who makes the world seem
brighter than it’s ever been.
There’s her smile and her eyes,
and I just wanna make her mine.
I hear her laugh and I smile
’cause I know she’s laughin’ at me.
There’s this girl, yeah this girl—
I think she’s the girl for me.
He’s still playing, repeating the last line again, as I join in on the melody, my fingers plucking the strings easily as I finally focus on Cam, and everything around me melts away. It’s just me and him, on his bed, under the stars, in our own space.
There’s this boy, oh this boy,
who’s got me all tied up
in the best kind of knots.
There’s this look you’ve gotta see,
when he’s starin’ at me;
it’s his hands on my hips,
and in the way that we kiss.
I can’t help but smile
’cause he’s lookin’ at me,
oh he’s lookin’ at me.
There’s this boy, oh this boy—
I think he’s the boy for me.
My face feels stretched tight as I stare at Cam, wondering how he has possibly gotten me to do this. Thankful that he has. I’m onstage, in front of thousands of people; real, in-the-flesh people. But I can’t think about any of that now. I’m playing with Cam again. He’s still staring at me when he starts in on the next verse. He’s not singing the song to the audience, he’s singing it to me. My heart is beating out of my chest watching his hands run along the strings, his lips caress each word he sings. I fight the urge to lean in to him.
There’s this girl, yeah this girl,
she’s the only bright spot in
my dark, dark world.
This girl, yeah this girl,
she sets my world on fire,
in the best kind of way.
It’s a rush and a thrill
and I swear that I will—
I swear that I will.
There’s this girl, yeah this girl,
she’s become the center
of my whole damn world—
and I swear that I will—
I swear that I will—
call this girl mine.
Wish she’d be mine.
Forever she’s mine.
There’s this girl, yeah this girl,
she’s the center of my whole damn world.
I’m choked up and staring at him, and I’m supposed to sing my last verse, but the words won’t come. Because those weren’t the lyrics I had expected. The words both exhilarate and crush me. Cam starts in on the bridge and I take a deep breath before joining in.
There’s this girl, yeah this girl
There’s this boy, oh this boy
I’m gonna make her mine.
I’m gonna make him mine.
I’m frozen on the stool as Cam leans over and kisses my forehead, the crowd erupting into applause. Real applause this time. They aren’t chanting at me to get off the stage or telling me how horrible I sounded. They don’t hate me. They are legitimately cheering, as loud as I’ve ever heard them, and even if maybe it’s all for Cam, everything inside of me is lit on fire and glowing. I take a tiny, nervous bow, and run offstage, feeling like I could fly.
CAM
Caustic Underground is playing their first song. Vee is backstage, swaying a little from side to side when I return from our post-performance pep-talk with Jenn. Everything about Vee is relaxed, loose. I walk up behind her, so close there’s no way she can’t know I’m there. Still high off of our performance, I feel like I could do anything—even face off with Vee. But right now, I just want to be close to her. Bringing her onstage was the only way I could apologize for how much I hurt her. And thank her, for how much she loved me. I wanted to give her something she had always dreamed of, something she didn’t believe she could do. I always knew she could.
“If you get any closer we’ll be cuddling,” she says, looking over her shoulder at me, her brows raised.
“Would that be horrible?”
“It might be.” She shrugs with a smirk. “It might not be. You’ve caught me in a good mood.”
I say a silent prayer as I wrap my arms around her shoulders and pull her into me. Slowly, she relaxes against me, letting her head fall back against my shoulder as we both watch the band in front of us.
“I’m sorry,” I say, leaning down to her ear. “I don’t think I ever said that. Those two words. But I am.” I squeeze her a little tighter, feeling like I can’t get close enough to her. “No more excuses.”
She nods against my shoulder, but doesn’t say anything.
I kiss her hair and feel her body tense. “I’m not giving up on us.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
THEN
VIRGINIA
It’s nine days until Christmas, and twelve hours since I snuck out of Cam’s bedroom. The house smells like cinnamon and spruce. In the kitchen, Mom stirs a steaming pot of pasta for our Thursday night dinner together. There’s nothing on TV but holiday movies—I’ve been flipping through channels for ten minutes. And God, love is everywhere. From what I can tell, not a single song has been written, or movie directed, that doesn’t have two idiots falling in love.
