Bad Girls with Perfect Faces Read online

  Last year, I was the one who got it for him.

  Xavier

  The morning of his seventeenth birthday, the first thing Xavier felt was a body sliding up against him, and then a kiss on the cheek, and hot breath near his ear. “Eyes closed, mouth open,” Ivy said.

  Then she fed him something. Xavier was smiling before he even swallowed.

  She remembered.

  He felt her get up off the bed. He opened his eyes. She was across the room, back to him, walking to the bathroom. The summer sun was coming through the window and her sheer curtains. She was naked and unselfconscious in a way he couldn’t imagine ever being. It didn’t feel safe to look at her. It didn’t feel safe because of what it did to him.

  Don’t let this happen again, Xavier told himself. He couldn’t believe he was there. He thought about the night before, after all the stuff in the woods, Ivy convincing him to come stay over. She promised they wouldn’t get caught, as though that was the only thing to be concerned about.

  “That’s maybe not the best idea . . . ,” Xavier had said.

  “But the maybe-not-the-best ideas are the best ideas, aren’t they?” Ivy had smiled that smile that meant she knew there was no way Xavier could resist her.

  And she had been right.

  Xavier had texted his mom that he was staying at Sasha’s. His parents trusted him so much that it would never even occur to them that Xavier could lie. Which made him feel especially guilty when he did.

  Xavier stared at Ivy’s back, then forced himself to look away. He reached for his jeans on the floor, took his phone out of the pocket, and for a moment Xavier was back in the real world. He saw the text from Sasha sent late the night before.

  Sasha.

  Xavier thought again about the great birthday time they’d been having. It was the first real fun Xavier had had in so long. And he thought of how for a moment it had seemed like . . . well, Xavier didn’t know exactly. It seemed like the air between them had shifted or something. Like things were inching in a strange direction. Xavier wasn’t even sure if he had been making it up or not. And then Ivy appeared.

  But here, in Ivy’s room on the morning of his seventeenth birthday, he felt certain he’d imagined all that Sasha stuff. Which Xavier knew was a good thing, for a bunch of different reasons, not least of which was the fact that Sasha was his best friend on earth.

  Now in the bright light of day, he felt weird that he’d left Sasha and gone off with Ivy. Not that Sasha would care about the being alone part—she liked to be alone—but because she might care about who he’d gone off with.

  He found himself defending his decision to Sasha in his head. Defending Ivy. She wasn’t all good or all bad. She was human and complicated and confusing, like all of us. True, she made messes sometimes. But she never meant to and she always felt awful about it after. And Xavier didn’t quite understand her, but then again, could you ever really understand anyone? He didn’t understand Sasha, either. Sasha, who was always so strong. Who only ever did what was right. She was solid and secure and never needed anyone. But Xavier wasn’t like that.

  And besides, Sasha hadn’t heard Ivy apologizing in the woods, and hadn’t seen the look on Ivy’s face this morning when she’d kissed him. Ivy had done some not-so-great stuff, but Xavier didn’t blame her, and maybe it was dumb and naive not to, but he just didn’t. Life messes us up in so many ways, messes all of us right the hell up. And when we fumble and bumble around, crashing into one another, stepping on toes and hearts, it’s not on purpose. Being a person is nearly impossible.

  He heard the toilet flush and Ivy’s bare feet padding across the shiny wood floors. And then she was back in the room and Xavier forgot everything else. She stood by the door, watching him, one arm raised up against the frame, dark hair sticking straight up.

  Xavier started to get out of bed. She sprang forward and then her hands were over his eyes and her mouth was against his ear again.

  “Not yet,” she said.

