All Our Worst Ideas

by Vicky Skinner

  It’s better this way, if we both focus on what we need.

  “Thanks, but I’ll find someone else to go with. See you in bio.”

  Jackson is rushing to get his keys out of the ignition, to get to his backpack in the back seat. “Let me walk you,” he says, but I’m already closing the door and rushing through the parking lot. I feel like I can breathe once I’m out of his truck, the air cold and biting. I duck around the side of the building and lean against the red brick wall, looking at the empty tennis court across the sidewalk from me.

  Absently, I wonder if Oliver likes the Lumineers. Without thinking, I open my contacts and call him. My stomach is in so many knots from being in Jackson’s truck that I’m feeling dizzy.

  “Hello?” I hear a shout of music in the background and then it goes quiet, and then it’s just road sounds.

  “Are you on your way to work?” It doesn’t even occur to me to tell him it’s me. We’ve been texting back and forth about music so much lately, I know I’m saved in his phone.

  “Yeah. Going in early to set up displays before open. Want to help?”

  I find myself smiling down at the wet concrete beneath my feet. “Wish I could, but I have AP bio.”

  All he does is make a little humming noise, and I’m surprised at how intimate the sound is. How it sends a chill up my spine. But maybe that’s just the cold.

  I plunge forward because I did actually call him for a reason. “Do you like the Lumineers?”

  There’s a silence, and I realize I might have switched subjects too fast. “The Lumineers are good. Why? Have something awful to say about them?”

  This makes me laugh, and I hear the first bell ring inside, so I move around the side of the building, toward the front door, my eyes scanning for Jackson as I go. “No. They’re my favorite band. I bought tickets to see them in June, but I don’t have anyone to go with. I thought maybe you’d want to.”

  I hear shuffling, the gentle click of a turn signal, the slide of his hands across the steering wheel. “Don’t you have other friends who’ll want to go with you?”

  I bite my lip. That would be a no. “If you don’t want to go—”

  “I want to go,” he says over me, and I feel everything in my chest unclench. “I can pay for the ticket if you—”

  “No,” I say over him, a little too loudly. I’m almost inside now, and I stop just outside the door. “No, that’s okay. I already bought the tickets.” I don’t mention that my parents bought me the tickets for my birthday.

  We’re quiet for a minute, and then he says, “What’s the last concert you went to?” I’m very aware of how low his voice is, like he’s whispering to me, and it makes me stop, makes me pay attention.

  “Amber Run, back in September.”

  “I don’t know them.”

  I gasp, trying to be playful, but something about this moment doesn’t feel playful. “They’re essential, Oliver. I’ll bring you an album next time I see you.”

  He goes quiet again, and then he says, “Okay, Amy,” in a weird way. The steps in front of the school are completely empty now, and I’m fairly certain I’m going to be late.

  “Gotta go, Oli. See you at the Valentine’s Day party on Sunday.”

  I don’t wait for him to answer because I don’t think I can handle hearing his voice all low and quiet like that again, so I hang up and rush inside.

  “What took you so long?” Jackson asks when I drop down in my seat beside him in AP bio.

  “Nothing,” I say, but for some reason, I’m avoiding his eyes.

  AMY

  VALENTINE’S DAY. THE day when people who are in couples get showered with presents and affection and special favors while the single people of the world, like me, have to just … take it.

  Homeroom is fourth period, and I’m exhausted by all the love and cheer and human-size teddy bears by the time I get there, only to be reminded that we still have to do Valentine-grams. And it’s not even Valentine’s Day. That’s not until Sunday. But God forbid we don’t celebrate at school. Luckily, since I manned the Valentine-gram table more than once, I don’t have to do the delivery, which is the job everyone wants anyway because it means they don’t have to sit in homeroom.

  “Make it quick,” Mr. Pearson grunts at the gram deliverers when the time comes, and I set my head down on my desk because I can’t watch.