Mom shakes salt into the pot. “I saw Logan at the grocery store yesterday. He thinks you’re still considering State.” She’s stating a fact, but there’s a question there too.
Mom taps the wooden spoon on the edge of a saucepan. “Why don’t you give him a call later and tell him about Northwestern?”
“Don’t worry about it, Mom.”
“He said he’s going to visit State in a few weeks. He wants you to go with.”
“Mmhmm.” I slam my thumb down, assaulting the remote as I ascend to the premium channels we don’t get. I click on Gold Rush, and an obnoxious blue box fills the screen, telling me what I already know: we don’t get this channel. “Why can’t we get any good channels?” I slam the remote down onto the coffee table. All I’m asking is to see some fat, beardy guys dig in the dirt. Love-free. Why can I not watch the one safe show on all of television?
“Virginia.” Mom’s face is tipped down and she’s staring at me from over her dark rimmed glasses, giving me a squinty look that says, Shut down the attitude. “I think you should tell him, now that—”
—Now that I’m going to Northwestern with Cam.
“I think”—I’m yelling, throwing my arms across my chest as I swivel on the couch to stare at my mother, who is still stirring the steaming pot—“maybe you should consider telling me that you and Dad are getting divorced. If we’re so concerned about disclosure in this house.” Tears are scraping at the corners of my eyes, my throat is tight. “Actually … maybe you should have considered it a few years ago, when you started this whole charade.” I wave my arms around me, at the house that shows no trace of my father. “Where’s his stuff, Mom?” She’s stopped stirring, resting the wooden spoon on the edge of the silver pot. “Isn’t it strange that he has to come home with a bag of clothes?” My eyes are fixed on the window behind her, steamy and opaque, tiny droplets of water dripping down. It’s nice not to be able to see all the snow outside for once.
Mom takes a step away from the counter and stops. “We did.”
“You did what?”
“We got divorced.” I tear my eyes from the window and meet my mother’s, which are shiny. “We were waiting to tell you after you graduated. We thought we could work it out with space and a separation. It was finalized over the summer.” Her eyes drop to the counter, where she’s fidgeting with the spoon. “We didn’t want it to overshadow your senior year.”
“That’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard.” My shoulders are shaking, and my breaths are tiny and short—I feel like they’re stuck in my lungs. “What a great graduation present that would have been.”
“That’s not the whole story, Virginia—”
I throw the
black remote, shocking both of us, and watch as square plastic panels crack off and litter the floor. “I don’t want to hear the whole goddamn story. You should have told me.”
She’s staring intently into the pot like something interesting is happening there. “Yes.”
“And the house?” I wonder if she’s going to try to lie. “I’ve been there. Your stuff’s still in it.”
Her head pops up and she looks surprised. “Your father kept the house. But Virginia—”
I don’t let her finish her pointless excuse. I storm into the hallway, and with one hand on my doorknob, I summon my most composed voice. “I’m not going to Northwestern, Mom. Drop it.” I turn on my music and let it drown out the sound of my mom at the door. If I want lies, I’ll get them from love songs. I don’t need them from my mother.
CAM
At seven o’clock, after a day’s worth of text messages and voicemails begging her to come over, Vee is standing in my living room. Her jacket is still on, and she doesn’t look like her plans include staying, but she’s here.
“We need to stop this.” Even as she says the words, I hope she doesn’t mean them. She waves her hands between us. “Whatever this is, it has to stop.”
I know this is my fault. Between Sienna showing up and my dodging Vee’s questions about my family, there’s no one to blame but myself. But there’s no room for the guilt, because all I can feel right now is anger. I’ve felt guilty for so long, and finally, I’m mad. At everyone. Because once again, I’m losing everything.
“So you don’t want to be friends anymore?” I ask her.
