This Is All Your Fault, Cassie Parker

by Terra Elan McVoy

  When we arrive at Aja’s house, Evie leads us straight across the street to the neighborhood pool, where there’s music, kids laughing and splashing in the water, and a grill full of hot dogs and hamburgers. She introduces us to Aja’s dad, and points out a bunch of other girls we know. Seeing them makes me excited to be back in chorus again, and as I wave and say hi, I notice several other kids I wasn’t aware Aja was friends with. I say so to Evie.

  “Kendra’s not the only one who can have a big party this weekend.” She raises her eyebrow in a grown-up way. “Lots of people are here just because of that.”

  The unexpected mention of my redheaded nemesis pulls Cassie back to the front of my mind. Is she at Kendra’s today too? Does she know they were making fun of her at the mall? Or is she siting there sipping fizzy punch and tugging her swimsuit top, having no idea how they really feel? Does she still even like Cory, or has that changed for her, the way my feelings for Tyrick have? What would we tell each other, if we somehow were able to talk about these parties later? Do we still have anything in common, or is everything just too different now?

  My trance is broken when I see Aja with River and a few other kids over by the grill, laughing at something River’s friend is saying. Tyrick isn’t with them, so probably he’s not even here, which is a relief but a little disappointing. Aja glances up in a giggle, and our eyes meet. She’s surprised to see me, but glad, and shy, and something else. Maybe sorry. I have the feeling all those same expressions are happening on my face, too, so I lift my hand in a wave, but a girl walks in front of me with a plate of food, and in that brief second, Aja’s attention shifts back to the kids she’s with. Somehow, though, it doesn’t bother me. Maybe we don’t need a big makeup with lots of hugging and tears. Maybe we can have had our disagreements, and still be friends anyway. We can keep revising our friendship until we find something that works for both of us.

  “Should we eat first?” Evie asks.

  “Or get in the pool,” Sanders says, like that’s the real answer.

  They look to me to make the final vote, but I can’t say anything, because there’s Tyrick, coming straight over.

  “Hey, Fiona.”

  I’m so surprised. Not only to see him, but that he walked right up.

  “Hey,” I say.

  “How’s your summer been?” He kicks one foot against the other, unable to look me in the eye. I feel suddenly glad I wore my one-piece instead of my tankini. It would make me even more self-conscious than I am right now.

  “Good?” It’s true now, but it also hasn’t been, and I have no idea how much of that I could explain to him.

  “Yeah.”

  He still can’t look at me. I remember liking him so much, and then not liking him, and now feeling unsure what to think about him at all. I’m wishing I could back out of this conversation without making either of us feel worse, when a hand stretches around my side to shake with Tyrick.

  “I’m Sanders,” he says, stepping closer. “You a writer too?”

  Tyrick seems baffled by Sanders’s friendly directness. He’s also eyeing him like he’s trying to tell if Sanders is my date or not. But Sanders jumps straight into the conversation as easily as he does with everyone else, explaining to Tyrick how we met in writing camp, and all the stories we wrote. Evie chimes in next about our jump off Teamer Cliff, and that Sanders inspired us, which makes Tyrick’s eyes go wide in an impressed way. Before long our whole conversation flows from daredevil acts to the most terrifying roller coaster we’ve ever been on, and then what we’ll do after the robot takeover.

  Finally we get into the pool, but not long after Sanders gets hungry, so since he’s my guest I join him to scarf down a couple of hot dogs. Evie’s still in the water, crammed inside a giant inner tube with four other girls, all of them singing Beyoncé. They’re sticking to the shallow end so they don’t get jumped on by the kids taking running leaps off the diving board, including Tyrick.

  “Tyrick is cool,” Sanders says, watching him.

  “You think so?”

  “Sure.” Sanders shrugs. “Not as cool as you, but still.”

  We trade smiles. Talking things out has been a theme for me lately, but I know there’s no need to tell Sanders the whole uncomfortable arc with Tyrick. Especially not that I used to write down every single thing he said in English class.

