The Start of Me and You (15 page)

I eyed Max. “Um. I like my friends, too.”

He rolled his eyes at me. “No, I mean … I guess I’m surprised by how much I like being around a group of girls.”

“Yes. That is shocking, teenage boy,” I said, and Max laughed.

I got this little buzz every time I made Max laugh. His eyebrows shot up in tandem with every grin, like he was perpetually surprised that I could amuse him. “They were the girls I went to elementary school with, but I never thought I’d be able to talk to them like friends. They’re really easy to talk to.”

“Yeah, they’re good like that.”

“I already knew I liked Tessa. But Kayleigh is just cool,” he said. “And Morgan … I mean, she
looks
like …”

“… a ginger 1950s housewife?” I guessed.

He laughed again, eyebrows lifting. “Yeah. But then she rattles off feminist ideology in her prim voice. It’s awesome.”

I nodded. “She’s wanted to major in women’s studies since we were, like, ten.”

“How does that work, exactly? Isn’t she … I mean, she’s religious, right?”

“Yeah. She believes in personal freedom, God, and true love. In that order,” I said, quoting Morgan’s oft-repeated explanation.

“That sounds about right,” Max said. “Considering that, in history class yesterday, she raised her hand to politely suggest that the teacher was slut-shaming Anne Boleyn.”

“Ha!” Only Morgan would defend a known mistress.

“Anyway,” Max said as we reached the point where our paths diverged. “Ryan and I were talking about catching a movie tonight. If you want to come, you—”

“Yes. I mean. Sure.” I didn’t even bother to ask which movie.

“Cool,” he said. “I’ll tell Tessa in math. You should invite Kayleigh and Morgan if they’re around. I’ll text you later.”

I was jittery for the rest of the day, running my
wardrobe through my mind. All that stood in my way was a cute outfit. And my mother. After school, I mentioned it to her casually.

“This is a bit last minute,” she said, sighing. I regretted telling her that it was a group of people. If I had said I was going with Tessa, she wouldn’t have blinked. Now she wanted to know the names of everyone going. What are parents looking for when they ask for that information? Is there a secret list of Bad Kids passed out like a phone tree? I rattled off a few names in one breath, hoping none of them would stick in her memory.

“Are you dating one of these people?” she asked, arching an eyebrow.

“No,” I said hotly. “Ugh, Mom, seriously.”

“Well, how would I know? You never talk about boys to me anymore.” It was an offhand comment, but she paused when she realized its implication. I hadn’t talked to her about boys since Aaron. She cleared her throat. “You can go. Just be home by ten.”

“Mom, the movie starts at eight. With previews, I don’t even know when it’ll be over.” I was about three seconds from throwing my trump card: if you’re allowed to date Dad, I’m allowed to stay out until eleven.

“Fine,” she said, looking back down at her magazine. “Then ten thirty. The later you’re out, the more people are leaving bars and driving drunk.”

I gave her an eye roll so extended that Cameron would have been proud. “At least give me eleven.”

“You have to be at your grandmother’s early tomorrow. Ten thirty is my final offer.”

“Fine,” I said, turning my back so she couldn’t see my follow-up eye roll. I considered fighting her on this, telling her that Dad would totally let me stay out. Unfortunately, pitting them against each other—the one perk of being a divorce kid—was useless these days.

At seven thirty, I heard a honk in my driveway, but I was surprised to find Max’s SUV instead of Tessa’s. I glanced back at the house, hoping my mom wouldn’t look out the window. She would probably come out and grill Max about his driving record and intentions.

I climbed in the backseat and shut the door behind me. “Hey. What’s going on?”

Tess glanced back at me. “We decided to carpool. Max was over at my house anyway. We had a math project.”

“That we were using as an excuse to watch Mystery Science Theater,” Max said.

Their connection made sense to me. Tessa couldn’t stand to be around anyone who was trying too hard, and Max was never trying to be anyone he wasn’t. And I could see how he’d gravitate toward Tessa, who loved music and yoga as passionately as he loved trivia and cult-favorite sci-fi and who knows what else.

I hoped we were picking Ryan up too, but Max drove us straight to the theater. I could barely hear him and Tessa talking over the radio as they discussed the many merits of Ryan Adams’s music.

“I mean,” Max said as he parked the car. “I’m usually not much for cover songs, but his cover—”

“Of ‘Wonderwall’?” Tessa finished. “I know. I
know
. Almost as good as the original.”

