The Map from Here to There

by Emery Lord

  Hunter leaned back, elbows on the bed, casual as could be. “I dunno. Is it?”

  My eyes shot to him—he wasn’t confessing feelings for me, was he? His eyes went wide, hands splayed out. “Oh no. I don’t mean—”

  “No, I know!” I insisted, mirroring his gesture.

  “But if I weren’t hung up on Julia. And if you weren’t still completely in love with Max …”

  He paused, giving me space to correct him. I didn’t. My feelings pointed at Max like a laser beam, direct and bright. But if I’d never met Max Watson. If our history didn’t bind us, if my heart had space. Wouldn’t I be smitten with Hunter? Wouldn’t anyone be?

  “We have fun,” Hunter continued. “I think you’re interesting and pretty. And, as you know, I’m extremely good-looking and talented.”

  I lagged my head toward him. “It’s your modesty, really, that gets me.”

  “I’m just saying. That’s not where I’m at. But it’s not ridiculous. Is it?”

  Well, when he said it like that … Hunter Chen and his big grin and his big heart, scooping me right up into his world. “No. I guess not.”

  Not ridiculous at all. So un-ridiculous, in fact, that I felt embarrassed to meet his gaze. There was a part of me that could see the whole montage: Hunter fast to pull me onto the dance floor at prom, his fun-loving side a counterweight to my hesitation.

  Suspended in that strange, candid moment, I felt the choice so clearly. I could have kissed Hunter in that moment, and he might have kissed me back. Maybe it would have become more, our connection eclipsing older loves in the end. Hunter Chen was really something. But I wouldn’t try to soothe my heartbreak with him, not at the expense of our good, easy friendship. And as I finally managed a small smile at him, I suspected he thought the same of me.

  “Maybe give the guy a break, yeah?” Hunter clapped my back, nodding toward the living room. “C’mon. Let’s have fun.”

  I didn’t see the picture till after I’d climbed into bed. Lane had posted it hours before, their Twister board with a record-setting number of people still in the game. My head was thrown back in embarrassed laughter. At least from this angle, you couldn’t tell my bra was outside my clothes. You could, however, see my legs spread over Hunter’s precariously balanced pose.

  I rocketed up, horrified. There was enough overlap between my friend group and Hunter’s—someone would have seen it, maybe even Max. I dove into who followed Lane, deciphering my options. I could just text her to take it down, right?

  But when I clicked to Max’s account, trying to figure out if it was too late, I found a photo he’d posted. The QuizBowl varsity team, mid-celebration. It was a great shot—Malcolm and Sofia high-fiving, surprise on both their faces. And then there was Max, his open-mouthed grin an exact mirror of Aditi’s—their profiles aligned as they locked eyes. They looked … close. Not only in proximity, but in connection.

  It felt like taking a punch. Maybe because the photo was from a QuizBowl match, with Aditi in my former chair. But hadn’t I chosen to walk away from it? Hadn’t I chosen to walk away from Max?

  I wasn’t even sure when it was from. Did they have a match after Max got home from Notre Dame? Was this before? I hated not knowing the whens of Max’s life almost as much as I hated this picture, and I couldn’t resist any longer.

  Hey, how was Notre Dame?

  Good. Really good.

  Good.

  This is what we were reduced to—Max and Paige and our bond that used to feel inevitable. “Good” had never felt so terrible.

  Maybe texting isn’t the best idea.

  My jaw dropped open as I reread the words. Of all the cold-blooded power moves. To act like he didn’t even want a quick check-in, a checking of our friendship’s pulse. But fine. All connective tissue severed. A clean cut.

  Yeah, you’re right.

  See you at school.

  I stared down at the exchange. Why—why?—did I feel the tiniest bit of relief beneath my sadness? I’d been so fixated on the idea of losing Max eventually—eyes locked on when it would end, how much it would hurt. I finally knew: here and now, with words dissolving between us.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  I didn’t feel like talking—not in class, not to my friends, not to my mom. So the start of thrice-weekly 2BD, 1BA rehearsals served me perfectly. Monday, Wednesday, and Friday afternoons, Tessa dropped me off at the nearest city bus stop and I rode downtown to Mythos. My dad picked me up after his evening class. Inside the rehearsal room, my role was essentially silence: listening closely, taking notes. Cris told me exactly what she needed, and I reveled in the straightforwardness. I was a runner, a task-doer, a list-keeper.

