Leading Lines

by Chantel Guertin

  I make a beeline for the door so I don’t have to walk out with Ben. I don’t want Dylan to think we’re all chummy or anything.

  “Pip, wait up,” Gemma calls, her tight black curls bouncing as she rushes to catch up. I pause as she falls into step with me. “This’ll be fun,” she says.

  “We just have to come up with an idea,” I say.

  “You’ll think of something, you always do.” She laughs as we push through the front doors. “Oh, there’s Emma,” she says and waves at her twin who’s just pulling into the lot. “See you tomorrow.”

  “’Kay,” I say, giving her a wave, then looking around the parking lot for Dylan’s dad’s car. He’s not here. We didn’t exactly text to confirm, but he’s been picking me up after school ever since, well, ever since he became my boyfriend. I call, but it goes straight to voicemail. I hang up and slip my phone in my coat pocket then pull my camera out of my bag. The afternoon sun is reflecting in the icicles hanging from the gutters, and I tilt my head back, holding my camera steady to capture the light reflection—this week’s photo club theme.

  “Need a ride?” a familiar voice says behind me, but I don’t move. I pull the camera away from my face and check the screen. Not enough zoom. I sigh and turn around. Ben’s throwing his book bag over his shoulder. I scan the parking lot for Dylan’s car again.

  “Waiting for a better offer?” he teases.

  “Ha ha. Dylan’s supposed to pick me up. I should probably just wait.” I check my phone for the millionth time but there’s only the pic of Dylan and me skating. I feel nostalgic for winter break, when Dylan and I hung out every day, even though it just ended yesterday. Dylan planned that romantic skating date for us: he’d read online about this continuous path you could skate on. We packed a backpack with snacks and hot chocolate and made the hour drive. There was a parking lot at the start of the path where we left the car and bundled up—hats, mitts, scarves and extra pairs of socks—then headed out on the route. We planned to make it as far as our toes could last the cold, stop for a hot chocolate and snack break, then skate back. We figured it would take hours. At first we could only see a small section of the path in front of us. We were holding hands and chatting, when, just two minutes later, we rounded some reeds and trees and realized we were back at the start of the trail again. The rink was a figure eight. We looked at each other and started laughing—and couldn’t stop. For some reason we thought it was the funniest thing. That’s when we took the pic. We did another couple loops, then got back in the car and caught an early matinee movie instead. It was one of our best dates yet.

  Of course, in some ways, this Christmas was the worst one yet—Mom and my first Christmas without Dad, and being upset with Mom about the whole David secret—but being with Dylan made it one of my favorites. Which felt wrong, but I guess that’s how things go. Sometimes bad things open your eyes to how good other things can be.

  I shove my phone in my pocket and pull up the collar on my coat as a gust of wind whips by.

  “All right, see you tomorrow,” Ben calls, already a few steps into the parking lot.

  “Wait!” I say, hurrying to catch up. “I’m too cold to wait any longer.”

  He clicks the key fob. The lights on his black BMW SUV flash twice.

  I scan the street leading into the lot once more before climbing in, then slink down in the leather seat as I put on my seatbelt, not crazy about people seeing us together. If Ben notices, he doesn’t say anything.

  “Home?”

  Home. “Actually, could you drive me to Dace’s?” I say, texting Dace to see if it’s OK if I come over. The last thing I want to do is go home.

  “Trouble in Greeneland?”

  I didn’t realize I had said that last bit out loud. I blush. “Oh, no. Just … yeah.”

  “Your mom?” He lowers the volume on the radio.

  “Yeah.”

  “You told her you found out about David?” Ben and I had talked a lot on the bus ride home about whether or not I should tell Mom that I know. He made a pretty convincing case for being honest, especially since I was so upset with her for keeping such a big secret. Hypocrisy, and all that.

  I fiddle with the door lock. “You were right. I couldn’t not tell her, and I guess I wanted to hear what she had to say. But what could she say? And now it’s out there, but I’m so angry with her. And I can’t hide it.”

  “It was a huge secret that she kept, for sure,” Ben says. “Did she explain why she and your dad decided not to tell you that David was your birth father?”

