by Portia Moore
“You mean the guy you think is secretly in love with me?” I snicker.
“I don’t know why you think it’s so funny. He’s totally in love with you,” he says adamantly.
I roll my eyes at him. “Zach and I are just friends. We make out every so often, but he’s almost like a brother.”
“Except for the making out part,” he says sarcastically.
“Except for that,” I retort, and he grimaces. “Besides, aren’t people my age too young to fall in love? We don’t know what real love is, right?”
My eyes meet his, and I instantly regret it because they hold me and don’t let go, magical orbs that put a spell on me each time they lock on mine. His mouth slowly turns upward. His eyes smile at me before his lips do, and I fight to look away from him.
“Here you go, sweetheart. Stuffed shells.” The waitress has saved me. She gives Will a warm smile. She has coal-black hair with streaks of gray in a tight bun and a strong Italian accent. “And for the beautiful lady, chicken Alfredo. My favorite.”
I smile and thank her. As we eat, he tells me about how he feels sad when the school year ends and his students leave. I tell him about how graduation wasn’t as big a deal as I’d expected it to be. He counters, saying that he bet it felt good holding that diploma. I admit that it did.
The waitress with the black hair and warm smile returns and asks if we’d like to share a dessert.
“I’m up for it if you are,” he says.
Even though I feel stuffed, I can’t pass up the chance. We share a big bowl of gelato, and I feel a little more guilty when I compare this dinner to all the crappy dates I’ve been on. Because this isn’t a date, it shouldn’t feel like a date and shouldn’t be compared to one, but part of me does, and the stupid part of me is giddy. I’m reminded of how stupid that part is when Will orders Gia a spaghetti and meatballs with extra sauce, just how Gia likes it. I realize that in my fantasy, or if I were to have a fantasy, my date wouldn’t order his girlfriend a to-go plate. In the ideal fantasy, his girlfriend wouldn’t be my sister.
“HEY, LITTLE SIS.” Gia nudges me awake.
I open my eyes and see her sitting beside me, beaming.
“Hi,” I say, sitting up and giving her a hug.
“I’m so glad you’re here.” She squeezes me tightly.
“You can’t be more glad than I am.”
“I have something for you. It was for your graduation, and I was going to mail it, but I thought I’d just keep it to give it to you personally.” She hands me a small box wrapped in pink paper.
I restrain myself from ripping it open. I carefully untie the ribbon and delicately unwrap the gift, making sure to appreciate the beautiful paper. When I open the box, my eyes well up. “Gia . . .”
She doesn’t say anything but just keeps a small smile on her face. I notice the wetness in her eyes. I lift the silver heart necklace Dad gave her when she graduated.
“I can’t take this,” I say, and my voice breaks.
She only shakes her head, unclasps it, and lifts my hair so she can put it on me. “You will. I have so many gifts from Dad, and I know how hard it had to have been for you to not have him there. I know how much that would have meant to you.” She finishes hooking the clasp around my neck. “Funny story—when I graduated, I wanted a car. I just knew that Mom and Dad were looking at this little red dust beater, but to me, it wouldn’t have been a dust beater. It would have meant the world.” She clears her throat. “On graduation day, Dad handed me that box. I thought—I willed it even—to be a key. A key to the car I had been dropping hints about, that I’d convinced myself they were going to get me.”
I nod, vaguely remembering that day. I remember her acting happy, showing off the necklace to me that night at dinner.
“When he gave it to me, I was sooo disappointed. You wouldn’t believe how much. I even let it slip.” Her voice breaks, and tears flow down her cheeks. “I’ll never forget the look on his face. Mom . . . you know how she is . . . she looked angry, like how dare I not appreciate what I was given. But Dad, Dad looked hurt.” She sniffs. “I realized then that I was being a brat and if they could have gotten me the car, they would have.”
I hold her hand, and she takes a deep breath.
“I would give anything to go back and change what I said. If I had known that was the last gift he would ever give me, give either of us . . .”
I hug her. “You didn’t know, Gia. Dad got it. You know how he was. He knew you didn’t mean it.”