  I knocked on the green room door, where one of the leads paced, memorizing lines.

  “Hey, sorry to interrupt. They’re almost ready for you.”

  “Oh, thanks!” Marisol hurried to the hallway with me. “You’re Paige, right?”

  “Right,” I said. “Your audition was phenomenal.”

  “Oh. Thanks. The script really spoke to me, so …” Her dark eyes widened. “Ugh. That was such an actress-y thing to say. But it did.”

  I liked her for deflecting the compliment to the writer. “Oh, I understand. For me, too.”

  We chatted on our way to Cris, who stood gesturing at the taped-off floor where a couch would be.

  “Hancock, can you duck in the prop room? Find a pizza box? Or something similar in size and weight.”

  “Sure thing,” I said, and I disappeared.

  On Sunday afternoon, I arranged a hierarchy of work I had to do: finish calc homework, study for a history exam, make a dent in my English paper. I’d only gotten as far as cursing Gottfried Leibniz and Sir Isaac Newton when I heard Morgan arrive downstairs. She’d asked my mom to be a professional mentor, as required by her Women’s Studies final project. True to form, Morgan was co-writing an op-ed for the school paper about sex education reform.

  The two of them settled into the kitchen table, and I sat at the other end, laptop open to my English paper. As Morgan explained her many resources and binder tabs to my mom, I busied myself making popcorn. I’d seen her fired up before, obviously, but this had the focused power of the sun through a magnifying glass: a precise burning.

  “Why had I never heard of PCOS or endometriosis?” Morgan was saying. “I took an entire semester of health. Plus, there’s more from Gabby. Like, does our curriculum even acknowledge queerness? Seriously.”

  “This sounds very close to you,” my mom said. “That’s good. A human angle—a personal lens—can make a strong point.”

  Morgan glanced over at me, and I nodded, encouraging her.

  “Yes.” She pulled her shoulders back. “If you think it’s helpful and appropriate for the article, I’m willing to talk about my personal diagnosis and all the frustration. Reid says it made a big difference when he was writing articles for the Warrior Weekly.”

  Sitting there, I couldn’t resist opening a recent screenplay outline, one I was still dabbling with. A girl whose brother died in a drunk driving accident crusades for local reform. She joins forces with her brother’s best friend and battles her own grief and anxiety along the way. It was a little bit me and a little bit each of my friends, the parts of our stories that might make other people feel less alone.

  I wasn’t trying to think about college. But there, at that table, my mind skipped off to that coffee shop in Bloomington and a seat there next year, across from Morgan. Rallying each other as we tried to turn the things that hurt us into something bigger than ourselves.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  I always imagined being in my bedroom, on my laptop, when I received my first answer about college admission. Instead, I got the USC e-mail on my phone—notifying me that my status had been posted—while I was at Mythos. I sat down in a back row, shielded by the balcony’s shadow. It felt full circle here, a place that reminded me of my grandmother. A username, a password, a breath held in so tightly that
it ached.

  An answer.

  I scanned the first lines—committee has reviewed applications carefully, most impressive pool of candidates to date—until my eyes snagged on the word.

  Unfortunately …

  Of course. I knew that was coming, right? I was 99.99 percent sure.

  Still. When people called it “the sting of rejection,” they weren’t kidding. It actually stung, like a slapped sunburn. I blinked back tears.

  I am one hundred percent not going to USC. Another feeling swept through me, like a quick breeze on a stifling day. Finally, I knew one detail of my future with total certainty. And once that relief wriggled in, it expanded. I knew all the reasons I should have wanted this school; I knew the opportunities it held. Getting in would have been an incredible affirmation, and maybe I would have thrived.

  But it was off the table.

  God help me, I wanted to tell Max. It had been almost three weeks of our gap year, of wan smiles in the hallway and limited eye contact in group conversations.

  No from USC, I texted Maeve, lump in my throat. I sent a frowny face, and immediately wished I hadn’t. I didn’t want her to feel guilty if she was accepted.

