An invitation, and it’d be rude to turn it down. Salem’s set it up that way: Jess doesn’t have any reason to hold something against a fifteen-year-old kid who’s into contemporary dance, but if she doesn’t respond, it’ll seem as if she does.
“She’s been going to the same studio in Boston since she was seven,” Salem adds.
There’s a long, tense pause. I’m holding my breath.
Jess finally says, “That’s nice for her.”
I figure this is about as closed off of a response she could’ve given to Salem.That’s nice for her, but I don’t care what it means for you, she might as well be saying.
But Salem obviously figures something else. She’s never seen something closed that she doesn’t want to open. The Baltimore story’s been closed for a decade to everyone else, but here we are, trying to pry it off the hinges.
“Does Tegan do any activities outside of school?” Salem asks.
And that does it. I can’t look over to see if there’s another storm on Jess Greene’s face, but I feel it nonetheless. An atmospheric shift.
She turns her head toward the seat behind mine, a flash of that spun gold I now accidentally know the texture of. I have a stupid thought about my forearm: Would there be any trace of the smell of her shampoo left there?
I don’t have time to dwell on it.
“We made a deal, Salem. My sister doesn’t talk unless I’m around, and I don’t talk unless she is.This”—I can only assume she’s gesturing to a sleeping Tegan—“doesn’t count as her being around.”
I don’t dare turn my head, even though I want to. Instead, I check the rearview. Salem looks calm, unbothered.
“I hope it’s clear I’m not attempting to start our work with this conversation.”
“Oh, you’re starting it,” says Jess, her voice soknowing. It’s as though she’s been doing battle with people like Salem for years.
“It’s a long way to Tennessee,” Salem says. I can hear the shrug in her voice.
I resist the urge to tell Salem it’s not all that long now. And anyway, I’ve got a feeling that Jess can stonewall someone for a lot longer than four and a half hours.
After only a few seconds, though, it’s clear that something about this exchange has rattled Jess. Maybe she’s so insulted by the veneer of friendliness, or by Salem’s confidence, or by the last two days in general, that she simply can’t hold back.
“You know, we don’t know anything about Tennessee. We’ve never been there. Our mother had never been there. We don’t know anyone there, and never have, and that postcard she wrote from Chattanooga is probably the vaguest one of the five. So if you’re expecting to find out something helpful from us about why she and Lynton Baltimore went there, between now and the time we arrive, you’re out of luck.”
I grip the steering wheel tight in my hand, my knuckles going white. I wish I could have put out my arm for Jess just then, because she doesn’t realize what she’s just crashed into: information Salem has that she doesn’t, uncovered only a day before we left Boston to come on this trip. I would’ve told Jess about it, had she given me the chance yesterday, but she’d barely been interested in the itinerary. She wanted those conditions secured and then she wanted me to go.
The pang of guilt I feel is instant, and the only thing I can think is that I better get used to it.
Because I’m probably going to feel this sort of guilt for the next three weeks.
I don’t dare look in the rearview, in case Salem catches my eye and sees right through me. But I can hear her shuffling back there. I’m pretty sure she’s taken a book out of her bag.
She’s about to win this standoff, and I know it’s going to hurt the woman sitting beside me. Doesn’t matter if I have an arm out for her or not.
“That’s fine, Jess,” Salem says. I can hear her turning pages, finding her place. “Hawk and I already know who we need to talk to in Tennessee.”
Jess doesn’t move for a few seconds; she’s still turned toward Salem’s seat. Probably she’s trying to strike her with the lightning from her eyes. She must want to ask who it is; shemust.
If she does, though, she wrestles the impulse back under control. Contains it.
She slowly faces forward again.
But she doesn’t clasp her hands on her lap, at least not right away.
Instead, she reaches one out toward the van’s stereo and gently adjusts the volume, turning up the music.
And I can’t help but notice. Her fingers tremble the smallest, saddest amount.
