“No,” she said, taking a deep breath. “It’s not our girls. It’s somebody else’s girls. There are two of them, and someone left them in pieces all over Mrs. Schneider’s yard.”
5
Lauren saw her mother and brother come out of Frank’s deli and walk toward the Sweet Shoppe. She wrinkled her nose a little and turned her head away, even though there was little to no chance of her mother seeing her through the window in the dim interior of the arcade.
She stood next to Miranda, who was standing very close to Tad, the greasy-haired (and also greasy-faced, Lauren thought) object of her affection who did not look at all like Matt Dillon.
On the other side of Tad was his friend Billy, who also did not look like Matt Dillon and who seemed to have about as much interest in Lauren as she did in him—that is, none at all.
Tad was very involved with his latest round of Karate Champ and they were all supposed to care just as much as he did. Lauren didn’t see why they couldn’t all at least go and play their own games as long as they were in the arcade, but Tad liked to have a cheering section around him.
Billy would shout and clap when Tad got a good hit on his opponent, and he apparently understood that as his role. Maybe cheerleading Tad’s skill at the joystick was required if you were permitted to ride in Tad’s Camaro. Miranda had pointed at the car out front as they entered the arcade, and the only thing Lauren noticed about it was that Tad hadn’t bothered to put it in between the diagonal parking space lines.
She didn’t think Miranda was interested in the outcome of the latest match. Her friend did seem to enjoy brushing her breasts against Tad’s arm as he played the game, though, and Tad didn’t tell her to get off so he must have been enjoying it, too.
What would happen if I just left without saying anything? Lauren wondered. Would Miranda notice right away, or only when she wanted to drag Lauren to the bathroom to touch up her lip gloss and talk about Tad?
She’d just about resolved to do it—slip away without telling Miranda—when the howl of an ambulance siren made everyone crane around their video screens and look out the window. The ambulance flew down Main Street, a notable occurrence by itself in a town with few emergencies, but the fact that it was followed by both of the Smiths Hollow Police Department cars had everyone muttering.
“Whoa, wonder what’s happening,” Billy said.
“We should follow the police cars,” Tad said, and looked ready to abandon his game and run outside to jump into his car.
Lauren knew that if that happened, Miranda would want to follow, and she decided right then that she wasn’t going to go with them. She was not going to get herself trapped in Tad’s car and then wind up someplace she really did not want to be, like the mall in the next town or at the Make-Out Field. The way that Miranda was rubbing herself against Tad meant the Make-Out Field was a distinct possibility, and Lauren planned on escaping before anyone expected her to kiss Billy.
“They’re long gone, man,” Billy said. “We’ll never catch them.”
“The Camaro could,” Tad said belligerently, as if Billy had somehow questioned the masculinity of his car.
“Sure,” Billy said. “But if you chase the cops at that speed you’ll end up getting a ticket.”
Tad’s shoulders relaxed. “Yeah. And if I get another ticket the Mother Monster said she’s going to take away my car keys.”
Miranda trilled a long laugh at this. “Mother Monster. That’s a good one.”
“She’s always ragging me,” Tad said, and his voice became high-pitched. “‘Clean up your room, cut your hair, work more hours at your job.’ Jesus Christ, it’s summer. Can’t she lay off for five seconds?”
“Yeah,” Miranda said. “You already work a lot at Wagon Wheel.”
“Not that much,” Tad admitted, sliding another quarter into Karate Champ. “I was thinking of applying at someplace in the mall.”
Lauren felt a headache coming on. It was brewing behind her eyes and soon it would clobber her there, making her feel nauseated and dizzy as it pounded the back of her eyeballs. She’d been subject to these headaches occasionally as a child, but lately they’d become more frequent. If she didn’t get home soon she wouldn’t even be able to ride her bike without falling over.
She started to say something to Miranda, who was deeply involved in the discussion of Tad’s future employment prospects.
“What?” Miranda asked, flashing Lauren an annoyed glance.
Lauren jerked her thumb at the food counter where some bored teens dispensed popcorn and soda and candy. “I’m going to get a Coke. You want one?”
“No,” Miranda said. “You shouldn’t drink soda, either. The sugar will rot your teeth.”
Lauren knew she’d added this last bit because she was irritated that Lauren interrupted her conversation with Tad, and it was the best insult Miranda could come up with on short notice.
“Okay,” Lauren said, not caring about Miranda’s attitude. She just needed to get away from the noise and lights of the Dream Machine as quickly as possible.
Lauren drifted in the direction of the food counter, glancing back over her shoulder. Miranda, Tad, and Billy were all absorbed in the game. She changed direction and darted for the front door.
As she stepped into the obscenely bright sunshine she wondered how long it would take for Miranda to notice that Lauren wasn’t coming back.
She closed her eyes for a second, because the glare of the sun was especially sharp after the dim interior of the arcade, and light always made her headaches worse. When she opened them again her gaze darted along the diagonal parking spaces across the street. Her mother’s station wagon was gone, so she and David had gone home.
It was too bad, because Lauren would have liked a ride from her mom at that moment. She wasn’t sure she would be able to ride her bike without puking.
Her father had always worried about these headaches, speculating (quietly, to her mother, when he thought Lauren couldn’t hear) that Lauren had some kind of neurological disease.
“They’re just migraines, Joe,” Mom would say in that scathing tone that she reserved for moments when she considered Dad especially stupid. “Lots of girls get them, especially after their periods. It’s hormones.”
Her dad would always shuffle around then and mumble that he was just worried. Discussing hormones and training bras and anything else that meant Lauren was becoming a woman made him profoundly uncomfortable.
But Lauren had gotten the headaches even though she was still waiting on her period, so she thought it couldn’t just be hormones the way her mother said. Sometimes it felt like there was something else living inside her skull that was trying to break out. She’d never told anybody else this, because she knew it sounded stupid.