I shake my head. “Not yet.”
“Well, your secret’s safe with me.” She smiles and says, “See you.”
I lift my unclenched hand to give a little wave. “See you.”
I watch her glide down the hall. The girl I was once afraid to say hi to is now keeper of my biggest secret. I’m not sure why, but it feels good for someone to know.
Lipton catches up to me at the end of the day, worried something’s wrong after the way I ran out of class. “Did someone upset you? Did I?”
“What? No.” I squeeze his hand. “I just needed to find a quiet place to catch my breath.”
“Okay.” He smiles. “You know you don’t have to wear the necklace if you don’t like it. I won’t be upset.”
I clutch it to the base of my throat. “Are you kidding? I’m never taking it off.”
He laughs. “You didn’t need it, though. The presentation was so good. I think Braxley was crying.”
“Think he’ll give us a perfect score?”
“I will dance in front of the whole class if he does,” Lipton says, then does jazz hands combined with something slightly resembling the moonwalk and a little hokey-pokey. I’m too busy laughing to be embarrassed, though I do hide my face behind my backpack.
He walks me to the bus line and says, mournfully, “Will you ever get your phone back?”
“Oh! I forgot to tell you, I did! Now I just have to find my charger.”
“Finally!” He walks toward his bus, grinning like crazy. “I’ll text you later.”
After homework and dinner, I log in to Instagram on my computer. Vicurious is up to 2.4 million followers. I try not to think of them as numbers. They are not my first and eight hundredth and two millionth followers. They are lonelyyygirlll and dumbledorefanatic and tanyazeebee and kookiest-kimberly and ambivalentlessly. They are radhakrishnanraj and halliebrycedances and justjennafied.
I open the last photo I posted and scroll through the comments. Half of them are still exchanges between the helpers and those in need of help. But the others are panicked expressions of worry . . . about me. My followers have noticed my absence and they aren’t happy about it.
Where are you, @vicurious? We miss you.
Are you okay?
Please come back. I can’t do this without you.
Oh, God, if something happened to her I don’t think I can take it.
And on and on. Some of them make it sound like I’ve abandoned them personally, and now I’m the one causing them pain instead of healing it. I lock my door and put on my Vicurious costume. The neon skirt is wrinkled from being balled up in a bag for so long. I smooth it out and get dressed, choosing the white cat-eyed sunglasses from my very first post. I open the Photo Booth camera on my computer and hang the white sheet behind me. I smile and wave.
Instead of pasting myself into another scene, I simply make a cheerful yellow background using a water-paint filter. I write:
Took a few days off and missed you all so much! Thank you for always being there for me, and one another. Please know: If I’m hiding, it’s not from you!
I allow myself one hour to reply to comments, zipping through as fast as I can to reach out to as many as I can. It’s a high, I can’t deny it. As soon as my followers see me on there, they go a little crazy for my attention. When my hour is up, I can’t stop. “Just one more . . . ,” I keep saying. Until another hour has passed, and another.
Finally my eyes are bleary. I can’t see the screen anymore. I write my last message and fall into bed.
In the morning, I find my charger wedged behind my dresser and plug my phone in before leaving for school. I can’t wait to tell Lipton that we’ll be able to talk and text soon, but he’s not waiting at my locker as usual. I walk to his locker, uncomfortable breaking my usual routine and venturing beyond my safe route to find him. He’s not there, either. I worry I’ve now missed him at my locker, but it’ll take too long to go back to see if he’s there and still get to class on time, so I head for Mr. Braxley’s room. He’s not there, either.
I sit nervously at my desk, glancing at his empty one. The bell rings and two seconds later the door opens. Lipton walks in, glances at Mr. Braxley, and mumbles, “Sorry.” He crosses the room with his head down and scoots into his seat.
I wait for his smile, a note . . . anything. He doesn’t acknowledge me. My stomach falls and my heart pounds. Lipton always looks at me when he comes in. Why isn’t he looking at me?