  Last year, Jackson asked me out on a gram. Go to the V-Day after-party with me, it read, the party after the basketball game that Bryce threw. I get a prickly feeling down my arms when I remember that I still have the gram, in the top drawer of my nightstand.

  I listen to people murmur as they read their grams, some people trying to figure out who could have sent grams from secret admirers. There are sighs and giggles, and I could puke.

  “Here you go, Amy.”

  I lift my head and look up at the person blocking the light. It’s a freshman whose name I don’t remember, and she’s holding a carnation out to me, which I take quickly, surprised.

  But how could I forget? He wrote it right in front of me.

  Sure enough, there’s Jackson’s chicken-scratch handwriting, so messy that I almost can’t read it.

  Do you remember Valentine’s Day last year? I couldn’t stop looking at you, all night.

  It’s a hard thing to forget.

  We went to the party and halfway through the night, Jackson became attached to my hip. Before the night was over, he was whispering in my ear about how he wanted to make me his, about how much he liked me, about how beautiful I was. And then he kissed me.

  I take a deep breath and stare at the carnation. It’s a beautiful orange-y pink, and I blush, thinking about the fact that Petra was on the other side of the table with me while Jackson wrote this, that she might have read it before tucking it away.

  And now I’m more confused than ever. Because he wrote this after the party, he wrote it seconds before telling me that I shouldn’t have kissed him. But these aren’t the words of someone who’s finished with what we had. My feelings are all jumbled. And maybe he’s just as confused as I am.

  I press the flower to my lips, close my eyes, and pray for clarity, because if he keeps this up, I don’t know if I can stay away from him.

  OLIVER

  MY MOTHER AND I are silent at dinner, but I know it can’t last. She sits up straight, and I prepare myself. I pray that it doesn’t have to do with MBU. What if they called her? What if she found out that I never sent that application? The deadline hasn’t passed, but that doesn’t mean she’s going to be completely fine with the idea of my lying to her for the past month.

  “Oliver, we should talk about your father.”

  There are about a million different things that she could have said, but nothing is as surprising as this. My parents never speak. They rarely even acknowledge that the other exists. In my mind, they’re so far removed from each other that I can’t even imagine them ever being in the same room, much less being in a relationship.

  My mother stabs at her salad for a minute. But I can’t tell if she’s angry at me about something or if she’s angry at Dad about something. Chances are good she’s equally pissed off at both of us. “When was the last time you saw your father sober?”

  If I’m being completely honest, I can’t think of a single time in my entire life when Dad was 100 percent sober. For as long as I can remember, being with Dad was kind of like hanging out with a toddler: I can’t keep his attention, he often rambles, and sometimes he won’t stop touching things.

  “Mom, it doesn’t matter. Dad’s never going to change. You know that.”

  She nods sagely. “Yes, I do know that.” She puts her elbows on the table and steeples her fingertips over her plate. “Sweetie, have you thought about attending school outside Missouri?”

  I blink at her. “What are you talking about? I thought you wanted me to go to MBU.”

  She sighs. “This isn’t about what I want. This is about what you want.”

&
nbsp; I just stare at her, ping-ponging between disbelief and rage. This is about what I want? Even though if I, right now, open my mouth and tell her that I don’t want to go to college at all, she would flip out?

  She sighs. “I’m just concerned that you feel you have to stay here because of him, because of how much help he needs, and I don’t want you to feel tied down by him.”

  I grind my jaw together. I shouldn’t feel tied down by Dad. I can’t believe that she’s not even processing how hypocritical she sounds right now. Maybe Dad is holding me down, but not any more than Mom is.

  “You don’t need to worry about Dad,” I say as calmly as I can. “I can handle myself.”

  A crease appears between her eyebrows. “You’re eighteen, Oliver. You can’t handle yourself, and you certainly can’t handle your father. He just uses you—”

  “I don’t care,” I say between gritted teeth. It’s the truth. I don’t care. He’s my dad. It doesn’t matter if the only time we spend together, he spends in the back seat of my truck, passed out. It doesn’t matter that when I try to talk to him about something serious, he shows up drunk as piss. None of that matters. He’s my fucking dad.