  * * *

  For the next hour, Xavier was just a body. Lips. Hands. Skin. A beating heart. And when they were done, they were wrapped together in her sheets, and Xavier was full of all the chemicals, those love ones or the post-sex ones that are impossible to distinguish between. She grabbed her hairbrush, which she hardly ever used herself, and started pulling it through his hair with long, smooth strokes. She did this all the time when they were dating. “You’re like the doll I always wanted as a kid,” she had said once. Xavier took it as a compliment at first. He was the thing she’d always wanted. After they broke up, Xavier told Sasha the story and she had raised one eyebrow in that wary way she didn’t know she did. “It’s kind of fucked she said that to you,” Sasha said. “As though you are just a thing.” That’s not how she meant it, Xavier had wanted to tell her. He wanted Sasha to understand, but he was so tired back then, he could barely speak at all.

  Now, that morning in Ivy’s bed, Xavier was trying not to think of anything at all as she brushed and brushed. But then Ivy’s phone vibrated, and she reached for it, and the corner of her mouth twitched up into a special kind of smirk. His stomach was immediately tight. Xavier knew that smirk. But Xavier also knew it was ridiculous to be jealous. He and Ivy weren’t actually together. They weren’t going to be. This was just for today.

  But Xavier was wrong about the smirk and what it was, because she turned her phone toward him. On the screen was a guy’s Instagram account, locked. The guy was maybe a couple of years older than they were, though it was hard to say, because the picture was cropped so you could only really see half of him, half a handsome face, one muscular arm.

  “Look,” she said. “An arm followed me.” She stuck her tongue through her teeth, then tossed her phone onto the nightstand. She slid close to him. A second later her phone buzzed again. This time, after she looked at it, she frowned and pulled away.

  “My parents are on their way back.You have to go now.” Her tone was totally different then, all business. It was something he’d almost let himself forget about her, how quickly she flipped from one thing to another. “This was fun. It was good to see you.”

  Xavier stood, gathered up his T-shirt, jeans, the one sock he wasn’t wearing. Adrenaline was coursing through him. This was fun. It was good to see you. Those were ending words—those were the words of this being done again. Of course, he told himself. That was the plan all along, one night and that’s it. He knew it was for the best, but in that moment it really, really did not feel that way.

  Suddenly, Xavier was filled with dread at the idea of going home with this finished again, returning to the hard work of getting over her, made all the harder now that Xavier remembered so clearly what being with her was like. Because what is getting over someone if not a slow, excruciating forgetting? Ivy was very, very hard to forget.

  He started getting dressed, putting his clothes on in reverse of the order Ivy had taken them off him—underwear, T-shirt, jeans. Xavier imagined himself in a video playing backward, the love Xavier poured out at her being funneled back into his chest, the taste of her lips leaving his, walking backward out of that room, shutting closed his heart.

  He walked toward the door. He turned to wave.

  “Wait,” Ivy said. “You forgot something.” She ran toward him, then jumped up, wrapped her legs around his waist. “This isn’t over,” she whispered. “I won’t fuck it up this time. I mean it.”

  Sasha

  A good girl would have played it different.

  Good Girls do not scheme or plot. Good Girls do not twist and sneak. When their best friend calls them on his birthday and says in this shy, squirrelly, embarrassed way, I know this is going to sound stupid, but I think we’re kind of seeing each other again, maybe, Good Girls say, Xavier, listen and Xavier, I’m concerned. And when their best friend says, We’re going to take things slow, and I promise to be careful, but they can hear in his voice that he is already long gone and is only trying his best to sound reasonable, but he is far
past reasonable, like someone who has newly been recruited into a cult, Good Girls calmly say their piece, and step back, as he does not listen, does not listen, does not listen, and makes the same mistakes, only worse this time. Good Girls tell themselves, Well, I tried my best and it is not up to me and you have to let people make their own choices, and then they watch as his once-ex-now-current-girlfriend wraps herself around his neck and chokes him until he’s dead.

  But Bad Girls know it’s never that simple.

  Bad Girls know everything is gray. Everything is messy and complicated. And sometimes you have to do some fucked-up stuff to make things okay.

  Bad Girls sink their teeth in.

  Bad Girls use every weapon they have.

  Bad Girls know there is no right and no wrong. There is just what you’re willing to do. What you need to do.

  Here is what I did.

  July 21, 11:24 p.m.

