Tell Me Three Things (12 page)

I look over at Caleb again, try to imagine SN’s words coming out of that guy’s mouth, try to picture him making as romantic a gesture as tucking my hair behind my ears. Him understanding that touching my hair requires a certain amount of intimacy. No, the image doesn’t work. Instead, I picture Caleb as a future frat president, the type to yell at his pledge to chug a beer. SN’s probably not Kilimanjaro gray T-shirt boy then. But who the hell is he?

“I’m drunk,” I tell Dri and Agnes.

“You’ve already told us,” Dri says. “Like a million times.”

“Sorry. Apparently, I’m the type of drunk who likes to let other people know,” I say.

“It’s charming,” Agnes says, in her typical dry way. “I’m a little drunk too. Though not as sloppy as you.”

“I’m not sloppy,” I say. I look down. Am I sloppy? Everything seems to still be in place except my mind, which is rolling around in my head. I’ve gotten drunk before, though usually alone with Scarlett. I guess my tolerance is two Agnes Specials.

“You’re both sloppy,” Dri says. She throws her arms around our necks, which I’m grateful for because it helps me with my balance.

“Do you think it’s possible to have a crush on two people at once?” I ask, which is one of those embarrassing questions I would never ask sober. Maybe I should never drink again.

“Totally. I’m usually into, like, five guys at a time,” Agnes says. “I like to keep it varied. Optimize my chances.”

“So who do you like? SN, obvi, but who else? Please, please don’t say Liam.”

I’m about to say it out loud, tell her
Ethan,
and finally get the entire scoop since I know Dri is not the type to withhold details: she’ll tell me his life story, what he was like in sixth grade, whether he has a girlfriend, whether he’s a d-bag. Maybe she’ll even help angle us closer to him so I can say hello. So far, our only contact has been when he passed by me after the show—a “hey” that was neither rude nor friendly nor an invitation to talk more: the same closed-up can of nothing he seems to lob at everyone else. I thought we were getting past that. I guess I thought wrong.

Just as the word is about to come out of my mouth—“Ethan,” which is a pretty word, don’t you think?—Gem comes barreling toward me.

“You stay away from my boyfriend, you skank,” she says, and gets right up into my face, my grill, which is an expression I’ve never once had an occasion to use until right now.

“Umm…,” I say. I wish I could go back in time and not drink those two drinks, because I’m having trouble understanding what’s going on. Why is Gem yelling at me? I’ve grown accustomed to her passive-aggressive under-the-breath taunts, which I can usually pretend I don’t hear. I can’t do that with her yelling into my mouth. And skank? Really? “What?”

I want to wipe her breath off of my face, a slathering of onion and alcohol. I want be far away from here, maybe tucked in bed. California is exhausting.

“Stay. The. Hell. Away. From. Liam,” Gem says, and then flicks her hair, like she’s in some mean-girl movie, and struts away. I take it back. She’s not a great actress. She lays it on too thick.

I look around to see if anyone saw, but it’s just me, Dri, and Agnes in our own little circle in the vast backyard.

“Holy crap, did that just happen?” Agnes asks, and starts to giggle.

“It’s not funny,” I say, though I wish it were. “What the hell?”

“Gem’s been all messed up since her dad got arrested last year. It was, like, all over the tabloids,” Agnes says. “I mean, she wasn’t that nice before, but since then she’s gone full-on raging bitch. I hear he could go to jail.”

“What did he get arrested for?” I ask, though I don’t really care. I hate her. No Wood Valley sob story is going to get sympathy from me.

“Her dad solicited a prostitute,” Dri says. “And there’s some sort of tax fraud thing.”

“Seriously?” I ask.

“Whatever,” Agnes says.

“Just tell me one thing?” Dri asks, and I can hear the plea in her voice. “Before, were you just about to say you liked Liam?”

“No, of course not,” I say, but I can’t tell if she believes me.

Even through my drunken haze, I realize I’m lying. My hands are shaking. My teeth are chattering. I want to go home. No,
home
doesn’t really exist anymore. I lower my expectations. I want to go to bed.

I see Ethan only once more before we leave the party, on our way out the door. He is lying down on one of the lounge chairs, alone. I’m pretty sure he’s sleeping.
Good,
I think.
He needs it.
It takes all of my willpower not to brush the hair from his forehead.

When I come downstairs, my dad is in the kitchen wearing an apron that says
CHEF BITCH
, which I assume belongs to Rachel but could just as easily belong to Theo. Music is playing in the background, something country, an overly sentimental ode to pickup trucks and short denim shorts. What Scarlett calls WPM: White People Music.