  “Just that my dad wanted to be my father. David didn’t. Simple. Which I knew. I guess I wanted to hear something else. Something more. Something that made it all feel less … random. Something to make it all right.”

  “Hmm. That sucks.” We’re stopped at a red light. An army of dogs yank on their leashes, practically dragging a girl with dreadlocks and harem pants across the intersection.

  “Yeah, it does. And now she wants me to tell David I know. Which, if you think about it, makes no sense. She didn’t tell me because she didn’t want David in my life, and now she does? And I don’t.” I sigh, getting a flash of David making out with Savida at the end-of-Tisch-camp party. The light turns green and we start to move.

  “Maybe she’s feeling guilty. Maybe now, since your dad is gone and David being part of your life can’t make him feel bad, maybe … I dunno maybe she’s just trying to do the right thing? Whatever that is?”

  He’s probably right about my mom, but I don’t feel like cutting her any slack at the moment. “Turn here,” I say, pointing toward Everleigh Road. He turns. We’re both quiet until a few minutes later when we pull into Dace’s driveway.

  “I didn’t even ask you about your mom. How are things going?”

  He shrugs. “Fine, fine. Another time.” He puts the car in park. The seatbelt whirrs as it retreats into its holster and I grab my bag from where I’d tossed it on the floor.

  “Well, thanks for the ride.”

  “Anytime.”

  I get out and head for the front door as he reverses down the driveway.

  Dace is waiting with the door open, wearing a floppy black wool hat over her long blonde hair and woolly-mammoth-like furry pull-on slippers. She raises her eyebrows as Ben’s car disappears down the street.

  “What?” I say defensively, as she pulls me inside and quickly closes the door. “It’s no big deal. Dylan didn’t show, and I needed a ride.” I kick off my snowy boots and then straighten them on the mat by the door. She pulls off my coat and hangs it on one of the hooks on the wall.

  “And Ben just happened to be hanging around?” She squeezes past me, and I follow her down the hall.

  “Photo club, remember?”

  She lumbers up the dark wood stairs in her ridiculous slippers, her long legs taking the steps two at a time. “Dylan needs to step up his game, because Ben is homing back in.”

  I follow her up to her room. “I completely set Ben straight. I’ve mentioned Dylan and our wonderful Christmas break about a zillion times. He gets it. We’re just friends.”

  “No need to get so defensive,” Dace says, pulling on the sleeves of her gray cable-knit sweater and plopping down at her desk. “So you ready to accessorize our school stuff? My mom said I can spend $100, but we’ll just split it two ways.” Dace has this idea that if she gets really cute binders and pens, she’ll actually take pride in doing her homework and getting good grades this term. At first I was very impressed with her New Year’s resolution. I thought it was a result of her volunteer placement last term with the after-school homework club and I was going on and on about how the volunteer placements really were so good in the end (I got a boyfriend! Dace started caring about homework!), until she revealed her mom and stepdad said if she gets straight As this term they’ll buy her a car in June.

  Dace doesn’t much like he
r stepfather, but she seems to be coming around, after a winter break at his chalet and now this bribe.

  “I made a Pinterest board for inspiration,” she says, flipping open her laptop.

  “Of school accessories?”

  She looks at me over her shoulder, raising her eyebrows. “Oh, I didn’t think of that. No, of driving accessories. These Coach gloves, this cute hat from Anthropologie, that sort of thing.” She leans out of the way so I can see. “But a board of stationery essentials is a great idea. And more suited to the task at hand.” She starts a new board. “Ooh, I’ve got the best name for it.” She types “The Write Stuff” and hits return. “Sometimes I’m brilliant.”

  I lie back on her bed and stare up at the ceiling, which is decked out in strings of white lights and wispy netting.

  My phone rings. I sit up and grab it from the end of the bed. Dylan.

  “Hey,” I say, my heart thumping.

  “Hey yourself. What’s up? You called. Seven times.” There’s a teasing tone in his voice, but still I blush, feeling stupid and glad he can’t see me.

