I Love You More: A Novel (28 page)

What was weird was that sometimes it seemed like none of it ever happened. Jewels didn’t show up at our door that day. I didn’t spy on her and Bert when they were parked in the church parking lot. The three of them didn’t meet at Rainy Cove Park and plot to kill Daddy. Daddy wasn’t murdered. In fact, sometimes it felt like Daddy never lived at all, or if he had, it was a long, long time ago, in a place that wasn’t real, like maybe another dimension. Nobody ever talked about him, and since Mama had finally gotten around to taking his clothes and other stuff to Goodwill, it was easier to pretend I never had a daddy. That way I could imagine that Mama had found me on one of her ocean swims. What a pleasant surprise I’d been—a fully grown and pretty eleven-year-old standing on a big white shell, hair all flowing like Aphrodite’s. She loved me from the instant she saw me and decided to raise me on her own. Detective Kennedy was a bonus.

One day, when I was feeling pretty bad about liking Detective Kennedy so much, Kelly Morgan, who for some reason was being really nice to me, grabbed my arm as I was walking by her. She was eating lunch with Ashley Adams, Gillian George, and Ugly Cindy two tables over from where Ryan sat with Audu, which I already said was short for Audubon. What is interesting is that Audu is really good at biology, like I’m good at lying. When I have kids, I’m going to be really careful what I name them.

“Here sit.” Kelly patted the bench. The other All That Girls shifted around to make room for me. “How’s it going with Ryan?”

“Fine,” I said. “Everything’s pretty much back to normal.” For the most part it was, but I had to admit, at least to myself, that Ryan wasn’t quite as attentive as he was before the incident that I ended up apologizing for, even though I was being self-sacrificing and modest, and was letting him win all the spelling bees.

“Pretty much?” Kelly asked. If there’s one thing Kelly is, it’s astute. “Are you sure? You didn’t look too happy when you were walking by just now. If I hadn’t stopped you, you probably would’ve run into a wall, you were so distracted.”

“No, really,” I said. “It’s good. I was just thinking about something else.” No way I was going to say anything about Mama and Detective Kennedy to Kelly Morgan. It’d be all over the school by the time lunch ended.

“Hmm,” Kelly said. “Well, just so you know, one boyfriend is as good as another. They might look different and smell different, but when it comes right down to it, they’re all the same. So if stuff doesn’t work out, just know you can replace him.”

“Ryan Anderson isn’t replaceable,” I said.

“Oh yeah?” Kelly said. “What do you think, Ashley?” Ashley had finally stopped flipping her hair at Ryan. Her new boyfriend was Audu.

“Kelly’s right,” Ashley said. “I don’t miss Ryan one bit.”

“That’s because Audu is so hot,” Gillian said.

Ashley’s back was to the table where Ryan and Audu sat, so she had to turn all the way around to look at him. “He is, isn’t he?”

“See,” Kelly said to me. “Not just replaceable, better.”

Audu caught Ashley staring at him. He smiled wide, motioned her to come sit with him. She balanced her tray as she carefully rose and stepped one foot at a time out of the bench. “Want to come?” she asked me.

Awkward
. “I’m good here,” I said.

All four of us—the three remaining All That Girls and me—stared at her with open mouths as she trotted over and inched her way between Ryan and Audu. Then Ryan motioned for me to come over.

“Don’t,” Kelly said. “You need to play hard to get. That way you keep the upper hand.”

I pretended I didn’t understand he was inviting me over and just waved.

“Laugh,” Kelly said.

“What?” I asked.

“Act like I told you something really funny. You know, like you’re having a really good time without him.”

Now, I wasn’t one to show excitement of any kind, but because Kelly told me to, and by that time I was doing pretty much anything Kelly told me to do because I totally trusted her insight into boyfriend-girlfriend relationships, I laughed bigger and harder than I ever had. Within a few minutes, Ryan was standing over me asking if he could walk me to class.