  “And he likes you.” Sanders looks at me, sly.

  I flush. It’s embarrassing that Sanders noticed, but somehow pleasing too. So does that mean I want Tyrick to still like me? Is there a way I could ever like him again?

  “Come on.” Sanders puts his empty plate down on the nearby table. “This party needs some ninjas.”

  He makes a sudden lunge for the edge of the pool, leaping into the air at the last minute and screaming an ancient Japanese curse. He manages not to land on anyone, but the giant splash he creates cascades over a dozen different kids, including Evie and her inner-tube girls. At first it seems they might be mad about it, but within moments, the pool is full of the most legendary splash war ever. The second I slip into the shallow end with Evie, there’s so much water flying around I’m immediately soaked by people I can barely see. So I get into it too. We thrash and thrash at each other, choking and laughing, not caring who we’re aiming at. Someone hits my arm. I feel my legs kicking against another person. It’s a giant free-for-all, and no one cares who likes who, or who knows who else—only that we’re having fun. A lot of it.

  Eventually the splashing dies down, and somebody calls for a game of survivor. As kids argue over who gets to be shark and who’s submarine, I catch Tyrick looking my way from the other side of the pool. I smile, and roll my eyes to show I think the fighting’s silly. He smiles back. But then Aja yells, “Go,” and there’s nothing but the game, until the shadows start getting a little longer, and parents appear in Aja’s curved driveway across the street.

  “Bye, Fiona,” Tyrick calls as he’s leaving with River and two other boys.

  I wave, and Evie elbows me, but I swallow the smile that wants to bloom up, because I’m still not sure about him.

  Above us, Aja’s standing at the top of the stairs like a queen, wrapped in a towel and thanking everyone for coming as they leave. Looking at her standing there so tall and regal and happy, I feel like giving her a small hug before I go.

  “It was nice of you to invite me,” I say when I get up the steps.

  Beads of water are glimmering in her dark twists. “I’m glad you were here.”

  There’s more to say—that I’m genuinely glad she’s with River, and that it was nice for her to be so invested in me and Tyrick at first. Maybe also I want to say I’m sorry, though I’m not sure about what exactly. But I lose my chance to say anything, because two other girls come up to thank her for the party too. From the look we exchanged when I first got here, and how she’s being now, though, I can tell she understands.

  I slip away from Aja behind the other girls and head to the sidewalk where Evie and Sanders are waiting. I know as good as it is to talk things out with people, sometimes it’s just as good to let them pass: to accept that things are different, without saying anything at all, in your diary or anywhere else.

  What if, I write before bed since I can’t stop thinking it, I had been able to say any of those negative things to you, before? Would it have made a difference, hearing them from me instead of her? Would we have survived?

  Getting back into the groove with Evie and Aja crams my mind and my feed with messages and photos, pushing out any lingering thoughts I might still be having of Cassie. Evie invites us to a slumber party at her house, and Aja suggests we do horseback riding on the beach before school starts. Plus one more round of back-to-school shopping, and a return to Room for Dessert. It reminds me that I want to see some of my writing camp friends before summer ends, so I suggest a big group movie outing. I ask Leelu to help us pick which film, so that we can take her along, too.

  When we’re back at Mom’s Monday, right
away she says I look like a changed person.

  “You weren’t in San Francisco that long,” I say.

  “But you were one unhappy little flower last time I saw you.”

  I agree, but assure her things are different. I sit at the little counter between our living room and the kitchen, and while she puts together dinner, I tell her all about Aja’s party—including the parts about Tyrick. Mom listens, asks questions, and offers guidance in the same way she has before, but it feels like she’s listening more too. Like Dad was.

  When I move to fetch plates from the cabinet and set the table, Mom reaches out and takes my chin in her hand.

  “You’re such a lovely, grown-up girl. Do you know that?”

  I remember Dad saying something similar. And feeling it myself, at Aja’s pool party.

