Between the Notes (18 page)

Wynn’s eyes lit up. “She probably went into the city. There are
some amazing vintage shops in Manhattan.”

“Remember that Pucci dress I found last summer?” said Willow.

Wynn mewed appreciatively, but Jenna stayed quiet. Did she know Chandra was more likely shopping at the Goodwill or Salvation Army these days? She caught me watching her and looked down at her uneaten sandwich, pushing it back into its wrapper.

Reesa finally appeared and sat in her usual spot across from me, but she refused to meet my eye. Her silent treatment further weakened my already-dwindling courage, so my voice came out in barely a whisper. “I have something to tell you all.”

Nobody but Reesa even noticed I said anything. She kicked me under the table, gave me a warning shake of her head. At least she cared enough to do
that.

I cleared my throat and spoke louder. “I have something to tell you. All of you.”

Wynn’s head snapped in my direction. “Ohmygod, you’re pregnant.”

“What? No! Why would you think that?”

“She’s not even dating anyone,” said Willow. “Please.”

“You got a car,” Wynn declared.

“Did she ask you to guess? Stop guessing!” Willow scolded, turning a patronizingly patient face toward me. “What’s the big news, Ivy? I hope it explains why you didn’t show up Saturday to shop for our costumes for the Halloween party.”

A guilty expression came to Reesa’s face briefly. So she’d gone
without me, without
telling
me. “So much for honesty,” I muttered.

She looked down at her lunch and I turned my attention back to the other girls. “I just wanted to tell you that we moved. My family. We moved to a new place.”

My announcement was met with a chorus of surprise. “I didn’t know you were moving!” “Why did you move?” “But you have the best house!” “Where?”

I took a bite of my apple to buy some extra time while I formulated my next sentence. Every coherent thought seemed to evaporate from my mind. I chewed thoroughly, took a sip of chocolate milk. And a deep breath.

“My parents decided we needed to downsize, because of the shaky economy and all that.” I decided not to get into the part about the foreclosure and the expense of Brady’s therapy. “We’re renting a place. It’s out past Jackson Boulevard,” I said, waving my hand in that general direction.

“Oh. My. God,” said Willow. Her eyes were huge. “It’s in Lakeside, isn’t it? My sister came home last week rambling on about Kaya living in the slums and I did not believe her. Are you serious?”

“Yeah,” I said as breezily as I could manage. “No biggie. It’s not that bad. It’s temporary, anyway.”

“Oh, my God,” said Wynn.

They didn’t laugh, but the looks they gave me were far worse. It was a horror-disgust-pity combo of facial expressions that
made me want to crawl out of my skin and under the table. Then Reesa opened her mouth. Maybe she thought she was coming to my rescue, or maybe she was trying to throw me under the bus.

She said, “Aren’t you going to tell them about your billionaire boyfriend?”

Willow and Wynn and Jenna and everyone else within earshot swiveled their heads to hear more, and Reesa delivered. “The guy’s loaded, and he doesn’t care where she lives. Apparently.”

I shrank at her mention of his wealth. I didn’t care if he was loaded, and we didn’t know that for sure.

“Who are you talking about?” said Willow. “I didn’t even know you had a boyfriend.”

“We just started dating,” I mumbled. “His name is James Wickerton.”

“Does he go here?” said Wynn. “Why haven’t we met him?”

Reesa crunched a carrot stick and waved it as she spoke. “He’s in our AP English class. Really cute.”

They were clearly finding it hard to believe a cute, rich guy had been roaming our halls undetected. “He’s homeschooling part-time,” I explained. “He only takes two classes. That’s probably why you haven’t seen him.”

“I’ve never heard of anybody doing that.” Willow turned to Reesa. “Have you ever heard of anybody doing that?”

Reesa looked to me for an explanation, but I had none. I hadn’t questioned it. And when we’d gotten in trouble for ditching, Mrs. Lanahan had been aware of his part-time status. She’d referred to
it as unusual, but clearly he was attending our school. As dreamy as he was, I was pretty sure I hadn’t conjured him entirely.

“He got special permission to take AP English and art history. That’s all I know.” I slurped my chocolate milk.

Willow wouldn’t let up. “Do you have a picture of him?”

I shook my head.

“I do,” said Reesa, pulling her phone from her bag. “Snapped it in class the other day when he wasn’t looking.”

