"I've got it, thanks," like Grandma was a stranger she was forcing herself to be polite to.
When Dad sat down in the living room, smiling at me and Mom and Todd, I figured we'd finally talk about the house, or at least discuss where we might move to. After all, we had to live somewhere, and Mom had already said it wasn't going to be in our house anymore.
"Is there anything to eat?" Dad said.
"Of course," Mom said, and we ended up back in the kitchen, the four of us sitting around the kitchen table just like we used to every night for dinner.
"So," Dad said, looking at Todd and me as Mom handed him a plate with a sandwich on it, "I guess you two know about the house?"
Todd and I nodded.
"Good," Dad said. "That's really good." He clapped Todd on the shoulder. "Dave at the coffee place told me about your job at their new branch. Congratulations." He leaned over and kissed Mom. "I'm beat, honey. Can you wrap this up for me? I think I'd better go get some sleep."
He yawned and started to get up, pushing his chair back from the table. I stared at him.
That was it? I knew Dad didn't handle bad news well, but this was our house, not me failing my driver's test, or Todd doing it with some girl in his room, or even Grandma coming to visit. I must have looked upset, because when Dad glanced at me, he quickly looked away.
Like he did anytime he saw something he didn't want to see.
"I can't work tomorrow," I said, the words coming out strangled, like they'd gotten caught in my throat. I looked at Mom, waiting for a reaction. She wouldn't let this be it, would she? She'd say something, tell me I had to work, tell Dad we needed to talk about everything that had happened. Mom didn't look at me. She just stared at Dad's sandwich, her mouth a thin, tight line.
"No problem," Dad said. "With Todd getting a job, I'll need to get used to working by myself a bit more anyway."
And that was it. That was all anyone said about the house, about how it would soon belong to someone else.
Chapter twenty-four
When I woke up the next morning, I looked around my room.
I saw the smudges on the wall from where Anna and I had practiced handstands and rested our feet against it, scrabbling to stay upright before we fell. I saw the weird crack in the corner of my ceiling that I'd always thought looked like a spiderweb. I saw the shells I'd collected the summer me and Mom and Todd stayed with Grandma at her beach house. I'd forgotten how much I loved walking along the beach with her. She never got mad when I wanted to stop and pick something up. She said walking too fast was silly, and it was important to see everything you could.
I tried to picture my desk and my bed in a new room. I tried to picture myself in a new room. I couldn't do it, even though I knew it would happen.
Since I didn't have to go to the mall, I went for a walk, not even bothering to try and talk to Mom about driving. I just wanted to get away from the house, from everything that was already gone.
I ended up at Anna's.
Walking by her house made me feel better and worse. Better, because it brought back so many memories. Worse, because that's all I had. Memories.
I stood at the edge of her driveway, staring down at it and wishing I could walk up to her front door without even thinking about it the way I used to, when I heard Anna say,
"Kate?"
I looked up, embarrassed, and saw Anna standing just inside her house, peering at me from the open door. I waved weakly, feeling like an idiot.
"What are you doing here?" She didn't sound mad, just surprised.
"I was out walking. I would have gone for a drive but Mom has this whole thing about me and driving and . . ."I forced myself to stop talking, aware I was babbling and that Anna had no reason to care about me walking or anything else.
"Oh," she said, and then, a second later, "Do you want to come in?"
And just like that, my friendship with Anna began again. It was like a dream but better, because it was real, because we went to her room and sat like we always did, me curled up in the overstuffed chair that Anna's mom had picked up at a yard sale years ago, and that Anna had decorated with the butterfly stickers I'd given her when she turned eleven. It felt like coming home in the best way.
The stickers were gone, but the chair was still there, familiar and solid, and Anna lay on the floor like she always had, resting her feet on the bed, and told me all about Sam.
She told me everything I'd always wondered about the two of them, answered all the questions I'd wanted to ask but hadn't been able to.
