Page 32 of Dead Boys Club

“It’s ass,” Zach repeats firmly. “But I’m—I’m really glad you told Paige. About… you know.” He twists his fingers into the hem of his shirt and tries to keep looking at Parker. He ends up staring at his right shoulder instead. “I think you both needed that.”

Parker shrugs but he knocks his knee against Zach’s again, maybe a little harder than before.

“Yeah,” he says. “I dunno, it’s stupid; it’s so stupid.” He sighs, scrubbing one hand through his hair. “I don’t even know why I kept their secrets anyway.”

Zach pushes his knee into Parker’s and leaves it there. Parker presses back.

“’Cause they’re your parents,” Zach says. “They’re supposed to, like… take care of you.”

“Fuck that,” Parker mutters.

Paige returns from the bathroom, face clear and dry, just as Zach’s mom comes back in from the porch.

“Well,” his mom says. “Your parents said it was alright if you stayed here for the night. I told them you’d call them in the morning before school.” She grabs her jacket off the hook. “I’m going to go out and get some pizza, okay?”

A look of determination has settled over his mom’s face, and Zach has never felt so reassured in his life.

“Thank you, Mrs. Reid,” Paige says. “I mean, Kate.”

Zach hasn’t had someone sleep over at his house since he and Isaac stopped having weekly sleepovers, which had been arranged entirely by their moms. It’s a little weird to have Parker and Paige in his house like this but the tension of the evening starts to leak away. His mom returns with a box of pizza and a Walmart bag carrying two new toothbrushes and a pair of pink plaid pajamas for Paige.

“You’re a little tall,” she tells Parker, having to look up at him while they stand in the kitchen. “But you can fit into something of Zach’s.”

The four of them eat pizza in the living room in front of the television, and nobody talks about Parker’s suicide attempt or the Reids’ lies for the rest of the evening. They watch three episodes of Family Feud, and Paige and Zach’s mom form a team against Parker and Zach to try to guess the most answers that end up on the board. His mom and Paige win by a mile but Zach’s never been good at Family Feud anyway. Parker keeps saying rude answers that make Zach’s mom laugh and say, “No, stop that.”

When it gets late, Zach digs out the old air mattress from the hall closet while his mom makes up the couch for Paige. It doesn’t really feel like a sleepover. Maybe because it’s a school night, or maybe because Parker and Paige aren’t here because they want to be here. Zach still feels weird and jittery as he gets ready for bed.

Paige raps her knuckles gently on the open bathroom door as Zach brushes his teeth. He startles, turning to look at her. She smiles tiredly, holding up the yellow toothbrush his mom bought her. “Can I come in?” she asks. Zach nods around a mouthful of toothpaste.

They brush their teeth side by side, silent but for the trickle of the sink. When he looks at them both in the mirror, Paige almost looks exactly like Parker. She’s a head taller than Zach, but not as tall as her brother.

Zach feels like maybe he should be excited or nervous, or other things you’re supposed to feel when the girl you’ve had a crush on since the eighth grade is standing right next to you. She’s so close that Zach can feel the warmth of her shoulder as they crowd together at the sink.

But mostly he’s kind of… happy? He’s happy that she’s here, not because she’s Paige Reid and she’s in his house, but because she’s here where Zach knows she’s safe. At least for the night. If the Reid twins were going to run away, Zach reasons, at least they ran away to his house.

Paige spits into the sink, tucking her hair behind her ears. “Can I ask you something?” she says, wiping her mouth.

“Yeah?” Zach answers, focusing very hard on rinsing his toothbrush.

“Did Parker tell you?” Paige asks. “That my parents were keeping this from me?”

Zach’s stomach starts to bubble unpleasantly.

“Yeah,” he says, after a beat. He shuts off the sink and puts his toothbrush back in its holder.

“So, you knew,” Paige says. Her voice wobbles. Zach lifts his gaze, looking at her in the mirror. She’s wearing the pink Walmart pajamas. She must have washed the makeup off her face earlier, because he can see smudges under her eyes where her mascara had been. “This whole time, you were just—what, keeping this from me? Helping my parents keep secrets?”

“No!” Zach says. He swallows, gripping the edge of the sink. “No, Paige… I wasn’t. I mean, I was keeping Parker’s secret, I guess.”

Paige frowns. She turns her head and Zach turns his, tilting his chin back to look her in the face. They’re so close, and Zach is struck once more by how much of Parker he can see in her nose, her cheekbones, the shape of her eyes.

“Well,” she says. “Don’t. If we’re gonna be friends, now… no more secrets. Especially if you’re going to be friends with my brother.”

Friends. Friends with Paige Reid. And Parker too.

“No more,” Zach breathes out, and it’s a lie. It’s another lie, because he’s keeping the secret that Parker still wants to die. That he’s planning on it. Has been planning on it. Zach swallows that secret down again. It settles in his stomach like a stone.

Suddenly, Parker fills the doorway of the small bathroom, trying to edge his way in around Paige. “Move,” he tells her. She rolls her eyes and elbows Parker in his ribs as she squeezes past him and out into the hallway.