by Amy Spalding
“Oh my god.” She throws a tote bag at me. We both learn very quickly that empty tote bags are not built for flight. “Do not call him Mustache Paul.”
We laugh until we cry just like we used to years ago when, in a lot of ways, Rachel was my whole world. It’s weird to realize it’s okay that she isn’t anymore.
“Come on,” Rachel says, and I can tell from the look in her eyes that she has An Idea. It feels good to be the little sister ready to follow her again, no matter where that leads.
I sit in the passenger seat of her Honda and watch out the window as she drives down our street and to the edges of our neighborhood. My mind’s awash with possibility: music, art, snacks?
But, no. We’re in an empty parking lot.
“Switch with me,” Rachel says once the car’s in park. I can’t even process what she’s saying before she’s outside and opening the passenger side door.
“Did Mom put you up to this?” I ask. “Did Maliah?”
“No one put me up to it,” she says. “I know you’re scared, and that’s fine. But fear doesn’t always mean that something’s wrong, you know.”
I give her a look. “You’re the one hiding out here.”
“Touché.”
We continue our staring contest.
“I know you want to move to New York,” Rachel says, “and hopefully you will. But sometimes life goes in other directions. Also, you have a whole year until then. Don’t you want some freedom?”
Who doesn’t want freedom? But why does it have to be tied so closely to this one freaking activity?
“Come on,” Rachel continues. “Obviously it would be horrible getting your first driving lesson from Mom or Dad. But it’s me. I’d never lead you astray.”
“Oh, really? You just drove me to an abandoned parking lot in industrial wherever in the middle of the night.”
“It’s seven-thirty, Abby.”
We both laugh. It’s crazy how you could go months without seeing a person and have everything fall right back together this easily.
“Just around the parking lot,” Rachel says. “One loop. If you hate it, we’ll go home and never speak of it again.”
“I find that really hard to believe,” I say, but I unbuckle my seatbelt and get out of the car. It’s jarring to sit down in the driver’s seat, like a mirror image of how things are supposed to look from the front seat. And there’s stuff in the way of everything—my feet and my boobs and my arms. Rachel so calmly explains everything, though, that I can’t deny that nothing feels quite as scary. And before long, I carefully shift the car out of park, take my foot off the brake, and watch the world slowly roll by us.
“You’re doing it!” my sister says, and it hits me that I am.
I make the entire loop around the parking lot, and it sort of happens so quickly that I decide to do it again. We keep going until we’re almost dizzy and then switch spots again for our drive back home.
“I think I’m going back in a few days,” Rachel says as we pull into the driveway.
“You can’t! I have to learn driving on real streets!”
“I promise we’ll do that before I go,” she says. “But you’re already becoming a pro. Now a few lessons with Mom or Dad won’t kill you.”
“But I need you here,” I say, though as the words leave my lips, they don’t exactly ring with truth and urgency. A lot happened without Rachel here, and I survived. It’s funny how having someone back can prove what’s true without them. I hope Rachel’s always sort of my actual bestest best friend, but I also hope that it’s because she wants to be and not that she has to be.
“You’ll be fine,” she says, and then I’m sort of annoyed that she’s older and wiser and has figured all of this out already on her own.
Dad looks up as we walk into the house. “Is this an okay time? Not secret girl stuff going on?”
“If there was, would we tell you?” I ask.
“Excellent point, Abby. So I know we haven’t done this in forever, and you’re both grown up and probably don’t want to spend any time with your dad, but I was thinking about taking a night hike. You guys probably don’t remember, but we used to do that all the time.”
“Dad, that was literally about four years ago,” Rachel says. “I was sixteen. I can remember things from when I was sixteen.”
“I want to go,” I say. “Rachel?”
“Despite my supposed diminished mental capacity, yes, I want to go, too.”
“You’re very funny,” Dad says. “Let me put on my hiking shoes.”