“I know, I know, but I just . . . I want you to have it. I know how much it would mean to you,” she says, pulling herself together.
I touch the locket and hold onto it. “I’ll wear it, not forever though. It’s yours.”
She waves me off. “I’ll let you know when I want it back.”
I get up, and she shows me the small sun porch she’s decorated to look more like a bedroom. It’s half the size of my old room—not my room at Martin’s house but my room in our house with Dad, which was half the size of the house Mom has now—but it’s perfect with a twin bed, purple linens, and Madonna posters everywhere. She helps me put away my clothes, and we talk and eat candy for the rest of the night.
Before I drift off to sleep, I tell myself tonight I won’t dream about Will’s voice. I won’t look forward to seeing him. Whatever I feel, whether its curiosity, infatuation, or lust, isn’t worth what it could cause between my sister and me. It’s nothing. I will make it be nothing.
It will be nothing.
MY PLAN IS to keep busy. If I keep busy, I won’t have time to think or analyze my feelings for Whatshisface. I’ve convinced myself if I refer toWill as Whatshisface, my feelings will cease to exist. I mean, who would have feelings for someone they refer to as Whatshisface?
While Gia is out, I clean the house. I read books, and I watch TV, though Gia doesn’t have cable. I talk to Zach as much as I can, but since he’s working more hours at the gas station and his uncle isn’t keen on him being on the phone, I can’t use him to pass the time as much as I like. By day three, I feel restless. With Gia at work and school, she’s not home as much as I’d imagined her being. This is actually nothing at all like I pictured life here being. I guess I only imagined freedom—lots and lots of freedom to do what I want—but when I don’t have to go to school or work, freedom doesn’t really matter. Boredom isn’t as glamorous as I thought it’d be. I have absolutely nothing to do.
By day four, after I’ve watched as much crappy TV as I can stand and cooked everything in the house, I decide to try my hand at the public transportation system. There’s a bus stop on the corner of Gia’s block. From talking to a woman in the gas station, I think the bus will take me right to the train station, which would take me into the heart of Chicago. If you can’t find something to do there, you’re a lost cause, at least that’s what the clerk at the gas station tells me.
So I buy a transfer to get on the bus, and with the train fare in my pocket, I start my journey. It seems like a great idea until four hours later, when I somehow end up in a suburb on the opposite side of town from where I live and it’s starting to get dark and I’m too embarrassed to ask someone how to get home. Why would I, someone who’s foreign to the public transportation system in my own hometown, attempt to conquer it in one of the biggest cities in the world?
I finally swallow my pride and head to the payphone, where realize I don’t know Gia’s work number. I can barely remember the name of the firm she’s interning at. Is it Waters and Mitchell or Waters and Michaels? The operator gets frustrated with me, saying she has over a hundred listings of law firms in Chicago with the name Waters in them. I hang up, frustrated, and laugh at myself. The reason I wanted to get out of the house was so I wouldn’t be bored and think about the only person in this city whose number I remember, and that’s who I’ll have to see.
He picks up on the third ring. “Hello?”
I bite my lip. He doesn’t sound like a Whatshisface. He sounds anything but.
“Gwen?” he asks, but it’s more of a statement.
“Yeah,” I say, embarrassed.
“Long time, no hear, stranger.”
My heart skips a beat. He’s noticed that we haven’t talked. I wonder if three days seemed as long for him as it did to me. Of course not. He has a willing girlfriend to talk to. Not a girlfriend—my sister.
“Are you busy?” I say hopefully.
“Not so much . . . what’s up?”
I explain how I’m an idiot and lost and ask if he could pick me up. Before he says anything, he laughs at me, which is expected. But he asks me where I am, and once I tell him, he says he’ll be here to get me in thirty minutes.
Thirty minutes can’t go fast enough, especially when some creepy guy who smells like old cabbage keeps asking for my phone number and saying he’s a lot younger than he looks. I couldn’t care less how old he is, but he smells as if he’s over a hundred. I’m so glad when Will pulls up I could kiss him.
