The Pact by Jodi Picoult

Melanie crushed the cigarette beneath her heel. "Did the judge rule yet?"

  "Bail was denied."

  Melanie exhaled. "Wow," she said softly. She felt as if she were floating an inch above the ground. "I think I need another cigarette," she said.

  Lou dug into his coat again. "How about an even trade? You get the cigarettes." He handed her the whole pack. "And I get a front-page story."

  CHRIS CHANGED BACK INTO a jumpsuit in the booking room of the jail. An officer led him to the pod where he'd spent the night. The TV was still on, and there were two new men in the area. One, who looked to be violently drunk, was throwing up in the toilet in Chris's cell.

  Heedless of the sound and the smell, Chris crawled onto the mattress where he'd slept the night before. He stayed there for a few minutes, curled into himself. "I want to go home," he said. The drunk stared blearily at Chris. "I want to go home."

  He stood up, walking out of the cell toward the end of the pod where the officer stood behind a locked metal door. Like the door of a fucking cage. He was an animal now. Chris grabbed at the bars and rattled them hard.

  The officer stared at him. The other inmates ignored him; a few snickered. Chris rattled the bars again, and then more, until his hands hurt from clenching them. He fell to his knees and stayed that way for a long while.

  Then Chris stood up. Dry-eyed, he walked past his cell toward the TV at the end of the catwalk. He sat down in a chair behind the black-eyed man with the goatee. No one spoke to him; no one even indicated they'd heard his tantrum. Sally Jessy Raphael was on. Chris let his eyes go wide and he stared at the screen until he was seeing absolutely nothing.

  THEN

  April 1996

  "Swimmers, take your marks."

  Emily leaned forward at the edge of her seat in the middle of the high school bleachers. She watched Chris snap the band of his goggles twice, for luck, and shake out the muscles of his arms and legs. Then he hooked his toes over the edge of the starting block. As he bent down, he turned his head and unerringly found Emily's face in a sea of others. He winked.

  There was a buzz, then Chris bulleted into the water, streaking beneath the surface of the water to emerge halfway across the pool. His shoulders rose like a great whale, and his arms windmilled in a powerful butterfly stroke. He reached the fifty-meter mark before any of the other swimmers.

  Then he turned, the soles of his feet flashing silver as he raced home.

  The gymnasium swelled with the yells of the crowd, and Emily found herself smiling. Chris reached the wall in an eruption of sound. Over the cheers, the student announcing the meet warbled Chris's time. "A personal best," he crowed, "and a new school record for the hundred-meter butterfly!"

  Panting, Chris hauled himself out of the pool. He was grinning from ear to ear. Emily stood up and pushed past the other people sitting on that row of the bleachers. Walking down the aisle, she made her way to the floor, where the next race was about to start.

  Chris hugged her and buried his face in her neck. Emily could feel the exertion of his heart and his lungs. She imagined the crowd watching as they embraced. The fact that everyone knew someone like him had picked someone like her was one of the things she loved about being Chris's girlfriend.

  Unfortunately, there were also things she hated.

  CARLOS CREIGHTON, WHO WAS nearly as legendary a breaststroker as Chris was a butterflyer, had the locker beside his. "Nice race," Carlos said as Chris emerged from beneath a towel, his hair sticking up in spikes.

  "Thanks. You too."

  Carlos shrugged. "'Course, I could have probably gone faster if I had a hot little piece waiting for me at the finish line, too."

  Chris smiled tightly. It was no secret that he and Em were going out--they had been for almost three years--but that led to assumptions that were not necessarily true. Like the fact that Emily put out, or why else would Chris have stuck around so long?

  The thing was, if he chose to set Carlos straight, it made Chris look like a fool.

  "Bet you get some tonight," Carlos said.

  Chris shrugged into his shirt. "Who knows," he said, just off-handed enough to sound modest.

  "Well, when she gets sick of you give her my phone number," Carlos said.

  Chris buttoned his fly and swung his knapsack over his shoulder. "Don't hold your breath," he said.

  EMILY KNEW THAT her relationship with Chris was very different from most of the other teenage relationships she saw at school. First, it was not a fleeting thing--she had known Chris her entire life. Second, it was truly love, and not infatuation: Chris was practically a member of her family.

