“Your cousin.” Sierra cocked her head at Zoe. “I never really thought about that.”
“I don’t think I understand,” Zoe said.
“Oh, you know the story, Z. How I came down to Hankinson on a break from filming One Precious? I was going through a hard time then. . . . I’m sure Jane told you about our fight.”
Zoe’s hands began to tremble. After all these years she suddenly wasn’t so sure she wanted to hear it.
“I’m surprised Jane hasn’t told you,” Sierra continued. She reached for a tissue and tore it into shreds. “David might not just be your cousin. He might be your half-brother.”
Zoe suddenly felt like she was going to throw up. She had to get out of here. She looked at her sandals by the door. They were impossibly far away.
“Jane and Rich were already split up when he and I spent time together. Let’s just say, we made some mistakes.” Her mom pressed her pale fingers over her mouth. “It’s funny to come back for your graduation, and Rich is here too. I know you want a simple answer about your father, but I can’t give you that. Sometimes life is complicated.”
Sierra let out a sob and disappeared into the bathroom. Zoe doubled over her knees, breathing fast. Was her mom saying that she and Rich had had an affair? That Rich could be her father? Zoe thought about their hands together on the piano, the same freckles, the same musical instincts.
“Did you lie to me?” Zoe shouted, standing up. “Why did you always say it didn’t matter? Of course it matters!”
The sink was running, and it sounded like her mom was on the phone. Zoe wanted to bang on the door and demand the exact truth. Or maybe not. Maybe she didn’t want it to be true. For the past four years she’d felt safe here in Hankinson, but everyone had been lying to her all along.
Zoe loaded the containers back into the cooler. She forgot to put the lids on. The beans spilled out, swirling around in the bottom of the cooler with the roasted zucchini and oil and chunks of mozzarella. She put on her sandals and walked out of the suite. She stabbed at the button for the elevator until it arrived at her floor. Her phone started to ring. Jane. She dropped her phone into her bag again.
MIA
“DOES EVERYONE TELL you that you have sexy toes?” Brock asked. They were dipping their feet into the pool in Whitney Montaine’s backyard.
“Does everyone tell you that you are the king of clichéd come-ons?” Mia asked.
Brock kicked some water at her. “First of all, it’s not a come-on. And how are sexy toes cliché? I just like the way your second toe is longer than your first. Supposedly, it’s a sign of fertility.”
“So, now you want me to have your babies?” Mia asked. “Remember, we have to be thirty and only if we’re both single.”
“I’m not saying anything about babies, woman. I’m just saying, you have sexy toes.”
“Fertile toes,” Mia said, kicking water back at him.
Ever since she’d gotten together with Jeremiah at Admitted Students Weekend, she and Brock had become actual in-person friends. She no longer cared that he was popular or that he’d gone up her shirt at the waterfall that time. They liked each other, and the friendship worked for them.
Mia swirled her sexy fertile toes around in the water. High school was over, and honestly, so were the stupid labels. Whitney was together with Gregor Lombard from band. Brock had brought Mia to Whitney’s pool party. And Laurel, one of the bitchiest popular girls, was here with her baby boy. Mia had cooed at Hunter in the kitchen, and Laurel had said she should come to the playground with them over the summer.
Not to mention that tomorrow was graduation and Mia was valedictorian of the senior class. She was even okay with the fact that she’d be standing at the podium tomorrow, giving a speech. A few days ago—the afternoon that Jake texted her about the orientation group meeting up—she’d slipped down to the basement of the school and put the envelope with the letters back in the hole inside the fire extinguisher cabinet. She’d taken out that photo of Brock that she’d stolen from Kyra’s locker freshman year and also her SAT scores and report cards. Only their original five letters were in there, and Mia hadn’t let herself reread them. She was saving that for tomorrow.
“Want to swim?” Brock asked Mia.
A bunch of people were splashing around in the water, dunking each other and having chicken fights.
Mia shrugged. “My suit is in the car.”
“So that means I get to toss you in with your clothes on!” Brock grinned mischievously. The sun was casting a golden glow on his face, his auburn hair. “Awesome. The wet T-shirt contest begins!”
