by Kelly Oram
“What happened? If you weren’t mad at me, why’d things change so much? You said we would still be friends, but we weren’t.”
“It was because of Mindy. She was so threatened by you. When we got together, she asked me about you.” Aiden shot me a grim smile. “Probably didn’t handle that conversation very well, either. I told her I loved you more than anyone else on the planet. She didn’t take that very well, so I tried to explain how it was for us. Hearing about how we grew up only made it worse.”
I focused on the snow crunching under my feet as I listened to Aiden tell his story.
“I was determined to keep both relationships. You were my best friend, and Mindy was my girlfriend. There wasn’t anything wrong with that. I should have been able to have both, but that first day back at school when Mindy and I were officially a couple at school, so many people were so shocked. Everyone we saw asked about you. Mindy couldn’t handle it. She got angry and went off about how people didn’t have relationships like ours. She said our moms were wrong to force us on each other.”
Aiden got really quiet for a minute and then muttered, “She said a lot of stuff. She was captain of the debate team. She had a convincing argument. Plus, she was my first girlfriend. I’d never had anyone like me that way before. I wanted to make her happy.”
“I get it,” I said. I did understand to an extent, but it didn’t explain the malice I sometimes felt. “But why did you seem so angry? Sometimes you’d look at me, and I would swear you hated me. What did I do wrong?”
Aiden’s jaw clenched tight enough that he winced because it hurt his broken nose. That anger was exactly what I was talking about. He said I hadn’t done anything wrong, but something was definitely bothering him.
“That wasn’t you. I was mad at Grayson.”
“Grayson?” The answer startled me. “Why?”
“Because it was so unlike him to take such an interest in you. I thought he was trying to take advantage of you. I was worried he was going to play you like he did every other girl, and…” He hesitated, shoving his hands in his pockets. “And because I was jealous.”
I stopped walking and gawked at him. “Jealous? Why? You weren’t interested in me. You had a girlfriend.”
We’d come to the edge of a small pond. The edges were iced over. We stopped and Aiden kicked a chunk of ice. “Because I’m selfish,” he said. “When you told me that you loved me and wanted to be with me, I hated that I was hurting you, but I was flattered at the same time.”
I felt like I was going to die from embarrassment any moment. I actually expected myself to drop dead right there.
“I’d never thought about us like that before,” Aiden said. “But after you mentioned it, I kept wondering. I knew almost immediately that I’d rather be with you than Mindy. I was going to break up with her right away, but it was too late. Grayson had already stolen you from me. You guys spent all your time together. He made you laugh and held your hand. I could see how much he made you happy, and I hated him for it.”
My heart hurt again. It hurt for both of us. It hurt for Grayson too. He was innocent in all of this.
“Please don’t hate him for that. Grayson has done so much for me. He’s one of my closest friends now.”
Aiden tensed again. “I know.” He shook his head in disgust. “And I drove you to him. I hurt you so bad that you needed him. I’m grateful he was there for you, but Aves, when I saw him kissing you, I almost killed him.”
“Why?”
“Because I wanted it to be me.”
“You what?” I gasped.
“I still want it to be me.”
Aiden took my hand again and wet his lips as he pinned me with an intense gaze. “You asked me to kiss you once, and now I’m asking you, will you give me a second chance?”
I froze. And not because it was cold outside. For a second I convinced myself I was still in bed asleep. I’d wanted Aiden to kiss me for so many years, and now here he was asking to make that dream come true.
There was a part of me that wanted to say no—a piece of my brain, or maybe my heart that didn’t want to kiss anyone but Grayson. But this was Aiden. I had to know. I owed it to myself to see what would happen. In more ways than one, I needed this.
“Okay,” I whispered.
“Okay,” Aiden answered. He took my other hand and stepped closer to me so that the tips of our shoes were touching.
He didn’t kiss me right away. He swallowed and wet his lips again. He was as nervous as I was.
My pulse skyrocketed, and I couldn’t keep any air in my lungs. I think I may have even been trembling a little when he finally leaned in.
He moved slowly, and I kept pretty still because I was scared of bumping his nose and hurting him. His kiss was shy at first as if he were testing the waters, and then his hand came up to my face, and he pulled me closer, urging my lips to part.
I liked kissing Aiden. He was sweet and considerate, and I could feel that when he pulled away, he wasn’t quite ready to let the kiss end. It was a good kiss, but that was it. This kiss was all of the anticipation but none of the excitement that I got when I kissed Grayson. There was no spark. At least not for me.
Aiden looked happy until he saw my forced smile, and then his grin faded. “It’s not going to happen, is it?” It didn’t sound like he needed an answer.
“It was nice,” I said.
“But it wasn’t like kissing Grayson.”
I felt my face go from polite to pained. The whole situation was so surreal. Who knew I’d ever be the one rejecting Aiden?
Aiden shook his head as if to let me know he wasn’t upset. “I had to try, but I think I knew it was coming.” He sighed. “As if I could ever compete with Grayson when he got all the looks and the charm.”
I felt awful and tried to lighten the situation. “But you got all the brains, so he may be the one to rule the country someday, but you’ll own it.”