  That was why Emily could not understand what was the matter with her.

  When she and Chris had first started going out, two whole years back, it had been an amazing exploration. There was no safer way to stumble through intimacy than with a good friend. But then something had changed. Chris's hands moved; Emily found herself fighting him off. At first it was fear, which gave way to curiosity. The problem was, curiosity gave way to something else.

  Em did not know what sex was supposed to feel like, but she guessed it wasn't having your skin shrink back from his, your stomach roll, your head pound out that this was wrong. Every time her body betrayed her like that, she was embarrassed. It was clear that Chris loved her; of course he'd want to make love to her. And certainly it was right--for God's sake, she'd been hearing her name linked to Chris's since before she could speak. She could not imagine exposing herself so vulnerably to anyone but Chris. Unfortunately, she could not see exposing herself so vulnerably to Chris, either.

  He'd yelled at her when she pulled away; once he had even called her a cocktease. But Emily didn't mind, because the alternative was having Chris ask what was the matter. When that happened, she went silent, unwilling and unable to hurt him with the truth.

  With a vicious yank of the brush through her hair, Emily turned away from her bedroom mirror. Dinner had been a quiet affair, her father off on house calls and her mother absorbed in the nightly news. She dropped her brush on her bed and gathered up her math books.

  "Where do you think you're going on a school night?" her mother asked, as soon as Emily came into the kitchen wearing her coat.

  "To Chris's," she said. "To study."

  "Oh. All right." Melanie poked at several buttons on the dishwasher; it hummed to life. "Call when you're ready to come home. I don't want you walking through the woods when it's dark."

  Emily nodded and zipped up her jacket. It was still cool for April. She felt her mother's hand on her shoulder. "Are you feeling okay?"

  "Yeah. I guess." She lifted her eyes, staring into her mother's, willing Melanie to put together pieces that Emily could not fit into place by herself. "If it was someone else--not Chris--would you let me go?"

  Melanie smoothed her daughter's hair. "Probably not," she said, smiling. "But why talk about something that isn't going to happen?"

  FOR A MOMENT THEY both stood at the threshold to Chris's bedroom, afraid to enter.

  Chris swallowed. How come he'd never noticed how little furniture was in here? The dresser, the tiny desk, and that bed. "Why don't we sit on the floor?" he suggested.

  Relieved, Emily sank down and immediately began spreading out her notes. "I think that McCarthy's going to try to get us on the proofs. So I thought we could go over some of the--" She broke off as Chris leaned down and kissed her. "We're supposed to be studying," she whispered.

  "I know. I just had to do that."

  Emily's mouth twitched. "You had to."

  "Like you can't imagine," Chris said. He settled behind her, curved into the shape of her body, one big hand protectively slung over her ribs.

  This she liked. Being close to Chris, and being held, and well, just being. It was the other that upset her.

  She stared at a carefully printed page of graphs, wiggling because of what Chris was doing to her. She could feel his teeth scraping the tendons of her neck. Emily thought of the wavy sine curve
on her homework: one half leaning in, one half pulling away.

  THE FLOOR; THAT HAD SEEMED like a good idea. Monkish. But with Emily on her side, the slides and curves of her body were more apparent. It never failed to amaze Chris how one moment, Em could be as familiar as his own sister, and the next, a mystery.

  He kept thinking of what Carlos had said. Everyone on the planet probably thought he and Em were having sex. It was practically a given that they'd get married one day, so what was the big deal? It wasn't like that was the only reason he wanted to be with Emily. She certainly knew that.

  She let him kiss her. Sometimes, she let him slide a hand under her shirt. He'd never tried anything below the waist. For that matter, neither had she.

  Chris curled closer behind her and began to kiss her neck. She twisted in his embrace. "We're not going to get any studying done, are we?"

  He shook his head. "I studied last night," he admitted.

  "Well, that's just great," Emily grumbled, turning to face him. "What am I supposed to do?"

  He was going to say, "Study tomorrow." But the words came out wrong, and before he knew it he had grasped Emily's wrist and pressed it between his legs. "You're supposed to touch me," he said.

