And now I’m sitting here, sad, and angry, and confused. Fee is sobbing, and I can’t tell her she’s being too loud because pregnant and abortion. Paula is comforting her and I just don’t have it in me right now to go join that tableau. Paula is sweet, petting Fee’s head, almost maternal, no, definitely maternal, telling her it’s all gonna be okay.
Paula is ten years old. I love this little kid. For real.
Jagger Jonze. I’ve turned it over and over in my head. Could the father of Fee’s baby be the same evil fuck whom I filmed nailing Jinny Hutsall—the same evil skeez who staged that whole scene in the parking lot, and put the bomb in the bathroom, and was so fucking freaky on orientation night?
I’ve been thinking this whole time that Jagger and Jinny wanted me dead because of what I saw them doing in Jinny’s bedroom. Maybe that’s not it at all. It’s possible they don’t even know. Maybe it’s not about me at all. Maybe Jinny’s just Jagger’s puppet. Protecting him. Maybe Jagger needed Jinny’s help to get rid of Fee and her zygote. Maybe I’m the collateral damage.
* * *
—
Back to orientation night? Buckle up, because a lot happened. After Jagger’s emotional talk, we were completely down to ditch our daddies and go back to Jinny’s for the promised rap sesh. We all wanted to go home and change into something cute before we reconvened, but the Reverend told us, specifically, not to change out of our school uniforms, and to leave our cell phones in the basket by the Hutsalls’ front door. Okay. I mean, not okay, but okay.
At Jinny’s, we lounged on the sectional in the den where we always did, drinking the lemonade she always served, waiting for him to come down from upstairs, where he was having a long, loud meeting with Mr. Hutsall. I don’t know what that was all about, but with all the questions in the news about Jonze’s financial ties to Jinny’s dad, it must have been about money.
Finally, the Reverend came into the room, looking less rock star-y than he did onstage. I didn’t like the way he looked at me, or any of us really, now that he was the only adult in the room. And I didn’t want to blog about Jagger’s story. I guess, even then, I didn’t actually believe it. I should’ve left, but I didn’t. I’m realizing that asking questions of yourself isn’t enough. Like, you need to actually answer yourself. Dig deeper. That’s gonna be my motto when all this is over.
Jonze joined us on the sectional. At first he seemed fine to listen to Jinny and the girls serenade him with praise about his awesome story of redemption and how they cried buckets when he sang “Thank God for American Girls.” But Jagger noticed I was quiet and kept glancing at me, not in a clearly lustful way, like he did with Fee and the others, but kinda threatening. And he kept checking a spot on the bookshelf. It occurs to me now he must’ve put a camera there to record the whole thing. Of course he did.
“Reverend Jagger?” I said. “There must be so many flowers on Merilee Magee’s grave. People must be putting them there, like, all the time.”
“What’s that?” he said.
“Oh my gosh, you guys!” Dee said. “Is the grave in Chicago? We should go there! We should, like, drive there, road-trip it, and lay a huge wreath.”
“It’d take, like, a week to drive to Chicago,” I pointed out.
The girls, all but Jinny, seemed pretty excited about the idea anyway. Zee goes, “I would love to pay my respects, Reverend Jagger. I feel her. I feel her spirit here with us right now.”
Jagger Jonze cleared his throat, ignoring the question of Merilee Magee’s grave. “You girls can call me Jagger when we’re here in this safe place. I just want you to feel comfortable opening up, and sometimes the Reverend part gets in the way. I’m just a man. Just a man.”
Too true. Apparently.
Then he quoted some Bible verses about women, which I didn’t listen to because I’m not Christian or a 1930s housewife and I’ve heard enough of it at Sacred. Plus, it was dead boring after Jagger’s tale of drugs and rape. He noticed Delaney scratching her legs. She’s allergic to wool and she has to, like, take Benadryl every day to endure her uniform, and he goes, “What’s wrong, Delaney?”