Chapter Text
Summer in Hatchetfield always brings rain. Big, heavy drops hit Grace Chasity's bedroom window rhythmically, then drip down and away.
It’s early Friday evening, just two days after graduation, which had been a loud, overwhelming affair. Her mom had taken lots of photos, and Grace stood unposed with more of a grimace than a smile in her itchy, sweaty gown. (Her mom will take the photos to Walgreens, get them printed and framed. They will hang in the hallway for years, a reminder of That Year for Grace to see every time she comes home for Christmas).
Grace hasn’t left her room since. Her heavy comforter weighs down on her chest, causing her to sweat in the early June humidity. She rubs her eyes.
She’s uncomfortably warm in her pajamas and socks. Her mom has yet to turn on the air conditioning, citing too low of an outside temperature to warrant its need. Grace from a year ago would keep her mouth shut about it because she was a good girl. Grace today keeps her mouth shut because she is resigned. Because the warm dampness of the air in her bedroom makes her feel worlds away from the bitter chill of the football field that November night.
Here's the thing about surviving: The pain makes you feel real.
Grace keeps the lights on almost all the time now. It was so dark under the bleachers, she could hardly make out the difference between her limbs and his. She likes to wake up and count her fingers until she gets to eighty, to see her chest rise and fall as she breathes. (Not that she really sleeps much).
She can hear her parents talking downstairs. Their voices are muffled. Grace thinks of the Charlie Brown cartoons she used to watch as a kid, how the adults sounded like trumpets. It used to make her laugh. She doesn’t feel like laughing now.
She hears the doorbell ring and her father get up to answer it. She doesn’t know who it is. Her parents don’t really have friends come around often, save for her mother’s bible study that meets in the den every few weeks. But that’s always on Thursday, and today is Friday.
She hears the door close, and her parents' muffled voices go back to their conversation. Then there is a knock on her bedroom door. Grace doesn’t say anything. It’s unlocked, and should her mom decide to open it all she’d see is Grace’s back. She could pretend to be asleep. That’s all she’s been doing for the past few days, anyway.
“Chasity,” Says a voice as the door swings open. Grace can hear it creak on its hinges like the person is leaning their weight on the handle. “I know you’re awake.”
Stephanie’s voice is like lemonade, sweet and icy as it cuts through the humidity of the bedroom and floats to Grace’s ears. Grace squeezes her eyes shut and draws her comforter tighter around her shoulders.
“Grace,” Steph says again, softer this time.
Grace rolls over, still cocooned in her sheets, to look at Steph. The taller girl is in black shorts and a shirt proudly displaying the name of a band Grace probably wouldn’t be able to guess a single song of. She looks radiant, sandy hair in a loose braid that is slung over her shoulder, arms crossed against her chest. Always on the defense, Steph. Grace is the first to bite, usually. Maybe that's why they work, in a strange sort of way.
“Hmph,” Grace grunts into her pillow, blinking up at Steph.
“Let's go on a drive,” Steph says. Her smile is mischievous. Grace can’t ignore it.
&
Steph’s car is much cleaner than Grace ever would’ve guessed. She learned that the first time they drove around together way back in December, after everything.
It started with Steph driving Grace home from school. She framed it like charity, just something nice she could offer since they were quasi-friends now, but Grace saw through her for what it was. Steph was lonely. And god, if Grace wasn’t just the same. With all the people she could claim as anything close to a friend dead, Grace clung to anything warm and kind with a white-knuckled grip.
They used to not talk in the car. Steph wouldn’t even play music. Silence would eat away at the stale air (Grace would later find out that stale smell was weed). Slowly, as the months went on, Steph took that 9 minute drive as a chance to introduce Grace to her favorite artists. Fleetwood Mac and Paul McCartney, Cage the Elephant and Faye Webster. Songs that Grace from last year would’ve called blasphemous and sinful. Songs that now, on a muggy June evening, Grace hums along to as they pull into the parking lot of the Hatchetfield Playground.
The rain has stopped. Both girls get out of the car and start a slow stroll towards the swings.