  For a moment, her fingers curled around the length of him. Chris closed his eyes, drifting. Then her hand jumped up, trembling. Emily jerked into a sitting position. "I ... I ... can't," she whispered, her face turned away.

  Stunned--was she crying?--Chris got up on his knees. "Em," he said softly. "I'm sorry." Afraid to touch her, he held out his arms. She looked up at him, her eyes wide and wet. It took a moment, and then she came to him.

  "I LIKE THIS TIME OF YEAR BEST," Gus announced. She was sitting on Melanie's porch, drinking lemonade, the unseasonably warm temperatures melting away the last of the winter's snow. "No black flies, no mosquitoes, no snow."

  "Mud," Melanie said, her eyes fixed on something beyond the tree line. "Lots of it."

  "I always rather liked mud," Gus said. "Do you remember how we used to let Em and Chris roll around in it like piglets?"

  Melanie laughed. "I remember scrubbing dirt out of the bathtub," she said.

  Both women stared down the length of the driveway. "Those were the good old days," Melanie sighed.

  "Oh, I don't know. They still roll around ... just not for the same reasons."

  Gus took a sip of her drink. "I caught them in Chris's room the other night."

  "Doing what?"

  "Well, they weren't actually doing anything."

  "And how do you know?"

  "I just do." Gus drew her brows together. "Don't you think?"

  "Not with the same level of certitude that you do," Melanie said.

  "Well, if they do, so what? They're going to have sex one day anyway."

  "Yes," Melanie said slowly, "but it doesn't have to be at fifteen."

  "Sixteen."

  "Wrong. Chris is sixteen. Emily is fifteen."

  "A mature fifteen."

  "A female fifteen."

  Gus set down her lemonade. "What does that have to do with it?"

  "Everything." Melanie shook her head. "You wait till it's Kate's turn."

  "I'll assume, as I do now with Chris, that Kate is old enough and bright enough to be making the right decisions."

  "No, you won't. You'll want to keep her your little girl for as long as you can."

  Gus laughed. "Emily's always going to be your little girl," she said.

  Melanie turned in her chair. "Think of yourself, after your first time," she urged. "Emily is mine now. But afterward, well, she'll belong to Chris."

  Gus was silent for a moment. "You're wrong," she said softly. "Even now, Emily belongs to Chris."

  THE PREVIOUS SPRING, Chris had begun working at Shady Acres--a small playground that was neither shady nor on a full acre. It sported an octopuslike plastic climbing structure, a sandbox, and an antique carousel, which could be ridden for twenty-five cents.

  Chris ran the carousel. It was mindless, dizzying work--collecting the quarters, settling the kids on the horses, checking safety belts, pushing the button that activated the motor, then waiting for the calliope tape to finish one entire round of song before shutting the power and letting the carousel spin slowly to a stop. He liked the candied smell of the toddlers he hefted into the saddles. He liked swinging up on a support pole as the carousel slowed, to help the children unlatch their belts and slide down. He liked taking a damp cloth at the end of the day to wipe down the manes of the horses and to stare into their frozen, rolling eyes.

  This year, the owners had given him his own key.

  It was Friday, and exceptionally warm for a night in April. Chris and Emily had gone to see a movie, but it was early and Chris wasn't ready to go home. Driving aimlessly, he wound up in the parking lot of the playground. "Hey," Emily said, her face lighting up. "Let's go on the swings."

  She got out of the car and raced across the mud. By the time Chris made his way there, she was already in the air, her face tipped up to the night sky. He walked in the other direction, hearing Em call out, then used his carousel key to open the control panel.

  In the moonlight, the horses began to run.

  Delighted, Emily got off her swing and came closer. "When did they give you the key?" she asked.

  Chris shrugged. "Last weekend."

  "Oh, it's wonderful. Can I get on?"

  He grabbed her around the waist and swung her up by the white horse she loved best. "Be my guest," he said.

  Emily climbed onto the wooden horse and, after the carousel made one full revolution, held out her hand to Chris. "You come too," she urged.

