Another long silence developed. This time Cybill was the one who ended it. Wiping the base of her nose with the back of her hand, smearing her lipstick again in the process, she said, “We should probably get going. Sasha and Bianca are waiting in the parking lot, and if I leave them on their own too long they get all disoriented and confused. It’s like they need someone to boss them around or they’re lost. You two coming?”

Alice made to follow, but was stilled by Charlie’s hand.

“Actually, Cybill,” Charlie said, “Alice and I are going to walk home. I need to sober up a little before my mom and Richard see me. And I think I remember him saying that the house was a closer walk than a drive.”

Cybill nodded. “Much closer. Not even a quarter of a mile down the beach. Speaking of beaches, the club’s is pretty nice. Either of you want to do a little sunbathing tomorrow?” She was asking both of them, but really, Alice knew, she was asking Charlie.

“I’m up for it,” Charlie said.

And immediately the conversation between her and Cybill turned to one-pieces versus two, suntan lotion versus sunblock, the best time of day to absorb the sun’s rays. The back-and-forth went on for five or ten minutes. It was as if, Alice thought, listening to them, they were trying to wash the taste of ashes from their mouths, cleanse their palates of death and disease and disfigurement with girl talk.

Finally Cybill promised to call Charlie when she woke up, which she hoped wouldn’t be before noon. The girls exchanged their good-byes, went their separate ways.

Chapter Five

Chapter

• FIVE •

What a night, Charlie thought. A face-off with the town’s reigning mean girl, an (almost) brawl between two preppie studs, an accidental death that turned out to be an intentional one. And yet . . . fun. Really fun. And not making-the-best-of-a-crappy-situation fun or a laughing-at-them-not-with-them fun—the kind of fun she’d been expecting to have—but straight-up, in-every-sense-of-the-word fun. She never would have imagined she’d have taken to a bunch of stuck-up rich kids. She did, though. They had style and they knew how to have a good time. Plus, she liked the attitude of their parents: letting their teens drink right out in the open so long as they were cool about it, didn’t act like spazzes. No hypocrisy. No unrealistic Goody Two-shoes expectations. It made perfect sense to her. Not to mention, she thought the guys were pretty cute, and they seemed to think she was pretty cute right back.