Part Two

anecdoche: a conversation in which everyone is talking, but nobody is listening.

XI.

i've been hating everything, everything that could have been
could have been my anything, now everything's embarrassing

The Clearwater telephone rang at seven thirty-five one Saturday evening in June. Leah held her pillow tighter over her head and rolled onto her stomach. She groaned. Can't anyone see that I'm so preoccupied doing absolutely nothing?

She waited for the phone to stop ringing so she could finally sleep in peace. Being the day after graduation, Leah would finally, finally, finally be able to really sleep. She could have done the thing typical of kids her age in the badlands and dropped out, but she had too much pride for that. She just didn't have enough pride to really give the end of school her all. It was over, though. She had done it. The treacherous journey that was high school was finally over and now she could get a nine-to-five job and get married and have three kids and go to Disney World and live the White American Dream.

Or something.

The phone didn't stop ringing. She found herself in a tired, angry haze as she walked to her living room, and she silently cursed at Seth for not being here to answer the phone. He was never home. Then again, what could she really say? Fuck you for having a better social life than me?

Leah picked up the phone, not really having an idea of who was calling. Probably a bill collector. Sue had a bad habit of not paying bills on time, but it wasn't entirely her fault. Leah braced herself to listen to the phone for two seconds and then hang up.

"Come out and feel the sun." It was Kim.

Leah's tone was more sour than usual. "I have windows for that."

"You're cold as ice, Clearwater."

"You already know, Conweller."

"Oh, Leah, what's got you pissed?" Kim was really good at sounding on the verge of condescending but not condescending enough for Leah to get mad. Kim didn't know about everything that had happened between her and Paul because Leah hadn't said anything, but she had a good idea. Kim just thought that Leah should get over it, but she didn't get it. She would never get Leah and Paul and everything concerning them. Nobody would.

"I'm a high school graduate and I'd like to sleep for the first time in four years, but you're kinda interrupting that," Leah said bluntly. "Something big's gotta be going down since you're not sleeping, either. Or you're high again."

"Sleep later," Kim told her, ignoring her comment. "Come down to the beach."

Leah absentmindedly twirled the phone cord around her left wrist as she cradled the phone between her ear and shoulder. The cord could wrap around her left wrist four times. She wondered how long it would be before she cut off her own circulation.

"Hello?" Kim asked, making sure Leah was still on the line.

"Yeah?"

"You coming?"

"Wait, what's going on, again?"

"I think some people came home."

Leah unwrapped her wrist, hung up the telephone, put on her sneakers, and ran.

She ran all of the two blocks to First Beach, effectively permeating her shoes with sand, but she didn't mind. Sand-filled shoes meant the beginning of summer, the beginning of something not at all new, but just as promising, even for someone as pessimistic as her. First Beach was a beacon, though; it could bring about anything, and everything always came back.

She instantly recognized her all friends when she got there. She had to have been the last person to arrive. Kim was the first person Leah saw, and she was—naturally—with Jared, his huge arm wrapped around her. Leah wanted to ask about the girl Kim had kissed at Prom just to spite Jared, but she couldn't focus on being petty at the moment.

When people were starting to make their way down to the beach at their own pace, Leah latched Kim's arm and pulled her aside while Jared started to walk with Jacob.

"What's going on?" Leah asked. "Who the hell is here?"

Kim stared ahead and nodded in that direction. At that moment, Leah hated her. It was an irrational hatred, but she still hated her.

Among the group of people that Leah saw—the people that had always been here and would always be here—the only new person was Quil. It was only Quil. Nobody else.

Kim felt Leah tense up. "I know it's not Paul—"

"It's whatever," Leah said with a shrug, and she instantly closed up again. The hint of excitement that had captured her just at the possibility of the Incredible Return of Paul Lahote was enough to make her want to die. Now that she saw that he truly wasn't here and would never be here again, she felt completely embarrassed. She could feel herself burning from the embarrassment.

"I'm sorry," Kim told her. "I really am."

Leah nodded. "Yeah."

"Will you stay?"

"So you lied to me to get me to leave the house?"

"Quil's still our friend," Kim reminded Leah. "He's been our friend since we were kids."

"First of all," Leah said, "Quil's your friend. You know he's always annoyed me. And don't you think it's kinda fucked up how you had me thinking Paul was back?"

Kim shook her head impatiently. "I didn't at all imply that Paul was back, so I don't know where you got that idea from. And my bad for not knowing you hate Quil. It's hard to tell since you're so bitter to everyone all the time."

"It's whatever," Leah said again, trying to be cool but boiling with anger underneath it all.

"You can go home if you want," Kim told her.

"I'm already here."

"But you're clearly not happy about it."