  JakeJones1717: Well, having scrolled through your Instagram photos, I’ve come to the conclusion that if there’s an infinite number of parallel worlds, there’s at least one in which you and I are already best friends

  JakeJones1717: oops, sorry. That was a typo

  JakeJones1717: I meant fucking

  July 21, 11:35 p.m.

  TwistedTree16: In how many of the infinite worlds do you think I just punched you in the balls?

  JakeJones1717: 92300329 where I deserved it. 3 where I didn’t

  TwistedTree16: TWO WHERE YOU DIDN’T

  JakeJones1717: Fair

  TwistedTree16: But in those 2 you probably liked it, I can tell your type. Perv

  JakeJones1717: Okay, but seriously I’m not actually a creepy perv. Just messing around on here and I guess if we’re being totally honest, looking for cute girls to talk to because everyone I know in actual life is boring as hell

  JakeJones1717: I like your pics, your dog is really fluffy. What’s her name?

  TwistedTree16: Dog talk is boring. Maybe YOURE as boring as the people you know. I liked perv you better

  JakeJones1717: If you want perv, I can do perv

  TwistedTree16: I just said I liked it BETTER than boring dog talk

  JakeJones1717: Okay fair. What do YOU want to talk about?

  TwistedTree16: You wrote me first. I might not want to talk about anything

  JakeJones1717: But you’re answering me aren’t you . . .

  TwistedTree16: Maybe I’M just bored

  JakeJones1717: Okay, good point. In another one of those worlds we are having this exact conversation, but it’s going better

  JakeJones1717: Can we try again?

  TwistedTree16: If there’s an infinite number of parallel worlds, there’s one in which you and I are already fucking

  TwistedTree16: oops, sorry. That was a typo

  TwistedTree16: I meant “dead”

  JakeJones1717: I think you probably meant *in love*

  July 22, 10:13 a.m.

  JakeJones1717: In how many of the parallel worlds am I as hungover as I am in this one, do you think? Serious question

  TwistedTree16: Maybe like 4

  JakeJones1717: Oh god . . . that’s not many if we’re talking about infinity. Though it is impossible to imagine anyone more hungover than I am right now . . . so maybe 4 is good?

  TwistedTree16: If it makes you feel any better, in like 6 you just died of alcohol poisoning

  JakeJones1717: Dark. At least those other Jakes are out of their misery

  TwistedTree16: Parallel worlds are no kinder than this one

  JakeJones1717: I’m going to go try and flush my own head down the toilet now

  TwistedTree16: Are you trying to talk dirty to me?

  TwistedTree16: but really . . . let me know how it goes. Most people who show up in my DMs are dumb boring idiots. You seem fun

  JakeJones1717: Awww, are you flirting with me, Twisted?

  TwistedTree16: Well I’m not NOT not not NOT NOT not not flirting with you. If you see what I’m saying

  JakeJones1717: oh god. That is really confusing

  JakeJones1717: hey . . . so I don’t mean to be presumptuous or anything, but can I have your number? Maybe I’ll text you sometime . . . and when I do I WILL be flirting

  TwistedTree16: _ _ _ -_ _ _ - _ _ _ _

  JakeJones1717: what’s that?

  TwistedTree16: have you ever played hangman?

  JakeJones1717: Yeah . . .

  TwistedTree16: that’s hangman for my phone number, if you guess it, you can text me . . .

  JakeJones1717: Are there any A’s?

  TwistedTree16: it’s a phone NUMBER?

  JakeJones1717: I stand by my question . . .

  JakeJones1717: *s??

  TwistedTree16: oh my god. Okay. 914-555-7278. That either IS or IS NOT my phone number. Text it and find out

  Xavier

  Xavier went back home late in the morning of his seventeenth birthday, still smelling like Ivy. He was hungover and had barely slept, but somehow he was wide-awake.

  And he had no idea what to think or how to feel.

  Back in his room, outside of the bubble of the woods, of Ivy’s house and bed, everything from the night before felt like it had happened to someone else a very long time ago.