  “I just thought you were going to pick me up after school?” I say. “It was really cold out. Maybe the windchill went to my head.”

  “Oh crap. Did we say that?”

  “No, I just … assumed.” I pull my knees up to my chin and hug them with my free arm.

  “I wasn’t really thinking that you were back at school, I guess. And I just got up—I didn’t realize it was already after 4.”

  “Oh,” I say, not able to hide my surprise. “Did you sleep all day?”

  “Luxury of the gap year,” he jokes. I laugh, but I get a flash of worry: what does he do all day while I’m at school? “You home now?”

  “No, I went to Dace’s.” I bite my bottom lip.

  “You walked all the way there? I thought you said it was freezing out.”

  “No, uh … Gemma gave me a ride after photo club.” Dace is making a “You’re such a liar” face at me, but I bug my eyes out at her in response. No way am I telling him Ben Baxter drove me, out of the blue and over the phone.

  “Cool. Well, call me later, kay?”

  “OK.”

  “Love you, girl.”

  “Me too.”

  I flop back down on the bed as I hang up.

  “When did Gemma get her black Bimmer?” Dace teases.

  “I don’t want him to be jealous for no reason.”

  “Well, if there’s no reason, then you shouldn’t worry, right? And lying …” She makes an “eek” face. “Plus Ben’s in photo club, and you guys are no longer mortal enemies. This may not be a one-time thing.”

  “I know it’s just …” I roll over to my side and face her.

  “You got a bad case of the guilts.” She twists around so she’s facing me too, straddling her chair backwards, her arms slung over the back.

  “Yes. I keep thinking if Dylan started hanging out with an ex-girlfriend, I’d be jealous. Even if he said there was nothing to be jealous about.”

  “Aaand Dylan doesn’t know the whole story. Or even half the story.”

  “Exactly. Unless I tell him how much time Ben and I spent together in New York, and the whole Ben and his dad thing and how we bonded over that, it’s weird that I’m suddenly not anti-Ben. And if I do tell him, it’s weird that I haven’t already told him. It’s just simpler if the Ben thing doesn’t come up.”

  Dace pops off her chair. “You want a Coke?”

  “Yes. No. I think caffeine will make me crazier.”

  She nods. “You know the problem isn’t caffeine, right? It’s two little words.”

  I make a face. “I never should’ve told you!” What Dace is talking about, what I know she means, is the two words I said to Ben in New York.

  Dace puts her hand on her heart and reaches out to me, OTT-acting-style: “Don’t go!”

  I throw a pillow at her, which she dodges, and we both laugh.

  “Are you regretting it yet?”

  I groan. “Yes. Though over the break it wasn’t a problem. Out of sight and out of mind and all that. I just didn’t reply to his texts. Now that we’re back at school …”

  “You can’t pretend you didn’t beg Ben Baxter to come back to Spalding with you.”

  “Yeah. And who says that? Who says ‘Don’t go’ all dramatically?”

  “I could totally see myself doing that. But you?” She shakes her head. “It’s just not like you.”

  “Thanks for rubbing it in.” I think back to that night, running to the subway to catch him before he left New York, to our trip back to Spalding and to today at school. “And really besides that … lapse of judgment, I haven’t given him any reason to think that I’m into him. I have been very platonic all day. And ignored him for the whole break.”

  “Pippa,” Dace says, sitting down on the end of the bed, where she keeps a fuzzy white faux-fur blanket, “he basically professed his love for you, and then you told him not to move away. So platonic signals are maybe too subtle. You’re going to have to actually tell him you’re not into him if you’re not into him.”

  “Which I’m not.”

  She nods. “You know, it’s OK if you are. It’s kind of natural: he’s hot, he’s into you, you bonded in your parental distress, you were in magical Manhattan and Dylan was miles away. We all want to be loved, and sometimes absence doesn’t make the heart grow fonder, it just makes you feel sad and lonely.”

  “That’s profound,” I say.

  “I told you, I’m really going to brush up on my smarts this term.” She smiles. “All I’m saying is don’t be so quick to discount your feelings. But at the same time, Ben’s your friend and you have to let him know if romance is off the table.”