Leah would never give somebody the benefit of getting her to leave. She was really passive-aggressive in that way, and it drove Kim mad, but Kim had always stuck with Leah through thick and thin—for the most part, at least. They had more history than anything.

"I'll stay," Leah said. "Is Em here?"

They started walking down to the driftwood benches, where everybody else was. The group had just exploded with laughter—Quil Ateara was back, for sure. Even if Leah didn't particularly like him, she couldn't deny that he really was the life of the party, even as he'd been gone for over two years.

"I think so," Kim answered.

Leah and Kim approached the group, and Kim quickly found a spot next to Jared. He wrapped his arm around her again, and Leah felt the urge to roll her eyes. She had a good number of friends, but of course, it was her best friend to be the one to date the guy that Leah disliked the most. Leah had always gotten bad vibes from Jared—besides the fact that his narcissism was a prime reason as to why she lost her scholarship to UPenn, he just rubbed her the wrong way. Also, he constantly made Kim feel inadequate, which Leah hated. Even lately, Kim and Jared had been having issues. Between Prom and graduation, they had broken up and gotten back together again twice. Whenever Leah pointed this out to Kim, Kim just brushed it off because Leah's general disposition was bitter. That didn't mean she was wrong, though.

Leah found Emily and sat on her right. Embry was on Emily's left, and Leah waved to him.

"Finally decided to leave the basement?" Leah asked.

"Decided to pay my yearly visit."

Leah smiled. "I appreciate it."

She looked at Emily, who was looking down at the tablet in her lap. "How's it going?" Leah asked. She hadn't seen her in a while since Emily hadn't been able to make it to her graduation because of her job. She missed her.

Emily tapped away at the device. She was on a word processor, but Leah didn't read because she knew how Emily got about people reading what she wrote: angry.

Emily quickly finished typing and saved the document. She looked up at Leah and sat up straighter. "It's going good," she said.

Leah stretched her legs out, her heels digging into the sand, and she stared out at the ocean. At First Beach, sometimes she felt like she was at the edge of the world even though she knew it wasn't.

"You been taking care of yourself, girl?" Leah asked.

"Yeah," Emily said, staring down at the sand. "Thanks for asking. How are you?"

"I'm fi—Wait, what the fuck is Claire doing here with Quil?"

Emily looked in the same direction as Leah with scrunched up eyebrows. Just under the sun stood Claire, Emily's fourteen-year-old cousin from the Makah rez, and she walked with Quil, hand-in-hand.

Leah stood up and walked towards them, Emily following. Leah paid Quil no mind. "What are you doing here?" she asked Claire. Even though she wasn't technically related to her, Leah treated her like her own family.

"It's a free beach," Claire said, her tone brattier than usual. She had just gotten braces, too, which didn't make her look any less bratty.

"Thanks for the welcome home, Lee," Quil said sarcastically.

"You're a sick fuck, Quil," Leah replied.

Emily turned to Claire. "Who are you living with right now?" she asked the young girl quietly.

"Grandma," Claire replied.

Emily nodded in understanding.

"Why did you bring a fourteen-year-old down here?" Leah snapped at Quil.

"I'll be fifteen in August," Claire interjected.

"Doesn't matter," Leah said, still staring at Quil. "You brought this kid down here as your date while you're eighteen years old. You're a damn adult and you're dating this girl. I ought to call the cops."

"Sheesh, I didn't kidnap the girl," Quil said. "You don't know what we've got."

"I have a good fucking idea," Leah said, balling up her fists. "What the fuck do you want to do with a fourteen-year-old girl, anyway, Quil? What's so fucking sexy about braces and training bras and pink Sketchers? Huh?"

She got closer to him and he started to back up. He was a little taller than her, but he was still the same punk-ass kid she'd been annoyed with from the start.

"Back up, Leah," he warned her, puffing out his chest.

"What are you gonna do about it?" she asked. "Knowing your weak ass, you wouldn't do shit about it. I should knock your teeth out for trying to fuck a kid. What, did the weed kill all your brain cells? Do you not have any sense at all?"

Suddenly, there was a crowd around them. Something semi-big always happened whenever they all linked up. All the sharks had smelled the blood and started swimming. Jared was the first to come up and pull them apart. He went to Leah and started to pull her back.

"Chill out, Lee," he said.

She shoved him. "Get off of me, Jared. You should be holding back your boy Quil over here, since he's just dying to get into a fourteen-year-old girl's pants."

"Shut the fuck up," Jared said to her.

She turned and shoved him again, harder this time. It took him all his strength to not push her back. "Fuck off."

"Ease up, Lee," Jacob said.

Leah ignored him and turned back to Quil. "Don't you dare touch her," she told him. "I'll fucking ruin you."

She backed up and turned to Claire. "Me and Em are gonna take you home," Leah said. She looked at Emily. "Right, Em?"

