The evening throbs quietly with the muted sounds coming from the gymnasium, and with a hiss and a click the streetlights turn on. They flood the town with a deep orange light that penetrates the purple dusk, turning the streets into long catwalks dappled in shadows.
She is right under one, slouching in the driver's seat, and when the bulb flinches twice and snaps on, it's as though she is the actor on the stage whom the spotlight pins.
She stands there still, like a dancer awaiting the music, the cue.
Slowly her hand raises up to her mouth, the glowing firefly tip of the cigarette lights up, blinded by the buzzing streetlight. The rest of her is motionless.
A thin stream of smoke curls slowly from between her half open lips, descending upwards into the night.
She's wearing her uniform and white, thin flip flops on her feet, poms and shoes in a neglected pile on the hood.
With the slow, hypnotic grace of a feline, a tiger, she turns her strange, glittering eyes on him. Without seeming to raise a finger, she makes a motion somehow towards him that seems to say, come here. And drawn by the picture she is painted in, he feels himself magnetically drawn to this terrible girl who languorously drops her cigarette, and stubs it out with two precise twists of her foot.
They say nothing. An insolent, sleepy smile is curling on her lips, and her head tilts back slowly, resting on the leather. Her long legs sprawl out, knees together, then a little less, than back together again.
He says nothing.
Her mood seems to change, flickering imperceptibly like the streetlight.
She jumps to her feet, her smile welcoming, and hurriedly grabs her shoes, pulling socks on her feet.
"Hey there point guard," she grins. He is mesmerized by the sudden change for a second, then shrugs it off. He picks up a pompom and turns it slowly in his hands as though it is diseased. He shakes it a little, feigning fear at the rustling sound. He looks at it closer, and then pretends it is choking him. With both hands, he grabs it and flings it off, wiping imaginary sweat off his brow. She's laughing without abandon, and he loves it when he hears her laughing like that, this choky giggly smoky laugh.
"I knew those things were evil. You know you can't see your hands when you're holding them because they're so massive? When I was little I thought pompoms ate whoever's hand grabbed them and that all the cheerleaders didn't have hands, just these big fluffly blue and white things."
She shakes her head, taking a deep breath.
"You're so weird," she giggles, pulling herself up and slamming the door shut. "Let's go or you'll be late and Brooke with carve me up and serve me with Calorie-Free Ranch."
She grabs his hand, half running half walking, and drags him along with her, his protests echoing through the empty parking lot.
"And a one. And a two. And-a, one-a, two-a, thhhreeeee-damn it!!!!! Courtney, are you motion dyslexic? Cause I said to the right, not to the left!"
This is Lila.
This is practice.
Brooke's voice is slow and measured, rhythmic, almost like a song. The hands are clapping in slow motion.
"Ex-tra, ex-tra, reeeeaaaadddallllabbbbouuuuttttit. The-Ra-ven-s are-the-best and there's nnooooddddddoooouubbbtttabouut-it-."
Peyton is slowly swinging her arms, thinking about how to finish some stupid English essay.
"For Christ's sake, Jill, stop acting rhythmically retarded and keep beat! Gina, you need to lose a few pounds or Jamie WILL drop you on the toss. And Laney, so help me god if that nose-ring is real I'll yank it out with my bare hands! People, what IS GOING ON!!!"
Peyton cringes at the sound of Lila's voice." Poor thing must be upset," thinks Peyton maliciously. "She's probably just found out she has a hole in her esophagus. Brooke is gritting her teeth hard enough to do damage to that perfect dental job of hers. And Gina could stand to lose a few pounds, and I can tell, because I have to toss her too."
Then, "Christ, what is with me today?"
She turns around and sees everyone's puzzled face. She pales, wondering what she's said out loud.
"Peyton, did you just say what is with me today?" giggles Brooke.
She sighs in relief.
"I must have."
"You seem really distracted," says Lila in saccharine sweet tones. "I hope it's nothing grave, like an abortion."
The tittering stops.
Peyton opens her mouth to deliver the final blow.
Lucas' face flashes lightning quick before her eyes.
She walks up to Lila. The other girl is standing her ground, her narrow green eyes barely flickering with a little fear. Peyton is a few good inches taller.
But there is no strike, no blow, no hit.
Instead, Peyton leans down very close to Lila's ear.
"Miss Christian Coalition," whispers Peyton, her tone so low she knows none but Lila can hear it. "You forget last summer I worked in your doctor's office, which would mean I had full access to your file."
Lila is deathly pale and mute.
"Let's keep this between us, shall we?"
And Peyton stands up, eyeing the girls that are in little groups, watching them and whispering.
"Show's over. Brooke, stop grinding your teeth. Gina, you do need to lose two pounds honey cause I don't have that much muscle. Everyone else, stop FUCKIN STARING!!!"
