The Girl Who Kissed a Lie

Chapter Eight

Chapter Eight

We get back to Beacon Hill, and I am still shaking uncontrollably. Andy just keeps saying, “What the hell? What the hell?” over and over again. Kelsey is biting furiously at a nail. She is silent most of the ride, which I appreciate, because I am exhausted and my head is pounding.

“What should we do?” Kelsey asks as we drive up Beacon Street. “I mean, we should tell someone. About Brody. We should—”

“We can’t tell them Brody turned into a monster,” Andy says from the front seat. “Are you crazy? That’s not what happened. He’s Brody. He’s…terrible at beer pong.”

Maybe I did imagine this whole thing. It seems like I could have. And yet other people saw it. I don’t know. I’m so confused.

I close my eyes for a moment, trying to think. “I don’t know,” I say eventually. “I don’t know what to do.”

“I’ll ask my mom,” Kelsey decides. “She’ll know what to do. Don’t worry about this. I’ll take care of it.”

It feels good to hear that, because I don’t have any idea what to do next. I feel helpless and powerless and, frankly, on the verge of collapse. I refuse Kelsey’s offer to come inside with me, and in fact, I don’t go inside at all. I sit on the front steps shakily and watch Andy’s car drive off.

And I’m sitting there, terrified that I’m losing my mind and terrified that I’m not losing my mind, and what I want at that moment, more than I want anything else in the world, is Ben. Ben, who doesn’t think I’m normal and thinks that’s fantastic.

I find myself dashing across Beacon Street and onto the Common in search of him, and he is standing behind his lemonade cart. I don’t even know whether  he’s serving a customer or not. I just fly directly at him, and he catches me awkwardly with a little oof noise.

“All right,” he says soothingly, his arms lifting up to enclose me against him, and I don’t feel claustrophobic; I feel safe. “What happened? You’re soaking wet.”

And Ben hates to be wet. The thought changes my sob to a bubble of laughter, and I lift my head up. Ben is Ben. Not a monster. He is Ben, with his thick, curly, dark hair and moonbeam eyes. He looks at me, concerned, like I’ve lost my mind. But I only thought I lost my mind today. Today, the craziest thing actually happened. Maybe everything I think is crazy in my life is actually real, and I’m not crazy at all. Maybe my father is the sanest person of all.

Maybe, after all, this is normal. My version of it anyway.

“I kissed a boy, and he turned into a monster and possibly tried to kill me,” I tell Ben. “I don’t think that’s normal. Is that normal?” I feel almost like laughing as I ask the question. It’s possible I’m hysterical.

Ben, to his credit, barely blinks at this story. Because Ben has never expected—or apparently even desired—normality. He says, “What did you do to him?”

“Pushed him into the water.”

“Good,” says Ben.

Good, he says. I tell him this crazy story and he just says good. “I don’t think he could swim. I think I killed him.”

“You didn’t. He’ll be fine.” Ben is walking us now, away from the lemonade cart and the subway station, toward my house. His arm is still protectively around my shoulders, even though I’m wet, and I’m grateful for that.

“How do you know that?” I ask.

“Because I know everything,” replies Ben. “Because I am older and wiser than you. And an expert in things that aren’t normal.”