Shot Through the Heart (20 page)

She keeps right on prancing backward, a huge grin on her face.

“What?” I walk faster so I can keep up, but refuse to break into a jog.

“This is your lesson.” She skips over the tree roots without so much as a bobble. “Come on.”

I stop cold. So does Tessa. Still sporting a know-it-all smile, she covers the distance between us in a few steps and pops me in the shoulder with the flat of her hand. “You’re going to quit, aren’t you, Peyton?”

“Don’t bully me,” I say, popping her right back. Not hard, but with enough force to send a message. She’s so obvious. “And I am not quitting. I’m choosing to be finished.”

She’s hardly sweating, yet my entire back and chest are damp and my pits are dripping like I’m the test subject for a deodorant manufacturer. Worse, I sound like a loaded freight train struggling to make it over a mountain pass. I am
not
running past the cross country guys like this. Huh-uh, no way.

“Don’t you like it back here?” She makes a sweeping gesture to encompass the trees, low ferns, and wild aster growing along either side of the trail.

“I love it back here.” And I do. The air is fresh and infused with the sweet scent of pine needles, which eases my mind the same way it does when I run in my dreams. But in my dreams, I run without looking or feeling like a first-class fool. “It’s just that I’d rather not run anymore.”

“You mean you’d rather quit.” She emphasizes the last word. “And you’re not quitting because you’d ‘rather not run anymore’ or whatever other excuse you want to give me. You’re quitting because you’re not perfect. Period.”

Not only does she use her fingers to make air quotes, she speaks her punctuation. Does she really think that’ll convince me?

“I can enjoy the trail without running.” Or listening to her. I push past Tessa to walk. She should be happy I agreed to come at all, let alone that I allowed her to wake me up at the crack of dawn without thwacking her.

“Perfect Peyton,” she says, matching my pace. Her smile is gone now. “
That’s
the lesson you need to learn. You’ll never know what really matters to you if you’re worried about being perfect every minute of every day.”

“Oh, please.” Sounds like something she heard in yoga class.

“If you were all by yourself on a deserted island right now instead of on a trail behind Eastwood High School, I bet you’d run. You wouldn’t be worried about being embarrassed.”

I roll my eyes and up my pace. If I walk fast enough, maybe she’ll shut up.

“No one wants to fail, Pey. But that doesn’t stop people—most people—from trying things.”

“I try things,” I grind out to her insta-response of, “Ha!”

Despite the threat of blackmail hanging over my head, I’d never have touched my running shoes if I thought she’d harangue me about this. I assumed her little ‘figure out what matters’ lesson would be about the joy of running or some such nonsense, as if she thought my taking up running would give us a bond. Like, she could talk yoga and I’d talk running whenever we saw each other on her weekends home. Josh could pipe in with commentary on soccer or basketball and we’d be one big happy sporting family.

I’d let her believe that, then I’d go right back home and sleep.

“You only try things when there’s a low risk of failure,” Tessa says. “But Pey, it’s human nature not to be good at something the very first time out. Or even the second or third. In the long run, that’s how you find out what you enjoy, and how you grow as a person. You can’t care what anyone else thinks about your success or failure.”

Apparently I can’t walk fast enough to zip her lip. “You been taking a lot of psych classes with that accounting major?”

She’s right on my elbow, refusing to be ignored. “You didn’t want to quit running until we could hear other people. You even had a smile on your face. Did you know that?”

“That was me gasping for air.”

“Breathing hard, yes, but not gasping. And definitely smiling. You can’t deny it. But the instant you think anyone can see you doing something you don’t have a hundred percent confidence in, that’s it.” She slices her hand through the air. “Time for Peyton to quit so no one can see that she’s not perfect. Reliable ol’ Peyton, never makes mistakes, always makes the right choices.”

“I make wrong choices all the freakin’ time.” Like with Connor.

