Just Friends

by Tiffany Pitcock

  He wanted to be happy for her. She was his best friend, and Drake was her first boyfriend. Part of him was jealous—jealous of the way Drake’s hand lingered on the small of her back as he guided her down the hall, of the way her gaze lingered on Drake as he walked away and of that wistful smile playing at her lips. Chance tried to choke that part of him down, but it was hard.

  The only saving grace seemed to be that Drake wasn’t ever invited to Jenny’s house. Chance and Jenny still had their quiet afternoons and clandestine sleepovers—though they were regulated to when things were particularly bad at Chance’s house. He didn’t think Drake knew about them, but he didn’t want to bring it up. Sure, some nights she went to Drake’s band practice and he had to go home, where his parents were always bickering about something or other. And she was out with Drake most weekends. But Chance was still the only one invited to her house. He knew he shouldn’t, but he took pride in that little victory.

  “Jenny, do you want to go to my show tomorrow night?” Drake asked a week after they’d become Facebook official. The weather had turned cold and he had traded his loose, short-sleeved V-necks for long-sleeved ones layered over tank tops.

  Jenny, to his left, looking adorable in a striped sweater, was too busy focusing on her AP US History reading to hear him.

  “Jenny,” Drake said again, sounding annoyed. “I asked you a question.”

  Chance nudged her. “Wessler, your boyfriend asked you a question.”

  Jenny’s head shot up. She looked between Chance and Drake. “What?”

  “Your boyfriend is trying to talk to you.” Chance gestured to Drake, who was looking at them both worriedly.

  She turned to Drake. “I’m so sorry. I heard there’s going to be a quiz next block, and I didn’t have time to get this reading done last night!”

  “It’s all right; it’s cute when you concentrate.” Drake slipped an arm around her shoulders. “Would you like to go to my show tomorrow night? We’re playing at that coffee shop downtown. You know, the one that still thinks cyber cafés are cool.”

  “The one with those neon Macs and inflatable furniture?”

  “Yeah, that one. The Cyber Bean or whatever. They’re doing a showcase on local bands this week, and the band for tomorrow night backed out, so we got their slot. You wanna come?”

  Jenny’s eyes lit up excitedly. “I haven’t seen you play a concert yet. Of course I’d like to go!”

  Chance felt weird witnessing this moment—like a Peeping Tom looking in on something private that he wasn’t supposed to see. And that, honestly, he didn’t want to see. He pretended to read his book—Native Son by Richard Wright—but it was hard to do so when Drake and Jenny were excitedly making plans less than two feet across from him.

  He was jealous, and the jealousy only made him feel guilty. It was a horrid cycle. He had no right to be jealous and he knew it. Jenny could do whatever she wanted. Chance knew all that and yet, sitting there surreptitiously watching them over the top of his book, he burned with jealousy.

  “Am I going to ride with the band, or do I need to find my own way?” Jenny asked her boyfriend.

  Drake thought about it for a moment. “I don’t think there’ll be room in the van for another person, what with the equipment.”

  “Okay, no problem. Chance can take me,” she said, as if that solved everything. Both boys looked at her as if she’d sprouted a second head and started speaking German.

  “Chance is coming?” Drake asked, not sounding too pleased with the idea.

  Jenny looked at him as if he were an idiot. “Yeah. Obviously. You wouldn’t just make plans in front of him without inviting him, would you? That’s rude.”

  She has a point, Chance thought, but that doesn’t mean I want to go. On one hand, it was better than sitting around at his house or going to Their Spot. On the other hand, he didn’t want to go to Drake’s show. He had seen The Bleeding Axe Wounds live many times, and none of them were good. Also, the last thing he wanted to do was spend more time around the Happy Couple.

  “I don’t mind,” Chance said, meaning he didn’t mind being excluded.

  “See, he doesn’t mind taking me,” Jenny said, gesturing to Chance. “It’s settled, then. Chance will take me to your show tomorrow night.”

