WHEN PEARL GOT home, Dad was on the Beetle Cat, checking out the rigging and generally puttering around. She raised her hand to him as she started toward the house.
She was kicking off her flop-flops when she heard an engine. She looked out the screen door to see a silver Jaguar pull into the driveway. As she stared, Bridges got out, glancing over at Dad.
She was through the door and down the steps in an instant. “What’re you doing here?”
“I needed to talk to you. Your phone was off—”
“Did you follow me?” When he hesitated, her voice sharpened. “How did you find out where I live?”
Bridges put up his hands. “I asked around the club. Sorry. Was it supposed to be a secret?”
Dad was on his way over. Pearl’s entire body felt charged, intensely aware of how their one-story house must look, with scum from the elements clinging to the vinyl siding because Dad hadn’t pressure sprayed in a couple of years, the patches of dead grass in the yard, the rusty Fisher plow blade beside the shed.
“Everything okay?” Dad stopped at the edge of the driveway, his worn-out sneakers inches away from Bridges’s OluKai sandals.
“It’s fine.” Pearl couldn’t look at him.
“Hi.” Bridges put his hand out to shake with Dad. Pearl waited for some flash of recognition in his face, some sign of hey, aren’t you—?, but of course there was none. To him, Dad was just another faceless servant, trimming hedges and mulching gardens at the club. “Bridges Spencer. I’m a friend of Pearl’s. Good to meet you, sir.”
Dad shook with him. “Win.” His wariness was obvious, maybe waiting for this to somehow relate back to the club, to be told more trouble was coming down on the Haskins family, courtesy of the summer elite.
“He just stopped by,” she said lamely. Why hadn’t she stayed at Reese’s house longer? Bridges probably would’ve dropped this whole thing when he saw that her car wasn’t parked in the driveway.
“Okay. Well. Don’t let me hold you up.” With another quick scan of Bridges’s face, Dad made his way back toward the Cat, watching them go up the steps as he squatted down with his tools.
It had been a long time since a new person came into their house. Everywhere Pearl looked, humiliating things jumped into the foreground: dirty dishes in the sink, windows desperate for washing, faded hand towels, the general clutter on every surface. She went to the kitchen table immediately, stacking mail, sweeping crumbs into her palm, not looking at Bridges.
“Uh . . . sorry if this wasn’t”—he stood in the entryway, watching her—“look, don’t feel like you have to—”
“I don’t.” She shook the rattan place mats over the sink and straightened them in front of each chair with brisk movements. “So. What couldn’t wait until I checked my voice mail?”
“I wanted to say that what happened last night wasn’t okay. I know that. We never should’ve brought you guys out there.”
“You knew he was going to do that to us.”
“I hoped he wouldn’t. I figured we might check the place out and leave. I didn’t think, with Hadley there . . .” He saw Pearl reach for the broom, came over and touched her shoulder. “Stop. Okay? It doesn’t matter.”
Pearl barely resisted the impulse to shove his hand away, a reaction that surprised even her. She took a breath and faced him. “When Tristan turned off his flashlight, you didn’t hesitate. You say you’re sorry, but what about then? Why didn’t you do something?”
“That’s not how it works with Tristan.”
“You mean that’s not how it works with you when you’re with Tristan. You and Akil act like he’s God or something. It’s crazy. I mean, is that really what you guys do at night, cruise around finding new ways for him to torture you?” Bridges glanced away. “He tried the cave thing with you first, right? That’s what he meant when he said, ‘You managed to figure it out,’ about following the sound of water to the chamber pool.”
“He tried Akil first. Then they brought me.” Bridges pulled out a chair and sat, tugging absently at a lock of hair over his ear. “It’s not always like that. Sometimes it’s fun. We go all over the place. The islands, wherever. Explore some of the waterfront estates in Bar Harbor.”
“You mean trespass.” Oh, the irony.
“I guess. One time, we borrowed this boat.” He looked at her quickly. “The keys were in it. We didn’t hurt it or anything, just took it out on the bay to see what it could do and brought it back. Tristan . . . he’s not scared of anything. He doesn’t worry. None of my friends back home would have the balls to try that stuff. They wouldn’t even believe me if I told them about it. But it’s like if Tristan decides nothing can touch him, nothing can.”
She thought of Tristan’s rapt expression as they’d danced, as he’d told her about midnight defining him, about forcing himself out onto the dark sidewalks and beaches to run. That didn’t sound like somebody who was untouchable. Was it possible that the boys didn’t know about any of it? “But sometimes it’s more like last night, right? Like he’s pushing to see how far you’ll go for him.” No backing down now; she was into the fray. “Quinn told me about a video that was posted online last summer. She said it happened at a party you guys had.” She paused. “There was a girl.”
He gave his hair a final tug and then pressed his hand flat against the table, as if willing himself to stop fidgeting. “There are always girls.”
