Total pages in book: 93
Estimated words: 87068 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 435(@200wpm)___ 348(@250wpm)___ 290(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 87068 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 435(@200wpm)___ 348(@250wpm)___ 290(@300wpm)
But the chaos is too much. The crowd’s raucous, and before I realize it, someone’s yanked the broom away from me. Stella’s clutching her face, wide-eyed with astonishment. Meanwhile, a scrum of blue figures rushes forward and surrounds Tammy.
Police.
Flashing lights are already pulsing outside, blue and red reflecting off the wet pavement. Two officers, one tall and built like a telephone pole, the other short and mean-eyed, take in the carnage in a glance, and then start barking orders.
“Everyone against the wall! Now! Hands up!”
A mad scramble. Drinks dropped, phones shoved into pockets, bodies pressed flat against the walls. The officers wade into the center and fix on me and Stella instantly. We’re easy to spot: me gaping with my mouth open, her with blood on her cheek and thigh, both of us in dresses that say “we were here to party.”
“Sit down. Right there,” the tall one says, jabbing a finger at the floor. “Don’t move.”
I drop to my knees, dress riding up embarrassingly high. Stella sits beside me, breathing hard, hair wild. Someone in the crowd is still filming, but the officers don’t care.
The short cop yanks out a zip tie and pulls Stella’s hands behind her back. “You’re under arrest for assault and battery,” he says, voice flat. She spits a string of curses at him, but he’s unfazed.
The tall cop looks at me, at the broom, then back at me. “What’s your name?”
“Kayleigh McEnroe,” I say, barely above a whisper.
He shakes his head, like he can’t believe the paperwork he’s about to have to file.
He zip-ties my wrists with practiced efficiency, the plastic biting into my skin. “Stand up,” he orders. I do, wobbling on my heels, dress askew, hair in ruins. I look over at Stella, who’s already snarling at the officer, lip split and eyes blazing.
They hustle us through the crowd, out the front door, down the slick driveway and into the squad car waiting at the curb. The flash of camera phones follows us, a paparazzi sendoff for the newest criminals in Minneapolis. I catch a glimpse of Tammy through the window, red hair everywhere, hands clutching a bag of frozen peas against her crotch.
Stella and I are loaded into the backseat, cuffs tight, knees pressed together.
Stella lets loose a torrent of outrage, shouting about civil rights, unfair detainment, and her right to one phone call. The cop slams the door, and her voice cuts off, muffled by glass.
I sit perfectly still, knees pressed together, trying not to cry. The streetlights paint everything orange and white, and my reflection in the window looks hollow, almost cartoonish.
“Don’t worry, girlfriend,” Stella says in a loud voice while shooting evil glances at the cop driving us. “I’m going to teach these dudes a lesson. We did nothing wrong!”
But I don’t answer because my head is whirling. What the hell just happened? How did me and Stella end up in the back of a cop car, being driven to prison? My mind hurts, feeling of the broom handle in my hand, the blissful and ecstatic look on Tammy’s face as she was penetrated.
Did she plan this?
Was I caught in her net, instead of Stella?
I want to die.
But more than that, I want Trevor to come save me.
But what would my stepbrother do now? Probably laugh at the cesspool I’ve just gotten myself into.
I close my eyes, press my knees together, and don’t make a sound.
The Minneapolis holding cells are exactly what you’d expect: too cold, too bright, and so clean you can taste the bleach on every breath. Stella and I are placed in side-by-side cages, about six feet apart, each cell barely big enough for a cot, a metal bench bolted to the concrete, and a single exposed toilet that might have been manufactured in the depths of hell. The lights overhead are fluorescent, flickering just often enough to make you doubt your own vision. There’s no clock in sight, but the way time moves here, it could be midnight or three in the morning or even the next afternoon. There’s no one else but us in this bank of cells, thank god. No one to witness our downfall.
Stella paces her cell like a caged tiger, heels clacking on the concrete, the blue dress now a shredded mess that shows more than it covers. Her face is streaked with mascara, the cut on her cheek gone brown at the edges, her left eye puffy. She doesn’t seem to care. She’s got a monologue going, and it’s aimed at anyone who might be listening—me, the cop at the desk, the universe.
“It’s a public health thing,” she’s saying, hands carving wild shapes in the air. “Like, if you know your boyfriend is fucking other people, you tell them, right? But no—Tammy has to act like I’m the only reason she got chlamydia, which is a total lie, because first of all, she was with three guys at Homecoming, and also, you can get it from gym mats. Look it up, it’s a fact.”