Free A Good Killing by Allison Leotta Page B

lipgloss before you got out of the car.
    One day, about a month after Homecoming, I was hanging out there with Jenny, Kathy, and Kathy’s two-year-old girl, Hayley. We were looking for hair paint to streak our hair blue for the Friday night football game. Outside, it was a cold November afternoon, grayed by a low winter sun and seasoned with coarse salt on the ground. Inside, it was bright and warm and full of distractions made in China.
    To pass the time, we were trying on hats, not the kind we would actually buy, but the kind that made each other laugh. Kathy put on a huge straw one with plastic fruit all over the brim and became the Queen of England. She waved the cupped-hand royal greeting at passing shoppers. “Ma-ma,” said Hayley. “Gapes. Nummy.” The baby tried to grab the plastic grapes from the hat, smacking her little lips with anticipation. God, she was a cute kid. Like a miniature Snow White: jet-black hair, green eyes, and roses in her cheeks.
    Kathy herself didn’t look so great. She put all her energy into that little girl, and not much was left for herself. Her dark hair was listless and frayed, and she hadn’t lost all the baby weight. She looked thirty, though she was only seventeen. She’d lived a lot in those last two years, and the living wasn’t easy.
    Kathy and that worthless husband of hers rented in the trailer park, always a few weeks behind in their payments. Her husband cemented driveways, but not often enough. She’d gone through a few menial jobs by then and tried to study for her GED when Hayley was sleeping. She was exhausted to a degree I’d never seen in any other teenager. But she doted on that little girl. Said it was all worth it because she got her.
    She patted her daughter’s head and said we’d go to the grocery section to buy her some real grapes. Kathy kept the hat on and continued to be the Queen as we pushed the cart down the toilet paper aisle, using a snooty voice to describe the absorbency necessary for royal arses. We were laughing until we turned a corner.
    Wendy Weiscowicz was there with her mother, beaming a scanning gun at an infant car seat. When they saw us, Wendy’s mother had the good sense to look embarrassed, but Wendy smiled broadly. She was barely showing then—she must’ve been about three or fourmonths along—but she already wore a maternity shirt. When she saw me, she smoothed down the front, so I could see the little round bump on her previously concave stomach.
    Only Wendy could be proud to be registering for baby items a week after getting married. Seeing her gut hit me in mine. A baby is way more permanent than a marriage.
    At least I understood why Coach married her. I imagined she’d tricked him into it, claiming to be on some sort of birth control that she wasn’t. I felt sorry for him. Wendy was so manipulative and selfish; his life was going to be pure misery. Of course, I didn’t say that.
    I said, “Hi, Mrs. Weiscowicz.”
    Wendy’s mom was a nice lady. After Dad left, Mrs. Weiscowicz was one of the women who brought Mom casseroles. Mrs. Weiscowicz’s tuna noodle was the best in town—she didn’t skimp on the potato chips on top. I felt a pang of guilt. For what it’s worth, I had no idea Wendy was pregnant when we got into it at the Homecoming game.
    Mrs. Weiscowicz smiled and launched into nice-midwestern-mom small talk, asking after our families and cooing over little Hayley. When there was a pause, Kathy looked pointedly at Wendy’s stomach.
    “So how are you , Wendy?”
    “I couldn’t be better,” Wendy trilled. “Married life suits me.”
    She held out her hand and waved her diamond ring under our noses. The other girls said ooh! and wow! and congratulations! It struck me that I didn’t know a single person who’d been invited to the wedding—and that was the sort of thing you’d hear about in Holly Grove.
    “Was it a big wedding?” I asked sweetly. “Did everyone throw rice?”
    Wendy’s smile dimmed. She