by Gina Ciocca
My parents almost took out a restraining order against him.
Noah’s father appears at the front door, waving his son into the house. I have to get out of the car to free him from the back, and while he’s fiddling with the lever to release the seat, I swipe through my phone to take another look at the pictures I sent myself. A quick zoom of one of my and Joel’s drunken selfies confirms it. Not only is the car the same, but that’s definitely Noah, a year younger and with much shorter hair, leaning against the rear fender.
Glaring at us.
I click out of the screen as Noah emerges from the car and hide the phone behind my back. He tells me he’ll call me later and leans in to hug me.
His eyebrows knit together at my stiff response. “You sure you’re all right?”
I nod. I’m also sure that Noah is the jerk in the blue car.
And that there’s way more to his rivalry with Joel than either of them is telling me.
Twenty-Five
JUNIOR YEAR
Meredith steps away from me to assess her work, grinning as she closes the tube of lip gloss with a triumphant snap. “You look amazing, Macy Jean.”
I don’t know how I let myself be convinced to go to the dance. Walking into homecoming alone is right up there with “lick a tarantula” on my list of things I have zero desire to ever do. But my friends rallied so fast and so fiercely that I didn’t have much choice. Meredith practically flew over to my house, her hair still in rollers, her makeup half-done, and fuzzy blue slippers on her feet. She’d barely set foot in the front door when my phone started blowing up with calls and texts from other girls on the squad, begging me not to let Joel ruin the night.
It’s a little late for that. But I don’t want to seem weak. I don’t want Joel to think he got the better of me, even if he did. And I don’t want to turn my back on the people who actually want to be around me on account of the one person who doesn’t. So I found myself sitting on the toilet cover, letting Meredith fix my wrecked makeup while she and my mother buoyed me with compliments and one-upping each other thinking up appropriate punishments for Joel.
“Forget running him up the school’s flagpole by his boxers,” Mom says, leaning against the bathroom doorframe. “When he sees what he missed out on, he’ll be kicking himself until his butt is bruised.”
When I step in front of the mirror, I can’t help but agree. Meredith did a fantastic job of hiding the blotchy, puffy evidence of my disappointment. And when I put my dress on, the reflection staring back at me is as pretty as a picture.
I just wish she didn’t look so sad.
* * *
It’s not so bad at first, being at homecoming without a date. My friends take extra care to stick by me, bringing me punch and dragging me out to the dance floor every five minutes. It’s not that I’m not still disappointed and hurt and confused. But for a while, the feeling of being loved is like a bandage, holding together the pieces of me that are threatening to fall apart.
A short while. Because soon enough the fun, upbeat music gives way to a sweet, slow guitar melody. Everyone starts heading to the dance floor in pairs, and I’m staring at my hands and feet, hoping no one makes a big deal if I sit out. Hoping even harder that no one tries to force me into a slow dance three-way, the most uncomfortable act of third-wheeldom I could imagine.
Jadie says, “Be back in a minute, Macy,” as Tyrell leads her to the center of the gym. I gather the skirt of my dress and take a seat a few bleachers up. It’s the first time since Meredith showed up at my door in fuzzy blue slippers that I’ve been alone with my thoughts, and they waste no time wandering into dangerous territory.
I don’t get it. It’s not like I coerced the invitation out of Joel; he seemed so happy when he asked. And yet at some point he’d told Ben that he wasn’t going to the dance at all. Whatever happened to change his mind, it obviously didn’t stick. Because I’m here. And he’s not.
As I watch all the couples sway, I can’t help it: I’m uncomfortable. And worse, I’m jealous. Each beat of the music is like a chisel, chipping mercilessly at my mask of indifference. I’m supposed to be out there with them, with Joel. Laughing, dancing, having a good time. Not sitting by myself, wondering why he decided that the last place he wanted to be tonight was with me. What the hell did I do wrong? And how many more times will I have to retreat to this spot tonight, asking myself the same damn question?