  He chose the horse beside hers, and as soon as he was seated he realized his mistake: When Emily was up, he was down, and vice versa. He leaned into her as their horses came level and kissed her cheek. Emily laughed, then leaned back to kiss him.

  He slid off his horse and held out his arms for Emily. And then they were lying on the thick painted planks beneath the horses, the churning wooden hooves just clearing their arms and legs. Emily leaned back, her eyes closed, her mind full of the music. Chris slipped his hands up her shirt.

  Her bra unhooked in the front. And oh, God, she felt good. Soft and full all at the same time, and she smelled of peaches. Chris leaned his head toward the curve of her neck and licked her, certain she would taste of them too. He heard Emily make a noise at the back of her throat, and he took it to mean that she liked this as much as he did.

  He slid his hand down the front of her jeans, slipping beneath the waistband of her panties as well, so that his fingers brushed against silky hair. Holding his breath, he inched his fingers downward.

  "Stop," she whimpered. "Chris, stop."

  And when he didn't, she took her fist and clubbed him in the ear.

  He reared back, his head ringing like a sonofabitch. But before he could yell at Em he saw the white oval of her face shake in denial, then she was standing. She leaped off the moving carousel, falling once before she gained her footing, leaving Chris spinning in circles.

  IN THE MOVIES, when things like that happened, the heroine somehow found her way home. But all Emily could think was that in real life the ultimate indignity was having to shove your boyfriend away, then still need him to drive you home.

  She felt Chris slide into the seat beside her, and kept her face averted until the overhead light in the Jeep went off. But she did not have to look to know that his jaw would be tight, his lips pressed into a line.

  For a moment she wanted to mold herself against him, in hopes that that would make him soften. She remembered being a toddler, screaming to her mother that she wanted to be put down, but clinging all the harder. "Maybe," she whispered, "we shouldn't see each other for a while."

  Chris put the car into drive. And nodded.

  EVERYTHING ABOUT DONNA DEFELICE was legendary--from her spun-sugar hair to her grapefruit-size breasts to her cheerleader split, the fastest anyone could ever remember seeing at the hi
gh school. For two years she had made it clear to Chris that if he was willing, she was available. And finally, pushed over the edge by Emily, he'd decided to reciprocate.

  He could not see in the Jeep, and moisture that had fogged the insides of the windows seeped through the shoulder of his shirt when he brushed up against it. Beneath him, Donna writhed on the backseat.

  Chris hadn't even taken her out to dinner. She'd put her hand on his leg during the drive to the restaurant and asked what he was really hungry for.

  And now she was, remarkably, totally naked, and her hand was wrapped around him, and Chris didn't think she even realized he'd never done this before.

  In the thin light from the dashboard, Donna's chest was tinted a luminous green, but magnificent for all that. Her eyes were slitted and her mouth rounded on his own name. The only thing wrong with her was that she wasn't Em.

  "Oh, God," Donna moaned. "Give it to me now." She pulled him onto her.

  One thrust, he thought, and I'm gonna lose it. But to his surprise, he wasn't nearly as carried away as he'd expected to be. He felt almost as if he was watching himself from a corner of the car; seeing Donna buck beneath him like an animal he couldn't put a name to.

  When it was over she pushed him off her and wriggled into her underwear. Then she curled up under his arm, feeling all wrong there. "That was something," she breathed, "wasn't it?"

  "Something," Chris agreed. He stared out the windshield, wondering how he could have been stupid enough to think that it was sex he had wanted all along, when in fact he had only wanted Emily.

  ALL DAY LONG EMILY had hidden in school corridors and ducked into bathrooms so that no one would see her cry. Everywhere she went, though, she heard people talking about the way Chris Harte had been walking with his arm around Donna DeFelice. At sixth period, when Emily had walked toward the trig class she had with Chris and found him leaning over Donna on a bank of lockers just outside the door, she finally broke down. She asked Mrs. McCarthy for a pass to the nurse and had no problem getting the woman to believe she was ill. It wasn't her throat, and it wasn't a fever, but it hurt all the same to be heartbroken.

  When her mother came to pick her up, Emily slouched down in the passenger seat and turned her head away. Then she went up to her room and crawled under the covers. She stayed there until it was dark.