Vee narrows her eyes at me, and I’ve never seen her look like this. “Don’t be an asshole. We became more a long time ago, and you know it.”
“I guess you’ll have to be more specific with me. Exactly what parts were my ‘friends with Vee’ benefits, and which were my ‘more than friends’ benefits? I’m just curious what exactly will change. I mean, do I still pick you up for school? Do you pretty much live at my house? What about sleeping in my bed? Do I still get to touch you? Where exactly will you draw the line?” Her face pales as I say the words but I still can’t stop. “Hopefully the benefits packages between Logan and me won’t get too confusing for you.”
There’s a moment when I know it’s going to happen. It’s the second after she bites down on her lower lip, when her face fills with something I’ve never seen before. Hate, I think. Then she slaps me across my face. There’s no flirtation or playfulness. She’s out for blood. And when her ring makes contact with my lip, she gets it.
“Shit, Vee.” I swipe my thumb across the warm blood seeping from my lower lip as she shakes her hand out in front of her, staring at it.
“Sorry. Cam, I…” She reaches out for me, then recoils. “No. You know, I’m not sorry. You don’t get to speak to me that way.” She slams her hand into my shoulder. “You don’t get to act like—like—”
“I didn’t mean it, Vee. I just—” I can’t even get my thoughts together, because the only thing running through my mind now is Vee walking out of here. And how I deserve it. “I don’t know what I’m doing. I’m just so mad.” I grab her hand and she lets me take it. “Not at you, though.”
“I know.” She squeezes my hand. “You need to get shit figured out, Cam. There are things you need to tell me. And until you can, we can’t do this anymore.” She slowly pulls her hand out of my grip. “I can’t do this to myself anymore.”
“You don’t have to know everything about someone to love them, Vee.”
“I get that, Cam, but you do know everything about me. You know all my secrets, all the things I thought I’d never tell anyone. And we’re not talking about knowing each other’s favorite ice cream flavor or which boxers are my favorite to sleep in.” She stops for a second. “It’s the blue ones, by the way. The first ones I wore.” She’s forcing a smile and trying to lighten the mood. She’s as nervous as I am, and I would kiss her right now if I thought she’d actually let me. “This is serious, Cam. You can’t tell me the most basic things about you … about your family. Where you’re from. The fact that you can’t tell me—that says something.”
“It’s not that, Vee.” When I reach for her this time she flinches; like my touch will physically hurt her. I feel like her touch is the only thing that can fix me.
“Then say something.”
But I can’t. There isn’t anything I can say that will make this better, because the truth is just as ugly as the lie. I don’t deserve you; I don’t deserve anyone. I should let you go.
“You don’t have to tell me,” she says.
I feel the tiniest bit hopeful, but all I see in her eyes is resignation, defeat.
“If you’re not ready, you don’t have to. But until you are, this”—she waves her finger between us—“can’t happen. I deserve better than this.”
“I’m fucked up, Vee.” I don’t even know how to explain it, but maybe if I can, I could fix this. “That’s just who I am now.”
“Maybe you are,” she says. “But I love you, and nobody ever said you had to be fucked up by yourself.” She tucks a piece of hair behind her ear. “But you have to let me in.”
“I want to. I can, maybe … eventually.”
She nods. “I guess we’ll worry about it when it eventually happens, then.” She’s staring at the corner of the room, where I have a picture of us tacked up on the wall. She had made fun of my bare walls, so one day I printed a bunch of photos of us and stuck them to the wall with thumbtacks. She laughed, but then said it was tacky, and took them all down. Except for that one. We’re lying on the beach, and the tops of our heads are cut off. We’re supposed to be kissing, but we both started laughing, so we look like we’re just smiling at each other with our faces pressed together. We look happy.
She has one hand on the doorknob, and before I can think of an explanation, she’s leaving. And as the door closes, all I can think is, This house is burning around me too. And she said she loved me.
* * *
I’m exhausted after Vee leaves, and at the same time, I’m filled with a sort of nervous, anxious energy. I feel like I just ran a race or was punched in the gut. Everything hurts in a way I haven’t felt in a long time, and I only know one person who understands this amount of pain.