I don’t want to stick around to find out. I thought I could do this. And maybe I can, but the truth is, I don’t want to.
So I grab my stuff and hurry down the bleachers, then make my way along the wall to the closest exit. I’m supposed to spend the night at Meredith’s after the dance; all the cheerleaders are. The homecoming parade is tomorrow afternoon, and we thought it made sense to have everyone crash in one place, especially since it’s the place where the float is located. But I just want to curl up in my own bed. I have my house keys, and it’s not far to walk home. I’m sure Meredith will forgive me for meeting them there tomorrow.
For walking out on the dance . . . that might be a different story.
The tightness in my throat releases a little as soon as I step out into the cool night air. I fill my lungs with it, telling myself that if I can wait until I’m home to crumble, then maybe I won’t have to fall apart at all. I don’t want to waste one more tear on someone who handles a football with more care than he handled my feelings.
I make it a few steps down the sidewalk that lines the parking lot before the door I just exited crashes open behind me.
To my surprise, Ben comes flying out. The sleeves of his dress shirt are rolled up to his elbows, and the black-and-blue tie he chose to match Meredith’s dress flaps against his torso. “Macy? Where are you going?”
“Home.”
“No, no, no.” He clears the steps in what looks like one leap, and then he’s at my side, gently taking my arm. “What are you gonna do, walk? I’m not letting that happen. Please come back inside.”
“I’ll be fine walking. I brought flip-flops.” I hold up the small Godiva shopping bag housing my spare footwear, like that makes everything okay. I try to pull my arm away, but he doesn’t relinquish it. “Please let me go. I just want to get out of here.”
“Mace, I’m really sorry about Joel. If I’d had any idea that he was going to pull something like this, I would’ve—I don’t know, done something. Warned you. Somehow.” He exhales, and it’s such a remorseful sound that I feel like I should be comforting him instead of the other way around. “I should’ve warned you,” he says again.
“How could you warn me about something you didn’t know was going to happen?” Unless— “Did he say something to you? About any of this? Because the way you reacted when you found out he’d asked me was . . . a little strange.”
Ben looks at the ground and releases my arm, putting his hands into the pockets of his pants. “I was mad at him for something else, and I guess I kind of took it out on you. I didn’t mean to.”
“Why were you mad at him?”
He starts to say something, then stops. “It’s complicated. And what he did tonight is way worse. But still.” He takes a step closer. “Please don’t leave.”
“Look, Ben.” I squeeze his hand. “I really appreciate everyone trying so hard to make this better. But I don’t feel better at all. I feel . . .” The knot in my throat springs back to life, strangling my last words. “So stupid.” And now I feel even dumber for being on the verge of tears, so I gather the skirt of my dress and say, “I’ll see you at the parade tomorrow.”
But he holds my arm again when I try to leave. “Wait. You didn’t even get to dance.”
“Yes, I did.”
Mischief lights his eyes. “Going to a dance doesn’t count unless you’ve slow danced at least once.” And then he’s holding his hand out, offering it to me.
“Ben. I’m not going back inside.”
“No need.” He takes my shopping bag and places it on the ground,
right before leading me over to the streetlight a few paces away. “How about right here? Look, we’ve even got our own spotlight.” He motions at the halo of illumination that falls around us, pooling in a semicircle at our feet. I’m shaking my head. But I’m also smiling, because it’s sweet. “Come on, Mace,” Ben says, soft but insistent. “One dance, and then I’ll take you home myself.” He holds out his hand. “Okay?”
My responding “okay” is barely audible. I lay my hand on top of his, and he guides it up to his shoulder, and then we’re holding each other the same way we were that day on the homecoming float. Except I’m not Meredith, and this isn’t practice.
Which reminds me: “Isn’t Meredith going to be looking for you?”
“She had to help with a decoration emergency. I’m sure she won’t miss me for a few minutes.”
