Condemned by Christopher Renna (best biographies to read txt) 📗

"I talked about Levi because I thought you guys did."

"Anything else?"

"I said we smoked weed a couple times."

"Seriously!" Trevor replied, raising his voice. "Did you also tell him we stole candy bars in the third grade? Or about you and—"

"Stop." Adam shifted in his seat. "Calm down."

"No. I don't want to calm down. I'm tired of all this. I want it all to go away."

"So do we," Conner said. "But why are you yelling at us?"

From experience, Conner knew that Trevor expressed anger to the point of not wanting to subject his friends to an explosion of fury. Instead, he'd stomp away. And that's exactly what he did.

"Because Jared's dead!" Trevor hollered. His square jaw twitched as if he'd bit his tongue to control lashing out. "And it's probably our fault." Then he marched out of the house.

Tilting his head back, Conner rhythmically pressed his fingertips along the nape of his neck and blew out a puff of air. "Well, now we gotta calm him down."

"He'll be fine," Adam said. "We can talk to him later."

Mason poked his head into the room, his friends hovering over his shoulder. "What the hell was that about?"

"Nothing," Conner groaned. "Get your asses outta here."

Silently, he and Adam continued to eat. Then Adam finally asked, "What now?"

"I don't know. I think I need a nap."

"I should get home." He stuffed the last bite of sandwich into his mouth and rose to his feet. "See you later?" he asked, pelting Conner's forehead with breadcrumbs.

Conner swiped at his forehead.

"Sorry." Adam chuckled.

"Maybe I'll come over after dinner."

"Cool." Adam strolled out of the room.

When he heard the front door shut, Conner slumped in the chair. His mind was too clouded with thoughts to focus on one topic without straying to another and then another. He just wanted to lay in bed and drift to sleep so he didn't have to think about anything.

His phone chimed. He contemplated ignoring it because he wasn't in the mood for a chat. But he checked it anyway. A text from Levi.

Miguel doesn't need to know anything.

Then he noticed a text from Hailey, sent a couple hours earlier. If he didn't spend the evening with Adam, maybe he'd hang out with her to boost his spirits. He clicked on her text, prepared to read about their date the previous night.

Reporters showed up at church today.

He set the phone onto the table with a thud and then went upstairs to take a nap.

*   *   *

Hailey sat in the back seat of her parents' brand-new silver Acura ILX. Her younger twin sisters sat beside her, completely engrossed in their cell phones. Since the surprise arrival of the reporters in the church parking lot, she'd remained quiet and observant. The adults had reacted with mild irritation but swift evasion. Hailey had been impressed by the prompt efforts of everyone to shield the children, the rectory, and the deacons. Now, having departed lunch at a fellow churchgoer's home, an almost irresistible impulse to discuss the reporters danced on the tip of her tongue.

She checked her phone. Still no text from Conner.

"Are Father Bersani and Father O'Leary going to be able to keep the reporters away?"

"That's parish business, dear," her mother said. "Best leave the discussion to the church. It's not our affair."

"Yeah. But those reporters are trying to get the story on Jared. Doesn't that involve all of us?"

"No," her father said sternly. "Your mother's right, this is not our affair. Let's drop the subject."

"I went to school with him. I knew him. Someone my age is dead because the devil—"

"I said, drop the subject." He locked eyes with her in the rearview mirror. "This isn't an appropriate conversation to be having with your sisters present."

She averted her eyes to the houses they passed.

Following a moment of silence, her mother asked, "What's gotten into you lately? You've had a bit of an attitude the past week."

"I have not."

"You most certainly have so. And your judgement has been less than ideal."

"What does that mean?"

"The other night, that incident at the Smiths' house and the cops."

Hailey sighed. "I thought the subject of Jared was off limits."

"Do you have some morbid fascination with what happened to Jared Smith?"

"No," Hailey huffed. "Don't be ridiculous."

"Excuse me, young lady?"

"Watch yourself," her father interjected. "Don't talk to your mother with that tone."

"Sorry."

"Again, your mother's right. You've been acting out lately."

"If you say so."

"There's that attitude again. Better embrace silence."

Biting her lip, Hailey wanted to shout "I want to talk about the terrible thing that happened to Jared. I want to understand how something horrible like that could happen to an innocent person." Yet she refrained from giving in to the impulse. Still, she was tired of being treated like a little girl. She was tired of obeying demands and putting on a good-girl front to appease her parents' expectations of her.

When Hailey's grandmother Mavis was alive, she'd spend hours sewing quilts for her granddaughters. Carefully selected panels of flowers or animals or farm scenes or girly things were stitched together with precision by dutiful fingers and a grandmother's love. And Hailey loved those handmade quilts of heavy padding and cotton threads with their earth tones and subdued pastels. Yet now she felt very much like one of the quilts, constructed of squares that someone believed constituted a representation of Hailey. But no matter how much love had gone into making the quilt, those scenic squares were more a representation of the maker than of the receiver. Hailey wanted to pull at the seams that held together the images others had assigned to her. She wanted to replace at least one panel with something of her own design, no matter how haphazardly she'd constructed it. At least it would truly represent her.

She clenched her hands, pressing her fingernails into her palms. Then she straightened her posture and blurted, "I lost my virginity."

The car suddenly accelerated.

"Oh, dear Lord," her father bellowed as he apparently weakened his foot on the gas pedal.

Her mother burst into