  My phone buzzes and I grab it. Dace gets up and leaves the room.

  Ben: Join ski club!

  Me: Sno-go

  Ben: So punny. But seriously.

  I toss my phone aside as Dace walks back into the room with two glasses of water and hands me one.

  “Ben’s bugging me to join ski club.” I roll my eyes.

  “Oh yeah, do it! I signed up today.”

  I stare at her, mouth open. “Are you kidding?”

  She takes a sip of water and shakes her head, shrugging, then sits back down at her desk.

  I text Ben again.

  Me: U hijacked my BFF?

  Ben: And the twins. Gemma & Emma. Not man-twins from bus. That would be weird.

  “Tell him you’re in,” Dace calls over her shoulder.

  “Fridays are my date night with Dylan.”

  She turns to face me. “Can’t you change date night?”

  “To what? Saturdays are our night,” I say, batting my eyelashes at her.

  She points a bright pink nail-polished finger at me. “Good point. Sleepover Saturdays are sacred.”

  “See? I’ve thought this through.”

  “Huh. Well, I’m gonna miss you.” She focuses back in on her computer screen for a split second. “Ooh, we should definitely get these rainbow Sharpies.”

  I glance at the blank screen on my phone, then toss it back in my bag, thinking about how Emma and Gemma and Dace will be off snowboarding every Friday night with Ben. Sure, I didn’t really think about what they were doing on Fridays the past few months when Dylan and I were having date night, but now, for some reason, I feel left out.

  CHAPTER 3

  At least a foot of snow has fallen by the time I leave Dace’s. I take the route through the woods, where the wind has created drifts, like the peaks on a lemon meringue pie. My thoughts drift to Dylan and why things feel off. The break was pretty much perfect, even though it got off to a shaky start: my homecoming wasn’t exactly like I’d envisioned. Dylan was supposed to be back in Spalding first, and before we’d parted I’d given him my arr
ival information. So I kind of thought he’d be there, waiting for me at the bus terminal, like in the movies, only sketchier, because the Spalding bus terminal hasn’t been updated since the ’80s, so the seats have ripped vinyl, with yellowed foam bursting out or restrained by duct tape. And the walls are dismal gray and have random stains and the floors are dirty and there are always people lying in the corners.

  But he wasn’t there. I decided the communication ban was officially over, so I texted him while Mom drove me home from the bus station, and then again before bed. He didn’t reply and I assumed he wasn’t back yet. On Sunday morning I put together the album of photos I’d made for him from New York and took it over to his house to wait for him to get home. (He gave me a key a while ago, so even if his parents weren’t home, I wouldn’t be stuck on the porch in the snow.) But when I got there, he answered the door and while he seemed happy to see me, he didn’t apologize for being in the same area code and not letting me know.

  My irritation subsided pretty quickly though, because just the sight of him tends to make me forget my train of thought on typical days, and after not having seen him in more than two weeks, it’s like he got even better looking. His caramel-colored hair, which lightens in the summer seemed darker than ever, making his green eyes even more intense. He hadn’t shaved in a few days, so his dimple was hidden until he grinned, and then it was game over. And then he pulled me into the kind of kiss that caused every cliché in the best possible way: I got weak in the knees, got butterflies in my stomach and felt lightheaded all at once. If I weren’t kissing, I would’ve sworn I was having a panic attack. (Turns out, a panic attack feels strangely similar to being head over heels in love.) We went straight to his room and nestled together on the bed for a bit. Later, he went to the closet and took out a bag of souvenirs for me: a t-shirt of one of the opening bands he liked and a handful of used guitar picks (not that I’ve ever played guitar). He had all these stories to go with each pick, and he relayed them with relish. And then I gave him his photo album. It was totally old school, plastic sleeves and everything, and held my favorite shots from New York—stuff that reminded me of him when I was there. This huge window display of Twizzlers in Times Square, the bright sign on the entrance to Dylan’s Candy Bar at 60th and 3rd, a car with a license plate that said DYLAN and a bunch of other random stuff.