She also talked about watching me watch Weston, and catching Weston looking at me—dozens of time. My stomach began to hurt.

A knock sounded on the door.

“Erin?” Julianne said before peeking in. Her hair wasn’t soft and shiny. It was in tangles and matted in places to her head. Her face was shiny and makeup free, and her pink floral pajama set was mostly covered by a long, thin robe. “Oh, honey. It’s three in the morning. Do you think maybe you should take a break?”

It was then that I realized my eyes felt like dry, scratchy balls under my lids, and the skin around them was heavy and tight at the same time.

“I’m almost finished.”

“O-okay,” she said. “Weston called a few times earlier. He said you weren’t answering your phone.”

“It’s still in my car, I think.”

Her lips made a hard line, and she offered a sympathetic smile. “You’re a blank page, Erin. Maybe you shouldn’t fill it with Alder’s words.”

“Did you know? About Gina?”

She nodded. “I think everyone knows.”

I closed my eyes. “No wonder Gina was angry. She was alone, and blamed, and hated, and all she had was me as a reminder.”

“Not you. It wasn’t you. You were conceived of love and nothing else. You’re ours.”

“Everyone was wrong.”

“Yes, they were.”

“No. They left her with all the blame, and he still got his family and his reputation. It’s not fair.”

“No, it’s not. I’m sorry Sonny and Alder took it out on you.”

“I need to see her. I don’t know why. I’m not ready yet, but I need to talk to her about this.”

Worry sparked in Julianne’s eyes. “Oh, okay. I, um, I understand.”

My eyes fell to the binder in my lap, and Julianne shut the door. I rested my chin on my fist as I turned the pages of Alder’s high school journals. She knew I liked Weston, and that was the only reason she pursued him. She wrote about losing her virginity, but to my absolute surprise, it wasn’t with Weston. She was cheating on him with Eric Liberty. My face twisted into disgust. Eric was a gangly, pimple-faced pothead who had been held back twice, and then dropped out of high school altogether, and she was in love with him, not Weston.

The sky was changing outside Alder’s window. I looked up at Alder’s alarm clock. It was nearly six in the morning.

I turned the page, reading about the first week of our senior year. Page after page, I’d read about my misery through her eyes, and how much she enjoyed inflicting it. It was one of the only things that brought her joy. She hated Blackwell, her house, her car, and sometimes Sam and Julianne. Her aspirations included marrying Eric and moving to San Francisco.

Her first entry in October made my blood run cold.

My hands began to tremble, and I slammed the binder shut, leaving it on the floor with the others. My mattress barely made a sound as I crashed into it, burying my head in the pillow. As much as I wanted to believe it wasn’t true, Alder wouldn’t lie in her own journal. The Erins were planning one last twisted, humiliating moment for me before graduation, and Weston was going to help them. The picture he’d drawn of me, the necklace, the attention and phony kindness were all part of the plan to disgrace me in front of the entire school.

My pillow was soaked with tears. After everything they had put me through, how could I have been so gullible? How could I have trusted that Weston had suddenly taken an interest in me for no reason? The nights at the overpass, the late-night talks, losing my virginity…It was all part of the plan. Maybe it wasn’t his idea, but he was going along with it, and Alder was only pretending to be jealous because she knew it wasn’t real. And even if it was, she didn’t care. She was secretly planning to be with Eric anyway.

I kept trying to make excuses for Weston, trying to think of anything that would make him an innocent bystander, but it was all there in her journals. One last stab at me, even after her death. No wonder Weston didn’t want me to read them. He knew exactly what I would find.

Why stay with me after Alder died? Why continue the charade? And then it hit me: he had asked me to prom. He was going to carry out her plan. He was in love with her, and he was determined to carry out her final wish.

How malicious would someone have to be to agree to and go through with something like that? I knew the Erins were evil, but Weston…That’s what Brady meant before. He knew what Weston was doing. I had given myself to someone like that. Let him touch me. Put his mouth on me. Penetrate me.

I ran to the bathroom, pulled the necklace away from my skin, threw it in a drawer, and then stripped off my clothes. The knob whined as I twisted it, and the water rained down. I stepped in when it was still ice-cold, desperate to get any trace of Weston off of me. I stood under the water as it warmed, scrubbing and sobbing, feeling utterly destroyed and beyond betrayed.

My skin felt raw and waterlogged, so I turned off the shower and wrapped a towel around me. A faint knock on my bedroom door made me stiffen. Julianne poked her head in, and her face fell.

“Gracious, sweetheart, you look exhausted. Did you get any sleep?”

“I’m awake,” I said. “Wide awake.”

Chapter 8

SAM AND JULIANNE MET ME IN THE KITCHEN an hour before the first bell would ring at school. They both had concerned expressions, coffee mugs in hand.

“I know I said I wanted to spare Sam the details, but…,” Julianne began. She didn’t have to finish. I could see on Sam’s face that he knew what we did.

“I’ve been trying to think of something to say to you to make you feel better. Dads are supposed to be wise, but when you’re the one who raised the person responsible…” He trailed off, recoiling from his own thoughts.

“Sam, this isn’t your fault,” I said. “It’s not Julianne’s fault. It’s a brutal, ongoing cycle.”

He walked around the island and put his arm around my shoulders. “You make it very easy to forget I’m talking to a high schooler. I’m supposed to make you feel better, not the other way around.”

“Would it help if I said this sucks?”

He offered a small smile. “No, not after what Julianne said was in those journals. But thanks for trying.”

“Clearly upbringing has nothing to do with behavior,” Julianne said, rubbing her forehead. “You’re such a sweet, kindhearted person, Erin. Even after everything you’ve been through.”