If You Loved Me

by Marilyn Reynolds

  “Tyler. The guy who was trying to save you? The guy who keeps wanting to talk to you?”

  I nod.

  “If you don’t believe in this Tyler guy anymore, then what?”

  “I guess Grams is the only one left who I know will be there for me.”

  “Too soon to tell for me, huh?”

  “Way too soon,” I say.

  “How about space aliens?”

  “Nah . . . Maybe . . . I don’t know.”

  “How about the overall goodness of humankind?”

  “Right,” I say, all sarcastic. “Did you watch the news last night? Those three guys who killed a homeless guy because he asked them for a dollar?”

  Jack takes a bite out of the bagel and chews carefully, watching me all the while.

  “Sorry if I sound cynical,” I say. “I’ve been having sort of a hard time lately.”

  “I gathered. Have you decided to hear his side of things yet?”

  “No,” I say, feeling my muscles tense in resistance. What business is it of Jack’s anyway?

  A big bluejay lands on the sidewalk near our table and starts pecking at crumbs. Jack tosses a bite of bagel down to it. It eats fast and starts squawking. Jack laughs.

  “I like jays,” Jack says. “They know exactly what they want. . . . Do you, Lauren? Do you know what you want?”

  I shake my head.

  Between questions from Harp and Coach Terry this after­noon, and now Jack, it seems like I’m on some kind of witness stand. I’m tired of it.

  As if he’s sensed my mood, Jack says, “I don’t mean to be nosy. It’s just that I’ve missed out on so many years with you, I’m in a hurry to get caught up. Just tell me to jump back if I’m asking too much.”

  Jack throws another handful of crumbs down near the jay. Another one comes swooping in to get in on the feast, but the first jay is not big on sharing. We sit watching the birds for a while, then Jack looks at his watch.

  “Come on, I’ll take you home. I’ve got an appointment to show a couple of newlyweds a condominium. Can’t keep ’em waiting.”

  On the way home Jack asks me about the blonde he always was seeing me with.

  “She’s with another friend today,” I say.

  He takes his eyes off the road long enough to check out my expression.

  “Isn’t that okay?” he says.

  “Whatever,” I say. “She acted sort of mad.”

  “So, who all’s mad at you right now—or the other way around. Who all are you mad at?”

  “Well, Tyler. And Shawna. Mr. Harper, my creative writing teacher, and Coach Terry, my volleyball coach.”

  “You mad at your gramma?”

  “No.”

  “Me?”

  “Not right now.”

  “Oh, but you’re going to get mad at me any minute now?”

  “No. It’s just . . . I used to be mad at you for a long time.”

  “But no more?”

  “Maybe not. I’m not sure.”

  “But you’re giving me a chance, right?”

  I nod.

  “That’s all I ask,” he tells me, “just a chance.”

  He pulls into the driveway at Grams’ and lets me out, then leaves for his appointment. No sooner have I put my backpack down when I hear another car. It is Amber. I open the back door for her and she stomps past me into the kitchen. I follow her. She abruptly turns and faces me.

  “I thought I could trust you!”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Don’t act all innocent! You promised you wouldn’t tell anyone and I believed you!”

  She is crying now, red in the face, fists clenched.

  “Probably the whole school knows I’ve got herpes because of your big fat mouth!”

  “What . . . ?”

  And then I get it. Tyler must have told . . . Oh, God. It feels as if someone has slammed me over the head with a baseball bat. I step backward, barely breathing.

  “Amber . . .”

  “Blake took me home from Barb ’n Edie’s. We’re laughing and talking and then he gets all serious. ‘I love you so much, herpes couldn’t turn me off,’ he says. I can’t believe you’d tell Blake that I had herpes. I trusted you!”

  “I didn’t tell Blake,” I say.

  “Well, someone did and you’re the only other person who knows! Who knew!”

