The Backup Girlfriend (Grove Valley High Book 2)

by Emma Doherty

  “Someone’s eager,” Sasha says, smiling over at me.

  I really couldn’t care less.

  “Um…well…”

  Sophie winks. “Let Dan Summers take your mind off some of your stresses for a couple of hours.”

  I glare at her, for some reason not liking that she’s saying this in front of Brett and his friends, which is just confusing, because why the hell would I care if Brett thinks I’m sleeping with this guy or not?

  “I guess I’m out,” I say, throwing my phone into my bag and leaving some cash on the table for my share of the bill and tip. Brett scoots over to let me out and I wave to them all, making my way to the entrance, and I hear a burst of laughter behind me just as I’m about to reach the door.

  I look back at them and see that Jessie has spilled his soda down himself and is wiping at it while Sophie says something that makes them all laugh again. Yeah, no doubt about it, I’d rather be over there with all of them, and watching them laugh and joke about something just makes me feel like I’m missing out.

  What makes me feel weirder still is that the second I’m out of the booth and making my way to Dan’s car, I miss the warmth of Brett’s body next to mine.

  19

  “So, I’m sorry.”

  I look up from digging in my locker to see Sarah standing next to my locker.

  “Excuse me?”

  “I’m sorry, okay?” she says again, looking like she’d rather be anywhere but here right now and as uncomfortable as I’ve ever seen her. “I was a total bitch about you that night at the party, I shouldn’t have told everyone about your grades, and I deserved you calling me out and hooking up with Dan Summers.” She sighs. “You know that made me crazy jealous. You won.”

  Dan Summers, the guy she has a crush on and the guy who, while I was hanging out with him last night, I realized I have absolutely no interest in. When he tried to get me to disappear up to his room with him, it clicked that I had no desire whatsoever to sleep with him, and I promptly left, telling him I wasn’t looking to date at the moment and he shouldn’t bother texting me again.

  “I’m not dating Dan, not anymore. It was just…” I shrug, trying to find the words for it. “It was nothing. I’m sorry if I hurt you.”

  She looks completely baffled at my apology.

  “Seriously, it’s done. I can give you his number if you still want it, but honestly, he’s not all that great, and I think you’re better than him.”

  “Who cares what he acts like when he looks like that?”

  Yup, my words of wisdom are completely wasted on her.

  “Anyway, I’m not here to talk about Dan Summers. I’m sorry for what I did to you.”

  I look at her, this girl who was glued to my side for so long.

  “Everyone’s frozen me out,” she says accusingly, like I had something to do with it—and perhaps I did. It’s definitely something I’ve done in the past, but now the thought of it just makes me tired.

  “I didn’t tell anyone to do anything.”

  She scoffs. “You didn’t have to. You’re still Abigail Baker, even without Chase by your side. I guess I got that wrong.”

  How did we get here?

  How did what I thought was friendship lead to this? Have we really just taken shots at each other and struck passive-aggressive blows so much that we can’t even see it’s not normal?

  She sighs. “Are we good? Can we go back to normal?”

  Normal? If I think back to what our normal used to be, I’m not sure it ever made me happy.

  “We’re fine,” I tell her, and we are. I don’t hold any animosity toward her, not really. If I’m totally honest with myself then I’m not surprised by how she behaved; it’s probably not too dissimilar to how I would have behaved not that long ago.

  “Okay, great. What are you doing now? Want to hit the mall?”

  Out of the corner of my eye, I see Brett cut across the hallway, and it reminds me of what he said to me last week.

  You get to decide who you are, no one else.

  He’s right.

  I get to decide who I am and who I surround myself with.

  “What are we doing?”

  “Huh?”

  “Us? Our friendship?”

  She looks at me skeptically. “What are you talking about?”

  “We’re not nice to each other, Sarah.”

  “I just apologized!”

  “I’m not talking about that.”

  She just stares at me blankly, seemingly not having a clue what I’m talking about.

  “We take digs at each other and don’t support each other.”

  She still doesn’t say anything.

  “We were best friends. We should be each other’s biggest allies, biggest supporters, and we’re not.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean, look at Livy and Sophie—they’re what best friends are supposed to be like. They would kill for each other.”

  She rolls her eyes. “Not everything is about Livy Chapman, Abigail.”

  She’s just proving my point. She’s not even listening to what I’m saying.

  “We bring out the worst in each other, and I don’t want to be the worst version of myself anymore. I don’t like it.”

  “Look, you’re just having a shitty couple of months, but we’re Abigail and Sarah. We’ve ruled this school for the last couple of years.”

  “So?” And I genuinely mean it. What does that actually mean, and who actually cares? “It’s not because people love us. The people who don’t know us don’t want to be around us like they do Chase or Sophie. They’re scared of us. It’s like they think we’re just going to be bitchy and mean.”

  She doesn’t have anything to say to that because it’s the truth.

  “I don’t want to be bitchy and mean anymore.” I pause. “And I don’t want to be around people who bring out that side of me. I need to be around people who tell me to shut the hell up when I’m being that person.”

