by Lara Chapman
The absurdity of it has my head swimming.
“Hel-lo?” Kristen snaps her fingers to get my attention. “Did you hear what I said?”
I nod slowly. “I think I heard you say that you want me to write to him on Facebook as you.”
“Right!”
“You want me to log on to your Facebook account and reply to his messages as if I’m you and keep that conversation going … without your input.”
“Exactly,” she says, nodding her head in satisfaction.
“This doesn’t strike you as the tiniest bit deceitful?”
“Of course not! It’s not like you’re hacking into my account. I’m giving you my sign-on. You totally have my permission.”
I stay silent, unsure what to say, knowing that nothing will change her mind. And until I agree, she’ll make my life miserable.
“You’re the only one I trust,” she says. “We’ll confirm him right now, then I’ll text you when he sends a message so you can log on and get busy writing. Okay?”
She mistakes my silence for agreement. “I love you!” With a quick hug, she jumps off the couch and heads up the stairs to my bedroom and my laptop.
I look quietly at the space where Kristen sat, seriously contemplating a mad dash to the car. Of all the mind-numbing schemes she has roped me into, none of them put me at risk of getting hurt. Not like this.
“Sarah!” Kristen screams over the balcony. “I need you to unlock the laptop. Pronto!”
Blowing hair out of my eyes, I stomp up the stairs like a grouchy child. When I walk into my bedroom, Kristen’s sitting on the bed, laptop open to the log-in screen. I sit down next to her, grab the computer, and reluctantly type in my password.
“Happy?” I grumble.
“Yes, yes, yes!” In a span of three seconds, she logs on to Facebook and confirms Rock as a friend. I manage to sneak a peek at his profile picture and instantly wish I hadn’t. Seeing his face churns the dread settled in the pit of my stomach.
“Okay,” Kristen says, eyes glued to the computer screen. “Let’s see what happens.”
“Chill. It’s not like he’s just sitting at the computer waiting for you to confirm him,” I say, grabbing the bagel from the bag and picking off the crusty sweet cinnamon from the top. My favorite breakfast, hands down. Kristen knows all my weaknesses.
“Omigod!” Kristen shouts, scaring me so badly I lose my grip on the bagel. “He sent me a message. Look, look!”
Already? Maybe he was waiting for her reply. My heart immediately jumps into overdrive and I take a deep breath to steel myself for the words I’m about to read. I lean closer to read Rock’s message.
Good to hear from you, gorgeous. I had a great time last night. Since we only have one class together, I propose we start a round of Twenty Questions, a game my family played on road trips. Actually, we still play it. The way it works is I’ll send you a question, you answer, then ask your own question.
I’ll start.
If you had one day left in this world, how would you spend it?
In spite of the fear splayed across Kristen’s face, I grin. It’s an awesome question and I would love to know Rock’s answer. I picture him somewhere quiet with his family. Maybe reading or writing or something equally peaceful at the edge of the lake, wearing nothing but swim trunks, his dark skin soaking up the summer sun …
“Um, that’s supereasy. Shopping.” Kristen smiles triumphantly.
My head snaps sideways, trying to focus on Kristen because that’s who this is about. Not me. “Come again?”
“Shopping. What else is there?”
“Well, considering this would be your last day on Earth, I’m not sure shopping is the best use of your time. You’ll only have a day to enjoy what you bought.”
“That’s the beauty of it; charge all day with no regrets,” she says with a wink. “But I get your point. I guess I’d do something with you and my mom.”
I pull the laptop from Kristen and reread the question to myself. “What do you really want to say?” I ask.
“I don’t have a good answer, Sarah. Just write what you would do. I’m sure whatever it’ll be he’ll love it.”
“You can’t be serious,” I tell her, eyes narrowed in disbelief.
“Of course I’m serious. Now get busy,” she says, snapping her fingers playfully. “I’ll grab you a Diet Coke while you play me.”
I watch Kristen skip—yes, skip—out of the room.
Feeling like a total fake, I study the blank screen for what seems like an eternity before finding the words. My words.
I love these kinds of games. I’m in.
I’ve actually thought about this question a lot and my answer is pretty simple. Nothing too extravagant, too flashy. If I only had one day left to live, I would take my closest friends and my mom and spend the day at the beach in Kauai. Mom took me there when I was younger and it was the most beautiful, most relaxing place I’d ever seen. My only caveat is that I want a full twenty-four hours there, so my day starts after I get off the plane.
Now for my question … What is the worst thing someone has ever done to you?
Tag, you’re it!
Love, Sarah
“Wait!” Kristen screams from behind me. I hadn’t even heard her come into the room, so I nearly have a heart attack.
“Geez, are you trying to kill me? You scared the crap out of me.” I lean back on the bed and take a deep breath. “What’s the problem?”
“Hel-lo! You signed your name, doofus!”
I turn my eyes back to the screen and stare in shock at my mistake. “This is exactly why we shouldn’t be doing this.”
“It’s fine,” she says. “Quick fix. Just change the name and send it.”
I glance over my words again, then click Send before I come to my senses.
And that one little click, something I’ve done a million times before, feels like I hammered the first nail in my own coffin.
