Keeping Up Appearances

by Elizabeth Stevens

  Thankfully, Xander didn’t say anything. He just held me, rubbing my arm or kissing my temple now and then comfortingly. I had to admit there was something I liked far too much about it. But then, there was something about Xander I seemed to like far too much, too. Even if we were wrong for each other.

  e

  The next day, I was too busy staring at a highly inconsolable Nancy as Jess awkwardly patted her shoulder that I didn’t see Jason before I’d run into him.

  We both blinked, cleared our throats, and took a hurried step back.

  “Sorry,” he started.

  I shook my head. “These things happen.” I started walking away.

  “No. I meant I’m sorry about everything.”

  I stopped and my heart was the first one brave (or stupid) enough to look at him. “Pardon?”

  “I’m sorry about everything. I… I didn’t handle any of this well.”

  “Shouldn’t you be less worried about apologising to King Douche’s girlfriend and more worried that yours is crying?” I asked, nodding in Nancy’s direction.

  Jason opened his mouth, closed it, and nodded. “Yeah. We’re not… I…” He sighed. “I broke up with her.”

  I blinked in total surprise. “You did what?”

  He shrugged and shuffled his feet awkwardly. “I just got the feeling like I didn’t know her anymore.”

  “Yeah, there’s a bit of that going around,” I muttered.

  “I got you were being a dick, but I didn’t think that warranted the way she was acting and the things she said about you.”

  I nodded, deciding I wasn’t going to nit-pick about who was a dick first. Although, I guessed Jason didn’t know that Nancy had been a dick first. I was so over everything that I really didn’t think he needed his eyes opened to just how much of a dick his girlfriend was. He’d wanted her? That had been his choice to make. Not sticking up for me? Well, that was maybe not entirely his fault.

  “It’s fine. What else is high school for if not finding yourself, making poor decisions and spreading a million unjustified rumours?” I asked sarcastically.

  I was starting to see that pretty much every rumour I’d ever heard about anyone was unjustified bullshit. All the scandalous ones anyway. Okay, when I say starting to see, I was like one hundred percent sure. Well, maybe ninety percent. Either way, I was done judging people based on rumours; my new philosophy was that if I didn’t know you, I wasn’t qualified to have an opinion about you.

  Jason gave me a ghost of a smile, but there was more apology in it than anything else. “I don’t know what happened to make her act that way. I thought maybe something else had happened between you two–”

  “It did,” I interrupted, thinking now was as good a time as any to bare my heart for him. Not literally, get up. “Aside from years of conversation, she spent the whole of that Sunday helping me to work up the courage to tell you how I really felt.”

  Jason had been watching me the way people do when they think they know sort of what you’re going to say. But, at that, his whole face changed and I could see it was the last thing he was expecting.

  “How you really felt?” he asked slowly.

  I nodded, thinking that maybe unearthing one of Nancy’s lies wouldn’t be more trouble than it was worth. “Yep. Nancy spent the whole day helping me to decide how best to tell you I’d always loved you. I was about to do just that when I saw you kissing her at her locker.”

  He was staring at me like I’d told him I’d been a dragon this whole time and everyone but him had been able to see the real me. My heart, in a moment of delirium I’m sure, tried breathing fire. Unsurprisingly, it didn’t work.

  “What?” he breathed. Then he chuckled. “No. You never…?”

  I sighed. I had a feeling of detachment from it all now, at least when it came to Jason. Whether he’d known and ignored it or never known, I wondered now if I’d never really been in love with Jason and that it was Nancy’s betrayal that had stung in the whole saga of them getting together. Jason had really only hurt me by not sticking up for me when it seemed such an easy thing for King Douche to do.

  “Oh, no. I did. Well,” I amended, “I thought I did. I was convinced that I was madly in love with you, that I would always be madly in love with you. I was going to tell you that Monday morning after Nancy and I had practised what I was going to say all the previous day.”

  “But, Nancy and I were already together by–”

  “I know. I know that now.”

