Housebreaking (30 page)

* * *

THAT WEEK
they hung out every day after school at his place. He kept offering her hits off his joints until he finally got the message that she liked pills, not pot. Okay, he said, we'll get some tonight.

“Really?”

“Yes, really,” he said.

Back at her house that evening, a Thursday, Emily endured her parents' obligatory late-night rituals—her dad flipping between Leno and CNN in the den, her mom appearing at her door, face smeared with cream,
Everything okay, honey
?—until at last, at midnight, they settled down to their unquiet slumbers. She killed some time on her laptop and texting Leo and a few other friends in the city, who never slept anyway, waiting for 2:00
A.M.
At last, she dialed Billy's cell. “Are you ready?”

He sounded groggy. “Who's this?”

“Wake up, jackass. It's time to go.”

He coughed. “Oh, right. We doing this?”

“Yes, we're doing this. I'll be at your house in five minutes.”

She listened for any sound from her parents' bedroom; the house was so cramped, you could hear everything. Except for the ticking of the hall clock, all seemed perfectly quiet. She pulled on a black fleece jacket and her black yoga pants. She tiptoed down the hall, carrying her sneakers, pausing when the kitchen door creaked and Sheba raised her head to study her for a moment before collapsing back on her cushion.

Outside, the wind gusted. She considered going back for her winter coat, but decided against it. Too risky. How could she explain taking a stroll at 2:00
A.M.
on the coldest night in October? She hurried across the intersection, not a car in sight. She clutched the neck of her jacket to keep the wind from getting in. As she passed a driveway, a bright light came on, startling her, but it was just a motion sensor. Most of the houses were wholly dark except for the stray porch or kitchen light, everyone snug in their beds, the wind howling. No one was looking out the window, no one could see her shivering in the street.

Her heart was racing, that same thrill. She'd started shoplifting when she was eleven or twelve. The first time had been an accident; she'd been standing in the checkout line at the grocery store with her mother, reading
Seventeen
; only when she got to the car did she realize she hadn't paid for the magazine. Just like that, that simple. She told Daniel what she'd done, and he said it was stupid. He didn't get the thrill of it, the way she did. In junior high, she would hit the mall after school with her friends, picking their stores. At first, it was little things, things she could fit into her pocket: a tube of lipstick, fake pearl earrings. She started carrying an oversize bag. She would pay for a toothbrush at CVS, smiling angelically, making conversation with the cashier, her bag loaded with mascara and nail polishes, lotions and makeup. The sensors at the door did nothing. Then, she started on clothes. She would go into dressing rooms and slip on whatever she wanted under her coat. It was easy. In department stores she would pick out a nice pair of shoes—Coach heels, BCBG flats—and put them on, stuff her own shoes into her bag. She told Billy Stacks about it, how she'd carried a jackknife to cut the security tags off expensive dresses or purses. She had two Chanel bags, a closet filled with designer clothes, price tags still hanging from the sleeves. She'd never gotten caught.

“That's cause they're not watching little rich white girls like you,” said Billy.

It was true, she didn't need money. She could simply ask her father, and if he said no, which was rare, it didn't matter; he and her mother left their wallets around the house. She would take a couple of twenties whenever she wanted, and they never noticed. She stole for the rush, not the money. She and Billy made a deal: He could keep whatever they got except for the pharmaceuticals.

Pharmies were her department.

She kept stashes in her closet and school locker. Douglas, her pal from Denton, sent her pills in ancient cassette cases every couple of weeks. Billy Stacks smoked weed all the time, but she didn't like the mellow, hazy way it made her feel. She liked coke and scripts: painkillers and tranquillizers. She could go the day, sometimes, without opening one of her bottles, but she couldn't fathom the notion of
not
having some medication on hand. When her stash got low, she became panicky. How did people do without? Pills to get going, pills to fall asleep, pills to ward off bad thoughts. At friends' houses, she raided parental medicine cabinets: Ambien, Vicodin, Xanax, even Viagra (which all the fathers seemed to have), which she would trade or sell. One time, a few years back in Greenwich, she'd cleaned out the bathroom cabinet of some friend of her dad, after her parents had dragged her and Daniel to a law firm Christmas party, with about fifty guests. She'd disappeared upstairs and found at least twenty brown bottles, the best haul ever, a zillion Xanax, the two-milligram kind. Take one of those and you entered the outskirts of heaven.

