I regarded the soup as if it were a murder weapon, which it sort of was. Then I thought, What the hell, I’ m starving, and it smells delicious. I took a spoonful and blew on it before tasting it. Okay, it was pretty good. Weawwy goog, in fact, I thought, scooping up more. Why not? It wasn’ t as if the soup had been driving the car.

‘ Do you enjoy school?’  my mom asked Deedee.

‘ It’ s okay.’

‘ June tells me you’ re an honors student. Good for you! So, do you have a boyfriend at school?’

Deedee poured ketchup over her oven fries, looking as if she’ d like to crawl under the table. ‘ Not really.’

I shot my mom a look. What was she doing? Had I not made it clear there would be no talk of babies, and didn’ t the fact that Deedee was pregnant imply that there was, in fact, a boy in the picture, at least at one point?

My mom barreled ahead, pretending not to notice the daggers I was shooting at her. ‘ You will. You’ ll have lots of them, that’ s for certain. You’ re such a pretty girl.’

Deedee seemed increasingly uncomfortable, so in an effort to get my mom off whatever oddball track she was on, I said to Deedee, ‘ She’ s right, you are& but don’ t put too much stake on anything my mom says. She used to think that I was cute when I was your age, too.’

‘ You were cute!’  my mom insisted.

Dad gave a chortle. ‘ Didn’ t she have those braces? And the eye patch?’

‘ It’ s not my fault I had a lazy eye! And it was only for a few months!’

Deedee cheered instantly. ‘ An eye patch? Serious?!’  And she made an arrrgh noise like a pirate-as if I hadn’ t heard that every second of every day that I wore it. ‘ Got any pictures?’

‘ Sorry. There are no pictures of me because I was so ugly& and the second child. If you want to see my brother, however, we have about a million photos of him.’  Then I patted the back of my head to remind her of the neglect I’ d suffered.

‘ Don’ t you listen to her, Deedee,’  my mom said. ‘ She may have had an& awkward phase for a while there, but that’ s exactly my point. By the time she reached high school, she’ d blossomed. Truly, it’ s the best time of your life. I can’ t wait for you to get out there and experience it all. With your brains and beauty, I’ ll bet you have big things ahead of you.’

Ah. So that’ s what she was doing. I’ d been baffled at first, until I realized that this was Doris Parker’ s one-woman public service announcement to try to convince Deedee to give the baby up for adoption. Not so subtle, but an A for effort.

Deedee responded by putting her attention to sawing at her steak, to the point where my dad said, obviously annoyed, ‘ Hey now, you ought to be able to cut that with a fork.’

Dessert was rhubarb pie and ice cream served on the back patio to the sounds of the bug zapper killing flies and my father’ s complaints that the Bloomingdales next door recently landscaped with low-water plants-cactus and rock gardens-instead of grass. ‘ Can you believe it? What do they think this is, Death Valley? They ever hear of a water hose? Next thing you know, they’ re going to be installing one of those solar panels.’

‘ Your parents are a riot,’  Deedee said as I showed her to my brother’ s old room, where she’ d be sleeping. It was only nine o’ clock, but since the alarm would go off at three a.m. we were both eager for an early turn-in.

‘ They sure liked you,’  I said. ‘ I wouldn’ t be surprised if they’ re downstairs right now adding you to the will.’  Then I left to shower, not daring to leave it for the morning in case I overslept. It was quarter to ten by the time I’ d blown-dry my hair, and I’ d already done the finger-counting thing and realized the most sleep I could hope for was five hours. Ugh-how did Troy Jones do this every night? Before going to bed, I noticed a light on in Deedee’ s room. I gave a knock and went in. She was under the covers, still in her big shirt, reading one of my brother’ s old comic books. ‘ I can’ t fall asleep this early,’  she said.

‘ I can. I have a remarkable gift for slumber. It’ s waking up on time that I’ m worried about.’

‘ Me too. I set the alarm.’

‘ Good-between the both of us, one should manage to roll out of bed.’  I sat on the edge of her bed. ‘ You need a lullaby?’  I started to sing, ‘ Gitchy gitchy ya ya da da& ‘

She set down the comic. ‘ You told your mom that I’ m pregnant.’  I attempted to put on an innocent face, but she said, ‘ I’ m not stupid.’

‘ Sorry. She’ s my mom. I couldn’ t not tell her.’

‘ At least she was nice about it. My mom screams at me all the time. I’ ll bet yours never yells at you.’

‘ In defense of your mom, I’ m a bit old for that.’

‘ But when you were a kid, I’ ll bet your parents didn’ t yell.’

I thought about it. ‘ Probably not much. We Parkers aren’ t big yellers, but that doesn’ t mean they didn’ t come down on me if I deserved it.’