  Drake shot Chance a glare, but agreed. Chance sank his head into his hand, biting back a frustrated groan. Tomorrow night is going to suck, he thought bitterly.

  * * *

  CHANCE PULLED UP to Jenny’s house around seven the next night, his music blaring. He had briefly considered bringing a date of his own, but decided against it. He wasn’t the double-date type. He was halfway up the drive when Jenny came sprinting from the house.

  “Chance, let’s go!”

  He stopped in his tracks, eyes on her. She stood before him, brown hair completely straight for once and falling about mid-back. She wore a denim miniskirt over black tights patterned with little golden stars and half-moons. Her shirt was maroon with long sleeves; the color suited her pale complexion.

  “I would’ve knocked on the door,” he said when he was able to speak again, still unable to take his eyes off her.

  “Then my mother would’ve assaulted you with questions about Drake,” she said. “What do you think?” She turned around so he could see her entire outfit.

  The tights complemented her shapely legs and the skirt showed off her hips. “It looks very nice,” he said lamely.

  “Kelsey helped me,” she went on, walking past him to his car. “I went to her house after school.”

  That explained why she’d wanted Kelsey to take her home that afternoon. Chance rushed to the car before her, opening her door. He wasn’t sure what possessed him to do it, but it felt right.

  The Cyber Bean was just as lame as he remembered it being. It was downtown, between a bakery and what used to be RadioShack. It was trying to cash in on that early 2000s nostalgia, but Chance didn’t see the point. That wasn’t that long ago, after all. But people flocked to it “ironically.” The door even had a beaded curtain that little girls used to hang up over their doors. It had “modern” egg-shaped chairs and old neon-colored Macs at tiny round plastic white tables, which he assumed were supposed to look cool.

  The worst was the type of people who came: people in metallic clothing and clear backpacks, who had crimped hair and tattoo choker necklaces, people who still wore Jelly shoes and holographic jewelry. Chance hadn’t enjoyed his childhood the first time; why would he want to relive it through this place?

  “I love this place,” Jenny said gleefully, looking around wide-eyed. “It’s so Lizzie McGuire.”

  Maybe that type of nostalgia is a girl thing? Chance shoved his hands in his pockets, slowly making his way to one of the small tables and uncomfortable egg chairs. It’s like a froyo place in here.

  Jenny pulled out her phone. “Drake says they’ll be doing sound check soon.”

  Chance had almost forgotten about Drake. “Do you want to go backstage and see him before they start?”

  “Nah.” Jenny shook her head. “He says that seeing me before the show might throw him off. He needs to have a level head to go onstage.”

  Jenny noticed a flyer advertising Drake’s band on the table next to theirs. She snatched it up and folded it into her purse. “You’ve seen them live? How are they?”

  Horrible. “They’re all right.”

  “Kelsey says that they’re whiny garbage,” Jenny said, glancing back at the stage. “I’m sure that’s not true. Drake seems really passionate about his art. It’s all he ever talks about.”

  “Really?”

  Jenny nodded. “He’s always like, ‘Babe, listen to this song I wrote,’ or ‘Babe, I’m going to write the best song about you.’ It’s a little annoying, but he’s cute when he’s excited.”

  So are puppies, Chance thought bitterly.

  “Remember when we tried to start a band?” Jenny said suddenly, turning back to Chance. She leaned forward over the tabl
e, talking fast. “I started piano lessons because Kelsey’s mom made her take them, and you and I came up with the brilliant idea that we could be some kind of alternative band.”

  “Of course,” Chance said, picking up where she left off. “You would play the piano and I would play guitar, as soon as I learned how to play one. Or had access to one.”

  “We picked out a name—”

  “Friends Are Formalities.”

  “Naturally, we had to keep up with all those new emo bands. We were going to be circus themed.”

  “Our Panic! At the Disco phase had a strong hold on us at the time,” Chance said solemnly.

  “We even made a MySpace for it. That was the pop-punk thing to do.”

  Chance couldn’t help but laugh at that. “We even convinced some people that we were a real band.”