“Pancakes, sweetheart?” my dad asks, full of annoying morning cheer. He looks all wrong in this kitchen. He’s never made pancakes. That was my mom’s job. Syrup and flour congeal on the pristine marble countertops. Does he feel at home here, comfortable enough to man the stove and serve up pancakes barefoot? I feel awkward when I use the microwave. I don’t want to leave crime-scene splatters on its insides, or any other evidence of my existence.

“Umm…” Will I be able to eat breakfast without throwing up? No choice. I’ve never once turned down a carb, and I don’t need my dad getting suspicious about my drinking. “Sure,” I say. What I don’t say:
What’s going on? Are we staying? Are you suddenly really happy or is this an act?
“You made breakfast? This may be a first.”

“Gloria’s day off.”

“Right.”

“Listen, we need to talk,” he says. My stomach drops out, and vomit pushes its way up. Clearly, this whole kitchen act is a sad departure gift. My dad and Rachel are breaking up, and we are leaving. They are unraveling that which never should have been raveled in the first place. That’s what this faux happy performance is about: a way to butter me up before the news. I put my head down on the cold counter. Screw it. Who cares if he knows I’ve been drinking? He’s guilty of much bigger transgressions. In fact, he’s lucky I’ve never had the energy to seriously rebel. I should win a Trouper of the Year award. Should have been given a little brave golden man statue or some sort of plaque to hang on my wall.

This breakfast must be a last hurrah before we have to hit the road. Makes sense that my dad would take advantage of his final chance to use a Viking range and fancy-ass pans and organic pressed coconut oil in a perfectly measured spray. I should run upstairs and wash my hands with that delicate, monogrammed soap that still has a price tag on it. Learn what a hundred dollars gets you in the soap world.

“Here, these will help settle your stomach.” My dad places a stack of perfect circles on a plate and puts them in front of me. They smell surprising, not like the thing itself but like a representation of the thing. The fragrant-candle version of a pancake. “Just tell me you didn’t drive last night.”

“Of course not. Dri did,” I say.

“Dri?”

“I have friends, Dad. Don’t be so surprised. Did you think that I wouldn’t talk to anyone ever again?” I don’t know why I’m being mean, but I can’t help it. For once, my words are one step ahead of my mind, not the other way around.

“No, I just…I’m happy for you, that’s all. I know it hasn’t been easy.”

I laugh—not a laugh, exactly, more like a nasty neigh. No, no it hasn’t. Nothing has been easy for a long, long time. Even last night, my first attempt at fun since we moved, ended with a sociopathic blonde calling me a skank.

“I guess I deserve that,” my dad says.

“So what now? Are we leaving?”

“What? No. Why would you say that?” he asks, and his surprise seems genuine. Did he not realize the entire city of Los Angeles heard his fight with Rachel? That the other night he basically admitted that this whole thing has been a huge mistake? Doesn’t he know that I’ve spent the entire week psychologically readying myself for another departure?

“Your fight with her.”

“It was just an argument, Jess. Not the end of the world.”

“But she said—”

“I sometimes forget that you’re just a teenager. But I remember that—how everything feels bigger or, I don’t know, somehow just
more
when you’re your age.”

“Don’t you of all people dare be condescending,” I say. There’s a sharpness to my tone, and of course, I’m a hypocrite, accusing him of talking down to me while acting like a stereotypical teenager. All snark and pouts.

But screw him.

Seriously.

Screw. Him.

My dad sighs, as if I am impossible, as if I’m the one who doesn’t make sense.

“She said ‘leave and don’t come back.’ I heard her.”

“Stop saying ‘she’ and ‘her.’ Rachel. Her name is Rachel. And people say stupid things when they’re angry.”

“And people do stupid things when they’re grieving, like get married and move across the country and not give a shit about their kid.”

“Don’t.”

“Don’t what?” I’m yelling now. I don’t know when my control slipped. Because here it is. The anger delivered, whole and solid. Hot and unwieldy. Placental.

“Do you want to leave? Is that what you’re saying?” he asks.

I think of SN, of Dri and Agnes, of Ethan with his electric-blue guitar and his dismissive “hey.” No, I don’t want to leave, but I don’t want to feel like this either. Like an interloper in someone else’s home. If I do throw up today, which is more likely than not at this point, I don’t want to have to worry about soiling Rachel’s bathroom. I don’t want to feel in constant danger of eviction.

No, none of that is important. What do I really want? I want to punch my dad in the face—connect fist to nose, crush, crunch, make him bleed. Kick him hard and watch him bend over and squeal and scream the words “I’m sorry.”

This feeling is new. This anger. I’ve always found a way around the pain, have never burrowed straight through like this.

My dad doesn’t look delicate right now, not like the other night, not like most of the last few years. Why have I been the one wearing kid gloves all this time?

