by Amy Spalding
“She’s beautiful and talented and perfect?”
“Famous is what I was going to say! You’re beautiful and talented, too, and she isn’t perfect.” GARRICK IS SO NICE. “For a while I hoped something would happen with you. I just can’t help how I feel about Syd.”
“Trust me,” I say, “I understand. I’m totally falling in love with someone, too.”
“Thanks for telling me about the book,” he says. “But it’s okay.”
“I should say the rest of it. I wrote about that you did it with Sydney in the book, and I know you swore me to secrecy, but…”
He sighs. “I really hope that doesn’t get out, just because she worries about her reputation and stuff, since her fans are so young and their parents get weird about stuff—but, okay. Fine.”
“Are you mad?” I ask. “You can hate me if you want.”
“I don’t hate you,” he says. “It sucks, and I don’t get why you did this whole thing. But in chemistry you always forget to take down full notes when we’re doing experiments. I’m impressed you managed on this.”
“You can quit being my chemistry partner if you need to.”
“I have fun with you,” he says. “Though you should take better notes. And never do something like this again.”
“I promise I won’t.” I don’t say anything about taking better notes because that seems like more of a distant dream.
“Also can I guess who you’re in love with?”
“If you want,” I say, my heart pounding like my bass drum.
“Ted Callahan?”
“Ted Callahan,” I confirm.
“That guy’s great,” he says. “I’m glad it’s someone great.”
OH MY GOD, GARRICK IS SO AMAZING.
I give him a huge hug, and he asks me if I want to go inside and meet Sydney. I do, but I act cool about it and say I’ll meet her soon and I’m happy for him.
Also I’m going to make my hair look better before I meet Sydney Jacobs.
I get into my car, and it’s like the world is reborn and flowers have sprouted up everywhere, and I can breathe again because I start thinking about it, and maybe Milo will be even easier to tell. He doesn’t go to my school, he doesn’t know any of my friends, and I said lots of things about him being the perfect guy.
I know technically I could definitely get away with not even telling him. It must be someone at school who has the notebook, and I never used Milo’s last name, so they’d never be able to track him down. But this weird part of me doesn’t even dread telling him the truth about Ted. That part thinks it’ll be good to finally say what’s what and move on.
* * *
Milo is free, so I drive over to his house for the first time. It’s two stories and huge and there’s a basketball court in the driveway and a beautiful seasonal wreath on the front door. When I ring the doorbell, it plays soothing chimes.
“Hey.” Milo opens the door. “Come on in.”
“Something kind of bad happened,” I blurt out.
“What do you mean?” Milo asks. “Are you okay?”
“Okay, so, me and my friend Reid—well, let me back up, a while back, we found out my other two bandmates were doing it, and—basically, I didn’t have much experience with guys and Reid had zero experience with girls, and we were like, if Lucy and Nathan are always off doing it, maybe we should be off living, too.”
“So you did it with Reid?” Milo shrugs. “That’s not a big deal.”
“No, ew, I did not do it with Reid. We, um, we teamed up to help each other find love or sex or whatever. And we kept track of everything in a notebook. IS THAT THE WEIRDEST?”
“Well, yeah, a little?” Milo kind of laughs. “So you wrote about me in it? Is this what you’re telling me?”
“Yes,” I say. “The notebook’s missing, and I’m sure it’s someone at my school, and there’s really no way it could get back to you, but I wanted to be honest. I wrote about you, and also I was seeing other guys at the same time.”
“Well, we weren’t exclusive,” he says, which is so right and true, I want to high-five him. “But I wish you would have said something. I guess I think you should have said something.”
“Yeah, I know,” I say. I want to end it there, but I know I have to keep going. “AlsoIthinkI’mfallinginlovewithsomeone, so…”
“Oh.” Milo stares down at the ground. “And it’s not me, I’m guessing.”
“We can still hang out,” I say. I should have realized this a while ago, and I definitely should have said all of this way sooner than now. “If you even want to. I like going to shows with you, and—and you’re awesome! I just… don’t want to go out with you anymore. Is that okay?”