A wave of nausea washes over me. The last thing I wanted to do when I came out here with my sister was think about how I’d screwed up my chance with Connor. I swipe a hand over my head, accidentally loosening part of my ponytail from its elastic. It’s stupid, but as I smooth back my hair and re-loop it, all of a sudden I want to cry again.

I scramble to cover my messed-up emotions as I fix my ponytail. “No one can avoid making wrong choices in life, Tessa. I’m not perfect, and I know it.”

“True.” She stops walking and perches on a low wooden rail that edges a long curve in the path. When I finish my hair repair, she pats the spot next to her. I sit, leaving an arm’s length of space between us.

“You avoid risk more than anyone I know.” Her voice is lower now, since the guys on the other path are within a minute of passing by. “If there’s a choice, you take the safer option ninety-nine times out of a hundred, even if you suspect it won’t be the path that makes you happy. Thing is, you’re not going to be happy until you take a few more risks.”

“Tessa—”

“I want you to be happy, Pey! And you’re not. You think it’s a coincidence you dreamed about running and feeling free when you obviously went to bed upset?” She scoots closer to me and puts a hand on my arm. “I know I’m lecturing, and I know it sounds cheesy, but you need to hear this: You regret the things you don’t do more than you regret the things you do.”

“You don’t regret dating some of the losers you’ve gone out with over the years?” It’s a nasty topic to fling back at her, but I say it because I really want to know.

“Yes and no.”

At my skeptical look—since really, I can’t believe she doesn’t regret at least a few of her dating disasters—she says, “I took a gamble going out with Matt. He has a strong personality and I’ve allowed myself to get swallowed up by relationships before. No secret there. But I’ve learned from my mistakes, so I can’t really regret them.” She shrugs. “Nothing was so awful I wasn’t willing to try again.”

“Even after you’ve whiffed so many times with boyfriends? And messed up in school because of it? How can you trust yourself after that?” I bite my lower lip a soon as the words leave my mouth. “Sorry. It’s not that—”

“It’s okay. I’ve had a few horror stories. But it’s like anything else in life. You probably won’t succeed on the first try, but you get more confident as you go because you know what
not
to do.”

She lets out a long breath, then looks at me. “I’m not ignorant of the way you’ve reacted to my mistakes. Josh said on the phone a few weeks ago that you’ve only gone out with a couple guys since I’ve moved to Syracuse, and nothing was serious. Not because the guys are losers, but because you keep them at arm’s length. You avoid relationships, I think, because you want to be sure you’re in control. You don’t trust yourself.”

I don’t say anything. I’m shocked that she and Josh talk on the phone, let alone that they talked about
me
.

“Pey, you’re not me. You won’t make my mistakes.”

I toss off a flippant, “You don’t know that. For all you know, I already have.” ‘Cause the truth is, I have. Missing a trig assignment may be small scale compared to nearly flunking out of Syracuse University, but still.

She laughs so loud I suspect the cross country guys can hear her. “Nah. If you were ignoring your homework or skipping school, you wouldn’t have that Academic Olympics paperwork on your desk. I didn’t even know you applied, and here you’ve made the team!”

“Shhh!” I give her a two-handed warning wave so she’ll pipe down. “The team hasn’t been announced yet.”

“Oh, gotcha.” She’s still smiling, though. “But you’re on the team?”

I can tell she changed the subject on purpose so I can pull myself together. I explain that I didn’t have to go through the regular application process, that someone dropped out of one of the math and science slots and Ms. May asked me if I’d be interested in filling it. “It’ll be official on Monday. Just had to confirm with Mom and Dad first.” I try not to look too excited, but it’s hard not to. “I didn’t even know a junior could apply, so I didn’t.”

“That’s fantastic, Pey!”

The cross country guys are less than fifty yards away now, having turned onto our path. They’re huffing and puffing along as their feet thump against the packed dirt and leaves. Tessa glances their way, then returns her attention to me. “What I was saying earlier about regretting the things you don’t do? Academic Olympics is one of mine. I really wish I’d done it.”

“You were worried about what your boyfriend would say.”