  Amber sinks down into a chair and puts her head down on the kitchen table—the same table where we worked on Brownie projects together, and struggled over algebra, and where Grams told us both about menstruation when Amber asked, after her mother had refused to talk about the subject—the table we sat at when we made tiny pin pricks of blood and held our wrists together, vowing we’d be sister-friends for life.

  She is shaking with sobs.

  “Oh, God, Amber. I’m so sorry. Damn Tyler!”

  “It’s not Tyler! It’s YOU! You broke your promise to me. You took my most private secret and spread it around!”

  “I didn’t spread it around! Tyler promised he wouldn’t tell! I didn’t plan to tell him, it’s just, we were arguing, you know, about my virginity plan, and it sort of slipped out.”

  “And then it slipped out to Blake and who knows where it’s slipping right now! I’m so embarrassed . . . and if my mom finds out . . .”

  I thought I already felt as bad as I possibly could, what with the loss of Tyler and all we had been to one another. But I feel even worse now. Why had I told Tyler about Amber? I’d give anything if I could take it back. But watching Amber, seeing the hurt in her eyes, I know there’s no taking it back now. I’m filled with guilt.

  “Could we just decide we’re not blood sisters anymore?” Amber says.

  It’s like someone has kicked me in the stomach—knocked the breath right out of me. I sit across the table from her, wishing I could make things better.

  “I made a terrible mistake,” I tell her. “I’m so sorry.”

  I reach for Amber’s hand. She draws it away from me, like I’m fire.

  “You’re not my blood sister,” she says. “Blood sisters don’t tell each others’ secrets.”

  She stands and walks out the door. I follow.

  “But we are blood sisters,” I say. “We can’t change that.”

  “You changed it when you broke your promise to me.”

  Amber walks away, faster. I catch up with her.

  “I’m sorry! I’ll never do anything like that again. Give me a chance! Think about how I’ve always been there for you!”

  She turns and gives me such a look . . .

  “I have always been there for you.”

  “In your dreams,” she says.

  I can tell by the way she’s breathing, slow and deliberate, that she’s trying hard not to cry again.

  “Your blabbing my secret is only the final blow,” she says.

  “I don’t even know what you mean,” I tell her.

  “My point exactly! It’s like you’re the only person in the world with a problem. Half the time when I call you, you can’t be bothered to call back. And then when I see you at school, you just shrug it off—‘I was feeling too down to call,’ you say.”

  Her face is red again, and her voice is up about an octave.

  “What if I’m feeling down? Who do I talk to? My mom doesn’t want me going out with Blake—she’s decided he’s the Antichrist or something and it turns out you were right, I like him, and who can I tell any of that stuff to? No one knows me as well as you do, but you’re out there on Pluto or a mile underground, or somewhere that you can’t be reached.”

  Her lower lip is quivering.

  “I’m sorry,” I say. “I didn’t know.”

  “How could you know when you don’t listen and you don’t ask?”

  Her deep blue eyes are all watery again, and tears are sliding down her cheeks. She is so pretty, and so nice, how could I have forgotten how lucky I was to have her for my best, best friend. How could I have told her secret?

 
; She turns and starts walking again.

  “No! Don’t leave. Please. I’m sorry. Give me a chance,” I beg. “I want us always to be sister-friends. I want always to be there for you. Tell me about your mom.”

  “Why, so you can go blab my business to someone else?”

  I am so ashamed, there is nothing more to say. Amber gets in her car and drives away. I wander out to the deck and sit thinking of all Amber and I have been through together, our years of being best friends, and I can’t believe I’ve ruined it. When the phone rings I go to the door to hear if there’s a message. It’s Tyler. This time I pick up.

  “How could you have told Blake about Amber having her­pes?”

  “I didn’t tell Blake,” Tyler says.

  “I don’t believe you.”

  “Don’t then, but I didn’t tell Blake. I wouldn’t do that.”

  “Who did you tell then?”

  “I didn’t tell anyone. I promised you I wouldn’t tell and I swear I didn’t. But Lauren, I want to talk about . . .”

  “Why should 1 believe you?”

  “Well, for starters, because I’ve never lied to you.”