Jacobi booms like he’s announcing the president of the United States. “Today marks a new beginning. Today, we will begin our study of one of the most tortured love stories ever written. The Scarlet Letter is timeless, a lesson in regret, in morality, in love.” He finishes with a loud clap of his hands. “Let’s get started.”
I open my copy of the novel, a little bubble of excitement bouncing around in my chest. There’s nothing I love more than the anticipation of starting a new adventure. Even if it’s in a classroom. I know, I’m a total geek.
As I read along with Jacobi, I grow increasingly frustrated. Not by the book, but by my hair. I let it dry naturally this morning, so it’s a little out of control, loose and curly, hanging in my face as I try to read, forcing me to spend half my time pulling it back and holding it out of the way. I finally twist my hair and use a pencil to hold it in place.
“Stop fidgeting with it. It’s fine,” Rock whispers from behind me.
His warm breath tickles my neck and I look over my shoulder to face the grinning god known as Kristen’s boyfriend. “What?”
“Your hair.”
I shrug, refusing to let a single kind word settle itself in my heart.
“Your assignment today is a paired discussion,” Jacobi announces after he closes his tattered copy of the novel.
“We’re partners, right?” Rock asks, like I’d actually consider pairing up with anyone else. It may be pure and utter torture, but what the hell. Sign me up.
I nod without turning around to face him. The last thing I need is for Jacobi to catch me not paying attention again.
“Your assignment is to discuss the quotes I give you. With your partner, I expect you to dissect the quote and talk about its meaning, its implication in the story. I also want you to think about whether or not the quote is relevant in today’s society. Please get in your pairs and get to work.”
I grab the pencil from my hair before turning to face Rock.
When Jacobi hands Rock our quotes, I lean forward in an attempt to read them u
pside down. Hawthorne’s writing isn’t as hard to understand as Shakespeare’s, but one of the things I’ve learned from being in Jacobi’s class is that he doesn’t accept pat answers.
Rock shifts the paper so I can see it better and then reads the first quote aloud. “One token of her shame would but poorly serve to hide another.”
He reads it with the ease of a college professor, with the exact intonation and meaning rarely heard from the lips of a high school senior. Especially a guy. When he reads the second quote, my eyes are shamelessly fixed on his face, his lips.
“Ah, but let her cover the mark as she will, the pang of it will be always in her heart.”
Lord have mercy.
Kristen is the luckiest girl that ever lived. Honest to God.
“So,” Rock says, breaking up my mental pity party. “Want to start with the first one?”
I nod, then look back at the quote. Anything but back into those mind-melting, heart-stopping, deep brown eyes.
One token of her shame would but poorly serve to hide another.
“What do you think?” he asks.
“Seems like he’s trying to say you can’t ever really hide your mistakes.”
Rock nods, studying my face and making me feel completely uncomfortable. Still, I watch him watch me, looking for any telltale sign that he’s studying my nose. But he doesn’t. I swear he’s looking into my eyes.
“Yeah,” he says solemnly. “The scarlet letter isn’t the only evidence of her mistake. There’s still her daughter.”
“Makes sense. Think it’s true today?” I ask.
Rock bites his lip in a seriously enticing way, making me wonder exactly how he kissed Kristen. Did he hold her face? Did he put his hands in her hair as he brought her face to his? I fight the burn of tears in my eyes. Talk about a tortured love story.
“In a way,” he says. “Not exactly like Hester’s situation. Girls get pregnant all the time and don’t get married. It’s not considered a sin to have sex out of marriage these days.”
Just the mere mention of sex sends a heat to my face I can’t hide. What am I? Twelve?
In an effort to detract from my own scarlet display, I tag his thoughts with mine. “But I think, in a lot of ways, what he’s saying is still true. I mean, we all make mistakes, but it’s almost impossible to hide them. Really hide them.”
“You’re right,” Rock agrees. “Definitely true. When I first got my license, I was backing up one foggy morning and hit my dad’s car. Dented it all to hell.”
“Uh-uh,” I say, shaking my head, a smile creeping onto my face. I can just picture a younger Rock in full panic. “What’d you do?”
“I thought I could lie my way through it. Took off before Dad came out and then acted surprised when he told me about it that night.”
“Get out.”
“Serious. Of course, he’d known the second he’d laid eyes on the dent. He strung me along for a couple of days, building up the cost of the body work that had to be done. I was sweating like a heroin addict in detox.”
“You finally spilled your guts?” I ask, laughing.
He shrugs. “Eventually I figured out he knew, so there wasn’t any sense hiding it anymore. When he told me the paint from my green truck left a ten-inch mark on the side of his white car, I couldn’t believe I’d been so stupid.”
“It’s amazing what we let ourselves believe.” I’m a shining example.
“You’d never do anything that stupid,” he says with a smile.
“You have no idea,” I mutter. But we’re not even going to get into how stupid I can be.
Rock turns the paper back so he can see it better, then rereads the second quote. “Ah, but let her cover the mark as she will, the pang of it will be always in her heart.”
“You first,” I say.
“It’s about living with your choices, good or bad.”
“Hester made a horrible choice.”
