Eventually I dried my eyes, changed into a tank top and cotton short, and crawled into bed. Suddenly, I was exhausted, but I knew I wasn't going to be able to sleep.
I propped my pillows up against the headboard and sat with my sheets covering my knees. I could hear my parents talking in low hushed voices, but intense ones, in the kitchen.
From what I imagined I could hear, my father was seriously angry and my mother was defending me.
Finally, I heard the floor boards squeak and their bedroom door closed. For a moment I thought they had both gone to bed, but then I heard my mothers footsteps coming down the hall. She knocked lightly and opened up the door.
"Mind if I come in?" she asked, peeking her head inside.
"Sure," I said. I reached over and turned on my bedside lamp. My heart felt sick and my insides were all twisted up. I just hoped my mother was here with good news, not something that would make it all feel worse.
She sat down at the end of my mattress and rubbed my foot through the sheets.
"Cassie, about what your father said earlier," she began. "He just doesn't want to see you get hurt. We know you're getting older, but it's kind of hard for us to stop wanting to protect you."
"I don't get it mom. What is the big deal with the Kents? So Jared's mom fell in love and left tow. Big deal! That shouldn't make them public enemy number one."
My mother took a deep breath. "The story's not that simple."
I tipped my head back in frustration. I was sick of cryptic answers. Of gossipy stories and muddled facts. "So tell me the story! Come on, Mom. If you guys want to get me to understand, then just tell me. I'm a big girl. I can handle it.
My mom looked at me in the semidarkness, then turned and lifted her legs up onto the bed. She sat there Indian style in her night gown, and folded the end of my quilt over her knees.
"Okay, Cassie. I don't like to talk about this because I don't like dredging up bad memories, but now that the Kents have come back into our lives, I suppose you should know."
I leaned back, still holding my knees, and settled in. Half of the kids in my high school would have killed to be there in that moment, getting the real Kent saga from a woman who had been there. But all I cared about was how it might affect me and Jared.
"Robert Kent was this gorgeous teenage hotshot who came up here every summer with his parents and his two older brothers," my mother began. "The brothers were totally sauve and obnoxious, but mostly kept to themselves like the other summer locals, so they were no big deal. Robert, however was another story. He would get up here before Lake Logan High was even out for the year and he'd hang out in the parking lot with his corvette, talking to local girls and taking them out for rides. Every girl who met him completely fell in love with him. Except me of course, I was already taken."
I smiled at this, recalling the picture of my parents in their senior yearbook: "Class Couple." So cheesy, but so ridiculously cute.
"Anyway, as you know, Susan Morris, was my best friend, but as adventurous as she was around here, she was totally shy when it came to boys. Plus she wasn't the fashion-plate-type. She was pretty, but not into clothes and makeup and all of that. Robert tried to talk to her once and she basically turned red and ran away," my mother continued.
"After that, he didn't bother her, but for two years, Robert was all she could talk about. She daydreamed about him. Wrote his name in all over her books. And even though he came up here every summer and broke some girls hearts, she never stopped thinking that if she could just get up the guts to talk to him, they would fall madly in love."
I knew the type. Those girls who just wanted to tame the player. Somehow it just never seemed to work out the way they planned.
"So then senior year rolls around and suddenly Susan starts experimenting with makeup and starts reading fashion magazines," my mom said with a sigh.
"We all thought it was great. You know how girls are. We'd been telling Susan for years to fix herself up. She was the smartest girl in our class and she got into all the Ivy League schools. I figured she just wanted a new one for college or whatever. But then, that summer, Robert shows up and Susan tells me she's going to talk to him. I said 'Yeah right' There was no way the Sue I knew had the guts to do that. But she did. Right there at Pete's in front of all these Lake Loganers and everyone. Robert took one look at her and that was it. We all knew there was going to be trouble."
"So, for the next four weeks, Susan and Robert spent all their time together. They ran around town like they owned it, racing his car, stealing flowers from the roadside stands, just generally acting like morons. At first Susan and I still hung out, but she changed pretty quickly. She had interest going to the lake anymore or going horse back riding. It was all about Robert's friends and the country club and day trips to the city. One time I didn't see her for a week, so I called the Kents' to try to talk to her and Robert picked up the phone. He told me Susan didn't need farm trash friends anymore and to stop stalking her." My mother looked down at the quilt and picked at a loose string.
"I wouldn't have believed hi,, but I could hear her laughing in the background. I hung up the phone and that was the last time I heard her voice. Laughing at me."
My heart panged and I felt sick to my stomach. I couldn't imagine what I would do if Donna dropped met that way. If she laughed while someone insulted me. I'd probably crawl under the covers and cry for days.
"He completely changed her. She just took off with him half way through the summer and sent her parents a postcard saying they had eloped. After that they had never heard from her again. Didn't even bother telling me she was married. She had enrolled in Harvard, but never went."
"Her dad had a heart attack a few years later and passed. Then her mom died a couple of years after that. Supposedly she took care of their funerals, but I never saw her. The Susan I knew never would have ignored her education or dropped her family like that. It was awful."
I swallowed a lump that had formed in my throat. I wondered if Jared even knew half of what I had just heard.
"I'm so sorry mom," I said. "I had no idea."
"Well, your dad went through all of that with me," my mother said. "So you can imagine why he's a little wary of the Kents. Susan broke my heart and I guess he just doesn't want to see Jared break yours."
"But he won't mom," I said straightening my legs. "I really like him, but it's not like I'm going to run off with him and get married. I mean, seriously. This is me. Reliable. Predictable Cassie. Are you really worried about that?"
My mother looked at me and then cracked a smile. "No, I suppose not."
"So can you talk to Dad?" I ask. "I don't want him to hate Jared. This summer could be really really horrible if he does."
Taking a deep breath my mom reached out and ran her hand down the side of my face, briefly cupping my chin between her finger and thumb.
"I'll see what I can do," she said with a small smile.
I grabbed her into a hug and squeezed my eyes shut. "Thanks mom."
She rubbed my back, then broke away and stood up. "Good night, hon." She said. "Sleep well."
"I will," I responded. "Mom?"
She paused on her way out of the room. "Yeah Cass?"
"Do you think you'll ever see her? Susan, I mean. Now that she's back in town?"
My mother paused, her hand on the door knob, and smiled at me sadly. "I don't think so. I don't really feel the need to go down that road again."
I feel my chest well up with sorrow for her, but I suppose I understood. I can't ever imagine ever wanting to speak to Donna again if she did something like that to me.
Maybe if she had made some kind of effort over the years, but the fact that Susan had never even tried to make it up to my mom made the whole thing that much more horrible.
"See you in the morning," my mom said.
"See ya."
Then she closed the door and left me to stare at the ceiling, a million different thoughts of hope, betrayal, and sadness swirling through my mind.
* * * *
HELLO EVERYONE!!!
I do hope that everyone enjoyed this chapter. I must say, this chapter was the hardest one to write so far.
How do y'all feel about Susan Kent?????