Mr. Braxley starts teaching and my ears start roaring. Something’s wrong. I try to think what could possibly have happened since I last saw him. We were getting on the bus, he said . . . oh, shoot. He said he’d text me. Maybe he tried and now he thinks I’m ignoring him because I didn’t respond.
I tear off a piece of paper and scribble a note:
I didn’t find my phone charger until this morning, if you tried to text. Sorry! ☺
I toss the note to his desk when Mr. Braxley’s back is turned, and Lipton covers it with his hand. But he doesn’t read it! He slides it into his notebook.
I clear my throat.
He finally glances at me. I mouth, “Are you okay?”
He nods, curtly, but still doesn’t read the note. He looks like he’s going to be sick.
Mr. Braxley hands us the grade on our Siege of Jerusalem presentation—a perfect score. I had expected Lipton to break into the hokey-pokey, as promised, but all he manages is a feeble thumbs-up and half a smile. The way he’s looking at me is really strange.
Adam notices, too. He punches Lipton in the arm. “What’s wrong with you?”
Lipton mumbles, “Not feeling great.”
I try to talk to him after class, but he leaves in a hurry. “I think I’ll go to the nurse” is all he says.
Adam stands next to me and shrugs. “Guess he’s sick or something.”
I nod. It’s the “or something” I’m worried about. I kick myself for spending so much time on Instagram last night instead of searching for my charger before bed. Then I’d have my phone and be able to text him right now, find out what’s going on. Or I would’ve been texting him last night, instead, and he wouldn’t be mad at me at all.
He doesn’t turn up at my locker between classes, either, so I go to his. I see Adam in the hall and approach him, my stomach in knots. “I haven’t seen him,” he says, before I can even ask. “Maybe he went home?”
I head to the yearbook office at lunch. Marissa, Beth Ann, and Marvo are there, but they all have exams, so they’re studying rather than doing any yearbook work. I try to retouch some photos but can’t concentrate. Even if Lipton were sick, he wouldn’t ignore me like that.
Something’s definitely wrong.
There’s a knock at the door then, which is unusual since people generally just barge in. Nobody moves to open it.
“Come in!” Marissa shouts.
There’s another knock, a bit louder.
“Jesus.” Marvo takes the four burdensome strides to the door and swings it open.
It’s Lipton.
“What?” Marvo barks. He’s teasing, but Lipton doesn’t know that and flinches backward.
“I, uh, was looking for Vicky.”
I peer around from my workstation.
“Can we talk privately?” His voice breaks as he says it.
Marvo and Beth Ann and Marissa exchange looks.
I reach for my backpack. “Sure, I—”
“We were just going,” Marissa blurts. “Weren’t we?” She nudges Marvo and Beth Ann. “You can talk here.”
They grab their stuff and scurry past Lipton as he steps inside. Beth Ann says, “See ya, Vic!” and closes the door.
I wait for Lipton to say something, but he just stares at me. He’s breathing really hard, shoulders heaving upward and falling back down. “You said you weren’t her. You said you weren’t on Instagram.”
Oh.
I shake my head.
“I can’t believe, all this time . . .” He rakes his fin
gers through his hair.
“It’s not me,” I say, knowing there’s no use denying it but desperate for Lipton to stop looking at me the way he is right now.
He leans over Beth Ann’s computer and quickly pulls up Instagram on the browser. He types out my account name on the keyboard with a single finger, and with another click, the image I posted last night fills the screen.
“Then tell me why she’s wearing the necklace I gave you.”
My hand goes to my throat. The tiny sword is hidden under my sweater, at the hollow of my neck. But in the photo, Vicurious wears a lower-cut top. It’s right there for all the world to see.
“Lots of people have that necklace, I bet.”
“Lots of people who look exactly like you?”
I gesture toward my limp hair and baggy clothes. “I don’t look anything like her.”
He leans to the computer again and zooms in on the image. To my mouth. “That freckle,” he says, pointing to the freckle above my lip. “You don’t think I know that freckle when I see it? I’ve kissed that freckle.”
