The Year of Needy Girls Read online

  “If I want company? Sure, that’s fine,” Deirdre said. “I’m not staying long, though. One beer and I need to get going.”

  The woman nodded to the beat of the music.

  “I’m Deirdre.” She stuck out her hand.

  The woman glanced over. “Hello, Deirdre-I’m-not-staying-long.” She offered a flirtatious grin, shook Deirdre’s hand, and finished her beer. “I was going to offer to buy you a drink, but since you’re leaving . . .” The woman swiveled to face the bar.

  “I . . . could be convinced, I guess,” Deirdre said. “One more, why not?”

  “Hmmm, don’t let me talk you into anything.” The woman motioned for the bartender, then turned to face Deirdre, eyes sparkling.

  Deirdre felt the other woman’s presence more than she noticed her physical beauty. The woman oozed self-confidence. She was cute too, Deirdre had to admit, but it was more the easy way she inhabited her body that was appealing. The way she sat on the stool. Leaned her arm on the bar. Reached up and ran her hand through her hair.

  “I’d like that, thanks,” Deirdre said. “I can stay a bit longer.”

  “I’m Jamie, by the way.” She handed Deirdre another beer and raised her own in a toast. “Here’s to Women’s Week.”

  Deirdre touched her bottle to Jamie’s.

  “Not many women come alone to Women’s Week,” Jamie said.

  Deirdre didn’t hear any judgment in what she said. “I didn’t mean to come for Women’s Week . . .”

  Jamie raised her eyebrows.

  “I drove here kind of last minute. I live in Bradley, just north of Boston. I got in the car and drove and ended up here.” She realized how crazy it sounded. “It’s a long story.” She took a breath. “And, yeah, well, it’s a long story.” She heard the clack of pool balls; the dance music pulsed.

  Jamie sat with her legs crossed, arms leaning back against the bar. She waved to someone across the room. “Must be a good long story for you to drive all the way to P-town.”

  Deirdre searched the woman’s face for signs of amusement or boredom but saw none.

  “You going back tonight?”

  “The was the plan, yeah.” Deirdre sipped her beer. She was starting to feel the effects of the two previous beers. “’Course, soon, I won’t be in any shape to drive.” She laughed.

  “Come on. You better dance it off.” Jamie hopped off the stool and held out a hand. “Come on,” she said again.

  Deirdre didn’t recognize the song but it was catchy enough. How long since she’d been dancing? “Okay,” she said, and took Jamie’s hand.

  They danced. And danced again. And again. After six or seven songs—she lost count—Deirdre wiped the sweat from her forehead. “I need a rest,” she said. But the music changed and a slow one came on. Jamie held her arms open and Deirdre walked in easily.

  * * *

  Was it that first slow dance that marked the line of no return? The way Jamie held her, the feel of her hand at the base of Deirdre’s spine? Or the second slow dance, when Jamie leaned in and nuzzled her neck, sending one long shiver right through to her toes? If she were honest about it, Deirdre would have to say that she had crossed the line as soon as Jamie sat on the barstool next to her, but she liked to think that it had taken some doing and that she had been seduced.

  Now in Jamie’s house, in her bedroom, she reminded herself that SJ had thought about leaving the relationship and had gone as far as renting an apartment. She told herself that she was only having an adventure, and after everything that had happened, didn’t she deserve some fun?

  “You’ve gone quiet on me,” Jamie said, running her hand the length of Deirdre’s arm.

  Deirdre shook her head. “It’s okay, I’m here.”

  Jamie leaned in and they kissed. The line now was gone altogether, wiped away by their kisses, their touching, their skin, which felt electric, hands and thighs and shoulders and soft bellies, nipple touching nipple, tongue to breast, fingers and hair, earlobes and breath on skin.

  Deirdre moaned. To be touched. To be desired. To want and crave to be wanted.

  “God, you’re beautiful,” Jamie said.

  And when they came, they came together and rocked each other and held on, and only after Jamie fell asleep with her arm wrapped around her did Deirdre start to cry.