In the days after it all, neither of them could be alone, but neither of them were ready to talk. Facing each other had been hard. Grace had felt raw in the days after, the weeks after. (she still sometimes feels like a blister that’s just popped. Like an open wound in the sunlight). They found that sitting next to each other helped. The park helped, when Solomon Lauter’s house felt too empty for Steph, when the stairs creaked and the corners felt cold. When Grace couldn’t face her parents, couldn’t bring herself to tell them what had happened.
They’d drive to the park and sit on the swings. It was easier to not be alone.
Today, Grace pushes her feet against the sand lazily, causing the swing to twist back and forth rather than sending her flying forward.
In her periphery, Grace can see Steph clicking a lighter and then huffing out a mouthful of smoke. Grace watches it float up, counting the seconds it takes for it to dissipate above their heads.
“Isn’t that bad for you?” Grace asks, kicking a rock by her foot and not bothering to look up at Steph.
Steph just shrugs.
They do this little dance every time. Grace feels, perhaps a little stupidly, that she must ask. Like the world might not spin correctly if she doesn’t.
“Can I try it?” Grace asks. She isn’t sure what makes her do it. She’s never felt like it before. Steph raises her eyebrows at Grace, but wordlessly hands over the lit cigarette.
Grace inhales, letting the warm smoke fill her lungs. She revels in the way they tighten, then immediately loosen in a way she’s not sure her body has ever felt before. Her head feels light. She takes another drag and resists the urge to cough.
“Do you think about them?” Steph asks, eyes on the wood chips beneath their feet. The front of her white sneakers turn brown as she kicks them through the dirt.
Grace squeezes her eyes shut, the buzz of nicotine suddenly overwhelming. Does she think about them? Only all the time. Only always. She thinks of Richie’s tentative giggles and Ruth’s abrasive jokes. She thinks about how sometimes she’ll turn a corner and think she sees Ruth’s frizzy curls or Richie’s backpack covered in pins, but then the image is gone as fast as it took her to blink it away. She thinks of their souls, of how badly she hopes Richie and Ruthie are in Heaven. How she prays for them and hopes they hear it and someday might respond. (She also thinks of how there probably is no heaven, and how God isn’t real anymore. Not if all that could happen. Not if the Lords in Black are real).
“Sometimes,” Grace says instead. “I think about him more.”
Grace knows Steph wasn’t asking about Max, she never is. Max didn’t have his fingers in the folds of her brain the way he did with Grace, squeezing and prodding at things she didn’t think anyone could touch but her. But oh, does she think about Max. He breathes down her neck, uncomfortably close even in death. She feels his rough hands on her hips and thighs when she’s trying to sleep. She smells his breath, foggy and thick with the feeling being so wholly unalive, when she wakes up in the dead of night to an empty room. When she closes her eyes, she’s back under the cold bleachers, backlit by moonlight and staring up at Max’s face. He was so smug, so proud. (Maybe that was the worst sin of that evening). He’d looked like he’d trapped an animal. Like Grace was prey, and he’d finally won the chase. Who knew one well-meaning smile freshman year would end her here?
Steph looks at Grace funny, like she wants to ask, but then just nods curtly and reaches into her pocket for another cigarette.
&
Grace rots in her bed again that night after Steph drops her off at home. Her sweater smells like ash and sweat. Her stomach is warm with the scent of the interior of Steph’s Jeep and the way her eyelashes fluttered as they smoked. She feels sick with it.
Her parents are asleep. The house is silent, save for Grace’s sniffles and her feets rustling the sheets. She feels restless, like a ringing microphone in a silent auditorium. She needs to shout. She throws her comforter off and stands up.
The bathroom tiles are cold against Grace’s thin, frilly socks. She pads as silently as she can, opening the bare cabinet and pulling out scissors.
There's no medicine in the cabinet, never has been. There are bandaids and mouthwash, but no cough syrup. No pain relief. Grace doesn’t think she’s ever even had Tylenol. If she thinks about it, the only substance she’s ever taken was the two puffs from Steph’s cig just a few hours ago, save for the multivitamin gummies she used to take at breakfast as a kid. Back when she was still a good girl.
