“You must be tired,” I say when he pulls into the parking lot and I get out. “Get some rest, okay? And thanks for the practice date! Not that I’ll ever need to practice, since, you know, it’s never going to happen, but it was a nice thought. I had fun.”
“You’ll have more fun,” Jack says, hands in his pockets and a faintly pained look in his eyes. “You’ll go on more dates, with other guys. And you’ll have fun.”
I shake my head. “I won’t. I told you – that kind of stuff isn’t for me.”
“It is.” Jack insists. “You’ll fall in love someday.”
I laugh. “Nope. Never again. It’s been three years, and it’ll be a hundred more. Drive safe, okay?”
I whirl around and start walking to my car. I swear I feel fingers glance over my hand, but they pull away just as quickly. Or maybe it was the wind. I don’t look back. I drive home. When I check on her room Mom is mercifully asleep, safe and sound. I pull my shirt off as soon as I can and throw it in the closet to rot.
Beautiful.
***
Part of me wanted to grab her. To pull her back. To hold her.
Another part of me knew she’ll hate the first man to do it after so long.
And the third part of me is afraid. Afraid at her conviction. Afraid of how convinced she is that she’ll never love again. Afraid of how pretty she looked in that blouse. Afraid of how sad she sounded when she convinced herself I didn’t mean what I said.
I am afraid of the things I am beginning to feel.
Because I haven’t felt anything new, for anyone new, for so long.
***
I wake up to Kayla’s texts filled with smiley faces and exclamation marks, describing her date – how kind Jack was, how good the food they ate was, and how he kissed her like he loved her. She’s going to ask him out again on Monday, and she thanks me a million times for whatever I did to get him to go out with her.
Mom’s at the table, sipping coffee.
“Sleep well?” I ask.
Mom smiles and nods. “Pretty well. You must’ve gotten in late, I didn’t hear you. Did you have fun?”
I recall the sushi place, and how delicious it was. I remember the tea and puking and Jack’s soft eyes –
Beautiful
“Yeah,” I force a smile. “It was fun.”
“Boys?”
“Just one.”
Mom quirks a brow, smiling. “Oh really? Not a dozen guys, this time? Just one? He must be special. Care to tell me about him?”
“Nothing happened! I just - there was a guy.”
“Booze?”
“Not even a bit of sake.”
“So it was a sushi place? With a boy? Sounds very suspect, young lady. Did you use protection?”
“Mom!” I snap, my face heating. “I’ve told you repeatedly; boys have cooties and bad hygiene. No one likes them except other boys and people with no sense of smell.”
“So I can expect you to bring home a girl one of these days? I’ll try to act shocked.” She smiles.
“I’m not bringing anyone home!” I wail. “I know it’s hard to believe, but some people my age aren’t entirely obsessed with the idiotic game called dating! Some of us have lives! And generally higher goals than messing around in the mud with the opposite sex. I’ve got colleges to apply to! And friends to hang out with! And an entire life to plan!”
“Whatever you say,” Mom singsongs, smiling knowingly. I take out a pan and start the burner, taking out a few eggs and slices of bacon. I can feel Mom’s eyes on my back, watching me, contemplating how much I’ve grown up or something equally annoyingly parental. The smell of sizzling bacon fat fills the kitchen. The birds chirp outside, sun streaming through the curtains. It’s beautiful.
Beautiful.
My skin prickles as his voice reverberates in my head. It makes me fumble with the pan and nearly sends all of breakfast casually crashing to the floor. Goddamn him! Even if he didn’t mean it, it still sticks in my head, like a grass thistle in my clothes.
And to put the shit-cherry on top of a shit-sundae, I can’t even lash out at him over it. The war is over.
I know that from how happy Kayla seemed. With her now satiated, I have no reason to attack him, other than general dislike and boredom. And those are petty. So petty I don’t know if I’ll have the heart to fight him with them.
It’s over.
I’m supposed to be happy. I won, more or less. Or we ended on equal terms, with me slightly winning. Or am I losing? Did him calling me that awfully wrong word mean he won? Does it even matter who won or lost? It’s over, and now I have nothing to look forward to. Nothing to scheme, nothing to plot for. Just emptiness where the war used to be. And somehow it hurts more than it should. I’d gotten so used to it, to exchanging barbed words with Jack whenever we passed in the hall or catcalling him with insults that I’ve forgotten how to be normal. Do I just smile at him? No, that’s repulsively, completely, definitely gross. All the other girls do that.
I spend the rest of the day finishing my college applications. I stare at them all – Seattle, Oregon – and secretly I know I’m only going to be sending off the one to Ohio State. It’s the closest. It’s the only one that’ll let me still look after Mom and get a college career at the same time. I don’t have siblings – I’m the only person she has left. I can’t leave her, hurt her like everyone else has. I dipped into my Europe travelling fund to pay for Kayla’s date last night. I’ve pretty much all but given up on that dream, anyway.
But it’s for the best. It’s the right choice. Not the one I wanna do, but the right one. And that’s all that matters.
-13-
3 Years
19 Weeks
0 Days
If it’s one thing in this world I’m certain of, it’s this: Jack Hunter’s gotta die.
Or he can cry like a huge nerd.
I’m not picky.
He’s stepped over the line one too many times. Now it’s faded and scuffed and I’ll have to draw it back on with paint, carefully, and it’ll probably take hours and my back will get sore and honestly he had no right to kiss me or take me on a date even if they were fake and he certainly, absolutely, positively had zero right to call me beautiful without my express permission. It was uncalled for and mostly a huge fat lie and lying is punishable by death. Or it should be. Uh, except for me. Because I’ve lied a lot. To Mom, to Dad. To myself. I should get exiled instead. To Maui.
I park and give an explosive sigh into my car. The war might be over, and I might be exhausted, but I have to get him back one last time. Just once, for messing with my feelings. Not that he did. Just, uh, he sort of kind of toyed with them, but I knew it was fake all along, so he didn’t really. But still. The fact he even said those lies to me objectively deserves some sort of minor capital punishment.
Also, because Jack is now going out with Kayla.
I get out of the car and make my way to Principal Evans’ office.
The first day Kayla grabbed Jack’s hand and he let her and they walked down the halls together, you could practically hear the hearts of a hundred ladies breaking in two. Poetry girl had burned her notebook. Dramaclub Wailer performed the greatest tragic screaming monologue from Shakespeare the drama teacher had ever seen. The girl who’s making the statue almost smashed it, but the art teacher convinced her to put it aside and finish it later, when she was in a better state of mind. A huge majority of lady teachers took sick leave to go cry into tubs of ice cream and watch Sex and the City.
I see the legendary couple as I walk through the quad before the morning bell. They’re sitting on a bench. Kayla kisses him on the cheek, and he nods. Just nods, doesn’t smile. Doesn’t say thanks or kisses her back. It’s like he’s just tolerating her. But Kayla can’t see that.