by Cameron Lund
“Fine,” Olivia says.
“I guess,” Jordan says.
“Wonderful.” Romina smiles. She backs the boat away from the dock, and we’re off.
Myriah crawls over to us then, trying to keep herself steady as the boat moves. I watch as she brushes past Romina, almost crashing into her and then jumping out of the way.
“Hi,” Myriah says, sitting down next to Kai and me. She’s wearing a giant floppy sun hat and pulling off a burgundy one-piece bathing suit like she’s made for it. The look is very distinctly un-Myriah. “I’m so glad you’re both here.” She lowers her voice. “It’s been so awkward.”
“What’s been awkward?” Kai asks. “I mean, besides the fact that Penelope and I are desperately in love.”
I shove him with my elbow. “Not now.”
“I can’t just turn off my love for you,” Kai says. “It’s an eternal flame.”
“Okay, yes, so is mine, but Myriah and I need to talk.”
“She won’t even look at me,” Myriah says. “And I’m wearing her favorite color. I even did my nails!” She holds her hand up to show off black nail polish that looks completely out of place with the sparkly daisy ring on her hand.
“Oh,” Kai says. And then: “Ohhhhh.”
“You should just be yourself,” I say. “You don’t have to fake who you are for Romina.”
“How did you two know you were meant for each other?” She asks, her eyes wide and hopeful. I’m distinctly aware of the fact that Olivia and Jordan are across from us, very likely within hearing distance. I chance a look at them, and both their heads snap away right when I do.
“Um,” I say, unsure how to answer. Kai and I never prepared for a question like this. And it’s not like our origin story is very romantic, even if this were real—we drunkenly made out at a party. Not really something to celebrate.
“It’s all about chemistry,” Kai says.
“Believe me, I never expected this to happen,” I say truthfully. “I mean, Kai is the most annoying guy I’ve ever met.”
“Annoyingly attractive, you mean,” Kai says.
“Yup, but somehow through all that annoyance, I . . .” I trail off, trying to think of a way to explain it that feels real, that doesn’t hurt Olivia even more. “Friends are supposed to be the most important thing. I betrayed my best friend for a guy and I’ll never forgive myself.” I glance at Olivia and see her back has gone rigid and she’s staring down at the floor. “But Kai and I . . . we just get each other. We’re more similar than we realized.” The truth of the words surprises me.
“I’ve been wanting you to get together for years,” Myriah says. “You’re my OTP.” Then her cheeks go pink. “I mean, but not like this, of course.” It makes me feel a little guilty. Myriah is too pure for this world, and on top of every other horrible thing I’ve done, I hate that I’m still lying to her.
We spend the next few hours cruising around the lake, exploring little coves and circling tiny islands. I’ve lived by this lake my whole life, but I’ve never seen it from this angle. My family doesn’t own a boat, obviously. The only other time I’ve been out here was on a school fishing trip in third grade where I ended up crying anytime someone caught a fish. Not my best moment.
But this actually isn’t so bad. The breeze feels nice in my hair, the sun is warm on my skin, and if I close my eyes I can almost forget for a second that my ex-boyfriend and my best friend are cuddled up together across from me.
“We should take a picture,” I say to Kai. “We don’t have any yet.” If we want this thing to seem natural, we should be doing all the same cutesy stuff I did with Jordan. And right now, on this boat in our stupid matching outfits . . . well, if I actually liked a boy, I would want to post this. He leans toward me and I hold up my phone and snap, then upload it, trying to think of a silly caption, something that will tell the world how okay I’m doing, how fine I am with all of this.
Is there anything better than a hot boy on a boat? Loving this summer already. I add Romina’s joke hashtags: #somelakeithot #noparents. There. Appropriately happy. I am a fun girl with a fun life. If I can believe it, then maybe everyone else will too.
Romina drives around the back of one of the little islands and then parks in a cove so we can swim. “You guys all need life preservers,” she says, throwing foamy orange monsters at all of us. “I’m serious!”
“I’m not putting this on,” Olivia says. I don’t blame her. If I had Olivia’s boobs, I would never want to cover them.
I take a life preserver from Romina and hesitantly slip it over my chest. I feel stupid immediately—it’s probably the least flattering thing a person could ever put on their body—but I don’t want to rock the boat, no pun intended.
Next to me, Kai straps his own life vest on too, and then turns to me with a big smile. “You look adorable.”
“Shut up,” I say, shoving him angrily with my shoulder, forgetting for a second how in love we are.
“I mean it!” He reaches out and gently tugs on one of the straps, tightening it for me, then brings his hand up to my face, tucking a strand of hair behind my ear. “There. All set.”
I know he’s just playing this up for everyone else on the boat, but at the feel of his palm against my cheek, I suck in a short breath and my face flushes with heat. I don’t know why I’m having such a stupid reaction. It’s probably just because it feels nice to be complimented like this. Even if I know deep down it’s all bullshit.
“Thank you,” I say, smiling.
“Now you really do look like a pumpkin.” He grins. “But you’re my pumpkin.”
