Twisted (13 page)

“That’s not true,” I argued. Although maybe it was, just not for the reason he thought.

He shot me a look that said he didn’t believe me. “I just miss her, you know? She’s smart and she’s so funny sometimes without ever trying to be. I know some people think she’s got this frosty personality but that’s because they don’t know her. She’s got the biggest heart. She’s so beautiful. And if you’ve ever seen her skate, it’s…she’s just…she’s amazing.” He groaned. “I sound like a total moron.”

“You don’t,” I assured him. He sounded like a lovesick teenager. “But how do you feel about Olivia?” I asked. “Do you like her?”

“Yeah,” he admitted, “I do. At first I didn’t really feel one way or another about her but thought…why not give it a shot? I mean, things were going nowhere with Phoebe. But the more time I spend with her, the more I like her. It’s made it easier to get over Phoebe.”

“So you’re over Phoebe?”

He gripped the steering wheel a little tighter as he shot a cautious glance my way. “Look,” he finally said, “maybe this wasn’t the best idea. I know you’re friends with both of them. I don’t want to put you in the middle of this. I just thought maybe you would have some advice since you and Phoebe seem to be pretty close these days. I used to be able to talk to Phoebe for hours. Things were just easy with us. When I teased her, she used to laugh. Now when I try, she looks at me like I busted a blade off her favorite pair of skates. I just want her to stop looking at me like that.” He sighed miserably. “Or she just leaves, like tonight, which is even worse. Most of the time I feel like she hates me.”

I wasn’t sure what I dared tell him. Phoebe had made it clear that what she’d told me, she’d told me in confidence. The reason she’d been so nervous around him was because she
did
like him so much. And she’d been worried he’d changed
his
mind. But now Henry did genuinely feel something for Olivia.

Did I have the right to say something that would mess that up? He hadn’t really answered my question when I asked how he felt about Phoebe
now
. But he obviously still felt something if he was so upset by the way things were between them. Phoebe was miserable without him. But would Olivia be miserable without him, too? Was it my place to try to influence who he should be with? I didn’t think so. It was his choice. Unfortunately, he’d made that decision with misconstrued information. The least I could do was encourage him to get his facts straight.

“Okay, first of all, I absolutely promise you Phoebe does not hate you.  My advice,” I said, “is to not give up on her. It’s not you she feels uncomfortable with. It’s you and Olivia. Together.”

“Why?” he asked. He looked genuinely startled by this revelation. He thought about it for a bit. “Does she think Olivia would be jealous of our friendship?”

“Something like that.” It seemed a simpler explanation than the truth.

He scoffed. “Well, that’s not going to happen. Olivia isn’t the jealous type.”

“She isn’t?”

He shook his head. “If Olivia isn’t getting enough attention, she just moves on.”

I thought about that for a minute. “And you’re okay with dating someone like that? Someone who would be ready to give up on you the minute you decide something else might
also
be important?”

We’d just pulled up to my house. I waited just a moment for him to answer my question. He didn’t. He seemed to be thinking it over.

“Another thing? When someone is nervous around you, to the point they can hardly talk to you? It can mean the complete opposite of hating you. You and Phoebe simply had a major misunderstanding. One of these days, you two
really
need to talk.” I thought I maybe said too much at that point but thought he deserved to know. I thanked him for the ride and hopped out before he asked
me
to be more specific.

My hand was already rooting around in my purse for my phone as I made my way up the sidewalk and heard him pull away. I dialed as I walked through the kitchen. I waved a ‘hello’ to Remy and Jeff. They had two bottles of wine sitting on the coffee table. They were in the midst of a boisterous game of Scrabble. Remy was arguing that “ginormous” was, indeed, a real word.

I decided maybe Rem was right, she
was
getting old.

“
I hate baking
!” Phoebe wailed in greeting as I closed my door behind me. “Did you see Olivia? All cute in her little apron? With that neat little smudge of flour across her nose, like it was part of her ensemble?”

“Henry never bothered to wipe
that
off,” I pointed out, hoping to help. I didn’t want to add fuel to Phoebe’s fire but I had thought that smudge of flour looked suspiciously well placed before we arrived. And Olivia seemed a little annoyed that it was Hailey who finally piped up and told her she had some nasty crud on her nose.