“I think this one was pretty memorable.”
His gaze went to the far wall, to a calendar they’d gotten from the heating oil company, covered bridges of New England. “It’s over now. Done. The video’s down, nobody else can watch it.”
“Decent of you.”
His eyes cut to her. “I didn’t say I did it. Seriously, you just assume it was me?” Pearl stared levelly back at him. “Did Quinn tell you that? Because she doesn’t know what she’s talking about. She wasn’t even there that night.” He sat forward. “Look, nobody made anybody do anything. And everybody was wasted. Tristan’s parents were out of town with Joe, so we pretty much cleaned out the bar.” Still she didn’t speak. “I was with Hadley then, so I didn’t—I’m not into that stuff, what happened upstairs.”
“But you were there?” She watched him rub his mouth with his hand, pulling his thumb slowly beneath his lower lip. “In the room?”
“No, no. At the party. Some of the guys were sharing the video around at the end of the night. I don’t know who posted it online.”
Pearl’s stomach did a slow slide, and she examined the pattern of the linoleum for a while until she felt like she could look at him again. “This girl knew somebody was filming her? And that people might see it?” Bridges hesitated. It was answer enough. “So now he’s got blackmail on anyone who was in that video. Or anyone whose girlfriend might not be too happy that he watched what happened upstairs.”
“Look, if we do something, it’s all in. If Tristan told on us for this kind of stuff, he’d get busted, too. And anyway, he never would. It’s more like . . . everything takes you deeper. You know? Even if one of us wanted to break away sometimes, or maybe say stop”—his gaze on her, almost pleading—“it’s already too late, because of everything else we’ve done. Does that make any sense?”
“It makes sense why Tristan would want you to feel that way. Then he owns you.” She didn’t wait for Bridges to make another excuse. “Does this mean that the next time Tristan thinks it’ll be fun to trick or trap me somewhere, you’ll go along?”
“No. No way.”
“Kind of hard to believe that after everything you just said.”
“I swear to God. He’s going through some dark stuff right now, and I get that, but I can’t keep messing with people. That’s his thing, not mine. College starts soon, and—I don’t want to be that guy anymore.” Bridges took a deep breath. “Are we okay? I don’t want to screw things up with you, Pearl. I like you.” He gave a half smile. “You don’t let me off the hook for anything.”
She waited, considering him. Then she put her hand out. “If we shake on it.”
Bridges shook. “Cool. Thanks.”
He left after that, he and Dad exchanging nods as Bridges got into the Jaguar, apparently one of his grandfather’s lesser rides. Pearl stepped back from the screen door before Dad turned toward the house, feeling like a coward, knowing she should go out there now and face up to whatever he had to say. She couldn’t; she felt drained, nothing left.
She curled up on the couch with her tablet until Dad came inside. She kept tabs on him from the corner of her eye, listening to him wash his hands at the kitchen sink. Had Bridges smelled alcohol coming from his pores after last night’s six-pack, like she could? Or was Reese right, it was an acquired skill? Dad turned, leaning against the counter. “What’s going on, Pearl?”
She sat up slowly, looking at him over the arm of the couch. “He’s a friend.”
“Since when do you have friends from the Row?” Dad didn’t sound angry, exactly; his speech was slow, measured.
“I met him in the dining room. He comes in a lot.” She waited to see if Dad knew who Bridges ran with, if he’d mention Tristan’s name.
“I thought you were too busy working to be meeting boys.” She flinched a little; he saw it, looked down, scuffed his thumb against his jeans. “What happened to Reese?”
“Nothing happened to him. He’s around.”
“Not like before. You’re telling me that’s got nothing to do with this Spencer kid?”
“I’m telling you that Bridges is a friend. He wanted to talk.” She didn’t know how much longer she could keep her voice steady when he wouldn’t look at her, when this whole thing felt like losing Reese all over again, times ten. “Dad? Are you listening? I’m not—” Switching sides. Turning on you. I haven’t forgotten. “Just please trust me. Okay?” He didn’t answer. “Okay?”
It was such a lame note to end on, but exhausted tears were threatening now. He nodded a little, looking around the kitchen, maybe noting her hasty attempt at straightening up. “The Cat sold.”
It took her a moment to understand. “What?” The word escaped on a breath. “When?”
“Yesterday. A guy pulled in, made me an offer after I got off work. I was going to tell you about it last night.” The implication was clear, that she’d been out too late and he wasn’t happy about it; like she was the one always gone, spending half her life at the Tavern. “He’s coming by with a trailer tomorrow.”
Pearl set her jaw, but it still trembled. “Oh.” She took a short breath through her nose. “You’re really going to—”
“Don’t have a lot of choice, do I?” He left the counter and went out the door then, leaving her sitting there with no reason to stop the hot tears from tracing down her cheeks.