She's the Worst

by Lauren Spieller

  “What about us?”

  “You guys both play soccer, and now that you’re on varsity, you’re going to be spending even more time together.”

  “It’s not like we’re on the same team,” I say. “We don’t even practice on the same field.”

  “I know,” he says. “But it’s still going to happen. Which is fine, don’t get me wrong. I just don’t want you to, I don’t know . . . forget about me.”

  My breath catches in my chest. I know Eric and Nate don’t get along—and after what he said in the car, I suspect it’s mostly Eric’s fault—but Nate’s never sounded worried about what us dating would mean for our friendship before.

  “I’m not going to forget about you,” I say. “No matter what.”

  We look at each other, and for the first time, I can’t read his expression. Whatever this moment is, we need to get out of it and back to neutral territory. Because the urge I have to take his hand and also run in the opposite direction at the same time? It is not working for me.

  “There’s one thing you should know if you’re going to become a soccer fan,” I say, my voice serious. “It’s crucial, really.”

  “What’s that?” he asks, his mouth quirking into a smile.

  “If you leave the United States,” I say, “don’t call it ‘soccer.’ You’ve gotta say ‘football.’ Especially if you’re in the UK. Otherwise, you’ll probably get jumped by a hooligan.”

  “A hooli-what?” he says. “You know what? Never mind.”

  We finish our food a few minutes later, then head inside. Jenn’s burger is barely half-gone, but Katie and Shruthi’s side of the table is strewn with burger wrappers and cold french fries.

  “There you are!” Katie says when she sees us walking over. Her voice is oddly cheerful, like she’s trying to cover for something. “I thought you were going to eat with us.”

  I glance at Jenn, but she doesn’t meet my eye. “Sorry,” I say to Katie, “we got distracted.”

  Jenn scoots in so I can join her side of the booth. Nate grabs a chair and sits at the end.

  “So, Nate,” Shruthi says. “Are you ready for junior year?”

  We start to talk about what classes we’re taking, which chem teachers will let you watch Breaking Bad for extra credit, and why it’s worth taking the PSAT first even if you’re doing well on at-home practice tests. I try to listen, but I keep thinking about what Nate said about going to college together. He tried to play it off like it wasn’t a big deal, but the way he said it . . .

  Across the table, Nate winks at me, and I realize I’ve been staring at him.

  Suddenly, I feel warm. No, not warm—hot. I excuse myself from the table and head to the bathroom. Once there, I soak a paper towel with cold water and press it to my forehead. What is wrong with me?

  The door swings open, and my sister comes in. “You okay?” she asks. “You got really red all of a sudden.”

  I throw away the wet paper towel and grab another to dry my face. “I’m fine.”

  “If you say so.” She opens one of the stalls but doesn’t go inside. “Thanks again for being cool with me sitting with my friends. I know you wanted it to be just us.”

  I don’t say anything, because the truth is, I did want that . . . but not for the right reasons.

  “So where were we going to go?” she asks. “If it had been only us?”

  “Tito’s Tacos.”

  Jenn’s mouth drops open. “Are you serious? I hate Tito’s, April. You know that.”

  I turn around to face her, so my back is against the sink. “No, you don’t. We had your thirteenth birthday party there. Remember, Mom made that huge cake?”

  “Yeah, and did you ever think about why she made such a huge cake if it was only for the four of us?”

  “No?”

  “Because we invited my entire seventh-grade class even though we had just moved to the district, and no one else showed up. It was humiliating.”

  The thought of Jenn feeling that way—because of something our parents did, no less—throws me for a loop. I’ve always thought of the three of them as being completely in sync. But there’s another piece of this that cuts even deeper—that the party had nothing to do with me.

  “I thought you only wanted to celebrate with me,” I say, my cheeks flushing, “and that’s why no one else was there. But I guess that’s pretty stupid in retrospect.”

  “It’s not stupid,” Jenn says quietly. “It’s just not true.”

