This Is So Not Happening (17 page)

“What?” I said, my pulse starting to race. If there was one thing I knew about my best friend, it was when she had good gossip to spill.

“Oh my God,” she said, covering her face with both hands now. “Oh my god oh my God oh my God. She couldn’t. She … she wouldn’t.”

“Who couldn’t what?” David said, looking around at the rest of us. “What the hell is she talking about?”

“Oh my God, she can’t possibly be that evil,” Annie said,
dragging her fingers down her face and smudging her eyeliner. “Can she possibly be that evil?”

My stomach started to slowly clench into a marble-size ball, and I wasn’t even sure why. I glanced over at the spot where Will and Chloe had disappeared, as if they’d signal the answer to me via flash card.

“Who?” Marshall asked, baffled.

“Annie, what’s going on?” I asked. “What do you know about Chloe and Will?”

“Are they, like, together or something?” Celia asked.

And suddenly, just like that, this snatch of conversation from last summer came back to hit me in the face. I had asked Annie if she knew anything about Jake and Chloe and she’d told me they
had
been hanging out a lot, but then she added, “The weird thing is, Chloe’s also been hanging out a lot with—”

And then she’d been interrupted when David and Marshall had come bounding through the door like two puppy dogs.

Suddenly my brain went fuzzy. The wind shifted and my senses filled with the acrid, smoky scent of the fire. I reached out and clutched Annie’s forearm, like she was going to anchor me to a sane reality. Because right now, my brain was going to some seriously
in
sane places.

“You don’t think Chloe and Will … over the summer … the other guy …” I couldn’t even form a real thought, let alone a sentence. Had Chloe and Will hooked up? Had Chloe and Will had sex?

Annie nodded, her dark eyes bright with suspicion. “He was the other guy,” she confirmed. “I kept spotting them together everywhere—at the movies, the farm, at Stanzione’s…. But
you don’t think she would … I mean, she wouldn’t actually
lie
about who her baby daddy is, would she?”

I just stared at Annie. Chloe would never. She couldn’t ever. Why? Why would she do something like that? I couldn’t believe it, even though a huge, huge part of me was dying to believe it.

“I mean, after I heard about Jake and Chloe I just figured I was wrong about
Will
and Chloe, but, I mean …” She gazed off toward the dugout. “Son of a—”

“Wait a minute. Will and Chloe hooked up?” David blurted.

“And now, like, two seconds after everyone finds out she’s pregnant, they’re having emotional tête-à-têtes?” Celia put in.

“Oooh, I love it when you talk French,” Marshall said, nuzzling her from behind. Then, suddenly, his head popped up. “I bet he thinks he might be the father! I bet that’s what they’re talking about!”

My mind was reeling. It was like the entire bonfire was trying to swallow me whole. The light, the heat, the ash, the laughter, the screaming, the music, the drums. I couldn’t think straight. Couldn’t see.

“Okay, everyone, just calm down,” I said, splaying my fingers. “We just jumped to about a million conclusions.” I turned and walked toward the chain link fence around the field. Moving away from the fire helped, and leaning my weight on the fence helped even more. “What do we actually know? Do we
actually know
Chloe and Will were a thing?”

Annie bit her lip. “We’re ninety-nine point nine percent sure. At least I was then. And I am now.”

I swallowed hard. “Then we don’t actually
know
anything,” I said, looking at each of them. “Maybe they were just hanging
out. Maybe they were just friends. Maybe she came here to, like, talk about a bio project or something.”

“But what if—” Annie began.

I shook my head, clutching the cold links of the fence behind me. “I can’t believe Chloe would do that. I mean, why would she do that?”

“I believe it,” Annie muttered, crossing her arms over her chest. “If you were queen of the Cresties, who would you rather get knocked up by? Jake or Will?”