“I actually think it’s better,” Max said, unbuckling his seat belt. “Janie, what do you think?”

“The cover’s better,” I said. And it was—sadder than the original, full of longing.

“Don’t listen to her,” Tessa said. When I made a face, she added, “I’m sorry, Paige, but you listen to girl-pop anthems, not ironically.”

“Hey!” I said. “You have
every
Lilah Montgomery song on your iPod.”

“That’s different. She writes her own music, and it’s folk inspired.”

“Some pop anthems are well written,” Max offered, and I looked at Tessa like:
Ha
!

When we walked into the theater, Ryan was already waiting with Morgan, who looked starstruck by his presence. I had to remind myself that Morgan didn’t like Ryan—at least, not any more than she liked every other cute guy in school. Kayleigh was out with Eric, of course,
though none of us was sure why they couldn’t come to the movie with us.

“Hey!” Ryan said, spreading his arms open. “My other two dates. Thanks for dropping them off, Max—see ya later.”

Tessa stepped past him.

His eyes followed her, and he called out, “I know you love me, Tessa.”

I hoped his affection toward her was only joking between friends. She certainly wasn’t interested in him, and he probably wasn’t used to that. I made a mental note that I should try to play hard to get, if I ever had the opportunity. While everyone stood in line for snacks, I leaned against the nearest railing, my appetite suddenly absent.

Other than Alcott’s, a decrepit bowling alley, and the frozen-yogurt shop, Cinema 12 was all Oakhurst had in the way of hangouts. It opened when we were in junior high, with high-tech screens, a deluxe snack counter, and even a small arcade area. I’d spent countless nights there, giggling with my friends in the dark theater.

My eyes wandered to the arcade area, which was usually filled with unruly little kids. I blinked, a memory fluttering into my mind before I could push it out. When I opened my eyes, I could almost see Aaron there, relentlessly maneuvering the claw machine, just a week before he was gone for good.

The air was that sticky, July hot, and I was sunburned from a long day at the pool. The icy air-conditioning of the
theater felt like a salve against my skin. Aaron’s dad had dropped us off, and, for some reason, Aaron set his sights on a stuffed cat in the claw machine. He must have spent five dollars in quarters, determined to win it for me, and we missed the beginning of the movie. But when that claw finally grasped the cat’s plush head, he grinned in triumph.

I got it on my first try!
he announced to everyone in earshot, even though it was an obvious lie to anyone who’d seen him there for half an hour straight. He presented the stuffed cat to me with bravado. I didn’t even really like cats, but I liked Aaron. I liked the mischievous glint in his brown eyes, his throaty laugh, and the easy way he could turn anything ordinary into an event—so that somehow a wait in the movie theater lobby became a battle with a claw machine.

“Hey,” Tessa whispered, standing close so that her shoulder touched mine. Her arms were stuffed full with a jumbo popcorn, Sno-Caps, and a soft drink as big as her head.

“Hey,” I said, snapping back into the present.

Her eyes traveled the length of my face. “You good?”

“Yeah.”

There were weeks—months, even—when these memories would have dissolved me. When I would have curled up in bed, my mind battling this impossible question: How could someone be here one day and be
gone
, forever, the next? The question held me to the ground, demanding answers, and I still had none. But I did have a group of
friends, laughing together and waiting by the theater door. Waiting for me.

“You comin’ or what, Hancock?” Ryan Chase hollered at me. Around us, grown-ups turned to frown at his unnecessary volume.

His grin broke through the cloud of sad memories, and I stepped forward.

I tried to hang back as we entered the dark theater, so that I was strategically sitting between Ryan and Tessa. This was fine anyway, since Max and Tessa were still talking music. Morgan sat on Max’s other side, settling in with her Junior Mints.

“Hey, man!” Ryan called toward the entrance. Tyler Roberts was walking in our direction, decked out in his letter jacket. “Over here.”

“What’s up, everyone?” Tyler said, taking a seat on the end of the row, next to Morgan. “Sorry I’m late.”

Tessa and I waved to him as the theater went dark. The first preview began, the surround sound crackling to life with the jaunty melody of an animated film.

“Is it cool if I sit here?” Tyler was asking Morgan. “Not waiting for another guy or something?”