“See, there’s my boyfriend over there,” I say, jumping up from my seat in the train terminal and practically skipping to Will’s truck. When I get in, he can’t stop laughing. “Oh, my being harassed by a possible rapist who smelled like an old produce section is so amusing to you.”
But his laughter is a sound I always welcome. It has a way of making me feel better.
“You want me to go kick his ass?” he says in a coddling voice.
“Yes, that would be nice,” I say sarcastically.
He rolls down our windows and looks at Mr. Cabbage. “Hey, you,” Will says in an angry voice, which surprises me.
Mr. Cabbage flips him off. When Will opens the car door and starts to get out, my heart races, and I grab his arm.
“I was kidding!” I say, and when he flashes me a breath-stealing smile, I realize he was only kidding too.
“I wasn’t going to hurt him. Look, he’s gone.”
I look over and see that Mr. Cabbage has run clear across the street and hasn’t stopped. I swat Will with pretend anger. He winks at me, and my heart nearly stops. I grasp the chain Gia gave me and remind myself of the reason I’ve been avoiding him in the first place. When he pulls off and turns the radio down, I know he wants to talk. Talking is what we do after all, but talking has caused so many problems.
“What made you decide to go downtown?” he asks.
I shrug. A valid response with no words spoken. He glances at me expectantly, waiting for me to follow up with a verbal answer, but I don’t.
“You don’t know . . . ?” he prods, and I shake my head. He looks a little confused. “Are you okay?”
I only nod. He doesn’t say anything for a while.
Suddenly he asks, “Have you decided take a vow of silence?”
I can’t help but crack a smile.
“You’re being kind of weird,” he says, turning the radio completely off.
I turn it back on, and he turns it back off. When I reach for it again, his fingers land on mine. I snatch mine back, trying to ignore the jolt of electricity that shoots through me.
“What, do I have rabies or something? Is this about that guy back there?” he asks.
I realize how ridiculous I must look. I can’t become completely mute around him. That’s not going to look normal at all.
“What’s up?” he asks, genuinely confused.
Of course he’s confused. He has no clue what’s going on in my head, and I’m pretty sure that aside from that brief lapse in his judgment at the carnival, my feelings are completely one-sided.
“I just don’t feel like talking,” I say, forcing the words out.
When we get to a stoplight, I feel him staring at me, probably trying to figure out what the hell my problem is. Little does he know he’s my problem.
“Gwen. Can you talk to me?” His usually playful voice is serious, and for some reason, the tone makes something move in me.
I suddenly feel my throat burn, and I feel as though if I do or say anything, even one word, I’ll start to cry.
“Please,” he says in a soft tone that makes my stomach flip. “Did I do something wrong?”
I want to tell him that I’m wrong, that the feeling I have for him is wrong and I hate it . . . so much that he’s driving me crazy.
Instead I lie. I take a deep breath, and my voice breaks as I tell him, “I just miss my dad.” My voice is so weak it sounds like a six-year-old’s. It’s a lie but partly true. I could never talk to my mom about this. She’d look at me as if I had two horns growing out of my head, but my dad, he would listen. He would give me the right advice. He wouldn’t judge.
What happens next surprises me. Will pulls over to the side of the road. He takes my hand and pulls me into a hug. He holds me close and tight, which makes me cry harder because this closeness, his touch, is so comforting. As he strokes my back, I yearn for him to touch my skin, but at the same time, my skin crawls, and I cry more. I think about when my English teacher asked us for an example of an oxymoron, and I realize I’m smack dab in the middle of one. My problem is right next to me, and my solution is being wrapped in his arms with the little silver necklace between us.
CHRIS AND AMANDA are officially dating, or so it would appear. Something I never in a million years thought I would say. It’s been five and a half weeks since I had the bright idea to put them together, not thinking it would turn out like this, and now they’re officially an item.
“You should have seen him. He was amazing. Those other guys didn’t stand a chance,” she says in excitement before kissing Chris’s cheek as she sits on his lap at lunch, recapping the audition Aidan and I weren’t allowed to attend.