“I’m not saying anything. Forget it, Dad. What did you want to talk about?” My fingers are pulled into actual fists. I can trust myself not to throw an actual punch, right?

“I just wanted to see how you’re doing. How school is. Just checking in. I know I’ve been busy. And the other night, I didn’t even ask about your day. I felt bad about that.”

“Busy? I can count the number of conversations we’ve had since we’ve moved.” The rage stays clean and pure and red, like last night’s drinks. Does he have any idea what my life has been like? Funny that he checks in only when I’ve finally started to find my footing.

Too little, too late.

“I just. Wow. I didn’t know—”

“Know what, Dad? That moving here has been hard for me? Are you serious right now?”

“Let’s—”

“Let’s what? Talk about this later? Sure, great idea.” I push away the plate, resist the urge to throw it in my father’s face, and storm out of the room.

“Trouble in paradise?” Theo asks, because of course he is coming down the stairs as I’m marching up, two at a time. I’m shaking with anger, vibrating with the pulse of it. My mouth tastes bitter, full of bile. I imagine switching targets, connecting my fist to Theo’s jaw. Ruining his pretty, pretty face.

“Screw you,” I say.

He shrugs, nonplussed.

“Rage is totally your color.”

Later, at Book Out Below!, I sip herbal tea and play
Candy Crush
on my phone. Only two purchases so far, and one jerk who took a picture of a book to buy online. By late afternoon, just as evening seeps in and I start to feel bored and lonely, the bell dings: new customer. My head snaps up, full-on reflexive now, and I gasp in surprise.

Caleb.

Kilimanjaro gray-T-shirt boy. Who I saw texting at the party. No one from school, other than Liam, has ever walked into this store while I’ve been working, not even Dri, though she promises to visit. I told SN just this morning about this place. So it doesn’t take great powers of deduction to conclude that this must be him before me, finally, in the flesh. My heart squeezes—so this is the person I’ve been spilling my guts to for the last two months—and I wait for the disappointment to hit. It doesn’t.

Instead, I feel disoriented, the same thing that happens after I ask someone for directions and then forget to listen, realize that I’m still just as lost as before. It’s hard to imagine SN’s words coming out of this guy’s mouth. He’s attractive, yes—hot, even—but in a normal, run-of-the-mill way. Generic. A variant of the presumptive prom king type you find in any high school in America. No special sauce. What do I say? Do I introduce myself? Play dumb? Act like I assume this is all just a strange coincidence?

He is wearing the same gray T-shirt as last night and as the first day of school, when I literally applauded him for climbing a mountain. He must have felt bad for me then, must have seen that I needed some help since I couldn’t even manage to find the right homeroom. Hopefully, somehow, he didn’t notice the grass stuck to my ass.

Mind officially blown. Sploof.

Kilimanjaro gray T-shirt guy.

“Hey, is Liam here?” he asks, and smiles down at me, like he’s in on the joke, though this doesn’t feel particularly funny. Just uncomfortable. Is this why he hasn’t wanted to meet until now? Knew it would feel this awkward and random?

“Um, no, sorry. He doesn’t work today.”
Jessie, this is SN. Up your game.

“Oh, I think he has my phone,” he says. “I lost it last night at the party. You go to Wood Valley too, right?”

“Yeah, I’m Jessie,” I say, and reach out, too formally, I think a moment too late, to shake his hand. His fingers are long and dry, his shake a bit limp. A mismatch to his voice.

“Caleb,” he says. “Nice to meet you.”

“You too.” I smile back, try to say with my eyes what I don’t have the nerve to say with my mouth:
I know it’s you.
This is a weird game we’re playing, but I guess so is IM’ing anonymously.

“So how do you like it so far? School, I mean.”

“I guess you could say I’m still adjusting.”

“Yeah, cool, cool.” Caleb turns to leave—is he as nervous as I am?—and I suddenly feel desperate to make him stay, to reestablish our connection. I feel like I’ve already screwed things up. All it took was thirty seconds face to face.

Should I ask him about Tanzania? That’s where Kilimanjaro is, right?

“Um, would you want to have coffee sometime?”
Did I really just say that? Out loud? Take a deep breath. Slow your roll.
“I mean, I just, I’m trying to meet new people, that’s all.”

He seems surprised, tilts his head to the side as if to get a better look. He’s checking me out, and he’s not subtle about it.

This whole thing is vaguely insulting.

No doubt we should stick to IM’ing.

“Sure. Yeah, why not? What’s the worst that can happen?” he asks, with a mysterious grin, an obvious reference to the same question I asked him just last night. I’m about to answer, I have a million things to say, but it turns out he’s just being rhetorical, because he has already walked out the door.