The Start of Me and You (29 page)

“Yeah,” Clark said. “Anyway, that probably sounds dumb to you … it’s just that, you know, Aaron went there every birthday. We, uh … wanted to invite you.”

“Really?” I’d figured Aaron’s longtime friends thought of me as an outsider—someone who didn’t have any right to be devastated.

“No pressure,” he said quickly. “I just tried to think about what Aaron would want, and I know he would have wanted me to call you.”

It wasn’t quite the same as
I’d like for you to come
, but it was close enough. “I’d love to.”

He told me the details, offered to pick me up, and after the conversation was over, I stared at my phone. Clark Driscoll reaching out to me—including me in a group of people who cared about Aaron so much—became just
another thing I never would have guessed at the start of the year.

Clark and I were quiet until we hit the first stoplight. The lack of both sound and movement was too grating, and I had to speak. “So, um, did you do this last year?”

He shook his head, not meeting my eyes. “I couldn’t. You know how it is.”

“Yeah. I guess I do,” I said. I’d experienced only a fraction of his loss, but I
did
know that feeling. Our strange camaraderie made me bolder. “Man, the first time I went back to Snyder’s Diner, I kept expecting him to walk in. But being there, I remembered details that I couldn’t before. I remembered exactly what we both ordered on that first date. I know it’s weird, but the taste of the French fries … it’s like I could close my eyes and see him so clearly in my mind.”

He nodded, jaw stiff, as he steered us onto the highway. “Thanks.”

I brushed my bangs to the side. “For what?”

“For telling me that. Hearing people talk about him makes me feel like … like I’m not the only one who remembers, or something.”

I wanted to reach over to him, to put my hand on his arm. But we barely knew each other, so I took a different angle. “Well, then, you
have
to hear this one …”

I told him, with as much animation as I could, about Aaron’s epic showdown with the claw machine cat. Clark laughed along, especially at the part where Aaron announced to everyone that he’d gotten it on his first try.

He ran his hands over the steering wheel. “That sounds just like him.”

At the trampoline center, called FlyHigh, I met—or re-met—a few of Aaron’s other friends. There were a couple guys from school and a few from his Boy Scout troop, whom I could barely look in the eyes—afraid they’d sense all the questions I’d never be cruel enough to ask.

“Everyone, this is Paige,” Clark said. “Paige, everyone.”

This wasn’t the beginning of a new friend-group, and we all knew it. But I was grateful to be allowed in the treehouse, even if our togetherness came only from a shared absence.

We stashed our shoes and cell phones in lockers and listened as a FlyHigh employee explained the many rules. I stared into the arena, which had dozens of black trampolines built into the floor, complete with side trampolines built to lean against the walls.

On my little rectangle of trampoline, I pressed down, barely bending my knees—a hesitant bounce to feel it out. The trampoline gave way and pushed back up under my feet. I steadied myself, arms out. I jumped down this time, and I sprang right back up. As my hair lifted from my
shoulders, I grinned like an idiot, already eager to be weightless again.

I leaped from one launchpad to another, hardly noticing how out of breath I was.

The guys bounced all around me, whipping dodgeballs at each other—without a single one sent in my direction. I wondered if Morgan would call it sexism or chivalry. But I wanted to participate fully, the way I would have if Aaron were here.

I scooped up a nearby ball and, focusing all my meager hand-eye coordination, I sprang down on the trampoline. Midair, I launched the ball, pegging Clark right in the stomach.

He made an
oof
sound, looking to see where the hit had come from. I waved to him, still grinning. This made me fair play, even if the throws seemed to be gentler in my direction.

We bounced until my forehead sweated beneath my bangs, but I still didn’t want to stop. I took a running start toward Clark, who leaped away from me as I retracted my arm. My ball missed him, but his swerve cost him his balance.

“Oh, shit,” he said as he stumbled, but an angled wall trampoline caught his fall. He bounced off it, on his side, and landed on another trampoline, shaking with laughter.

I bounded toward him, dropping down.

“Are you,” I said through gasps of laughter, “okay?”

He was laughing so hard that there were tears in his eyes. He bonked me lightly on the head with the ball in his hand. “Yeah. Totally.”

I sat there, legs folded beneath me, as Clark’s shoulders slowed from the laughter. Rosiness pooled in his cheeks—the way it used to before he thinned out.

“He’d be happy,” I said. “Knowing we were doing this.”

“Yeah. He would be.”

“Hey!” an authoritative voice yelled from the platform, “You two! No sitting!”

Clark scrambled up and offered me his hand. “I think we have to keep jumping.”

“Yeah,” I said, letting him pull me up. “I think we do.”

Later that night, I reexamined my plan, now tearstained in two different places. My progress was no different than it had been at the beginning of the year.

1. Parties/social events

2. New group

3. Date (
RC
)

4. Travel

5. Swim

But so much more had happened—things that didn’t exactly fit on the list. So I wrote everything out, just to see
it all together.
Kissed Ryan Chase (kind of), came to terms with my parents dating (kind of), applied for screen-writing program, sneaked out of my house for Kayleigh, planned a party, tried new ice creams and TV shows and movies, made new friends, played trampoline dodgeball
.

The smaller steps mattered, and I could finally feel the distance they’d put between me and the past. I never could have had a day like this last year. I never could have let my heart feel as buoyant as my body, midair. Sadness still fell—the soft pitter-patter of spring rain—but each small joy opened like an umbrella right above me.