  “But, Nancy said…”

  I huffed in annoyance. “I am super sick of hearing about ‘Nancy said’, Jason. Seriously, what did she do to you that made you lose everything that made you…you?”

  He looked at me in sharper focus. “She said you didn’t like me.”

  Now, it was my turn to be shocked and confused. “What?”

  “For years, she told me you didn’t like me. Not like that. Not like I liked you. I thought if anyone would know it would be her. I tried not to annoy her with it, but she seemed to just be able to see it and she told me she asked you again and how you felt hadn’t changed. I…” He scoffed. “I liked you for so long, Holly. I got to a point I assumed you knew and you were just pretending you didn’t so it made things easier. So, I hid it because I didn’t want you to feel weird about it.”

  My heart had fallen on its arse at this point in complete shock, all thoughts of moving away to become a dragon and rescue princesses forgotten. My brain was frozen and had zero thoughts. None. It was empty. My surprise had just sent any and all thoughts packing.

  But, that was fine because Jason kept talking. “So, when we were at Teagan’s party and somehow we ended up kissing…?” He shrugged. “I just kind of felt it was the right thing to do to ask her out?”

  Of course he had. Because he was, deep down, the Jason I’d known forever. Mostly.

  “It’s not like you got her pregnant,” I joked without thinking, then grimaced; the Holly he knew would probably never had said something like that. That sort of remark was entirely Xander’s fault.

  Jason looked me over with a small smile, but it was sad. “He’s been good for you.”

  I frowned. “What?”

  “King Douche. You look… I don’t really know how to explain it. But, you seem more…confident. I see you laugh more. I guess he was the right guy for you after all?”

  I swallowed hard. “Jason, I…” I sighed, knowing I had to be honest. “I thought I was in love with you. But, I wasn’t. I’m not going to go all teen rom-com on you and say something ridiculous like Xander’s shown me what real love is. But, as much as the Bows hate me, I get to just be myself around them, around Xander. I was about as low in their opinion as it was possible to get so I stopped trying to impress them. But, it didn’t matter. They started to like me anyway.” Something knocked into the back of my stunned heart, but I didn’t quite understand it yet.

  “You weren’t yourself around us?”

  It was my turn for apologetic smiles now. “I thought I was. I thought I fit in perfectly. I thought I was happy… And, I guess I wasn’t unhappy. But, it wasn’t until I didn’t feel like it was worth trying to impress anyone – that I knew they couldn’t think any less of me – that I realised there were parts of myself I…didn’t advertise. And, weirdly enough, the Bows actually accepted me anyway. Most of them.”

  “Holly, I’m sorry.”

  I shrugged. “It’s not your fault I was a shallow idiot. Well, I’m probably still a shallow idiot in many ways, but I’m trying to work on that.”

  “You think I’m a shallow idiot?”

  “I think Nancy’s a shallow idiot and I’d like to think we didn’t know any better.” I shrugged again. “I don’t know. We’re teenagers, aren’t we supposed to be shallow idiots?”

  He gave me a sad smile. “Yeah, I guess.”

  The bell rang and I pointed behind me completely wankily. “I should go.”

 
He nodded. “Yeah. Me too, I guess.”

  We then realised that we had the exact same classes all day and huffed a laugh.

  “I guess we could…?” I said.

  “I mean we’re going the same way…?”

  We walked along and I wasn’t sure if it felt normal or not.

  “So, King Douche is…?”

  Oh, I was not talking to Jason about Xander. “Yeah, I don’t think we’re there, Jason. I don’t know if we’ll ever be there.”

  He nodded. “No, yeah. I get that.”

  We stopped inside the door and hovered awkwardly.

  “Maybe one day, though,” I said quickly before I ducked my head and dropped into the seat next to Greg.

  “Tell me you didn’t just walk in with the git?” he begged me.

  “Can’t do that, mate.”

  “Why did you just walk in with the git?”