“That’s what I let Mom and Dad believe. It was far easier than telling them the truth, which is that Academic Olympics scared the daylights out of me. The more I read along in that application and saw the level of competition? Yikes.” She shudders. “I couldn’t deal with the pressure of answering questions in front of an audience like that. Mom and Dad wouldn’t have understood at all. They’d have told me to sign up and deal with stage fright later. Quentin was a handy excuse.”

Oh, yeah.
Quentin.
He was a winner. Used to make snarky comments about anyone and everyone behind their backs, including Tessa. And that was before he dumped Tessa to ask out our cousin.

“I should have trusted myself and taken the plunge. Even if it didn’t work out, at least I’d know I tried.” She stands, pulling me up with her at the same moment the pack of guys races by. There are at least a dozen of them, which explains why we could hear them on the other trail. They’re moving so fast they create a breeze. One of them—a sophomore, I think—flashes a grin at us.

At me.

Dripping T-shirt, messed-up ponytail, and all.

“Smile back,” Tessa whispers, but he’s past us before her words—or the guy’s dimples—register. Of course, this reminds me of Connor. Speedy the Sophomore didn’t have Connor’s eyes, though.

“Come on.” She starts jogging once more, continuing along the trail. My knee-jerk reaction is to protest, but since we can’t possibly go much farther, I start on a skip-step, then keep pace beside her. I wait for her to gloat, but she doesn’t. Instead, she says, “Deep inside, Academic Olympics was something I really wanted. I think there’s a little something you really want, but you’re ignoring it because you’re scared.”

I don’t have to ask to know she’s talking about the fact Connor’s name was all over the screen of my cell phone. “Don’t go there, Tessa. One lecture at a time, all right?”

She grumbles a ‘fine’ and we finish the loop in silence, enjoying the quiet of the woods. Squirrels rustle in the leaves on either side of us, dodging in and out of the underbrush as they rummage for acorns.

It’s not as freeing as in my dreams, but I have to admit, it’s close. When we reach the end of the trail twenty minutes later and start hiking back toward the senior parking lot, I tell Tessa. I also tell her never to corner me like that again. Blackmail is not a good
modus operandi
for her.

Her laughter carries as she plucks the keys to her orange sports car from where she hid them in an overgrown azalea at the edge of the lot. She circles to the driver’s side door, clicking the lock free as she walks, but before I can open my door she looks across the roof, capturing my gaze with her own.

“What?” I ask.

A wide grin spreads across her face, making her eyes sparkle in the sunshine. “If I have to engage in a little blackmail to help you out every so often, then I’m almost as good a sister as you are to me and to Josh.”

Right. “You’re moving from blackmail to sucking up? I’m not sure which is worse.”

She shrugs before ducking into the driver’s seat. I buckle in beside her, but before she can start the car, I say, “Wait a minute.”

“You forget something?”

“Yeah. You said you talked to Josh about me. About who I’m seeing or not seeing.” I turn as far as the seatbelt will allow in the confined space. The flicker of panic in her eyes leaves me unsettled. “Why would Josh care?”

Her innocent look is so fake. “He lives with you, last I knew.”

Time to take a risk. “Was he in any way trying to set me up with Connor?”

She fixes her gaze on the dashboard and turns the key. “I’ve been in Syracuse how many years now? I have no idea what he talks about with his friends.”

“Oooh, careful word choice there.” She remains mum as we drive across the empty lot toward the exit, so I pester. “If you still talk to Josh about those things—not that you’re admitting to it—you can tell him that ship has sailed.”

Her gaze flicks from left to right as we approach the exit, then she turns into the main road. “So nothing’s going on? I might be able to help, you know. Like I said, I’ve learned a thing or two from hard experience.”

I shake my head. Even though my heart seizes at the words, I need to say them. “Maybe next time.”

She ignores my words and frowns in the rear view mirror. “Was that Josh?”

I turn to look out the back window. Sure enough, Josh is turning into the parking lot we just left. Connor’s with him.