Billy Stacks appeared in his driveway wearing a dark tracksuit, carrying a backpack. “Fucking cold,” he said.

“Why didn't you wear a coat?”

He shrugged. “Come on.”

They went back the way she had come, crossing the street by her house. She glanced at her parents' darkened bedroom window and pictured them sleeping with their backs to each other, illuminated by the green night-light from the bathroom, like an Edward Hopper painting. Her father snoring, her mother lying on her side, clutching a pillow in front of her face. Thinking of her parents—so helpless, so pitiful—could make her cry. Being in their presence infuriated her; only when she was away from them could she feel any sort of affection.

Billy turned up Juniper Lane, the street parallel to hers. “It's a private road,” he said. She raised the sleeve of her sweater and wiped her nose,
which had begun to run in the night air. “You see or hear anything, you whistle. Got it?”

“Yeah.”

“You know how to whistle, right?”

“Yeah,” she said. “I just put my lips together and blow.”

He went up the driveway of the corner lot, slightly crouched. A station wagon was parked in front of the garage. She watched as he opened the passenger door—the inside dome flashed on—and got in the car. No movement came from the house. Water trickled down the sewer in the middle of the street. She waited. Finally he appeared, creeping toward her with that catwalk of his, and she began to giggle.

“What?”

“This is fun.”

“I got a wallet from the glove compartment,” he said, holding it up. “And some shades.” He put on the sunglasses, oversize pink ones, for an old lady. He slipped the loot into his backpack and zipped it up. “Come on.”

The minivan in the next driveway was locked. But the SUV beside it opened and he disappeared inside. She no longer noticed the cold. The night was overcast, a long blanket of gray, obscuring the stars. The wind didn't bother her. She liked when it gusted because the sound drowned out their footsteps and the opening and closing of car doors. He joined her at the end of the driveway, jiggling the pack. “Bunch of CDs,” he said.

It was easy. Half the cars were unlocked. Twice he disappeared through garage doors. Each time she waited silently for him to emerge, watching his flashlight beam streaking across the darkened windows.

When they reached the house at the top of the street, a cul-de-sac, he said, “Your turn.”

“Really?”

“Go for it, Little Miss Klepto,” he said, handing her the backpack.

The driveway was long, curved, and steep. She glanced up at the house, toward the dark third-floor windows. The car was an old Mercedes convertible, unlocked. She opened the driver's door and slipped in. The interior smelled like pine air freshener. She opened the glove compartment and the little bulb went on: CDs, owner's manual, a ten-dollar bill, a scattershot of business cards, a pack of cigarettes, a pile of coins. She swept it all into the backpack. In the backseat, she saw a
Vogue
and a red teddy bear holding a heart that said
I LOVE YOU
, and grabbed
them too. Suddenly a face appeared against the window—she nearly screamed—but it was only Billy, making a goofy smile. “You almost gave me a heart attack,” she said, getting out of the car.

“Come on,” he said. “We can get in through the basement.”

She eased the car door shut, barely making a sound. “Are you kidding? They're
home
, dipshit. You can't just—”

“Suit yourself,” he said.

He went around the back of the house. She waited, staring after him. Was he really going to break in? He was probably just screwing with her again. In a second he would jump out from behind the bushes and scare the crap out of her. She squinted after him into the darkness, holding her breath.

Then came a shrieking—an enormous horn bellowing. The sound was shocking, incapacitating. A moment later she saw Billy scrambling down the lawn, waving for her to follow. She ran after him across the backyard. They vaulted over a wooden fence and disappeared into some woods, she falling behind, branches whipping her face. In the distance the alarm continued to roar, and unseen dogs joined in, howling and barking. Her sneakers slipped on the grass and she nearly fell. Ahead, Billy jumped over a low stone wall. She followed, scraping her hand on a rock and kicking over an empty planter. They ran along the dark side of a house and finally emerged into the street.

