She stares at her knees, shrugs. “I’d like that. I just—I’d really like that.”
“Me, too,” I assure her, and I really do mean it. I know, deep down, that it’s really over now. Only a few months late, but I guess we finally did have our breakup talk. And … I’m okay. I have a house full of friends waiting for me to get back to them. Which doesn’t mean I won’t miss her anymore. But, I don’t even know why, I feel better now.
Back inside, she goes to rejoin her friends and I wink at Linus, who looks rather adorably flustered with Danny all cuddled up to him like that. I’m so happy for him.
I sit down in an empty space on the floor and can’t really decide between focusing on the movie or joining the conversation going on next to me. It’s Stella, Katie, and Alyssa discussing who’s hotter, Han Solo or Princess Leia. I like hearing that Alyssa is rather vehemently arguing in favor of Carrie Fisher. I’ve had my suspicions about her for a while, but this makes me grin.
“Hey,” she says, as if she’d been able to tell that I was just thinking about her.
“Huh?” I provide eloquently.
“I was just getting another soda. Do you want me to bring you anything?” she asks, and there’s just something in the way she smiles at me.
I smile back and nod. “Oh, yeah, soda would be great. Thank you!”
“Coming right up,” she says, and squeezes my shoulder a little as she gets up.
I can’t stop smiling as I decide to join the conversation.
Chapter 62
Linus
I SCOOT OVER TO WHERE Meg is sitting when Danny goes to get us drinks. I saw her sneak outside with Sophia earlier, and she seems okay, but I just want to make sure.
“The movie was your choice, wasn’t it?” she says as soon as I’m close enough.
I laugh. “I merely suggested it.”
“This is really nice, though.”
“It is. Um, so, you’re having fun?”
She looks at me like she knows exactly what I’m doing and rolls her eyes a little. “I’m fine. I promise.” She sounds sincere.
“You talked to her?”
“I did. It was—good.”
“Good.”
“Your boyfriend’s gonna miss you,” she points out, and grins.
I can’t help but grin, too. My boyfriend. “He’s gonna be back any second, he’s just—”
Danny chooses that exact moment to come back, sitting down on the carpet next to me, and with him is Alyssa, who sits down in the empty spot next to Meg and hands her a paper cup.
“There you go,” she says, and she has this really wide smile on her face and she’s blushing a little and Meg makes eye contact with her, and …
I look over at Danny, who looks back at me, and I can tell that we’re thinking the same thing. Instead of saying anything, he hands me my own paper cup.
“Thanks,” I say.
He leans in and kisses me, right here in front of everyone, and I can feel my ears burning a little. “You’re welcome,” he says, and takes my hand.
Chapter 63
Meg
WE ALL TURN OUR ATTENTION back to the movie, fresh drinks in hand, surrounded by friends. It feels good. We accomplished something, all of us together. Not just putting on that play but also forming this group of people who get along well enough to want to keep hanging out once it’s over.
Sophia smiles at me from across the room and I smile back at her. I can do that now. It feels okay to do that now.
Linus leans over to me, whispers, “Are you happy?”
I nod. “Yeah,” I say. “I am.”
“Good,” he says, and I can tell from the way he holds himself, the way he leans back into Danny’s side so comfortably, that he’s having a really good time, too.
And to think that this school year started off so badly.
Countless books and movies keep promising that things will get better even when they seem hopeless. And you know what? I guess they’re mostly right.
In any case, I’m having a good night. Sophia and I are over, but I still have all of this, all the people in this room.
And, I think, maybe now I’m finally ready to start something new with all of them by my side.
Chapter 64
Linus
IT’S THE FIRST DAY OF winter break and we’re seriously behind on our Star Trek marathon. So I go over to Meg’s house around lunchtime, bringing a box of cookies. She promised to order pizza.
“Hey,” she greets when she opens the door, and she’s even wearing her Starfleet Academy sweater, red hair pulled back into a ponytail. “Pizza should be here in half an hour, and Mom is at work all day so we have the living room to ourselves.”
