Crystal Grader, Tag Cavello [best books to read for beginners txt] 📗

from Crystal. “Shit. You’re right. I don’t.”

“So we abort?”

Now she gave her friend an irritated look. “What the fuck, Lucy? Is this Battlestar Galactica? No, we don’t abort.”

“What then?”

“Let me think.”

“Oh shit.”

“Shut up.”

Half a minute went by. One car passed in the direction of Norwalk without slowing down. A raccoon scuttled across the road and was dive-bombed by a bat.

“You should see yourself,” Lucy laughed. “You need to grow a beard so you can stroke your chin.”

“All right, fuck it,” Crystal said. “We sneak in through the corn. If there’s any sign of a dog, we leave. Sound good?”

“Good is not the word that leaps to mind. For me acceptable works much better.”

They crossed the street and plunged into the first row of stalks. Each of these stalks was at least Crystal’s height plus half that again. Within minutes the girls were in back of the janitor’s trailer. It was a rusty, ugly thing that had once been green but now looked more like the rotting carcass of a slaughtered hippopotamus. Junk tools—wheelbarrows, pitchforks, shovels—littered the yard amidst a chorus of insect song.

“Depressing,” Lucy whispered from her crouched position in the corn beside Crystal, “especially under the stars.”

“I disagree,” Crystal said, “because I don’t see a dog house, or even any dog shit. So I’m cheerful.”

“Bark, bark!”

Only one window in the trailer was lit up. Crystal asked Lucy to watch the driveway, then—minding the rusted hunks of who knew what at her feet—began a slow skulk across the lawn. Soon she was beneath the window. No good; she wasn’t tall enough. A flight of crooked doorsteps near the front enabled her to see more. Now she had a partial view of the trailer’s living room. Beyond a veil of thin, cheap curtains was a television (flickering against a wall of peeling paint) and a ceiling fan with dusty blades.

Pleased with the operation so far, Crystal returned to the back of the trailer. Here she faced the same problem as before, only with a different window: She was too short. Something to climb on seemed necessary. For this the janitor’s yard offered help in abundance. Plenty of junk looked like it could be stacked and stood upon. After a few minutes she found an old ladder buried in the grass. It was filthy and almost too heavy to lift, but for tonight at least, Crystal didn’t mind getting dirty. She was here on dirty business.

Once she got the ladder set beneath the window, she returned to Lucy.

“Now what?” her friend wanted to know.

“Now,” Crystal said, dusting her hands, “we wait for a light to come on in that window.”

“Why?”

“I figure that’s either his bathroom or his bedroom. Either way, once he’s inside I’m going to use this”—she pulled a pink camera from beneath her shirt—“to make his life a living hell.”

Lucy appeared flummoxed. “You’re going to…what? Post pictures of him on the internet?”

“Naked pictures, my dear. Dick pics.”

“What?”

“You heard me.”

“That’s nuts!”

“Watch my speed, Lucy.”

And before her friend could say anything else Crystal was off across the lawn. In seconds she arrived back at the trailer. The ladder took her weight without making a sound. Through the window lay a gloomy bathroom. Crouched in one corner was a toilet with a chipped seat. Hanging in another was a shower curtain covered in soap scum.

Crystal waited. It took an hour for the janitor to finally turn on the light. By that time she was so bored she almost missed her chance. Almost…but not quite. In the end she got two pictures, both of them disgusting, clear enough to use for stage two of her plan.

“Don’t post anything online,” Lucy told her on the way home, “they’ll be too easy to trace.”

“Where then?” Crystal asked.

“I know somebody who might be able to help. A fellow member of the geek squad. Why don’t you call me tomorrow?”

Minutes later they were back in the park. The night was still quiet. Not a breeze stirred among the trees. Crystal gave her friend a hug and thanked her for braving the elements.

The gesture appeared to surprise Lucy. “Me?” she said. “Nah. My mom and dad think I’m a golden girl, so they never suspect anything. You on the other hand,” she added with a hint of dreariness in her tone, “are down to your last strike. So be careful.”

“Lucy,” Crystal laughed, “I’ve never once been caught doing stuff like this, and I never once will be.”

They parted ways. By 12:30 Crystal was back on her porch. She put her key in the lock, opened the door…

And froze.

“Busted,” Hannah said, grinning from ear to ear.

Next to her, looking baleful enough to commit infanticide on the spot, stood Lucretia. “Young lady,” she grumbled.

Nothing that came after mattered. The ax had fallen.

13

 

The summer promised to pass more slowly than any she had ever known, or ever would know. Weeks of solitary confinement, under virtual lock and key, loomed. On weekday afternoons Lucretia Genesio drove her daughter to the church in Norwalk; in the evenings she drove her home. For the time spent in between, Crystal had two choices: lie down in her bedroom or sit down at the dinner table.

She mostly preferred the former. Though she hated to be alone, the alternative—or rather, facing the alternative—was far, far worse. It amounted to this: Hannah, her younger sister, was now her babysitter.

Her babysitter!

No one in the house used the word but really…did a more precise one even exist? Whenever Lucretia was at the office Hannah had instructions to take note on everything Crystal did. And at the end of every day there would be a report. That was babysitting, all right.

“Where are you going?” Hannah would ask, every time Crystal set foot outside her room.