“Probably because it was Olivia and she looked all charming and domesticated. Besides, the flour was sexy. Peanut butter is just slimy and it smells weird,” Phoebe whimpered.

“Flour is never sexy,” I decided. “But I do have a few things to tell you.” I told her what Henry had told me. He hadn’t asked me not to and it seemed to me these two had some serious issues to straighten out. I told her why he had agreed to go out with Olivia. How he thought Phoebe was nervous around him because she didn’t want him to like her. How now, he thought she hated him. I told her I tried to smooth things over as best I could. I hesitated but decided on full disclosure. I told her as gently as I could what he’d said about his feelings for Olivia, and felt horrible and rotten for having to do it.

“So that’s it,” Phoebe said. Then she sniffled quietly.

“That’s not it,” I tried to reassure her. “He still cares about you. He wouldn’t have talked to me if he didn’t.”

“As a friend,” Phoebe said between sniffles.

I tried to reassure her that I didn’t think that was it at all.

Ben continued to keep his distance from me but several days later there was another package on my car.

“Oh no,” I grated. “Not again.”

“Just go straight to the car and get in,” Phoebe instructed.

I did as she said. I tried hard not to meet anyone’s gaze. I could feel my cheeks flaming red and I hated that everyone was watching me. I could hear giggles and snickers and rude mutterings among everyone. I shook my head as I thought to myself that it was nothing compared to what Ben was constantly being put through. I was angry and really needed to work at not showing it. Surely, whoever was doing this was watching for my reaction. And Ben’s.

I slid into the driver’s seat. Phoebe slid into the passenger seat, placing the little white box on the floor by her feet. I saw Hailey and Olivia pushing their way through the crowd.

“Just go,” Phoebe commanded. “And don’t look at them! We’ll just pretend we didn’t see them.”

I had already started the car and shoved on a pair of sunglasses. I rolled past the crowd as fast as I dared. Once I hit the street I sped away.

“Should we just throw it?” she asked nervously.

“Probably,” I agreed.

The box was small and square. Other than that, it was the same. It was white with a gold seal, tied with a purple ribbon.

“Did you see Ben?” I asked. “Was he there?” I really hoped he wasn’t.

“I didn’t notice,” Phoebe said. Her voice sounded strained.

“What?”

“Pull over. Anywhere. This box smells funny.”

I found an open spot on the street and slid the Mustang in.

Phoebe threw the door open and hopped out. I followed. She’d placed the box on the ground and was pulling the ribbon off.

“I thought we weren’t going to open it?”

She glanced up at me. “I have to. Sorry. Morbid curiosity.” Using her fingernail as she had last time, she sliced the seal open. She wiggled the lid up with one finger.

“
Ewww
!” she said in disgust.

A familiar car passed us and then pulled into the first open spot, nearly a block down.

“As if we need this to get any worse,” Phoebe groaned.

Olivia and Hailey jumped out of the car.

“Why didn’t you wait?” Olivia asked as she rushed toward us.

“What is it?” Hailey wanted to know. She was wearing knee-high black boots with very high heels. Black shorts so short I could not believe they passed the dress code. A tight little black cami which closely resembled a bustier. And—unless she’d miraculously blossomed overnight—the cami was obviously covering a very well-padded bra. She had silver bracelets from her wrist to halfway up her elbow, and a black choker around her neck. Her ebony hair was split into pigtails again, both sporting multiple streaks of lime green. She teetered down the sidewalk toward us.

Phoebe groaned. “Just give her a cape and we could send her out as Super Slut for Halloween.”

I couldn’t disagree with her. The longer Hailey’s parents were holding out, the worse her attire was becoming. I didn’t want to imagine what she
would
actually be wearing, or not wearing, in a few weeks when Halloween came around.

“What’s in there?” Hailey asked, dropping to the ground beside us.

“Don’t look,” Phoebe warned.

But not one to listen, and being devoid of even a sliver of common sense she knelt close, lifted the lid and practically stuck her face inside to check things out.

“Ugh!” she groaned and turned away, her face looking slightly green.

“I told you not to look so why would you put your face right in it?” Phoebe hissed.  “There is not enough Clairol in the entire world to cover up your blondness!”