  She blinks at me.

  “So you don’t want to be friends anymore?”

  In a word, no.

  “I don’t think we can be. Look, I don’t want us to be enemies or anything and I’m not going to say you can’t be anywhere that I am…that’s not it at all. But be honest with yourself—when you go off to college in the fall, do you honestly see yourself staying in touch with me? Do you really think you’ll care to?”

  The look on her face tells me I’m right. I know we wouldn’t keep in touch.

  I close my locker and smile at her. I don’t hate her or anything, not at all, but I’m indifferent to her now in a way I never thought I’d be only a year ago, or even a few months. Her behavior showed me that, and I think I’m a nicer person without her. If I want to be a better person, I need to surround myself with other people. “I’ll see you around.”

  She doesn’t say anything as I walk past her, and I blink back a couple of tears, feeling all the emotions but knowing this is the right thing to do. We definitely had some fun times, but they were far outweighed by our bitchiness and our fighting.

  It’s good that I’m walking away.

  As I walk down the hallway, Brett appears from a classroom, waving at me as I fall into step with him. “We’re still meeting after school tomorrow, right? Because I can’t do the morning?”

  I nod. “That’s fine.”

  He seems to notice my expression for the first time, and he comes to a stop beside me. “What’s wrong?”

  I shrug. “Sarah and I just broke up.”

  “Sarah Billington? Your best friend?”

  “Former best friend.”

  “Girls are weird.”

  I don’t have much to say to that as he looks at me for another couple of seconds. Then he pulls his backpack off his back and starts rummaging around in it before pulling out a candy bar and holding it out to me.

  “What’s that for?”

  He shrugs. “Candy makes everyone feel better.”

 
A quick grin spreads across my face. I reach for it but then stop myself, remembering those couple of extra pounds I’ve put on.

  “Thanks, but I can’t. I’m on a diet.”

  He scoffs, reaches for my hand, and shoves the candy bar in it. “Eat the damn candy bar, Abigail.”

  “But—”

  “Don’t give me the diet bullshit. You couldn’t look bad if you tried.”

  And then he brushes past me, leaving me staring after him in his wake, all thoughts of Sarah completely gone.

  Did Brett Sanderson, the guy who has to be the least impressed by me ever, just give me a compliment?

  Wow. Wonders never cease.

  20

  I’m in the library after school playing on my phone and waiting for Brett to show up. I’m tired and cranky from a full day of classes and have just had to sit through ten minutes of Coach lecturing me about how it’s my own fault I’m in this position in the first place, even if she did reluctantly congratulate me on the success of my bake sale, which sold even more this past week. Even so, strangely, I’m actually looking forward to seeing Brett.

  Now that I know him a little more, I’ve realized he doesn’t look down on me at all. He’s patient, but not a pushover. He pushes me with my studies more than anyone else has, but every time he does, I surprise myself by wanting to push and help myself too. It’s a pretty nice feeling.

  And I kinda like the way he looks at life too. Like that stuff about doing what you want and not caring about other people judging you? That really resonated with me. I want to start working on living my life like that.

  “Hey.” I look up and see him standing over me.

  “Hey.” I slide my books over so there’s more space for his, but he doesn’t make a move to sit down.

  “I’m sorry, work called and asked me to cover this afternoon. I can’t do this today.”

  “Oh.” That’s disappointing. This is the only day this week that we’ve scheduled in the afternoon and not in the morning. “Okay.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “That’s okay. I can just work from home. Are we still on for tomorrow morning?”

  “Oh, you’re not going—I got someone to cover for me.”

  “Huh?”

  “I really need you to be practicing those calculus equations, and if you do them by yourself, there’ll be no one there to check them and make sure you’re actually doing them.”

  “What?” He’s gotten someone else to babysit me while I study?

  “I got someone else,” he repeats impatiently. “She should be here any minute.”

  “Who?”

  A smile breaks out on his face as he looks across the room. “Hey, thanks for this.”

  I turn to see who he’s looking at, and my stomach sinks when I spot the person making her way over to us.

  Hallie.

  Hallie Jenson. Captain of the girls soccer team, Livy’s good friend, and the girl I called out as a lesbian in front of a bunch of people months ago because I was so messed up about myself and my life and losing Chase that I lashed out at someone who didn’t deserve it just to try to make myself feel better.

  The shame still burns in my gut.

  “Thanks for this,” Brett says as she gets closer, completely oblivious to my discomfort. “We were working on page 210 in her textbook, and you just need to make sure she’s following all the steps so she gets to the right answer. She has a tendency to skip ahead.”

  Hallie nods, and Brett disappears with a wave of his hand.

  I wish I could just sink into the ground.

  Hallie clears her throat. “Hi Abigail.”

  “Hi Hallie.”

  She pulls out the chair next to me and slides into it as I sink farther down into mine.

