The Retake

by Jen Calonita

  I waited till Laura slipped away to pull out my phone. It was practically burning through my jeans pocket and it was only charged to 45 percent now. I flipped through the apps till I found Retake. My finger hovered over the app. I should delete it now, before it destroyed my phone. But…what if things weren’t as perfect as they seemed?

  “Zoe!” Taryn came flying out the front door with wet hair and charged toward me.

  “Hey!” I said, happy to see her.

  Taryn gave me a look. “Don’t ‘hey’ me.”

  Uh-oh.

  “I am not covering for you with Mom and Dad,” Taryn hissed. “If you’re going to ride your bike all the way to the Eaton movie theater after school today, then you deserve to be caught.”

  “Eaton?” I wasn’t even allowed to ride my bike up to the pizza place because Mom thought it was too far from the house. And I had to check in every hour no matter where I was in town. Laura and I basically rode to each other’s houses or to one of the coffee spots in town, and they were all within a few blocks of one another. Why would I ever ride to Eaton?

  “Don’t play dumb. Avery saw you last night when she was on her way to Chili’s with her mom. That’s two towns away on your bike, crossing over Marywood Turnpike. What were you thinking? A kid on a bike got hit there last week!”

  “Sorry, Mom,” I joked, but Taryn didn’t laugh.

  “You keep saying you want my advice about everything, including what’s been going on with you and Laura, but you never take it.” Taryn actually sounded hurt. “I tell you to do one thing, and you do the exact opposite. I don’t know why I bother. I told you all she cared about was hanging out with that kid Josh.”

  My heart pounded as I tried to get up to speed. “Do you mean Jake? Or is there a Josh now too? What’s going on with me and Laura?”

  “Zoe! Marisol’s mom is here!” Dad called. “Laura is already in the car!”

  Marisol’s…? That meant…

  Dad handed me a lunch bag. “Here. Mom and I talked. You can’t buy every day. I don’t care what Laura is allowed to do.”

  I never wanted to buy again after what happened the first time. “Dad…,” I started to say.

  “We’ll talk after school,” Dad said gently. “And your mom said to try to work on Laura, okay? Dianne is really worried about her. First you two quit Future City, and now you don’t want to try out for volleyball.” He hesitated. “Just promise me you won’t give up everything you love just because Laura doesn’t want to do it.”

  “I won’t,” I insisted. But had I already done that in this new present? “I’ll even send you a picture of me at volleyball tryouts today.”

  Dad laughed. “You don’t have to go that far. But maybe we could stick with our traditional first-night-of-school dinner tonight?” Both Dad and Taryn looked at me hopefully. If she wanted to go for hibachi, we had to be in a good place.

  “I’d like that.” I gave Taryn a hug and ran to Marisol’s mom’s massive SUV. I opened the door and jumped into the third row with Steph and Ava, who were singing along to something on the radio at the top of their lungs. Laura was already in the second row, scrolling on her phone and singing half-heartedly along with them. I heard her sigh heavily as we pulled out of the driveway.

  She turned around and looked at us. “My mom is driving me insane! She said I can’t go out tonight.”

  “Go out? Don’t we have dinner tonight at Izumi?” I asked.

  Laura made a face. “Yeah, but we told our moms no, remember? You did tell your mom no, didn’t you?”

  “Yeah,” I said quickly. Had I screwed things up already? “But my dad is still pushing for it.”

  “Tell him we’re doing something with our friends,” Laura said pointedly. “Why are they being so annoying about this? Ava’s having us over tonight.”

  “Yeah,” Ava said, and looked at me. “And everyone is invited, unlike your family dinner thing that’s just your two families.”

  Laura rolled her eyes. “I know, it’s so silly. My mom was going on like ‘This is family time! It’s not going to be summer all over again. You can’t hang out with your friends every day. She almost didn’t let me come to breakfast this morning because she says all I do is ask for money.”

  I heard a beep. My phone charge had dropped to 35 percent. I really should have grabbed a charger. The way this conversation was going, I was starting to think I still needed the Retake. But what if the phone died beforehand? Would the app just disappear?