  I’m rejected, too, Maeve said. LOL-oh-well. We’re meant for other greatness.

  I exhaled in relief, if guiltily. I’d wish Maeve well at any school; I’d keep working with her as long as she’d have me. But I did hope we landed somewhere together.

  “You okay, Hancock?” Cris Fuentes was glancing down at me. I hadn’t heard her enter, even with the clunky boots.

  “Yeah,” I said, sitting up from my sloppy posture. “Fine. Just a college rejection that I’m being a baby about.”

  “Ah,” she said. “Been there. You’re not a real theater kid until you have your own personal hiding spot for crying. C’mon. Let’s go talk to the crew and find you something to hammer.”

  USC was the jab. On Saturday afternoon, I took a hook to the jaw—a rejection from UCLA. I was on my laptop in my room for that one, the place where I’d written and rewritten my portfolio. This time, I didn’t cry. I stared. I would not be living in LA.

  Maeve got in, and I felt genuinely happy for her. But the reality of back-to-back rejections spread through me like darkness. The anxiety began to swirl, a galaxy churning. What if I didn’t get into any colleges at all?

  I cut the thought off, guillotined it in my mind. No. Tonight was Lane’s eighteenth birthday, a giant bash with her entire Venn diagram of Oakhurst, Linwood, and college friends. I packed my overnight bag for Tessa’s house, stuffing in a pair of ripped jeans and a black top I found secondhand in New York.

  My parents were on the couch, deeply invested in their favorite murder-mystery show. They looked happy and innocent, unaware that their daughter was 0 for 2 on college applications. “Hey. I’m walking to Tessa’s.”

  My dad glanced up, face bathed pale in the TV light. “Tell the girls we said hi!”

  “Do you work tomorrow?” my mom asked.

  “Yeah. Evening shift.”

  “Well, home from Tessa’s before noon, okay? We’d like to see your face at some point this weekend.”

  “Aye-aye.” I saluted, and I stepped out into the night.

  Lane took us up to her bedroom for her private stash—a shoebox full of half-empty bottles. My aversion to drinking had always been powered, like so much of my life, by the fear of doing something wrong. Tonight, I welcomed misbehavior. Why not? Everything was already screwed up.

  We raised a glass to the birthday girl and drank down our shots—all except Tessa, tonight’s driver.

  “Not bad,” I said. The burning felt good—cleansing. Or maybe that was just the lemon aftertaste, vaguely like kitchen soap.

  “Help yourself.” Lane handed me the bottle. “I drank lemon vodka after a breakup last year, and now I can’t stand it.”

  Meant to be. “Thanks.”

  A sip for USC, a swallow for UCLA, and a glug for the NYU rejection likely coming my way. Cheers. I drove the rest of my life into the ground for screen writing, and for what?

  “Okay,” Tessa said, on our way downstairs. “You’re going to need to tell me what’s happening with you. Is this Max stuff?”

  I adjusted my top, lower cut than my usual oeuvre. Ha-ha, “oeuvre.” What a snobby-ass little word. I didn’t really know how to do makeup, but I’d swiped on eyeliner, dark and glittery as granite. I felt beautiful and terrible.

  “Just trying to have fun,” I said breezily. Or the way I imagined a breezy person saying it, anyway. And really, this was just a yes, and attitude. Accept what someone is giving you and give something in return. Life had given me some flat-out rejection, yes. And I was going to do whatever I wanted now.

  The weird thing about lots of alcohol is that I figured it would go: fine, giggly, a lot less fine, drunk, whoa really drunk. But that night, it went: fine, fine, fine, my face feels weird, you know what’s funny is platypuses, hahaha woooo, oh God what have I done. I would have considered this progression a mistake, except that I couldn’t feel anything but sloppy-armed blurriness.

  “Is, like, half the school at this party?” I asked Morgan, in a voice that might have been too loud. We’d moved to the kitchen, where I responsibly, in my opinion, sought out water. Kayleigh was nearby with an extremely cute guy leaning in to talk with her. Tessa, last I knew, was consulting on a party playlist. I’d seen Hunter briefly, holding court in the living room. He’d held up both hands, gesturing in a way that I interpreted as I’ll find you later.

