Valley of the Moon Read online

  ***

  As soon as my dad’s worried face was out of sight, I jammed my foot on the gas and nearly shot right into one of the trees lining our road. I eased up and took the first curve down the hill a little too fast. But the tires gripped tight and cut perfect parabolas onto the asphalt.

  Ferraris are like that. Even vintage ones.

  From our house in Glen Ellen, it usually took me thirty minutes to get to school in the hills overlooking downtown Sonoma. But in my dad’s navy-blue Ferrari Maranello, I made it in fifteen. I took the off-ramp like I owned it and raced up the rolling hills east of town towards school.

  Halfway up the steep road that led to the parking lot, I blew right past a small girl wearing a giant pink backpack.

  Dark hair cut into a sharp bob. Bangs. Too skinny. I reined the Ferrari to a stop, threw it in reverse, and rolled backwards until I got next to her.

  I lowered the passenger window.

  “Eden? What are you doing?” Eden Crawford stopped in her tracks. Tears streaked her face.

  “We had a fight,” she said. “She made me get out and walk.”

  “Get in,” I ordered. Eden scrambled into the passenger seat and stuffed her backpack at her feet.

  “I hate my sister,” she said. She wiped her wet cheeks on the cuff of her sweater and looked around. “I love your new car.” She reached down and pulled up her white knee socks, which clearly were having trouble clinging to her skinny calves. She was small for twelve.

  “It’s not mine. What’d you fight about this time?” We cruised into the school parking lot, packed a usual with Sonoma’s finest cars and worst parking jobs.

  “You. We always fight about you.” My foot slipped off the clutch pedal. The gears squealed noisily.

  “Hey, you and I are allowed to be friends. It’s a free country, right?” I asked.

  “I guess.” She pursed her lips. “She said if she sees me talking to you again she’ll do something…bad.”

  “To you?” I passed a brand-new black Range Rover sporting a peace-sign sticker parked at a 45-degree angle taking up two spots.

  “No,” she said shaking her head. She fidgeted on the seat until it squeaked. A shiver ran through me.

  “Oh please. I’m not afraid of your sister.” No one had to know this wasn’t entirely true. I nosed the car into a slender space between a BMW X3 and an Audi A6 just as the first bell rang. “We better run.”

  An imposing stone staircase led up to the building’s front doors. We stopped to catch our breath at the bottom of the steps and Eden stared up at me, her cheeks pink and her eyes wide. She clamped her thin arms around me.

  “I wish you were still my sister. Merry Christmas, Lana.” She jogged up the steps. Her backpack jiggled from side to side on her narrow frame. I watched her until she made it to the top of the stairs. Then I glanced higher.

  In a second-story window, I caught a flash of white-blond hair right before it vanished.

  Mare Ingenii ~ Sea of Cleverness

  Calculus 401 Midterm

  Question 20.

  An object falls 200 feet.

  Almost the height of the bridge.

  What is the object’s average velocity as it falls?

  It was December. The water was 49 degrees, according to the coroner.

  How many seconds does it take the object to fall?

  She’s been falling my whole life.

  Please show your work.

  ***

  “One minute, girls.” Mrs. Ridpath strode up the aisle. She stopped at my desk. “Miss Goodwin, are you all right?” I snapped out of my reverie.

  “Yes, sorry, almost done.”

  Reading about plummeting objects tended to distract me. I scribbled something I knew was wrong and totally didn’t show my work. There goes the old GPA.

  I stood up and handed in my exam. My palms were damp and my fingers felt stiff from gripping a pencil for 90 minutes.

  It was midterm week for the seniors at the Briar School for Girls. Just one more day. Then one more semester. It was the only thing keeping me sane.

  Especially with The Anniversary coming up. Ten years this year.

  After Calculus, I white-knuckled it through a brutal French midterm. We had to translate an entire Rimbaud poem, and my late-night cramming session hadn’t helped much.

  After all, it’s kind of hard to study when things move all by themselves in your room. I had a good excuse, but couldn’t exactly share it with my teacher.

  My last class before lunch was an English senior seminar. I could finally relax—I had my English grade on lockdown.

