“So we’ll drop you at the Pavilion,” she was saying. “From there, you go back to the Tides and say you’ve just been out enjoying walking and thinking and had no reception. Okay?”
“Right,” I said. I sat up, locating my purse, then dug through until I found my hairbrush and an elastic. My head was pounding as I pulled my hair up in a high ponytail, securing it, then accepted the mints that Bailey was already holding out to me.
“Don’t make any rookie mistakes,” she said. “I’m sensing this is your first time doing this.”
“What? Being drunk in an ice cream truck?” I asked.
“Trying to explain yourself out of a punishment,” she corrected me. “The most common screw-up is giving too much detail or information. Stick to facts in simple statements.”
“Like five sentences,” I said.
She looked at me. “What?”
“Five sentences,” I explained. She still looked clueless. “What you say to introduce yourself, you boiled down to the basics. It’s a lake thing.”
“Says who?”
“Roo,” I told her.
“It’s true,” he said from the front seat.
“I haveneverheard of that,” Bailey said. “But sure, great. Five sentences. Keep it short and sweet. Like, ‘I went to the movie. I saw a friend. We had a beer. I felt bad about it. So I’ve been out here thinking.’”
“Wow,” Roo said, and I looked at the rearview mirror just as he did, our eyes meeting. To me he said, “She’s a natural.”
“Went to a movie, saw a friend, had a beer, felt bad, been thinking,” I repeated. “Got it.”
“Tears are helpful, too,” Hannah added. “I always cry when I get busted. Sometimes the sympathy vote is all you have going for you.”
“Nottoomany tears, though,” Bailey warned me. “If you’re blubbering, it just pisses them off more. Or it does Celeste. I don’t know your dad, though.”
When it came to this sort of thing, I didn’t really know him either: I hadn’t ever had to lie to him about where I’d been or what I was doing. There’d been no need to until now. Which was probably just what he would say, I was sure, if none of this worked.
“Getting close,” Roo reported, slowing for a stop sign. He looked at Hannah. “You want to hop off at Campus?”
“Can you come back by and hang out before you go to work?” she asked. “We can watch a movie or something.”
He glanced at the clock on the console. “Probably not. Sorry.”
She bit her lip, clearly unhappy. “I thought we werehanging out tonight. I mean, you invited me to this party—”
“Everyone was invited,” Bailey said under her breath. But I could hear her. “Not just you.”
“—and then, when I get there, all you do is take care of Saylor and leave early.” She sighed. “I just don’t understand.”
“Hannah.” Roo looked at her. “She was in over her head and we’re friends. What do you want me to do?”
“Let someone else take over,” she replied, nodding at Bailey.
“I’m kind of in this, now,” he pointed out.
“Yeah, but you don’t have to be,” she said. “I mean, you don’t have to save everyone just because you lost your dad.”
Silence. Except for the truck rattling, the sound of which also seemed quieter after this statement.
“This is not about my dad,” he said evenly. “Just trying to help out.”
“Almost there,” Bailey reported, and I looked up to see she was right: the Tides and the Club were lit up brightly just ahead. “You want to hop out, Hannah?”