  She puts up a hand. She pinches her lips together, and I can tell she’s trying not to get upset. “I’m not trying to start an argument with you.”

  I want to growl at her that it’s too late, but I’ve never been good at this, at arguing with Mom, with letting her know how I feel, letting her know that I feel suffocated here with her, but also feel like I can’t leave because then she’ll have no one. That I feel obligated to help Dad because she’s the one who left him, and now he has nobody, too. That I want to leave Kansas City, but I’m scared to leave them and maybe I’m just scared to leave in general because I’m only eighteen, and I have no fucking clue what I’m doing.

  But I’ll never say any of that to her.

  I push back from the table and put my dirty plate in the sink. “Gotta go,” I say, heading for the front door and snatching up my jacket as I go.

  “Where?” Mom asks, still sitting at the kitchen table.

  “Valentine’s party. Don’t wait up.”

  I leave her sitting there, her dinner still in front of her.

  AMY

  I’VE NEVER REALLY been one for nerves. I’ve entered academic competitions that I won without blinking, given speeches about historical figures without so much as a stutter, and was even Dorothy freshman year in our school’s production of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (don’t even get me started on how many people threatened to egg my house the day that casting went up), but tonight, when I’m standing in front of my full-length mirror, I can actually feel my fingers trembling as I try to do my hair.

  Maybe it’s because of that stupid gram from Jackson or maybe it’s because I’m about to go to a party at my boss’s apartment. Either way, I’m nervous. Extremely nervous.

  “You look nice,” Mama says from the doorway.

  “Thanks,” I say, turning back to the mirror. I still have my hands in my hair, trying to tie it up in just the right way. The dress I’m wearing—a black, knee-length dress with roses on it—is one I stole from my mother’s closet, and I can only hope she doesn’t recognize it. She hasn’t worn it since she had the first set of twins.

  “Don’t you think you’re a little overdressed for family dinner, though?”

  My hands freeze, and I drop the strands of hair I’ve been attempting to braid together. “What? Family dinner is next week.”

  Mama’s eyes go wide. I can see her in the mirror, her hands clutching the doorframe. “No. We moved it to this week. For Valentine’s Day.”

  My mouth falls open. “But I asked you last week if I could go to a Valentine’s Day party, and you said yes. You never once mentioned that you guys moved family dinner to this week.”

  “I didn’t think you’d have plans today. I thought the party would be another day.” She makes a weird shape with her mouth. “When you didn’t go out last night, I thought you decided not to go.”

  “But today is Valentine’s Day.”

  Mama’s lips clamp together, and she crosses her arms.

  “Can’t I skip this one time?” I plead. “Please. I already told everyone I was going tonight. We have family dinner every month. Please. I’m already dressed!” I gesture toward my dress like she might not have already noticed it.

  “Yes, in my clothes. I can see that.”

  Shit.

  “Amy, you know the rules. Family dinner is not optional. I’m sorry, but you’re not going to a party on a Sunday night, and on family dinner night, even if it is Valentine’s Day.”

  She walks away like the conversation is over, and I’m left standing in front of my mirror, entirely overdressed for family dinner. I pick up my phone and pull up my text thread to Oliver.

  Can’t come to the party. Long story. Sorry.

  I text Brooke next, since it’s her party. And then I throw my phone down on my mattress hard, as if that will somehow get back at Mama.

  OLIVER

  “DO YOU THINK we have enough cupcakes?”

  I look at Brooke’s counters, her kitchen table, and the coffee table in the living room. Every surface is covered in finger foods and bowls of chips and dip, and there are pink and red heart-covered cupcakes everywhere. There’s enough to feed everyone in Kansas City, but I keep my mouth shut.

