When the Light Went Out by Bridget Morrissey

Author:Bridget Morrissey
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Sourcebooks
Published: 2019-04-22T16:00:00+00:00

July 11

Five Years Prior

Marley Bricket always had a way of being coy. She presented a calculated yet attainable distance from the rest of us, which we all aided. She’d been to high school: a much-coveted, little understood land of promise and mystery. Still, she chose our neighborhood group for the summer. We did whatever was needed to keep it that way. We laid ourselves out like red carpet for her to walk all over.

Want to eat the last cupcake even though Harrison didn’t have one and you’ve had two already? Go ahead. Need to put your dirty clothes in my laundry pile so your mom doesn’t yell at you for spilling rum on your shirt? Sign me up.

The trade-off was daily excitement. A new game to play. Better, more scandalous things to talk about: kissing, and drinking, and what our parents did when we weren’t home. Learning what no one else would teach us. Seeing what no one else could dare to imagine.

There was never a dull moment with Marley Bricket around.

That space we’d provided her with, out of respect and fear and admiration, expanded into an empty ocean of blue marble swirls in her eyes. A startling vacancy covered up all of her trademark mischief. She—of scandalous red bikinis and house raids and endless adventure—was dead. We all knew it, yet Aidy sat with one hand pressed over Marley’s bullet wound, her phone up to her ear, and told a 911 dispatcher things like, “She isn’t responding yet,” and, “Just a little blood.”

The same Aidy—who called my parents to tell them how I was breaking the rules and going to Marley’s to swim—was bending truth.

That’s how bad it was.

Ruby rushed to Marley’s other side and held her hand. I wanted to copy. Earn my spot in the group through dedication, not blood relation to our second-in-command. I agreed to be called Ollie instead of Olivia, so I could have an -ee name like the other girls. I gave up both soccer and softball, so I didn’t miss out on any house raids, or trips to the park, or spontaneous relay races down Albany. I stopped watching TV. I didn’t have favorite musicians or movies. I’d given everything to our group, and still my instincts were wrong. I forgot to call 911. I didn’t think to hold Marley’s dead hand. I wanted to hide her under the bed until I found a way to reverse time.

With Nick missing, I stood in as villain: a human sponge that soaked up all blame in the room, bloating beneath my hideous peace sign tankini from absorbing every inch of desperation and confusion. Harrison grabbed on to a bed post and stared at blood pooling around his feet. Bigs and Teeny hugged. Better together than apart, they always fit into every ridge of each other until it looked as if they formed one person.

They all looked at me that day as if every bad thought they’d ever had about me had been proven right. I was bad news.

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