"So, that's how it happened," she said much later, her voice slightly hoarse from talking for so long. "Me and Sam. Our story. Wow. Our story. It sounds unbelievable, doesn't it?
I mean, if you'd told me this time last year that I'd be his girlfriend . ." She lifted her arms up and spread them out to the side, then giggled and crossed them over her chest like she was hugging herself. "I'm so lucky."
"You are." And she was. Being with a guy like Sam was the Jackson High equivalent of dating a movie star.
The thing was, I was the tiniest bit tired of hearing about Sam. Anna had talked about him before, of course, but he'd never been all she talked about.
"Do you miss choir?" I said. "I had to quit when everything with Dad happened, but in the fall we sang at least two songs at the winter concert that you totally would have gotten a solo for."
"Choir?" Anna said. "I swear, Kate, I totally forgot I was ever in it. I was the world's biggest loser back then, wasn't I?"
She laughed. I didn't. Anna seemed different, not just in how she looked, but in how she talked too. It was like Anna was there, but there was someone else layered on top of her as well. Someone new. Someone who didn't care about any of the things she'd once cared about except Sam.
"I guess I do miss singing a little, but I can always do it for real later, you know?" she said. "I was talking to Diane about New York City, and--well, I can totally see myself singing there, you know?"
"New York?"
"Yeah, Diane wants to go to NYU, and she'll totally get in because her aunt or somebody works there, and since there's no money for me to go to school, I'm going to go out there with her and we'll get an apartment and I'll get a job singing." She pointed her toes up into the air, bouncing her heels on the bed. "Maybe I'll end up in a really famous musical or something. Wouldn't that be amazing?"
"Amazing," I said, but it came out flat, strangled-sounding. Anna was going to move to New York and live with Diane. We used to talk about moving to New York. How had she forgotten that? We'd talked about it for years and now . . . now it was like none of it had ever happened.
"Okay, something's going on," she said. "I can tell because you've got that Tm-thinking-too-much' look on your face. What's up?"
Where was I going to start? Her? Dad? Grandma? Todd and his new job? Mom? Finding out about the house? Will?
Will, who hung out with Sam.
"I was thinking about Sam," I said, rolling my eyes when she nudged me with one foot.
"Not like that. I saw him on Friday night. At a party, I mean. Were you there with him? I didn't see you but it was pretty crowded, and I sort of ended up leaving in a hurry."
"Party?" Anna said, sounding startled. "What party?"
"Jennifer T.'s."
"Oh," she said, visibly relaxing. "That thing. I thought you were talking about . . . never mind."
"Talking about what?"
"Nothing." She waved a hand at me, grinning brightly.
I stared at her. She was trying really hard to act casual. Too hard. Plus her smile looked like Dad's did whenever Grandma was around, too wide and fake.
"Really?"
"Yeah. I'm just brain-dead because of everything with my mom, you know?" she said.
"But anyway, I definitely wasn't at Jennifer's. Me and Diane went out, and I was supposed to go to this thing at Tara's, but she called at the last minute and said it was just going to be a few people."
"Oh," I said, confuse
d as to what this had to do with Sam.
She laughed, but it was hollow sounding. "I forgot, you don't know that Sam and Tara hang out sometimes. See, he swore he wasn't going over there, but I thought he might drop by real fast or something. But instead he went to Jennifer's. I bet she loved that."
I looked at her, hearing something strange in the brittle tone of her voice. "Are you and Sam okay?"
"Of course." She looked away from me, staring up at her ceiling. "It's just that people like Tara can do anything, you know? And Sam says he loves me, but I--I guess I keep thinking it's all a dream, and I'm going to wake up and find out I'm still a nobody."
"Wait a minute--Sam's said he loves you?" WOW I couldn't imagine anyone saying that to me, not ever, and Anna had just said it like it was no big deal. But I knew it must be.