“I won’t be your anything for long if you keep calling me a pumpkin,” I say, and then press my lips together, because this is so not how I’m supposed to be acting. You’re in love. I repeat the words inside my head, a mantra, so that I won’t forget them. “I mean—you’re so hilarious and you look so cute. Um, good job being you.” I smile at him, trying to pretend that whatever words came out of my mouth made any reasonable sense. It’s just that saying nice things to the worst person on earth isn’t the easiest.
I glance over to where Olivia and Jordan are sitting and am disheartened to see they’re not even looking at us. Olivia is buckling up Jordan’s life vest, standing above him and leaning down for a kiss. It makes me feel like I’m going to cry.
“Wow, thank you for that detailed and beautiful compliment,” Kai says, laughing. “Love you too.”
He must see some look on my face because he stops laughing, his smile fading. I try to smile back at him, but it doesn’t work. “Hey,” Kai says softly. He glances over at them and then back at me. “Hey, let’s just go in the water, okay? Let’s go for a swim.”
I shake my head. “I can’t.”
All around us, people are getting up, laughing and shrieking and jumping off the side of the boat. I watch as Jordan and Olivia stand up and jump into the water together, holding hands as they fall. We’re alone on the boat now, everyone splashing and playing in the water around us. All I want is to be back at the cabin, curled up in that creepy children’s bunk bed with all the cobwebs, as far away from all this as possible. I don’t know why I thought any of this was a good idea.
“You can,” he says. “Let’s get in the water.”
But he doesn’t understand. My pin curls and red lipstick can’t get wet. Kai doesn’t get the hours that went into my hair, my makeup, how afraid I am to wash everything all off, to let anyone see the real me underneath.
“Just go without me,” I say.
“No way,” he says. “If you stay on the boat, I stay on the boat.”
“You don’t have to.” I feel bad that I’m taking away from his fun, which doesn’t make any sense considering I’ve pretty much wanted Kai to suffer for my whole life.
“Nah, the jump is kinda high up anyway.”
“O
kay,” I say. “Thanks.” Somehow I don’t really believe him. I know I’m holding him back. But I’m weirdly pleased he’s staying with me, even though it’s probably just to keep up appearances. He’s trying to be a good boyfriend after all.
“But one of these days, I’m still taking you skinny-dipping,” he says, laughing. And just as fast as they arrived, all of my positive feelings toward him are washed away.
THEN
JUNIOR YEAR—OCTOBER
JORDAN SENDS ME a picture right after the Halloween dance. It’s of his face, and he’s drawn purple horns on his head, green fangs with blood over his ridiculously perfect smile. Monster Smash? it says, and then there’s a winky face.
Nothing in my seventeen years on earth has prepared me for this text. I’m in the back seat of Romina’s car, pressed up against Olivia. Olivia is the only person I know who actually likes to sit in the bitch seat because she says it means she’s in the center of all the conversations and won’t miss out on anything. Katie is on her other side and Myriah is up front (Myriah is always up front when Romina drives), but when my phone buzzes in my pocket and I see the message from Jordan, suddenly I’m not in the car at all. Everything disappears around me, fades to black, and all I can focus on is the way my heart feels like it’s stuck in my throat. This isn’t a simple message. This took time. Jordan thought of me long enough to draw me a picture, to send me a stupid joke—a kinda sexual joke—which means he thought about me and sex in the same brain wave, at least for a second.
But then I realize with a sinking feeling that he probably sent this to all of us. It’s likely not meant for me at all. I nudge Olivia, who is laughing, leaning forward talking to Romina about something.
“Did Jordan just send you a pic?”
“What?” she asks. “Probably.” She pulls her phone out and lights up the screen and I wait, holding my breath, like somehow this is the most important thing. There’s nothing there. “Why, did he text you?” Olivia asks, stuffing her phone back into her purse. I show her the picture. Katie leans forward. “Oh my god, that is so flirty!”
“Who, something from Matt?” Myriah turns around.
“No, Jordan just, like . . . propositioned Penny!”
“It’s for sure a joke,” I say, flushing.
“Is it a joke?” Romina asks. “Or does Jordan want to make sweet, sweet monster love to you?”
“Jordan loooooves you,” Myriah says, spinning around in her seat to face me and fluttering her eyelashes. “Will you let me plan your wedding?”
“Like Jordan would ever get married,” Olivia says with a sharp laugh. “He’s never with the same girl long enough.”
“Accurate,” Myriah says. “And Penny is gonna marry Kai, anyway.”
“It’s stupid,” I say, even though it definitely isn’t. It’s just that I don’t want to let myself get too excited. “I thought maybe he sent it to all of us.”
“Nope, that one is all you, girl,” Myriah says.
“We saw you guys dancing together.” Katie has a habit of talking with her hands when she gets excited, and right now they are fluttering like crazy in Olivia’s face. Olivia swats them away.
“The whole school saw,” Romina says. She turns down the music like this is serious business. “Kai told me that Jordan has a thing for you, actually.”
“What?” Why would Kai be talking about me with Romina?
“Yeah,” she says, “just now as we were leaving. I was outside smoking and Kai came and found me—you know how he always calls me out on it, but whatever. He was getting on me about the cigarette, and then we were talking about the dance, and I don’t know, he said something like, ‘Jordan is having a good night.’ He said it’s clear Jordan is into you.”