She doesn’t feel like a good girl anymore. She doesn’t particularly want to.
Grace looks down at the scissors in her hands for a moment, holding them like they might turn into mist if she blinks for too long. Then she brings them up and snips.
Her hair is already short, landing on her shoulders, but she wants it shorter, wants it gone. She chops it off in big hacks, watching brown clumps fall into the porcelain sink. She pauses to turn on the faucet, watching again as the locks swirl down the drain.
Her eyes burn, but no tears come out. She isn’t sad. This is cathartic. It feels like letting out a long breath, like kicking a chair so it tumbles over. Her stomach settles into a comfortable normalcy she’s not sure’s ever felt. It’s soft. She feels human.
Grace looks at herself in the mirror, eyes red-rimmed and mouth agape. Her hair is choppy and uneven but hers. It sits floppily on the top of her head and snakes its way around her ears. It frays out, and it feels sharp when Grace runs her fingers gingerly over the ends. She grins.
&
“Holy shit.”
“Do you like it?”
Grace’s parents had been shocked, her mother a little wounded. Grace didn’t miss the way her mom looked at her when she left with Steph that afternoon. Be good, Gracie.
She’s been chasing their approval her whole life. ‘Be a good girl, Grace’ rang so fervently in her head, loud and stark in her mother’s voice at every turn. Her grades, her friends (or lack thereof), church. All of it, she’d needed her parents to like it. To like her.
Grace doesn’t doubt that her parents love her. They kiss her head and tell her they are proud. But she doesn’t think they like her, and that is the difference.
But this haircut feels like her, for her. She hadn’t felt like she’d needed her parents' approval for it.
But Stephie’s approval, well.
“Holy fuck,” Steph reaches out and grabs a piece of Grace’s cut hair, rubbing it between her fingers. Her cheeks are dusted pink and her mouth is open in a silent oh. “Yeah, love it.”
“It feels like me,” Grace responds, blushing at Steph’s honesty.
“It looks like you. You look…” Steph falters, dropping Grace’s hair suddenly, like it burns. “You look good, Grace.”
They share another cigarette.
&
They stop at Pete’s on the way home. He’s packing up his things, moving upstate to live with his older brother and attend college. Grace stands silently behind Steph as she talks to him.
“You’ll call?” Steph asks, leaning against Pete’s car as he throws a box unceremoniously into the trunk.
“Yeah, Steph,” He smiles good naturedly at her. Grace bites the inside of her cheek.
She never quite knows what to do with Peter. He’s sweet, one of the only people she can remember ever smiling at her in the hallways. (Besides Max). But He’s… tricky. He feels far away. He’s so normal in his glasses and button down shirt. He doesn’t have the same restlessness that she does. That Steph does.
“I’ll miss you,” Steph tells him, her eyes watery. Grace blinks away a scowl before it can manifest onto her face.
“I’ll only be a few hours away,” He says, shutting the trunk of his car and wiping his hands on his pants.
“I know, just…” Steph falters, sniffling. I’ve lost so much, her eyes say, don’t let me lose you too.
Grace doesn’t know to comfort people properly, not without a bible verse. She doesn’t like those much anymore, so she reaches for Steph’s hand instead. Steph squeezes.
“By, Petey,” Grace says quietly, finally looking at him.
“Bye, Grace,” He says, smiling solemnly. “Take care of each other.”
Grace watches Peter’s car drive off with her hand in Steph’s.
&
Grace’s face screws up like she’s bit straight into a lemon the first time she tries Coca-Cola.
“It’s fizzy,” She says stupidly, smacking her tongue against the roof of her mouth. She feels each bubble travelling down her throat like little bugs. This makes Steph laugh, which is a sound Grace wants to draw out of her forever.
“Well, yeah,” Steph is grinning, bright like sunshine. “Did you think it wouldn’t be?”