  The door swings open, and a woman and her young son come inside. “Sorry,” she says, “but he has to go and my husband is on the phone.”

  “Look,” Jenn says once the woman and her son are inside the stall, “I’m not mad, okay? It’s just, I’m about to move, so the last thing I want to think about is how much it sucked being the new kid with zero friends, you know? It’s bad enough that my current friends are already moving on without me.”

  “Jenn, I shouldn’t have said that—”

  Jenn’s phone buzzes. “It’s Mom,” she says, checking the screen. “They need us to cover the store for an hour while they run an errand.”

  I roll my eyes. “Can’t you just tell them we’re busy or something?”

  “I can’t refuse to go, April.”

  “Why not?”

  Jenn stares at me like I’m out of my mind. “Because it’s not right to shirk responsibility like that.”

  “You aren’t shirking responsibility if it isn’t your shift. And besides, we’re not done with the pact. We still have a few more stops.”

  Jenn rubs her temples. “To be honest, I’m kind of tired. I appreciate everything you’ve done for me today, but I just want to go see what they need, get it over with, and go home.”

  So that’s it, then. Not only has my plan failed miserably, but she doesn’t even want to hang out with me anymore. “Okay,” I say. “Sure.”

  “Thanks,” Jenn says, pulling open the door. “See you out there.”

  CHAPTER 18

  JENN

  We head toward the car, sodas in hand. The sun is high in the sky above us, baking down on the top of my head. Shruthi and Katie wave goodbye from across the parking lot, but I pretend not to notice.

  “When are you going to tell Mom and Dad?” April asks the moment we’re in the car.

  I wrap my fingers around the steering wheel, ignoring the way the hot leather heats my palms. It’s a fair question—one Grandma has asked me at least once a week since I got into Stanford—but the thought of seeing their faces fills me with dread. I check the time on the dash. Three o’clock. There’s still time.

  I start the car. “I’ll tell them later.”

  “Don’t you think maybe you should tell them now?” April says. “You’re kind of running out of time—”

  “You don’t think I know that?” I snap. “Put your seat belt on.”

  I reverse out of the space and edge my way toward the exit. Beside me, April shakes her head.

  “I still don’t understand why you kept it from them in the first place.”

  I turn on the AC, then roll my windows down for good measure. “That’s because you have no clue what it’s like dealing with Mom and Dad,” I say. “You have the perfect relationship with them.”

  April chokes on her soda. “I’m sorry—what?”

  “You run around doing whatever you want, totally oblivious, and then you come home and lock yourself in your room. Mom and Dad never ask you to do anything. You have no idea what it’s like being in the store with them every day.”

  “Oh, please,” April says, crossing her arms. “You love it. You get to be the golden child. Why else would you work there?”

  “Because I have to.” I grip the steering wheel even harder. Is she really this clueless? “If I’m not there to make them stop fighting, the whole place would shut down,” I explain. “And if you haven’t noticed, the store is what pays our bills.”

  “Wait,” April says. “That’s why you work there? To make the
m stop fighting?”

  “I mean, not originally, but if I didn’t the whole business would probably collapse. They’re too busy verbally abusing each other to run the store properly.”

  April’s eyes go wide. “I knew they fought a lot, but I didn’t realize it was affecting their business.”

  We pull up to a red light, and I turn to face her. “It’s not just affecting their business. It’s affecting everything.” I take a deep breath and let it out slowly. “Remember that night we were supposed to go to Uncle Chris’s birthday party? But instead Mom and Dad got in a huge argument and we stayed home?”

  April groans. “I had to go to Nate’s to get away from the yelling.”

  “Yeah, well, it got bad. Really bad. They started bringing up all these old grudges, and by the end of the fight Mom was talking about divorce.”

  April’s mouth drops open. “Really?”

  “Yes,” I say. “Really.”

  The light turns green, and I start to drive again.

  “But what does that have to do with Stanford?” April asks.

