couples have. The wordless communion that left everyone else out in the cold. Harper wanted to be happy for them, but she didn’t have it in her. All she could see was the potential for pain; all she could believe was that, in the end, everyone ended up alone.
She had been so optimistic on the way to Vegas, stupidly thinking that she could find happiness there, that Sin City would somehow show her a way to wash herself of her sins.
They say you can find anything in Vegas, but all she’d found were answers. She knew whom to blame now. She knew who was on her side-and who wasn’t.
Harper stared out the window, out at the desert flatness, remembering how much Kaia had hated the unchanging scenery, with its dusty infinities and scraggly brush, as if the land had a skin condition. The ground was pitted and pockmarked. Diseased.
She closed her eyes, trying to regain the certainty she’d felt up on that roof, her belief in the necessity of moving forward. And maybe it was possible. They had hours left on the road, time enough to cleanse herself. She would leave her emotional baggage in Vegas, and arrive back in Grace refreshed and renewed.
She would leave behind the anger, the pain of betrayal, the misguided hope, the guilt, the bitterness. And, hardest of all, most important of all, she would leave behind the love. She would leave Adam; she would stop clinging to the past and stop hoping they could go back.
But if she succeeded, if she really could leave it all behind… what would she have left?
Lost.
“Shit!” Reed pounded the wheel in frustration. He’d just passed the same crappy Howard Johnson for the third time in a row. Confirmation that he was no closer to the highway entrance than he’d been an hour ago. A fucking waste of time, just like the entire weekend, he thought.
Except not a total waste-at least he’d found out the truth. That was something.
He cursed the guys for ditching him-they’d hooked up with a couple of Haven High’s hottest stoner girls and were staying in town an extra night. How was he supposed to read the map and drive at the same time without crashing into the side of the damn Howard Johnson?
Maybe it wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world, he thought.
Then hated himself for thinking it.
He pulled the van into a gas station, intending to ask for directions. But instead of getting out, he just sat there, resting his head against the cool leather steering wheel. Then he lit a joint and let his mind drift.
Maybe this was a sign. Maybe he was supposed to be lost, stranded in Vegas, hundreds of miles from home. It wasn’t much of a home, not now, after Kaia… after Beth.
He’d gambled and he’d lost. Big. He’d lost it all. He could start over again in Vegas. Wait tables, get a cheap apartment, start up a new band. Track down Star la. He could make a new life for himself.
He knew it wasn’t realistic. It wasn’t going to happen. But it was nice to imagine, just for a while. It was nice to ignore the future, the crap he would face when he got back to Grace, the pain that would slice through the fog as soon as the buzz wore off.
Eventually, he’d go inside, get directions, hit the highway, drive home. He just didn’t know why. He’d lost it all this weekend, so what did he have to go back for?
Nothing.
Hope.
Beth had thought she would never experience it again. And maybe you couldn’t call it hope yet, not quite. It was just a tiny kernel of an emotion, buried so far down that she wouldn’t have known it was there if she hadn’t been so raw, if everything she thought or felt hadn’t screamed for attention. There was still so much pain, fear, sorrow, and, as always, guilt-but now there was something else, too. A tiny bright spot, a fresh breath. An expectation that maybe, just maybe, the worst was behind her.
Hope.
Her terrible secret had come out, she had been exposed-and then accused, and then abandoned. But not completely. She squeezed her hand into a fist, remembering how tightly Harper had grabbed her, how Beth hadn’t wanted to let go. Harper wanted her to live.
And, as she had realized on that roof, staring down at the cement, willing herself to take the step, Beth wanted it too.
Adam hadn’t spoken, not since they’d gotten onto the highway. And Beth didn’t know what to say, so eventually she had closed her eyes and pretended to sleep. She didn’t know what was going to happen next, when they got home, when she had to face Harper again. When she had to face the absence of Reed, who she knew would never come back to her.
He didn’t think she was worthless. And that was a start.
It seemed silly to hope, to think that anything good could happen or that her life could return to some kind of even balance, something tolerable, not weighed down by guilt and misery. But she couldn’t help it. Behind her, Vegas was dipping beneath the horizon, and it felt like all the horrible things she’d done-or, at least, that one horrible thing she’d done-was receding along with it.
Maybe Harper had been right.
Beth didn’t deserve happiness, forgiveness, or peace.
But maybe somehow she would find them anyway.
About the Author
Robin Wasserman enjoys writing about high school-but wakes up every day grateful that she doesn’t have to relive it. She recently abandoned the beaches and boulevards of Los Angeles for the chilly embrace of the East Coast, as all that sun and fun gave her too little to complain about. She now lives and writes in New York City, which she claims to love for its vibrant culture and intellectual life. In reality, she doesn’t make it to museums nearly enough, and actually just loves the city for its pizza, its shopping, and the fact that at 3 a.m. you can always get anything you need-and you can get it delivered.
You can find out more about what she thinks of New York, L.A., books, shopping, pizza, life, the universe, and everything else at www.robinwasserman.com.