Hailey gave her a wide-eyed shrug and Phoebe just shook her head.

“So what’s in the box?” Olivia demanded.

“White fudge,” Phoebe said as she eyed the box again. “Raspberry swirled white fudge.”

Olivia looked at Phoebe suspiciously and then glanced at Hailey who looked away. “Really? All that drama over a box of fudge?”

Phoebe ground her fists into her hips. “It was covered in maggots. Happy?”

“No, I’m not happy. I’m worried. I’m worried for Maya,” she said as she turned to face me. “Why can’t you just stay away from him?”

“I have been,” I reminded her. I shook my head. “Olivia, you’re smarter than this.
That
,” I said motioning to the box, my voice full of disgust at her blindness, “has ‘set up’ written all over it. How can you not see that? Furthermore, Ben is not stalking me. I can barely get him to talk to me, let alone spend two seconds with me.”

“Even if you don’t think he’s doing this, he’s obviously upsetting you,” Olivia said tightly. “Look at you! You’re shaking! Is it really worth all of this?”

She was right. My fingers were trembling. From anger, not from fear as she seemed to think. “Ben isn’t upsetting me.
You
are! Everyone at school. And yes, he’s worth it to me! He’s a good person. Everyone is so cruel to him and he doesn’t deserve it. What happened was not his fault. How can you be so kind to everyone else? Yet so heartless when it comes to him?”

Olivia couldn’t have looked more startled if I had slapped her. “I’m not the cruel one,” she said quietly. “You have no idea what Alec goes through every day because of Ben.”

“And you do?” Phoebe asked skeptically.

“All you have to do is look at him to see how difficult it is for him to have Ben around.” She turned to me. “And honestly, Alec is worried about you.”

“I bet.” The sarcasm was so thick it could have formed a puddle at my feet. “Because if I had to guess? I’d say Alec is behind this.”

“No way,” Olivia said as she stubbornly crossed her arms over her chest.  

I wasn’t going to argue with Olivia. It was pointless. I was afraid I’d say something I couldn’t take back. I knew Olivia meant well. Olivia always meant well. But she was wrong. I needed some time to cool off. I looked at Phoebe. “I want to go home.”

She nodded and we walked to the car. Neither of us looked back or said a word to Olivia or Hailey as we left.

***

I dumped the blueberries into my smoothie machine and turned it on. I didn’t hear the knock at the door as the motor ran to blend my drink. I turned to get a glass out of the cupboard and saw Ben standing there. His face framed in the window. I screamed, my arms flailed and my feet bounced off the floor in a little dance of fright. I immediately recovered, jabbed the ‘off’ button and let Ben in.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you. I knocked,” he said, looking guilty despite his harmless intent.

“That’s okay. Come on in,” I said, stepping back to allow him into the kitchen. My heart was fluttering out of control. I wasn’t sure if being startled or being so happy to see Ben was the greater culprit.

“I didn’t leave you those things,” he stated solemnly. “Everyone is saying I did. But I swear, it wasn’t me. You’re the only friend I have. I would never do anything to hurt you. Or ever try to upset you.” He looked at me closely. His eyes seemed to be begging me to believe him. “Not on purpose, anyway. You know that, don’t you?”

“I know,” I assured him. “Someone just has a really sick sense of humor.”

Ben looked at me uncertainly, unsure if I was telling the truth.

“I’ve told anyone who will listen that they weren’t from you,” I said softly, placing my hand on his arm to try to reassure him.

“How do you know they weren’t?” he asked as though the concept of someone having faith in him was incomprehensible.

I slid my palm down his arm and reached for his hand. He gripped my fingers tightly in his. “Because I know those things are probably even more upsetting to you than they are to me. You would never exploit Katie like that. I know the last thing you want is to draw attention to yourself.”

He let out a sigh of relief. “I heard you were really upset. Especially after the one you got today. I needed to see you. I had to make sure you were okay.”

“Where did you hear that from?”

His eyes darted away. “I hear a lot of things,” he said quietly.

I shook my head. “But I was only with my friends when I opened it. That was just a few hours ago, after school. Who told you?”

He hesitated. “I ran into Alec.”