Grace shrugs. She wasn’t really expecting anything, honestly. She was only ever allowed milk or water growing up, maybe orange juice if it was a special occasion. Soda was off the table completely. Drinking Coke feels like breaking some unspoken rule, just like taking a drag from Steph’s cigarette in the park. There is the Grace before nicotine, and the Grace after. The Grace before Coca-Cola, and the Grace after. She doesn’t feel that different.
(The Grace before Max feels eons away from the Grace after Max. Maybe every other new experience won’t rearrange her atoms the same way again. Maybe she will always feel stuck. Stagnant).
Steph is across from her in the booth of the diner. They’re sharing a plate of fries, and Steph is eating grilled cheese. Grace watches as she wipes her long fingers on a paper napkin. Her short nails are painted a deep purple, Grace’s favorite color.
“Do you like it?” Steph asks. Upon finding out that Grace had never had soda, Steph had insisted on getting her one.
In honesty, Grace doesn’t really like it. It tastes chemical, fake and almost sharp as it travels down her throat. But Steph is looking at her hopefully, her eyes wide and murky green. Grace’s stomach does an unregistered flip.
“Kinda,” She answers. It’s only a half lie. She doesn’t like the drink, but she likes the smile on Steph’s face, so it's worth it to take another sip.
Steph sits back against the tacky red booth, crossing her arms as a satisfied look takes over her face. Grace can’t help the giddy smile that traces its way onto her own face.
“What else should we do today?” Steph asks, picking up a french fry disinterestedly and swiping it through the pile of ketchup.
The question is phrased like they need an adventure to add to some growing pile, but the pair of them have been accomplishing a huge load of nothing the past few days since Pete left. Steph has spent every night on the Chasity's couch, and they’ve spent their days in a cycle of laying on the grass in Grace’s yard, smoking, and just driving around. Grace isn’t used to doing nothing. She’s used to homework then chores then church then repeat. Steph, she’s learning, is really good at doing nothing. Grace likes to learn.
“Dunno,” Grace shrugs. It’s evening and the sun is setting on the water. Grace watches the light dance on the still lake until she has to squint from the brightness. The water glitters rhythmically through the dirty windows of the diner.
Grace’s family used to go to the lake a lot when she was a kid. She’d dig in the sand for cool rocks and her dad would play with her in the water while her mom read a book on the shore. They stopped going, but Grace can’t remember why or when. Her heart aches, suddenly, for the kid who wasn’t afraid to be covered in dirt and get her hair wet.
“It’s pretty,” Steph says, following Grace’s gaze out to the water. Grace turns to look at Steph. Her eyelashes brush her cheek gently, long and thick against pale skin. Her green eyes look majestic in the golden hour light. Grace can see her faint freckles better with each day they spend in the sun. She wants to count them, collect them for safe keeping. Steph is gorgeous like this, sunkissed and happy. Summer suits her.
“Let’s go.” Grace says suddenly, impulsively. When Steph whips back to look at her confusedly, Grace clarifies. “To the lake, let's go.”
Steph’s face breaks into a toothy grin. “Alright, yeah. Let’s go.”
&
They aren’t really prepared for swimming. Steph has a blanket in the back of her car, but no towels.
“I’m in a sports bra,” Steph says, thinking out loud. “I could just swim in that and my underwear.”
Grace, without warning, gets an image of Steph’s half-naked body in her head. She has to squeeze her eyes shut in order to get rid of it. She hates the way her stomach dances.
(What would a good girl think, Gracie?)
Grace doesn’t want to swim in her bra. She doesn’t really like looking at her body, but especially her chest. It feels dirty. She’s in a blouse, but she doesn’t really want to get it wet. Her mom would probably be mad at her.
“You can wear my t-shirt,” Steph says, as if anticipating Grace’s anxiety. “It’ll be big on you, anyway.” Grace’s relief floods through the car palpably as they unbuckle their seatbelts.
They’re the only people in the parking lot, given that it’s a Tuesday and the sun is going down. The mosquitos are out, and Grace is already anticipating how itchy her legs are going to be later. She watches as Steph pops the trunk and sits down.