The thing is, I liked Detective Kennedy from the very first, and when he started coming around to see Mama and me, I liked him even more. But did I like him as much as or better than Daddy? I will say this: I was happy when he started sleeping over. They didn’t think I knew what they did in Mama’s bedroom. What is it with adults? Do they think we can’t see or hear? For example, one time when Detective Kennedy came over for dinner, he started rubbing Mama’s leg under the table. I could tell because his arm was moving back and forth. I dropped my fork on purpose so I could see for sure. I figured they’d at least stop rubbing at each other when I went to pick it up, but they didn’t. They didn’t even notice. I mean the fork had made a pretty loud ping, ping sound, and the chair leg squeaked so loud when I pushed it back that it hurt my teeth, not to mention that I disappeared under the table and watched them for I don’t know how long, but even if it were only a few seconds, you’d think they would’ve wondered where I went. Obviously adults are the ones that don’t see and hear stuff.

At least right then and there, I did like Detective Kennedy better than Daddy. Thinking about Daddy made me feel sad and guilty, and being around Detective Kennedy made me feel happy and light, and the truth was, everything had gotten so much better since Daddy died. My horizontality seemed to have morphed into verticality. Not only was I tall and surprisingly okay-looking
(though I worried since if that had changed once, it could again), I was clearly and officially Super Picasso. The kids at school seemed to like me. Mama and Detective Kennedy were so busy being in love that I could pretty much do whatever I wanted at home. Thanks to Kelly Morgan’s advice, Ryan Anderson seemed to have completely gotten over losing the spelling bee. But destiny, or maybe it was karma (a Kelly word), was determined to ruin my first boyfriend-girlfriend relationship.

A new girl moved to town; her name was Lucy Baxter. And guess what? It was bad enough that she was in my grade and that Mr. Dork shuffled the whole class around to fit her into alphabetical seating order, which meant right behind Ryan Anderson, but on top of that, her parents had bought the house right next to Ryan Anderson’s, which was also down the street from Ashley Adams’s. Not that I was worried about Ashley anymore, but living on Ryan’s street had worked for her, so it stood to reason it might for Lucy Baxter. The first time I saw her, my jaw
literally
(that means not really, but used for emphasis or to express strong feeling) dropped. I had never seen a prettier girl, even prettier than Mama, definitely prettier than Ashley Adams or Kelly Morgan. Her eyes were as blue as one of those Blue Raspberry Arctic Rush slushy drinks at Dairy Queen, so blue they looked fake, like she was wearing colored contact lenses, and her long straight hair was almost white it was so blond. We were all getting breasts by then, but hers were as big as a teenager’s, and she wasn’t even fat.
Svelte
was the word Ryan Anderson used to describe her. We’d just gotten it in spelling practice, but still it was a kind of big word for him. I mean, don’t get me wrong. Ryan Anderson was really smart, but he was also a true boy, so he had an image to uphold. Our class was in the gym playing tennis when he said it. It was a special track with a professional teacher. We did four that year: gymnastics, volleyball, golf, and tennis. Ryan and I were sitting out the rotation. His eyes followed Lucy’s every movement.

“What do you mean, svelte?” I’d asked.

“Slender and elegant,” he said. Since losing that spelling bee, Ryan had become a walking dictionary. He’d even copied me and started a word journal, which I have to admit bothered me. Mama always says when people copy you it’s a form of flattery, but I think she’s wrong. I think when somebody copies you it’s the same thing as stealing from you. That’s why they invented patents.

“I know the definition of svelte,” I said. “I was wondering if you meant it as a compliment.” I was fishing, of course. How could it not be a compliment?

He didn’t answer right away. “She’s not my type.” He was lying. If anybody could tell a liar, I could.

“Am I your type?” I asked. I sounded so pathetic.

“For someone so small, she’s a pretty good athlete. Did you see her last serve? Watch. She’s up again. Wow, did you see that?” He stood and clapped.

Ryan Anderson clapped? He never even raised his hand, or did much of anything spontaneous. Actually, I was kind of embarrassed for him. I looked around to make sure no one had noticed his brief departure from coolness. Then, to my utter horror, he put his thumb and forefinger in his mouth and whistled.

Everyone looked, including Lucy Baxter. All the way from where she stood on the tennis court, she smiled.

Bitch.

“Who’s a bitch?” Ryan asked.

I hadn’t realized I’d said it out loud. “I said
rich
.”

“Oh,” he said. “That would make sense.”

“Why?”

He hunched his shoulders.