“Come on!”

He grabbed her hand and they ran downhill. They were making so much noise, their sneakers slapping against the asphalt, the rattling of his backpack. At the bottom of the street—
her street,
she realized with a shock; they were outside her own house—they crossed the intersection and kept running all the way to his house. He led her to a toolshed in the backyard and they collapsed onto the floor.

“Who taught you to run?”

“Fuck off,” she said, gasping for breath. She rolled onto her back, her chest heaving. There were bags of fertilizer, wood chips, and soil piled against the wall, smelling like cow shit. Faint moonlight streamed through the cracked window above the door.

A car came along the street, its engine rumbling loudly. He said, “Shhh.” They looked at each other, eyes wide, as the noise of the car came closer, then very near, then slowly faded into the distance.

“Cop,” he said.

“How can you tell?”

He shrugged. “You cold?”

“Not anymore.”

“Check it out.” He unzipped the backpack and dumped the contents onto the wooden floor. A silver flask fell out, along with all the rest. He unscrewed the top and took a sip. “Whiskey,” he said, wiping his lips.

“The pink sunglasses are mine.”

“I'm keeping the wallet,” he said.

“What happened back there?”

“Fucking ADT, is what happened. I kicked in the door and two seconds later, screech.”

“My heart's still racing.” She placed his hand on her chest. “Feel.”

“Feels good.” He ran his hands under her sweater and pushed her tits together.

She pushed him away. “Your hands are fucking cold.”

“Rest of me's warm,” he said, rolling on top of her.

Outside the wind whined. Miles away, trucks hummed along the interstate, like a far-off surf. All those people going places in the middle of the night. It was just a few hours before dawn, and so perfectly dark. She heard the wind rattling the windowpane and her own voice, whispering the words guys liked to hear.

* * *

AT DAWN
the skies opened and rain clattered on the rooftop. Back in her bed, Emily drifted in and out of dreams, knowing she was oversleeping but not caring. So what if she were late for school? Besides, it wasn't her fault. Her mother woke her every morning precisely an hour before school. Then she would usually return a few more times to cajole and yell at her to get up. But this morning the door didn't open, her mother didn't appear.

Finally Emily roused herself, went down the hallway, and peered into her mother's bedroom. She was curled under the comforter, a pillow over her head. “Mom,” she called softly, then louder, and at last Audrey turned toward her, blinking. “Mom? Are you sick?”

“What time is it, honey?”

Emily went to the bed and slipped under the comforter. “Ten.”

Audrey blinked. “How did that happen?” She moved to get up, but
Emily draped her arm over her. She felt like a girl again, like when they were little and she and Daniel used to snuggle with Audrey after her dad went to work.

“Chill, Mom.”

“You have to get to school.”

“I don't have class till eleven.” A lie, but her mother wouldn't question her. Emily lied to her all the time—about where she went, what she did, what she ate—but her mother wouldn't want to know the truth about those things anyway.

“Don't you have to be in study hall or something like that?”

“You can fill out a pink card.”

“I've filled out too many of those pink cards already.”

“Just one more hour, Mother. Then you can drive me to school.” She pulled her close, stealing her warmth. She was so tiny. Emily felt huge beside her. Why couldn't she have gotten her mom's body? Boys liked short curvy girls. Instead she'd inherited her father's big arms and broad, Scottish ass.

“Am I a terrible mother for letting you sleep in?”

“Like I'm going to miss anything. That school isn't exactly challenging. Denton was ten times harder. Besides, I've got all As and nearly perfect SAT scores, remember?”

“How did you manage that anyway? The best I could do was twelve eighty.”

“I can't believe you remember your SAT scores.”

“Does that make me a nerd?”

“A
nerd
, Mom?”

“Whatever the word is these days.”