“Awesome.” I hug her hello and then hurry to get inside and close the door behind us, because as pretty as all the snow is, it’s really cold outside. “That means we can finally make a real dent in that rewatch list!”
“Yeah.” She leads the way into the living room once I’ve toed my shoes off by the door. “It’s about time, isn’t it? At least if we want to finish before we start college.”
I laugh. “Well, we have the rest of winter break, too.”
She hops onto the couch and snatches the remote off the coffee table, tilts her head as she looks up at me. “True, but you’ll be hanging out with Danny some of the time, right?”
I walk over and drop onto the couch next to her, lifting my shoulders in a shrug. “I guess,” I say. “Some of the time. Yeah.” I mean, he is my boyfriend. I’m looking forward to spending some alone time with him. But of course I’m gonna be hanging out with Meg, too.
“Good,” she says. “After everything I’ve done for you two.” She grins. “You better not be spending every afternoon on my couch after I put in all of that work. Hours and hours of it.”
“I knew you were just trying to get rid of me,” I tell her, pouting. “This is what I get in return for years of friendship.”
“No. What you get is pizza,” she says, pressing the button on the remote to start up the DVD menu. “I even ordered pineapple.”
I shake my head. “Doesn’t count. I brought cookies in exchange for that.”
“No, the cookies are in exchange for the coffee,” she says.
I look around, lifting my hands at her. “What coffee? I don’t see any coffee.”
“The coffee I’m going to make for us later if you behave now.”
“Ha.” I give her a challenging grin. “Are you actually saying right now that if I don’t behave, you won’t make coffee later? Because then you won’t have any coffee, either. I don’t think that’s likely.”
“Obviously I’m still going to make coffee,” she says, and smiles at me. “But only for myself.”
“You would never do that to me,” I point out, and she laughs, leans over to bump our shoulders together.
“You’re right,” she says. “I would never do that to you.”
Chapter 65
Meg
WE’VE FINISHED OUR PIZZA AND I’ve started a pot of coffee when my phone buzzes on the coffee table and I quickly pick it up while Linus is changing the DVD in the DVD player.
I unlock the screen and read my new text. “Alyssa wants to know if we want to go bowling with the rest of them tonight,” I tell Linus.
He looks up at me and nods. “Yeah, I know. Danny texted me while you were in the kitchen. I was just going to ask you.”
I raise both eyebrows at him. “Well? Do you want to go?”
He shrugs. “I don’t know. I guess. Bowling’s kind of fun.”
“I’ve never really been,” I admit, and just then my phone buzzes again with another text from Alyssa, who apparently really wants us to come along.
“Alyssa again?” Linus asks, and the smirk he’s wearing is way too transparent.
“Yes,” I say, and roll my eyes at him. “We’re friends.”
“Sure you are.”
“Hey,” I say. “Quit it with the meddling. I think we’ve
established that it doesn’t work for us.”
He laughs and walks back over to the couch, sits down next to me. “Fine. You’re right. Okay. So. Do you want to go bowling tonight?”
I nod. “Yeah. I think I do. If it’s okay with you.”
“It’s very okay with me,” he says. “I’m just gonna text Danny, okay?”
“Yeah, I should really text Alyssa, too,” I say.
Alyssa has been texting on and off for the past few days and she’s really nice—I think we’re becoming really good friends. I like that thought. I’m kind of interested to see where it goes. Because … it might be going somewhere, and that thought no longer scares me. I guess I’m finally moving on, and it feels good.
“Okay,” Linus says once he’s done texting his boyfriend, and we put our phones down on the table side by side. “We have four more hours for our rewatch today. Let’s do this!”
“Four more hours today, and then several dozen more over the rest of the break,” I correct him.
“Well, of course.” He nods. “And, oh, by the way, I was thinking. Once we’re through with this one, let’s take one weekend, all three Lord of the Rings movies, extended editions, and buckets full of sugar and coffee?”
