Can't Beat the Chemistry

by Kat Colmer

  ‘Don’t you get it? We were never going to work. We’re too alike.’ Same uni degree, same interest in music, same type B personality and the don’t-rock-the-boat attitude that comes with it.

  Annie shakes her head. ‘But that’s a good thing.’

  There was a time I once thought the same, but now?

  As hard as it is, I meet Annie’s eyes. I need to finish this, need her to understand. ‘We don’t challenge each other, Annie. We’d end up just floating along. At one time I thought floating was enough. But now it’s not. I want to jump into the rapids every once in a while, and feel the rush of fighting the current before it drags me under. And to do that I need someone who’s not afraid to push me off my emotional ledge.’

  Someone like MJ. My eyes find the ceiling at the thought, fighting a whole different kind of pull. When I look down, there’s a distinct lack of understanding on Annie’s face.

  ‘So you want to be with someone you can fight with?’ Annie’s weary tone tells me she thinks I’m a rapid short of a waterfall.

  ‘It’s got nothing to do with fighting. It’s about someone seeing an ability in you that you can’t see in yourself and encouraging you to act on it.’ Like the ability to complete a Special Ed degree.

  Annie’s face scrunches. ‘I can do that.’

  Don’t you think that’s too much for someone like you to take on? Annie’s not-so-old words barrel her new ones over.

  ‘That’s the thing, I don’t think you can.’

  ‘Luke!’

  Rosie. I should be helping the kids make their way to the holding room, not hashing it out with Annie. Some drum circle leader I am.

  ‘Hey, look at you. You were great!’ I take the bongos from her and pull my baby sister into a hug. Her arms wrap around me the only way Rosie knows how—vice tight. Strangely, it calms me. It always does.

  ‘Did you see? I got it right!’ She’s so proud of herself she’s bouncing. It puts a smile on my face.

  ‘I saw.’ Arm around her shoulder, I turn her to join the last of the drum circle gang as they snake their way to the holding room behind the hall. ‘You keep it up and you’ll be leading the group soon.’ She scrunches her nose but grins at the idea.

  ‘You did beautifully.’ Annie comes in from behind and loops her arm through Rosie’s so my sister is flanked by us. ‘You both did. Actually, the three of us make a great team, don’t you think?’ Annie’s smile might be for Rosie, but her performance is all for me.

  I wait until we’re in the holding room and Rosie is out of earshot before I take her by the arm. ‘Annie, you need to let it go.’

  ‘I’m not giving up on us.’ She smiles at me and, man, I so want to shake her.

  ‘There is no us anymore.’ My grip tightens and I quickly drop my hand from her arm before I hurt her. Where the hell is Zac? He’s meant to save me from exactly this kind of cockup.

  Annie’s smile wavers. She wraps her arms around herself. ‘It’s because of her, isn’t it?’

  ‘Her?’ But we both know who she means.

  ‘Theo’s sister.’

  ‘No.’ Complete lie.

  MJ and I might not be together, but if not for my time with her, there’s a good chance Annie’d have better luck wearing me down. Now? I’d rather be alone than float alongside someone until the sameness of it all cancels the both of us out.

  Wanting to be done with this conversation, I walk over to the far wall of the room where everyone is stacking their instruments. I add Rosie’s bongos to the pile of smaller drums.

  ‘Then why not give us another chance?’

  Annie and I have never had a fight. Not even the day I broke things off. Tears gathered in her eyes but she just nodded. That was us. Calm. Civil. No waves. No rocking the boat. Right now though, I’m in danger of losing my shit in a spectacular crash-the-vessel-against-the-cliffs fashion.

  Fighting to control my breathing, I turn back to her. ‘Annie, you need to realise—’

  ‘No, you need to realise that if she cared about you, she’d be here.’ Annie’s blazing eyes immediately soften when she sees the truth in the tense lines carving up my face.

  She’s right; MJ doesn’t care about me. Not the way I’d hoped.

  It takes a moment before I can push past the pain of that little fact and find my voice. ‘MJ might not be here. Doesn’t mean it changes anything for us.’

  ‘Luke, I … I’m sorry.’ She reaches for me.

  ‘Don’t.’ I duck away and get busy checking the drums are secured in their racks. I want this day over. Please let this day be over.

