Summer of Brave

by Amy Noelle Parks

  I glance at Aman, wanting—I’m not sure what—to have someone else disagree, I guess.

  Aman gives Matt a tight smile. “I don’t think she was flattered.”

  I was not. And I am not now, even though I’m safe. The fear of what might have happened is still much too fresh. My head tells me I should yell at Matt right now. I can even think of things to say. There were two of you. I didn’t know what might happen next. I will always be afraid now. But I don’t know how to be that person.

  “It would be best if you stayed away from Lilla,” Aman says, breaking the silence. “There’s no reason for you to be involved with the science camp. Molly’s in engineering. She should supervise us anyway.”

  Matt gets all offended. “I don’t know what she told you, but it wasn’t a big deal. I’m not a predator.”

  “Dude. You’re in college and you’re whistling at middle-school girls. You don’t like the label, you might want to reconsider the behavior.”

  They glare at each other. Then Matt throws up his hands. “Fine. I’m done here.”

  After Matt leaves, Aman asks, “You okay?”

  “Yes. Thank you,” I say. I am so grateful. Knowing I won’t have to deal with Matt while I’m here is a huge relief.

  But I’m uneasy too. Because this was my second chance to tell Matt what I thought of him. To take control. And I didn’t do any better.

  I’m not sure what’s wrong with me.

  CHAPTER 20

  Troubled

  After lunch, Aman puts me in charge of setting up static-electricity experiments. It’s quiet and uncomplicated work.

  Unfortunately.

  Because now I have to think.

  About Vivi and how she is sad and angry because I kept secrets from her.

  About Matt and how I didn’t stand up to him. Twice.

  About Mom and Dad, who are keeping secrets from me and who will be so Disappointed in Me if I don’t become a magnet school kid.

  And also about Knox, who, all of a sudden, I’m afraid to talk to and I can’t bring myself to tell him why because it might hurt his feelings if I say I don’t like him, or worse, if I say I do like him but don’t want to do anything about it because I’m afraid now. What if he thinks I’m afraid of him?

  But then, maybe he likes Vivi and not me.

  In that case, I guess it wouldn’t bother him at all if I didn’t like him. And even though I don’t want to do anything about it now, thinking he likes her instead of me still makes me sad, which I know doesn’t make any sense, but there it is.

  I’d like to blame all this on Matt, but it started long before yesterday.

  All my life I have worked to keep everyone happy. Vivi and Knox and my teachers and especially Mom and Dad. I have done all the things they asked me to do, and all the things they barely hinted they wanted. Good grades. Gymnastics. Drawing. Photography. Coding. Accelerated English. Advanced math.

  And even when they got divorced and moved me out of the house I grew up in and made me wonder why I wasn’t enough to keep together two people who still liked each other enough to sit at a kitchen table and laugh, I didn’t complain.

  But it wasn’t enough. And maybe it’s never going to be? No matter how many tests I ace or magnet schools I get into or science fairs I win. Maybe I can never be smart or ambitious or sweet or charming enough to make them happy?

  And this thing with Matt. Sure, I don’t like that guys are out there waiting to say stuff about my body. But more, I hate that I was so afraid of upsetting Matt—of not being nice—that I didn’t talk back.

  But I don’t know how to be different.

  Only then I remember that yes, yes I do.

  I told Mrs. Wilder I didn’t want to talk about what I was reading even though I knew she might not be happy.

  Why?

  Maybe because I didn’t have to yell, but mostly because of Vivi. I cared more about what Vivi thought than about what Mrs. Wilder thought. Maybe in some anti-peer-pressure-school-assembly kind of way, I shouldn’t care what anyone thinks, but I don’t see that happening. And what I know for sure is that caring what Vivi thinks of me makes me stronger and braver.

  I need to say sorry for not telling her I got the science museum. And I need to tell her what happened with Matt. And when I do, I want to be able to say I talked to Kate. Because that’s what Vivi will expect. And because it’s right.