  “Honey, it’s, like, twenty people. There’s enough food.” Lauren comes into the kitchen, where Brooke is skittering around, putting more trays of food into the oven. Lauren takes a tray from Brooke, puts it on the stove, and kisses her. “Everything is going to be perfect. It’s just a silly party.”

  My phone beeps, and I pull it out of my pocket, my stomach clenching when I see it’s a text from Amy.

  Can’t come to the party. Long story. Sorry.

  I don’t realize until my body sags under the weight of my disappointment just how much I was looking forward to hanging out with Amy tonight. A party without her … well, it just doesn’t seem as interesting.

  “You look like someone drowned your puppy.”

  I look up and find Brooke’s eyes on me. I feel like I can’t escape those eyes. “What’s wrong?” she asks, pressing her hip to the counter between us. I’m glad I’m sitting in a chair on the other side of her bar, where she can’t see the screen of my phone.

  “Nothing,” I say, tucking my phone back into my pocket, and I expect Brooke to let it go.

  But she just crosses her arms and says, “Is it your dad?”

  I’m about to lie, just straight up tell her that yes, it’s my dad. But then her phone beeps, too, and she puts up a finger to tell me to wait and reads the text she just got. But of course, I know what she just got. A text from Amy, same as me.

  Brooke’s fingers start to move, answering the text, but then her fingers freeze, and her eyes slide slowly up to me.

  “Oli,” she says. “Did Amy text you that she isn’t coming to the party?”

  I say nothing.

  Her eyebrows curve in confusion. “Is that why—” She cuts off, and my stomach turns. Her eyes go wide, and she says, “Oh shit. You like her, don’t you?”

  I push away from the bar and walk into the living room, pretending to rearrange plates of snacks. If she sees my face, she’ll see that it’s gone completely red. “No, I don’t,” I say, trying to sound stern, but I just sound like a little kid with his first crush.

  I hear her step out of the kitchen and come into the living room, and I work to keep my back to her as she comes to stand beside me. “Oh please. You have a big ol’ crush on her. Dear God, that’s adorable. I’ve never seen you so much as show affection for a dog.”

  “I am not showing affection.” I turn around to glare at her.

  She throws back her head and laughs. “Oliver, you’ve been sharing music with her. I’m pretty sure that’s as close to a declaration of your undying love as you’re ever going to get.”

  I grit my teeth.
She’s lucky I don’t just toss the tray of cupcakes in front of me onto the floor. “That is a very specific situation. That is not a mixed-tape situation. It is not a show of affection. Don’t you have cupcakes to be stressed out about?”

  But she’s grinning at me, and I know she’s forgotten all about the cupcakes.

  “Hey,” Brooke says, latching on to my arm and shaking it. “Cheer up. This is going to be so much fun, even if Amy doesn’t come. Look, Marshal’s here.” She gestures at the door just as Marshal slinks in. He’s holding a bouquet of carnations that he hands Brooke, blushing furiously. Dear God.

  Brooke smiles and gives him a hug.

  “Why the long face, partner?” Marshal asks once Brooke has unhanded him.

  While a few more people find their way into the living room, I take a deep breath and decide that coming here tonight was an absolutely awful idea.

  AMY

  AN HOUR INTO dinner, I want to pluck my eyeballs out.

  “Why are you dressed like that?” my cousin, Lupe, sitting on my left side, asks me, as if I haven’t been sitting right beside him in this exact dress for the last hour.

  I ignore him, but Tía Marci leans over him to see me. “I think you look beautiful. Perfect for Valentine’s Day.” She reaches across Lupe like he isn’t even there and takes my chin in her fingers. “You look just like your mama when she was your age.” She purses her lips. “I think you might have gone a little heavy on the eyeliner though.”

  I gently pry my face away from her fingers and smile, close-lipped. The less I say, the better off I am.

  I glance down at my phone in my lap. Oliver never texted me back after I told him I wasn’t coming, and I’m trying not to take it personally. Nothing says he has to text me back just because I texted him. He’s probably having a great time at the party, a much greater time than I’m having.