“Thanks. Great compliment,” I said, hating my voice for being so shaky. “It’s the wind, that’s all. My eyes always water when it’s cold and windy.”
Conor hadn’t let go of me yet. The next thing I knew, he leaned down from his skates-height to brush a tear from my cheek. There was a big spark when his hand touched my face, from the static electricity.
“Don’t—what—” I sputtered, pulling away from him.
“I—I’m sorry. You just—you looked so sad.”
“What is with you? You hate me. You do nothing but make fun of me. Now you’re done beating up Sean, and you try to kiss me?”
“What are you talking about? I wasn’t going to kiss you,” he said. “God, you can be so vain.”
“Then what were you doing?” I asked.
“You looked upset. I was trying to, like—I don’t know,” he said.
“Well, I don’t know either. But whatever it was, forget it,” I said.
“Fine. Don’t feel better.”
“Good. I won’t!” I said. Then I wondered what I was bragging about. “See you later. No, wait. On second thought, maybe not.” I darted around him and ran for Emma’s waiting SUV.
Now what? The only good thing about my encounter with Conor was that it had distracted me for a second from feeling as awful as I had when I saw Sean with that girl.
The sight of the two of them came back into my mind. They’d been too close—way too close—to have been just friends. So did he have a girlfriend? Why hadn’t he told me, if he did? God, how awful. No wonder he’d looked surprised when I kissed him.
“So? What happened?” Emma asked as I climbed into the front passenger seat. Jones was sprawled on the back seat, her feet up.
“Nothing,” I said. This could potentially have been the biggest day of all time in my love life, I was thinking. And it was, but not the way I wanted or expected.
“Kirst? You okay?” Jones asked.
“Oh, sure. Fine.” I managed a small smile.
“Did you ask him?” Emma said.
“No, I—I didn’t get a chance. Too many people were around,” I said. Especially the pretty one with long brown hair.
If I’d had anything to tell them about, beforehand, about me and Sean, now I wasn’t sure what was going on with us. Did I have a prospect, or didn’t I?
Jones leaned forward and rested her chin on the back of my seat. “I thought I saw you with goalie boy just now.”
I glared at her over my shoulder. “You said you weren’t going to spy.”
“Sorry,” she apologized.
“We were just talking. It was nothing,” I said.
“Oh. Okay. Well, who’s up for lunch?” Jones asked.
Somehow I couldn’t imagine summoning much of an appetite.
Chapter 11
“Sean called while you were gone,” Gretchen announced when I got home from lunch, and hanging out shopping with Emma and Jones. It was about five o’clock and they’d already left to go back home. “I told him you’d be home tonight, so he’s coming over around six.”
“He is?” I asked. The house seemed strangely empty without Brett around; he’d gone to his father’s for the weekend.
“Yes. Why do you sound so surprised?” Gretchen asked.
“Because…I don’t know,” I said. I wondered if it would be possible for me to hide in my room when he came over. Probably not. What if I ran to the bathroom and pretended to be violently ill?
I just couldn’t stand the thought of talking to him, after seeing him with that girl, in the warming—very warming—hut.
I’d completely made a move on him Friday night when we went sledding. Now it was Saturday night and I had no idea where we stood.
Did he want to be with me?
Or was he coming over to tell me he already had a girlfriend?
Maybe I wouldn’t have to fake being sick. I was getting nauseous just thinking about seeing him.
When I finally focused on Gretchen again, she was staring at me. “Are you okay? You look pale.”
“I’m fine,” I said. “Tired, that’s all.”
“Come on. Let me freshen your look before he gets here.” She took my arm and started to pull me toward the bathroom, where she kept a tower of beauty products. She was using one crutch to balance herself as she walked.
“What are you doing?” I asked.
“You look tired. I don’t know what’s going on with you guys, but you seem stressed about it. The last thing you want to do is actually let him know you’re upset.”
“I’m not upset,” I said.
“What are you, then?” she asked.
I didn’t want to tell her, but I had to tell someone. She knew Sean; maybe she could tell me something that made me feel better. Or maybe she knew something and wasn’t telling. Either way, I had to let her know what was bothering me.
“Confused,” I said.
She grabbed a compact of foundation powder and then some blush and gave me a mini-makeover while we talked. “Don’t make me look too made up,” I said.
“I won’t,” she said. “Don’t worry. Now spill.”
“I don’t know,” I said. “It’s not that big a deal, I guess.” I told her about the girl I’d seen with Sean, how she was all over him and how he could easily have been all over her, except that I closed the door and stopped looking.
“Oh, I wouldn’t worry,” Gretchen said as she leaned over to select a lipstick color for me. “That doesn’t sound like much.”
“It doesn’t?” I said. “What if he’s already seeing someone?”
“Well…are you seeing him? Technically?”
“Technically? I don’t know about that,” I said. “No. I guess not. I mean, we haven’t known each other that long. But I felt like…” I didn’t want to tell her about the kiss. “Like we were sort of moving that way.”
“So maybe you still are,” Gretchen said cheerfully. “That girl might be nothing to him. You could have interpreted the situation all wrong.”
How many ways were there to interpret someone crawling on someone else’s lap?
“Come on, Kirsten. Cheer up. Don’t be so negative. Whatever happened, you two will work it out.”
Why had I confided in her, anyway? Now she’d be giving me advice, and coordinating makeovers, on a daily basis.
“You know, you can really sound like Mom sometimes,” I told her.
“I do not! God, don’t ever say that again.”
“Why not? You said the same thing she always used to say to me when I got in fights with Tyler, or with my friends. You’ll work it out. Did we ever work it out? No. It didn’t work out then, and it’s not going to work out now—”
“I do not sound like Mom!”
“Fine. You don’t sound like Mom.”
“And you are being sickeningly pessimistic,” she said. “How do you know what’s going on with Sean and that bimbo? You don’t.”
“Bimbo?” I giggled.
“Whatever. Just ask him. Give him a chance to explain.”
Right. Just ask him. She made it sound so easy.
I thought about what I wanted to say to Sean about what I’d seen, or whether I’d say anything. For example, I could say: How could you do that to me, you pig? But he hadn’t really done anything, except let some other girl play Florence Nightingale, instead of me. Still, I didn’t like it.
The doorbell rang about half an hour later, as Gretchen and I were watching TV. I wished her leg wasn’t broken so that she could get the door. But no, it had to be me.
I took a deep breath and walked over to the door.