  I nod.

  “And I’m very proud of you.”

  She hugs me tight, her fierce strength holding me close. But for the first time I can feel strength pulsing out from me, too.

  Mom loosens our hold. “Your sister should help with the silverware, don’t you think?”

  I smile and skip down the hall to stick my head in our room.

  “Leelu, time to set the table.”

  She doesn’t look up from the game she’s playing. “Let me finish this. And your phone was ringing.”

  I tell her dinner’s mostly ready, but I also take a second to quickly check my screen. I figure it’s Evie making official plans for the coming weekend, but when I look under missed calls, there’s Cassie’s picture, smiling at me.

  I haven’t seen this photo in so long, it seems like a trick. I took it of her last fall, when we went apple picking with her family—a trip Cassie suggested, because it was around the time Dad bought his new house, and she hoped it would cheer me up. She’s sitting high in one of the trees, surrounded by leaves and yellow-skinned apples. The sun is glinting in her eyes and in her hair. She looks pretty, and happy, and best of all, relaxed.

  Staring at the golden image, I think, I don’t know this girl anymore.

  And also, I miss her.

  “Girls, it’s time,” Mom calls from the hallway, close to impatient.

  I decide to wait until after dinner to figure out what to do about Cassie. Partly because I don’t know what to say to her, but also because Mom really doesn’t like postponing our dinner schedule. Even Leelu hops off the bed and rushes out. When we’ve finished cleaning up from dinner, though, and she and Leelu are settling in together on the couch, I excuse myself to my room.

  “What are you up to?” Mom wants to know.

  I consider not telling her. Not because I’m hiding, or even because I think she’d jump into advising mode, but because I’m honestly not positive what I’ll do next. I just want to look at that picture again, see if I feel the same way.

  “Cassie called me,” I confess.

  Mom’s surprised, too. “And?”

  “And I was thinking of calling her back.”

  “Do you need to talk about it?” The warm understanding in her eyes says more than she needs to with words.

  “I think I’m okay right now,” I tell her.

  Mom turns her attention back to Leelu and the remote. “Well, you know where to find me if you need me. If you speak with her, I hope it goes well.”

  Saying out loud that I’m talking to Cassie still doesn’t help me understand what will happen when I do. To stall, I open my old diary, and then the butterfly journal I’ve been writing in since camp, flipping through entries in both and looking for inspiration. I read over my whole summer, remembering my agony and laughing a little about it, too. There are angry thoughts, and sad ones. Happy ones, as well. Parts where I sound like I don’t know if I can be friends again with Cassie, and some where I hope I will. So much isn’t cut-and-dry, only frustrating because nothing is clear. I turn another page, to the entry about the cliff, when I wrote about Evie: she’s changed and I’m changed but we’re still together, the same friends but both of us somehow different.

  When Cassie answers, she sounds as nervous as I feel. “Fiona?”

  “Hi. I saw you called.”

  “I didn’t want to just leave a voice mail.”

  “We were having dinner.”

  “Oh.” There’s a pause. “How are you?” she asks.

  I still don’t trust her, so I don’t know how to answer this honestly.

  “I’m fine. What about you?”

  “We’re in Maine.”

  I try to picture it. “Maine?” Mom said Cassie had gone on a trip, but I had no idea she was going that far.

  “Yeah, it’s a long story, but my vacation with Nono and Grandpa Howe got a little—redirected.”

  “Oh.”

  We’re both quiet. Maybe she’s remembering, like I am, that I don’t know anything about her grandparents’ wedding, let alone this honeymoon. Or why she’s suddenly calling him “Grandpa.”

  “My cousin’s here,” she says. “Lana.”

  “Yeah?”

  “You would like her. She’s really—well, anyway. She reminds me of you.”

  I wait, feeling a bunch of mixed things moving too fast to identify.

  “She’s the one who suggested I call.”

  When I still don’t say anything, she makes a sighing noise—more sad than annoyed.