  “We were talking.”

  “I noticed. What about?”

  “About the fact Nancy and Jason broke up, Greg,” I said.

  “So, you and Xand won?”

  “Yeah. We won,” I answered, hoping he’d just shut up.

  He didn’t say anything for so long that I though he was going to drop it. But, finally he asked, “Why does that not sound like a good thing, Doll?”

  “Xander and I are good.” Well, not so much. “But…” I sighed. “Look, Jason just told me that he liked me. Okay? It just took me off-guard.”

  “Well, duh.”

  “What?” I looked at him sharply.

  Greg shrugged. “Everyone knew you were his best girl, Doll. We just didn’t know why he never did anything about it when you clearly felt the same.”

  It was all starting to make sense now; Greg last term, Rachel the day before, Jason’s behaviour. “Because Nancy was busy telling us the opposite,” I said softly.

  “Ah…” He stopped and frowned a little. “This doesn’t…change anything, does it?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You and Xand. You’re not…going back to the git are you?”

  I huffed a humourless laugh. “I’m not going back to the git, Greg. Even if I knew how to be his friend right now, I don’t think he’d do very well with the whole me and Xander thing. Not for a long time.”

  “So, you did pick Xand, then.”

  It wasn’t a question, but I looked at him with a question.

  “It was always on the back of our minds, Doll. We were always going to worry that you were just trying to make the git jealous.”

  I smiled to myself as that something bumped against my heart again. “I really did pick Xander.”

  Greg gave me that adorably goofy smile. “Plus, the dark side has cookies.” He paused and looked at me. “Can you bake? I tried once and it didn’t go well. But, I do like cookies. We could just buy them, I suppose? What do you think? Is homemade better?”

  I didn’t have a chance to answer as Miss Potts got the lesson started while I tried not to burst out laughing and something was incessantly trying to get my attention. I just had to work out what it was.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  I’d thought the school had gone insane before? It was nothing on what they were like with a winner.

  All the kids who’d paraded around with a ‘Team Thomigan’ button were laughed at and teased for being idiots regardless of the fact that the threat of detention hung over the whole school. Those that didn’t maintain they were always ‘Team Bowdeen’, at least. Mr Burnett had had a few choice words to say to me about the whole thing and Xander was… Well, Xander was being King Douche about it all.

  He was parading the corridors like the king he was, waving at people’s congratulations, encouraging them and letting them cheer for us. It was everything like the King of the Bows of old and nothing like I’d come to think of as Xander. I was completely confused about when he was and wasn’t wearing that mask, and I was getting mighty sick of the way people were still at each other.

  So, when I bumped into Rachel and she said something like, “Happy you won?” I snapped.

  “No, I’m not happy we won. This is complete and utter madness.”

  She looked me over with barely concealed disgust. It seemed even coming to my defence the other day didn’t qualify us for any sort of friendship. “I’m sure it will all die down when you dump him.”

  “I’m not going to dump him,” was out of my mouth before I’d thought about it, but I didn’t sound very happy about it.

  Her eyebrow rose as she looked me over. “Wow. The passion you have for him is astounding. I’m surprised the two of you manage to keep your hands off each other.”

  I rolled my eyes. “I couldn’t dump him anyway,” I muttered to myself.

  “Has he always been an obligation to you? I have to wonder why you were ever with him.”

  I scoffed humourlessly. “Well, I wasn’t, was I? Not really.”

  “What?” she asked. “So, you never grasped that whole loyalty thing after all?”

  “No. Not like… It was all fake!” I hissed at her, losing all hold I had on anything. “Okay? We were never really dating. I’m sure that’s incredibly pleasing to you–”

  “What?” she repeated.

  I sighed, wishing I was still that person who worried over every single thing she did when it came to other people. If I was still her, then maybe I wouldn’t have blurted out my biggest secret to the last person who should have known.

  “None of it was real, Rachel. We were just keeping up appearances.”

  “Keeping up appearances?”