Rachel and I look to each other and burst into laughter. Dad has this ugly pair of brown sneakers he insists are hiking shoes. (They aren’t.)
“Should we ask your mom?” Dad asks, ostensibly, us, but looks right at me.
And I say yes.
CHAPTER 27
Jax wants to go to some random party on Saturday, and I decide it doesn’t sound like the worst thing in the world. I could stand to see people beyond my normal circle, but it’s safer at a Westglen party than a Village Community High one. I’m still too freshly post-breakup to see too many people from school.
“I told Maliah to bring everyone,” Jax tells me in the car. “Ya know, everyone as in Brooke.”
“I hope you specified that to Maliah,” I say. “Because everyone has never actually meant that.”
“Mal gets me,” he says.
“Uh huh. So why do you even like Brooke anyway? And you have to be specific.”
“One, she has a really good laugh. I goddamn love it when girls laugh at my jokes.”
I widen my eyes. “Girls laugh at your jokes?”
“Abby, I’ll have you know I have been very successful with the ladies,” he says. “You’d be surprised.”
“Fine.” I grin at him. “What else?”
“She’s cute, she’s smart, and she’s funny as hell,” he says. “She’s kind of like you but less …”
“Gay?”
Jax almost howls laughing. “I was gonna say difficult. You’re a lot of work. I need approximately five to ten percent less work in a girl.”
“Jax, I say this with all the love in the world, but … You’re the worst.”
I expect him to turn west in pursuit of fancier parts of town, but he’s still following Glendale Boulevard. Maybe someone’s parents live in a posh loft downtown.
“Thanks for making me go out,” I say. “I think I might occasionally need to be bullied into doing the right thing.”
“That’s what I’m here for, bullying. And, speaking of …”
He pulls the car off the street into a red zone. “This is actually weirder to do than it seemed when I helped plan it, but … You’ve gotta get out of the car now.”
“What?”
“Just trust me. You love me and I want the best for you.”
“I can’t go to the party?” I ask. “What’s happening? You’re just dumping me in … wherever we are?”
Actually, I know where we are.
“C’mon,” Jax says, though gently. “Get out of the car.”
I can’t believe I do, but I do. I regret this decision almost immediately, so I knock on his window. He rolls it down but doesn’t unlock the door.
“Give her a chance,” he says. “I’ll wait here.”
“Can’t we just go to the party?”
“Abbs, there’s no party. This is your party. Bam. Outfoxed you.”
Then he rolls up the window so I basically have no choice. I walk toward Pehrspace.
Jordi’s standing right in front, but there’s no crowd tonight. It’s just her. “Hey.”
“Hi.”
“Will you come in?” she asks, and I nod. The usual guy’s at the door, but he just smiles and waves us through. The place is empty besides us.
Jordi’s photos are still on the wall. I caught such a quick glimpse of the ones that weren’t me, but I think they’re all still up. In place of the ones removed are photographs I haven’t seen before. Each frame
holds somewhere I know, though. Lemonberry’s back room. The Chandelier Tree. The sidewalk outside of Folliero’s.
“This was after you,” Jordi says. “My summer without Abby. It looks the same, but … it isn’t.”
“The photos look good,” I say quickly.
“Abby, I’m sorry,” she says. “I should have asked.”
“Yeah,” I say. “You should have.”
“I fucked up,” she says. “I wanted to have the best show possible, and … those were my favorite photos I’ve taken. And, yeah. I knew what you’d say if I asked you, and … I couldn’t have used them if you’d actually said no.”
“These pictures are just as good,” I say with a shrug. “Better.”
“You’re the only one who thinks that,” she says, and a smile slides across her face. I missed that slow smile in my life. “You’re beautiful, Abby. I just wanted to capture that.”
“And have a good photography show,” I say.
“And that. I’m sorry. I’m sorry times a million.”
“I’m sorry I didn’t let you explain,” I say, and something in her expression softens. “I feel like maybe I owed you that? I don’t know. I don’t know any of this.”