  “Well then, how did Blake know?”

  “I don’t know. But I’ve got to see you. We’ve got to talk, and not about Blake and Amber, either. We’ve got to talk about you and me.”

  “No,” I say, but I’m not sure I mean it anymore.

  I’m so confused about everything. My whole world is upside down—the loss of Tyler. Jack’s re-entry into my life. The new knowledge that both my parents, not just Jack, saved me from a fiery death. The loss of Amber’s friendship. It’s all too much to deal with, and I don’t know what to do or where to turn.

  “I’ve got to go now,” I tell Tyler.

  “I didn’t tell Blake, or anyone, about Amber, and I did what I did with Shawna partly for you.”

  I hang up, then dial Amber’s number.

  “Tyler swears he didn’t tell a soul,” I say.

  Amber sounds hysterical, half laughing, half crying.

  “What is it? Talk to me, Amber!”

  She gasps out that it was all a misunderstanding.

  “Blake called about fifteen minutes ago, wanting to know why I got out of the car right when he was telling me how much he loved me. ‘All I could think of was the herpes business,’ I told him. He goes ‘you didn’t even give me a chance to finish—herpes wouldn’t turn me off, or AIDS, or syphilis, or pimples all over your pretty face, or rotting teeth . . .”

  “What?”

  “He was trying to tell me how much he loved me, that nothing would turn him off,” Amber says. “I totally jumped to conclu­sions.”

  “So Tyler really didn’t tell him?”

  “No. I just thought . . . I’m so relieved . . .”

  I want to turn cartwheels and dance under the stars.

  “I’m so relieved,” I tell her.

  “It doesn’t change the fact that you broke your promise to me, though.”

  “But . . . could you give me another chance? Can’t we still be blood sisters?”

  “I don’t know,” she says, and hangs up.

  Chapter

  23

  I get to Amber’s before seven in the morning. Mrs. Brody, in the yellow chenille bathrobe she’s had ever since I’ve known her, answers the door.

  “Come in, Lauren. Have you had breakfast? How about a scrambled egg?”

  She’s always like that—offering food before I even get into the house.

  “Maybe an orange?” I say, nodding toward the fruit bowl. It’s not that I want an orange, but I know she won’t relax until she sees me eating something.

  Mrs. Brody cuts the orange into sections, puts it on a small glass plate, and hands it to me.

  “How’s your grandmother?” she asks.

  “Fine,” I say. “Is Amber up?”

  “She’d better be. Why don’t you go see?”

  I go down the hall to Amber’s room, where she’s sitting on her bed, putting on her shoes. She gives me this big, wide grin, which fades immediately. Like she suddenly remembers she’s mad.

  “What’s up?” she says, all cold and distant.

  “Helium balloons,” I say, but she doesn’t laugh.

  “I want to ask you, really seriously, to give me another chance. That’s all.”

  “I’ll think about it,” Amber says in a whisper.

  “Do you want a ride to school?”

  She shakes her head.

  “Well . . . see you in peer communications,” I say.

  I walk out to the kitchen, put the orange peels in the disposal, the dish in the dishwasher, and go on to school.

  Even though I sit right behind Amber in peer communica­tions, it’s as if we’re strangers. At lunchtime I sit in my car by myself and read Jane Eyre. I’m not hungry.

  At volleyball practice Amber and I set each other up, working together as we always do. Volleyball’s the same, except for laughter and words of encouragement, and our special hand­shake that lines up the blood sister spots on our wrists.

  Big exceptions.

  It is not until I’ve showered and dressed that Amber breaks the silence between us.

  “I’ve been thinking,” she says.

  “Me, too. A lot.”

  We walk together to the parking lot and stand leaning against my grams’ car.

  “I was so shocked that you would tell my secret,” Amber says. “I know that if Blake and I keep getting closer, I’ll tell him about my herpes. But I want it to come from me, not from anyone else.”

  I only listen. I’ve already apologized, and asked for another chance. What else is there to say?