  “Not just ‘some people,’ Masters. I remember a little blond boy running around in guyliner.”

  “Why do you always put me in eyeliner in our stories?” Chance asked, remembering the eyeliner scar story they told when they first met.

  “Clearly I have a fetish.” Jenny shrugged. “You can take the girl out of the emo, but you can’t take the emo out of the girl.”

  Chance loved this. He loved making up stories with Jenny. He loved the adrenaline rush that came with spitting out the first response he could think of when Jenny volleyed a story at him. He loved seeing her eyes light up as they hand-painted their own past.

  It was at that moment that the band came onstage. Drake staggered up to the mike, saying a few words into it, startling Jenny. She turned around to look at her boyfriend, waving to catch his attention. He saw her and nodded once, giving her a wink.

  Just like that, their story was finished.

  Chance wondered if Jenny ever got like that with Drake—if she ever got caught up in her stories and if she ever showed him that excited, thoughtful face she always wore with Chance. He knew he’d make himself sick wondering about the intimate details of their relationship, but he couldn’t help it.

  “Good evening, everybody!” Drake yelled into the mic, causing the twenty or so people in the audience to howl. “We are The Bleeding Axe Wounds!”

  “Woo!” Jenny exclaimed, jumping to her feet. She reached over and grabbed Chance’s wrist, dragging him up, too. “Let’s get closer.”

  They weaved through the crowd until they were almost on the stage themselves. Chance averted his gaze, pretending not to notice the way Jenny was staring up at her boyfriend. In doing so, he noticed the way the two girls next to them were also staring up at Jenny’s boyfriend. He also noticed the way her boyfriend was kind of staring back at them.

  “This is so exciting,” Jenny hissed in Chance’s ear, bouncing up and down on the balls of her feet. “I can’t believe I’m at my boyfriend’s concert. This definitely has to be a teenage experience.”

  She already had her phone out, taking pictures of everything around her, not even noticing the way Drake was now smiling directly at her. When the band finally did start up, she started filming the whole thing, watching it through her phone screen. She was itching to dance—Chance could tell by the way she kept bouncing with the beat. Finally, he reached out and snagged her phone.

  “What the hell?” she said, reaching to take it back.

  He held it out of her reach. “Dance with me.”

  “What?”

  “I can tell you want to dance, so let’s dance.” He slipped her phone into his pocket.

  He grabbed her hands and spun her around, her straight hair fanning out around her as he did so.

  She laughed, her hands resting on his chest. “Fine,” she said, smiling. “We can dance.”

  They danced to every song Drake played. Neither of them could actually dance, and the moves they busted were awkward and hilarious, but they kept their eyes on each other the whole time and the smiles never left their faces.

  By the end of the set, they were sweaty and panting, collapsing into each other. He wrapped his arm around her waist as he led her toward the bar. She threw herself onto the nearest barstool, the biggest grin on her face. Chance looked at her, his own heart pounding in his chest, and felt like he was home.

  She pushed her sweaty bangs from her forehead and stuck her tongue out at him. “Stop looking at me. I know I’m gross right now.”

  “You are not,” Chance said, sliding onto the stool next to her.

  “I should go fix my hair before I go backstage for Drake,” she said, reluctantly getting up. “I’ll be right back.”

  Chance felt like he’d been dropped from a plane. He’d forgotten about Drake, weirdly enough, even though they had been dancing to his music. The world had shrunk down to just him and Jenny and the way they danced together. He had forgotten that they weren’t there together—they were there for her boyfriend.

  Something vibrated in his pocket, and for a moment he thought Levi might finally be calling, but there was nothing there when he checked his phone. Something vibrated again. He was confused, staring down at the phone in his hand, before he remembered that he had taken Jenny’s phone. He dug it out of his pocket. Her mother was calling her.

  He looked around, trying to find her. He doubted she was still in the bathroom. Chance made his way toward the restrooms just in time to see Jenny rush away backstage. He pushed himself through the crowd to catch up with her, ducking backstage as well. People rushed past him, taking equipment from the stage. Nick—Drake’s bassist—nodded at Chance as he passed.