“Here,” Steph says muffledly, tugging her shirt over her head and handing it to Grace. Grace takes it clumsily, eyes trained on Steph’s bare stomach. Her belly button piercing is catching the light, bright shine contrasting the milky smoothness of her skin. Grace swallows thickly.
“Do you want me to turn around?” Steph asks, cocking her head to the side. She’s already tugging off her socks, and Grace sucks in a sharp breath at the sight of Steph’s hair falling over her shoulders. It's not even remotely sexual, but Steph looks so pretty that Grace feels like she’s floating.
“No,” Grace answers, shaking her head, half in answer and half to recenter herself, and begins to unbutton her own top. Once her own is off, Grace pulls Steph’s shirt over her head quickly, avoiding Steph’s gaze as she pulls her skirt down so she’s in just a tight pair of shorts. The shirt, which was big on Steph, hits Grace’s mid thigh. She crouches down to pull off her shoes and socks and place them next to Steph’s in the trunk of the car.
They walk to the water’s edge together, so close together that their hands keep brushing. Each time, Grace has to resist jumping.
The sunset paints the lake in an orange glow, water shimmering as it ripples in the breeze. They stop when their toes touch the icy waves, allowing themselves a moment to get used to the way it laps against them. Grace feels emotional, suddenly. This place has only ever brought good things to her. It smells like her childhood, like before she ever worried about being good or being a girl or anything shaped like Max Jagerman or dirty or death. She breathes in deeply, letting the summer air fill her lungs. It has the same effect as one of Stephie’s cigarettes.
“You okay?” Steph asks, placing a gentle hand on Grace’s arm. Grace opens her eyes and turns to look at her. She’s so close, their shoulders brushing. Facing her, Grace breathes again, and is flooded with the smell of Steph’s perfume from her shirt and shampoo from her hair. It makes her feel light and giddy, like running. She grabs Steph’s hand and does.
“Grace!” Steph yells, but she’s laughing, allowing the shorter girl to tug her deeper into the water. It splashes up onto them as they go, spraying their faces. Once she’s waist deep, Grace squeezes her eyes shut and dives forward. She pushes herself under the water, allowing the cold feeling to wash over her for half a minute before popping back out. She’s facing away from the shore and can’t see Steph, so she turns to find the other girl having done the same.
“It’s freezing!” Steph complains, but she’s smiling and pushing her wet hair out of her face. Grace gives her a matching smile as she moves toward the taller. She stops just inches in front of her. The water is up to Grace’s shoulders, but only up to Steph’s chest. They’re so close that Grace could count each individual eyelash on Steph’s face. They’re dampened and clumped from the water, making Steph’s honey-colored eyes look that much brighter in the setting sunlight. Grace can feel Steph’s breath on her face. They’re so close that if Grace wanted to, she could stick her tongue out and it would easily swipe across Steph’s lower lip.
The thought makes her pause. In order to hide the redness flooding her cheeks, she puts two flat hands against the water and pushes, splashing Steph in the face.
“Oh my god!” Steph yells. Grace laughs, and immediately ducks underwater to avoid receiving a retaliatory spray.
&
They drive home in their wet clothes. Grace leaves the car window open and lets the cool evening air whip against her face until she’s shivering. Her cheeks are beginning to reveal a pink sunburn and her nose is dotted with freckles. She feels sunkissed through her soul.
They walk into the Chasity’s home, quietly giggling to each other as they take off their shoes and make their way upstairs.
“You can shower first,” Grace offers to Steph as they climb the stairs. The house is quiet, even though the sun still hasn’t set. The family car wasn’t in the driveway, so Grace assumes her parents are out somewhere. “Give me your wet clothes and I’ll wash them.”
Grace stands outside the bathroom as Steph sticks her arm out, hands full of her wet clothes and the shorts she’d pulled back over them to drive home. Once she hears the shower curtain close, Grace walks to the washer at the end of the hallway.
She strips out of her own wet clothes and throws them into the washer along with Steph’s. She then grabs a towel from the linen closet next to the washer and wraps it around herself before walking back into her bedroom.