“I bet she will.” And maybe it’s because my day has been so tumultuous, or because my emotional energy is all but sapped. But something about being this close to Ben, feeling the warmth of his body, breathing the summer-air scent of his cologne mixed with the smoky smell of lit fireplaces on a crisp autumn night, is the nicest sensation I’ve experienced in a long time. I want nothing more than to relax into him and stop thinking so much.
So I do. I rest my head beneath his shoulder. For a few quiet seconds, there’s only us, and the far-off, dreamlike sound of music escaping the gym.
“Meredith is lucky,” I say, more to myself than to anyone else. “You’re a keeper, Ben.”
One of his hands moves to the center of my back. “So are you, Mace.”
Not everybody thinks so. But I let the thought die as a silent frown on my lips, because bringing up Joel doesn’t feel worth it anymore.
Twenty-Six
SENIOR YEAR
“Do I just ask him about it?” I know it’s not the first time I’ve posed this question to Jadie, but I’m having a hard time focusing right now. “I don’t get it. Noah’s always made it sound like Joel is the troublemaker. Like he’s the reason things are shitty between them. But if that’s the case, then why would Joel need a restraining order?”
Jadie presses the barrel of a pen against her lips and leans against the wall her bed is pushed up next to. She’s sitting cross-legged on top of her kaleidoscope-patterned comforter, looking thoughtful.
“Joel said his parents almost took out the restraining order, right? So they might not know the whole story. They could’ve seen something that made them think Noah was the instigator.” She shrugs. “It could’ve been something. It could’ve been nothing. Your guess is as good as mine. But I don’t see the harm in getting the real story straight from the horse’s mouth.”
“Which horse?”
“Whichever one will give you an answer.”
* * *
I should know by now that getting a satisfying answer from Joel about anything is not a likely event. We left things unfinished the last time we talked, and so many times before that. It’s like there’s some kind of invisible blockade that springs up between us anytime we get within an inch of being 100 percent honest with each other, and I want it gone once and for all. Even if it means I have to ask him point-blank about the kiss in the dark, and face the fact that it meant something to only one of us.
I spot him slipping into the library before first period on Monday, and I hasten in after him. He drops his bag onto an empty table in the back, and in seconds my hand is on the chair next to his.
“Can we talk?”
Joel looks up, and nothing in his expression says that he’s glad to see me. “I forgot to study for a quiz and I have ten minutes to cram. No offense.”
“None taken.” I pull out the chair and sit down anyway. Much to Joel’s dismay, if his frown is any indication. “I’ll be fast. I promise.”
Joel pushes his notebook aside with a grimace, like he’s waiting for a punishment.
“Remember when you told me you almost took out a restraining order against someone from Mortonville?” He doesn’t react at first, just keeps staring down at the table. I wonder if maybe he doesn’t remember telling me. But then he nods once, and I continue. “That was Noah, wasn’t it?”
Joel turns to me. “Why is this coming up now? I told you about that more than a year ago.”
“Because it doesn’t make sense to me that one minute you’re pushing me off on him for homecoming, telling me I’m better off going with him than with you, and the next minute I realize that you almost had to make it illegal for him to go near you. Seriously, Joel. What’s going on here?”
“Look, the restraining order thing, it got blown out of proportion. Noah showed up at my house one night, and my parents caught us fighting and blamed him for the whole thing. We’d already gotten in trouble at school once, and it was like what you said about me with your parents that day. . . . They thought he was corrupting me, or something. Even though we were kind of both being idiots. I still think he’s the bigger idiot, but that doesn’t mean he’s not the better choice. If that makes any sense at all.”
“None.”
I sit there, hugging my book bag to my chest, staring him down so he knows I’m not going anywhere unless he does better than that.
“Look,” he says again, and this time it prickles with condescension. “What it comes down to is that I don’t have a chance in hell of giving you what you want. He at least has a shot.”