Aiden forced his mouth to curve up, and he squeezed my hand again.
“I’m sorry,” I said.
“I’ll survive.” My heart sank a little more until he said, “As long as you forgive me and promise to always be my best friend.”
It was that request that broke through the dark clouds in my world and brought me fully into the final stage of grief. If I were in a Disney movie, flowers would have bloomed and the birds would have started chirping.
Whether it was acceptance or hope or both, I knew that Aiden and I still loved each other. Things might be a little different between us now—no one heals without scars—but we were going to be okay. And if we could make it through this, we’d make it through anything.
Maybe now our relationship would be a healthy one. Maybe now we’d be able to have lives separate from one another and still be a part of each other. Maybe all of this needed to happen.
“I can do that,” I said.
“And you’re never allowed to have a birthday party without me ever again.”
I laughed. “Promise.”
Aiden let out a huge sigh of relief and leaned over to grab me up in a big hug. We held on tight, neither of us wanting to be the first to let go.
“Can you really forgive me?” Aiden asked, his voice thick with emotion.
I sniffled, but laughed at the same time. “I really can. I do.”
“I love you, Aves.”
“I love you too, Aiden.”
As we walked back to the car, I thought about how much my life had changed in the last few months. For the first time in what felt like forever, I was excited by the prospect of my future. With Aiden back, it was like I now had the best of both worlds.
“Are you going to be mad if I keep sitting with Grayson at lunch? It’s the only time I ever see him at school.”
Aiden sighed again, but it was playful. “It’s okay. I get it.”
“I’ll rejoin you guys next year after he graduates,” I promised.
Aiden watched me a minute with a frown on his face.
“What now?”
“I will never get used to the idea of you dating my brother. It’s seriously disgusting. If you guys start making out in front of me all the time, I am going to need therapy.”
I think I turned redder than I ever had before, and I felt a weight settle on my chest. “I think it might be too late for that,” I said, unable to hide my disappointment. “I think Grayson’s given up on me—not that I blame him.”
Aiden rolled his eyes and shook his head. “If that were the case, I’d be able to smell right now. Trust me, Aves, he’s still crazy about you. All you have to do is let him know you like him too.”
Grayson
I’m not going to lie, punching Aiden in the face felt really good. I hadn’t meant to break his nose, but I didn’t feel sorry for it either. Not even when I got grounded.
I don’t think my mom actually wanted to ground me—I think she knew Aiden deserved what he got—but it’s not like she could condone violence, so I received a month of house arrest. No friends over and no leaving the house for anything except family- or school-related activities, which, now that basketball was over, pretty much meant science club meetings. Oh freaking joy.
At least when I told Owen about it—I’d come clean to him about having to join science club—he offered to tough it out with me. I was a little shocked, but I wasn’t going to complain.
“What kind of geek stuff do you guys do?” he asked as we wandered into Mr. Walden’s classroom after school.
“Well, usually we work on our experiments for the science fair.”
“Dude. Do you seriously have to go to that?”
“Unfortunately. But it really hasn’t been that bad. Mine and Avery’s experiment mostly consisted of me taking her on dates. For that, I got extra credit and didn’t get kicked off the basketball team. One time I even had to kiss her as part of the experiment.”
“You got extra credit for kissing?”
“Pretty much.”
“You’re shitting me.”
“I believe those were Grayson’s exact words when he learned about the experiment,” Mr. Walden said as he came in the classroom with his standard cup of coffee. “Ones that almost earned him detention.”
I laughed as Owen’s face went pale. “Sorry, Mr. Walden!”
“Don’t let me hear anymore of that language, Mr. Jackson.”
“I won’t.”
Mr. Walden sighed but then smiled at me as he sat down. Actually, Mr. Walden is a pretty cool teacher.
“How is your experiment coming along, Grayson?”
The question made me want to be sick. Avery and I had worked so hard these last few months, and it was all for nothing.
I fell into a chair near Mr. Walden’s desk and frowned at him. “We tried everything we could think of, and Avery’s just not better. We were wrong. She’s, like, broken forever or something, so I guess we failed the experiment.”
Mr. Walden’s face fell. “That’s not your fault,” he said.
He must have seen the guilt in my expression, because he got up from his desk and put a hand on my shoulder.
“It’s nothing that you did, Grayson, and you couldn’t have prevented it. You have been wonderful with Avery. Don’t blame yourself, and don’t blame your experiment.”
“But I gave up on her. I was so frustrated. I didn’t know she was really sick. Her mom made her see a doctor.”
“She’ll be fine. She’s getting the help she needs now.” He gave my shoulder one last squeeze before going back to his desk. “I bet she could really use a friend right now, though. It’s not too late for you to help her get through her depression.”
Mr. Walden was wrong. It was too late for me. I’d called her house Saturday night after her mom came to see me, but she was out with Aiden. Her mother told me he’d dragged her to the museum. I wanted to break his nose all over again. I told the jerk I was in love with her, and he turned around and took her on a freaking date.
It was my own fault. I knew he wanted her, and I was the one that told him how much she was still in love with him. Of course he went to her. I would have done the same thing if I thought I had a chance with her.