"Yeah," she said, her voice shy and giddy, and in that was a glimpse of the Anna I knew, the one who dreamed about Sam and a perfect life. "Pretty amazing, isn't it? I still can't totally believe it, which I guess is why I worry sometimes. But anyway, you have to tell me how stupid the Jennifers were." She cleared her throat. "Did Jennifer T. throw herself at him?"
"No, but he got pizza when she'd told us there wasn't any food left."
She laughed again, sounding oddly relieved. "God, she's so pathetic. I bet Will talked him into going for some reason. Some girl, probably."
Me? Could Will have talked him into going for me?
"I totally get why you never liked him now, by the way," Anna continued. "You know how sometimes there are stupid rumors about Sam hooking up with random girls? It's all because Will hooks up with anything that breathes, and it's so annoying because it's obvious Sam has actual standards, you know?"
I nodded, stung, the brief flash of whatever I'd had before gone. I had heard rumors about Sam, but there was no way he'd kiss a girl like me, and I knew that. But Will would. He had.
And now I didn't want to know what Anna would think about that.
So I didn't say anything else about that night or Will, and when I left her house, I felt--I felt like things weren't totally back to normal between me and her. I thought they could get there, though. Hoped they could. That they would.
At home, there was a huge for sale sign up in the yard, and no one had called me.
No one called me all night.
I know I could have called Will, but I was afraid. Really afraid, and not like before, when I was afraid that I wouldn't know what to say, or what he'd say. Now I was afraid of everything.
Jennifer T.'s party changed things. I knew she'd tell everyone what she saw, and there was no way to escape the fact that people would know Will and I were . . . whatever.
But I hadn't truly realized what it would mean. Everyone would know. Anna would know.
What would she think?
After today, I was afraid to think about it.
And he hadn't called. When I went to bed, trying to fall asleep but staring at my silent phone, all I could think was that everyone knowing meant disaster on an epic scale. I'd wanted to keep whatever I had with Will quiet. Mine. I'd wanted the ending I knew was coming to be private.
I knew what Wills silence meant, and I hated that tomorrow everyone else would know what it meant too. Just once, I wanted to lose something without the whole world watching.
Chapter twenty-four
In the morning, I saw Anna. And she saw me.
I know she did, because she looked right at me. Then she looked away, like she'd forgotten me all over again.
For a second, I hated her. I mean, really hated her. Anna and I had talked, and I thought things had been fixed--or at least sort of fixed--between us. So why was she doing this?
I went to my locker, tossing my books inside and ignoring everyone around me. I didn't want to know if people were looking at me or talking about me, and when the warning bell rang and emptied the halls, I ignored that too. Anna could have her new perfect life for all I cared. It was her loss. Really.
Now if I could just get myself to believe that.
"Kate?" It was Anna. Anna right beside me, like she walked up to me all the time, and I felt my anger evaporate as I watched her bite her lip, clearly upset.
"Don't be pissed at me," she said. "I saw your face when you walked in. I wanted to say something to you, I swear. I just--"
She broke off and looked down at the floor, and when she spoke again, she whispered.
"I'm scared, okay? I know it's stupid, but I keep thinking 'what if Sam sees who I really am?' I mean, I've lost weight and everything, but I really don't care about pep rallies and I miss choir and I get so sick of hearing about Diane's new clothes or who she hates today that sometimes I just want to scream."
"I bet if Sam heard you sing he wouldn't care if you were in choir."
She gave me a look.
"Okay, he might care a little," I said. "But you can do whatever you want, you can be whatever you want. Remember how you always used to say that?"
"Yeah, and look how well that turned out." Her voice was flat. Angry.
"I just meant--"
She shook her head. "Don't worry about it. This morning is just stressing me out. You forgive me for earlier, right? Please? I don't want you to hate me. I'd go insane if I didn't know I could count on you being there for me."
"Since when were you ever sane?" I said, grinning at her, and she smiled back, eyes bright.
"Speaking of sane, is there something you want to tell me about a certain party and a certain guy I thought you hated? Did you and Will really get caught--?"
"Don't say it!"
"It is true! Why didn't you tell me yesterday?"