And with that, she marches out of the gym. She throws her stupid poms in her convertible, taking a deep breath.
And she knows it's really corny, but she still feels a little good about herself.
She's home on her bed when the door flings open.
A grinning Brooke throws herself on Peyton's bed.
"What is wrong with you, you psycho?" she laughs, diving on top of Peyton, pretending to strangle her. "First you go schizo, talking to nobody. Then you throw away the perfect chance to destroy Lila Slater, EVERYONE could see you had some dirt on her! Then, you go psycho and march out. Have you been raiding the medicine cabinet?"
Laughing, Peyton throws Brooke off her.
"Hey retard, the webcam's on! There's probably a hundred pervs watching this right now."
Brooke shrugs, blowing a kiss at the screen.
"So are you gonna tell me the dirt on Lila?"
"Nope."
Brooke suddenly turns serious, sitting on the bed.
"Well you know, Peyton, everybody now thinks you might have had something to do with an abortion."
Peyton pales.
"What?"
"Well, from the way the convo went, it sounded as though Lila had hit some sore spot so you blackmailed her into silence. They're wondering, Peyton."
The blond girl sits still for a second, regaining her composure.
Then, a giggle.
Brooke looks at her incredulously.
"Not funny, Peyton. You'll be hailed as the next prom-mom before you know it! This is serious business!!"
But Peyton is grinning.
"You know it's not true. Nathan and Lucas know it's not true. Who else do I give a crap? Nobody. Can't kick me off the squad for a rumor," she shrugs.
Brooke tilts her head, processing this.
"Yeah but,"
"Yeah but what? Do you think the school has a good opinion of us anyway? Besides, all they'll be talking about is what could Lila Slater have possibly done that is BAD?????????"
The two of them erupt into laughter.
Brooke looks at her curiously.
"Hey how come you didn't destroy Lila? And what's with all this sudden laughing and stuff of your own volition?"
"Volition? Geez Brooke don't tell me you've been reading the thesaurus again."
"I couldn't go to sleep! Besides, I was trying to find other ways of saying let's have sex. Technically, there's more than twenty I've found so far."
Peyton rolls her eyes.
"That sounds more like you."
"Thanks," replies the redhead airily, flopping backwards on the bed. "Now answer the question."
Peyton shrugs, staring into nowhere.
"Guess I just don't want to be so mad anymore."
Brooke snaps her gum, examining an unraveling stuffed animal.
"So what, are you going to start hanging out with Hailey now or something?"
"Maybe."
Brooke looks up, her face suddenly incredulous. She crosses her arms across her stomach, and Peyton knows Insecure Brooke when she sees her.
She dives on the other girl, pretending to strangle her, returning the exact favor.
"Silly Brooke. You know you're still my "second on Thunder Road," she says in her loud, corny "Pubescent Nerd" voice that she hasn't done for Brooke in ages. It sends the other girl into gales of laughter just like it always has, every summer at that stupid camp they spent together, everytime Brooke cried on the first night cause she missed home.
Brooke sits up, hair frizzed out.
"Ok, Peyton just made a Grease reference. This is way too weird people. I can't take so much in one day."
She heads towards the door, looking at her friend in wonderment, with a soft sigh.
"It's nice having you back, Peyton. You're almost like you were before……"
Her sentence stops short right there. Peyton's face has fallen back into her sullen mask, eyes sunkenly glaring at Brooke.
"I'm sorry," the other girl says, quickly exiting.
Peyton says nothing, just sits there. The tires of Brooke's car squeal in the driveway and fade in the distance.
Then her mouth wobbles.
"Hey, why don't you say it out loud, huh? Before your MOTHER died!" she yells after Brooke, at nobody really. Nobody is listening. "I hate your stupid, condescending, insensitive ass!!!!" she screams as loud as she can, kicking the door shut with a slam that shakes the house.
Bitterly, she turns towards the computer and furiously shuts off the webcam before the burning, humiliating tears come out.
In his room, Lucas shakes his head slowly.
He doesn't send a note. He doesn't want her to know he's seen this. It would only make her hate him.
He comes over to her house that evening.
They sit together on the living room rug, a rug that could use a good vacuuming. He notices little coffee mug circles on the counters, spots on the stove, and a thick layer of dust on the mantel. The loneliness of the place is striking, it's a house without a human touch to keep it alive.
Self consciously, she rubs at a cigarette burn on the carpet.
"Hey," he smiles gently, "Focus."
Papers are spread out all over the floor, like a snowstorm. Books are piled on the coffee table, and a big red poster board is propped up against the tv. The muted sounds of her "loser rock" filter through the walls from her room, and the toaster dings.