  The phone kept ringing in his hand, but he couldn’t find Jenny anywhere.

  “Hey!” He turned back and called to Nick.

  Nick turned around, his curly brown hair in his eyes. “What?”

  “Where’s Sellers?”

  Nick pointed behind Chance. “Room on your right, bro.”

  Chance set off, disappearing down the corridor behind the curtains. Sure enough, there was a big black door on his right, standing ajar. He put his hand on it, pushing slightly. He’d just hand Jenny her phone, congratulate Drake on his show, and then be on his way. He looked up from the still-buzzing phone and nearly dropped it in shock.

  The room was mostly bare—the only things in it were a small coffee table, a black leather sofa, and a small vanity with a mirror. Jenny and Drake sat on the couch, tangled in each other. Drake had Jenny pinned against the arm of the couch, his body half covering hers. His hands were in her hair and their faces were smashed together.

  Chance backed out of the room, hiding behind the wall outside it. He felt sick. He kept seeing Drake’s hands all over Jenny, pawing at her. He kept seeing her arms around his neck, her hands pulling at his hair. He wanted to run. He wanted to burst in there and pull them apart.

  No, he told himself. Jenny had made her choice and it obviously wasn’t him. He couldn’t chase off any boys she liked or force her to like him just because he had feelings for her. That was dumb, and Chance knew better.

  He decided then and there, standing outside the dressing room his best friend was getting felt up in, that he’d just have to learn to live with his feelings. She was happy and he was miserable, but that was the way it was and he couldn’t change it.

  So he squared his shoulders and went back out to the dance floor, to find a girl sitting alone to chat up. He was going to move on the best he could.

  CHAPTER 15

  Jenny

  Jenny sat at the lunch table, flipping through her history notes, ignoring the loud buzz of students around her. Drake was at her side, arm around her once again. They’d only grown closer in the week since his concert. Chance’s seat to her left was empty, however. He had been suspiciously absent from Oral Comm. Jenny was trying to hide her growing sense of worry.

  “Did you hear about Chance and Leslie?” Emelia asked excitedly, plopping into the seat next to Drake.

  “What?” Jenny asked. As far as she was concerned, Leslie and Chance barely even interacted.

  “I heard second block,” Drake said, h
is eyes shining mischievously.

  Jenny glared at them, annoyed. It got on her last nerve when people withheld information. “What happened?” she asked again.

  Drake looked down at her, grinning wickedly. “Let’s just say the librarian ran into our two friends in various stages of undress in the hallway.”

  Jenny’s eyes went wide. What? Chance and Leslie—together? In the hallway? Her mind was flooded with images of the two pulling off into some stolen corner, feeling each other up, and her stomach churned. “Is it true?”

  Emelia nodded. “At least three people saw them in the office afterward.”

  That’s why he wasn’t in class. She knew, of course, that Chance went on dates. He was Chance Masters, after all, and the number of dates had increased a lot over the past week—at least three that she knew about. But she’d never had evidence of them thrown in her face before. She knew the stab of jealousy ripping through her chest wasn’t right, but she couldn’t stop it. He didn’t want a relationship with her—he had made that abundantly clear—but hearing about how he got with someone else still hurt. He hadn’t even told her that Leslie was one of the girls he was going out with.

  “That’s such classic Chance,” Drake was saying, his arm tight around Jenny’s shoulders.

  I can’t be jealous, she told herself. It’s not fair to Drake. How could she be envious of Leslie’s rushed hookup with Chance when she was in a full-blown relationship? So okay, the conversation between them wasn’t stellar and they didn’t have much in common, but Drake liked Jenny so Jenny had to like Drake … right? It was her mission. She wanted a boyfriend, and she would make herself like him. Jenny Wessler never backed down once she set her mind to something.

  A rush of whispers broke out in the cafeteria, culminating into a background hum. Jenny looked around to see Chance enter the room and stalk toward their table, openly glaring at anyone who dared catcall or wolf whistle.