“Attack me? Naw.” She giggles. “I attacked him. Or I tried to anyway. But I couldn’t get his pants off. And you know what?” She hiccups. “I liked it. I really, really liked it. A lot.”
“Carrie? Are you mad at me?”
“No,” I say reassuringly. “Why would I be mad at you, Magwitch?”
“Because I’ve had more guys than you,” she says, with another hiccup and a smile.
“Don’t worry. Someday I’ll catch up.”
“I hope so. Because it’s really fun, you know? And it’s also like…power. Like you have power over these guys.”
“Uh-huh,” I say cautiously.
“Don’t tell Pe
ter, okay?”
“No, I won’t tell Peter. It will be our little secret.”
“And The Mouse too, right? Will it be her little secret, too?”
“Of course—”
“On second thought”—she holds up one finger—“maybe you should tell Peter. I want him to be jealous. I want him to think about what he’s missing.” She gasps and puts her hand over her mouth. I pull over to the side of the road. Maggie tumbles out and gets sick while I hold back her hair.
When she gets back in the car, she seems to have sobered up considerably but has also become morose. “I did a dumb thing, didn’t I?” she groans.
“Don’t worry about it, Mags. We all do dumb things sometimes.”
“Oh, God. I’m a slut.” She puts her hands over her face. “I almost had sex with two men.”
“Come on, Maggie, you’re not a slut,” I insist. “It doesn’t matter how many guys you’ve slept with. It’s about how you’ve slept with them.”
“What’s that mean?”
“I have no idea. But it sounds good, right?”
I pull carefully into her driveway. Maggie’s parents are fast asleep, and I manage to maneuver her up to her room and into her nightgown undetected. I even convince her to drink a glass of water and take a couple of aspirins. She crawls into bed and lies on her back, staring at the ceiling. Then she curls up into the fetal position.
“Sometimes I just want to be a little girl again, you know?”
“Yeah.” I sigh. “I know just what you mean.” I wait a moment to make sure she’s asleep, and then I flip off the light and slip out of the house.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
Transformation
Dear Ms. Bradshaw, the letter begins. We are pleased to inform you that a place has become available for the summer writing seminar with National Book Award–winning novelist Viktor Greene. If you wish to attend, please inform us immediately as space is limited.
The New School.
I got in! IgotinIgotinIgotin. Or at least I think I did. Does it specifically say I got in? A place has become available…. At the last minute? Did someone drop out? Am I some kind of backup student? The course is limited…. Aha. So that means if I don’t take the spot someone else will. They’ve already got dozens of people lined up, maybe hundreds—
“Daaaaaaad!”
“What?” he asks, startled.
“I have to—I got this letter—New York—”