I clap my hands I’m so excited about the idea. “That sounds amazing. Yes! I always wanted to do that!”
“Yay! Fantastic!”
I hesitate, but I just feel like I should ask. “We could—if you want to, we can invite the rest of the drama club people? Or just some of them?”
He seems to think about it for a second, then shakes his head. “Nah. This is kind of our thing, isn’t it? We can go bowling with them afterward. We might need the exercise after sitting through all those movies.”
I grin at him. “That sounds like a plan.”
“We’re good at planning,” he says.
“Yeah,” I say. “We’re really good at that.”
He bites his lip and I can tell he wants to say something else, so I don’t start the episode just yet and patiently wait him out instead.
“Can I tell you something really sappy, and will you promise not to laugh at me if I do?” he finally asks.
I give him a look. “No. I’m absolutely going to laugh at you. But you can still tell me.”
He huffs out a breath, then gives me an earnest smile. “I really missed you, Meg. Although right now, I’m desperately trying to remember why.”
“Aw.” I press one hand over my heart and blink at him. “You’re right. That was incredibly sappy!”
“Okay, I know! Shut up.”
“Absolutely not. Having lunch without me for a few weeks must have been so difficult for you! You can talk to me about it!”
“Don’t be a jerk!” He grins a little crookedly. “You made me go bowling with a bunch of strangers all by myself!”
I gently hit his arm with the remote. “Yeah, but you got a boyfriend out of that! My sacrifice was so worth it!”
“Your sacrif—” He breaks off, shakes his head, and buries his face in his palms with a groan. “Forget it. I take it back. I didn’t miss you at all. In fact, you skipping out on me all the time was a very welcome change!”
“No! You can’t take it back,” I inform him. “You missed me! You were sad and lonely without me!”
“I have no idea why I ever said anything like that.”
“Well, I have no idea, either, but you did say it. It’s out there now!”
He sighs and gives me a long, exasperated look, and it makes me laugh. He was always good at making me laugh. I lean over and give him a long hug from the side, and I know he understands what I’m trying to say.
“Yeah,” he tells me, patting my elbow. “You’re still my best friend, too.”
I smile and briefly tighten my arms around his shoulders.
Yeah. He always does get what I’m trying to say.
Acknowledgments
Writing may seem like a solitary activity, but it’s certainly taken a lot of people to make this story into a book.
First of all: Swoon Reads. Thank you so much for giving me this chance and for making my lifelong dream a reality. My editor Christine Barcellona is a superhero. If editing were a recognized superpower, she’d definitely need a cape. All of my thanks also go to Jean Feiwel, Lauren Scobell, Liz Dresner, Melinda Ackell, Raymond Ernesto Colón, Ashley Woodfolk, Kelsey Marrujo, Emily Settle, Teresa Ferraiolo, Emily Petrick, Janea Brachfeld, Kristie Radwilowicz, Claire Taylor, Kelly McGauley, and Helen Bray. This book wouldn’t exist without you, and I’m pretty excited that it does exist, so you’re all my heroes.
I’d also like to thank my family—my parents and grandparents, who put up with all of my stories when I was a kid, and my siblings, who at least pretended to not be too surprised when I told them I’d written a book.
I’m so lucky with my friends and beta readers. So many thanks first and foremost to Rachel Schaffer for always staying my friend even when I go into writing mode; she always manages to be interested in my novella-length e-mails, and even has enough patience left for brainstorming and reading my drafts. The same goes for Emily Murphy for all the comments and all the listening and all the support. Both of them put so many hours of help into this when they could have been reading finished books instead.
There’s Beckie Laskey, who agreed to read this even though she knew some of my (much) earlier writing. Stephanie McKell, Claire Torrey, Amanda Brown, and Naomi Tajedler, who not only read all of this in various stages of done-ness but managed to cheer me up and keep me excited about writing and kept talking to me even though I do go kind of weird when I’m in the middle of a story. I also want to thank Sandy Hall for just the amount of encouragement I needed to try this in the first place; I might still be trying to work up the courage otherwise.
