Only If You’re Lucky

It’s unusually calm on the water, the gentle churn of the engine creating little waves that ripple out around us. Marmalade sky reflecting off the surface, casting everything in an orange glow. It would normally be such a scenic picture, something ripped straight out of a song, but the boat’s slow approach to the island in the distance makes it feel like we’re being transported to a prison somewhere, cut off from society with no way to escape.

“Margot.”

I turn around, tallying up the bodies in the boat. Nicole is sitting on Trevor’s lap, angular legs sticking out of a fleece blanket draped across her stomach. He’s drinking something out of a flask, stainless steel and small in his hand, the other palm placed on Nicole’s thigh as he nuzzles his nose deep into her neck. Sloane is leaning into Lucas to their left, visibly rigid as his fingers play absentmindedly with her hair, while Will and James are next to me in the back and Levi is driving, knuckles white as his hands grip the wheel.

“Margot.”

“Yeah,” I say slowly, twisting further, already feeling Lucy’s eyes on me. Ice-cold and kaleidoscopic; curious, like she somehow knows. She’s all the way in the front, perched on the bow like a figurehead pulling us forward.

Or maybe a siren, seductive and dangerous, her little lies fooling us all.

“Did you hear that?” she asks me.

“Hear what?”

“There’s a full moon tonight.”

I look at Lucy, registering that little twitch in her lip. Like that day on the lawn, our first talk in the dorm, laughing at something I still don’t understand. I don’t know why she’s telling me this, what she’s playing at, so I just nod, smile, and twist back around as I pull my own blanket tight around my shoulders, the sharp chill whipping off the water sending a shiver straight through me.

I think about this afternoon, just over an hour ago, the very moment when everything changed. Sloane and I pushed close on my bed; the things she told me lodged in my brain, stuck like a splinter. Harsh and throbbing as I tried to summon a single memory of Lucy on campus, in one of my classes. Black curls bobbing in a sea of other students or sharp blue eyes staring at me from the back of the library.

That whiff of vanilla hovering like the ghost of her trapped in an empty room.

It was a pointless exercise. Lucy was never there. I was starting to accept it with a certainty that was startling, so much so that it’s hard to imagine how I never noticed it before—but the truth is, it’s easy to blend in in a place like this. Rutledge may not be big, but it’s sprawling. The classrooms are scattered across the city, historic buildings tucked into little cracks and crannies, disappearing into their surroundings so naturally it’s hard to even know what belongs to the college and what doesn’t. There are full sections of the school I’ve never noticed before, entire buildings I haven’t had a reason to step inside. Not only that, but I’ve seen the same handful of people in my classes for almost two years now, all of us trapped inside a bubble of our own making. Completely unaware of what goes on outside it. I rarely catch glimpses of Sloane or Nicole during the day, either, both of them retreating to their respective spaces and staying there until it’s time to come home again, and when I think about all this, really think about it, it actually seems shockingly easy to do what Lucy has done: to simply step into this place and blend in so seamlessly.

To convince us all she’s one of us.

“She’s still our friend,” I said to Sloane, the implications of it all sitting stubborn between us, refusing to sink in. “I mean, this doesn’t change anything—”

“Margot, it changes everything.” She gaped. “We’re living with a stranger.”

“She’s not a stranger,” I said, somewhat mildly, humiliation blooming in my chest at how natural it was for me to keep jumping to Lucy’s defense like this, no questions asked. Same as that first day outside the shed, listening to Sloane’s slander, the reflex to protect her was automatic, instinctive, like a mallet to the knee.

“Well, she’s not who she says she is, either.”

It’s still tempting, even now, to give Lucy the benefit of the doubt. Sloane hadn’t been with us that night on the roof; she hadn’t heard Lucy talk about her childhood, her past. The way things were and her desire to get away.

“I wanted a fresh start,” she had said. “I figured you’d understand.”

I did understand, and I was starting to convince myself that maybe it was simple: maybe Lucy moved to Rutledge on her own but didn’t have the money or the grades to get in. She started working at Penny Lanes, saw the way the students lived, and wanted that for herself, too. A chance at belonging, at friends. Not so different from any of us, really, so she met Sloane and Nicole on the lawn and felt at home in their presence; she was invited into their dorm, into their lives, and didn’t want to admit that she was somehow different, less than, because of her parents. The way she grew up.