She scrolled through her images until she found the one of James and turned it toward Willow, who leaned in to get a better look.

Her face lit up. “That guy?” she said, a wide smile spreading across her face. “I’ve seen that guy. And believe me, he’s no billionaire.”

I didn’t care if James was a billionaire, but Willow’s bait was too tempting not to rise to it. “How would you know?”

“I’ve
seen
him,” she said, “doing things that . . . let’s just say no billionaire would ever do.”

“Like what?” I tipped my chin up. “His own grocery shopping?”

“Oh, no.” She batted her eyelashes. “It’s much worse than that. You really need to see for yourself. How about I pick you up at Reesa’s house after school. We’ll all go on a little field trip.”

“Just tell me,” I said.

She pinched her lips together and motioned turning a key and throwing it away over her shoulder.

“I have to be home by four,” I said.

“No worries,” Willow said, smiling as she nibbled her sandwich. “It won’t take long.”

After school, I got on my old bus to Westside Falls with Reesa. She begrudgingly let me sit next to her.

“Do you know what this is all about?” I asked.

She shrugged, still not talking to me.

As the bus pulled out and circled around to the exit, I found myself gazing longingly at the state pen bus. I should’ve gone home with Molly.

“Why am I doing this?” I muttered.

Reesa sighed. Said nothing.

“I didn’t care if he was a billionaire, you know. I don’t care.”

She rolled her eyes.

“Honestly, I was hoping he wasn’t, because it would only make me feel poorer than I am.”

She stared straight ahead. I was clearly having a conversation with myself, so I stopped talking. We got off the bus when it pulled up to her gate, the ornate letter
M
flaunting her family’s wealth in my face. I used to love that sculpted gate, but now it seemed over-the-top.

Reesa punched her code in the keypad by the little foot entrance at the side, and it clicked open.

“Aren’t we waiting here for Willow? She’s supposed to pick us
up any minute.” She had driven her Miata to school that day and had to switch to a bigger car.

Reesa stood at the little gate like she was about to shut it in my face. “I’m not going,” she said, and then she did. She shut the gate in my face.

“But—”

“I’m not interested in Willow’s little field trip, and I don’t care what she thinks of James Wickerton,” she said. “Maybe he’s a billionaire, maybe he’s not. I really do not have the slightest interest in wasting one more minute of my life on James Wickerton.”

“Because he might not be filthy rich? You were obsessed with him when you thought he was.”

“I was obsessed with him when I thought he might like me, but that clearly isn’t the case,” she snapped. “I was just curious. I mean, what’s this billionaire kid from New York doing here, anyway
?
”

“Come along then.” I really didn’t want to do this without her. “Please? Don’t make me go with them by myself.”

She shook her head. “I’m sure they’ll tell me all about it tomorrow. You have fun now.” She wiggled her fingers good-bye and turned, walking up her driveway without another word.

I didn’t have to wait long before Willow pulled up in her mother’s Lexus, with Wynn riding shotgun, the music blaring.

I climbed in the back.

“Where’s Reesa?” said Willow.

“Not coming. Can you just drive me home?”

“Oh, come on. It’ll only take a few,” she said. “Besides, I need a latte.”

“Me too,” said Wynn. “Tall, with a shot of caramel.”

“Where are we going?” I asked.

“You’ll see,” Willow singsonged.

A few minutes later she pulled up in front of Bensen’s, the gourmet market. “If you’re stopping here for lattes then just take me home after. I really have to be there by . . .”

“Four o’clock. I know,” said Willow. “This is our final destination, anyway. So chill.”

She turned off the ignition. I followed them into the little coffee bar, where they ordered their lattes. While the barista was making them, Willow took me by the wrist and led me around the corner to the produce section. She stopped by the onions and pointed across the store where the fresh-squeezed juices were.

“There’s your billionaire,” she said.

His back was turned to me, but I could tell it was James. He was wearing an apron. Not bright green like Lennie’s. It was light blue, same as the walls and the shopping carts at Bensen’s. As I slowly walked toward him, he dipped a mop into a bucket and pushed down on a lever to squeeze it out, then slapped it to the floor. He was oblivious to the small audience behind him—Wynn had joined us with a latte in each hand. A white cord ran from his ear to his pocket. He was mopping to the beat.