  When I let Aman know I’m going to talk to Kate, he says, “Thank Joss Whedon and all the Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. There was no way I could let you leave without doing that, but I’m glad I don’t have to march you down there.”

  When Kate sees me at her door, she waves me in. Feeling almost as dizzy as I did last night, I sort of fall into the seat across from her.

  “Do you not feel well?” she asks. “Should we get your dad?” I shake my head. “I need to tell you something.”

  When she settles back, I tell her the story, leaving out my “’Kay?” and the dash across the street.

  Kate pulls a tissue out of a box on her desk and hands it to me, but I’m not crying.

  “Are you sure it was Matt?”

  “Yes. He apologized today.”

  “Oh! Well, good.” She’s a lot less upset than Aman.

  “Good?” I ask, trying to sort through my feelings. I expected more outrage. If anything, I thought I’d be the one telling her not to overreact.

  “It sounds like a misunderstanding. You were dressed for a party?”

  “Not a party,” I say, but I hear the doubt in my voice, and so does she.

  “Remember, we talked about this?”

  The dress-code stuff, she means.

  “What did your parents say?” she asks.

  “Oh, I haven’t told them yet. My mom’s out of town, and my dad…” My voice trails off.

  “I understand,” Kate says. “It’s hard to talk to fathers about this sort of thing. And you’ve told me. No need to make a big production out of it.”

  “I guess,” I say, surprised. Most adults—even near-adults like Aman and spirit-adults like Vivi—seem to push for telling the whole story. It’s weird to have a legit grown-up tell me it’s okay to keep quiet. “I suppose this sort of thing happens all the time?”

  Kate smiles. “I’m afraid it does. He shouldn’t have whistled at you, but boys…”

  She gives me a what-can-you-do shrug.

  So I guess that’s that.

  CHAPTER 21

  Totally Normal

  At the end of the day, Knox runs into the science museum. “Lilla, come see!”

  Despite everything, I smile. He is lit up.

  Aman sends me off with a promise that it will be okay. Knox gives me a curious look, but I ignore it. Knox still thinks Matt is a Cool Guy, and I don’t want to get into it.

  In the main hall of the children’s museum, blue and yellow foam blocks are stacked to make a giant Jenga game that towers way over my head. The only way to reach the top is to climb the tree house or the pirate ship on either side.

  “Want to play?” Knox says, bouncing on his toes.

  Joy washes over me. “Yes! Did you and Colby build this?”

  Knox nods. “But he had to go. Min and Garrett have to finish some paperwork, and they said we could try it out while they were working. This is going to be the first thing we do with the kids.”

  I’m jealous. Our first activity is picking up puffballs with static electricity.

  I scramble up the netting of the pirate ship, sliding one hand through the holes to anchor myself before I lean way over to slide out one of the blocks in the middle.

  “Careful,” Knox says below me, looking nervous.

  “You’re planning to do this with little children,” I remind him.

  “Maybe we need to scale back?”

  “Come on! Get up here!” I answer. I used to climb ropes to the gym ceiling. I’m not worried.

  Knox climbs the ladder to the tree house, leans out the window, and nudges out a block from
the other side. The tower holds.

  I crawl out onto the top of the monkey bars that connect the ship to the tree house. Then I push out another block with my foot. Everything wobbles.

  Knox joins me, but instead of reaching for the safest bet, he kicks at one of the corner blocks.

  “Knox!” I say as everything tumbles down. The blocks collapse into a giant mountain below us. I’m tempted to jump into them, but one time I did that with snow, and it turned out to be a lot harder than I expected. I glare at Knox. “You did that on purpose.”

  “I wanted to see what would happen.”

  We sit in silence on the monkey bars, swinging our feet.

  “I’m glad we got to do this together.” Knox’s voice is quiet but intense. “The camps, I mean. Not the blocks.”

  “Me too.” My eyes are still on the foam mountain below, and I’m too nervous to turn my head. I don’t want to see Knox looking at me the way Matt did.