Why wouldn’t she fake it when nobody questioned her? Why wouldn’t she just go along with it all, simply pretend, like the rest of us, to be something she’s not?

We’re so close to the island now that I can see the other boats anchoring, swarms of boys hopping off and onto the sand, carrying duffel bags and coolers over their heads to keep them from getting wet. Girls sitting on the sides with their legs dangling off, taking swigs of vodka straight from the bottle. Salt water and wind turning their hair crimped and wild. I thought about skipping the party tonight, hanging back while the others left and using the free time to sort through my thoughts, try to find some answers. Sloane couldn’t get away with bailing without upsetting Lucas—that, and she didn’t want to leave Nicole by herself—and neither of us wanted to tip off Lucy, either. Alert her to the fact that something was wrong. We’re supposed to be sharing a tent, after all, the only two roommates who aren’t coupled up—and then I had an idea.

“Luce, can you come back here?” Levi asks, bringing my attention back to the boat. “I’m getting ready to anchor.”

I’ve never heard him use that nickname before and I watch as he pats the seat next to him while Lucy stands up, stepping over our stuff as she makes her way toward the back. Images of the two of them flash through my mind again: Lucy in his bedroom, sinking deep on his mattress. Long fingers winding through his hair as she pulled him close, her lips on his. She plops down on the bench next to him and starts poking around the cupholder, always curious and forever bored, before pulling out a rusted fishhook and using it to pick at her nails.

“Make sure you girls don’t wander away when you’re drunk,” Lucas says, a giddy anticipation sweeping through him now that the night is so close to starting. “There are animals out there.”

“What kind of animals?” Sloane asks, crossing her arms.

“Spiders,” he says, his fingers crawling their way up her leg. “Alligators, snakes.”

“Just stay on the beach and you’ll be fine,” James says, and I turn around, startled at how close he is. With everything else going on, I forgot he was even here.

“Wait until you see the stars,” Lucas continues, hugging Sloane close. “It gets so dark without the ambient light—”

“Fuck!”

We all turn to look at Lucy, her sudden scream startling us all. A stream of bright red blood has erupted from her nail, running down her finger, and I watch as she throws the fishhook back into the cupholder like it somehow sprang to life and attacked her on its own.

“Here,” Levi says, rummaging through various cubbies in search of something to stanch the bleeding. I watch as it leaks out in a steady gush, perfect little circles dripping onto the floor of the boat, the cushioned seat, Levi’s shorts. He’s distracted, simultaneously trying to look and steer as the boat hits a wave at a weird angle and slams back into the water, hard, almost sending Nicole to the ground.

“Butler!” Trevor yells. There’s a subtle slur to his speech as he grabs ahold of Nicole’s thigh with his free hand. She winces, straightening herself on his lap. “Watch where the fuck you’re going!”

“I’m okay—” Nicole starts, but Trevor interrupts her, eager to keep fighting.

“Christ, dude, you’re going to kill us all.”

“It’s fine,” Lucy says quietly, touching Levi’s arm. “I got it.”

Levi peels his eyes from her and looks back ahead, through the windshield, purposefully avoiding Trevor’s gaze. I can see the tendons in his neck bulging, his jaw clenched tight like he has to physically restrain himself from snapping back. The tension on the boat is so palpable, so thick, and I realize, somehow for the first time, that it isn’t just between Lucy and us but the boys, too. Nicole and Trevor; Levi and me. This little group of us that was once so solid now warped and bending beneath the pressure of it all; little hairline fractures traveling slowly, threatening to burst.

“Are you okay?” I ask, my voice low as I watch Lucy hold her finger, the slow glide of blood between her hands like the wax of a melting candle dripping to the floor.

“Fine,” she says. “A little blood never bothered me.”

I watch as she lifts her head, eyes on mine, before pulling her finger to her lips and sucking it dry, and I get the sudden sensation of looming danger, watching her like this. Like eyeing a funnel cloud in the distance as it inches closer, collecting strength. Like we’re all marching toward something big, something permanent, the slow simmer of the last eight months morphing into full-blown boil.

The boat sidles up to the shore and lurches to a stop, the anchor plunging into the water with a violent splash. The night is officially alive with the sound of drunken shrieks and wild laughs, but all I can hear is my own blood in my ears. My own beating heart like the steady thrum of drums in the distance, the executioner’s call, intensity building until we hit the inevitable crescendo—and once we do, once we reach the top, there will be nothing left for us to do but fall.