I tasted bile in the back of my throat. Because she was right. If Chloe had to be in this awful situation, it would be a lot more livable with a fellow Crestie and Country Club member like Jake by her side than with a blue-collar worker like Will. It was disgusting, but it was just how Orchard Hill had always functioned. But Chloe was a good person. I’d known her my whole life. Compared with the rest of the Cresties, she’d always been the most human, the most kind, the most down-to-earth. I couldn’t imagine her screwing with people’s lives this way. But if there was even a chance …

“We gotta find out,” David said, his jaw set. “I mean, if the baby isn’t Jake’s—”

“He needs to know,” I finished. I cleared my throat and took a deep breath. “Okay, okay. Here’s what we’re going to do,” I said, pacing away from them, then back again. “I’ll tell him about Chloe and Will, and then he can ask her about it. Because technically, this is between them, right?” There was a prolonged moment of stoic silence. “Everyone good with that plan?”

My friends just stared at me. My throat filled with nervous desperation.

“You guys can’t tell anyone,” I said. “You
can’t
. I swear, if I hear this around school before I get a chance to deal with it, I will disown each and every one of you.”

We looked around the circle solemnly, each of us meeting everyone else’s gaze. My friends looked so sure that our hastily woven story was true, my heart pounded an excited beat. Because for a split second I let myself believe it too. I let myself imagine what life might be like if Jake wasn’t actually the baby’s father.

Everything would go back to normal for us. All the strain and jealousy and tension? Gone.

“Do we have a deal?” I asked pointedly. I put my hand in the middle of the circle, like I was one of the Three Musketeers or something.

“Deal,” Marshall said, putting his hand atop mine.

Celia groaned reluctantly. I knew that sharing gossip this huge about two of the most popular Cresties would totally improve her status. Right now she was seeing that possibility slip away. But she put her hand on top of Marshall’s.

“Deal.”

“Deal,” David said, adding his hand.

Annie took a deep breath. She looked up at the sky, blew out a cloud of steam, and shuddered in her Doc Martens. Then, finally, she slapped her hand down so hard on top of David’s that he winced.

“I just want you people to know this is the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do in my life. And you’re looking at a girl whose appendix burst on the same night her pet hamster died,” she said. Then she looked me in the eye and I just knew that whatever happened next, she was with me. “Deal.”

“Where have you been?”

I scurried to the end of the counter at Jump, Java, and Wail! on Sunday night, grabbed Jake by the apron with both hands, and kissed him. Someone nearby went “Aw!” One of Jake’s coworkers muttered, “Get a room.”

Jake leaned back, blushing. “Philadelphia, remember? I just got back a couple of hours ago. Also, your dad’s in the office, so maybe chill with the PDA.”

“Noted,” I said. I lowered my voice as I slid onto the last stool. “So? Did you lose your phone? Fry your laptop? Forget how to work a landline? I left you, like, a million messages.”

Jake’s blush deepened. He wiped his hands on a clean towel and looked around, as if any of the middle-aged couples huddled around tables were interested in us. Sunday night was not usually a big night for our age group at Jump. Which was probably why it was always packed with adults.

“I know,” he whispered. “I’m sorry. It was just a crazy weekend.”

I made a surprised, choked sound. “Crazy enough to not respond to a text that said ‘You might not be the father’?” I whispered.

I saw Jake’s jaw working as he stood up straight. He glanced over at his coworker as he untied his apron. “Chase, I’m taking my fifteen.”

“Got it, bro,” the guy replied, not looking up from his iPhone. So much for my dad’s strict rule about not texting while on shift.

Jake came around the end of the counter and tugged me
toward the back of the shop, where we sat down at the most secluded table there was—the one cornered by the door to my dad’s office and the emergency exit. The one no one from school ever came near. Jake sat down and blew out a sigh. He was acting beyond weird. Shouldn’t he be excited? Angry? At least moderately annoyed or intrigued? I tugged off my scarf and hat and sat across from him.

“I already know about Will Halloran,” he said. “I know he and Chloe went out this summer.”

