I sniffed. With a note of finality, I said, “I guess so.”
“Then we are done here for now.” He chose a pen from the small container on his desk and turned to write something in his grading ledger.
I didn’t move. I couldn’t. I watched him write what I assumed was a zero next to my name and my head screamed at me, What have you done?
Mr. Hammond was still writing. Without looking at me, he said, “You are dismissed, Miss Vaughn.”
I didn’t know how to take it all back and start the conversation over so I did the only thing I could think of. I walked away. I pushed through the classroom door and slammed straight into Joel’s chest.
“Ooof!”
His hands jerked out of his pockets and he caught me by my shoulders before I could tip over. “Steady there.”
“You didn't have to wait for me,” I told him over the noise of the hallway.
“I wanted to,” he said, reaching down to take my hand. “You said we’d talk later.”
My insides were still lurching wildly. I could barely catch my breath and everything around me seemed woozy and faraway. My armpits were damp and my head was starting to pound. “And?”
“And now it’s later.” His eyes went over my shoulder to the classroom door. “So, what was that about?”
I tugged my hand from his grasp and forcefully brushed my hair out of my face. “Don’t worry about it, okay? It was just boring academic stuff.”
“You mean like not turning in your work and just deciding not take a test?”
I shook my head. For what felt like the hundredth time today, I said, “I don’t want to talk about it.”
“And, let me guess, you don’t want to talk about why you yelled at Tillie? Or why you’ve barely looked at me all week?”
“I didn’t realize that this was an interrogation.”
“Hannah...” His voice was laced with frustration. He looked up and down the hallway and then he grabbed my hand and pulled me toward the stairwell. He stopped near a classroom door, peeked inside and pulled me in behind him.
It was the end of the day and the room was dark. I could tell by the posters on the wall that it belonged to one of the history teachers.
Joel closed the door and guided me against the wall. He pressed his long body into mine, fitting my legs between his thighs. Then he brought his hands up to cup either side of my head and tilted my face so that I had no choice but to look at him. His eyes were bright. Worried.
He said, “I don’t want to interrogate you so let’s just get that cleared up, okay?”
I nodded and he went on, “I’m just trying to talk and figure this thing out before it gets away from me. I get that you have secrets and there’s stuff that you don’t want to share with me yet but… Hannah, you and I have something, don’t we?”
I couldn’t speak. Couldn’t make myself form the right words. Joel and I did have something—I just wasn’t sure what it was. With everything in my life falling apart, I was confused, scared to mess up something else.
He ran his thumb over my cheekbone and I instinctively moved my lips to kiss his palm and then his wrist. He sighed and moved his hands to the wall behind my head so that his arms caged me in. Then he dropped his face against my neck and touched his mouth to the thin delicate skin beneath my chin. It felt so good, so different from how I’d felt for the past week, that I leaned my head back and closed my eyes. I wanted to forget about school and about Caroline. Just for a minute.
“I know it’s only been a few weeks,” he murmured against me, “but I’ve never felt this way about anyone before.”
My lips didn’t move but in my head I told him that it was the same for me.
“Open your eyes, Hannah,” he whispered.
My lashes fluttered as I focused in on him.
He moved my hair out of my face and rested the inside of his hand against my cheek. “Don’t you see it?” he asked.
“See what?” My voice was barely audible.
“That I’m crazy about you.”
“You don’t even know me.”
He shook his head. “But I do,” he said. “I know that you like Girl Scout cookies and Kraft macaroni and cheese and that you’re a lightweight when it comes to beer. I know that you’re stronger than you think you are and that you’re going to be a writer one day. I know that you like to laugh and you can find the constellations in the night sky. I know how you look when you’re sad and when you’re happy. I know how I feel about you and that I felt it the very first time I saw you. Why else do you think I signed up for the squash team?”
I blinked. My heart was going off like a field of exploding landmines and my head felt too light. Like it might detach and float away from my body at any second.
I had no idea what to say. I wanted to tell him that I was crazy about him too, that I knew it the moment I saw him on the first day of school in the administration office. Instead, I said, “My best friend and I are in a fight.”
My words sunk in and the skin above his forehead crimped. Probably not what he was looking for after a declaration like that.
“Caroline?” he asked.
“Yeah,” I said, feeling a single tear drip from my left eye. “We had a fight over the weekend and she’s not talking to me.”
“So that’s why you’ve been acting weird?”
I swallowed and nodded.
“Okay.” His soft laughter trickled down my spine like icy water.
“It’s not a joke,” I said frostily.
“I know that.” He paused and smiled a little. “But I thought it was something else.”
I was annoyed by how nonchalant he was acting. I was obviously upset and he was acting… relieved. WTF?
I sniffed. “And me being in a fight with one of the most important people in my life somehow amuses you?”
“No, of course not.” He wrapped his arms around me and pulled me in closer.
This was all wrong. That gnarled feeling I’d had all day was back.
“You don’t understand anything, do you?” I shook my head and pushed off of him. “I feel like I’m walking around with a Caroline-shaped black hole inside of me and you’re acting like it’s no big deal. For your information, it is a big deal.”
“I understand that.”