Mia leaned into Brock, and he put his arm around her. They joked around like this, but Brock knew he wasn’t getting anywhere. Mia and Jeremiah were together. They texted all the time, and he even sent her a necklace that she wore constantly. He’d had I wanna be your boyfriend engraved on a dog tag. That was from their favorite Ramones song.
Just then Mia heard Whitney shriek from the porch. She and Brock jumped up.
“He’s been stung!” Whitney was screaming. “Gregor’s been stung! He’s really allergic!”
Mia leaped off the pool deck and ran across the lawn. Whitney was sitting in a lawn chair, Gregor slumped between her legs. His eyes were closed, and he was clutching his throat and gagging.
“He needs an EpiPen!” Mia shouted. For the first time in her life she wished her mom was here. Her mom always carried samples in her trunk. “Where’s his EpiPen?”
“It must have fallen out of his backpack somewhere,” Whitney cried, her eyes filling with tears. “We can’t find it. Oh my god, Mia. I don’t know what to do.”
“Has anyone called 911?” Brock asked.
Mia ran to get her phone. She’d left it up at the pool. She could barely feel her legs moving as she climbed the stairs. But just as she began dialing 911, she saw Brock helping Whitney and Gregor into the back of an SUV. She watched him fly into the front and peel down the driveway.
JAKE
JAKE’S DAD COOKED up a serious night-before-graduation dinner. Quesadillas, guacamole, grilled steak, salad, corn on the cob, homemade blueberry pie. Jake ate until he was stuffed, then he brushed his teeth, kissed his parents, and got into the car. He’d loaded the party supplies into the trunk earlier so he wouldn’t get busted carrying a bottle of vodka down the driveway.
Before he put the car in reverse, he texted Ted to firm up plans for later. Ted was at a pool party with Brock and a bunch of other people. They’d invited Jake along, but he wanted to have dinner with his family and then hang out with JAZ. Ted was his boyfriend, but Zoe and Anna were his tribe. He couldn’t wait to see them get buzzed tonight. Now that was going to be hilarious.
Jake texted Anna that he was on his way to pick her up, and then he plugged his phone in and headed toward Breakneck Hill. He was halfway up the hill when he slowed at a red light and adjusted the volume on the music. He looked up just in time to see a white SUV hurtling past him, Brock at the wheel. He glanced in the rearview. Brock wasn’t even stopping at the lights.
GREGOR
ON THE DRIVE to the hospital, Gregor’s body was on fire and he couldn’t stop throwing up. His thighs were slimy with puke, but he was too out of it to care. He flopped his head loosely from side to side. Whitney was next to him, her phone at her ear. Her voice was high and tight. Gregor couldn’t even understand what she was saying.
Was this what it felt like for his dad when he collapsed in Mount Olive Park? To be sort of here, but not really. Mostly, to be slipping away.
Gregor could feel his dad with him, holding his hand. He could see his dad’s warm brown eyes and hear his voice telling him it would be okay.
“It’ll be okay,” Whitney was saying. “Gregor, don’t fall asleep. . . . Seriously . . . keep your eyes open. Brock, can you drive faster?”
Oh . . . it was Whitney holding his hand. It was Whitney looking at him with her beautiful hazel eyes. His beautiful girlfriend. But why had he heard his
dad’s voice? Gregor was having a hard time keeping things straight. He tried to breathe, but it was impossible to get air. He vomited again. He wanted to wipe his mouth, but he couldn’t lift his hand.
“Brock,” Whitney was saying, “can’t you drive faster . . . I don’t think . . . The emergency room says . . .”
As Gregor drifted off, he thought about a quote his dad once told him. It was when his dad had been recounting the story of how he’d met his mom. He said to Gregor, Someday, someone will walk into your life and you’ll realize why it never worked out with anyone else.
That was how it felt with Whitney. Maybe his dad had been passing on that wisdom so Gregor could tuck it away until he and Whitney got together.
That was what made Gregor realize he would live.