“Nope,” Morgan said, giggling at nothing.

“Cool,” he told her. “I’d sit on the other side next to Chase, but people might think we’re on a date.”

Morgan’s laughter stopped. “And what’s wrong with that?”

“Nothing,” Tyler said. “Except that I’m way out of his league. I mean, he’s a good-lookin’ guy, but … c’mon.”

“
Shhh!
” someone hissed from a row behind us.

“Yeah, Paige,” Max said, his voice too loud. He looked over at me, bringing a finger to his lips. “
Shhhh!
”

I could feel every head turning to look at me. Between us, Tessa muffled a laugh. My face burned as I whispered back, “I’m not even talking.”

Max grinned, leaning back in his seat. The next preview began, touting a new rom-com out at Christmas.

“Oh my God!” Morgan said, her eyes transfixed on the screen. She spoke loudly enough that we could all hear her. “This looks so good. I’m totally going to see this.”

Max gave Morgan a thumbs-down and Ryan feigned loud snoring noises, which prompted another outburst from behind us.

“Quiet down there!” a voice bellowed from the back.

“For the last time, Paige Hancock,” Max said loudly, turning to me again. He was doing this on purpose. “Pipe down!”

Ryan and Morgan snickered over their popcorn as I sank down in my seat, face aflame. Max’s face, however, was downright gleeful. Tessa patted my knee, but I could tell she was holding her breath to keep from laughing.

As the movie began, another feeling replaced my mortification: surprise. Someone other than my best friends had given me a hard time—embarrassed me, even. And other people laughed. It had been so long since anyone had
done that. Everyone had been treating me like a porcelain doll, with sad eyes painted on her unmoving face. They were so careful not to break me, tiptoeing around the fault lines caused by Aaron’s death.

Not Max. He got close enough to poke at me, to nudge me out of my comfort zone. I wondered—of course I wondered—if he knew about Aaron. I still couldn’t tell, but I desperately hoped that he didn’t. Maybe he’d never heard because he was still at Coventry, and maybe Ryan never mentioned it.

Eventually, I forced my attention toward the movie in front of me. In the past year, I had streamed nearly every movie and TV series available online. Sometimes, when the credits rolled, I felt almost sick with dread that I had to return to real life.

But, that night, when the lights went up, I didn’t feel the overpowering urge to stay planted in the seat. I wasn’t desperate to keep living in a character’s contained, well-lit world. I stretched my arms as we filed out of our row.

“Very funny, jerk,” I said to Max when we were in the lobby of the theater, batting his arm.

Max shook his head but couldn’t keep the grin off his face. “You should really learn to use your inside voice.”

Tessa had peeled off to use the bathroom, and she returned in a flurry.

“You guys,” she said. This was the most excited I’d seen
her since Thelonious and Sons announced their US tour. “There’s a
Rocky Horror Picture Show
happening here tonight.”

Tessa had a bizarre and long-standing love for
Rocky
. I found it creepily sexual, and the audience participation factor made me squirm.

“Uh,” Ryan said. “What is that?”

Tessa’s jaw dropped. “Only, like, the most amazing, interactive experience you could ever possibly have.”

“It’s creepy,” I told Ryan.

“Can we stay for it?” Tessa was all-out pleading to everyone. Since Max drove us, she had no way of getting home. But there’s no way my mom would let me. Tessa
knew
that. “Please? It starts in half an hour.”

“I’ll stay.” Ryan shrugged, and Tyler nodded, saying, “I’ll see what it’s all about.”

Crap
, I thought. I’d rather sacrifice my DVD collection to the volcano gods than let Ryan Chase know that my mother treats me like a child.

“I should get home. I’ve got stuff going on early tomorrow,” I lied. “So I’ll just ride home with you, Morgan.”

“Oh, I …,” She trailed off, glancing over at Tyler. “I was going to stay, but I could run you home real quick.”

I hated my mother. For the first time in my life, I considered not going home, just texting her that I was staying out late, too bad.

“I’ll take you,” Max said from behind us.

“No, I’ll just call my mom. Really, I …”

He held up his hand, twirling his keys around one finger. “Janie. It’s no big deal.”

I pushed my bangs off my face. “I mean, if you’re
sure
you don’t mind …”

“I don’t,” he said, and then added in a lower voice, “Please get me out of here.
Rocky Horror
scares the hell out of me.”