  That night by the river, I thought I wanted to find out what it would be like for Knox and me to be more than friends. But after what happened with Matt, I don’t anymore. I’m used to Knox seeing me as Lilla. A whole person he can talk to about his parents’ divorce and his music and our love of chocolate. I don’t want him to look at me like some girl-shaped thing…who he wants to do who knows what with.

  Knox’s fingers brush against mine, and I yelp, flinging myself off the monkey bars and down into the foam.

  Because I’m going to be totally normal around him.

  Obviously.

  Without speaking, I busy myself restacking blocks. Knox, after getting down the regular way, joins in. I can feel him watching me, but he doesn’t speak. I’m not sure how to make this awkwardness between us disappear. And I’m out of places to throw myself.

  We rebuild a tower not quite as tall as the old one, and go get Min and Garret to approve.

  Once we’re out on the front steps, Knox asks if I want to meet Vivi at the bakery before we go home.

  “Yes!” This is perfect. My individual awkwardness with each of them will cancel the other out. Like multiplying negative numbers. But I’m not totally sure Vivi will answer me. “Can you text her?”

  Knox tilts his head. And the gesture is so familiar, so his, that something in me warms. And that must show in my face because he gives me his sweetest smile.

  I look away.

  When I turn back, he’s focused on his phone. “She wants to know if you’re going to be there. You want to tell me what’s going on between you two?”

  I don’t know what to say. Knox, Vivi, and I talk about everything, except each other. This is how we hang onto this three-sided friendship.

  “Things have been weird lately. Because of the museum. And school next year. And Prisha. All of a sudden Vivi’s all jealous of her.”

  Knox raises his eyebrows. “Are you sure it’s Prisha she’s jealous of?”

  “What do you mean?”

  He stops, but instead of looking at me, he examines his red shoes. “It’s okay. Just say it.”

  Uh-oh. Maybe Knox knows. How I was thinking about him. And he thinks Vivi is jealous of us. This is so, so embarrassing. Especially since it’s all different for me now. I don’t want to deal with any of it.

  “Lilla?” Knox nudges my shoe with his foot. “However this works out, we’ll still be friends.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  Knox raises his head. “Colby?”

  Now I’m confused. “Why are we talking about Colby?”

  “Because you both like him.”

  “Who?”

  “You and Vivi.”

  “We do?”

  “Don’t you?”

  I giggle, and a smile creeps onto Knox’s face.

  “I don’t not like Colby. But I don’t like like him.” After last night, I’m grateful for Colby, but I can tell that’s not what Knox means.

  “He wouldn’t say what happened with you the other night, even though Vivi kept bugging him. She told me he gave you his sweatshirt and you kept it, and I wasn’t trying to eavesdrop, but I thought you said his name with your dad this morning before you came into the museum.”

  “I kept his sweatshirt because I blew my nose in it,” I explain. “I tried to give it back, but he didn’t want it. And I don’t remember what I said this morning, but it was probably that Colby isn’t an ax murderer, and my dad should stop thinking you two are trying to corrupt me and Vivi.”

  Knox’s smile grows huge. “Okay then.” He bumps my shoulder with his.

  Uh-oh. I might have overcorrected here.

  “Why do you think Vivi likes Colby?” I ask.

  “Because I have eyes.”

  “Even if you’re right, you have the accuracy of a coin flip.” Given how wrong he was about me, he doesn’t need to make it seem like he’s some kind of crush oracle.

  “My judgment might be…clouded when it comes to you.”

  I don’t want to think about his clouded judgment, so I think about Vivi. Maybe Vivi does like Colby and thinks I do, too, and that I’ve been keeping this from her, along with everything else. That’s why she asked if I was telling other lies to her and Knox and why she was so mad this morning after she saw me in his sweatshirt. This part, at least, will be easy to fix.

  “Come on,” I say and take off toward the bakery, eager to make things right.

  “Don’t tell her I told you,” he says, following me. “She’ll murder me.”