  ‘She was here.’

  I look up to see Rosie on the other side of the drum rack. How much did she hear? I don’t want her upset; she’s always liked Annie, even if my patience for my ex is running thin at the moment.

  I force a smile. ‘Hey, have you seen Zac? He said he’d meet me back here.’ Some wingman he’s turned out to be.

  ‘No, but I saw MJ. She was here!’

  Rosie’s beaming face … man, it kills me to have to burst her bubble.

  I muss her hair to soften the blow of what I have to say. ‘I think you’ve got that wrong. She’s flying out to her science comp today.’ I feel Annie’s eyes on me but refuse to meet her vindicated gaze. ‘That’s why she couldn’t play with us, remember?’ A disappointment Rosie hasn’t quite got over. And one that’s possibly making her hallucinate, because she’s shaking her head like I’ve just told her the sky is green.

  ‘She was here. Next to the fire extinguisher, that’s where she was standing. I saw her, Luke.’

  The leg stomp in her voice has me frowning, and something grips at my gut. ‘Then where is she now?’

  ‘Gone.’

  ‘Gone?’

  Rosie’s mop of dark hair bobs as she nods. ‘She ran out at the end of our song. Really quickly.’

  MJ was here? If she really was, that means she never boarded the plane, which means she’ll miss the science comp, which means …

  My mouth is dry. Yeah, what exactly does it mean? ‘You sure it was her, Rosie, not someone else, someone who just looks like her?’ Because if Rosie’s right …

  Rosie nods again. ‘I’m sure, Luke.’

  Right then I catch sight of Zac making his way across to us. ‘Sorry, got caught talking to—’

  I cut him off with a wave. ‘You okay to look out for Rosie until Mum finds her way back here?’

  He looks from me to my now grinning sister, and back again. ‘Er, sure. Whatever you need. Mind me asking why?’

  I take a deep breath, my lungs daring to fill with hope. ‘I’m driving back to campus. MJ was here.’

  Zac’s mouth drops open in a silent ‘ah’. He’s got too much tact to look at Annie.

  But I can’t help myself. Despite her stubborn resolve that we get back together, I’m not proud of the tortured look I’ve put on her face. ‘I’m sorry,’ I tell her. ‘But I can’t be who you want me to be.’

  I throw a glance Zac’s way, hoping he’ll pick up on my silent plea to do what he can to ease the hurt on Annie’s face.

  Then Rosie is pushing me towards the door. ‘Go. And tell her she’ll have to play without bumpers for not saying hello tonight.’

  ‘I will.’ I plant a kiss on Rosie’s hair through a growing smile and head outside into the rain.

  To find a smart, completely clueless, ink-haired little hedgehog of a girl.

  MJ

  Sandy, I Will Cry to Thee

  When I was fifteen Mum signed me up for a Young Minds of Science competition. I spent the whole spring holidays researching the uses of stem cells in various fields of medicine—I guess the interest in genetics isn’t all that recent. By then my history of holiday study camps, piano intensives and essay writing workshops meant nobody bothered to ask me along on their trips to the movies
or the shops or … well, whatever it is that fifteen-year-olds do during the holidays. I wouldn’t really know.

  Preparing for the Young Minds of Science competition kept me busy enough to pretend I didn’t care about my general lack of friends. Now, as I push my Honda through the rain, there’s no pretending—I’d sell my kidney for a friend.

  The turnoff for home approaches. I whizz past it, steering the car towards the boarding house. I need my friend, even though I’m well aware things aren’t all that friendly between us at the moment.

  When I open our dorm room door, I find Sandy sitting on her bed, study notes strewn around her like her folder had a serious case of gastro.

  She looks up and eyes me from dripping head to sodden foot. ‘What are you doing here?’ Her eyes widen at the carry-on I’m dragging to my side of the room. ‘Aren’t you meant to be at your science competition?’

  And that’s all it takes. The floodgates open and my eyes produce the other 75 per cent of the Pacific Ocean.

  There’s a rustle of papers and a creak of bedsprings. ‘MJ, what’s going on?’