“Me either,” she says. “Obviously.”
“It’s hard to think of myself as beautiful.” I’m saying more than I would have imagined sharing with her, with anyone. “People hate fat girls. The way people talk online. The way people will just stare sometimes …”
“That doesn’t make you ugly,” Jordi says. “Fuck those people.”
“I wish it was that easy,” I say. “It’s not always that easy for me.”
“I should have realized that,” she says. “But it’s hard to when I look at you. None of that makes sense when you’re this cute.”
“I feel weird saying that what happened is okay.” I shrug some more. Suddenly it’s all I know how to do. “It wasn’t okay. But I guess it is now. Or I want it to be. Or I’m over it. Or I get it. Or I don’t think you could ever be mean to someone who didn’t deserve it. Or—”
“Abby,” Jordi says and laughs.
“Don’t make fun of me,” I say, but I find myself smiling. “I missed you! I have like a million things to say.”
“Oh, god, me too,” she says. “My parents actually apologized to me.”
“About the arson?”
“Jesus, Abby, it wasn’t arson,” she says, but then she laughs again. “About the fire and the cop, yeah. Honestly, I don’t know what changed. They just finally saw me.”
“I’m really, really glad that happened,” I tell her, and she nods in her understated Jordi way. Did you know you could miss how someone nods?
“I drove a car!” I tell her, and she looks a little disappointed. “What? Aren’t you excited for me?”
“I wanted to be the one to teach you,” she says. “But, yeah. I’m excited for you.”
“I still might not get my license,” I say. “But I’m not scared anymore.”
We watch each other for a few moments.
“Are we okay?” Jordi asks. “If there’s even a we. Should I ask that first?”
I reach out and wind my fingers through hers. “I don’t want to pretend like what happened didn’t happen.”
“Of course not.” Jordi pulls me closer. It’s hard to think with her brown eyes looking right into mine, with her lips so close.
“But I feel bad for not believing you either,” I say. “Or letting you screw up without just ending stuff. Especially after your parents jumped to conclusions about you this summer. I didn’t want to add to that.”
“I’m okay,” she says. “I’m okay if you are.”
I nod. “I’m okay.”
She untangles her hands from mine and then clasps my face. “I love you, Abby.”
“Oh my god,” I say, and it’s a terrible reaction, and then I laugh, which is even worse. “I’m sorry! I just didn’t know if you’d ever—”
She presses her lips to mine. It fills me with relief that she tastes the same. I don’t know why I thought she wouldn’t. I don’t know why I thought that one mistake would alter everything. People make mistakes.
“I should have said it when you did,” Jordi says. “I was worried about the show—and you—and I was surprised, and—”
“I love you too,” I say, and I kiss her. It feels like before; her hair brushes my cheeks and her fingertips touch my face with just enough pressure that I feel held and when I slide my arms around her waist, we curve together as if we were built for each other.
But there’s something new, too; I know that Jordi won’t always have the right thing to say and she knows that I might freak out when she doesn’t. You don’t fall in love with just the good parts, and I know that now.
“Hey, um, you’re probably going to think I’m stupid,” I say. “But maybe now that we’re back together, you should take down the ‘summer without Abby’ photos.”
“Oh,” she says, and I can practically see how hard she’s thinking about what she’ll be able to replace them with.
“And this will make you think I’m even more stupid, and it’s your show and not mine, but … I have an idea of what you should put up in their place.”
Jordi puts all the original photos back up at Pehrspace. She invites everyone again, and I invite everyone else: Maliah and Trevor, Jax, Brooke and Zoe, and even my parents. Rachel’s already back in Boston, posting annoying selfies with Mustache Paul, and I’ve liked every single one of them on Instagram.
The photos of me aren’t actually as big and wall-covering as I remember. They take up a normal amount of space. Maybe even the right amount of space. I don’t look the way I do in mirrors, or in my own selfies. Jordi’s forcing the world to see me as she does, and I realize that in her eyes I’m beautiful.
