Such a Pretty Girl

“Wiess has created a spunky heroine—tough, darkly humorous, yet achingly vulnerable…. [A] gusty and effective thriller.”

—
Kirkus Reviews
(starred review)

“
Such a Pretty Girl
is a riveting novel and fifteen-year-old Meredith is a wholly original creation: a funny, wise, vulnerable girl with the heart of a hero and the courage of a warrior. This gut-wrenching story will stay with you long after you finish the last page.”

—Lisa Tucker, bestselling author of
The Song Reader

“In clear, riveting prose, Laura Wiess boldly goes where other writers fear to tread.
Such a Pretty Girl
is gritty yet poetic, gut-churning yet uplifting—a compelling, one-of-a-kind read.”

—A. M. Jenkins, author of
Damage
and
Out of Order

“So suspenseful you’ll wish you’d taken a speed-reading course. But slow down, because to rush would mean missing Laura Wiess’s wonderfully precise language, her remarkable access to Meredith’s darkest emotions, and a shocker of an ending—which you’ll want to read twice.”

—Tara Altebrando, author of
The Pursuit of Happiness

POCKET BOOKS, a division of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

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This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

Copyright © 2007 by Laura Battyanyi Wiess

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All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever.
For information address Pocket Books, 1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020

ISBN: 13: 978-1-84739-605-1
ISBN-10: 1-84739-605-4

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Acknowledgments

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter Twenty-Four

Chapter Twenty-Five

Chapter Twenty-Six

Such a Pretty Girl by Laura Wiess

To Chet,
who made a quiet wish
and
got way more
than he bargained for.

I’m so glad.

T
hey promised me nine years of safety but only gave me three.

Today my time has run out.

I sit on the curb at the back of the parking lot near the Dumpster. The waste from the condo complex bakes in this cumbersome green kiln and the stench is shocking, heavy with rancid grease and sickly-sweet decay. The association’s tried to beautify the Dumpster, painting the rusty sides a perky green and relettering the faded
RESIDENTS
’
USE ONLY
sign, but the battered lid thwarts them, as it’s warped from rough use and no longer seals the stewing fumes neatly in the box.

“Perfect,” I mutter and take a drag off my cigarette. Blow a couple of smoke rings and tempt the crusading, condo cowboys to rush from their air-conditioned dens and snatch the forbidden smudge stick away.

But they won’t. They keep their distance now, afraid my taint will rub off.

These adults who ache to interfere—convinced their quality-of-life ordinances and PC patrolling make them a village-raising-a-child—are the same people who picketed and wrote scathing letters to the editor to prevent my mother from renting a second condo in the front of the complex for my father’s homecoming.

It didn’t work, of course. My mother’s attorney protected my father’s rights and threatened to sue the complex owner if housing was denied. The owner caved, the condo was rented, and the neighbors were left reeling, hobbled by their own laws.

“I wish I could have found him a unit closer to ours, but this’ll have to do for now,” my mother had said earlier, spraying CK’s Obsession along her neck and thighs. “And besides, it’s only temporary until we can live like a family again.” Her cheeks were pink, her voice breathy with anticipation. “He’s really looking forward to it, Meredith. Being home with us, I mean. It’s what’s kept him going. I hope you can appreciate that.”

I watched her and said nothing. Silence was the key to self-preservation.

“Now, where did I leave my…oh, there it is.” She crossed to the bed, slipped off her robe, and smoothed the lace trim on her white La Perla panties. The matching bra was for show only, as she was almost flat on top. “And as far as this whole adjustment period thing goes…personally, I would have let you spend the weekend at your grandmother’s like we’d planned so your father and I could have had a little time alone first, but that’s not what he wanted.” Frowning, she examined the delicate, rhinestone heart stitched onto the front of the panties. “Hmm. This better not make a bump under my dress. He wants us both here for him and I think that says a lot about forgiveness and a fresh start. We’ve
all
sacrificed, Meredith. I hope you understand that, too.”

I studied my thumb. Bit off a hangnail. Dead skin, so no pain. Not bad.

“Just stay
down,
will you?” She poked at the glittery heart, not seeming to notice my lack of response. “Oh, for…I don’t have time for this. If it sticks up, I’ll just have to cut it off.” Impatient, she slid into her dress and presented me with her back so I could zip the new red mini. It was a size two from a Lord & Taylor window display she’d designed at the mall and probably not intended for a thirty-nine-year-old with a stranglehold on her fading youth. “Careful. This is silk.”

I eased up the zipper and lingered, one knuckle brushing the warmth of her neck.

“Time, Meredith.” She pulled away and shook her hair, poked her feet into scarlet mules, and smoothed the dress from hipbone to hipbone. “No lumps, no bumps. Perfect.”

I wandered over to her bureau and recapped the cologne as my mother continued her nervous chatter.

“I used this same shade of red in the
WELCOME HOME
! banner, the flowers in the living room, and the new guest towels, you know. In decorating, you want to tie everything together to create the impression of continuous harmony. I put touches of color in your father’s condo, too. I think he’ll be pleased. Oh, and I took three steaks out to thaw so now is not the time to go into that silly vegetarian kick.” She glanced my way and shook her head. “And please, put on something decent before we get back. This is a celebration, not a wake. No overalls and
no more gray.
I mean it. Try to look cheerful for a change.” She skimmed on lipstick and glanced at her watch. “Time to run. Tonight’s going to be wonderful!”

Wrong, I’d wanted to say as she swept out in a blur of red silk. Tonight is when the obscene becomes the acceptable.

My father has been gone for three years. Long enough for the town to finally stop shunning us and for his victims to get counseling. Long enough for me to lose one social worker to pregnancy and two more hollow-eyed, twitchy ones to career burnout. Long enough for my mother to have been granted a divorce, had she ever applied for one. But she hasn’t. Nor has she ever stopped visiting him in the Big House.

Today will be her final pilgrimage, and thanks to Megan’s Law, everyone in town knows it.

My father’s release date was given to all the local cops, school administrators, and youth group leaders. They got handouts with his name, photo, physical description, the crimes for which he was convicted, his home address, and license plate. The law says they aren’t allowed to share the info with anyone else, but of course they did—who wouldn’t?—so now we’re marked for life. His picture is even posted on the New Jersey Sex Offender Internet Registry.

My mother ignores it all; the hostile undercurrents, the whispers and disparaging looks, the grim disgust in my grandmother’s face, and the dogged blankness in mine.

Sharon Shale, my mother, does not see what she doesn’t want to see.

She never has.

And for the last three years, she hasn’t wanted to see
me.
At least not in private, when no one else is watching. She’s always half-turned away, ahead of or behind me, tossing out words without watching to gauge their effect, cluttering my wake with complaints of attitude, dirty dishes, or stray eyebrows plucked into the sink. She acts like my scars are on the outside and I’m too disturbing to look at head-on.

So I leave proof of my existence behind me like a snail trail with the small hope that years of talking
at
me will someday soften her enough to talk
with
me, that she’ll finally pull the knife from my chest and say yes, we
are
better off without him. That what happened wasn’t my fault and from now on she will thrust herself between me and danger, and shout
NO.

Hands shaking, I fish a fresh cigarette from the front pocket of my bib overalls and try to light it off the old one. My chin trembles, the butts joust, and the burning head gets knocked off into the gutter at my feet.

I grind it out. Jab the unlit cigarette back into the pack.

Look up to see my mother’s BMW pulling into the driveway.

A man sits shotgun.

My father.