“Right?” Blake goes.
“I’m neither confirming nor denying my own feelings, but trust me: Jason likes Erin. That’s why he’s going out with her.”
There are so many reasons why Jason can’t like me. But I still can’t stop thinking about my palm and tarot readings. How I’ll have more than one great love in my life. How my fate line shows that an immense conflict will happen soon.
How something might rip Erin and me apart.
The doorbell rings.
I go, “Can I put my head in this drawer and slam it now?”
“Not now. You have company.”
“Okay.” I take a deep breath. “I can do this. It’s not that serious.”
“Not yet,” Blake mumbles.
“What?”
“Get the door, girl. One step at a time.”
“Ha-ha.” I’ve totally converted Blake on the horoscope front. Now we read our weekly horoscopes together. This week, my horoscope said that I’d be faced with a great challenge and the best way to approach it would be one step at a time.
Somehow, I manage to open the door. And smile at the enormous bunch of balloons Erin has for me. And act like my normal self (or at least what I think my normal self acts like). But I can’t stop wondering why I didn’t deny it when Blake said I like Jason. I should have just told him he’s wrong. Then everything would be fine.
After dinner, two movies, cake, and a hysterical game of Twister, Jason and I are out on the back porch sitting on the swing while Erin and Blake are inside playing more Twister. I don’t know how we split up into pairs like this. Maybe Blake had something to do with it. I was laughing so hard playing that I almost hacked up a lung. So I said I was going to take a break and Jason said he’d come with me and Blake challenged Erin to another game and here we are.
My back porch is elevated over the lake. When you’re on the porch, it looks like you’re floating above the water. It’s really peaceful. We can hear “Transatlanticism” playing through the open window. It’s one of the songs on my desert-island CD pick. Death Cab is made of awesome.
“I like it out here,” Jason says.
“Me, too.”
“You can see defunct tracks right through those trees over there.”
“What?”
“Old train tracks. Some parts of the rail line aren’t used anymore, but the tracks are still there. The train used to go right along that side of the lake.”
“How long ago was that?”
“Don’t know. Like, fifty years ago?”
“How do you know all this?”
“My grandpa was a train conductor. We used to go for walks when I was little, all up and down these tracks. He showed me tons of secret places they go.”
“That’s so cool.”
A warm breeze blows over the lake. These May nights are the best. The air is really soft. By July, it’s so hot and humid out that the suffocating air practically crushes you the second you leave the house.
“I still walk them,” Jason says. “The tracks.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. My grandpa used to say that any problem I had could be worked out by walking the tracks. He said I could find all the answers out there.”
How perfect would that be? I could use that kind of magic right about now.
“Do you think it’s true?” I ask.
“It works for me. Whenever I can’t get something out of my head, I walk the tracks. Everything just sort of clears away.”
“I used to have a journal. The same thing would happen with me. As soon as I wrote about my problems, it was like they weren’t so bad anymore.”
“Exactly. Once you put it all out there, you’re free.”
Jason gets me. He even gets stuff I didn’t know I was trying to say.
He goes, “Maybe you can come with me sometime.”
“Where?”
“For a walk.”
“Okay. I mean, maybe. Not that I don’t want to. It’s—that sounds cool. I’m just not sure if . . . whatever. Walks are good.”
Walks are good? Could I be a bigger spaz? What’s the big deal about walking? Not that Jason and I will be walking anywhere now. Now that he knows what a complete and total freak I am.
“Do you still have a journal?” Jason says.
“No. I thought about starting a blog, but that’s not really my thing.”
“So what’s your thing?”
“What do you mean?”
“How do you deal with your problems?”
“Oh.” I take a mental inventory of the things I do to feel better. Use my favorite bath bubbles. Do some more fate research. Plant trees. Somehow, none of my usual techniques has been all that effective lately. “I guess I don’t, really. Deal with them, I mean.”
It’s so weird about Jason and the train tracks. When I was little, I was always fascinated by them. Where they were going. What they had seen. I wondered if anyone else was noticing them the way I was. There’s something about the train tracks that made me feel like I was in the center of everything, like I could go anywhere. The world felt so full of possibility. So I think it’s wild that this whole time, there was someone else out there who felt the same way.
And now he’s here.
“Everyone has their coping tricks,” Jason says. “Let’s see. Do you . . . get mad at the world and punch holes in the wall?”
“No.”
“No? Do you . . . eat ice cream and watch chick flicks?”
“No.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes.”
“Are you ticklish?”
“No!” I yell. Because I am so ticklish it’s not even funny.
“Let’s make sure.” Jason tickles my side.
“Stop!” I laugh-scream. “Stop it!”
The porch door slides open.
“Hey,” Erin says.
Jason stops tickling me.
I stop laughing.
“Oh, hey,” he says. “We were just . . . talking.”
“About what?”