He shrugs. “I guess it has to be.”
“The part about us hanging out, not about not going out anymore.”
Milo sighs really loudly. “I should have probably known something was up. You were always avoiding doing stuff.”
“I’m sorry you noticed,” I say, even though even Reid figured that out just from the Passenger Manifest. “I should have been more honest. Well, honest, period.”
I give him a hug, which he semi-accepts, but then he says he’ll hopefully see me at the Diarrhea Planet show in three weeks, so I think we’ll be okay as friends or at least as fellow show-goers. And Garrick and I will be fine, too! He is in love with Sydney Jacobs! And I am in love with Ted, and if things are going so easily, I can totally stay in love with Ted.
I call Reid once I’m in my car. “Hey. Your idea was good.”
“What idea?” he asks.
“The whole honesty thing,” I say. “It was hard, but… eventually Milo and Garrick were both supercool about it, and now I just have to talk to Ted.”
“I’m working up the nerve to call everyone,” he says. “But it went fine?”
“Yeah, they weren’t that mad, and I’m staying friends with both of them.”
“Cool.” He sounds like the Reid I know and platonically love. “I’ll give you an update later. Tell me how it goes with Ted. Or if you hear anything from anyone about the book.”
“Will do.” I end the call so I can call Ted. “Hey, is this an okay time? Are you busy at your mom’s work?”
“It’s an okay time,” Ted says.
“Can we meet up? I need to talk to you about something.”
“Can you come over here? I can meet you outside my mom’s office.”
I get nervous when I text him to come down, but I tell myself to calm the heck down. Talking to Ted is going to be fine. Especially because when he walks up, he’s smiling like I have brought all the sunshine back into his world.
“Hi, Riley,” he says.
“Hey.” I forget why we’re here, and I hug him, and even though we’re kind of in public—well, totally in public—I kiss him. He laughs nervously, but he kisses me back.
“What’s up?” Ted takes a bag of M&M’s out of his pocket and passes it to me.
“Um, so this is stupid, and it’s really not a big deal, but it could come up, so I want you to know,” I say. “So, like, Reid and I, we kept this book, it’s just this idea we had back when we found out Lucy and Nathan were together. We figured it didn’t make any sense for us not to have any experience, and since we weren’t interested in each other, we were helping each other, like, succeed with people they were interested in—”
“What do you mean, ‘succeed’?” Ted asks.
“You know, fall in love or do it or whatever.” Even though I’ve already said it twice it sounds worse out loud this third time. Ted confirms this by giving me a look like I’m covered in bees and bad ideas. “It wasn’t as awful as it sounds, I swear.”
“So you were trying to ‘succeed’ with me?” he asks.
“No, well, yes, but—I had the biggest crush on you.” Now I’m embarrassed for admitting that. Except WE HAVE DONE IT THREE TIMES. I shouldn’t be embarrassed by that. I don’t want to be scared of just saying honest things. “So, like, in a sense. Ye
ah.”
“And you kept track of it like a project?” Ted starts pacing around in a circle and it’s making me dizzy, so I try to stop him but he keeps going. “And you let Reid read it?”
“I had to,” I say. “We made a pact. Except I never told him about… like, recent stuff. None of that’s in there.”
Ted shakes his head and finally stops pacing. “It’s weird, Riley.”
“I know, completely, yes, right, ugh!” I feel whatever was spinning out of control settling back, and I’m determined to keep it all right here where it still feels scary and unsure but not unfixable. “I was trying so hard to figure out how to, I don’t know, make you like me. It’s dumb, and I know it’s dumb, and, seriously, once you started meaning something to me I stopped.”
Ted nods. “Okay.”
“Are you mad?”
“I don’t know what I am,” he says.
“I should say, also, just a couple other things,” I continue, even though I could just stop and maybe things could all be fine. Hopefully they’ll be fine anyway. “One, I was seeing some other guys, not like in a big-deal way, but I was. Also I wrote about them in the book, too, and now someone stole the book, so probably everyone at school is going to hear about all of this.”