  “Seems like it. And lots of people who graduated last year.” She was looking down at her phone, texting rapidly, and I kept looking around at vaguely familiar faces.

  Once, when I was in fourth grade, I lost my footing at recess and fell backward off the playground equipment. It wasn’t a long fall, and I landed on a patch of grass. But something about the way my back met the ground—I couldn’t breathe. I tried to gasp, but my diaphragm had seized up.

  That is what it felt like to see Max walk into the kitchen with Aditi. What was he even doing here? Oh God, of course Aditi would know Lane—tristate popularity.

  Max was a half step behind her, like he might guide her by the small of her back at any moment. She looked beautiful, black hair tousled to one side like she’d casually raked it. She glanced up to say something to Max, smiling, and he laughed.

  Oxygen disappeared from the kitchen, the house, the planet.

  I’d watched the changing expressions on Max Watson’s face in class, in the driver’s seat, in birthday-candle light. I had never seen him look at another girl like that. I hated their height difference. Short as she was, Aditi had to tilt her chin up high to speak to him.

  I hurried out of the kitchen, leaving Morgan there. I wanted to wreck my whole life. Swipe my arms across the game table, making the tiny pieces clatter on the ground. Start over.

  The world looked like it does from a carousel—only the nearest things seemed stationary or even real. And my watery eyes made even those things appear through a fishbowl. Color swimming past. A carousel inside a fishbowl. Or something. And spinning! How was I spinning while standing still, eyes squinted shut?

  On my way into the dining room, my shoulder knocked something with a hard edge. A shattering sound near my feet, a too fast cause and effect. I scooped up the picture frame and set it back on top of the piano. The glass had fallen out, smashed.

  “Shit,” I muttered, dropping to my knees. I tried to gather the shards into my palm as fast as I could. With as crowded as the party had become, tracking glass around would be a disaster.

  “Paige!” Tessa’s voice floated somewhere above me. “Up. Get up.”

  “I have to fix this! I broke it!”

  “Okay, but get away from the glass. Let me find a broom or something.”

  I saw blood before I felt pain. I glanced at my right palm, confused, and unstuck a small shard from the fleshy part of my thumb. When Tessa hauled me up, it became fairly apparent that
another had dug into my knee. I brushed it off, and it annoyingly bled onto my jeans.

  “Jesus,” Tessa muttered, pointing me toward the stairs. “Lane’s bathroom. Go.”

  I cradled my hand, suddenly feeling totally vulnerable. Quietly, I said, “Can you get Max?”

  She hesitated. To be fair, it didn’t sound great: drunk, bleeding, and asking for a boy I was not supposed to be talking to.

  “He keeps a first aid kit in his car,” I said.

  “Fine,” she said. “Go. We’ll come up.”

  I went, gripping the stair rail with my nonbleeding hand. It really didn’t hurt! Mystery! Lane had her own bathroom, attached to her room like in a fancy master suite. In there, I folded up some toilet paper and pressed it to my knee. The blood seeped, warm. I ran my hand under the faucet, watched the watery pink. I opened the cabinets but found only a box of tampons and a basket of nail polish.

  But wait! TV shows had taught me rudimentary medical care for dire situations! I unearthed Lane’s booze shoebox. A few drops of plain vodka onto a wad of toilet paper and held to my bleeding knee. I sat on the bedroom floor, gritting my teeth.

  “Paige! What on earth?” Tessa gasped.

  I looked up. Max was blocking the light from the doorway, a red first aid kit tucked under his arm. His mom had put it in his trunk when he got his license. I knew that because I knew him.

  He sighed, crouching down. “Disinfecting it with booze, eh?”

  “I am,” I agreed.

  Tessa sighed, too. “I’m gonna round up Morgan and Kayleigh.”

  “Go. I’ve got her,” Max told Tessa, and I did feel gotten. Getted. Had?

  He hoisted me up so that I was sitting on Lane’s bed. Near us, a picture of her and Hunter from childhood looked on, smiles with missing teeth.

  “I’m sorry,” I said. How embarrassing, for Max to see me nose-dive like this. Wasn’t I proving his point about not acting like myself, about searching for something?