And I guess it’s possible that it’s not just her. It’s possible I look this way to other people, too. It’s more than possible that I recognize the girl looking back at me in the photos myself.
“Thank you,” Jordi tells me, in the midst of this crowded room. “You didn’t have to.”
“I wanted to,” I say. “I wanted to see your whole show the way you intended it.”
“The way I intended it was to also have a photo of the fire.” She nods in her parents’ direction. “But I figured I shouldn’t push my luck.”
It’s hard to keep it just the two of us when the room is full of people who know us. Our hands stay clasped while we’re inundated with people.
Jax tells Jordi her photos are dope and then hits on Brooke.
Brooke rolls her eyes but I don’t see them apart for the rest of the night.
Jordi’s parents invite me over for dinner next week.
My parents don’t say anything stupid at all, and Mom even asks Jordi if she’s ever worked in food photography.
Maggie asks Jordi and me if we just want to split the part-time hours in the fall. We’ll both barely make any money but we all feel silly that we didn’t think of this solution sooner.
Laine says that I have to reconsider being in some photos for Lemonberry.
I tell her that I’ll consider it. It’s scary, but maybe girls like me should get to see Maggie’s beautiful dresses on someone who looks the way they do.
“Hey, are you guys still doing that app thing?” Jordi asks, looking between Jax and me.
“Hell yeah we are,” Jax says.
“So what’s the best burger?” Maliah asks.
Jax and I glance at each other.
She and Jordi exchange a little glance.
“How do you guys not know?” Jordi asks.
“I dunno,” Jax says. “Haven’t really thought about it.”
“It’s honestly just been really fun eating burgers,” I say. “I wasn’t, like, interested in data.”
We both get out our phones and tap on the Best Blank app.
“Is it just In-N-Out?” Maliah asks.
We nod. “It’s literally just In-N-Out.
”
“Will your dad mind?” I ask Jax.
“Nah. Who is Jackson Stockton Senior to challenge cold, hard, Animal Style data?”
“Animal Style is overrated,” Maliah says, and Trevor makes such a dramatic face that I pray their love survives.
“Can we get in on this?” Brooke asks, and it’s such a good segue for Jax that I shoot him little eye daggers until he turns directly to her. Suddenly it seems like everyone’s arguing over burgers and secret menus and rating systems, and so I lace my fingers back through Jordi’s and pull her away from the crowd.
I kiss her like no one’s watching, because who cares if they are? Tonight, the story isn’t about anyone else.
Tonight, the story is us.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Thank you so, so much to my editor, Nicole Frail, for believing in and loving this book. Thanks as well to Emily Shields, and the rest of the Sky Pony team for your hard work.
As always, thanks to my agent Kate Testerman for your tireless optimism!
Thanks to early readers and cheerleaders: Christie Baugher, Jen Gaska, Jasmine Guillory, Riley Silverman, Sarah Skilton, and Eliza Tiernan. Thanks for everyone who participated in burger research, especially Suzanne Casamento and Marisa Reichardt. Thanks to Jessie Weinberg for cool art! Thanks to Audrey DuBiel and everyone at Audrey K Boutique for all the shop talk! Thank you to my local crew of L.A. YA writers for their friendship and support, including—but not limited to because I know I’ll leave someone important out—Robin Benway, Kayla Cagan, Heather Cocks, Charlotte Huang, Jeff Garvin, Maurene Goo, Aditi Khorana, Kathy Kottaras, Gretchen McNeil, Nicole Maggi, Morgan Matson, Jessica Morgan, Isabel Quintero, Lilliam Rivera, and Zan Romanoff. Thank you to the Fight Me Club for the venting and the wisdom. Thanks to my mom, Pat Spalding, for all her support.
And to all the girls who worry they take up too much space: you don’t.
