting busted? He tried to bash my face in!”

              “We are here to discuss your behavior, Michael,” Mr. Edwards said firmly. “If you have nothing further to add on your own behalf, I suggest we end this as expediently as possible.”

              “I won’t apologize to that little black thing,” Michael said, stubbornly throwing himself against the back of his chair. “Give me detention until graduation, I don’t care.”

              “You don’t seem to understand the gravity of your situation, Michael,” Mr. Edwards intoned. “Prescott has very strict rules regarding this sort of behavior, though in my thirty years as headmaster, we have never had to deal with one student assaulting another.”

              “Assault?” Michael laughed in disbelief. “I didn’t beat her up or rape her!”

              “Michael!” Mrs. Littlefield wailed.

              The headmaster’s patience thinned. “Consider yourself fortunate the authorities are not involved in this matter, Mr. Littlefield. You would be looking at a criminal record and possibly jail time. As it stands, you face only expulsion.”

             
Expulsion
? Michael paled. That was the one penalty he hadn’t considered. He preferred jail to expulsion. Colleges didn’t accept students who got expelled three months before graduation! Especially if the expulsion was for an assault—even an
alleged
assault—on a female student. His future flashed before his eyes, and he envisioned it swirling irretrievably down the toilet.

              “You can’t expel me,” Michael said hoarsely. “Has Prescott ever been sued for unfair expulsion?” He glared at Mr. Curran. “Or reverse discrimination? You call this fair? Why don’t you swing a rope over the nearest branch and lynch me outright!”

              Mr. Cleese abruptly stood. “If my presence is no longer required, I must see to my first hour drama class.” He shook hands with Mr. Curran. He took Mrs. Littlefield’s hand and gave it a delicate shake. “I regret our first meeting comes as a result of unpleasantness, Madame.” Completely ignoring Michael, Mr. Cleese left the office.

              Satisfied the matter was being handled seriously, Mr. Curran too, excused himself.

              Mr. Edwards remained unintimidated by a bratty kid whose father should have taken him out to the woodshed years ago. “If you want to waste your time and resources with a frivolous lawsuit, that option remains open to you. The expulsion would stand in the interim. By the time a court procedure took place, your classmates will be graduating from college. This school has extensive resources and fine lawyers, many of whom are Prescott graduates or have children enrolled here. Our legal teams stand ready to defend the good name and reputation of this institution.”

              “H-He’s just talking.” Mrs. Littlefield nervously plucked at the edges of the handkerchief in her hands. “He’s blowin’ balloon juice, that’s all. He’s upset, really, just like all the rest of us.”

              “Shut up, Mom, just shut up!” Michael shouted. “Do you understand what’s happening here? The past four years of my life are down the drain! What high school can I transfer to? No school with a decent name will take me ten weeks before graduation! Dad doesn’t have the clout to fix this, and he obviously didn’t have what it takes to squash it in the first place.” He whipped to face Mr. Edwards. “Everybody knows Kendall Riley bought his way back into Prescott after he vandalized the art building. Name your price, dude. I can get my ‘rents to pay it.”

              “Bribery gets you nowhere with me, young man,” Mr. Edwards declared.

              “Michael, please!” Mrs. Littlefield wailed.

              “No college will take me if I’m expelled, Mom!” Michael yelled. “It would be a miracle if some crappy junior college accepted me in the fall!”

              “You can take your GED, go to junior college for a year, and we’ll look at other colleges after we see how that goes. Your father went to junior college while he earned the money to go to a university,” Mrs. Livingston said proudly.

              “Yeah, and look how he turned out.”

              Mrs. Littlefield’s slight, sinewy hand struck the sharp angle of her son’s cheek with a sharp whap that startled Mr. Edwards. “Your father does the very best he can,” she sobbed. “All your life you’ve tried so hard to be something you aren’t. What we couldn’t give you, you always went out and took! How did you become so selfish and uncaring? Ever since you were a little boy, you’ve accused your father and me of embarrassing you and ruining your life. Well, this time, Michael, you’ve embarrassed us. And you’ve ruined your life all by yourself!”

***

              Word of Michael’s expulsion zoomed through Prescott’s halls on the fleet feet of whispers and rumors. “I’m just glad it’s over,” Courtney said after bringing the news to Mr. Cleese’s office. “Chrissie said Michael did something to her cat yesterday after school. She thinks it’s because he was made she broke up with him.”

              “His poor mother,” Mr. Cleese said. “She seems rather put upon.”

              “She is,” Camden said. “Michael has always treated her like an employee instead of a parent. He and his dad are always yelling at each other.”

              “If the Littlefields are so upstanding, where did Michael acquire his racist, misogynistic, and elitist attitudes?” asked Mr. Cleese. “Apples and trees…”

              “The apple fell and skipped a generation in Michael’s case,” said Brian. “He gets that stuff from his grandfather on his dad’s side. Remember when we went to his lake house, Cam?”

              “Remember?” Camden said. “I had nightmares about it for weeks.”

              “We were in sixth grade when Michael invited us to spend a weekend at his grandfather’s lake house in the Ozarks,” Brian began. “Mr. Littlefield didn’t want us to go but Michael whined and pitched such fit, his mom gave in and said we could. I wished I’d stayed home the minute Virrell Littlefield picked us up at Michael’s house. He’s the scariest old man I’ve ever met. He drove a rusty old truck that had door handles in the shape of a woman’s naked torso. He wore a strappy T-shirt and dingy work pants, and his huge belly hung over his waistband like a bag of dough. Cam, remember how he fastened his belt underneath that giant gut?”

              “He smoked the worst cigars,” Camden said. “When Brian’s dad picked us up, he thought we’d been sprayed by a skunk.”

              “On the dashboard of that stinking truck, he had a ceramic ashtray in the shape of a naked woman lying on her back with her knees up, gripping her ankles,” Brian said. “You can guess where the lit end of the cigar went, and every time he ashed it, he’d say, ‘Here comes Big Daddy!’  The worst was when we got to the lake house.”

              “Actually, lake hut would be a better description of the place,” Camden said. “Before the trip, Michael made out like it was some kind of rustic mansion. It was a one-bedroom shack with an outhouse. The kitchen, dining room, living room, and kitchen were all one room. The cellar was bigger than the whole upstairs.”

              “Once we got there, Mike admitted that he’d never been there before,” Brian said. He picked up the tale. “Mrs. Littlefield told us we weren’t to go into the cellar, so, of course, we couldn’t wait to see what all the mystery was about. I think that’s why Michael invited us along that weekend. He was fascinated by his grandfather but scared of him too.”

              “Mr. Littlefield never spoke about his father, before or after that,” Camden said.

              “He always changed the subject when Mike would bring him up,” Brian recalled. “We found out why when Michael’s grandfather said we could play darts in the cellar.”

              “What was down there?” Courtney asked.

              “He had drawers full of guns and a cabinet full of rifles,” Camden said.

              “There were pictures,” Brian added. “And books, pamphlets, old fashioned tapes, DVDs—all kinds of stuff.”

              “Of what?” Courtney asked.