  He knew he should call Sasha then. But the idea of trying to explain it all, of somehow trying to justify this . . .

  He remembered when they had first become friends. They were in the same English elective but they’d never really talked before. Xavier could tell she was smart from the things she’d say in class. And he could tell she was tough because she didn’t ever look nervous when called on, and because she was always alone in the halls but did not seem to mind it. He liked the necklaces she wore—a little metal book that she was often fiddling with, and sometimes other ones too, like a homemade thing made from knotted twine, or a cat collar with a tiny bell on it.

  One day they needed to get into groups of two for a project and even though he was usually shy about things like that, he asked her to team up. And she said yes. And then there they were trying to come up with an idea for what to do for it, and one popped into his head. Xavier probably wouldn’t have even said it to most people, but, for some reason, with Sasha he didn’t even hesitate. “How about we do a thing about a guy who has an adult human body, and the head of a baby. But with a regular adult brain inside. Only because he is a baby, all he can do is cry and cry and cry. Which, like, isn’t that what most people want to do all the time, anyway? Because of how life is often very confusing?”

  And then Xavier had drawn a little sketch in the corner of his notebook of what this baby-head guy might look like and showed her, and she stared at it and then at him as though maybe they knew each other from a very long time ago and she’d just recognized him. “Yeah,” she’d said. “I think that’ll work.” And when she smiled at him, he felt like he recognized her, too.

  The comic they ended up making together was called The Adventures of Babyhead. It was basically about how the world is wonderful and terrible, how we are going to die and nothing matters, but it is also beautiful and everything does. That was the theme of their friendship, eventually, the theme of their everything, the underlying current of every interaction they had. Maybe the only thing they were both sure was true.

  Xavier thought about all of this, sitting alone in his room on his birthday. He thought about his best friend and how she had been there for him for the whole last horrible month, during which he felt like his chest had been ripped apart by wild animals, or maybe a shark, and that maybe there was no point in leaving his bed ever again. It had surprised him how bad he had felt, how bad he was capable of feeling. But Sasha had not seemed surprised or weirded out or anything, which was another thing he loved about her. She showed up for him, calm and undramatic. She didn’t try and make him talk about Ivy, or anything at all. She just came and hung out, even though he knew he was incredibly boring to be around, and he’d say, “Seriously, you can just go home. I am sludge.” And she’d t
ell him to shut his mouth-hole, but always so kindly. She brought him funny mugs she made at her job and they watched all those ocean movies. And she acted like she wasn’t even doing him a huge favor, but Xavier knew it took energy to be there for someone like that. So what right did Xavier have to just go back to Ivy? To go back to the very person Sasha had saved him from?

  He called Sasha. He felt embarrassed and weird and like, without totally meaning to, he was downplaying things, sort of hiding from her a little.

  Sasha did not sound happy. And he could tell she was hiding something from him, too, though it was no mystery what it was—she thought he was an idiot. And he wasn’t even sure he disagreed with her. He probably was one. He just felt powerless to do anything about it.

  When they hung up, his head was kind of spinning. Xavier felt disoriented and strange, and full of energy. After so long of not doing much of anything at all, the idea of sitting still seemed impossible.

  He decided to clean up his room. He did laundry and put away all his clothes, swept the floor, made his bed. Then Xavier took out his notebook and drew a picture of some new kind of undersea creature, a cross between a sea lion and an anglerfish with a fancy hat on. Usually Xavier would have taken a photo of it and texted it to Sasha so she could write back some funny caption for it, but somehow in that moment it would have felt wrong, like he would be pretending things were normal between them when they both knew they weren’t. That was the problem with being so close to someone, you couldn’t bluff your way out of weirdness like that.

  * * *

  When his parents got home, they all sat down to dinner. They gave him a new Moleskine, which they did every year on his birthday, and a gift card for the art store. His dad made tequila chicken tacos and his mom made a spinach salad. His parents were not big talkers, so dinner was mostly quiet, but Xavier could tell that they were glad to see him up and out of bed. There was ice cream for dessert.