  She reaches for her own textbook and opens it, presumably to the page Brett mentioned, before pulling out her own notebook and pen. “Should we get started?”

  “You don’t have to do this,” I tell her miserably, not even looking at her. I’ve avoided Hallie like the plague the last couple of months. Not that I would see her much anyway—we’re not friends—but if ever I see her in the hallway, I turn the other way and try to avoid her. She doesn’t need to see me and have to deal with me. I still can’t believe I called her out like that just to try to make her feel small, like that would make me feel big. I apologized and she accepted it, but I don’t blame her for hating me now. I’d hate me too. “Brett probably didn’t even tell you it was me he wanted you to help.” I know that’s the truth because there’s no way she could actually want to help me.

  “He did,” she said quietly.

  Well then she must be here to gloat about the fact that I’m about to flunk out of high school, because why would she want to help someone who made public something so private and that she was obviously struggling to come to terms with.

  I can still remember the look on her face when I said she followed Sophie around…the horror, the embarrassment, the mortification.

  I honestly hate myself for it.

  I close my textbook and sit up. “I’m gonna go. We can just tell Brett something came up.”

  She reaches out a hand to my forearm, stopping me from moving. She drops it quickly, like I’m on fire, before taking a deep breath. “Abigail, it’s fine. I want to help you.”

  I shake my head. “You really don’t have to.”

  “I know, but…”

  My eyes find hers as she struggles to finish her sentence.

  “…after you said what you said…”

  “I’m really sorry, Hallie. I was so out of line.”

  “You were, but you already said sorry, and I accepted it. You don’t have to keep feeling bad.”

  “I was such a bitch.”

  She looks down. “Looking back on it now, I can see you were going through a rough time.” She hesitates. “I spoke to Livy and I’ve been watching you lately, and I know you’re not that person, at least not anymore.”

  She finally looks up at me.

  “I can see you’re really trying, Abigail. You’re way nicer to people than you used to be.” My heart skips slightly at that. I am trying to be nicer to people, trying to distance myself from who I used to be, and the fact that she’s noticed means a lot. “And I think all this money you’re raising for charity is awesome.”

  “You do?”

  “Yeah, and honestly I think you’re the only girl in school who has enough sway to be able to do it. No one else would be able to get everyone so buzzed about expensive brownies that sell out immediately or be able to get everyone to show up at Chase’s party and hand over so much money for charity.” Well, that was more Chase than me, but we did end up raising a fortune that night between the money at the door, the auction sales, the extra contributions that kept getting passed around, and mine and Chase’s Venmo accounts, which he kept telling people to transfer money to. “Seriously, I think it’s great that you’re using your power for good.”

  Using my power for good.

  I never thought about it like that before.

  “And I think not graduating is too big a punishment for something you said to me months ago, when you were obviously struggling, which you’ve already apologized for.”

  “I really am sorry.”

  “I know, and I know you try to avoid me now.” A smile crosses her face. “I see you trying to avoid me and give me space or whatever, and honestly it just makes things more awkward.”

  I can’t help but smile at that. Subtlety was never my strong suit.

  “And…” She clears her throat. “You saying that made me face up to a few things. I told my mom, and it wasn’t the worst thing in the world. She was kinda surprised…” I raise an eyebrow, and Hallie barks out a laugh. “I know, right? But she told me she still loves me and we’ll tell my dad together when I’m ready.”

  I stare back at her, this girl who is too nice and too kind to even be giving me her time. “I’m really glad things worked out for you.”

&nb
sp; She grins. “So am I.”

  “I’m being serious, though—I don’t expect you to tutor me just because Brett is busy. I’m sure you’ve got a million other things you would rather be doing.”

  “I want to help, Abigail.”

  “I know I was a really shitty person to you, Hallie.”

  She smiles at me, reaching for my textbook and flipping it open. “You’re not that person anymore. Anyone can see that.”

  As she starts reading over the equations in front of her, muttering something to herself as she pulls out her calculator, I feel a weight lift from me that I didn’t even know was there.

  Hallie’s right. I’m not the same person I was.

  And that’s probably the nicest thing she could ever say to me.

  21

  The senior pep rally is actually the most fun I think I’ve ever had at a pep rally—which I get isn’t really saying much, but for one whole hour, I manage to put all the stress of my grades and graduating out of my mind, and I actually enjoy the moment and appreciate everything that’s happened over the last four years.

  The pep rally is supposed to be the beginning of the end for us seniors. It’s the start of the goodbye events the school puts on, culminating in prom and graduation, and I try not to think about the fact that this pep rally means my tests are only three weeks away and instead try to just enjoy today for what it is.

  To celebrate all the sports teams and everything they’ve achieved during our time at Grove Valley High.

  Our principal and the various coaches are leading the pep rally, introducing the teams and spelling out their achievements. Nobody gets a bigger cheer than when Chase comes out, the all-conquering soccer player, although Livy comes pretty close when Hallie takes the microphone and gives Livy props for scoring the winning goal in the final that won the girls soccer team our first ever state championship.