  When we get to Cookie Mistake, Knox jumps in front of me to grab the door, even though I was there first.

  I knock his hand off the handle because I am in no mood. “I am completely capable of opening a door.”

  “Drama queen, much?” he says, not moving out of the way.

  My emotions are all over the place. This storm cloud rising in me isn’t about Knox. Not really. But he’s the one in front of me, treating me like I’m helpless.

  “When you do something for me that I can easily do myself, I feel like you think I can’t do anything. Because I’m a girl.”

  “Me holding the door for you is not me saying that you—or all the girls in the world—can’t enter restaurants without my help. You think Vivi would let me walk around if she thought I didn’t believe girls could open doors?”

  “Vivi!” I say. Because it always comes back to this. Don’t act like a girl turns into Don’t act like Lilla. “Just because I like pink and am a little quiet and want to be in color guard instead playing soccer doesn’t mean it’s okay for you to take over. I am not a Cotton Candy Princess.”

  He smirks. “You are dressed like you’re going to someone’s funeral. You couldn’t look less like a princess. I was being polite. For a friend.”

  “Are you telling me you would have jumped in front of Colby to open that door?” I’m not raising my voice, but I want to be right a little more than I usually do. I’m mad, but, weirdly, a little grateful too. Because Knox is the only person I feel safe enough with to fight with like this.

  “I. Was. Being. A. Gentleman.” Knox is maybe not so much sensing my gratitude.

  A woman behind us clears her throat. I turn to her. “Could you please give us a minute?” I say. “I am educating him, and it’s important.”

  “You are blocking the door,” she angry whispers.

  “Sorry,” I say. It’s clear she thinks her need for a lopsided baked good is more important than whatever we have going on here. I take an exaggerated step to the side, but when I gesture dramatically toward the door, I smack the stroller she’s pushing, which makes the baby under the canopy wail. The woman glares at me, and I leap back. “Sorry. Sorry. I was only trying to make a point. I didn’t mean to wake your baby.”

  With a sarcastic look at me, Knox leaps to open the door for her.

  The woman says “Thank you” to him and pushes her stroller inside.

  “Well?” Knox says, still holding the door.

  His hidden smile makes my own want to break out, but I won’t l
et it. “I can’t go in there now!”

  He lets the door close. “You’re right. The crying baby is sort of a downside.” He’s trying very hard not to laugh. “I’ll tell Vivi to meet us at With a Twist instead.”

  CHAPTER 22

  Best Friends

  When we get to the frozen yogurt store, Knox puts his hands behind his back. “Go in however you think is best.”

  I pull the door open. “After you.”

  He goes inside but can’t leave it alone. “Thank you. Somehow that didn’t make me feel like you didn’t think I could get in on my own.”

  I scowl. “It’s not the same.”

  “Why not?”

  I haven’t thought this through, so I’m not sure, but it definitely has to do with knowing Knox is never going to get whistled at while walking down the street.

  “Look, I get you were trying to be nice, but when you jump in front of me to grab a door, you make me feel like a girl first and Lilla second.”

  “I can think of you as both Lilla and a girl. I do it all the time. And besides, you holding the door for me didn’t make me feel like you thought of me as just some guy.”

  I take a deep breath, trying to find words that will make sense to him. “It’s different. You holding the door for me is part of a whole thing. Hundreds of years of history that say that I can’t do basic things. Because I’m a girl.”

  “So I should never hold a door for you?”

  “No. If you get there first, you can hold the door, but if I’m already there, don’t push me out of the way to show how polite you are.”

  “Actually, when you say it like that, it sounds pretty reasonable.”

  Vivi comes through the door. “Why aren’t we at the bakery?”

  “Lilla got mad at me and caused a ruckus,” Knox says. “We had to leave.”

  “What did you do?” She doesn’t look at me. We are not okay yet.

  “I held the door for her.”

  “You monster,” she says and goes to get her yogurt.

  “Should I leave?” Knox says as we follow. “Seems like you two have some stuff to work out.”