She snorted. ‘ Yeah, right. What’ d you ever do wrong?’

‘ Plenty.’

‘ Forget it. You’ re too goody-goody. I bet you never did anything bad your whole life.’

‘ Sure I have!’

‘ Like what? What’ s the worst thing you ever did?’

Maybe it was the taco soup or the thought that I’ d be seeing Troy Jones in mere hours, but Marissa was on my mind, and before I even thought about it, I said, ‘ I killed someone.’

‘ I mean serious.’

I’ d regretted it as soon as I said it, so I tried instead to come up with some other crime I’ d committed to appease her. Unfortunately, sneaking into the spiked punch and puking at Kathy Berz’ s graduation party was the best I could do, and it seemed downright charming compared with killing someone. I sputtered and stammered until Deedee said, ‘ Shit, you did kill somebody!’

‘ Nah, I was-’

‘ Bullcrap-don’ t take it back now. You did.’

I sighed. ‘ You’ re right, I did. It was an accident.’  I turned my attention to picking a loose thread from the comforter. ‘ Only it was my fault, so I don’ t know if ‘ accident’  is the right word.’  I told her about giving Marissa a ride and the car crash. At Deedee’ s urging, I went into the details: from the dresser toppling off the truck, to how I’ d veered, to my first ride in an ambulance. Of course, I didn’ t mention that Marissa was Troy’ s sister or anything about the list. The last thing I wanted was for Deedee to suspect she was part of it.

‘ So how did she die?’  Deedee asked when I’ d finished. I gave her a blank stare, and she said, ‘ I know it was a car crash, and the dresser falling, but what exactly killed her?’  She said it without a shred of pity or empathy. She wasn’ t being ghoulish, either. It was simply information she wanted that I hadn’ t adequately provided.

‘ She wasn’ t wearing a seat belt, so when the car rolled, she got tossed.’

‘ Like through the window?’

And here was the strange thing: I felt as if I could finally say it. The details of that night that I’ d kept from Susan, my boyfriend Robert, my parents& everyone. It had always been my fear of their kindness. That their sympathy would have been more than I could bear. All I’ d admitted to them was that Marissa died when the car rolled-as far as they knew, that was it. ‘ The windshield,’  I told Deedee matter-of-factly. ‘ She crashed through the windshield.’

‘ She got cut to death?’

‘ No. As I understand it, she died because my car& ‘  I took a breath before continuing, ‘ It landed on her.’

‘ On what part of her?’

‘ I don’ t know-all of her, I suppose.’

‘ Gross. What’ d you do?’

‘ Nothing,’  I answered, yanking the last of the stray thread from the comforter. ‘ I did nothing.’

Granted, I’ d been pinned by the air bag with a banged head and no clue about where Marissa was. But really, all I’ d done was hang there. Twiddling my thumbs. Singing la-de-da. Waiting to be rescued while the entire time I crushed Marissa Jones to death. The worst part: At no point did the police or hospital staff comfort me with ‘ She died quickly.’  They always say that, and in its absence, I was left to assume that the opposite must be true.

I stood to leave. ‘ Well, it’ s late, I’ m going to sleep,’  I said as I clicked off the light, and out of habit I repeated what my mom said to me every night even when I’ d been too old for her to tuck me in. ‘ Sweet dreams.’

THE ALARM SOUNDED, and I smacked it off. Ugh. I felt nauseated from sleepiness. Three a.m. Why didn’ t I pull an all-nighter? At least I’ d already be up instead of having to wake up.

After dragging myself out of bed, I dressed in the jeans and long-sleeved T-shirt that I’ d left out. I yanked my hair into a ponytail, then went to check on Deedee, who sat on the edge of her bed looking as if she’ d been pulled from the dustbin and set there. ‘ It’ s the middle of the friggin’  night,’  she groaned. She wore the same clothes she’ d slept in and-after throwing on her tennis shoes-pronounced herself ready. Then she crawled under the covers and told me to wake her up again when it was time to go.

Pride forced me to make at least a cursory attempt at makeup. My eyes were slits, so I tried as best I could with mascara and eye shadow. Later, when the puffiness receded, I’ d get to see if my aim was on the mark or if I wound up resembling Bette Davis in All About Eve. Whatever. If Troy was hoping for foxy ride-along companions, he needed to switch to the afternoon drive-time shift.

The Van Nuys Airport was small and catered to commuter planes and helicopters. Deedee and I made it there a few minutes early and easily found Troy’ s hangar. He was there already, dressed in jeans and a hooded sweatshirt, drinking coffee and looking over some papers. Outside the hangar we passed a bright yellow helicopter with ‘ K-JAM-Getting L.A. Jammin’ ‘  emblazoned on its side.