“How many other guys?” Ted asks.
“Just two.” I immediately regret that just. Right now there is clearly no just two to Ted. Two is suddenly a big number.
“Okay.” Ted backs away from me. “I’m… I’m going home.”
“I can give you a ride,” I say.
“No,” he says.
“Ted, are you pissed?” I ask, even though of course he is.
“I don’t know, Riley, you kept some kind of secret log book with Reid Goodwin, you went out with other guys when I thought you were my girlfriend, and now the whole school’s going to know it.”
“You thought I was your girlfriend?” I can’t stop the question nor the eager tone I ask it in. Riley, shut up.
He starts walking away.
“Don’t do that!” I run after him, even though Ted is fast on foot. “Ted, don’t just say nothing.”
But he does exactly that. Even though I’ve managed to catch up with him, he’s completely silent.
“I know it was dumb, okay?” I realize that I’m mad and that I shouldn’t be and that makes me madder. I hate emotions. “Can we just talk?”
But his answer must be no, because he just keeps walking. His hair is getting longer, and I think about all the times recently I have run my fingers through it, and how maybe this means I never will again. And I am madder still, at everyone in the world about this, Reid, and the notebook thief, and Lucy and Nathan, and Garrick and Milo FOR MAKING IT SEEM SO EASY, and Ted, and of course myself.
“Go get your stupid hair cut!” I yell at him, which is the dumbest because I don’t even want him to, I just want his hair less appealing if I have no access to it. Also I’m just the worst right now and I know it, and I’m glad that’s the last thing I can say because by now Ted is far away from me.
I get in my car, but I don’t go anywhere because there’s no way I can see through the ten billion tears I’m crying.
I’ve ruined everything.
CHAPTER FIFTY-SEVEN
It’s still gone, and if it wasn’t, I would destroy it.
CHAPTER FIFTY-EIGHT
I spend my whole night crying and risk the wrath of the United Front by refusing dinner as well as not leaving my room at all. I keep my phone near me at all times, but it doesn’t ring or beep. The only email I get is from Nathan, reminding us that practice will be long again on Thursday because we need to get ready for our show. Thanks for telling us, Nathan; we’d have no idea without you.
At school the next morning there’s no one whispering about me, so I guess this villain is keeping the book under wraps for whatever they’re planning. For some stupid reason I check my locker like maybe Ted’s over being mad at me so he’s left me a CD or candy or a note, but he hasn’t left me anything. He walks by me when I’m headed to first period, and I don’t know what to do—like, do I look away or do I look sad or do I say something? But I don’t have a chance to do any of those things because he darts away from me.
Garrick smiles when I walk into chemistry, and I’m glad at least one person doesn’t hate me. “Hi, Riley.”
I try to sit at our station like a normal person, but I put my face down on the lab table.
“Hey, Riley, don’t do that. I don’t trust the janitor to clean up chemicals with proper protocol,” Garrick says. “Are you okay?”
I shake my head. “Ted hates me.”
“People can get mad,” he says, “and then they can get over it.”
Garrick is right about everything to do with science, but I don’t believe him on this.
* * *
Reid intercepts me on my way to lunch. “Ri, we need to talk now. Come on.”
I follow him down the hallway to the library. I wait for him to bring up my red and puffy eyes or the fact that I’m wearing a pajama shirt with jeans or any other SIGNIFICANT SIGN that I am falling apart.
“The honesty thing did not go like you said it would,” he says. “Jane is pissed that I lied about wanting a dog—”
“But you have the dog now! And you love him!”
“And Madison says ‘second-and-a-half base’ is the dumbest thing she’s ever heard.”
“Reid, oh my god, why would you tell her THAT part?”
“Ri, we swore to be honest.” He shakes his head so forcefully I worry he’s going to sprain something in his face. “Jennie and Erika didn’t really act like they cared, but I’m sure they think I’m a creep.”