I touch my finger to the freckle.
“See? You know right where it is.”
I quickly drop my hand and lower myself to the nearest chair.
“You’re Vicurious,” he says.
I nod.
“I don’t understand. How did you . . . why are you . . .” He shakes his head. “I just don’t get it.”
“It’s hard to explain.”
“Try.” He sits in Beth Ann’s chair and leans toward me. Waiting.
I pull my knees to my chest. “Jenna was my best friend, and she moved. She found new friends to replace me. I heard her tell them I was pathetic. I was alone. I didn’t have anybody. So I created someone who is everything I’m not, who does things I could never do,” I say. “She’s better.”
“Says who?”
“Says two million, four hundred thousand followers.” I glance up at him. “Give or take.”
“So, she’s popular. Famous, even. And that makes her better?”
I swallow. “She helps people. She’s there for them. Her followers are there for each other, too. It’s, I don’t know. It’s a community of misfits and people who feel alone, like me. They love her.”
“They love you.”
“No! That’s just it. I’m nothing like her. If they found out it was me . . .” I close my eyes. “They love Vicurious, not me.”
“So, there are two million people who know this whole other side of you.”
“She’s not—”
“Can you stop talking about her like she’s a different person? She’s you! You’re her!”
I drop my gaze to the floor.
“You could’ve told me,” he says.
“It would’ve ruined everything.”
“How?”
“I wouldn’t have been just Vicky to you anymore. And you were the only one who liked me.” I drop my head to my knees. “For me.”
“God, Vicky.” He kneels in front of me, puts his head to mine. “That wouldn’t have changed. It won’t.”
I bring my eyes to his. “How do you know? Just look at how you reacted when you found out. You got sick. You had to go to the nurse.”
“That’s not because you’re her. It’s because you lied to me.”
I shake my head. “It wasn’t just the lie. You were totally freaked out.”
He rocks back on his heels. “Okay, maybe I was a little freaked out. I thought I knew who you were and suddenly you’re someone else entirely.”
“Exactly.”
“Wait. Exactly what?”
“You think I’m someone else now. You’ll never be able to look at me the same way, and you probably won’t even like who you think I am now. Nobody will be left to like who I was. It’s as if I’ve totally disappeared and you were the only one who saw me anyway and now I’m just . . . I’m gone. That’s why I didn’t tell you.”
He stands up and presses his hands to the sides of his head. “Okay, now I’m really confused.”
“I’m sorry. I should go.” I can’t look at him anymore, knowing he’ll never see me the same way again. “I don’t want to be late for class.”
Lipton backs away from me as I gather my things. “So, that’s it? You’re someone else now and I don’t even get a chance to figure out if I like you?”
“I don’t know who this me is,” I say. “I don’t even know if I exist anymore.”
“Vicky, come on. That doesn’t make any sense.”
He tries to block my way but I push past him and out the door. It feels like I’ve been split in two—Lipton’s Vicky is left behind, and I have no idea who the new one is, or where she’s going.
33
I END UP BACK IN my favorite bathroom stall, where old Vicky would’ve gone, and I hide out there for the rest of the day. I could go to Mrs. Greene, but she’d want to know what’s wrong and I’d have to talk and I can’t talk right now.
I can barely breathe.
So I balance my history book across the toilet seat and I sit and wait for the final bell so I can hurry to the bus. I don’t even stop at my locker to get my coat. When I get home, I’m shivering, but not from the cold.
Mom asks how my day was and I start crying.
She immediately wraps me in a hug. “What’s the matter?”
“I miss Jenna,” I blurt out. It doesn’t explain what’s happened at all, or maybe it does. Maybe it all comes back to this.
My mother fusses over me. She tucks me in my bed with a cup of hot cocoa. She smooths her hand over my hair and asks if I want to talk about it.
“Maybe later.”
“Why don’t you call her?” She reaches for the phone on my desk and unplugs it from the charger. “You haven’t spoken in a while.”