"I was going to, but--" The final bell rang, cutting me off.
"Damn. Well, details later because the two of you--well, talk about insane, right?" Anna said as she headed down the hall.
I nodded even though I knew she couldn't see me and sagged against my locker, trying to ignore the weird mix of hurt and anger her last words had created. Anna had spoken to me at school. She'd told me she needed to know I'd be there for her.
Maybe things weren't exactly how they used to be, but now I knew for sure that Anna and I were friends again, and that was what I'd wanted. The final bell rang, but I didn't move. I was still processing everything that had happened.
And paralyzed by what I was afraid was going to happen when I finally made it to first period, where I'd have to face Will.
Chapter twenty-five
As I plodded to first period, my vision got all spotty and my heart was beating so hard I could practically hear it thumping in my chest. It got worse and worse the closer I got to class, and by the time I got there, I was convinced Will could be lying on the floor naked and I wouldn't notice him because I'd be too busy dying.
I was wrong.
That's because Will wasn't in class. Or naked. He was standing in the hall, listening to Jennifer T., who'd clearly cornered him. Jennifer M. was playing lookout, and I saw her see me and then elbow Jennifer T., all the while moving so I'd have to walk right by them to get into class.
Will, who was clearly trying to figure out why they were attempting to herd him into position by the door, looked around. When he saw me, he looked almost as freaked out as I felt, which made it very clear he was having "oh-shit-what-was-I-thinking-on-Friday-night" thoughts.
Great. I already knew he was having them, because he'd never called me back, but still.
"Hi," both of the Jennifers said to me, and then retreated into the classroom, leaving me and Will out in the hall. We looked at each other for a second.
He was the first person to speak. "Hey."
"Hey." My voice came out relatively normal, and I felt my heart pound even harder.
Maybe he wasn't going to blow me off. Maybe he was going to say something amazing.
"Ready for the test?"
Or not. "I guess. You?"
I could go on, but I won't. The whole conversation, which probably was about ten seconds long but
felt like it lasted for an eternity was just like that, so politely bland it hurt. And when Mr. Clark showed up, reeking of cigarettes and crabbily asking, "You do realize your seats are inside the classroom, right?" I was actually glad to see him.
I fumbled my way through the test, trying to remember what I'd supposedly learned but mostly thinking about what the non-conversation I'd had with Will meant. I mean, I knew it wasn't a good conversation, but he had talked to me.
Of course, it wasn't like he'd had much of a choice, since Jennifer T. and M. had trapped him into being around when I showed up. "Miss Brown, your test?"
"What?" I looked up and saw Mr. Clark waiting impatiently by my desk.
"The bell has rung. Your test?"
I handed it over.
"Thank you. I suggest you study a bit more in the future, as the tests are only going to get harder. That goes for you too, Mr. Miller." The scolding would have been more effective if Mr. Clark hadn't bolted for the door while he was talking, desperate to get his nicotine fix in the three minutes before next period started.
I grabbed my bag, careful not to look at Will, or at least, not look at him in an obvious way.
"Kate," he said, grabbing his stuff and walking toward me. "Sorry about before. The Jennifers sort of ganged up on me, and you know how that is."
I headed for the door. "Yeah, I saw your face. You should be thankful you've never had to go shopping with them."
You don't know how much it cost me to say that, to act like him not bringing up Friday night didn't hurt, but a year of disappointment had trained me well, and I was not getting cut off at the knees again. Will wasn't going to blow me off because I wasn't going to care. It was just that simple.
"Are you mad?" he said as I was getting ready to walk into the hall.
"What?" Where had that come from? I would never understand guys. "Do I sound mad?"
"Sort of." "I'm not," I said tightly. Why wasn't he going away? I'd given him his out. What more did he want from me?
"Oh. Okay. It's just . . . you never called me back and your grandmother--who seems really nice--said you would." He reached into his bag and pulled out a plastic shopping bag. "Here's your shoe."
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