“Sounds like Kai was just guessing about that,” Olivia says. “Like he thinks Jordan might be into you. Not that Jordan has told him anything.”
“I don’t know, dude,” Romina says. “Sounded pretty factual to me.”
I’m the closest stop on our way home, and when the car pulls up to my house, I say my goodbyes and then run inside and up to my room. I can’t wait to be alone. I want to text Jordan back, but I don’t want four other voices in my ear while I do it.
What even is the monster mash anyway? I hold my breath until he texts back almost a minute later.
Well, when a mommy and daddy monster love each other very much . . .
I send him the laughing/crying emoji. And then: A graveyard smash. I mean, it’s totally a song about creepy sex, right?
I canNOT believe I just texted the word sex to Jordan. But he started it. That means he wants this; he’s enjoying this flirting as much as I am.
Graveyards not your thing, Harris?
Definitely not my thing.
Then what is your thing? he asks.
You, I want to say. Jordan is my thing, has always been my thing, has always taken up about 75 percent of the space in my brain. But instead, I type out something much better, something that will make him work for it: Guess you’ll just have to find out.
NOW
WE HEAD BACK TO THE HOUSE once everyone gets cold, all wet and shivering and bundled up in towels. The sun is starting to set, painting the lake in pinks and golds. It’s just the kind of summer moment I know I should remember when I’m old—all of us young and beautiful and tired out from the sun, the warm twilight breeze in our hair.
But I feel like shit.
Kai stayed true to his word and sat next to me on the boat all afternoon, but honestly it only made me feel worse. I don’t know what’s wrong with me. How is it so easy for everyone else?
Sometimes I feel like everybody around me is living their life without really trying, like they all just naturally know the right things to do or say. I have to think about every move I make and analyze the consequences.
Jordan and Olivia were wrapped up in each other on our way back to the shore—literally wrapped together under one big beach towel—and they barely looked my way at all. Clearly, whatever Kai and I are doing isn’t working. We have to step up our game, be more convincing, do something to shuffle the pieces on the board.
I pull him around the cabin when we get back, out of the way in the trees so no one can see us. “This isn’t working.”
“We don’t know that yet,” he says, shrugging. “It’s still early days.”
“They barely even looked at us the whole afternoon.” There’s a pine needle in my hair and I reach up and try to pull it out, but it doesn’t help. “They were too busy gazing longingly into each other’s eyes.”
Kai is quiet a minute. “Okay, but maybe . . . I mean, sometimes the Not Looking means more than you think.”
“What does that mean?” The pine needle is still stuck in my hair, and I drop my arm, frustrated. Kai reaches out and extricates it for me.
“I just think . . . they’re probably purposefully not looking at us. It’s a good thing. It means they’re bothered.”
“I still think we need to step it up.”
“Yeah, how so?” He smirks, and I want to shake the grin off his stupid face.
“Don’t look at me like that.”
“Like what?”
“Like you think this is funny.”
His grin widens. “My bad, Weenie.”
“Ugh.” I groan and push him away from me. “Everything is always some big game to you, isn’t it? This is my life, Kai. It isn’t a joke.” Except lately, it certainly feels like one.
His smile falters. “You’re right. I’m sorry. Would it help if I told you I use shitty humor as a defense mechanism?”
“That’s not an excuse,” I say. “You can’t just be mean to people and then say it doesn’t count because you were trying to be funny.”
“When am I ever mean?” Kai asks, and I let out a harsh laugh because I actually think
he’s serious. Like he actually doesn’t know how condescending he is. How can he be so blind to his own faults? I’d love to live in a world with such an undeserved high opinion of myself.
“Um, a certain Pukey Penelope comes to mind,” I say.
I can still feel the pain of the humiliation like it’s fresh. I’d had the flu but decided to come to school anyway because it was Valentine’s Day and I’d wanted to be festive. We decorated cardboard boxes in Mrs. Epling’s class with glue sticks and lace doilies, tiny pieces of confetti shaped like hearts. We spent the morning sticking cards into the boxes, and then opened them after lunch. Olivia’s was, unsurprisingly, bursting open; she already had boobs, and everyone had noticed. She and Katie were giggling about something, lollipops in their hands, their lips stained artificial red. Jordan had a lollipop too, and I watched as he and Olivia clinked them together like they were toasting, which meant part of Jordan’s mouth had now touched part of Olivia’s. It sent a burst of jealousy through me and the symptoms from the flu came back hot and fast.
My breath was coming in short spurts as I reached into my box. There was a roiling in my stomach, my vision blurred, and when my hand found nothing, I thought at first it was the flu playing tricks on me. But then I looked inside, and sure enough, it was completely empty.
“No way.” Kai took a step forward. “Penelope didn’t get any Valentines.”
Everyone was looking at me. I locked eyes with Jordan and had to look away, staring down at my feet instead. “How on earth?” Mrs. Epling came over, long skirt billowing. “You were all supposed to give Valentines to everyone in the class. That was the rule. Penelope, are you sure?”