“How would Alec know?” I asked, perplexed. Who would have told him already? “Hailey,” I muttered. “I bet she told Blake. Then Blake probably told Alec.”

“So it was true?” he asked.

I sighed. I wondered what else he had heard. Hailey was certainly living up to her reputation as a gossip queen. I wondered if he knew that I had admitted to them how I felt about him. I shook my head, trying to clear those thoughts away. If he knew, he knew. There was no taking it back now. Not that I really wanted to. I let go of his hand and took out another glass, pouring half of the smoothie into each. I handed one to Ben.

“Can you stay for a while? We can talk.”

He looked indecisive but then seemed to think maybe we did actually have something to talk about. He followed me into the living room and sat on the couch, near the edge. I sat in the middle so I could turn my body to face him.

“You heard what was inside?” I asked.

He nodded. “I think everyone knows what was inside. Even my parents know,” he said, looking at the floor. “Good gossip travels fast. Especially in Beaumont.”

“Are they mad?” I asked. “They shouldn’t be. This isn’t your fault.”

“It doesn’t matter whose fault it is. It draws attention to me, which draw attention to them,” he said bitterly. “And even if it isn’t my fault, everyone will think it is.” He shrugged. “I’m not even sure my parents believe me. Either way they’re mad that it even happened at all. They figure I must’ve pissed someone off enough for them to come up with pranks so sick. Or maybe they just figure I really have lost it and I am the one that did it.” He looked at me nervously as though he feared this is what I secretly thought, too.

I slid over until I was closer to him, thigh to thigh. “I’m sorry. I can’t even imagine what it’s like for you to have your parents doubt you about this. People at school are just horrible. I can’t imagine how awful this has to be for you because of the memories it brings back.”

He didn’t say anything so I continued talking.

“It’s Alec, isn’t it?” I asked.

“I think so,” was his tense reply.

“I figured. It seems so clear to me that all he’s trying to do is stir up trouble. He’s obviously trying to make you look bad,” I said in frustration.

Ben let out a sigh. “Unfortunately, it doesn’t take much to do that. But…why do
you
think it’s him?”

I shrugged. “I think he’s a complete coward. Hiding behind the pranks is just one more thing to add to his list.”

He was quiet for a few moments before looking back at me. “Maya, I don’t know how to make this stop. Not unless we don’t have any connection to each other. At all,” he said quietly. His face was pale and dark crescents were visible under his eyes. I knew the past few weeks had been harder for him than he was willing to admit. “You need to stop talking to me in the halls, or wherever. I’m not sure that even talking at the park is a good idea. You never know who might be there.”

I knew what he meant is that
Alec
might be there.

I didn’t say anything for a while. I wasn’t sure where to start. There was so much I wanted to say but my thoughts were bouncing around like bumper cars inside of my brain. “Is that what you really want?” I finally asked. “If these pranks are too much for you, I understand.”

“It’s
not
what I want.” He shook his head. “I’ve never
wanted
to keep my distance from you. I just don’t want you getting hurt,” he said somberly. “Or even upset. After what happened today...”

“The pranks probably aren’t as bad as everyone is making them out to be,” I tried to assure him. “You know how people like to exaggerate.”

He looked at me for a minute before answering. “I think we both know that it’s not so much what was in the boxes as it is the intent behind them.”

He looked so lost and so hopeless. I felt so much sadness for him. Anger at everyone who treated him badly. Desperation for people to see him for who he really was.

“Ben,” I began, but then my racing thoughts collided into a mental wall. I slid my arms around him and hugged him tight, yet still being mindful of his tender ribs. I had wanted to do it since the moment I had seen him in the kitchen doorway. He surprised me by instantly hugging me back just as tightly, even briefly burying his face in my curls. I held on to him a little longer than what was probably necessary. But he didn’t let go, either.

Ben needed a friend. That was what I was going to be for him. I loosened my embrace but I didn’t let him go right away.

“The only reason I was upset about today was because I knew it would come back to hurt you. I don’t care about the sick pranks. They’re stupid and malicious. What I care about is how hard they must be on you. I know what people say. I can’t tell you how much that upsets me because I
know
it’s not true. That’s why I was so upset. I just want people to leave you alone.”