I had walked slowly closer, and when he finally turned, there
was surprise, even delight in his eyes, at seeing me. He pulled the earbuds out.

“Ivy. What are you doing here?”

“Wh-what are
you
doing here?” I stammered.

“Uh . . . mopping?” His gaze flicked to where Willow and Wynn stood sipping their drinks, then nervously back to me. “Someone dropped one of those half-gallon containers of OJ. Didn’t even tell anyone, so it got stepped in and carts rolling it all over the place. Big mess.”

He leaned on the mop pole.

“So, you, um . . . work here?” I said. “As a janitor?”

He pushed the mop away and looked at it, like it had magically appeared in his hand and he had no idea how it got there. “No.” He laughed. “Not a janitor. More like an errand boy. Stacking shelves, unloading trucks, carrying groceries to cars. Occasional mopping.”

“Oh,” I said. It all sounded perfectly reasonable, except that he’d never mentioned it before.

“No food prep, though,” he said. “I absolutely draw the line at wearing a hairnet.”

He was trying to be funny, and I wanted desperately to laugh or smile but I couldn’t seem to make the muscles of my face move. Not with Willow and Wynn watching and judging and . . . I tried to swallow but couldn’t. It was like being onstage again and I froze. An audience of two—two miserable, horrible friends I didn’t even care about—and I couldn’t speak, I couldn’t budge.
I dropped my gaze to the pocket of his apron. There, stitched in white, was the name
JIM
.

I didn’t hear them walk up beside me until Willow’s hand was on my shoulder. “You’ll have to excuse our friend,” she said to James. “She may be in a state of shock. She thought you were a multibillionaire!”

“You really had her fooled,” said Wynn.

I stood paralyzed, like someone was shining a giant spotlight on me. I kept opening my mouth to say something but nothing came out.

I could only stare at the stitching on his pocket:
JIM
,
JIM
,
JIM
,
JIM
. What had Lennie called him?
Jimbo.
The janitor? No—errand boy. Stacker of shelves. Why hadn’t he told me? He knew everything about me. I hadn’t held anything back.

“Ivy?” James stepped toward me.

Willow pulled me away. “Maybe you should leave her alone now. You’ve done enough damage.”

James let the mop clatter to the floor and stepped over it, coming closer as Willow continued to pull me away. “You thought I was a billionaire?” he said. “That’s why you liked me?”

It felt like I’d been slapped. I shook my head. “No, that’s not . . .”

“After all you went through with your family—” He tore his apron off. “I thought you were different,” he said.

I watched him turn and storm away from me, my vision closing in like a tunnel. Then I was in Willow’s car again and she was gunning the engine, tearing out of the parking lot. She and Wynn
were talking over each other. “. . . mopping . . . what a loser . . . can’t believe . . . who does he think . . . poor Ivy . . .”

Then Wynn was shaking me. “Where do you live? We have no idea how to get there.”

I pointed, and said “turn here” a couple of times. When I saw the Save-a-Cent coming up, I told Willow to stop. “This is good,” I said.

“You live
here
?”

I didn’t answer, just pushed myself out of the car and stumbled across the parking lot toward the wooded area next to our neighborhood. I couldn’t find the walking path that cut through it, though. So I just pushed my way into the brush. Branches scraped my bare arms, but I didn’t care. I didn’t . . . Where was my jacket? I stopped and dug around in my bag, but I must’ve left it in Willow’s car.

“Shit,” I said, then laughed at myself.

Losing my stupid jacket is what I can finally speak up about?
Brilliant, Ivy. Just brilliant.
Stand there like a fucking idiot in front of James and let him think you care if he’s rich and don’t say a fucking word and fuck fuck fuck fuck
fuck.

I mouthed the word, repeating it soundlessly because as pissed off at myself as I was, I still wasn’t the girl who said “fuck” out loud. And that
really
made me laugh. Everything that had happened—losing my house and my piano and my best friend and my boyfriend, my parents fighting and the food bank and . . . and . . . I was still going to watch my language?

My mind darted and swirled around the frantic conversation in my head as the tree branches tore at my arms and clothes. The strap of my bag got caught and I couldn’t get it unstuck so I shoved it from my shoulder and left it there. I stumbled and fell forward, my hands and knees slamming into the ground. I cried out from the pain and then I . . . I just rocked back onto my heels, then sat and cried.