“Reid, I’m—”
“I can’t believe I let you talk me into this.”
“Talk you into what? Being honest was your idea!”
“The Passenger Manifest,” he says.
“Are you serious? That was both of our ideas. Don’t make this about me.”
“I wouldn’t have done any of this without you.”
“Neither one of us would!”
Ms. Jensen, the school librarian, walks over and literally shushes us. I don’t feel like standing here and getting yelled at by Reid, who’s clearly taken up residence in Crazy Town, so I walk out like it’s a regular day and I’m going to go eat lunch.
I tell myself not to, but I glance over at Ted’s lunch table. He’s in between Brendon and Toby, who are gesturing frantically about whatever guys gesture about. I do my best to make eye contact, but instead of returning it, he looks right through me.
* * *
We have practice after school because timing is crappy. I don’t want to see Reid, and I don’t want to act normal around Lucy and Nathan, and basically everything in the world sucks.
I’m trying to concentrate on “Stop Talking/Start Dancing,” but my mind is only sort of with the music. Every time I hear Reid’s bass I wish it was a tangible thing I could punch. We finish the song, but unlike how often that’s a moment of triumph, the four of us glance around like we’re acknowledging it was crappy.
“Let’s take that one again,” Nathan says. “It could have been a lot cleaner.”
“I think something’s off with the drumming,” Reid says.
“I think something’s off with the drumming,” I chipmunk at him. “Why don’t you go detail it to death in a book?”
Reid stares at me for a moment like he’s making sure he heard what he heard. “Why don’t you lie about it and pretend it never happened?”
Lucy’s mouth is agape like an extra in a crowd scene from a monster movie.
“Whoa, guys.” Nathan looks back and forth between us. “Let’s just take it again from the top.”
“Let’s not.” I get up from behind my drums. “You’re not President of the Band. And I don’t want to do this today. Maybe at all.”
The “at all” is a bluff. It just feels so great to say.
“Riley,” Lucy says. “Let’
s go inside and talk.”
I don’t even respond to her. I leave my drums in the garage and walk out. I’ve never left them somewhere before, and it’s as if I’m leaving my heart and lungs behind. But I drive away like I’m brave.
At home I work on homework because what else am I going to do? Still, everything seems pointless. Who cares if I can do the quadratic equation if I have no friends and Ted hates me and my band is over?
My phone beeps, and I come up with a billion wonderful possibilities. It’s Ted, saying everything’s okay! It’s Reid, and he’s calm and cool and collected and apologetic and wants to go shopping for vinyl, which is boring, but I can live with it! It’s Madison, and she’s made me more jewelry and boxes to put it in! (That would be surprising. But I’d take it.)
The text is from Reid, but it is not about vinyl.
Way to make everything worse.
CHAPTER FIFTY-NINE
No, seriously. Where is the freaking book??
CHAPTER SIXTY
Lucy is sitting on her front porch when I walk up on Friday afternoon to get my drums back. Her hands are wrapped around a mug of cider, and she looks like a postcard for fall. “Hey. Do you want to stay for a while?”
“Sure.” I follow her down the hall to her room. Just five months ago if this much of my life was falling apart, I would tell Lucy to tell me what to do, so maybe I should do that now. And Lucy won’t think my guy problems are silly and childish, because now we’ve both done it.
Except, wait, it’s not like I think Reid’s girl problems are silly and childish just because he’s holding steady at second-and-a-half base. Which means maybe Lucy never would have—no. I am not doing this now. I am getting advice and fixing stuff.
“Hey, um.” I keep getting distracted looking around her room for ch-ch-ch-changes, but it’s all but identical to last time I was in here. I’m happy the framed Jonestown documentary poster I bought her for her last birthday is still in its very prominent place over her desk.
“I’m glad you came over,” she says, which feels dangerously close to saying something about, uh, EVERYTHING, so I get ready to launch into my crap because, Lucy, let’s not do this. Lucy, don’t make a big deal over any of it.