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Asking Bristal to be nice to MacKenzie is one thing, but asking MacKenzie to be nice to Bristal is another.
“I just need you to keep it civil,” I tell her as I strap on my seat belt. “I’m not asking you to be her best friend.”
“Well, I think that position is taken already,” Kenzie snorts as she backs out of my driveway.
I ignore the jab and chalk it up to jealousy. Between the podcast, avoiding flying bricks in my living room, and trying to keep my GPA above a 4.0, I haven’t had a lot of time to do things with MacKenzie. I’ve known her my whole life, so I’m prepared for the passive-aggressive fog that’s going to settle over this entire day.
I just don’t know how Bristal is going to take it.
“You know what he’s in for, right?” MacKenzie asks, eyes fixed on the road, a small muscle at the edge of her jaw jumping in anger. I glance up from my phone and a text from Bristal letting us know to pick her up at the library.
“Who’s in for what?” I ask. “And you’ll need to turn around. Bristal said to meet her at the library.”
MacKenzie heaves a huge sigh and does an illegal U-turn at the end of Lincoln. “Probably she doesn’t want me to see which trailer she actually lives in, so I can’t tell Mom next time she has to issue a summons. And you know damn well what I meant—Dover Jamison is in prison for beating the shit out of his ex-girlfriend.”
“Ah . . . ,” I say, letting my phone slide back into my lap. It’s another weight on Dover Jamison’s scale of judgment in my mind—and it’s not currently tilted in a positive direction.
Bristal is leaning against her car, vape pen in hand, casually blowing smoke into a gathering cloud above her head when we pull in next to her.
I roll down my window. “Hey.”
“Hey,” she says, giving me an up-nod and leaning over to glance at MacKenzie, who stares pointedly forward. Bristal gives me a small smirk and then climbs into the back seat.
“You can’t smoke in here,” Kenzie says automatically, glancing up into her rearview mirror. “My mom would kill me.”
“Incorrect,” Bristal says. “I don’t think your mom would kill anybody. But I bet you are high on the list, if she has one.”
“Do you have any questions for Dover?” I ask loudly, hoping to change the subject as we leave Henley behind. It’s a forty-five-minute drive to the prison, but it’s going to feel a heck of a lot longer than that if these two are going at each other the whole time.
“Not really,” Bristal says. “Hey, can we swing by the gas station? I need to steal a few things.”
MacKenzie doesn’t bother replying, just turns on her signal and pulls onto the highway, grinding her teeth.
I turn in my seat and give Bristal a glare. “Be nice,” I hiss.
“Yeah, Jo-Jo said I’m supposed to be working on that,” she says. “Hey, Mac-Mac, do you have child locks on?”
“Yes,” MacKenzie says. “And how did you figure that out? Did you—did you seriously try to open your door on the highway?”
“I wouldn’t call it opening the door. More like performing an experiment.”
“With physics? And your body? As we go down the highway at eighty miles per hour?”
“If you’re going eighty, then we’re speeding,” Bristal says calmly.
“OH MY GOD,” I scream, and turn up the music very loud. I can’t stop this war; but I’m done participating in it. As we fly past another semi I glance at the speedometer to see that MacKenzie isn’t going eighty; she’s going eighty-five. But I’m not about to point it out.
The sooner this car ride is over, the better.
When we pull into the prison parking lot, MacKenzie takes one look at the armed guard patrolling the door marked VISITORS and says she’s decided to stay in the car.
“It’s too cold,” I tell her. “And besides, you don’t have to come all the way back with us. We have to go through security and everything. You can just wait outside of that. It’s not that different from the airport.”
“Except for the high percentage of murderers in the population,” Bristal adds.
“I’ll keep the car on and run the heat,” MacKenzie says. “I’d rather stay out here.”
“Whatever makes you comfortable,” I tell her. “And seriously, thanks for driving us.”