  I nodded. “Yes. Pretending. Not. Real.”

  “You thought you were pretending?” she scoffed.

  Was she going deaf? “Yes. That is usually what not real means.”

  “Uh huh.” Rachel’s slight disinterest disappeared as she glared at me. “Let me tell you something, Holly. You may have thought you were pretending, but I have never heard such bullshit, even out of Nancy-fucking-Milligan’s mouth. I’d never seen you as real as you have been since this whole thing started. You used to walk around this school completely fake and snotty and simpering and annoying. Now, you’re real. I believe your smile, I believe the words that come out of your mouth even if I don’t like them, and I believe you when I see you with Xander.”

  “Did you not hear me? It was fake. We were just keeping up appearances. He was supposed to be helping me make Jason jealous and I was supposed to keep the wolves at bay while he got one over on the git.”

  Rachel’s glare didn’t let up. “I hated you.”

  That had not been what I was expecting her to come back with. “Uh…thanks?”

  “I hated the way you trailed after JT, looking at him with those puppy dog eyes and just hoping he’d notice you. I hated the way you pretended to have time for people when it suited you, but never when it was inconvenient. I actually could never really put my finger on it exactly – it was more of a feeling – but I hated you–”

  “Hate to interrupt the epic tirade, but is there a point to this?”

  Rachel sighed. “The point is, it didn’t matter that I hated you because Xander was completely smitten. The idiot always has been.”

  I blinked. “He what?”

  She nodded. “He’s always had this weird thing about you. Even though he and JT were mortal enemies and you were simpering all over the git, Xand just couldn’t help himself. I'd see him smiling as he watched you laugh, frowning when you looked like you were upset. So, you knew he was using you, but I assume by the look on your face that you didn’t know he’d been waiting for the first opportunity to get you away from the idJit?”

  I shook my head and Rachel gave me the first friendly smile I’d ever seen on her face. It was only small, but it was there.

  “He’s always liked you. I don’t know why and I don’t know how. And, he’d almost given up on you looking at him as anything but the King of the Bows. He’d waited so
long to see you look at him differently, I thought he’d seen it when it wasn’t there. I refused to even look so I couldn’t see if you were. I was convinced you were going to hurt him.”

  “But, you…? You argued with him about me, but you never told him to break up with me?”

  She shook her head. “No,” she said like that would have been unforgivable. “It wasn’t my place to ruin his relationship. I told him what I thought and, when he asked me if I wanted him to dump you, I told him not if he was happy. I told him I hoped I was wrong. I told him that every part of me distrusted you. He told me he was happy. He told me I was wrong. He told me I just had to see. And, then I realised I didn’t actually know you well enough to really judge.”

  God, didn’t that seem to have been the lesson of the last few months?

  “And now?” I asked.

  “Now, I see it.”

  “You see it?”

  “I see it. I see what he wanted me to see.”

  “What did he want you to see?” I asked, hoping she was not going to come back with the words I thought she was.

  “That the two of you are amazing together.”

  “Oh, God. Anything but that,” I muttered.

  “What?” she spat.

  I shook my head. “It’s a thing.”

  “What thing?”

  “A thing. Xander has this…this way of looking at me sometimes and I let myself forget that it was all fake, I’d let him con me into believing we could…” I took a deep breath. “That he was amazing. That I could be amazing with him. That we could be amazing together.”

  “And, that’s a problem?”

  “How long will it last, huh? How long until we finally both realise that it’s not going to work? That the King of the Bows and JT’s minion aren’t compatible?”

  “Really? This is the reason Xander’s not yelled at me all week? You two are fighting because you think it won’t work?”

  I blinked as I looked at her. “I guess…?”

  She rolled her eyes. “Look, I have no advice for you on whether it’s going to work or not. I’m not the relationship type. The whole thing just sounds too hard. But, anything can happen, Holly. You both want each other, but it’s sure as hell not going to last if you don’t take steps to let it.”