He would live and, in the fall, he and Whitney would move to New York City. They would be on their own campuses, Whitney downtown at NYU and Gregor at Manhattan School of Music up in Morningside Heights. They would talk every day, and on weekends they’d see live music in underground clubs and they’d eat cheap Indian food in the East Village and they’d walk across the Brooklyn Bridge and hook a padlock with their initials onto the metal lattice of the bridge.
After college, maybe when they were twenty-five, they’d be back in Hankinson visiting their families and they’d take a walk in Mount Olive Park. Gregor would get down on one knee and propose to Whitney and she’d say yes. They’d name their first son Charlie after Gregor’s dad.
Give or take a few details, Gregor saw his entire future on the drive to the emergency room. That was what kept him alive.
ZOE
IT WAS GOOD her gas tank was full because Zoe drove for hours. She took small roads and big roads and, for a while, the New York State Thruway. She didn’t even care where she went. All she wanted was to get away from this life that she thought was real but was actually a lie.
Her phone kept ringing and texts were coming in. Zoe read them whenever she stopped at lights, but she wasn’t writing back to anyone.
Jake and Anna both wrote, Where the hell are you?
Dinky wrote, What’s up, babe? Are you okay?
Aunt Jane wrote, Call me. I need to explain.
Rich wrote, I’m so sorry you had to find out this way.
Her mom wrote, I’m having a hard time right now. Please try to understand.
And then Max wrote, Don’t do this, Zoe. You don’t run off like this. Not when you’re in the public eye.
Zoe slowed at a red light and texted, Fuck off, Max.
Then she turned off her phone.
As the sun was setting and the sky was streaked with pink and violet, Zoe pulled onto the shoulder and turned on her phone.
“Zoe!” Jake shouted. “What the hell? Where are you? Are you alive?”
As soon as she heard his voice, her chest squeezed up tight. She wanted to be at Bean, serving lattes with Jake, or drinking vodka with JAZ tonight. She didn’t want to be alone on some roadside. But like everything in her life, Zoe didn’t ask for it. It just happened.
“Is anyone with you?” Zoe whispered. She didn’t want to talk to Anna, who would be so upset she’d start crying, which would make Zoe cry. And if Zoe began crying, then she’d never stop.
“I’m at Anna’s,” Jake said, “but she’s in the bathroom. When you didn’t come to your place tonight, we—”
“Listen,” Zoe said. “I’m going to talk quickly and I want you to hang up as soon as Anna comes in.”
“Why?”
“I found out tonight who my real dad is and basically that my life is a lie.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Jake said. “Like, where are you? Everyone is freaking out. Your aunt wants to call the police.”
“Tell her not to call the police,” Zoe said. “Tell her I’ll be okay.”
“You’re not going to do anything stupid, are you?”
“Duh . . . no,” Zoe said.
“What about graduation?”
“I’m not going to graduation,” Zoe said. “It doesn’t matter.”
When Zoe heard Anna’s voice in the background, she hung up and turned off her phone again.
WHITNEY
“YOUR PHONE’S RINGING, Whit!” Alicia called into the shower. “Want me to answer it?”
It was an hour before graduation. Whitney had slept over at Gregor’s last night, just to be near him. For part of the night she was in a sleeping bag on his floor, but then she’d crawled into his bed and wrapped her arms around him, grateful he was alive. She’d gotten home a little while ago, downed a bowl of cereal, and jumped in the shower. She’d already shaved her legs, and now she was letting the hot water spray her stiff neck. Last night had been intense. Hopefully, she wouldn’t get a migraine today. She’d started medication last summer to prevent them, but she still got headaches when she was stressed.
“Who is it?” Whitney called to her sister as she shut off the water.
In their mom’s new house Alicia’s and Whitney’s rooms were connected by a shared bathroom. In a way it was nice to have neutral territory where they could meet. Two nights ago they sat on the edge of the tub and had a leg-shaving party.
“Jake Rodriguez,” Alicia said. “Who’s he?”
Why was Jake calling her? Maybe he was checking on Gregor. Jake’s boyfriend, Ted, was at her pool party yesterday. All last night people kept texting to ask how Gregor was doing.
“Yeah, you can answer,” Whitney said. “Thanks.”