  ‘I’ve messed it up. All of it.’ I swipe at a fresh wave of tears and—great!—snot. I hate crying. It’s so useless, so unproductive, although this time it might have helped raise the cooler than usual temperature of our dorm room since the birthday card incident.

  Feet pad across the floorboards. ‘Here.’ A handful of tissues materialises under my nose.

  I give Sandy a grateful, snotty look, take the tissues and blow.

  ‘Now spill. What’s going on? Is it Jason?’ Her hand brushes my arm. ‘He hasn’t dumped you already, has he?’

  I search for the justified vindication in the question but can’t find it. In its place is concern, even though I don’t deserve it.

  ‘It’s Luke,’ I whisper.

  Silence.

  ‘He’s back with his ex.’ Just saying it out loud starts another teary snot wave and I’m blowing into the tissues again. Hard.

  Somewhere over my shoulder, Sandy takes a sharp breath. Here it comes, the you-deserve-your-heart-gouged-out-with-a-potato-peeler tirade she’s got every right of serving me but … nothing. Instead there’s the pad of her feet across the room again, followed by foil crinkling, then ripping. Next I’m staring down at a neat row of Mint Slice biscuits.

  I turn to look at her. ‘Should I worry these are laced with laxatives or something?’ Not that her concern doesn’t seem genuine, but I wouldn’t put a little pay back past her.

  She snorts. ‘No runs, I promise, but these will dull the pain a bit, make it bearable, at least while the sugar spike lasts.’ She grabs one and takes a bite, her face dissolving into a momentary picture of bliss, and I’m left wondering what Sandy knows about having to dull pain with chocolate-coated biscuits.

  She holds the packet out to me. I take one. ‘Now talk,’ she says around a mouthful of chocolate as she pulls me down to sit on my bed.

  I swallow what’s left of my Mint Slice bite and angle a cautious glance at her. ‘Are you sure you want to hear this? I mean, with the way you feel about Luke.’

  She shrugs and dives into the packet for another minty chocolate hit. ‘I’m a big girl. I’ll get over it. Besides, I’ve been thinking …’ She looks down to brush non-existent crumbs off her leg. When she peers back up at me again, a smile softens her face. ‘It’s stupid to let a guy get between the two of us.’

  Relief floods me from my head to my squelchy shoes. ‘Thank you.’ I throw my arms around her. Unlike me, I know, but I’m beyond grateful she’s forgiven me for muscling in on the guy she’s liked for so long.

  When we pull apart, she pins my gaze with hers. ‘So what happened?’

  I hesitate, but only for a moment. ‘This morning at the airport Jason said something that made me realise I was making a huge mistake. So I drove three hours straight to see Luke, to talk to him, only to find him swapping spit with Polly-Annie.’

  ‘Polly who?’

  ‘His ex. He’d moved on.’ My voice cracks and I have to clear my throat before continuing. ‘Which is fair I guess, since I told him it wasn’t going to work between us but that was before I had my life changing rev—’

  ‘Wait, hold on, Luke asked you out and you turned him down?’ Sandy’s eyes grow wider with each word. So much so, I edge back across the bed a little.

  ‘Well, yes. Because I didn’t think it could work, what with my mother and Jason and …’

  She stares at me, scarily intense. I add another couple of centimetres of distance between us until my spine hits the wall.

  ‘I’m trying really hard not to hate you right now, but stupid decisions like that aren’t helping your cause,’ Sandy says. ‘You had him and you turned him down? What exactly were you thinking?’ She shakes her head but after a drawn out sigh, she scoots back to join me sitting up against the wall. ‘To ease the pain of that kind of stupidity we’re going to need more than one packet of these.’ She grabs another Mint Slice.

  I sniff at her. ‘You’re not making me feel any better.’

  Her face pulls into an expression that could pass for either pity or remorse. ‘So, you were saying?’

  I heave a sigh of my own. ‘That’s basically it. I have a Luke-not-Jason revelation, ditch the science competition and drive all the way to tell Luke the good news only to find I’m too late.’ My shoulders sag. I reach for another Mint Slice in a futile attempt to fight the sting behind my eyes. I don’t need a fresh round of snot and tears.