Someone had left a glass canister of cinnamon on the table and he started to fiddle with it, sliding it back and forth from hand to hand across the pebbled marble. I felt like he’d just whipped my chair out from under me.

“What?” I whispered, leaning into the table. “And you didn’t tell me?”

He shrugged. “It doesn’t matter.”

I felt like reality had just reversed itself. “How could it not matter? How do you know Will’s not the father?”

“Because. Chloe never slept with Will,” Jake replied, holding the canister with both hands now. He scratched at some crust on the side with his thumbnail.

“How do you know that?” I asked.

“Because she told me,” he replied.

My jaw dropped. “And you believed her? Just like that?”

From the corner of my eye, I saw my dad emerge from the back room. He looked like he was about to say hi, then noticed how serious we looked and thought better of it. He moved to the other side of the shop.

“Do you really think Chloe would lie about something like that?” Jake snapped defensively.

I sat back. For a long moment I couldn’t locate my voice. Was he seriously defending Chloe’s honor to me right now? When I was trying to help him? When I was trying to throw him a lifeline? I couldn’t believe that he didn’t grasp the seriousness of the situation.

“Well, let’s see, I never thought she was the kind of person who’d fool around with two guys at one time, but apparently I was wrong about that,” I said finally. “And I didn’t think
you
were the kind of person who’d have sex with someone else when you were supposed to be in love with me, either.”

“We were broken up!” Jake snapped angrily. “God! I thought we were done with this.”

“Yeah, well, I guess not,” I said, pushing my chair back. I wanted to storm out, but I couldn’t. I needed more from him. I needed him to say that he’d talk to Chloe. That he cared enough about knowing the truth. That he cared more about being with me than hurting her feelings. “Don’t you think you should just ask her again?” I said. “See what she says? This is a huge deal, Jake. For you and for Will.”

“I know it’s a huge deal, Ally!” he whisper-shouted angrily. “Do you think you know better than me what a huge fucking deal this is? I’ve
seen
the baby. I’ve seen it roll over and kick and suck its thumb. There’s a baby out there that’s mine and sometimes all I can think about is that I never even get to name him or talk to him or see him play soccer. I’m dealing with that. Maybe
you’re
the one who’s not.”

Suddenly I saw something in his eyes that stopped me cold. It was fear. Just the tiniest flicker, but it was there. He was scared of asking about Will again. He was scared he might find out he wasn’t the father.

Jake wanted the baby to be his.

And I was going to be sick.

“I have to go,” I said, standing, trying not to cry in front of him.

“Ally, wait. I’m sorry,” Jake said.

“Forget it,” I said.

I shoved through the door and onto the wintry sidewalk, the bell jangling jauntily above my head. I’d gotten about five steps along the salted sidewalk when my dad came after me.

“Ally! Wait up!”

I whirled around, took one look at my father in his brown apron and T-shirt, his breath making fog clouds in the frigid air, his eyes concerned, and I burst into tears.

“What is it?” he asked, hugging me to him. “What just happened?”

For the splittest of seconds I considered not telling him. He loved Jake. And he was Jake’s boss. I didn’t want to take their good relationship away from them. But then, screw that. He was my dad first.

“Chloe’s pregnant,” I sputtered into his chest. “And Jake might be the father.”

“What?” my father croaked, stepping back so I could look at him. “I’ll kill him. I’ll kill the little—”

“We were broken up when it happened, Dad,” I said, sniffling. Always protecting Jake. Even when my heart was breaking. “You don’t have to kill anyone.”

My father shifted and brought his fist to his mouth for a second. It looked like it was taking all his self-control to keep from running back inside and flinging himself at Jake, Ultimate Fighter style.

“Are you okay?” he asked finally.

“No,” I replied, a fresh wave of tears choking me.

My dad looked at the light traffic on Orchard Avenue. The sky was pitch-black in the way only a winter sky could be, and only a few crazy people had braved the cold. He hooked his arm around my neck. “Come on.”