Class - Cecily Von Ziegesar [17]
“Jesus.” Tom gagged at the mention of blood and kept walking. “Almost died,” he snorted disparagingly as he struggled to regain his composure. “You probably just got a concussion and dreamt the whole thing.”
Eliza glared at his back. Asshole.
“Maybe it was just hormones,” Nick inferred from behind her. “Because of—you know—what happened the next day?”
“Shush!” Tom stopped. “Do you hear that?”
The sound of Guns N’ Roses’ “Sweet Child O’ Mine” echoed through the woods.
“Come on.” Tom broke into a run. The way he ran, dodging the trees, reminded Eliza of horror movies. Freshman Orientation: The Haunting.
Up ahead, Tom could see the old logging road. Then he saw where the music was coming from. Shipley was behind the wheel of the van, doing slow figure eights in the road. It looked like she was giving herself a driving lesson of sorts. The radio blared obnoxiously. She spotted them and pulled up. Her pale blue eyes glowed in the half-light.
“Anyone up for Dunkin’ Donuts?”
4
The sheep were out grazing and the house was quiet. Ellen and Eli Gatz had gone out west to a crafts fair in Stanley, Idaho, and left Adam and Tragedy in charge. The sheep could take care of themselves. It was Tragedy who needed stewardship. If left to her own devices, she would have pawned every pawnable object in the house and hitchhiked to Rio by now. She would have drunk all the wine and burned the house down. Not that she was irresponsible. Quite the contrary—her teachers often said that she was fifteen going on fifty. But she was easily bored, and, as she liked to remind everyone in the family on a daily if not hourly basis, she couldn’t wait to get the fuck out of Dodge. Her bedroom was filled with travel guides.
Tonight they watched reruns of Scooby Doo while Tragedy played “Global Fashion Charades,” a game she’d invented. She tried on every odd article of clothing in the house—flippers, long underwear, fishing waders, snowmobile suits, beekeeping hats, sunbonnets, snowshoes, hunting vests—and Adam had to guess what sort of international fashion disaster she was dressed as.
“What am I now?” she asked, jigging noisily across the living room in her mother’s wooden clogs and a white bikini, a fringed green and yellow plaid blanket tied at her waist. Tragedy could tell Adam was nervous about starting at Dexter tomorrow. She was trying to make him laugh. So far it wasn’t working. Adam was wound way too tight.
“Loud?” Adam replied. “Annoying?”
“I’m a Scottish hula dancer,” she declared, stomping her feet and undulating her arms like a deranged octopus. “I’d play the bagpipes, but we haven’t got any.”
Adam picked up the discarded red flannel shirt from her Australian kanga hunter costume and tossed it at her. “Please put your clothes back on,” he begged.
His sister seemed to forget that she was no longer five. She seemed not to realize that clogging in a too-small bikini top in front of her brother was entirely inappropriate. If only she had friends who could tell her what was okay and what wasn’t, but the girls from school all hated her. Her legs, eyelashes, and hair were all longer than theirs. She’d started wearing a bra in fifth grade. She was their nemesis.
“Scooby dooby doo, where are you…?” Tragedy kicked the clogs off her feet and removed the blanket from her waist as she sang.
Adam averted his eyes and sighed. His life thus far had been full of these bored, tiresome moments, but at least it was quiet at home with their parents away. The Gatzes never ceased shouting. Not because they were angry, they simply preferred to shout. And the more Tragedy riled them up, the louder they shouted. The house was almost peaceful with them gone, although still not peaceful enough for him to really think. Not with Tragedy around. She never shut up.
“…the way you shake and shiver…,” Tragedy sang. She dropped the plaid blanket on the floor and tied a white chef’s apron over