  “Uh, Mrs. Tolman? Can I use your phone charger?” I asked awkwardly.

  “Mine is broken, sweetie, sorry!” Mrs. Tollman pulled over in front of the bagel store. “All right, girls. Enjoy breakfast. Just watch the time. Are you sure you don’t want me to wait and drive you to school after?”

  “Mom, we’re fine,” Marisol said huffily as she exited the car first. “We can walk two blocks.” The rest of us filed out after her.

  “ ‘Boys, boys, boys, that’s all you talk about!’ ” Laura said, still talking about her mom. “ ‘You need to focus on school more than YouTube videos of makeup!’ ”

  I just nodded. There were so many gaps in our story that I wasn’t sure what was real and what wasn’t. In the past I knew every place we’d been before—the great days, the bad ones, along with the things we’d stayed up late talking about and wishing for. But now with Retake, there were these missing chunks of time taking us from one moment and shooting us into a new one. As great as it was to retake moments, I didn’t know the Laura I was coming back to. And that was really scary.

  “Why doesn’t she see I’m older now?” Laura asked. “I want to hang out with my friends, not our parents.”

  I winced. I always liked our first-day-of-school tradition.

  “Things change,” Laura added.

  “Things change.” I guess that was what I was most afraid of. I followed Laura into the stream of cool air-conditioning blasting out of the bagel store. The other girls walked ahead of us, not waiting. I tried to play peacemaker. “Couldn’t we do dinner and then go to Ava’s?”

  “Zoe.” Laura sighed as she opened her bag and pulled out a lip gloss. She applied it looking in the mirrored side of the drinks fridge. “Don’t be weird about this again.”

  “Weird about what?” I really didn’t know what she was talking about.

  Laura finished with her lip gloss and turned to me. “Hanging out with the guys. Your mom doesn’t have to know. And you don’t have to like anyone there to go. I’m not telling my mom.”

  “You’re not?” My mom would freak if she heard I was hanging out at a boy’s house without permission, even if we were just friends.

  “No, and you can’t tell your mom either.” Laura gave me the stink eye. “Because your mom will tell my mom, and then we’ll both be toast.” She looked at me pleadingly. “I really want to see Jake, so don’t screw it up like last time.”

  How had I screwed things up last time? “I’m not. I didn’t realize you and Jake were a thing.”

  Laura blushed. “Kind of. Maybe? I mean, ever since that day at Aquatopia, we’ve been texting. And he talked to me when we were at the cabana this summer, but then he was gone most of August because his family has a place in the Poconos. I don’t know.” She curled a strand of hair around her finger with its manicured pink nail. “Dougie says he hasn’t said anything, and even though Ava is with Shardul now, he barely talks to her at all, let alone talks about me and Jake. Maybe Hyacinth can find out from Peter, or Marisol can talk to Connor. They might know something. I have to ask them.”

  “Does everyone have a boyfriend?” I asked, surprised.

  Laura checked her lip gloss in the reflection of the mirrored countertop full of pastries. “You’re the only who doesn’t, but guess what? Ava says Max likes you! We can forget about setting you up with Dougie.”
/>   “Max who?” I asked.

  “Max Tanner. Jake’s friend? The one on the Sharks with him? He’s going to Dougie’s house tonight too—you know we’re not actually going to Ava’s, right? We just told the moms that. So if you go, then maybe you and Max can talk, and then we’d all have boyfriends.” She grinned.

  But I didn’t know who Max was! How did I know I even wanted him to be my boyfriend? Did I have to have a boyfriend to hang out with Laura and the drama queens? I hadn’t had much experience with boys yet. They seemed to speak a totally different language, and so many of them just burped or farted and laughed about it like it was cool. I couldn’t even understand best friend code anymore. How would I speak boy?

  “Maybe,” I said, since Laura was still looking at me expectantly.

  “Come on!” Laura got huffy. “You need to be with someone, too, or…” She trailed off. “You just do, okay? Come to Dougie’s. Just don’t be all weird.”