“Why?” I asked again.

“She just seems so confident.”

And I’m not?
I decided that was a good time to use the power of suggestion, something else I’d learned form Kelly Morgan. “Really? She seems a little too whiny to be rich.”

“Whiny?” Ryan hated whiny girls.

“Oh that’s right,” I said. “How would you know? She was whining to Kelly and me about the snow when we were all in the bathroom together this morning. Apparently she hates snow because it gets her hair wet. And she hates all winter sports. She practically hibernates all winter. Oh, and she doesn’t like to read either.”

“Huh,” Ryan said.

That got his attention. No way Ryan could like a girl who didn’t read.

The bell rang then and we dispersed to the locker rooms to change back into our school uniforms.

One week later, I saw Ryan and Lucy leaving school together.

Now, I’d tried to convince myself that Ryan wasn’t actually walking Lucy home; they’d just happened to leave school at the exact same time. And even if they did walk together all the way home, it didn’t necessarily mean anything. After all, they lived right next door to each other, and since they probably walked at the exact same speed, it made perfect sense that they’d end up walking side by side all the way home. I never did actually hear Ryan offer to walk Lucy home, like he’d always done with me before we became boyfriend and girlfriend. Obviously I had just imagined that Ryan seemed preoccupied the previous week. I must not have heard him right when he told me he couldn’t walk me home that day because his dad needed his help with something, because if that was true then I couldn’t have seen Lucy and him at Dairy Queen. The same Dairy Queen where he had taken me the first time he walked me home after school. The same Dairy Queen where at least half my class had decided to show up. I mean, did I miss an intercom announcement that said, “Be at Dairy Queen right after school today so you can witness the total and utter embarrassment of Picasso Lane”?

So there were the three of us trying to act like nothing was weird about just happening to all be at Dairy Queen at the very same time, even though at least I knew that I hated runny ice
cream, especially in the winter, and we all knew that Dairy Queen was not even close to being on any of our ways home.

“Hi, Picasso,” Lucy said. She was all teeth.

“Oh yeah, hi, Picasso,” Ryan said. “What are you doing here?”

What am I doing here?
“I came to get ice cream,” I said, wanting badly to add,
Do you have a problem with that?

“Wow, me too,” Lucy, bless her heart, said with high-pitched excitement. “I’m so happy you’re here. I’ve been so wanting to get to know you and your friends.”
Friends?
She looked over at the table where Kelly, Gillian, Cindy, and Ashley were sitting, so I did too. Kelly saw me and waved me over, which made sense because I’d gone to Dairy Queen to meet them in the first place, since Ryan had plans, but right then and there no way could I act all fun and cool, prerequisites for All That Girl meetings. “I can’t believe how smart you are,” Lucy was saying. “Oh, do you think you might be able to help me out with spelling? I suck at spelling.”

“Why don’t you ask Ryan,” I said. “He’s the best speller at our school.”

Lucy looked confused.

“Didn’t he tell you?” I asked.

She looked at Ryan. “You said spelling was for geeks.”

Ryan didn’t say anything.

“So now I’m a geek?” I asked Ryan.

He looked down at his shoes as if he’d just noticed something on them that he’d never seen before.

“Oh, sorry,” Lucy said. “Of course you’re not a geek. I sure wish I was better at spelling.”

“Right,” I said, and stomped out the door and down the street. I’d gone pretty far when I heard someone calling my name.

“Picasso, wait up.”

I turned to see Lucy only steps behind me. “I’m sorry, Picasso.” She sounded out of breath from running. “I didn’t mean to say that about spelling. I don’t know why I said it. It was insensitive.”
Insensitive? I was surprised she’d used the correct word. “I really want to be friends with you and Kelly and the other girls. The five of you sure seem tight.”
Five
of us? “I’m really sorry. Please forgive me?”

“Are you sorry for stealing my boyfriend?” I said, and walked off.

The farther away I got from Dairy Queen, the lighter my footsteps got. I realized I was smiling. I knew I should still be smad at Ryan Anderson, and that I should hate Lucy Baxter, which I obviously was and did, but right then and there I felt even happier than the day Ryan Anderson gave me the valentine because Lucy Baxter thought that I, Picasso Lane, was an All That Girl.