“Stuff it up your ass,” was the reply Crystal always gave.

“I’m telling Mom.”

“What, that I went to the bathroom? Fine.”

On one of these toilet trips towards the end of her first week in isolation she locked the door, sat down on the edge of the tub, and cried for half an hour. She missed Jarett and Lucy. She missed the Jackson farm and the land it stood on. She even missed Chubby, and wondered what wild game the smiling dog might be chasing at that very moment.

Now what? her sobs seemed to be asking. Now what?

The answer came in the form of a long soak. She spent the next hour submersed in hot, bubbly bathwater. Steam rose; tiles dripped. Crystal washed the tears from her cheeks and waited for them to return. When they didn’t, she began to feel better. Yes, the final dilemma in her plot—getting back into the house undetected—had proven too heavy for her luck to carry, but in the end it wouldn’t matter. Not for Shit-Shit the Johnny Appleseed of cigarettes. What she had in store for him would still be his, oh yes. In spades it would still be his.

Taking a deep breath, Crystal slipped under the water. Five seconds passed. Ten. Jarett’s face, pensive and irresistibly tragic as always, appeared above the surface. His hand reached under. She felt his fingers on her neck, caressing the adam’s apple.

“Will I see you again soon, Crystal?”

It was a fair question. She’d missed two lessons already; he deserved an explanation for that. Also…

Well, no way she could let Hannah keep her in the house. That would be ridiculous.

Just then a stabbing pain—a rusty knife—tore through Crystal’s bare chest. She winced and blew a flurry of bubbles up at Jarret’s face. When the storm cleared, he was gone. Not for long though. She would see him at least one more time this summer whether anyone else liked it or not.

 

On Tuesday morning of the following week—the last Tuesday of that June—she walked out of the house while Hannah wasn’t looking. The sun did not greet her. Heavy gray clouds hung overhead, thieving the season of its color, and by the time she was halfway to Jarett’s house there was thunder in the western skies.

Its rumble escorted her from here. The clouds grew darker and more fitful, so that Jarett’s drive, when at last she reached it, took on the appearance of a cave. Not the least bit frightened, Crystal delved into the trees, breathing in the smells of wildflowers and ripe foliage. Halfway to the house Chubby came charging down the drive, happy as ever to see the new girl who’d been spending so much time with his master this year, and after a hug and a few sloppy licks, Crystal followed him towards the front door. He didn’t lead her straight to it, but veered around the side of the house instead. Curious, she followed, past a granite lawn ornament (a giant turtle), and a stick swing hanging from one of the larger oaks.

“Hello?” Crystal called, cresting a slope that overlooked the corn field.

A gust of cool wind answered, stirring a set of wind-chimes on the back porch. She turned to find Jarett seated in a lawn chair with Chubby on one side and a mug of coffee on the other. Looking tentative (was he ever not tentative?), he smiled down at her.

“Hey, Crystal,” he said. “Welcome back. Come on up before the rain starts.”

She sprang up the steps with an apology for missing this week’s lessons gushing from her lips. The writer told her not to worry, that it was all right, before redeeming himself of disinterest in her affairs with an invitation to sit down and explain what had happened.

“Well which part do you want to hear first?” Crystal asked, placing her bottom in the chair opposite. “The good or the bad?”

“The bad.”

“I got busted.”

“Ha! What for this time?”

“That’s the good part. Remember I told you I was going to make Shit-Shit pay?”

“Oh yes. With great clarity.”

Crystal crossed her legs and leaned forward. “Well he’s about to become the laughing stock of this entire town.”

“Okay,” Jarett replied, his tone cautious. “How do you mean?”

First she described her midnight excursion to the janitor’s trailer. Jarett looked puzzled early on, but then burst out laughing when she told him about the pictures.

“Oh boy,” he said, rubbing his eyes. “Oh boy. And now you’re going to upload them to the internet?”

“Nope. Lucy says that’s too dangerous. We’re going to have copies made and hang them up around town instead.”

“What?”

“You heard me.”

He shook his head. “So when I drive to the post office I’m gonna see this guy’s dick pointing me towards the door?”

“That’s the plan. You might wanna hold off on entering any sweepstakes for awhile.”

But of course not quite everything had gone according to plan, and this she shared with him too, just as another, stronger gust of wind swept through the cornfield and a bolt of lightning split the sky.

“Ears!” Jarett suddenly yelled, hands jumping to his head.

Crystal opened her mouth to ask what he was talking about when the heaviest clap of thunder she’d ever heard exploded over the house. A scream tore from her throat…and later, she thought that if the roof over the porch had been just a bit lower she might have banged her head on it.

To his credit, Chubby didn’t look scared at all. He lay between Crystal and Jarett wearing his favorite smile as an assortment of leaves, twigs, and flower petals soared over the yard. Crystal imagined a thousand different scents passing into his nose. Her own fear was short-lived; storms had never scared her very much. She gave Chubby a pat on the head and wondered aloud how she was going to get home.

“I’ll give you a lift,” Jarett offered.

“You can’t. I’m grounded for the rest of the summer. I’m not even allowed to come and see you.”

“Strange to hear you say that while we’re sitting on my back porch.”

“You know how I feel about rules, Jarett.”

He nodded