“Sorry to disappoint,” I say, shaking my head. “But they’re going to try to make it work without me. Actually, Jenn told them about how the fighting is affecting the store, and they’re going to work on that too.”
“That’s incredible,” he says. “Do you think it’ll actually work?”
“I don’t know,” I say. “I hope so.”
“Me too.”
He pulls me toward him, and before I know it I’m on top of him, straddling his hips as his hands wander my body. If kissing him felt hot before, this feels positively on fire. “I want you,” I say into his mouth as he kisses me. “I’m not trying to rush you, but—”
“You’re not,” he says. “But I promised I would—”
His phone buzzes on his desk.
“—talk to my brother.”
“Is that him?” I ask, sitting up.
He nods and grabs the phone, then comes back to the bed. “I can call him back,” he says as the phone buzzes again. “It’s going to be awkward anyway, and it’s late—”
“Don’t you dare.” I stand, then take an extra step away from the bed for good measure. “I want you to talk to him.”
“Are you sure?”
The phone buzzes a third time. “Yes. Call me tomorrow?”
“Tonight,” he says as he accepts the call. “I’ll call you tonight.”
I give him a quick kiss, then push open his window. It’s a slow climb down, and an even slower climb through the window into the downstairs bathroom of my house. By the time I step out into the hallway, cool as can be, there’s a text waiting for me.
We’re still on the phone, Nate says. Bo asked who I was talking to when I picked up. I told him it was you and that we’re dating now. He said “about time.”
Damn right, I type back.
I hurry up the stairs and stop outside Jenn’s door. Music is playing softly, and I can hear the murmur of her talking to someone on the phone. For once I decide not to listen in, and instead I continue to my room and lie down on my bed. But before I can get comfortable, there’s a knock on the door.
“Come in,” I call.
Jenn slips inside and closes the door behind her. “That was Grandma. I told her I’m going to Stanford.”
I scoot over in bed, and she sits beside me. Her hair is wet and already starting to curl. It looks just like mine does when I get out of the shower.
“Was she happy?” I ask as she puts her feet under the covers and lies down.
“Yes. We’re going to have lunch next week.”
“And what about Thomas? Did you call him, too?”
“We texted.”
“How did it go? Did you get back together?”
“No,” she says. “I told him how it went with Mom and Dad, and that I’m not going to be flying up with him tomorrow.” She rests her head on my shoulder, her wet curls cool against my neck. “I’m really happy you’re coming with me instead.”
“Me too.”
I close my eyes and listen to my sister’s breathing slow beside me as she falls asleep. This entire day feels like it was a dream. The Ferris wheel. The man lifting Jenn onto his shoulders. The chill of the water as I tumbled into the canal. The fight we had in the car. Some of it still hurts, but in a distant way, like it happened to someone else. Or maybe like it happened to me, but a different me.
Either way, today was a good day. And if the way it ended is any indication, tomorrow is going to be even better.
Acknowledgments
Thank you to my wonderful agent, Jim McCarthy, who always gives it to me straight, and to my editor, Catherine Laudone, who is endlessly patient even when my first draft has so many ellipses and em dashes that my book looks like it was written in Morse code. Thank you also to the wonderful marketing and publicity folks at Simon & Schuster, and to my brilliant cover designer, Krista Vossen, for giving me the cover of my teen self’s dreams. You knocked it out of the park.
I’m also very grateful to my brilliant critique partners, Juliana L. Brandt, Bess Cozby, Hannah Fergesen, Elizabeth Lim, and Rachel Lynn Solomon. You guys helped me make this book what I wanted it to be, and I am eternally grateful.
Thank you also to the Electric 18s, who continue to be a source of comfort and joy, and to the Highlights Foundation. Cabin 16 is my home away from home.
I’d also like to acknowledge the incredibly important and often thankless work that librarians, booksellers, and book-peddling teachers do every single day. You guys are superheroes, and on behalf of authors (and readers!) everywhere, thank you.
I could not have written this book without the support of my family. I am lucky to have the encouragement of not only my dad, grandma, godmother Gail, uncle Mark, and extended family, but also my best friends in the entire universe—my husband, Patrick, and my sister, Diana. Jenn and April might be the worst, but you two are the best.
Finally, I’d like to thank readers for giving my books a chance. I couldn’t live this dream without you.
About the Author
© 2018 BY DAVE CROSS
lauren spieller is the author of Your Destination Is on the Left and She’s the Worst. She lives in New York City with her husband and works as a literary agent. When she isn’t writing or agenting, she can be found drinking lattes, pining for every dog she sees, or visiting her native California. Visit her at LaurenSpieller.com and follow her on Twitter at @LaurenSpieller.
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Your Destination Is on the Left
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This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and events are products of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or places or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Spieller, Lauren.
Title: She’s the worst / Lauren Spieller.
Other titles: She is the worst
Description: First edition. | New York : Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers, [2019] | Summary: Told in two voices, sisters April, age sixteen, and Jenn, eighteen, have twenty-four hours to fulfill a childhood pact and deal with a secret that threatens to tear them apart.
Identifiers: LCCN 2018058780 | ISBN 9781534436589 (hardcover : alk. paper) | ISBN 9781534436602 (eBook)
Subjects: | CYAC: Sisters—Fiction. | Family problems—Fiction. | Promis
es—Fiction. | Dating (Social customs)—Fiction. | Los Angeles (Calif.)—Fiction.
Classification: LCC PZ7.1.S71453 She 2019 | DDC [Fic]—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2018058780
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