Page 9 of Riot Rules
Pax isn’t a fan of words. He flashes Wren a shark-toothed smile, nonchalantly shrugging a shoulder as he trudges up the hill.
“Don’t be a dick,” Wren warns. “Say it. Out loud. I wanna hear it. I promise I won’t be a psychopath.”
The look on Pax’s face isn’t very promising; neither his shit-eating smile nor the wicked look in his eyes inspire much hope that he’s going to behave. Still, he repeats the words as directed. “I promise. Cross my heart and hope to die. I will not be a psychopath.”
5
DASH
Napoleon Bonaparte was a bad motherfucker.When he was exiled, he escaped his island prison and started stirring up trouble for the English all over again. After he lost the battle of Waterloo, he was exiled a second time, to St. Helena, and that was the end of him. The English like exiling people when they misbehave.
When the time came to punish me formysins, my father decided against exiling me to a tropical island. He chose Wolf Hall, because he figured I wouldn’t be able to get myself into any trouble halfway up a mountain in the middle of New Hampshire. He figured I’d be confined to a room, so desperate for something to do that I’d actually throw myself into my schoolwork. If he’d done his research, he’d have realized that there wasanotherpublic school within Mountain Lakes’ town limits. And if he knew absolutely anything about teenagers, stranded in small towns with very few amenities, he’d have known that bored kids find ways to entertain themselves.
Every weekend, somewhere in Mountain Lakes, someone is throwing a party just like this one. We enter the farmhouse, and a thick cloud of pot smoke greets us. “Christ. Half the fucking county’s here,” Wren says.
Pax grunts. “Works in our favor. If there are this many people here, no one’s gonna noticeus.”
The kid who owns this place comes from money. The place reeks of wealth. Framed, original art hangs from the walls. Everywhere you look, there’s plush, rich furniture and vases filled with lilies. A mosaic of photographs tesselate along the entryway wall—some steel-haired guy in a tailored suit shaking hands with the likes of Warren Buffet, Jeff Besos and…oh no. Come on. You’ve gotta be fucking kidding me.
Wren stands underneath one of the photos, grinning like a monster. “Haha! Check it out, Lovett. It’s your old man!”
How can the world bethissmall?
Demonstrate tomethat you can do better.
I hear the fucker’s voice loud and clear, like he’s standing right next to me, whispering the words into my ear. I haven’t been able to shake the worthless feeling that consumed me when I read his email; the feeling only worsens when I see his disapproving expression scowling out at me from the photo. I can never escape his judgement. I can never escapehim.
I reluctantly follow the boys deeper into the house. A huge Steinway sits in the formal living room—perhaps one of the most beautiful pianos I’ve ever seen. My fingers immediately itch to skip up and down the keys and see how it sings, but that’s a no-go. The place is packed, and I don’t play in front of other people. Plus, Wren and Pax are on a mission, and I can barely hear myself think over the grinding EDM that’s pulsing out of the expensive speaker system, anyway. No way I’d be able to hear myself play. My old man would roll his eyes at the stunning instrument if he saw it here. He thinks music is a waste of time.
Try harder, boy.
A red light, rigged up on the other side of the giant living room strobes, painting the faces of the people dancing and grinding up against one another a slick, sweat-covered crimson.
Do better, boy.
Crossing the makeshift dance floor to the kitchen, I look down, and find that the Carrera marble floor is carpeted by caramel popcorn that crunches under the soles of my sneakers every time I take a step.
Try not to be such a disappointment, boy.
Pax searches the faces of the revelers as we pass them. “Most of these fuckers are rolling.”
“And? You gonna narc on them?” Wren prods.
Pax growls, his lip curling upward—an expression that’s preluded a number of violent disagreements between our group members in the past. At least he isn’t aiming it at me this time. “Screw you, man. I’m just wondering where the fuck they got the Molly from.”
The kitchen’s lousy with bros. There are backward-turned baseball caps, wife beaters, board shorts and Ray Ban sunglasses everywhere I look. My immediate response is to leave as quickly as possible, but my escape plan’s thwarted when Wren grabs me by the back of the neck and thrusts me into the melee.
“Don’t even think about it. If I have to deal with this bullshit, then there isn’t a cat in hell’s chance thatyoudon’t. Come on. We’ll grab a beer. Talk to some girls. Get the job done and get the fuck out of here. Goddamnit, dude, smile already. You look like you belong on a mortician’s slab.”
“A mortician’s slab would be preferable to this,” I grouse, even as I force a ten thousand-megawatt grin onto my face. When a petite brunette hops up onto the island in the middle of the kitchen and starts to dance, running her hands all over her body, I cheer and shout along with everyone else, slapping a guy’s hand when he holds it up for me to high five. To an outsider, I must look like I’m one of them—just another disenfranchised youth with too much time on his hands, too scared of the future to admit that he feels lost.
On the inside, I couldn’t be more unlike these rejects. I’ve never felt lost a day in my life. Uncertainty is a foreign concept to me. I’vealwaysknown what the future holds. My education and my subsequent career as an estate manager was laid out for me like a red fucking carpet on the day of my birth, roped off to the left and the right to prevent any thought of deviating off course.
I am a Lovett.
LordLovett. One day, I will beDukeLovett.
I was born into generations of pride and tradition, and I’m expected to uphold and defend both with all my might until I take my dying breath. If my father knew I was in the kitchen of a public-school boy, participating in what essentially boils down to a frat party, he'd have an impromptu heart attack, die, and then raise himself from the dead so he could berate me for my poor decision making. Even if he does know a kid’s father well enough to shake hands with him in a photo, there are just certain types of people I’m not supposed to fraternize with.