And so as I closed my planner, I opened my heart another inch.

Chapter Twenty-Two

Sunday night, I barely slept, knowing I’d see Max at school. I clicked his name on my phone—the only light in my dark room—at midnight, at 1:00 a.m. What would I even say? Since that first day at his house in the fall, Max and I had never gone this long without talking.

I awoke with shadows beneath my eyes, and my first three classes couldn’t hold my attention at all. As I took my seat in Honors English, my palms went clammy, and I told myself it would be fine. I heard him sit down as the bell rang, and I glanced over my shoulder. He was staring down at his desk.

“Hey,” I said.

“Hey.” His eyes didn’t move.

That was it. I couldn’t process a word Ms. Pepper said throughout class. When the dismissal bell rang, I turned around again. Max was already ducking out the door. My mouth opened to call out his name, but for what? To talk it out in front of everybody?

“Do you want me to talk to him?” Morgan asked as we walked out together. “I will.”

“No,” I said. “I need to do it. I just … need to figure out what I want to say.”

On Tuesday, I caught Max at his locker before school started. I strode over confidently, even though my lower lip quivered, giving me away.

“Hey,” I said.

His eyes flicked to me. “Hey.”

“Listen. Are you … are we okay? It was so messed up, what happened, but—”

“I’m fine,” he said. “I’m just really busy. I have robotics stuff and everything. Sorry.”

“Oh. Okay.”

The locker door shut with a clang, and he said, “See ya.”

I was left standing there, gaping. Morgan appeared at my side within seconds, her gossip radar flashing red.

“Hey,” she said. “What was
that
?”

“That,” I said, “was Max blowing me off.”

“The pool thing still?”

“Yeah.” Heat pushed at my eyes, but I blinked it away.

“He has no business being mad at you!” Morgan said.

“He does, though, Morgan. We both screwed up.”

“Will you see him any other time, outside of school? Where it might be easier to talk? QuizBowl maybe?”

I shook my head. “Not until the QuizBowl semifinals. And that’s two weeks away.”

“It’ll be fine,” Morgan said. “He just needs to cool off. I’m sure you guys will make up by then.”

We didn’t. In the eight school days that followed, Max disappeared with the finesse of an actual ghost. He sneaked in as class started, bailed out right as it ended. His avoidance confused me the first week but pissed me off the second. I had a right to be mad, too, but I wasn’t dodging
him
. Still, I couldn’t work up the nerve to corner him again or stop by his house. I replayed the situation over and over in my mind, trying to figure out how I’d hurt him more than he hurt me. I told myself I was giving him some space to collect himself, but really, I was just terrified that I’d get weepy and confess my real feelings at the exact wrong moment.

In the evenings, I started a new spec script on my laptop. I wrote mainly fight scenes, characters passionately yelling about how they really felt. At least Max’s freeze-out was good for my dialogue. I refreshed my inbox, hoping to see NYU pop up. Radio silence from them, too.

As I got ready for the QuizBowl semifinals, I felt sweaty just thinking about sitting next to Max, facing an audience
of parents and other teams. The tension between us shrilled like a dog whistle—not everyone could hear it, but, for those of us who could, it was grating and impossible to ignore. I feared, once we sat down, the auditorium windows would crack from our awkwardness.

“Can you put the flash cards down, please?” Kayleigh asked, wrapping the curling iron around a lock of my hair. “You keep moving your head, and I’m almost done. You already look much cuter than Lindsay Lohan when she went to the Mathlete finals in
Mean Girls
.”

“Ha-ha,” I said, but I set the flash cards down.

Kayleigh’s dark eyes examined the newest curl, giving it the lightest mist of hairspray.

“So, what are you guys doing tonight?”

“I thought we told you,” Kayleigh said. “Tessa’s parents got us tickets for some art gallery thing. I dunno. Sounds kind of boring, but Morgan’s excited.”

“Cool,” I said. I knew that already, and I also knew how bored they’d be at the semifinals—it was a bit of a drive to Anderson, Indiana, and they’d have to sit through two other matches before our team went onstage. But I wished they were coming anyway.

“There! Cutest nerd I ever saw,” Kayleigh proclaimed, and I had to smile. I’d borrowed lilac nail polish from Morgan and a blazer from Tessa, which I wore over a cute dress. All in all, I hoped I looked put together and academic, but
not too serious. Only my dress and flats were my own, but I felt like myself. And I felt like I was taking all three of my best friends with me.

Kayleigh wished me luck and called good-bye to my parents as she left.

“You look nice, honey. You ready to go?” my mom asked, reaching for her purse. I nodded, holding my flash cards so tightly that the paper edges pressed lines into my hands.

My dad practically danced his way to the driver’s seat. “This is so cool! Can’t wait to see you up there, kiddo.”

My nerves quivered like tiny live wires right below my skin. The semifinals were different from regular matches in a few ways: parents attended, the location was at a neutral away school with a neutral moderator, and we would actually be seated at a table on the stage. With lights beating down on us. Also, there were two other matches tonight between different schools. We were third, so I’d have to sit through other wins and defeats, imagining which ours would work out to be. I chugged my entire bottle of water and asked my dad to blast the air-conditioning. Neither helped.