Page 83 of The Debutantes
“Vivian.”
The way he said my name. It was almost the way he said hers, like it meant something.
I looked away. “She says you’re, like, the perfect boyfriend.Like, you’re all considerate and nice and basically a goddamn knight in shining armor.” My face was getting warm, which made me feel stupid. “She also thinks you’retotallyhumble and secure and not at all fishing for compliments, so—”
He sat up, making me stop cold.
The way he was looking at me then… it was almost the way he looked at her. Almost, but different. Wyatt looked at Lily like she was some perfect thing he couldn’t believe he got to hold in his hands. In that moment, he was looking at me like I was real. Like I was something he wanted.
He leaned in, and I sucked in a breath, my heart thudding against my rib cage. Wyatt’s mouth was inches away from mine, hovering there like he was waiting for an okay, like all it would take for him to stop was me telling him to. Ineededto tell him to stop.
But all I could think of was how Lily had snapped at me outside.Just leave it.
All I could think of was Wyatt saying she was done with him. How they weren’t broken up,not yet,but they would be.
All I could think was how badly I wanted to close the gap.
So I did.
I’ve never been a girl to romanticize my first time. I always figured at best, it would be fine, and at worst, it would hurt a little. So maybe, I told myself, this wasn’t the worst way, doing it with someone who didn’t love me. At least he knew me. We knew each other. I’d memorized plenty about him, from the brand of protein bar he always eats before practice to the way he taps his pencil against his knuckles when he doesn’t know the answer on a test. And maybe I’d been wondering what it would feel like to be looked at the way he looked at her. Kissed the way he kissed her.
It was quick. He finished. I didn’t, and he didn’t ask me if I did.
After, I didn’t feel any different, at least not in the ways you’re supposed to. All I felt was a weight start to settle on my chest as I watched him get dressed again, his back turned to me.
I didn’t want to ask, because I already knew the answer, but it came out anyway. “Did you and Lily ever…?”
He shook his head.
The weight got heavier. Wyatt walked to the door, stopping before he opened it. “Don’t tell anyone.”
“Obviously,” I said, not looking at him.
He left. I got dressed. And that was it.
A few days later, Wyatt and Lily were back together, like nothing had ever happened. Besides a few small moments of tension, things I couldn’t tell if I was imagining, they seemed exactly the same. As perfect as ever.
And maybe I did imagine it. All of it. It was easier to think of it that way. Easier thanthis. But as terrible as this feels, the worst part is the tiny flash of vindication. Because itwasreal. For a moment, I felt it. The way Lily must have felt when he looked at her.
I stop walking. I’m past Jackson Square now, past Café Du Monde, too, veering into the part of Decatur Street where the crowd thins out and the shadows stretch long from the streetlamps. It hits me how I must look right now, a girl in a dirty ball gown, all alone.
And somewhere, April is just as much an easy target. I pull out my phone to call her, but when I tap the screen, it doesn’t light up.
No.I press the power button, andno, no, no.The little dead-battery image blinks, mocking me.
Okay. This is fine. I can find a drugstore or something that’sopen and buy a charger, walk to a bar and beg to borrow an outlet. But then, just as I’m turning around, I see him.
Detective Marty Rutherford stands a block away, his cloth mask floating like a ghost in the breeze. His hands are in his suit pockets, and even through the mask, I can feel the slow smile creeping on his lips.
I run. Heart pounding, wondering how I could be so stupid. Here I am, doing theonething my parents have always told me not to do, walk alone in this city at night, and now this might be how it ends: at the hands of a man who won’t get caught, all because I made reckless choices. Is this how Margot felt?
Or Lily?
I just need to get back to the crowd, I think, as I cross the street. Somewhere safe, somewhere—
A car screeches its brakes in front of me, the driver sitting on the horn. I freeze in the blinding headlights, adrenaline pulsing through me as the car skids to a stop, just a few feet from hitting me.
The door opens, and someone climbs out. I still can’t see them in the glare of the headlights, but then there’s a familiar voice.
