If I Tell

can’t.”
    I hardened my heart. “No, you can’t.”
    She wiped her nose with the back of her hand and rubbed under her eyes with her fingertip.
    Her misery hurt me. “Why, Lacey? Why do you have to be this way?” I asked.
    Her lips pressed together tight. “You want to know?” she asked and blew out a puff of air. Her voice turned icy. “You want to know the truth?” Her voice cracked with emotion. “Remember how I told you about my stepfather? Number two. The way he watched me. Trying to sneak in when I showered or changed?”
    I squirmed and bit my lip, nodding.
    “Well, what I didn’t tell you, what I forgot to mention was that number one was worse. Much worse.”
    I swallowed a lump of dread. “What do you mean?”
    “I think you know what I mean.” Her voice was bitter, dripping with cold. “He did more than watch. The only person I ever told was my mom, and you know what she did? She blamed it on me. She said that I asked for it.” Lacey closed her eyes for a moment and took a deep breath. When she opened them, her eyes were full of hate. “I was only thirteen. A kid. What kid asks for that?”
    I swore softly under my breath, but she kept going.
    “Mom dumped him, but before long she brought home number two. At least number two only looked. I had to live with that until I was old enough to get out of there.”
    Another car pulled into the parking lot, its wheels crunching over the pavement, but it pulled into a spot behind Lacey, and neither one of us moved.
    “So maybe that’s why I drink. To try to forget. It doesn’t take a psychology degree to figure it out. Why I’m such a slut, as you said.”
    I opened my mouth to speak and closed it. I tried again. “I’m sorry, Lacey. I mean, why didn’t you tell me before?”
    She stepped back, looking away from me. “Because I didn’t have to, Jaz. I don’t go around bragging about the gory details in my life. You accept me for who I am. Or you did. You put up with my stupid drinking. And the boys. You never made me feel like I was a bad person because of it. Until now.”
    A third car pulled into the parking lot and stopped, waiting for us to move. Lacey stared at me, her expression wounded but at the same time just as hateful as mine felt. The car honked and I walked off to the side. Lacey didn’t move. She seemed to be waiting for me to say something.
    “I’m sorry that happened to you,” I managed, but my voice was strained. I wanted to go to her, take her by the hand, and move her out of the way, but I couldn’t.
    Why had we never told each other the secrets we carried around? Talked about the things that had happened to us? We’d been drawn together, sensing somehow our wounds and differences, but we’d never opened up. We’d never talked about the things that could have brought us closer. Maybe we could have helped each other sooner.
    The driver in the car rolled down his window. “Hey, would you get out of the way already?”
    “Forget it, Jaz. Just forget everything.” Lacey started to run. Her feet pounded on the ground. I felt paralyzed, stuck to the cement and helpless as I watched her go, unable to go after her and give her what she needed from me. I couldn’t forgive her. No matter what had happened to her in the past.
    My insides gurgled with bile. My stomach churned with my inability to forgive my best friend. Or Simon. I couldn’t forgive either of them for what they’d done.
    ***
    I walked down the busy hallway in the mall, spotting Mom at our meeting place in front of the food court. I hurried toward her, clutching the paper bag full of cookies I’d brought from work.
    She whimpered when she saw the bag. “Oh, God. No. Not the cookies. Take them away. Please.” She stepped back to distance herself from the bag. “I don’t need cookies around me right now. Willpower. Zero.”
    I dropped my arm, shifting the bag to my other hand.
    “I’m such a cliché, aren’t I? Fat pregnant woman with raging hormones.” She started waddling away with a crazy look in her eyes. “I want to buy you some new clothes. Thin clothes. Live vicariously through you. You, skinny minny, got your metabolism from someone else.”
    “You mean the Sperminator?”
    She clucked her tongue on the roof of her mouth just like Grandma and lifted a shoulder. Him again, her expression said. She’d brought him up, not me.
    “Maybe.” She stopped. “Anyways. Here. Let’s go in here.”
    She grabbed my arm and dragged me into a