“Maybe she will get better,” I said. “But if she does, it’ll be because of therapy and medication, not the seven stages of grief. We were both wrong.”
“Don’t get discouraged, Grayson. Trial and error is a big part of science.”
“Whatever.” I didn’t really want a bunch of teacher mumbo jumbo right then.
Mr. Walden sat there looking at me like I’d just told him I was dropping out of school to make a living selling drugs or something. He seemed sad, and for the first time in my life, I hated that I’d disappointed one of my teachers.
“I’m sorry I let you down, Mr. Walden,” I mumbled. I felt the back of my neck get warm and reached up to rub it before Owen noticed my embarrassment. “I really did try, though. I swear! I told you I wasn’t good at all this science stuff.”
Mr. Walden’s face went from sad to shocked. “Is that what you think? That you’ve failed and you’ve let me down?”
I shrugged uneasily. “Well, we did. The experiment was a bust. What happens now anyway? Do we get kicked out of the science fair? I suppose I don’t get my extra credit, either, right?”
Mr. Walden jerked back in surprise, nearly spilling his coffee all over his desk. “Good hell, Grayson!”
I was surprised to hear the curse after all his lectures on the subject of foul language. Owen seemed pretty stunned too.
“Of course you’ll get the credit!” Mr. Walden said. “You did the work, didn’t you?”
“Yeah, but we can’t go to the science fair now.”
“Why not?”
“Because we don’t have a finished experiment. We failed!”
Mr. Walden sighed. “Do you know how many times Thomas Edison failed before he had a working lightbulb?”
“Uh . . . no?” Why would I know something like that?
“They say it was over a thousand, Mr. Kennedy.”
“No way!” Owen said.
Mr. Walden smiled. “Indeed. Allegedly when he was asked about it, he said, ‘I have not failed one thousand times. I have successfully discovered one thousand ways to not make a lightbulb.’ Failure is a part of the process, Grayson. Of course you can still take your experiment to the fair this weekend. Yours will not be the only unsuccessful project there, and you may even still place.”
“What? How?”
“The project itself is intriguing. I believe people will be fascinated with your efforts despite the negative outcome. All you have left to do is write up your conclusions, and you will be ready for Saturday.”
Showing off a lame failed experiment didn’t sound like much fun to me. “Maybe we still shouldn’t go, though. The nerds are already embarrassed having to take a dumb jock like me to the fair with them. This experiment just proves them right. I don’t want to ruin their day when they’ve all worked so hard.”
Suddenly Mr. Walden had the look on his face that he always had when he was about to start doling out the detention slips. “You are not a dumb jock, Grayson.”
“Right.” I scoffed.
Mr. Walden leaned back in his chair and rubbed his head like it hurt. I knew I exhausted the guy on occasion, but I thought we were past me giving him migraines.
He sighed and pulled his grade book out of his desk. He walked over and plopped it in front of me. After finding my name on his class list, he ran his finger down the line and stopped it on a B.
I was a little shocked. “Is that the grade from my test last week? Did I seriously pull a B?”
“No,” Mr. Walden said gruffly. He scooted his finger back to a different column. This time he pointed at an A minus. “This was the grade you got on the test last week. The B is the grade you will see on your report card for third quarter when they’re handed out this Friday.”
Scratch being a little shocked. If I hadn’t been sitting, I’d have fallen o
ver in a dead faint. “You’re totally shitting me, Mr. Walden!”
Mr. Walden frowned at me, but before I could apologize, he cracked a smile and said, “I assure you I am not shitting you, Grayson.”
There was a round of laughter in the room. I hadn’t realized that the science club geeks were all standing behind us, listening to the conversation.
Mr. Walden smiled at everyone and then met my eyes again. This time his were shining. I couldn’t believe it, but the man was proud of me.
“I haven’t added in the extra points from the science experiment yet, Grayson. This lift in your grade is purely from you actually turning in your homework assignments and studying for your tests. If you attend the science fair this weekend as we agreed on, and if you continue to apply yourself as you have been, I have no doubt you will graduate with an A in my class.”
At that everyone broke out into a round of clapping and cheers. I took an exaggerated bow, pretending like it was no big deal, but it actually felt kind of awesome knowing I’d done so much all by myself. Well, it wasn’t completely on my own. I totally owed the science squad.
“I think this calls for a celebration. What do you guys say to some applied physics for science club today? My treat.”
“Applied physics?” Owen asked.
Now I understood why everyone laughed at me the first time I’d heard that term. The horror in Owen’s voice was hilarious.
I slung my arm over his shoulder. “Don’t worry. It’s not as scary as it sounds.”
“Sounds like a party in here.”
Avery’s quiet voice broke the scene like a sledgehammer through a window. She stood in the doorway to the classroom, blushing from the way she’d brought everything to a stop. She’d been so nonresponsive lately that she’d faded into the background both at lunch and here in science club. We weren’t used to her speaking up anymore, and I wasn’t the only one surprised when she’d interrupted the conversation.
Of course, we were also shocked because of who she’d dragged with her to science club.
Libby was the first to snap out of it and answer her. “It is,” she said. “Today a miracle has occurred, and we are celebrating.”