And then there are the friends, and there are the writing buddies and/or beta readers, who taught me so many things about writing or friendship or both over the years. Maria, Deirdre, Kes, Nicole, Caterina: I don’t know if I ever would have gotten here at all if it hadn’t been for all of you.
Also, anyone who’s ever read any of my stuff and said nice things about it to me, encouraged me, and made me want to keep going: I’ll be forever grateful to you for making me believe I could do this. To all of you: thank you!
A Coffee Date
between author Hanna Nowinski and editor Christine Barcellona
Getting to Know You
CB: What was your favorite book when you were a kid?
HN: Ronia, the Robber’s Daughter by Astrid Lindgren. I read it so many times! I wanted to live in that world. I think that book is one of the main reasons I wanted to become a writer.… Well, what I really wanted to do was go and live with Ronia and Birk in the Swedish woods. Their world seemed so magical and so real at the same time, I would have happily lived in a cave if it only meant I could be there with those characters I loved. Later I read and reread Tamora Pierce’s Song of the Lioness quartet. That was a really important story to me as a kid.
CB: What are your favorite books now?
HN: Usually when someone asks me this question I just say Harry Potter. And, I mean, it’s true! But I also really love Douglas Adams’s The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy and Jasper Fforde’s Thursday Next series. Newer additions to my list of favorites are Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe by Benjamin Alire Sáenz and Rainbow Rowell’s Carry On. I never really know what to list as my favorite books because it also really depends on my mood at the time. But if a book just has a character for me to connect to, I’ll probably like it. Characters are everything.
CB: Who is your OTP, your favorite fictional couple?
HN: Ohh, I have so many! If we’re talking books, Ron and Hermione from Harry Potter, for sure. Ari and Dante from Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe. If we’re talking TV, I don’t even know where to start … I love and Kurt and Blaine from Glee. Same goes for Luke and Lorelai from Gilmore Girls. Tom and B’Elanna from
Star Trek Voyager. Sam and Jack from Stargate.… I could go on for several pages, honestly. I like fictional relationships where the characters are friends as well as a couple.
CB: Do you have any hobbies?
HN: Other than writing and reading, I like watching TV. No, really. I love TV shows. Much more than films. I can watch an entire season in a day if no one interrupts me. Mostly because I like stories that just go on and on. It’s nice knowing that there’s more after the end of an episode.
I also love music. Listening, and making it, whenever I have the time. I play piano, guitar, and trumpet—not very good, maybe, but I have fun with it. I also recently acquired a ukulele.
CB: If you were a superhero, what would your superpower be?
HN: I pick something different every time I think about this. Being able to fly would be really cool, though. That’s the one I keep coming back to most often. I’d never have to walk anywhere. And just imagine going to see a movie and having a really tall person sit in front of you. You could just hover over your seat for the length of the movie and still see everything.
CB: Meg and Linus are both wonderfully nerdy! What are some of your favorite fandoms?
HN: I grew up watching Star Trek and I’d say it was my very first fandom. Pre-Internet, even. I used to spend all of my pocket money on Star Trek magazines. Later, right around the time the Internet became a thing for me, I was very much into Stargate, and then came Doctor Who and Firefly. These days it’s mostly Glee, Agent Carter, and Supergirl. And I’m pretty sure I’m forgetting things. But I just like being a fan of things. Fandom is a wonderful way to spend your free time. People create amazing things.
The Swoon Reads Experience
CB: How did you first learn about Swoon Reads?
HN: A writer friend told me about it. I’d had no idea there was a site like that—I knew about the various other websites where you can upload and share manuscripts with other people, even though I was never brave enough to use any of them. But ever since my friend told me about Swoon Reads I couldn’t stop thinking about trying it.
Meg & Linus Page 26