  There was no end-of-semester midterm in English, but we’d be getting our final papers back. “Outsiders on the Inside: The American Novel.” That was the actual, semi-pretentious name of the class. But we read Jack London and Willa Cather, and the most popular teacher at Briar taught it. Mr. Quarry was always nice to me, especially compared to some of the teachers at Briar who played favorites.

  They didn’t put that in the brochure or on the website, where Briar proclaimed itself “finest private all-girls day school in Northern California. Housed in a Spanish colonial mansion and nestled in the low mountains above the picture-perfect Sonoma Valley, the School was founded in 1949.”

  Also this gem: “Sonoma is the favored destination of wine lovers and romantics from all over the world.” I didn’t fall into either category.

  There was just one thing I hated about English class.

  Piper Blodgett raised an eyebrow as I rushed in and slid into the seat next to her. It was always summer in Piper World. Her long legs were bronzed from playing tennis every day. She was seeded something like number 214 in the country.

  “You’re late,” she whispered.

  “Don’t judge,” I said. “I just bombed French and Calculus. I’m emotionally fragile right now.”

  “Yeah. Sure you did, Miss Three Point Nine.” Piper didn’t know that I had no choice about the GPA. It was part of my heinous scholarship arrangement. If it fell below a 3.7, they were allowed to kick me out—or force us to pay full tuition.

  Not “they”—her.

  And tuition was $41,000 a year last time I checked.

  But, hey—that’s what happens when your father dumps the president of the Briar Board of Trustees.

  “Think he’ll hand back our papers today? I totally phoned this one in,” she said, leaning in close. She smelled like the strawberry-scented soap in the gym showers.

  “Yeah, today’s the day. I’m sure you did great.”

  The door opened and Cressida Crawford strolled in.

  We had kind of a past.

  Mr. Quarry got up from his desk and gathered a stack of papers from his desk. He was perfectly preppy, in wrinkled chinos, a button-down shirt rolled to his elbows, and a woven navy tie.

  He cleared his throat. He looked twenty-five, but we all knew he was thirty-two. But with his dark wavy hair and creamy skin, a lot of girls had big-time crushes on him.

  Not me, of course. Not really.

  “Okay, girls,” he said. “I have your midterm papers graded and ready to hand back. Overall, I was very impressed.”

  He walked along the desks set up in a semicircle. (From the Briar brochure: “Most classrooms are arranged to resemble small college settings in order to stimulate debate and discussion.”)

  “But before I do, I wanted to give you a chance to read what I consider the single best paper written by a student this semester. I made a copy for each of you.”

  He handed the stack to the girl on the end. She took one and handed the stack to the girl next to her. My heart beat a little faster. When I got my copy, I scanned the title page. “Good, Evil, and Jack London: The Revolutionary Power of Resistance in American Fiction.”

  It was mine. Piper snickered. I kicked her loafer. She knew all about my Jack London thing. Everyone in the class knew. It wasn’t an obsession, though. Not really. I practically lived next door to Jack London State Park in Glen Elle
n, after all. It was where I went to forget things.

  All the things.

  “Please read it over break,” Mr. Quarry continued. “I think it’s exactly the kind of paper your professors will want to see next year.” I stared down at my desk, praying for him to stop talking.

  “And now, the moment you’ve been waiting for,” he said. He picked up a new stack. “As you know, this essay represents thirty percent of your grade in the class.” He dropped the first one on Cressida’s desk. She flipped to the last page, pursed her lips, and slid it under her notebook.

  Piper leaned over and said under her breath, “C is for Cressida.” Cressida looked up at us, eyes blazing. She wore her corkscrew white-blonde hair halfway down her back and had huge pale blue eyes, a sharp, slightly long nose, and an angular face. She slowly smiled at me.

  There was something almost angelic about her porcelain features—until she smiled. Then the corners of her mouth pulled back, a little too far, until it looked like she was about to devour something. Or someone. Me, usually.

  Mr. Quarry handed me my paper and I started to stuff it into my bag. Prying eyes must never, ever—

  “Aren’t you even gonna look?” Piper whispered.

  “I’ll look later.” But Piper reached over and snatched it out of my hand. She flipped to the last page and started reading out loud.