  Amber takes a deep breath. “Last night, my mom was looking through old photos. She’s putting together this family history thing and redoing a bunch of old albums. She kept calling me to look at photos. A bunch of them were of you and me—camping, in our look-alike Halloween pumpkin costumes, one from when we first started playing volleyball, back in seventh grade. Boy, were we dorky looking.”

  Amber smiles and I smile back, awkward.

  “There was one of us at the beach, which reminded me of how you saved my life when I got knocked down by that giant wave and you pulled me out of the water.”

  “I didn’t save your life. You’d have gotten out on your own.”

  “I’d gone under for the third time.”

  This is an old argument. Amber was only about two feet from shore when I grabbed her arm and pulled her up to the damp sand.

  “I only gave you a hand,” I say.

  “I was drowning.”

  We stand next to each other for a long time, quiet, thinking. Each of us, I suppose, remembering so many times together. Finally, I get up the nerve to ask, “Wanna go get something to drink?”

  Amber nods and we get into the car. We go to a drive-thru and order sodas and fries, then sit eating them in front of Amber’s house.

  “I’m sorry I told Tyler,” I say, as if I can’t say it enough. “And I’m sorry I’ve been so wrapped up in my own troubles I haven’t been much of a friend lately.”

  Amber nods and shoves a handful of fries into her mouth, like she does when she’s tense.

  “You said your mom doesn’t like Blake,” I say, hoping Amber will talk with me like we’re friends again.

  She finishes the rest of her french fries and I hand her mine.

  “What doesn’t she like about him?” I prompt.

  Amber looks at me, like she can’t decide whether to talk or not. But then she starts.

  “Oh, you know how my mother gets—all judgmental and protective. When Blake first met her she asked him what he wanted to be when he grew up. Like she’d ask a six-year-old. He told her he was a poet. And then she went all ‘rhyme something.’ How embarrassing! Anyway he said he wasn’t a rhyming poet, his style was more like Allen Ginsberg.”

  “Oh, no!”

  “Not that my mom knows anything about Allen Ginsberg, but she know
s he’s in league with the devil.”

  With that we both laugh, thinking of gentle Blake in league with the devil. We laugh and laugh until we’re worn out with laughter and the barriers between us have weakened.

  “See, if I were to tell Candy that my mom thought Blake was in league with the devil, she wouldn’t have a clue, I’d have to explain all about my mom, and her church . . . but you, you get the whole picture right away.”

  “Years of knowing you and your mom . . .”

  “I like Blake, a lot. It’s hard though, because we want to see each other, and I don’t want to lie to my mom. But I think she’s being completely unreasonable to tell me I can’t go out with him.”

  “She’d like him if she’d get to know him,” I say.

  “Yeah. She said he could come for dinner Sunday. That seems so phony to me, but it might help.”

  After we’ve tried to figure out ways Amber can convince her mom that it’s okay to go out with Blake, and talked about all that she likes about him, the conversation shifts, and I try to catch Amber up on what’s been going on with me. It’s not that everything is exactly okay between us, but that things are starting to get better.

  I go through the whole story about Tyler and Shawna again, and how it’s as if I’ve been living way underwater and only hearing and seeing things from a great distance. Floating. Dis­connected.

  “And THEN, my father found me . . .”

  “WHAT?”

  “Yeah. It’s so amazing. The guy in the red Honda . . .”

  “The ex-addict? Jacob?”

  “Yeah. Jack.”

  “Your father?”

  I tell her the whole story, and how it was sort of mystical, when Jack called me Rennie, like a deeply buried memory suddenly unearthed.

  After a long silence Amber says, “I’m glad we’re talking.”

  “Me, too. Thanks for giving me a chance.”

  Amber nods.

  I take a long, deep breath and realize that my hands and feet are no longer numb, and that even though the Tyler hurt is still there, so’s a lot of other stuff, like being a friend to Amber, and caring about Grams, and getting to know Jack.

  We talk on and on, until sunlight fades.

  “I’d better get inside to help with dinner,” Amber says. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”