The Initial Insult - Mindy McGinnis Page 0,18

out into the main room. More people have shown up, and the staircase is packed, the geeks who are working on the clock giving everyone orders about tiptoeing around the pieces and parts they’ve got laid out everywhere.

“Hello! There’s a system at work here!” One of the boys shouts at a football player who trounces right past him. But the jock isn’t interested; he’s got one hand on his stomach, the other covering his mouth, his skin a sickly green.

Huh . . . Maybe Felicity wasn’t totally wrong about the flu.

I pause for a second, anxious to know if her screams are coming up through the floorboards. They’re not. All I can hear is the low hum of party talk, and crying from somewhere outside, high-pitched and desperate. Curious, I follow the sound out onto the porch, where Hugh, David, and Brynn have shifted the underclassmen out onto the lawn and are gathered around Gretchen in a protective circle.

“He probably had to take a piss,” David says, his skin still sallow, one hand on Gretchen’s shoulder. She shakes her head.

“William Wilson wouldn’t get out of the car unless I told him he could,” she hiccups, wiping her face with the edge of David’s shirt. “He’s a very good boy.”

She gets to her feet, swaying a little, her own color not good. “William!” she calls out into the dark. “William Wilson Astor, you get back here right now!”

“Wow, whipping out the full name, huh?” Brynn says.

Hugh pats Gretchen’s hair, carefully avoiding a splatter of puke from earlier. “I’m sure he’ll come back.”

“What if he doesn’t,” Gretchen wails. “What if it’s like last time? He got so scared and nobody knew where he was, and the only person who actually helped me was”—she hiccups again—“Ribbit.”

Hugh’s jaw tenses, and my cousin appears out of the darkness, the light on his phone flicking off. I go to his side, grabbing his arm as he’s about to step up onto the porch.

“You might want to split,” I tell him.

“Huh, why?” His breath has beer on it, his eyes bleary. It only takes one, with Ribbit.

“Because Hugh doesn’t exactly like you, and—”

“Hey!” As if I’d conjured him, Hugh elbows his way through the crowd on the porch, his fist tight around the neck of Ribbit’s T-shirt before he can even get his hands up in surrender.

“You sick little shit,” he seethes into Ribbit’s face. “You hide that little dog away so you can save the day again, get a little off Gretchen?”

“Whoa, hey.” I put my hand on Hugh’s arm, but it’s like metal.

“I know he’s your cousin, Tress, but this is between us,” he says to me.

So I hit him.

Hitting Hugh Broward with my bare hand is like pitting a mosquito against a car going eighty miles an hour. Nothing happens except I get hurt. I cradle my hand to my chest, and Hugh’s eyes bounce off Ribbit for one second to meet mine, then settle back on his prey. We know each other well enough to be aware he’s not going to let go of my cousin, and I’m not going to stand down and let Ribbit get hurt.

“He didn’t do anything,” I say. “Leave him alone.”

“You don’t know shit,” Hugh says. “I’ve told you before; he’s a squirrelly little bastard.”

“I’m not . . . ,” Ribbit argues, his voice shaky. “I’m a good guy.”

“Dude.” David comes over, puts his hand on Hugh’s shoulder. “I don’t think it was him. He’s been with us the whole time.”

“Of course he has,” Huge says, giving Ribbit a little shake. “Parasite.”

“No, man,” David goes on, his skin still green, wobbly on his feet. “He didn’t do anything to the dog.”

“That’s your area, right?” I snipe at David, thinking of Goldie’s hair floating on the surface of the gator pond, the wet paint on our sign, someone putting a name to us that isn’t Allan or Usher. Just white trash.

David blinks slowly, his gaze dull. “What the fuck are you talking about?”

“Forget it,” I say, as I watch Hugh’s grip loosen on Ribbit’s shirt. I’m settling that score with someone else, down in the basement. “Let him go, Hugh.”

Hugh gives me a long look, a fire behind his eyes I’ve never seen there before. I’ve known Hugh awhile, but it’s always been the teddy bear side of him I see. I’ve never had to stand my ground against him, because until tonight, Hugh and I have always been on the same page. Now I’m seeing something new, something