  “A+. Another extraordinary effort, Lana. I am blown away by your crisp prose, your well researched, original argument, and your lovely phrasing.” Piper elbowed me and kept reading. “Thank you for giving me the pleasure of teaching you this semester. Louis.” My cheeks burned.

  “He signed it Louis!” Piper shriek-whispered. Cressida narrowed her eyes at us. She slowly crushed her copy of my paper into a ball.

  Mr. Quarry cleared his throat. “And I thought, since this is our last class before Christmas break, I’d let you go to lunch early. Everybody cool with that?”

  Everyone cheered and gathered their bags. “Good. Oh, Lana, would you mind staying after class for a minute?” Mr. Quarry asked. I stared at him and nodded. I felt all the eyes of the other girls on me. I pretended to adjust the zipper on my backpack.

  Piper stood up. “See you at lunch. The usual spot. Be goooood!” She shook her finger at me, like a schoolmarm scolding her young charges.

  Cressida slid out of her chair and sauntered over to Mr. Quarry’s desk.

  “My mother asked me to give you this, Mr. Quarry.” She held out a long white envelope.

  His eyes widened a little. “Oh! Uh, thank you, Miss Crawford. Enjoy your break!” She walked over to the garbage bin by the door and dropped the crumpled ball—my paper—into it. Without looking at me, she sashayed out of the room.

  Mr. Quarry sat on his desk and crossed his arms. I met his eyes and my stomach clenched up. I stayed at my desk. Why did the nicest teacher at school also have to be the cutest?

  Through the second-floor classroom’s windows, I watched gray winter clouds rolling east over Sonoma. The light in the classroom dimmed.

  “I wanted to tell you in person how good your paper was. Really.”

  I shrugged. “Thanks, but it’s because of you, Mr. Quarry. You’re the best teacher here, you know.”

  He seemed to wince a little. “No. I don’t think I am, Lana.” He stepped over to the windows. From the second story, there was a view of the parking lot below and the western hills of the valley beyond. He shoved his hands into his pockets.

  “Mr. Quarry? Are you okay?”

  He turned to me, his face ashen. “What did your stepmother do? I mean, how did she react? When things with your father weren’t going well?”

  My face hardened. No one asked me about those days. Why my arm got put in a cast in eighth grade. What it feels like when a cold, thin hand slaps your face and how it rattles your teeth so hard you think they’ll break off in your mouth. Why we left in a rush of packing that horrible morning two years ago. New Year’s Day. It was New Year’s Day.

  “She’s my ex-stepmother now, Mr. Quarry. As in, former.” I tried to cover the tremor in my voice by laughing.

  “How long were they married?” he asked softly. “I don’t mean to pry; I’m sorry.”

  A familiar, awful weight settled down into my chest. I wound a thread hanging off the bottom of my skirt around my finger until the tip turned white.

  “It’s okay. They got married right before I started Briar in seventh grade. They got divorced when I was in tenth grade. So three years.”

  “And he survived unscathed?”

  “I think we’re both scathed.” His mouth tightened into a thin line. “Maybe you’ve noticed Cressida and I aren’t exactly BFs.” But I still had Eden. Her mother and sister hadn’t ruined her yet. “But my dad’s doing great. He’s a good guy, except for his brief lapse in romantic judgment.”

  Mr. Quarry cleared his throat. “Speaking of lapses in romantic judgment, as you so wonderfully phrased it.” He blew out a deep breath. “Lana, you know Mrs. Crawford—Ramona—much better than I do. In terms of her reaction to, well, let’s say…ending a relationship—do you think she’d react badly?”

  I gripped the sides of my desk. An eddy of leaves skittered across the parking lot below and the wind swept them into the air. “What do you mean, relationship?” I asked. The words fell out of my mouth like stones.

  Mr. Quarry squeezed his eyes shut. His words came out fast. “When I moved to Sonoma last fall to teach, I didn’t know anyone here. Ramona started calling me all the time, offering to show me around. She seemed so…”

  “Charming? Wonderful?” I spat the words out. “Attractive?”