  I shift in my seat. If I tell her the rest of what happened that night, there’s no going back. She’ll know exactly how bad things have gotten between our parents. But maybe that’s a good thing. “I got into Stanford that same day. I was going to tell them, but then everything went to hell. So I gave them the acceptance letter and went to bed. The next morning, they came into my room and told me I wasn’t allowed to go away for college. They said I had to apply somewhere else. Somewhere in LA.”

  “But why? Why would they want you to stay . . .” Her eyes go wide as the truth hits her. “You think they wanted you here because otherwise they’d fight even more and eventually . . . get a divorce?”

  I nod. “At the time I was too upset to think it through. But later, when I saw how relieved they were, I realized what was really going on.” My voice shakes, but I push forward. “I was so angry, but I didn’t want to be the reason they got a divorce. I love them, you know? I wanted them to be happy. I still do.”

  “Then why are you still going?” April asks.

  “Because when it came time to turn Stanford down, I couldn’t do it. I didn’t want to stay in LA anymore, not if nothing was going to change. So instead I talked to Grandma, and she helped me apply. And . . . that’s it. You know the rest.”

  We pull up in front of the store, and I turn off the car. We sit in silence, watching the cars speed by. It feels strange to have told April all of that. I’ve kept things from her for so long that it’s almost a habit, but being honest with her about how bad things are between me and Mom and Dad is a huge relief. But another feeling surfaces, one I wasn’t expecting—guilt. I might not be alone anymore, but there’s a new burden in being the one to tell April, because now she has to live with it. I’m sure that’s scary, and painful, and a million other emotions I’ve grown accustomed to burying. But April deserves to know the truth. It’s the only way she’s going to be able to deal with them on her own for the next two years.

  “I guess you’re glad you don’t have to worry about any of this anymore,” April says suddenly.

  I turn in my seat to look at her. “What do you mean?”

  She nods at the store. “O’Farrell’s, Mom and Dad. Our family. You don’t have to care about any of it anymore.”

  “That’s not fair,” I say. “I still care about those things.”

  “Really?” She crosses her arms. “Because it seems like you’re perfectly happy dumping all of this in my lap. So what if I have to give up soccer and—”

  “Oh, I’m so sorry,” I say, cutting her off. “Poor April has to actually contribute for once. How awful for you that you have to act like you’re part of this family.”

  “That’s bullshit,” she says. “I’m constantly trying to be part of this family. Why else would I spend all day trying to make you happy even though you lied to me for months? Why else would I try to convince you to stay in LA?”

  “Wait,” I say, holding up my hand. “What did you just say? You’ve been trying to convince me to stay?”

  The color drains from April’s face. “Oh . . . um, yeah? But I didn’t mean—what I was trying to say was—”

  I narrow my eyes.

  She clasps her hands in her lap. “I thought that maybe if I could convince you not to go to Stanford this year, you might, you know, not leave me alone with Mom and Dad. You might defer a year so you could stay here and help me.”

  “Wait, is that why you said Katie and Shruthi might be moving on without me?”

  April flushes. “I thought maybe it’d make you stay, and then I wouldn’t have to give up soccer. . . .”

  The weight of what she’s saying slowly sinks in. I knew she was irritated by me leaving at first, but I thought she was coming around. She said she understood. She even chose to stick to the pact, even after I gave her a way out. I believed she wanted to spend time with me. And when she said those horrible things about my friends, I believed that, too. I thought she cared about me.

  But it was never about me. I was right from the beginning—my sister always has an angle. I was naïve to think any different.

  “I knew you were self-centered,” I say, my voice shaking, “but this is so much worse than I realized.” I turn away from her and look out the window. It’s the only way to keep my fury from spiraling into tears. “And for the record, there is no way I’d ever stay here. Especially not for you.”