“Who is Jake, anyway?” Alicia called from Whitney’s room. Whitney could hear her phone ringing. “Was he in that freshman orientation group? Group eighteen, right? His name sounds—”
“Just answer!” Whitney shouted, reaching for a towel.
“Touchy, touchy.” Alicia cracked open the bathroom door. “Here’s my sister,” she said into the phone, and then handed it to Whitney.
Whitney lifted the phone to her ear. “Hey, Jake . . . what’s up?”
“Hey,” Jake said. “How’s Gregor? Ted said he got stung by a bee and he’s allergic.”
“He’s okay . . . thanks.” Whitney sat on the toilet lid and squirted moisturizer in her palm. “The problem was that we couldn’t find his EpiPen. That’ll never happen again.”
“But he’s okay?”
“He’s tired,” Whitney said, “but he’ll be fine. The doctor said he can come to graduation.”
Jake sighed. “Speaking of graduation, you know how we were going to meet later? I’m not sure it’s going to happen.”
“Why? What’s going on?”
“The thing is . . . Zoe is missing.”
Whitney gasped. “Missing?”
“She had a fight with her mom last night, and no one knows where she is. I shouldn’t even be telling you this, but—”
“No, it’s okay.” Whitney was trying to be a different person, more caring, less self-absorbed. In the past she would have been excited about this nugget of news because of the Sierra Laybourne connection, but now she was genuinely concerned about Zoe.
“I’m sure she’s okay,” Whitney said. “Has Dinky talked to her? Or Anna? Or anyone?”
“I did briefly, but she didn’t say where she is.”
“I’m sure she’ll show up at graduation. But if she doesn’t, will you let me know what I can do or how I can help or whatever.”
“Thanks,” Jake said quietly.
“Anytime.”
JAKE
JAKE FOLDED HIS cap and gown into his backpack and biked to the high school. Ted said he could easily pick him up on the way to graduation, but Jake was hoping the ride would clear his head. Even though his mom and dad and Ted and Anna and even Whitney said that Zoe would turn up at graduation, he was the only one who’d talked to her, who’d heard how distant she sounded.
He had to get his shit together before he made his speech as senior class president. He was introducing the keynoter, a New York State assemblywoman. Right now his brain felt murky. For the p
ast twelve hours he’d been talking nonstop with Anna and Dinky and Zoe’s aunt Jane. Everyone was a wreck. Once, when he’d been on the phone with Jane, she’d broken down and started crying. She told Jake that she’d talked to Sierra, who told her what she’d said to Zoe about Rich.
“I never told Zoe because nothing was certain,” Jane had said to him. “At least I didn’t think it was. And Sierra had always threatened that if I said anything about it, she’d fly Zoe home. That was what she said.”
Jake was stunned. Rich? The guy who helped Zoe write her song? He shouldn’t even be hearing this. He was in way, way over his head.
“Where do you think she is?” Jane asked Jake.
“No idea,” Jake said. “All she said was that she was going to be okay and not to call the police. I’m sorry. It’s sort of a blur.”
“But what do you think?” Jane asked.
“I don’t know. . . . I’m sorry.”
It was almost like people were mad at him for not knowing more. It wasn’t as if Zoe had given him a choice. She’d hung up before he could get any real information. On top of being worried about her, he was also pissed.
As Jake locked his bike to the rack outside school, his stomach was churning. He slipped into a side door, washed his face, and pulled on his gown and cap. Then he rushed to the VIP room to meet Mr. Bauersmith and the assemblywoman. In one hand he had his note cards for the speech. In the other hand he was holding his phone, waiting to hear from Zoe.
MIA
MIA HAD IT all planned out. She’d been thinking about it ever since Whitney texted her two days ago. After graduation the five of them would find each other. Mia, Jake, Zoe, Whitney, and Gregor. Four years ago, at freshman orientation, they said they would meet under the basketball hoop right after the ceremony and walk to the basement together to get the letters.
The way she figured it, when graduation was over, they would go to their families and take pictures and get their flowers. But then, after a few minutes, they’d see each other and drift together. Mia would say, “Do you think the letters are still there?”
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