  There was that word again. What did Laura mean by that?

  “Laura! Zoe!” Hyacinth was waving us over to a table. Everyone was squished into a corner booth, tie-dyed bagels in front of them along with drinks. They were laughing hysterically.

  Sarah high-fived Ava. “That was epic! She totally thought you were inviting her to sit with us!”

  “Did you see her face?” Ava asked. “I was just trying to tell her she had toilet paper on her shoe. She’s so sensitive!”

  “Who?” Laura asked, sitting down.

  Ava shook her head. “Forget it. It’s so not important.”

  “We got you a bagel,” Sarah told Laura. She looked at me. “The line is short, Zoe, if you want one too.” I heard one of the girls snort. Laura looked away awkwardly.

  The drama queens and I had obviously cooled off since my last retake.

  “Zoe, you aren’t wearing pink,” Hyacinth pointed out.

  “Oh. I forgot.” I noticed them look at one another. Laura pretended to be busy unwrapping her bagel. She was wearing pink. Why hadn’t she reminded me this morning before we left?

  Laura picked up her bagel. “The blue-and-green tie-dyed bagels are back! I love them!”

  “Me too,” said Sarah. “Remember when we took that picture of us balancing a stack of them on our heads?” The two of them started to giggle.

  I didn’t have a picture of that on the Retake app, so clearly I hadn’t been there for that moment.

  “Let’s do it again now,” Laura suggested.

  “No, gross!” Ava said. “Let’s just take a picture of us with our bagels.” She held up her phone and the bagel for a selfie. “Everyone crowd in.”

  I didn’t have a bagel, but Laura pulled me in close anyway.

  “Smile!” Ava said as she snapped the picture. She quickly sent it to all our phones, and I heard mine ping.

  I looked around. Every girl was quickly posting the photo to their social media. I got a flurry of alerts almost immediately. The alerts were going to eat up my phone power.

  “I should go get a bagel,” I told Laura. “I’ll be right back.” What were the chances I’d find a phone charger for sale in a bagel store? Slim to none, and I really needed my phone to work if I wanted another retake. This wasn’t good.

  Marisol didn’t look up. “What are we hashtagging this shot?”

  “Bagel bosses?” suggested Steph.

  “I like that,” agreed Ava.

  I left them to their hashtags. As I got on the superlong line, my phone was making strange noises. When I pulled it out of my pocket, I noticed the power was down to 22 percent! Even worse, there was now an ominous message on the screen.

  Do you want to go into power-saver mode? Some apps will be unavailable during this time.

  No! What if one of those apps that became unavailable was Retake? Or my phone actually died, and the app died along with it? I couldn’t believe I’d thought this morning that I could just delete the app. Laura and I were talking, yes, but she was acting weird, which meant things weren’t great between us. But were they bad enough that I needed another retake? I had to admit, time travel was getting exhausting.

  “The register is down, so it will be a few minutes, folks!” the guy behind the counter yelled to everyone on line.

  I didn’t have a few minutes. I had to find a charger. Maybe there was a store nearby that sold one. I headed back to the table to tell the others where I was going and got stuck one table away behind a mom trying to put a squirmy toddler into his stroller.

  “You think she’ll tell on you?” I heard someone say. “Don’t invite her, then.”

  “She’s not going to even talk to any of the guys. She’ll just stand there looking awkward.”

  I froze. Were they talking about me?

  “She’ll probably have to leave early to go to Future City anyway.” That voice sounded like Ava’s.

  “Definitely. I told her I was quitting, but she was like ‘I like the club and I’m staying.’ ” That voice was my supposed best friend’s.

  My cheeks burned.

  “Why are you guys still friends? You’re so different!”

  “I don’t know. We’ve been friends forever. But lately she’s been acting so odd about us hanging out with the guys,” I heard Laura say. “She doesn’t even like any of them, so what is she even doing there? She’s obsessed with knowing who’s dating who. She just asked me about it again.”