  The car goes silent, the only noise coming from the street outside. Then she starts to cry. “I was only trying to do what was right,” she says, sniffling. “For our family. That’s why I tried to convince you to stay by taking you to places you love—”

  “Places I love?” I choke out. “April, everywhere you took me today was about you. First the Ferris wheel, where you conveniently forgot throwing up all over me. Then Muscle Beach, where you once celebrated your achievements. Then the Stairs, which is the last thing I’d ever choose to do, and finally, you were going to take me to Tito’s! My least-favorite restaurant ever!” I hit the steering wheel with the heel of my hand. “If you really wanted me to stay in LA, you would have taken me somewhere that was about both of us. Not just you.” I roll my eyes. “But I bet you can’t think of a single place. You’re that selfish.”

  “I can too!” April says. “I could pick the perfect place if I had to. In fact, I’ll prove it to you: Meet me there at eight o’clock. That should give you plenty of time to see your precious Thomas and to realize what an asshole you’re being.”

  “Yeah, fine,” I say, waving her off. “Whatever.”

  She climbs out of the car, slams the door behind her . . . and waits. I know what she’s doing. She expects me to roll down the window and apologize even though she’s the one who’s been a complete monster. But I’m not going to. I’m done with her games. So instead I start the car, check my mirrors, and drive away, leaving her in the middle of the street, alone. She can go into the store and face Mom and Dad by herself.

  It’s exactly what she deserves.

  CHAPTER 19

  APRIL

  Mom, are you in there?” I pound on the door of O’Farrell Antiques, not caring that the glass is rattling in its frame. “Dad? Open the door!”

  I wipe my eyes and step back from the door. I can’t believe this. First they demand we come to the store, then Jenn abandons me, and now no one is here. If this isn’t the perfect metaphor for my family, I don’t know what is. I wipe my eyes again, and peer up and down the street. There’s no sign of their SUV, but maybe they’re parked in back.

  I head around the corner to the small lot behind O’Farrell’s. No SUV . . . and the back door is locked too. Great.

  I pull out my cell phone and try calling them. It goes to voicemail. “Where are you guys?” I ask, my voice catching. “I’m here, but no one . . . no one else is.” I clear my throat and will myself not to start crying again. “Call me back.”

  I hang up and try the door one m
ore time, just in case. I’m about to give up—I can’t just stand here all day, sweating my ass off in the sun—when I picture Jenn’s smug face when she finds out I left before Mom and Dad got here. She’ll say it’s proof that I’m lazy and a terrible member of this family. No way am I giving her the opportunity. I have to find another way inside.

  I walk around to the side of the building, searching for a door I don’t know about, or maybe a window. Sure enough, I find a window that’s cracked open and just big enough to squeeze through. The only problem is that it’s about six feet off the ground. I drop my purse, then hunt around for something to stand on. Eventually, I find two milk crates in the back alley and stack them beneath the window. I climb up, plant my hands on the dirty windowsill, ignoring the way the grit immediately sticks to my palms, and heave myself up. So far so good. I push the window open the rest of the way with one hand, then start to pull myself inside.

  I’m halfway through when I realize that six feet off the ground outside is six feet off the ground inside, too. Which means the moment I push myself all the way through this window, I’m going to fall face-first into the store.

  Shit.

  My arms start to ache from supporting myself. I take a deep breath and adjust my grip on the windowsill. I can’t keep going forward, and I can’t go feetfirst, either, because the window is way too small to turn around in. I have to get down and figure something else out.

  Except getting down isn’t easy either. I could drop back to the ground, but if I hit the milk crates beneath me on my way down, I’ll screw up my ankle. And if that happens, my soccer days will be over, regardless of what my parents and Jenn think. I’m just going to have to climb back down the way I came up. I feel around for the milk crates. They should be right beneath me, but the window is so high that the toe of my shoe barely grazes the top. I reposition my hands so I can reach down a bit farther with my foot, and eventually I find the crate on top—and knock it over.

  “Shit.” Without the crate, I can’t get down, and without being able to see where I’ll land, I can’t jump, either. Which means I’m stuck.