“What exactly is it that you think I want from you, Joel? You asked me to homecoming, remember? Both times. All I’ve ever tried to do is be your friend. And yeah, maybe last year I would’ve liked more than that, but this year I would’ve been fine never speaking to you again. So if you went through all this trouble to make up with me just to prove to yourself that you don’t feel that way about me, then I’d say that’s a pretty shitty thing to do.” I stand up and fling my bag over one shoulder. “Almost as shitty as what you did the night of the blackout.”
I’m rooted to the spot, watching his reaction. Waiting for the moment of truth. He swallows hard, staring at his thumb as it runs along the edge of the table.
“I guess,” he finally says, “that might not have been the best decision.” He looks up at me, and guilt and sadness shine in his eyes with a thousand other emotions I can’t read. And one that I can.
Relief.
It’s plain to see when he forces half of his mouth into a smile and adds, “But at least now you know.”
I’m not prepared for how disgusted I feel. Or the lump that forms in my throat.
I push in my chair with such force that the legs stay planted in the carpet and the backrest bounces off the table’s edge with a smack. “Yep. I know that you used me and then left me in the dark when you decided I wasn’t good enough for you. Although, at this point, I’m starting to think no one is.”
It’s as much as I can manage without giving in to the shake in my voice. I turn and stalk out of the library as the first bell rings, my body aflame with hurt and rage. I can’t believe I let Joel Hargrove ruin even one more minute of my life. I was stupid enough to let my guard down, even with Ben and Noah and an entire parade of warning signs telling me not to.
I’m as angry with myself as I am with him.
Of course, part of me knows I shouldn’t be this disappointed. I tried to prepare myself to let go of what I now know for sure was a fantasy that vanished under the glare of stadium lights. I told myself that if the kiss on the football field was more than just a kiss, then the person who initiated it wouldn’t stay hidden in the shadows like some kind of reverse Cinderella.
That kiss was my glass slipper. Except, instead of leading me to the prince, it led me to the same brick wall I slammed my head into last year.
Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. The first time Joel crushed a piece of my heart, I’d given it to him willingly. The second time, he stole it while I wasn’t looking. And then stomped all over it when the lights came up.
Shame on me indeed. I’ve been blind to so many thing
s. And there’s not a blackout in the world that I can blame for it.
Twenty-Seven
JUNIOR YEAR
The thump of Ben’s heart beneath my cheek matches the rhythm of the song pulsing from the school. As it reaches its crescendo, Ben pulls his cell phone out of his pocket. “So what do you think about capturing this moment?” he asks, almost like he’s afraid I’ll turn him down. “I know there’re a lot of things about tonight that you probably want to forget. But I’m kind of hoping that right now isn’t one of them.”
I smile, and it’s small but real. “This is probably one of the few things about tonight that I’ll actually want to remember.”
Ben crouches a bit as he extends one arm and drapes the other around my shoulders. I wrap mine around his waist and press my face against his, savoring the last seconds that I’ll get to hug him like this. It’s kind of weird to think that I’m going to miss it, but I think it nonetheless. He taps his phone, and the moment we see our faces with the horrendous fish-eye effect of the screen, we burst out laughing, the same way we did the day we danced in Meredith’s garage.
“Be cool, be cool,” Ben says, forcing his face into a more composed smile. Except that I’m watching him on the screen, and it makes me crack up even harder. And I’m so grateful for the rush of release, for ending this night on a high note—and for him—that I do something even I’m not expecting. I lift up on my toes and kiss his cheek.
The camera clicks, and Ben turns to me, rubbing at the pink imprint of my lips with an embarrassed grin. “Now, that’s a keeper,” he says, holding up the photo. I agree, and he returns the phone to his pocket.
The song from inside is down to its final notes, and I wrap my arms around him again while I still can. “Thanks, Ben,” I whisper into his shoulder.
“Are you sure you won’t stay?”
I pull back with a sigh. And even though I mean to say no, when I look up at his face, I forget to actually form the word. He’s watching me with those wide, inquisitive eyes, and all I can think is, You really are beautiful.