“Do you?” I asked harshly. “Because I thought you didn’t have anyone that mattered to you like this. That’s what you told me.”
His face took on a slightly panicked look. “Hannah…”
“I’m not happy here, okay? I miss my family and my friends and… I just… I can’t do this right now.”
“You can’t do what?” he asked. He took another step back and I felt the cool air of the classroom invade the space between us and brush up against my skin.
“Never mind,” I muttered.
“You can’t do what, Hannah?” he repeated. “You can’t do me?”
I shook my head. “That’s not what I meant.”
“Then what did you mean?”
“I don’t know, Joel. Things are just not good for me right now.”
“Hannah…” I could tell he was frustrated. He lifted his arms and pushed both of his hands into his short black hair. His cheeks puffed with a held breath.
“Just forget it,” I said even though it was obvious neither of us would. “Forget everything.”
Joel looked down at the floor and then back to me. This time I saw something like resolve on his face. He took my hand in his and turned it over. His index finger gently traced the lines on my palm. “I have an idea. It’s Friday, so why don’t we skip practice this afternoon and go find those last few noses in Soho.”
“I can’t. I skipped practice on Tuesday,” I reminded him.
“So what?” he said. His finger made a bunch of oval loops on my skin. “You don’t care about squash.”
“Yeah, but I just bailed on one of Mr. Hammond’s tests. I think I should show up for practice. Which, now that I think about it,” I said, looking
over my shoulder to the classroom door, “we should get to the gym. School’s been out for like ten minutes.”
Joel didn’t seem to care if we were late. “Or how about this? I read about a dinner theater in Shoreditch in one of my mom’s magazines,” he told me as he drew a star into my palm. I shivered.
“Apparently, they do readings of Grimm’s fairy tales by candlelight. It’s supposed to be fun and a little bit creepy. Maybe we could do it tonight.”
Dinner theater made me think of Caroline. I wondered how she was doing with rehearsals. “I don't know…” I pulled my hand away and rubbed it against the fabric of my school blazer. “It sounds cool but I just don't feel much like doing anything.”
Joel opened his mouth to speak but my phone cut him off.
“Just let me turn the ringer off,” I said as I yanked my bag around my body and dug out my phone. When I saw the name flashing on my screen, I couldn’t believe it. Everything else vanished from my mind.
“Owen?” I answered.
“Hey, Hannah.”
Relief punched my chest. I closed my eyes and smiled softly. “Thank God. Give me two seconds.”
I met Joel’s eyes and pointed to my phone. Then I turned from him and walked to the opposite corner of the classroom to give myself a little privacy.
“Are you still there?” I asked nervously. I was glad he had called me back but Owen and I hadn’t spoken or had any contact since our break-up. I wasn’t sure how awkward it would be.
“I’m here,” said a familiar voice.
“Thank God. I know things are strange with us but I’m so glad you called. I just don’t know what to do about Care. We had a huge fight last weekend and now she’s not answering any of my emails.”
“Why don’t you just try calling her?”
“I’ve tried but she doesn’t answer. Does that sound familiar to you?” I asked pointedly.
Owen gave a groan which turned into shallow laughter. “I guess I deserved that one.”
“You do, but honestly I don’t want to get into that now. What happened with us, well, I think it was meant to happen.”
He was quiet for a second. Then he said, “You’re right. I have a lot to tell you but we can get into that later.”
I smiled. “So Caroline.” I said, bringing the conversation back to point. “She won’t answer my calls or my emails. All I want to do is apologize, but I don’t even know what I’m apologizing for and it’s impossible if she won’t talk to me! She’s mad I told my brother about her crush on Miles.”
“Uh-huh,” he said.
“But I don’t get why. It’s like, I’m not really sure what I’m supposed to be apologizing for.”
“Hannah,” he said in a chastising tone.
“What?”
“You are one of the smartest people I know. Are you really that blind or are you just choosing not to see what’s right in front of your face?”
“I don’t…” I shook my head. “What do you mean?”
“Caroline doesn’t like this Miles guy.”
“But she said—”
“She likes Henry.”
I sat down in the nearest desk chair. “Noooo...”
“Yessss,” he said, stretching the word out like I had.
“She would’ve told me.”
“Would she?”
I thought for a minute. Would my best friend have confessed that she was crushing on my brother? On Henry?
A flood of memories washed over me. Caroline and Henry singing karaoke together every summer when we stayed at the cabin. Caroline and Henry staying up all night watching movies together, long after I was too sleepy to keep my eyes open.
Everything clicked into place. “Ohmigod.”
Owen laughed. “Just had a revelation, huh?”
My brain was spinning. “Um, you can say that again. This explains everything.”
He laughed some more. “Now you know. So what are you going to do about it?”
“I don’t know yet but I’ll figure it out. I will fix this,” I vowed. And I would. I just wasn’t sure how to go about it. “Thank you, Owen. After everything… Well, you know you’re the best.”
His voice dropped an octave. “You are too, Hannah.”
I smiled. Maybe things would never be the same with Owen, but maybe one day we’d figure things out. “Talk soon?”
“I hope so,” he said before hanging up.
