Page 80 of The Surprise

Her cute little car’s parked, headlights on, in front of our house. I’m dirty. I stink. I’m exhausted, and my house is a mess.

“You sounded like maybe you could use a hand.” Beth walks toward me, her eyes wide. “I was on my way over anyway.”

“Can you hand me that screwdriver?” I ask. “I need to adjust this.”

She spends the next half hour handing me tools and rewinding videos to show me what to do. I’m pretty proud of myself for getting the sprinklers fixed before Mandy’s people arrive to pump the septic.

Unfortunately, Mom gets home just in time to help me scrub the bathrooms and floors. Even then, Beth insists on staying to help. When it’s finally done and the house is clean—just in time, because we’re all super filthy—I apologize.

“I’m sure that’s not anywhere on your list of how you’d like to spend your weekend.”

“Actually,” Beth says, “it was probably more fun than I would have had at home.”

“Ouch,” I say. “Are things really that bad?”

She nods slowly. “I ticked my parents off, but they deserved it. It’s been bad lately. My mom. . .isn’t happy. My dad. . .is greedy and that makes him miserable. It’s just.” She shrugs. “It’s bad.”

As awful as the past weekend was, maybe it’s for the best that I got delayed. When I look at Beth I feel at peace. I feel calm. I feel warm and happy. I guess that means that being her friend for a little longer isn’t so awful.

And maybe what we both need the most right nowisa friend.

16

Beth

There’s something freeing about realizing the truth about people. For years, I’ve known my dad wasn’t the hero most girls believed their dads to be. But he also took me to daddy daughter dances. He bought me dolls. Clothes. Jewelry. He put a roof over my head, and he never beat me or attacked me like I know some dads can.

He told me he loved me.

It made it hard for me to know what to think about him. And then when Aunt Donna came home, I watched her dad treat her like an indentured servant. I saw him yell horrible things at her. I saw him take swings at her, the very person who was caring for him.

I know there are worse people than my dad.

So I made excuses for him.

But hearing that he got his own sister fired because she had the audacity to ask for part of their inheritance?

And then discovering from Izzy that he had been lying all along—Grandpa and Grandma had changed their minds. They didn’t want to cut her out. They wanted Dad to share what they left with her. He knew that.

And he lied to her anyway.

And he lied to me about it.

My dad may not be a serial killer, but that doesn’t mean he’s a hero.

There are many shades of gray in between absolute good and absolute bad, but I do know that I want to fall on the side of white, or as close as I can get to it.

I’m eighteen now, but I’m still living at home, waiting to graduate. So my revelation didn’t really change a whole lot, but it did impact how I spent my time. Instead of spending a lot of time at home, begging for scraps from Dad and hoping Mom would have a few good weeks, I spent more time away. I spent time with Izzy. Time with Aunt Donna and Aiden. Time with friends on the paper at school.

And I applied to UCLA.

It’s a long shot, but I had to at least try. I also applied to a half dozen other, less prestigious schools. But to be honest, even that was a little half-hearted. The more time I spend taking photos, the less I want to do anything else. I know UCLA and other colleges have great programs for photography, but I’m not sure they’re really the best way to learn. Even if that’s where Mom went to study art, and even if she had a promising career before her accident, I’m not sold on college at all.

So when the letter comes from UCLA telling me I’m on their waitlist, it doesn’t wreck me.

UCLA doesn’t have the market cornered on photographic skill.

The world isn’t black and white, but there is truth out there, and I see it much more clearly through the lens of my camera. People lie all the time, but their faces, their expressions, and their actions rarely lie.

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