Deadgirl

Chapter Eleven

Party Hardly

“No Taser, no party.”

I stared at my dad in horror. He sat calmly—his arms folded across each other in a little lazy X on the kitchen table. The dying sunlight streamed in through the window above the sink, back-lighting him, throwing him in sharp silhouette. He didn’t look angry, but he wasn’t joking either. Dad radiated Zen as he pushed the little black plastic box toward me. It slid across the table, two metal fangs bared.

“Technically a stun gun, honey,” Mom said as she floated by, dangling an empty coffee cup from one finger. “The Taser fires the barbs.”

“Thank you, honey,” Dad said. “No stun gun, no party.”

“Dad! You’re a freak,” I said, and stood up from the table.

“Sit, young lady.”

I sat, but I wasn’t happy about it. I rattled the table with my knees as I crossed my legs. The little black stun gun jumped on the table as if to say look at me.

“You were nearly killed or worse—”

I tried not to smirk at the “or worse.” Typical fatherly priorities.

“—and I’m still letting you go to a party, because I’m a good guy. And this particular good deed is going unpunished, do you hear me, Lucy?”

I sighed.

“You are carrying the stun-gun from now on, everywhere except school.”

“Is this even legal?” I whined. I could hear the teenage-girl-scorned in my voice, but I had no desire to disguise it. “Can a minor even carry one of these?”

Dad shrugged. “I’d rather a cop give you trouble than a thug or a murderer.”

I rolled my eyes.

“This isn’t an argument,” Dad said.

“No stun-gun, no party, right?”

“Right.”

“Then no party. I won’t go.”

Dad laughed.

“All right, I didn’t expect that,” Dad said. “But you still have to carry the thing.”

I groaned. It was actually the answer I expected—I’d much rather go to the party anyway, even if I had to carry it. Mostly I was just calling his bluff.

“Then I’m going,” I said, quickly.

“I figured,” Dad said.

“But I’m not—”

“Take the damn stun gun, baby,” Mom said and sat down next to me. “Keep it in your purse, no one will see it. Just…stop arguing.”

I groaned and scooped up the stun gun. Before I could put it into my purse, Dad stopped me.

“Wait,” he said. “Push the trigger.”

“Dad—”

“I want to make sure you know how to use it,” Dad said. “Push the trigger.”

It wasn’t hard to find. The button nuzzled my index finger when I grabbed the stun gun. I touched it, and a little blue arc zapped between the metal fangs. It made a horrific clacking noise, and I nearly dropped it.

“Upper shoulder, under the ribs, or above the hip. Got it?”

I rolled my eyes again and dropped it into my purse.

“I gotta go shower,” I said. “The girls will be over soon.”

Dad nodded and waved me away. I ran up the stairs to get ready.

As I showered, I let my mind wander.

I’d left school early after my disastrous kiss with Zack—I didn’t even want to think what would have happened if I’d let the kiss go on any longer. Would it be possible to hold my breath? Was it even air I was breathing?

I wasn’t exactly able to go home without incurring parental wrath. I’d hung around the Orient Express take-out, because I was both hoping to run into Puck again and I couldn’t think of anywhere else to go. By the time school ended I trotted back over and intercepted Morgan.

I deflected most of her queries about my truancy, just explaining that Ms. Crane had asked a few questions I wasn’t happy with and I’d bailed. Morgan frowned at that—I had promised to explain to her the reason I’d fled to her house in the middle of the night, something I’d yet to do, and I think the continued secrecy was digging at her. Still, she listened, unhappily, when I told her to keep the information from my mom. As far as she was concerned, I was at school all day.

I’d gotten home and been ambushed by my father. He demanded phone numbers for Benny’s house, his parents, his neighbors, his distant relatives, his ancestors, his pool boy, etc. I’d provided them all, and after a short discussion with Benny’s parents—who were in actuality Benny himself and Daphne on a three-way-call—Dad agreed to let me go.

By the time I left the shower, Daphne, Sara, and Wanda were already lounging around my room. Daphne lay across my bed, her head hanging off of the side facing me, and she was staring at me upside-down with her purple-black hair streaking across it like surreal streamers. She stuck her tongue out when I walked out of the bathroom. Sara sat in the window sill, and Wanda held her cheeks in her hands at my desk, staring at the wall.

“Ladies,” I said, and began collecting garments.

“Hey, Lucy,” Daphne said, and rolled around right-side up. She made a face and clutched her forehead. “Whoa. Brain rush.”

“Don’t you need a brain—” Sara began.

“—for that to work. Ha-effing-ha,” Daphne interrupted. “Your jokes are pedestrian and cheap.”

“So—” Sara began.

“—is my mom,” Daphne laughed. “Try again.”

Sara flashed her teeth at Daphne, threw her arms across her chest, and stared out the window. Daphne flashed me a victorious look, hopped off the bed, and cleaved to my side.

“So…did your dad buy it?”

Daphne grinned and waggled her eyebrows at me and threw her hair up into a quick faux ponytail—I imagine it was her attempt at miming mom-hair.

“How did I do?” she asked, inexplicably, with a British accent.

“You…didn’t use the accent did you?”

Daphne’s sour look answered that question.

“Well, Dad believed you were Benny’s mom,” I said. I couldn’t disguise the lilt of shame in my voice. “So I guess it worked.”

Daphne was, as usual, more perceptive then I gave her credit for. “Unhappy, babe?”

“Just worried.”

Sara, from the windowsill, grunted.

“What?” I asked.

“I think you should be worried,” Sara said. “I think you’re taking advantage of your dad, who’s just scared and wanting to make you happy.”

“What?” I said again, because I agreed with her and wanted to hear her take on it.

“Morgan agrees with me,” Sara said. Both Wanda and Daphne flashed her dirty looks. “But that’s it. I agreed not to say anything else.”

Daphne let out a sigh that sounded like a zeppelin deflating. She hooked her arm in mine and led me over to the closet. Her quick hands swept through my hangers, dresses, and blouses with a keen eye and a familiarity of my wardrobe that I didn’t like. She removed a red pin-striped pencil skirt from the tangle and spun it on its