"Dinner is done," she mutters, springing up. She wonders what he thinks of a girl that makes no effort to clean and whose cooking is limited to pop tarts and microwave meals. His mother knows how to do all that stuff so well. Don't guys like that kind of crap?
But he doesn't seem to mind. He accepts the pop-tarts happily, praising her culinary genius, asking her if she's hand rolled the dough herself, making her smile again. He helps her with her English essay, pulling out the long ignored John Steinbeck and searching for the passages Jake marked for him. Relieved, she constructs a halfway decent essay, and then does all the decorative work on his poster. So she's no genius, but she does have a flair for lettering and a steady hand with the marker. He watches her carefully gluing, examining in almost childlike delight the results, and munching on her pop-tart in a smug, self satisfied manner. He loves watching her, her small idiosyncrasies and jerky movements, her messy hair that's always sitting in a halo around her head, illuminated gold by the lamplight. She takes pleasure in these little attentions he offers, feeling like the star of her own show, and the warmer, more charming things in her personality come out gradually, feeling their way towards daylight tentatively.
While he's typing up the last of his report, she goes to the kitchen and hesitantly dampens a sponge. She takes a swipe at the stove, and stares at the gleaming black revealed. In two minutes she's cleaned the whole stovetop.
Then he's right by her side, soundlessly in that jungle cat way of his.
"Let me help," he says, and his voice is so kind it almost makes her cry.
He lays out the cleaners for her, and explains each one. He finds a roll of paper towels in the crowded pantry and gives her directions, emptying out countless takeout leftovers from the fridge, vacuuming and washing dishes. Hesitantly, she follows his lead, soon feeling pleased with the white countertops that emerge and the disappearing grime. She turns up the music and finds a mop in the dark garage, wiping down the floor. She ties her hair back and changes into an undershirt, drying the dishes, spraying him with the hose, and dusting off the living room. One hour later, exhausted, they fall down on the couch looking around in satisfaction.
She's just looking at him, unsure of what to say.
"Thank you," she smiles a little.
He shrugs.
"I do this all the time at home anyway. It's more fun with you here. Besides, you did my poster."
She pushes a damp strand of hair out of her face. She's sitting close enough to him to feel the warmth emanating from his body in the cool room. She looks down.
"My dad's always gone and I get so caught up in other stuff….we don't really…"
"It's ok," he says simply, and she really all of a sudden feels like it is.
She looks up at him.
He smiles, and wipes a tiny smudge off her face with the back of his hand. It's a casual gesture.
But when he kisses her, it's very slow and measured, careful, as though he's afraid to frighten her again.
Very lightly, his hand lands on the back of her neck as she lets her head tilt back slowly. Her eyelids droop closed. His mouth is tender and gentle, the kiss more of a promise than a demand. Both of his hands are cradling her cheeks now, and he kisses her forehead. She feels weird and shaky and sad all of a sudden, less in control then she'd like to be. Her kiss is humble, less brash, less self assured. His arms wrap around her slowly, pulling her close, and she burrows her head into his chest, clutching at the warm cotton. Blinking, she fights back tears and swallows then with a vengeance. Her face hardens up again, but it is less angry this time. Something has left permanently.
"I think about you all the time," he's whispering in her hair. "I worry about you being all alone here."
She clenches her fists, and stiffens up a little, leaning away from him.
"I can take care of myself," she says, her voice unsteady. "I've been doing fine on my own for forever and I don't need anyone coming in here and convincing me that I need help because when they leave too, it'll be twice as hard to do it all alone again."
And with this, she stands up rather abruptly.
"I think you'd better go," she tells him, but her voice is not harsh or angry. It's just soft and sad. "It's late and I'm so tired and confused."
He packs his things up and walks to the door quietly, turning around once outside.
She's lingering in the doorway, her face hidden in the shadows.
"I'm not here to make you weaker, Peyton," he says, voice clear and steady. "I'm just here to lend a hand when you need it. Maybe even teach you something new, something that will make you do even better on your own. No matter how many boys are around, you'll still always be on your own and I'm the only person who respects that. But I won't let you offend me away, push me away, try to make me dislike you. I'm still here, and I'll be here as long as you are. Feel free to make use of me."
She watches him departing, growing smaller and smaller. Without thinking, she hesitantly raises her hand up to her chest and makes a little waving motion.
As though he were psychic, at the same moment he turns around and sees her.
She pulls her hand back, as though burned, and runs inside.
But not before she sees the wide smile on his face, a smile that grows on hers, wider and wider until it hurts and she's can't restrain him. She looks at her sparkling house and all of a sudden there's laughter bubbling up and she's dancing around the living room like a little kid, making little yip sounds and throwing herself on the sofa breathless, biting the cushion. She calms down but the smile doesn't go away; she falls asleep with it plastered on her face, waking up with a cramp in her jaw in the morning.