I dropped the phone to my lap and stared out the classroom window into the London sky. I couldn’t believe I hadn’t seen it before. The truth was so insanely obvious.
Caroline liked Henry. God, she’d probably liked him for most of her life and had been too afraid to tell me.
I laughed and turned to tell Joel everything I had just learned. But there was no one else in the shadowy classroom. I was all alone.
I had already resolved to spend the evening holed up in my bedroom watching some of my favorite movies. I wouldn’t let myself think about my ongoing fight with Hannah or the dance. Or about how Henry had been avoiding me at school for the past two weeks. Or that our morning rides had stopped and he’d dropped out of working on the play. No, I wouldn’t go there tonight.
Instead, I’d focus on the here and now. Which was, in this case, a plan to stuff my face with pretzel M&Ms, salty snack mix, popcorn, microwave pizza and chocolate-chip cookies. To top off the junk food extravaganza, I’d purchased Rocky Road ice cream and a twelve pack of soda from the grocery store this afternoon.
Dad, I guessed, was on a job. That was just as well because we still weren’t speaking to each other. Also, I didn’t want anybody to witness the epic display of gluttony that was about to take place. It wouldn’t be pretty.
I settled on the bed with my laptop and snack stash and pulled up Netflix. A “new message” notification blinked in the corner of my screen but I ignored it. It was probably something else from Hannah but I wasn’t ready to talk to her yet. I wasn’t sure if I’d ever be ready.
Remembering my decision not to think about Hannah or all of the other problems in my life, I clicked on Sixteen Candles in hopes that Samantha Baker’s disastrous sixteenth birthday would somehow make me feel a little less depressed about the current state of my existence.
Five minutes into the movie, Aspen gracefully jumped up onto the bed. After turning in a circle, she laid her head down on my lap and stared at me with pale blue eyes. For a moment, I assumed she was being sweet and snuggly and I curled farther into her warmth. Then I remembered the open bag of pretzel M&Ms next to me. Damn dog just wanted to mooch some of my candy.
“Little beggar,” I said, pushing her muzzle away from the bag. She blinked at me and I laughed and patted her head. “You’re lucky you’re so cute.”
Outside my window I heard the distinct sound of an engine cutting off and a car door slamming. Aspen heard it too. Her ears perked up and she bolted off the bed and out of the room.
Was Dad back? If so, I didn’t want to bump into him in the hallway. Setting aside the bag of M&Ms and pausing the movie playing on my laptop, I walked over to the window and used my finger to pull my white curtains apart.
Henry’s car was parked in front of my house.
“What in the...?” I said under my breath as I watched him get out. It was dark, but even through the shadows, I could see that he was wearing a suit.
I undid the window lock and heaved it open. Poking my head out, I shouted down, “What are you doing here?”
He startled at the sound of my voice but quickly recovered. He lifted his face and when he saw me with my head hanging out of the window, he smiled cautiously.
“You agreed to go to Homecoming with me,” he hollered back up to me.
“No, that was before,” I uttered, disbelieving. “We decided to call it off.”
“I already had the suit.”
“But I—” I glanced back into my room. “I’m not ready.”
“You have a dress, don’t you?”
I had two actually.
Not speaking to my father also meant no truck. There had been no way for me to return the two dresses to the mall in Tulsa. “Sort of.”
“Then you better sort of get ready. And fast. The dance has already started.”
“But—” It felt like the whole world was moving. Or maybe I was just that shocked. “We aren’t even talking. Are we?”
Henry dropped his head and sighed. “Care, you were mad at me and I was mad at you but I’m done with that. You like Miles and I’m going to help you,” he said soundly. “Whether you believe it or not, I am your friend.”
A strange sensation stabbed me in my middle. Henry still thought this was about Miles… “Henry, I appreciate the gesture, but I—”
“I’m not leaving. Do I need to get my boombox and hold it over my head until you get dressed and come down?”
He’d remembered my favorite scene from Say Anything. That made me crack a smile. “You wouldn’t.”
“I would,” he stated confidently. “And I have the boombox to prove it. It’s in the car. Do you want to see it?”
“No!” I couldn’t even imagine what my neighbors would think if he actually did start to play loud music. I couldn’t risk it.
Knowing I was caught, he laughed. “You wouldn’t believe how hard it is to get one of those dinosaurs.”
“Just… wait there.” I slammed the window shut and backed away from it. Was this really happening?
I ran down the stairs and flung the front door wide. Henry was waiting on the porch, making a show of getting comfortable. Now I could see how incredibly handsome he looked dressed up like this. He had shaved and smoothed his normally wayward hair back from his forehead. His eyes were sparkling under the porch light.
My pulse hiccuped violently. It’s not that I’d never seen him in a suit before but… I’d never seen him in one that he’d put on for me.
“Henry, you don’t have to do this,” I said. “You can go home.”
“I told you that I’m not leaving without you,” he told me. “Go get dressed. You have ten minutes max.”
“Ten minutes?”
“Now it’s nine minutes and fifty-three seconds.”
“What? And you call me a stubborn ass?”
He stepped through the front door like it was his right. “Nine minutes and forty-eight seconds.”
Steering the Stars Page 23