I can’t really remember what we were talking about. Something about journals and train tracks and . . . How did that turn into all the tickling?
Erin looks at me.
I go, “Um. Just . . . you know . . . random stuff . . .”
“How’s Twister?” Jason says.
“Over.”
Blake swoops up behind Erin. He lifts her up and carries her out to the porch.
“Put me down!” she squeals.
“Not until you admit that I am the reigning Twister champion of all time that was and all time left to come.”
“Fine.”
“That doesn’t sound convincing!” Blake lifts her higher.
“Okay, okay! You rule!”
“Thank you.” Blake puts Erin down.
“But you so cheated on left-hand yellow!” Erin yells. Then she runs off the porch shrieking with Blake chasing her. He catches her and carries her back.
“It’s getting late,” Erin tells Jason. “I should go.” She sneaks a quick look at me. The sparkle in her eye says, Fill me in on what he said later?
I give her a little nod. I wish I had something good to tell her.
“Yeah, okay.” Jason gets up.
I stay on the swing. I’m surprised at how much I don’t want him to leave.
“So . . .” Jason goes. “Happy birthday. Thanks for having us over. It was fun.”
“Of course. Anytime.”
Anytime? Why did I say that? It sounds like an invitation to come over and make out or something.
Blake sits on the swing next to me after letting them out. I’m in a total daze. I can’t even get up.
We listen to Jason’s Jeep pulling out of the driveway.
“How’s it going?” Blake says.
“I wish I knew.”
“Are you okay?”
“Yeah.”
“What happened out here?”
“Nothing.”
I’m sure th
at’s exactly how it felt to Jason. Like nothing happened. I just wish that to me, it didn’t feel like something.
13
We’re doing pointillism in art. It’s a method of painting where the image you’re creating consists of all these tiny dots. The cool thing is that you can only see the dots up close. When you look at the painting from far away, it just looks like a regular painting. Pointillism is really hard because it takes forever to make all the little dots. And getting the right colors in the right places is key. If your colors are corroded in one little section, it ruins the whole painting.
Naturally, Connor rocks at pointillism.
“You’re so good at everything,” I tell him. “I suck at this.”
“No you don’t,” he says. He’s just being nice. I’m trying to paint an underwater ocean scene. It’s just not working. My queen angelfish is supposed to have these bright yellow eyes and electric-blue stripes along the edge of her fin. Instead, it looks like I’m trying to paint a fried egg with some blue bacon. Maybe I can pass it off as postmodern.
“Are you sure I don’t suck?” I ask.
“Positive.”
“Then what’s this supposed to be?” I slide my paper across the table to Connor.
He turns the paper around and barely looks at it before sliding it back. He goes, “A fish.”
“How did you do that?”
“You’re not as bad as you think. It looks good.”
“Really?”
“Yes.”
People are always telling me that I’m too hard on myself. That’s part of being a Taurus. I can be so stubborn about making things perfect that I don’t stop to notice they’re already good enough.
“What do you think of mine?” Sophie asks me. She’s been sitting with me and Connor since that day Ryan harassed her. She doesn’t really say much.
“It’s good!” I say.
“Thanks.” She grins at the table.
Sophie and Connor are so much better at this. I’ve been blending red and blue together for ten minutes and I still can’t get the exact shade of purple I want.
“Maybe it doesn’t exist,” I tell myself. But I say it out loud.
“What?” Connor says.
“This color I’m trying to make. Maybe it’s not an actual color.”
“Kind of lost me there.”
“I mean, have all the colors been invented already? Or are there some new colors that don’t exist yet?”
“Still lost.”
“Like . . . how are colors . . . made?”
“How are they made?”
“Yeah.”
“From pigment combinations.”
“Well, where do pigments come from?”
“I think they’re just naturally occurring.”
“Naturally occurring in what?”
“Um . . .”
I hate when questions like this get stuck in my head. They bother me until I can find an answer. The annoying thing is that these kinds of questions usually don’t have definite answers. Like with the whole fate thing. Do we have control over our fate, or will our lives turn out the same way no matter what we do? This is the one question I wish I could know the answer to more than any others. But I’ll probably never know.
Ms. Sheptock lets us out early. This happens sometimes when she has to set up complicated project materials for the advanced art class she has next. I go to get a drink of water near the locker room. I wonder if Danielle’s around. She has gym now.
Just when I’m about to leave, Danielle comes out of the gym with a group of girls. They pass by in a cloud of cherry lip gloss and Secret deodorant, disappearing into the locker room.
“Hey,” she goes. “You got out early from art again?”
“Just in time. I was two seconds away from ripping my pointillism fiasco to shreds.”
“You’re too hard on yourself.”
“Only when it’s true.”
“So . . . I’ve been meaning to ask you something.”
“What?”
Danielle looks behind her, toward the locker room. No one’s around.
“I just . . .” She gets really quiet. “I was wondering if . . . there’s anything going on with you and Jason.”