I really think his reason is a crock of shit right about now. I glance at Aidan, who has the same sneer I’m hiding behind a weak smile.
“It was stiff competition. I’m just lucky,” Chris says modestly.
“They play their first set this weekend at the Deegan’s in Sheridan. You have to come see how good he is,” she says in a sickly sweet voice, almost like the mother of a five-year-old.
“Sweeet! Chris!” Devin slaps Chris’s back, giving his approval.
“We’ll be there,” Mike and a few others at our lunch table chime in.
“What about you, Lisa? Maybe you can ride with me. That is if we can remember to not embarrass our town rock star,” Aidan says with a sarcastic snarl.
Amanda frowns, and Chris grimaces.
“You know it wasn’t like that,” Chris says, his tone apologetic.
“I don’t know what it was like. I just think it’s weird that you wouldn’t want your two best friends to come support you but you let cheerleading Barbie be front and center.” Aidan’s tone is joking, but the undercurrent is bitter, and I can’t say I don’t feel the same way.
“Hey chill out, Aidan,” Amanda says, glaring at him.
Aidan rolls his eyes at her and laughs before getting up from the table. The phrase “three’s a crowd” has never seemed to apply to Chris, Aidan, and me, but with Amanda added to the mix, a better saying would be “four’s a disaster.” She just hasn’t gelled in, and it sucks because she’s my best friend. She and my other best friend being together has really thrown my life out of balance.
“I’ll go talk to him,” I tell them, unable to muster up anything other than the artificial grin I’ve had plastered on since this whole thing started with them.
I think about how a few weeks can change things. Since when am I the one to go coddle Aidan? He’s at the table across from us, flirting with one of the junior cheerleaders.
“Can we talk a minute?”
He looks at me in annoyance. “I’ll be right back, Jada.” He follows me out.
“Kayla,” she calls after him.
“What’s up?” he asks.
“Look, I’m not thrilled about Chris and Amanda any more than you are,” I say, and he grimaces.
“You’re the one who had the bright idea to set them up.”
“Yeah, but I didn’t think they’d actually do this . . . I was just trying to stop my best friend from becoming one of your wham-bam-thank-you-ma’ams,” I say defensively.
“Amanda’s not an angel. You act as if she’s a virgin or something, like she’s not aware of my reputation. If you would have just let nature take its course, we wouldn’t be having this issue. She’s got Chris wrapped around her bipolar little finger! And what the hell is with him not inviting us to see him play? She invites us like we’re the pity friends!” he says angrily.
“I’m not happy about it either, and yeah, my feelings were hurt a little bit, but I know Chris isn’t embarrassed of us. I think he just would have been embarrassed by us being there.”
He looks at me as if I’m crazy.
“I think he wanted to do something on his own,” I say, and Aidan crosses his arms as if nothing I’m saying is getting through to him. I sigh in frustration. “Okay, you’re right. He was an ass to not invite us, but are you going to act like a mad little girl for the rest of our senior year? This could be our last year together for a long time. Don’t let your ego ruin it.” I walk off and leave him where he’s standing.
EVEN WITH EVERYTHING that happened earlier today with Chris and his new girlfriend—gosh, that sounds weird—today is still going down as an awesome day. I woke up for the first time in a long time without a strange guy, or one I didn’t like, in the house with Evie and me, which was unusual, but I didn’t question it. And for the first time since I was a freshman, I received a B-plus on a math quiz, even getting a “Keep up the good work” from Ms. Gregory.
I can’t help glancing at my quiz every so often to make sure it was real. It isn’t an A, but for math, a B-plus is a big accomplishment. I didn’t manage a grade that good even the one time I tried to cheat or when I worked with a partner. The first person I want to share the news with is Mr. Scott . . . Will. When he told me I could call him that, I felt like I was on cloud nine. Our three-time-a-week tutoring sessions have paid off. Not only that, but they’re something I’ve begun to look forward to. Something about him makes me feel warm inside. He makes me feel as though I can do anything, be anything I want. Even though he’s tutoring me on a subject I hate—well, used to hate—I can’t help looking forward to them more than most things.