  October 9

  To the Editor, Bradley Register:

  I am writing out of great concern for the children of this town. We have all waited anxiously, though certainly none more anxiously than the parents of that poor child Leo Rivera, while the police have labored to solve his horrible murder. We should be proud of the excellent work of our fine police department, because not only have they apparently solved the crime, but they have also brought to light a very real and hidden threat to all our children. How many of us are aware, that when we drop off our sons and daughters at schools, libraries, after-school programs, that we might be leaving our precious children in the care of predators? There is a clear need for more extensive background checks for all personnel involved in direct work with children. As much as we can’t control who might become our neighbors, we can have more stringent control over the people we hire to work with and take care of our sons and daughters.

  Frances Worthington, Chair, Board of Trustees

  Brandywine Academy

  Bradley, MA

  Chapter Six

  The message said for Deirdre to report to the police station. Surrender yourself were the words the officer used. Deirdre played the message over and over again. Surrender yourself. It sounded so ominous. And oddly dreamlike. Deirdre Murphy, the voice on the machine said. Had SJ heard it, saved it as if she hadn’t?

  Before falling asleep, Deirdre had called SJ. She didn’t want her to worry that something terrible had happened.

  “I’m in P-town,” Deirdre had said on the phone. She glanced at the clock—eleven thirty. “I . . . ended up driving here, I don’t know why,” she laughed. “I just felt like driving and I drove all the way to P-town. I found a room and I’ll be back tomorrow.”

  “You drove to P-town?”

  Jamie slept, arms and shoulders exposed. Sleeping like that, she looked both inviting and vulnerable. Deirdre still didn’t know how old she was or much else about her. She lowered her voice. “Yeah, it’s weird I know, but here I am. Anyway, I’m staying. I’ve had a few beers and didn’t want to drive.”

  “You waited awhile to call,” SJ said, her tone even.

  “I know, sorry. I . . . wasn’t sure if I was going to stay or not, you know? I won’t be late tomorrow.” She hated lying to SJ, was surprised the lie came so easily.

  And now, here she was, back home and needing SJ. Please be at the library, Deirdre thought as she dialed. “SJ! Thank God!”

  A brief silence. “You’re home?” SJ said, voice cold, flat.

  “I don’t know what to do . . . I have a message. Did you listen to the messages?”

  “Yesterday? There weren’t any.”

  Deirdre swallowed. “I . . . there’s a message . . . I . . . I have to . . . they said to surrender myself!” She felt the tears coming, the hysteria building inside.

  More silence. A deep breath. Then, “I’m coming home. Wait for me, okay? I’m coming.”

  Deirdre wiped her nose and hung up the phone. She knew the two incidents had nothing to do with each other, but it was hard not to see this message as a kind of payback for the previous night. And here was SJ, coming home to be with her, to help her out.

  Mechanically, Deirdre moved through the routine of showering: soaping up, rinsing, shampooing, then applying conditioner. She felt a need to be particularly clean, a thought process that went something like: If I am clean, I’ll be okay. If I’m clean, I can’t be in trouble. Some part of her knew the wishful thinking was ridiculous, but she couldn’t help it. She opened her closet and scanned the clothes. She didn’t want to seem too vulnerable or like someone who could be taken advantage of. She wanted to look like a slightly be
tter version of herself.

  The front door rattled and Deirdre heard it shut tight. She yanked a cable-knit turtleneck over her wet hair. “In here!” she yelled. She pulled on her best jeans and struggled to zip them, hands shaking.

  “Hey.” SJ stood framed in the doorway of the bedroom. She shifted her weight.

  Deirdre felt the tears pooling, the panic rising. She fluffed her hair. “What’s going to happen?” She swallowed hard, forced down the lump, readjusted the neck of her sweater.

  SJ took a few steps into the room and dropped her bag on the floor. “What did the message say?”

  “I mean, they can’t arrest me—can they?” Deirdre paced.

  “What did it say?”

  Deirdre stopped pacing and faced the bureau. “They said to surrender myself.” She shrugged. “Surrender myself,” she repeated. “It sounds so . . . awful. Like I’m a criminal or something.” She pulled a pair of blue socks from the top drawer.

  “And . . .” SJ looked cautious, sounded tentative. “Did you call the lawyer?”