“For the right reasons,” Rock adds quickly.
“Which makes it even more heartbreaking. Knowing you did the wrong thing for the right reason doesn’t go far in making you feel any better.”
“You don’t think?” he asks, searching my face again. And this time, he does it. His serious eyes settle on my nose and my heart sinks.
“No,” I say, moving my head so we’re face-to-face. Head on, my nose always looks smaller. I should know—I’ve studied it from every possible angle.
“Explain,” he says, eyes back on mine. And it surprises me when he doesn’t apologize or offer some lame comment about my “distinctive” nose, like everyone else.
“About a year ago, I was picking up some things at the grocery store. There was this woman in the same aisle as me and I could tell she was poor, maybe homeless. Her son pulled a jar of peanut butter off the shelf and tried to open it, but she took it from him and put it back on the shelf. He started crying about how hungry he was, so she picked him up and hugged him close, whispering something in his ear. I looked away to get what I needed and when I turned back around, I watched her put that jar of peanut butter in her purse. When she saw me, I could tell she was scared, you know? Worried I was going to rat her out. But I just smiled and walked to the check-out stand. I never said anything to anyone about that. Not even Mom, now that I think about it. That event’s been ingrained in my mind. The pain and guilt in that mother’s eyes haunted my dreams for months afterward. It breaks my heart to think that’s someone’s reality.”
“Wow,” he says softly.
“So doing the wrong thing—like my not reporting her or her taking the peanut butter—still makes you feel bad, even when you do it for the right reason.”
“Point made,” he says, then reaches up and rubs my arm in a move of total compassion. The warmth of his hand on me freezes me in place. Never before have I been affected by someone’s touch like this.
Never.
On the way to lunch after lit, I do my best to keep the conversation with Rock light. Casual. Like I’m okay with him kissing my best friend.
And I must do a pretty good job, because the second we see Kristen waiting for us outside the cafeteria, he takes two big steps toward her, leaving me behind.
I can’t pull my eyes away from the train wreck taking place right in front of me.
Rock reaching for Kristen, taking her hand.
Rock leaning close and whispering something in her ear.
Rock pulling her in for a quick hug.
It’s more than I can stomach, and I turn to escape. But I’m not quick enough.
“Where do you think you’re going?” Rock calls out, hand in hand with Kristen, proving he’s still a guy and completely unaware of how agonizing this is for me.
I stop in my tracks and turn to face him. “Um …”
“Come on,” Kristen says, smiling bright enough to burn my fair skin. “You have to eat.”
I follow the embarrassingly happy couple into the cafeteria, wishing like hell I’d been smart enough to think of somewhere else to be. I mean, I’m about as tough a girl you’ll ever find, but this is enough to wear me down.
By the time we make it to the table, I’ve totally lost my appetite. I do my best to play the supportive friend, like I’m happy to see Kristen in such obvious bliss. And it’s not that I don’t want her to be happy; I totally do. Always have, always will.
I was taught that friends are the most important people in your life because you get to choose them. Mom’s words.
Mom never really had a best friend. Not as an adult, at least. She said she got burned by a friend when she first started in journalism and it must have been a scorcher, because the memory of that betrayal has kept her from trusting other women ever since.
She always taught me to take care of my friends. “Good friends you can trust are rare,” she says. And she’s right, of course. The hallways of this building are littered with superficial girls interested only in themselves. And they’ll claw their way right over you to get what they want, r
egardless of who gets hurt in the process. I don’t want to be that person to Kristen, the kind of person who would turn on her best friend, who’d throw away a lifelong friendship for selfish reasons.
Kristen and I have always stuck together.
Nothing’s beautiful from every point of view.
—HORACE
Chapter Eleven
Despite the fact I’m surrounded by more than fifty kids in the library, I don’t have to turn around to know Kristen’s walking up behind me. The floral scent of her perfume is the only announcement I need. Well, that and the energy radiating off of her. It’s like having the sun at your back.
“Sit down,” I say, never raising my eyes from the Emily Dickinson book opened on the old chipped table in front of me. I definitely don’t want any trouble with our cranky librarian, Mrs. English.
Kristen takes two quick hops and practically bounces in the seat. “Put the book down,” she whispers, yanking it from my hands and slamming it shut.
“Rude,” I growl.
“Necessary,” she singsongs, eyes dancing like a toddler who’s just been given her first dollhouse. “It’s e-mail–writing time.”
I’m shaking my head before she finishes. It was bad enough I did it once and brought them closer together. Then add the texting and Facebook … it’s gone too far already. “N. O.”
“Whatever,” she says, totally dismissing me, which makes me even more resolute.
“I’m serious, Kristen. This is wrong. What if he finds out?”
“How would that ever happen? Are you planning to tell him?” she asks, arms crossed over her chest sullenly.
“Hardly,” I scoff.
“Then what’s the problem? What he doesn’t know won’t hurt him.”
“Something tells me he might disagree.”
Kristen turns her attention to the last page in her math folder. She shoves it in front of me ceremoniously, like she’s just presented me with the winning lottery ticket.
I refuse to look down at the notebook, choosing instead to nail her with a deadly serious this-isn’t-happening look.