  That’s because I don’t know what is happening in this reality! I wanted to shout.

  “Maybe she’s jealous,” Sarah suggested.

  “Zoe isn’t like that,” Laura said. “I think. She’s just such a baby.”

  Was that what my best friend really thought of me? That because she was wearing makeup and hanging out with boys, she was cooler than I was? Forget about telling them where I was going. I was already gone. I turned around fast and banged into two construction workers headed to a table.

  “Sorry, kid!” one said loudly.

  Laura looked over and instantly knew I’d heard them. Her face crumbled as she stood up.

  But for once, I didn’t want to hear what Laura had to say. I ducked around a mom taking bagel orders from four kids and maneuvered past the long line at the counter. The exit was blocked, so I changed directions and searched for a bathroom. I refused to cry in front of everyone at Bagel Boss. When I turned the corner and saw the sign for a unisex restroom, I ran in and locked the door behind me.

  “This is occupied!” someone said in a strangled voice.

  “Sorry!” I turned and saw a girl with pink hair crying.

  “Clare?”

  She was sitting under the window, on one of half a dozen boxes of toilet paper. The walls were so thin I could hear people calling out breakfast sandwich orders in the kitchen.

  “Are you okay? I didn’t know anyone was in here,” I explained. “It wasn’t locked.”

  “It’s okay. It’s my fault.” Clare wiped her eyes and stood up. She was wearing a “Skip the Straw! Save the Sea Turtles!” tee that matched her huge gray hoop earrings. “I darted in here so fast to get away, I didn’t lock the door.”

  Now the conversation I overheard Ava having at the table when we arrived was starting to make sense. She must have been talking about Clare. “Is everything okay?” I asked.

  “It’s fine.” Clare took a deep breath. “Actually, it’s not fine. I don’t know. Maybe I overreacted. I swore I wouldn’t let her get to me again this year.” She ran a hand through her hair. “Sorry. I know I’m not making sense.”

  “It’s okay,” I said gently. “Do you want to talk about it?”

  She exhaled slowly. “There’s not a lot to talk about. My best friend doesn’t want to be friends anymore. She’s got a new group, and she doesn’t want me to be a part of it.”

  I knew this story too well. “I’m sorry.” />
  “Me too. I don’t get what happened between us, but I have to stop caring.” Clare wiped her eyes again as the tears started coming. “It just hurts too much. I hate change.”

  “I do too,” I admitted.

  Everything was changing, and I couldn’t stand it. Even in this new reality, Laura didn’t find me cool enough anymore. Why did things have to change? My eyes started filling with tears.

  “Oh no! Now I’ve made you cry!” Clare said.

  “I’m fine!” I said, and we both started laughing through the tears.

  The whole situation was kind of absurd—Clare and I were hiding in the Bagel Boss bathroom, crying over the same group of mean girls. There was a part of me that just wanted to turn to Clare and say Let’s get out of here. But I didn’t know this new reality any better than I knew the last one.

  I just wanted to go home.

  “Okay, enough!” Clare said suddenly. “We are not starting seventh grade like this.”

  “We’re not!” I agreed.

  “No more crying.” Clare handed me a piece of toilet paper to wipe my eyes and dabbed her own as well.

  “No more crying.” I blotted my eyes.

  “And no more crying in bathrooms,” she added, starting to smile.

  “No more crying in bathrooms,” I seconded.

  And that’s when I realized Clare was a glass-half-full girl, like I usually was. It was the retakes that were making me second-guess everything.

  “I don’t know how sixth grade was for you, but I am not spending seventh grade hiding in a bathroom,” Clare added.

  My stomach twisted when I heard her say that. No one should have to hide in a bathroom all the time, even if that was what we both were currently doing.

  “Sorry.” Clare blushed. “I know you don’t know what I’m talking about.”

  “I kind of do and I kind of don’t,” I said carefully. “But if you ever want to talk more, I’m here.”

  I missed having someone to talk to.

  Clare hesitated and made a strange face. “I saw you disappear at Aquatopia, you know.”