  Up until now, Deirdre hadn’t wanted to admit that she really needed a lawyer. Susan had tried to convince her, but she couldn’t quite let herself believe that she was in serious trouble. Sure, Martin Loring had sent her home immediately and that action surprised her, but most of the time Deirdre felt like these days weren’t her real life at all, just some sort of temporary bad dream that would end, once everyone realized the truth.

  The truth.

  What was the truth? How had she crossed the line with Anna Worthington? Well, obviously she knew that kissing Anna was beyond crossing the line. But had she given Anna encouragement, a signal that it was okay to kiss her? How had Anna summoned the courage to kiss her teacher? Unless Deirdre had somehow suggested it first? She knew this was what SJ was thinking too, though SJ had never come right out and said so. Deirdre could see it in her eyes, could hear it in the words SJ didn’t say, the silences that might as well have been an outright accusation. You brought this on yourself. But now, here was SJ looking nervous and concerned.

  Deirdre pulled on the socks. “I haven’t called him yet.”

  “I don’t think you should go to the police without a lawyer.”

  Deirdre cuffed and uncuffed her sweater.

  “Don’t you think? I mean—I don’t know, but it sounds pretty serious.”

  Deirdre tugged at her sleeves some more. “I don’t even have his number yet. When I called Susan—” But she couldn’t continue because what she would have to say was that when she called Susan to get the lawyer’s name, the police had shown up at the door wanting to question her about SJ and Mickey Gilberto, and then they would need to have the discussion about SJ not going to work and not telling Deirdre about it, and she didn’t want to go down that path right now. She shook her head. “I don’t have it,” she said again. She pulled her clogs out from underneath the bed and slipped them on.

  “Let’s call Susan and see if we can’t get him now.” SJ picked up the phone by the bed. She dialed and held the phone out to Deirdre. “It’s ringing.”

  Deirdre wrung her hands. “What’ll I say?”

  “She knows what’s going on. The whole board does, I’m sure. Just tell her the truth.”

  Deirdre heard the phone ringing on the other end. She felt her hands shake again. But the machine came on and she hung up. “I couldn’t just leave a message . . .” She stopped. “You really think they can arrest me?” She played with the phone cord. “Jesus.”

  SJ sat next to her on the edge of the bed. “Did they give you a time frame? Do you have until the end of the day? Do we have to go immediately?”

  Deirdre shook her head. “I don’t know. But I don’t want them to show up here, that would be awful. I think . . . I don’t know . . . I think we should probably go soon?” It was a question, because she wanted SJ to take over. She wanted SJ to tell her what to do, how to make this better. Because somewhere, if only on the surface, Deirdre still imagined that they could make it better. Her gut told her that things were much more serious than she had first thought, but she could not let herself go so far as to imagine the very real possibility that she might be arrested, and if she were arrested, that she might have to go to jail.

  * * *

  SJ drove them to the police station. Deirdre couldn’t bring herself to look at SJ. Instead, she watched the houses pass by, felt as though she were looking at them for the very first time, as if she were a foreigner. In French, the word étranger meant both foreigner and stranger. Deirdre didn’t usually see the two words as necessarily related. What was foreign, she had explained to her students, doesn’t have to be strange. But here she was, driving through her own town, her own neighborhood, and these houses, the people in them, suddenly felt both strange and foreign. Deirdre could not even begin to imagine what lives her neighbors led. She could not even begin to imagine how her own life might play out. Wasn’t that the irony? You thought you knew; you thought you were in a relationship that would last the rest of your life; you thought you could envision how your life might unfold, but it was all an illusion. And it always had been, but you were just realizing it for the first time. What kind of mean trick was that? Or did other people get it all along and Deirdre was suddenly waking up?

  “You okay?” SJ glanced at her. She took one hand from the steering wheel and reached to pat Deirdre’s thigh.

  Deirdre gave a small smile. “This is just so . . . surreal, you know?”

  SJ pulled over to the side of the road in front of a brown-shingled Victorian and turned off the car.

  “What are we doing?” Deirdre looked around.