Getting dressed again feels silly, she’s just going to shower once Steph is done, so Grace simply flops on her bed.
Grace closes her eyes and breathes deeply, feeling grounded in a way she hasn’t since before Max died. Her eyes are heavy with sweat and the cold lake water, her cheeks a dusty pink from spending time in the sun. She feels incandescently happy. Laying alone in her bed, Grace Chasity smiles.
“Grace?” Steph's muffled voice from the bathroom calls. Grace pops her eyes open and walks out into the hallway.
“Stephie?” She replies nervously once she’s outside the door.
“Sorry, I just don’t have a towel,” Steph says.
“Oh,” Grace sighs in relief. “Here, I have one.” Grace unwraps the towel from around herself to hand to Steph through the door. She’s looking at the floor, expecting Steph to just stick her arm through a crack like she had with her wet clothes. When she looks back up, however, Steph’s head is peeking through the door.
Oh God.
“Thanks,” Steph says hastily, grabbing the towel from Grace’s hand and shutting the door quickly. Grace doesn’t even have proper time to realize what had happened, what Steph had seen, until the door is closed and she’s left alone in the hallway again.
Only Max has ever seen her naked. She barely ever sees herself naked. Somehow, it doesn’t feel as scary as she thinks it should. Her cheeks are red, sure, and her stomach is dancing in that funny way it does whenever Steph looks at her right, but it doesn’t feel bad. Not like it had with Max. Grace squares her shoulders and goes back to the linen closet to get another towel.
&
Once showered, Grace and Steph move around each other quietly in the kitchen. Neither of them really know how to cook, so Grace cuts up an apple and Steph puts chicken nuggets in the oven.
“Where are you parents?” Steph asks when they sit down at the kitchen island.
“Bible study,” Grace answers. It’s Thursday evening, and this week’s session is at some other family’s home. “They’ll be home around 8:30.”
“You didn’t go with them,” Steph comments, uncapping the bottle of ketchup and squirting some on Grace’s plate and then her own.
Grace nods. It’s her new thing; lying. She tells her parents she’s studying at home. She has enough of the bible memorized that she can make something up when they come home, anyway.
When she turns back to Steph, she's smiling at Grace with something that looks like pride. Grace blushes under her gaze and turns her gaze to stare down at her apple slices.
&
They get ready for bed together in silence. Stepahnie reaches over Grace’s shoulder to grab toothpaste, Grace brushes her hand against Stephanie’s west to turn the faucet on. It feels weird choreographed. Grace doesn’t have a better way to explain how easy it is to exist with Stephanie.
When Steph climbs into bed next to Grace, she doesn’t mention anything. This closeness feels so natural that she doesn’t know why Steph has spent the past few nights on the couch anyway. Grace listens to Steph rustle around under the covers as she waits for it to fall quiet as she clasps her hands together to pray.
When she opens her eyes again, Steph is laying on her side facing her, scrolling on her phone. Grace, who hardly ever picks up her own phone, rolls her eyes and smiles.
“What if you lost that thing?” She asks, sliding down under the covers.
“Hm?” Steph asks, looking up and following Grace’s gaze. “Oh, that would suck.”
“It’s like you can’t live without it,” Grace says. Once she registers the weight of it she slaps her hand over her mouth.
“Was that… Was that a joke, Chasity?” Steph cracks a tentative smile, and Grace relaxes her shoulders.
“Not on purpose,” Grace answers, rolling over onto her back and putting her hands over her face in embarrassment.
“Alright,” Steph snorts. “Goodnight, Grace,” She says softly.
Grace’s stomach does a little flip at Steph’s tone. It’s so gentle.
Just six months ago, Steph spoke to Grace like she was a muzzled dog. She was always so wary, like Grace might snap and lunge for her jugular vein. Now, Stephanie giggles with her. Grace can splash her in the lake and know that it’s all in good fun and that they’ll eat dinner together after.
It’s nice. Grace has never really had a friend before.
“Night, Stephie.”