“Maybe later,” I say again.
She lays the phone on my nightstand and leaves, closing the door gently. Kat curls up next to me, her purring form vibrating against my leg. I let the mug of hot chocolate warm my hands, but I don’t drink it. When it finally gets cold, I set it on my nightstand and pick up my phone.
It feels strange in my hands; it’s been so long since I held it. I key in my password and the home screen lights up and the little green texting icon shows a red circle with the number 37 in it.
I’m afraid to look, because they’re probably from Lipton. He was the last person I texted before Mom took my phone that day. He was mortified that she might’ve read what he wrote.
Now I know why.
Adam told me what Braxley said. Crazy.
You there? Hellooooo . . .
Okay, I’m just talking to myself here. *Dancing with my sel-elf, ooh ooh ooh*
Awkward.
Must. Stop. Texting.
Vicky?
Do you like me? Circle one: yes no
. . .
That was a joke, btw.
So, obviously, you are not there, and I am making a complete fool of myself. Feel free to interrupt at any time. “You are not a fool, Lipton!”
Vicky?
Yep, I am totally a fool.
Hey, remember my cat? She misses you. She really likes you.
Seriously. So do I.
I’m going now.
See you at school tomorrow.
I will be the one with a bag over my head.
I read it over and over. He’s so sweet and funny and I HAVE RUINED EVERYTHING. I press my finger to the little text window, and hover there for what seems like forever. But there’s nothing more to say. The girl he liked is gone.
I close the text thread with Lipton, and right below it is Jenna’s name. It says there are 21 new texts. I stare at the little red number.
Jenna texted me?
I click on the window and try to find the beginning, where the new ones started. I scroll back to the last one she sent that horrible day. “Have a nice life.” It was back in October.
The new ones started before Thanksgiving, two weeks ago.
Vicky,
I’m sorry. I was angry and upset and I wrote stuff I didn’t mean. I never wanted to be friends with those girls. You are the best friend I ever had, and could ever want. Forgive me?
Please. I take it all back.
I need you.
Vicky?
A few days later she writes one long message.
I really need to talk to you. It’s Tristan. He wants to . . . He says he loves me. I like him a lot. But I don’t know. I need to talk to you! Please, you have to forgive me. I don’t have anybody else.
I scroll quickly to the next message. Three days later:
Never mind. It’s too late.
“Nooo!” I call out, startling Kat. She jumps from the bed. “No no no no no no.” Tears well up in my eyes. I wasn’t there for her. I was helping people on Instagram, but I wasn’t there for my best friend when she needed me. Yet she kept texting me. Almost every day.
She had nowhere else to go. She kept coming back to me, and I wasn’t there.
He told all his friends I’m a slut.
Nice, huh?
Always wanted a nickname. Yay.
Got my driver’s license. Drove Mom’s car to school today. Some guy asked me if I’d show him the back seat. Asshole.
I know you’re Vicurious, by the way. Nice cat.
I guess you don’t need me anymore. You have a million friends. Must be awesome.
I have nobody.
You’re my best friend.
You are, or you were.
You always were.
Vicky?
I can’t handle this without you.
The next date stamp catches my attention. It’s today. Less than an hour ago. I was in the kitchen with Mom, crying, and Jenna was texting me.
I don’t want to be here anymore.
I don’t want to be anywhere.
There’s a picture, too. A photograph of a cliff overlooking a lake. What does that mean?
I sit up, thumbs speeding over the keypad of my phone, and text a reply.
Jenna. I’m here.
My mom took away my phone weeks ago.
I am just seeing your messages.
I’M HERE JENNA. I love you. I’m here.
I press send after each line, but the little “delivered” notification doesn’t pop up. I switch from text to phone and find her number in my favorites. I press on her name and it’s ringing forever and a thousand years. Then it stops, and it’s not Jenna’s normal voice mail. It’s an automated voice that says, “The person you are calling is not available.”
How to Disappear Page 24