  Beside me, Sandy chews away in silence. Does the pinched look on her face mean she’s digesting more than just the biscuit? God, I hope so. If there’s one thing the frequent rotation of her preppy North Shore boyfriends is good for, it’s gathering knowledge on how to deal with being dumped. And even though technically Luke didn’t dump me, there’s no denying I’m sitting here, nursing what is essentially my first broken heart. I jolt into sitting straighter and swallow the undeniable truth along with the choc mint mush sticking to the roof of my mouth: Luke broke my heart. Which means that somewhere during the past months I must have opened it up to him.

  ‘For what it’s worth,’ Sandy finally says, pulling one leg underneath her so she can face me better. ‘I don’t think Luke is the type whose preferences swing depending on who’s available. He’s a stayer. That’s the whole reason I’m—I was—interested in him.’ She gives me a sheepish smile. ‘So he told you he was interested and you turned him down—’ she shakes her head again in disbelief, ‘—but I can’t see him running back to his ex-girlfriend so soon after.’ A frown pulls at the smooth skin between her brows. ‘Are you sure they’re really back together?’

  ‘I saw what I saw.’ And no amount of mental bleach can erase the crushing image of Polly-Annie’s lips on Luke’s.

  Sandy dabs at some crumbs in the biscuit packet. ‘Sometimes what we see on the surface doesn’t reflect what’s going on beneath. And you’re not the sharpest tool in the box when it comes to reading people or situations.’

  I should bristle at her words, but it’s hard to when they’re true. Add the well-meaning smile curving her lips and I don’t have it in me to be annoyed. Still, it doesn’t change my conviction that Luke has decided to move on.

  ‘I can see you’re not convinced,’ Sandy says.

  I shake my head.

  ‘In that case we’ll definitely need another packet of these.’ She rattles the two remaining biscuits in the plastic tray. ‘That and my go-to dump-night movie.’

  My hand falters mid-reach for another Mint Slice. She’s endured this heart-shredding torture so often she has a go-to dump-night movie? A sudden wave of sympathy for her rolls through me. And the realisation that I’ve never been a go-to for her on dump night.

  She hops off the bed and pulls another Mint Slice packet from one of her dresser drawers, then swipes her laptop off her desk. ‘Have you
seen The Princess Bride?’ she asks, plugging her charger into the socket closest to my bed.

  ‘The Princess Bride? How is a fairy tale meant to make you feel better when you’ve just been dumped?’ A revenge thriller with a high male body count would fit the bill heaps better.

  She rolls her eyes at me and the start of a smile tugs at the droopy corners of my mouth.

  ‘Not just any fairy tale.’ Voice full of conviction like she’s an authority on the subject, she flounces back onto the bed and flips her laptop open. ‘Whenever it ends with one of the preppy guys you think I love to date so much, I watch The Princess Bride.’ She turns to me, a little lost but also fiercely determined somehow. ‘It reminds me not to give up on love.’

  My mouth pops open. I’ve never seen this side of Sandy: this vulnerable and slightly bruised part of her that hides behind a polished and confident future-dux-of-the-school exterior. Something I might have noticed earlier if I’d paid attention instead of being so wrapped up in my own drama. A cocktail of shame sets my eyes prickling up all over again. For someone who hates crying I’ve been doing way too much of it in one day.

  ‘No more bawling.’ Sandy passes me a fresh wad of tissues with one hand as she boots up her computer with the other.

  I wipe my eyes and blow my nose. ‘Thanks.’

  Sandy acknowledges the word with a gentle bump of her shoulder against mine. It’s such a relief we’re back to normal, back to being us. This recent fallout has really driven home how much I value her friendship—and how I’ve often taken it for granted.

  ‘Doesn’t matter how many times I’ve seen this movie, it never gets old,’ she says after a stretch of comfortable silence while we wait for the movie to download. ‘Helps that Westley is edible.’ She nudges my shoulder again, and I take a breath, this one a little deeper than most I’ve taken today.

  Losing Luke before I ever really had him is like breathing with a collapsed lung—each inhale measured, laboured, and acutely painful—but I’ll get through it. And maybe, once time has anesthetised the pain to a bearable ache, I’ll brave to ask him for his friendship again. Because as much as it’ll hurt to see him give Annie the smiles I wish were for me, his absence the past two weeks has proven it’s far worse not to see him smile at all.