Backlash (29 page)

But I can start to change that tonight, right here, right now, by standing up for my sister. Maybe that can be my way of starting to move forward, the way trying to make a new law is for Mom.

“It’s not Liam’s fault,” I say. “He’s a victim, too. Like me. Like Syd. You can’t blame him for what Bree did. Or what his mom did.”

Mom and Dad exchange a glance. Apparently it means that Dad should do the talking.

“We know that, honey,” Dad says. “But it’s a complex situation.”

“What’s so complex about Liam and Syd wanting to stay friends? They really
like
each other.”

Mom looks at me sharply. “You mean ‘like’ as in … a
crush
?” she asks.

“Maybe. Or maybe just friends. I don’t know.”

Mom shakes her head, rubbing her temple. “This is all I need. The visuals of my daughter dating the son of the woman who cyberbullied you while I’m calling for legislation to make it a criminal offense …”

And that’s when I can’t take it for another minute longer.

“Visuals? Do you even hear yourself, Mom? We’re your
daughters
, not props for your political photo ops!”

“That’s not what I meant, I —”

But I don’t stay around to hear her explanation of what she meant. I’m already halfway up the stairs. I’m going to talk to Sydney, to apologize for ratting her out and to see if I can make it up to her, somehow.

Even if I can’t make up for the past, I can try to do better in the future.

I’
VE GOT
my headphones on, and I’m blasting music that matches the beat of all the angry words in my head. Now I know why people punch walls and things. Not that I’d do that, because I can imagine how much it would hurt, plus my parents would freak if I damaged the wall — or my hand. But I’ve got so much mad I’m not sure the four walls of my room can contain it, and maybe punching a hole in the wall would let it out.

Or maybe I could climb to the top of a really tall mountain and just scream and scream until I lost my voice. The problem is, despite its name, Lake Hills is pretty flat. It should be called Lake Hillslope. Or Lake Mounds.
Hills
is really stretching it.

Whatever you call this place, my life in it is unfair, and I’m so sick of it. And just when I had something good happen in all the awfulness, guess who ruined it, as usual? Lara, of course. Because that’s what she does. I’m starting to wonder if her goal in life is to ruin mine.

The music’s turned up so loud, I don’t hear her come in, so when she touches me to get my attention, I shout in surprise.

“Jeez, Lara, did you ever hear of knocking?” I say, pulling the headphones out and pausing the music.

“I did knock. But you didn’t hear me.” Lara gestures to the headphones.

She has a point.

“What do you want?” I ask, unwilling to concede anything because I’m so mad at her.

“I just … Can I sit down?” she asks.

“I guess,” I agree, reluctantly sliding over, but only a little so she has to perch on a little corner at the end of the bed.

“Syd … I just … I want to say I’m sorry. Really sorry. For … everything.”

I’m not sure I can believe what I’m hearing. My older sister is
apologizing to me
?

“Uh … what do you mean?”

She looks at me, confused. “Um … what I said. That I’m sorry.”

What is she sorry for? For ratting me out to Mom and Dad? For trying to kill herself? For making me miss auditions for
Beauty and the Beast
? For the fact that everything ends up being about her in this house?

“Wait … did Mom tell you to do this?”

“What?” Lara seems genuinely surprised I asked. “Why would you even think that?” she asks, her cheeks flushing.

I shrug. “Maybe because the only times you’ve ever apologized to me in my life are when Mom’s made you?”

Lara flinches, and her eyes glaze with tears.

I wonder if she’s going to turn and run, or do that thing she does where she disappears into Lara Land.

But she doesn’t. She lifts her chin and says, “Well, she didn’t make me
this
time. I decided to do it myself. I
wanted
to do it.”

And then she takes my reluctant hand and squeezes, hard, until I look her in the eye. When I do, she repeats, “I’m sorry, Syd. For everything. I mean it. I know things have been hard for you because of me. I’m sorry.”

Who are you and what have you done with Lara?

“I hope someday I can make it up to you,” Lara says.

A tear traces its way down her cheek.

And I feel like she just punched a hole in the wall for me, but with her words instead of her fist, because the anger inside me begins to escape.

I say, “Thanks,” and I sit up and hug her.

My sister has said “I’m sorry” to me so many times, but this time is the one that matters most. This time, she means it.

S
YD CALLS
and tells me to take Dad’s offer of a ride rather than fighting the press, even if it means being in the car with Bree. She says it will be less awkward than facing the looks we’ll get if we sit together on the bus again.