  “All of the above.” He turned to me. His handsome face twisted up into a pained grimace. “It only lasted two months, Lana. Not even.” He watched my face as realization broke across it. I tried to find words and failed. Not you too, Mr. Quarry. How COULD you?

  I picked up my bag and darted to the door.

  “No, wait! Please, Lana!” He came up to me and put his hand on my arm. Wide, blue eyes searched mine. “It just happened,” he said in a low voice. “I still can’t believe I let it. I was so stupid. But don’t worry—Cressida doesn’t know.” Revulsion clawed up my throat and I fought the urge to vomit all over the classroom floor. He looked like he expected me to whack him with a stick.

  “Why are you telling me?”

  “I need your advice. She wants to meet me tonight. I’m going to tell her it’s over.”

  “Good idea.” Did he want me to help him write his breakup speech?

  “She even threatened me. She told me if I didn’t change someone’s grade, she’d go public. Get me fired. Or worse. It’s got to stop.”

  She wanted him to change Cressida’s grade! She was using him. She was probably “dating” every single one of Cressida’s teachers. Including the obese, sweaty guy at the DMV who sits in your car when you take your driving test. And probably everyone who graded Cressida’s SAT.

  I shook my head in disbelief and turned to go. “Don’t hate me, Lana. Trust me, I hate myself enough. But I have this weird feeling she is going to do something crazy when I tell her. Am I just being paranoid?”

  I swallowed hard and felt for the door handle behind me. “She doesn’t like it when people walk away from her. She won’t be happy. But, she hasn’t murdered us.”

  Yet. A strange chill swept through me.

  He nodded, reached into his back pocket, and pulled out a brown leather wallet. He took out a business card. His hand shook a little. “Call me, Lana,” he said. “If you ever need anything. And thank you.”

  I snatched the card out of his hand, squeezed through the door, and fled.

  ***

  “So did you and Louis do it on his desk or the floor?” Piper asked, examining Mr. Quarry’s business card. Piper, her tennis teammate Bernadette, and I were sitting at stone benches set under one of the flowering pear trees on the grounds.

  “On Cressida’s desk,” I said. “It was amazing.” I didn
’t tell them about his Big Secret. I wished he hadn’t told me.

  Bernadette slurped her Diet Coke. “Hey, did you guys hear? Someone stole all the frozen rats from the science lab. Mr. Shelhammer had to postpone the Biology midterm until after break! How freaking awesome is that?”

  “Awesome,” I nodded. “And disgusting.”

  Piper grinned. “Ladies, I have an announcement. My parents are meeting my brother and his girlfriend in Mexico so I have the whole place to myself. Which means…New Year’s Eve party at my place!” She sat back and gloated.

  “Um, is anybody else going?” I asked slowly. I glanced over at Bernadette, who subtly shook her head. I knew it would be an all-girls sleepover. Like always.

  I wasn’t in the mood to eat raw cookie dough and watch The Notebook. Again.

  “Tons of people,” Piper said. “Bernadette’s on the ski trip, but I invited a bunch of kids from tennis. This time, there WILL be boys there. I promise. No, really.”

  Half the class was going on a senior ski trip to Tahoe over break, but I hadn’t bothered to ask my dad for the $3,500 trip fee, which didn’t include ski rentals or lift tickets. Or ski pants, Patagonias, hats, gloves, après ski UGG boots, and other winter essentials I didn’t own. Piper had a tennis tournament in San Francisco over break, so she was staying in Sonoma.

  “Put me down as a maybe.”

  “You’re not working for that crazy valet company on New Year’s, are you?” Piper was one of the few people who knew about my job.

  “No, my boss is out of town for Christmas.”

  “Thank God. Don’t forget your PJs. You and Maya can sleep over after.” She slid her sunglasses on, grinning like a fool.

  I shivered and pulled my sweater tighter. “What kind of school makes young children eat outside in December?”

  “It builds character,” Bernadette said. “The colder we are, the higher our SAT scores.”

  Piper scoffed. “Except Cressida. I heard she’s failing three classes.” Maybe there were a few teachers Ramona hadn’t gotten around to seducing yet.

  “God, that girl,” Bernadette said. “I can’t even.” Bernadette had never been under her sway.