“What? No! Why would you think that?”
“Because you sit with him every day at lunch.”
“I thought you weren’t mad about that. I told you, it’s—”
“I’m not mad. I just meant . . . I see the way you are with him.”
This is tricky. I could ask exactly what she means by that. Of course I want to know. But then we’ll be talking about it. It’s better to not go there.
“We’re just friends,” I say. “You know he’s with Erin.”
“I know.”
“We have this connection, is all.”
I can tell that Danielle doesn’t believe me. We’re close. She knows me. So because we’re close and she knows me, she’s letting it go. That’s how you know you have a good friend. When they spare you from a conversation you don’t want to have.
When I head to English in a direction that will probably make me late, it’s not a conscious decision. Something is making me walk a different way than I normally would when there’s no reason I should. You know how you’re so used to having the same routine every day that sometimes you’re not even aware of how you got from point A to point B? Like, all of a sudden I’ll be somewhere that I totally don’t remember walking to. I’m used to sort of tuning out like that in between classes. But right now I just have this really strong feeling that I should go down a different hall. So I do.
And there’s Jason. Right around the corner.
“Hey,” he says. “I never see you before fourth.”
“Well . . . here I am.”
“Nice. What do you have now?”
“Um. English.”
“Do you have Mrs. DeFranco?”
“No, Ms. Martin.”
“I hear she’s decent.”
“Yeah, I like her.”
The bell rings.
Jason says, “See you at lunch?”
“Yeah.”
We both go to leave at the same time. I bump right into Jason. Or he bumps into me. It’s hard to tell.
“Oh!” I go. “Sorry!”
“No, it’s my fault. I’m still learning how this whole look-where-you’re-going thing works.”
We try to walk our separate ways without bumping into each other again. We both move to the same side, then the other side.
“Whoa,” Jason says. “Maybe one of us should let the other go first.”
“I’m not moving.”
“Walking away now.”
Jason finally manages to leave.
Kids go to their classrooms. I just stand there, processing it all. What made me walk this way, knowing it would make me late for class? Was the Energy controlling my fate? Or was I controlling my own fate?
14
Today is one of those typical spring Sundays. Mom is working in the garden, planting sunflower seeds. Dad’s in his recliner with a new crossword-puzzle book. Erin’s over. We’re watching a movie in my room. It’s the same scenario we’ve all played out tons of times before. Except today is different.
Today I feel guilty.
Erin doesn’t care that Jason and I sit together at lunch. She loves that we’re friends now. Before that time we all went out for pizza, she was worried that we wouldn’t like each other, which would have harshed her excitement over all of us doing stuff together. So she’s relieved that Blake approved Jason as worthy and that I like hanging out with him. With all of their staring at us, I don’t know if the Golden Circle has said anything to her. Even if they have, it wouldn’t occur to Erin to take their gossiping seriously. In Erin’s mind, Jason and I only exist in relation to her. She gets like this sometimes—only seeing what she wants. It’s a sort of tunnel vision that makes her oblivious.
Erin wants to know what Jason’s been saying about her. But Jason
never really talks about Erin. Whenever I bring her up, he changes the subject three seconds later. Not that I bring her up as much as I should. Which is why I’m having trouble answering Erin’s questions.
“But what did he say?” she goes.
“Nothing.”
“You asked him if he liked my hair and he didn’t say anything?” Erin has curly blonde hair. She just started blowing it out straight. I was supposed to ask Jason if he likes Erin’s hair better straight or curly. I mean, I did ask him . . . I think. I’m sure I did. I just can’t remember what he said.
“No, he said it looks nice,” I tell her.
“He likes it better than curly?”
“I think he likes both ways the same.”
“Huh. That’s weird.”
“Why?”
“Guys have strong opinions about how they want girls to look. They usually either like curly hair or straight hair. Not both.”
“I guess Jason’s more open-minded.”
“I know, isn’t he awesome?”
“Totally.”
We go back to watching Thirteen. But I have this thing lately where I can’t concentrate on simple activities. Like, I’ll be reading a book and my mind will just drift off and twenty minutes later I’m still on the same page. Or I’ll be watching a movie and a whole scene will go by before I realize that I have no idea what anyone said.
“What do you like best about him?” Erin asks.
“Who?”
“Jason!”
“Oh.” I really don’t think I’m the best person to ask. Not because I don’t have an answer. More like because I have too many answers. “Um . . . he’s funny.”
“So funny.”
“And smart.”
“So smart.”
Gromit peers at me from around a bit of coral. I go over to the aquarium and press my finger against the glass. She looks at me curiously. Then, concluding that I am not food, she drifts away.
Erin’s like, “Next year’s going to be the best.”
“Totally.”
“We should all do a road trip!”
“Um—”
“We can drive to Arizona and check out that world’s largest solar panel you’ve been dying to see.”
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