“Oh. Okay. Sure,” I say, but I’m gutted because I think that she’s already having second thoughts about kissing me. I’ve been replaying that kiss over and over and imagining more, but maybe she’s been thinking it was all one big mistake, never to be repeated, ever.

But then … “I got into a major fight with my parents at dinner,” she continues.

“What about?”

“You,” she says. “Lara saw us. And she snitched.”

“Uh-oh,” I say.

“ ‘Uh-oh’ is right,” she says. “My parents were all,
What possessed you to hang out with him, Syd? It’s awkward under the circumstances, Syd,
and I was like,
Yeah, circumstances that have nothing to do with either of us
.”

I smile, happy that she stood up to her parents for me. “Wow. Thanks.”

“And you know what’s the craziest thing of all?” she says. “After ratting me to Mom and Dad, guess who then stuck up for us and said they should back off?”

“
Lara?
No way.”

“Way! I couldn’t believe it, either,” Syd tells me. “And what’s even more amazing is the talk we had afterward. She came up to my room and said she was sorry for everything I’ve had to go through because of her.”

I try to imagine
my
sister saying something like that. Epic fail.

“Seriously?”

“I know, right? At first I was like,
Who are you and what have you done with Lara?
”

I laugh.

“But then, once I realized she really meant it, that maybe all this therapy stuff she’s been doing has actually made a difference, we talked. I mean
really
talked. It was pretty cool.”

I wonder what it would take for Bree to apologize to me. To any of us. Most of all, to Lara and the Kelleys. I wonder if I’ll ever understand what made my sister do the things she did.

We drop Bree off at the high school first the next morning.

“Keep your chin up, Breenut,” Dad says. “Don’t forget — go to the principal’s office and call me or Mom if you have a problem.”

Bree still doesn’t have a new cell. After what happened with her voice mail, she doesn’t seem in a hurry to get one, which is crazy because Bree’s life used to revolve around that phone.

Bree gets out of the car slowly, like she’s half-asleep still.

“Hey, Bree, could you hurry up? I have to get to school, too, you know,” I remind her.

Dad gives me a hush-up look in the rearview mirror.

“Bye,” Bree says, shutting the car door and shuffling off, shoulders hunched and head down.

“Can you try to show a little compassion for your sister, Liam?” Dad asks.

“What, like she showed for Lara?”

Dad’s lips set into a thin, grim line in the rearview mirror. “Bree did wrong. Very wrong. I’m not denying that,” Dad says. “And she deserves some consequences. But hacking her cell phone? Death threats? She’s fifteen years old, Liam, and she’s your sister. Can’t you cut her some slack?”

I’m so mad at Bree, it’s hard to let go of it, even though I hear what Dad’s saying. But I mumble, “I guess,” and figure I’ll try.

That’s until I hit the bathroom in between second and third period. I’m at the urinal taking care of business when four kids from the football team walk in, and Shane Perry says, “Yo, it’s Bullying Bree’s brother!”

Just my luck to be standing there, pants unzipped, midstream when four guys trap me in the bathroom.

Hurry up and finish,
I tell my bladder, because all I want to do is zip up and get out of there. But it keeps on coming.

Meanwhile, they walk up behind me.

Steve Malloy says, “My sister’s a cheerleader at the high school. She said your sister pretended to be a guy and made Lara Kelley try to kill herself.”

He shoves me, and pee goes up the wall.

“Who does that?” Steve asks.

Not me. And could you at least let me put my junk away before you beat me up?

I finally finish and start trying to put myself back in my pants, but Todd Adams punches my arm really hard.

“Yeah,” he says as emphasis. “Who does that?”

“It wasn’t me,” I say. “It was Bree.”

Whose fault it is I’m getting beat up right now.

“And your mom,” Joe Anderson says. “Your mom is seriously cray-cray.”

I manage to get put away and zipped, just before Anderson and Malloy pin me against the wall.

Now I’m freaking out. I’m about to get seriously messed up. And there’s no way I can win four against one.

“That girl almost died,” Adams says, pulling my hair as he gets up into my face. “Doesn’t that make you feel bad, Connors?”

Spittle gets on my face as he says the
s
in
Connors
. I want to throw up.

“Of course it makes me feel bad,” I say, trying not to gag from the spittle.

“Not bad enough,” Shane Perry says. And he punches me in the stomach, hard, just as the bell rings for next period.

Anderson and Malloy let go of my arms and split with the rest of them, and I sink to the floor, clutching my stomach and trying to breathe.