  SJ tucked the loose hairs behind her ears and shifted in her seat to face Deirdre. “Don’t you think we should really talk about what might happen? About the fact that you might . . . I’m sorry, but I think we have to admit it . . . you might be arrested?”

  The word hit her like a sharp arrow. “But I don’t have a record. Doesn’t that mean they’ll let me go home . . . What’s that called?”

  “Personal recognizance. But Deird, we don’t know. It could happen. I just think we should be prepared.”

  Deirdre threw her hands in the air. “Be prepared? How, exactly?”

  “Mentally. I just think we should discuss this first.”

  What was there to discuss? Deirdre didn’t always share SJ’s point of view that talking helped everything. She would have liked to believe that, but she just didn’t. What good would it do to talk? She laughed. “Getting arrested would suck.”

  “C’mon. I’m serious!”

  “Me too! It would suck.” She looked directly at SJ. “I just . . .” But she couldn’t even begin to say it, to think the words, because there again were the tears, pooling, spilling over, ruining her mascara.

  SJ looked sincere, her voice soft and serious. “If that does happen, I’ll track down the lawyer. You don’t have a record and you’ve not even ever gotten a parking ticket.”

  Deirdre wiped her tears, nodded.

  “So I’m sure we’ll work something out. But I just thought we should admit that it might happen.” SJ sat with one arm draped behind Deirdre.

  “I guess you’re right, but my God, this just seems crazy! How could . . .” and the tears started again, they wouldn’t stop. “I’m sorry, I just can’t help it!”

  SJ put her arms around Deirdre and held her. “It’s okay,” she said. “It’s terrifying!”

  Deirdre waited until the tears were finished and wiped her face. “Jail,” she said. She was a teacher, for God’s sake. And if she found herself in jail, then she was certain first of all that Martin Loring would never take her back, and that second of all, she might never teach again. “So what, they read me my rights and I’m arrested? Is that it?”

  SJ let go of Deirdre and shook her head. “I have no idea,” she said, her voice quiet.

  On TV even the unlikely suspects were grilled mercilessly by the cops and made to feel guilty. Deirdre twisted in her s
eat, pulled the seat belt away. “It means the world that you’re behind me. I couldn’t do this without you.” She fiddled with the seat belt. “I don’t think I could survive.”

  SJ glanced out the window. “Don’t say that. You’d survive.” She rubbed her hands on the steering wheel. “It’s going to be okay.”

  Deirdre nodded. But she wanted SJ to say something more effusive, more staunchly supportive, about how it was ridiculous, this reporting, surrendering to the police, how absurd it was to even think she might be guilty of a crime. Deirdre watched SJ take in the street, glance nervously to the dashboard and up to the rearview mirror. She couldn’t remember when she had stopped yearning for SJ in that desperate way she had felt in those early days when they’d first started seeing each other. SJ had seemed so remote, which for some reason had been a turn-on. She’d wanted to see if she could get SJ’s attention, make this independent woman want her. Winning over SJ had felt like an accomplishment, and in the early days, Deirdre had felt such desire she thought she might explode. It had scared her at first, the intensity, but now, she couldn’t remember that it had lasted long or when the feeling had died. Maybe as soon as SJ didn’t seem so remote, when she suddenly seemed accessible to Deirdre, the longing had vanished.

  SJ started up the car.

  Attraction was so mysterious, and even now, at almost thirty, Deirdre didn’t really understand the role it played in forming relationships. She glanced over at SJ, watched her hands on the steering wheel, the way she sat slouched in the driver’s seat, leather jacket worn and fitted to her form. This was the woman she’d assumed she would spend the rest of her life with. What was going to happen now, to both of them?

  “I’m serious, SJ. It means the world that you’re with me. I really don’t know what I’d do if I were alone.”

  SJ kept her eyes on the road. “You’d do what you have to do. You’d get through it.”

  “Maybe. But I’m just saying, I’m glad you’re with me.” Deirdre reached over and gave SJ’s knee a squeeze.

  * * *

  Inside the police station, fluorescent lights glared. Deirdre felt a bit woozy, as if she’d had too much to drink. SJ stood next to her while they waited for an officer to “process” Deirdre. That was the word the heavyset man behind the information desk used.