"Yeah."

The three of them started to make their way back to the parking lot. They were almost at Emily's car, a red Dodge Stratus, when they heard yelling. Emily and Leah stopped and turned around. Claire waited at the car.

"You're always taking Leah's side, Kim!" Jared yelled, completely unaware of how loud he was. "I'm starting to think you're dating her instead of me."

"She's my best friend," Kim retorted. "And we both know Quil's wrong. Why are you defending him? Just because he's your weed dealer doesn't mean you have to be his bitch."

"You don't have to be Leah's bitch," he told her. "You're turning more into her every single day, and I don't like it."

Kim truly was a nice girl with nice intentions, but because of that reason alone, she would never stop being nice and start defending herself. She only stopped being so nice when she had to stick up for somebody else, like Ashley—or in this case, Leah.

Kim would protect anyone she cared about except herself.

"Good," she said. "I'd rather be real and like Leah than be a fake to make you feel better."

"You're really gonna regret saying that, Kim," Jared told her.

"I doubt it. Now leave me the fuck alone."

She started to walk towards Leah and Emily with her pride on her shoulders. Jared was cursing to himself and walking back to the beach. He wouldn't be upset forever; he'd just smoke the feeling away tonight with Quil, who clearly hadn't gotten clean in Neah Bay. Kim was serious, though. She and Jared were over for good. She couldn't see himself forgiving him ever again because there was no fucking way he was going to say that about Leah ever again.

Leah, Emily, and Claire were silent as Kim approached them.

"Neah Bay's an hour-and-a-half drive, right?" Kim asked. "We better get going."

She climbed into the backseat behind Leah, Leah got the shotgun seat, and Claire got behind Emily, who quickly started to drive away.

After dropping Claire off at her grandma's house in Neah Bay, Emily turned up the radio a little and started to drive towards Port Angeles.

"I don't wanna go back to La Push," she said.

Leah smiled. "Me neither."

They were driving for a while, Kim leaning forward behind Leah, when Kim asked, "So what's the deal with Quil and Claire?"

"They met up in Neah Bay," Emily said. "I didn't know they were a thing until today, though. I haven't seen either of them around."

"Claire seems like a little ho," Kim remarked.

"Her mom's never around," Emily explained. "She's staying with our grandma right now, so her mom must be out of it again. And, anyway, I wouldn't call her a ho when it was more than likely Quil who came onto her first."

"Sorry, my mistake," Kim said. She nudged Leah. "I wish you got to fight Quil back at the beach."

"Me, too," Leah said. "I was ready to beat his ass. Like, you don't fuck with underage girls. I don't know how he didn't see how wrong that is. I know he's your friend and all, but—"

"He's not my friend," Kim clarified. "He's Jared's friend. And fuck Jared."

"Did you guys break up for real back there?" Emily asked.

"Yeah," Kim replied. "For real and for good. I want nothing to do with him anymore."

"Fight night almost popped off back at the beach," Emily recalled. "Things got wild real quick."

"It felt good," Kim said. "Breaking up with Jared, I mean."

Leah smiled to herself. "I'm proud of you, Bambi," she said.

"Thanks, babe." Kim turned to Emily. "What are we gonna do in Port Angeles?"

"Anything we want," Emily replied.

"Good," Leah said, "'cause I'm hungry."

Upon entering Port Angeles, Emily drove as they all searched for the nearest McDonald's. Out in the badlands, they just couldn't get the classic fast food corporation's delicacies every day. When they saw the golden arches to heaven, it was practically Christmas morning.

At around ten that night, the three of them sat inside McDonald's and shared a pile of chicken nuggets and French fries. Nothing was wrong for the moment. They laughed over stupid shit like old friends, and when it was all said and done, they walked around the streets of the main part of Port Angeles like they knew the place. The closest thing people like them had to a big city was alive, and they embraced it with open arms.

They walked past a tattoo parlor, and Kim jokingly said she was going to get a tattoo except it wasn't a joke. Before Kim entered, Leah asked if she was high. Kim just laughed it off. Leah could keep believing Kim was a druggie, but she hadn't done molly since Prom night. Kim was just feeling more brave and free at the moment.

Leah and Emily just side-eyed each other as they followed Kim into the tattoo shop.

It took hours, but once it was over, Kim had tattoos of angel wings on her upper back. It wasn't anything too crazy, but Kim felt victorious. (Leah thought the idea of angel wings was cheesy, but she didn't say anything.)

When they all got back to Emily's car, all that Kim could do was laugh.

"What's so funny?" Leah asked.

"I think I've finally stopped caring."

A/N: I think I'll maintain my Monday-Wednesday-Friday flow. There are a lot of chapters in this story and I don't want to take up a whole year writing it. Thanks as always,

HS