  “Could we see each other?” she asks.

  “Okay,” I say. Even though I’m not sure what that would be like. I try to picture inviting her over, going to Room for Dessert and splitting a cookie-dough brownie, or any of the other things we used to do together. It’s hard to imagine us there now. While some of this conversation feels a little like old times, I know we can’t immediately go back to the same activities, the same closeness we had. At least, not right away.

  “Maybe we should go skating,” I say.

  “On the boardwalk?” There’s a little of the old Cassie disapproval in her voice.

  “No, I mean at the rink.”

  “Does anybody go there? I don’t think it’s still open.”

  “Leelu loves it. We went the other night.”

  “How is ol’ Loodeeloo?”

  “She’s good. We’ve been spending more time together, which I’m glad about since—you know. Since school’s starting again soon.” I’d been about to say “since Jennifer will be around all the time now,” until I remembered Cassie doesn’t know about the engagement. Or Disneyland, even.

  “Well, if Leelu’s into it, I guess it’s all right,” she says. “And at least we know we won’t run into Kendra Mack.”

  When we both laugh, I discover I actually like the sound of it: our voices carefully merging, even if only for a few seconds, back together.

  Chapter Twenty

  The night Cassie and I are supposed to go skating, I’m nervous. We haven’t talked since her phone call, but she has shared some photos during their long drive back from Maine. The super-friendly ones of her and Lana surprise me, at first, and for a second I wonder if Kendra and I have simply been replaced by this thick-haired girl with her happy, open smile, but the more I examine them (and tell Mom my concerns), the more I think Lana looks like someone I might want to know myself. I definitely admire the checkered cap she has on in some of the pictures, anyway. And if Cassie has a new best friend whom I actually like this time, maybe that won’t be so bad. After all, if we find a way to make up, I’ll want her to be friends with Evie, and Sanders, too.

  Part of what makes me nervous, though, is understanding that just because Cassie and I are meeting up, it doesn’t mean things are going back to the old way they were. Even from our stilted phone call, I can tell from Cassie’s voice that she’s not the same. And she knows I’m not, either. When we finally really talk, there may be things that don’t fit anymore—things we’ll have to share with other friends instead.

  But what if the new me and the new her won’t go together at all? Even if we’re willing to revise a hundred times, what if we can’t turn this into a stor
y that has a good ending?

  To calm myself down on the way over, I lean across to show Leelu the latest pictures of me, Evie, and Aja. I remind myself that Aja and I had our own kind of break, and we’re okay now, even if we’re both different.

  I just hope there’s enough left of the old Cassie, and the old Fiona, to help tie the new parts together.

  Cassie’s not there yet when we arrive, but I pay for our admission so Leelu can go straight to joining her friends. The skating rink is more crowded than it was the last time we were here, and to my surprise there are even some kids I recognize from school. As Leelu changes into her skates, I watch for Cassie. I wonder if she’ll look different. What she’ll be wearing. It took me forever to choose an outfit from the new stuff I’ve gotten over the summer, and I’m still not sure about these yellow leggings or the T-shirt dress I got at Plato’s Closet covered in lemons and tangerines. Cassie will probably think, especially with the red beret, that it’s all too noisy, but I’m telling myself it’s a good combo of the old and the new. If she says something snarky it will just be a sign.

  A couple of minutes later I see her walking up to the entrance, and am surprisingly relieved she looks a lot the same. At least, her hair and clothes do—sophisticated and stylish as always, especially with those long beaded earrings. But her face seems less harsh, and definitely less confident, even though she’s wearing a little makeup. The windows facing the parking lot are mirrored on the outside, so I watch her undetected. Walking up, she definitely doesn’t look like the jaunty, cocky girl who made fun of me for dressing up like a princess during Spirit Week.

  “Hey, Cassie,” I call as soon as she’s through the glass door.

  She flinches at the sound of her name, but smiles in relief when she sees me waving.