Cam:
Sorry
For everything
Sienna:
Stop it
I’m sorry for showing up. I shouldn’t have
I’m sorry about Vee
Cam:
Not your fault
I haven’t told her. I can’t talk about it
Sienna:
I get that
Cam:
I know
Sienna:
Just breathe, Cam
The words repeat in my mind, over and over: just breathe, just breathe, just breathe. As I collapse against my bed, I can feel the heaviness of the day washing over me. Pinning me down.
* * *
I’m lying on the stone, a few feet from Sienna, and I’m not sure what’s broken. The jump was so much farther than I’d expected. Maybe it’s all broken. The pain is radiating down my left side, stabbing through my shoulder, throbbing in my wrist. I gasp for air, and feel another sharp jab to my chest. I can feel the heat of the flames. It’s uncomfortable, almost unbearable, like having your legs too close to a campfire, but a thousand times worse. Leaning to my right, I push myself up carefully. My legs feel okay. Bruised, maybe, but nothing broken. I hold my left arm to my side as I make my way to Sienna’s crumpled body.
She’s slumped to one side, her leg twisted unnaturally. I don’t know if a full minute has passed since she jumped. If five have passed since we woke up. Everything feels surreal. I sink to the ground next to her, still cradling my left side. She looks delicate, fragile; broken and unfixable.
“Sienna, we need to move.” The heat is rolling off the house in waves, the smoke stinging my eyes. “Can you stand?” I reach my right hand down to h
er, wincing as I release my grasp on my left side, but we have to move. She’s sobbing, her shoulders and chest heaving, but I can’t actually hear her over the noise of the flames and the sirens and the lapping of the river, which is choppy. It’s like watching the television on mute. She shakes her head, over and over. I’m hunched down, trying to slip my arm under hers, when I see movement. Mr. Anderson is running from the river, missing the dark-rimmed glasses that usually sit on his plump face. He’s older than my parents, with black hair quickly fading to gray, and a round, friendly face. His cheeks are always red, but now they look almost sunburnt.
He waves me toward the water. “Get on the boat, I’ll get her!” He’s beside me, carefully lifting her up into his arms, as her screams pierce the air. “I know, I know. I’m sorry.”
“Maybe—” Sienna fell, and maybe we shouldn’t move her. I think about everything I’ve heard about emergencies—wait for the ambulance, a stretcher. Don’t move them. But I don’t know what else to do. We can’t leave her here, we’re too close to the house. There’s burning debris and ash falling around us, swirling in the air like toxic snowflakes. A portion of the roof is collapsing in on itself at one corner of the house. Mr. Anderson makes his way to the boat with Sienna shrieking in his arms and I follow behind. I hold the boat steady as he steps on, and carefully deposits her on the bench seat in the back. She cries out again, another strangled sob of pain as her body comes to rest against the cushion. I’m in the bucket seat across from her, stroking her hair and trying to calm her. Sienna used to be friends with my sister Maggie, so I’ve known her for years, but we’ve only been dating for a few months. She’s a year older, and we don’t have much in common, really. It’s still new—and casual. I’ve never had to comfort her; I’ve never even seen her cry. I don’t know what to say to her.
“Shhh. It’s okay … just breathe. You’re okay … just breathe. Just breathe … you’ll be okay. Just breathe.” I mutter the words over and over until they don’t sound like words anymore. Until I start to believe it. Start to believe maybe it will be okay. Maybe she’s just panicking, she’s not hurt as badly as she seems. I hear a crash. Another chunk of the roof is falling in on itself. The first-story corner of the house where my room is—where my room used to be—is completely engulfed. If Sienna hadn’t come over, I would have been in that room. The house looks like a giant bonfire, so bright it’s hard to look at for long. We’re on the opposite side of the river, docked in front of the Andersons’ twin house. This is what mine used to look like, I think. I can see the spray of water coming from the other side of what used to be my home.
Love Songs & Other Lies Page 19