Unfriended (18 page)

For once, I was the first to arrive at Stubbs. I got my latte, along with everyone else’s current usuals, from Vince the barista and made my way slowly over to the area we had long ago staked out as ours. I sat in the armchair that was always saved for me. I looked across at the couch that Lisa and Schuyler shared and then next to me, at the wooden chair that was Ruth’s. It had been left empty for her even during the two months when she hadn’t been hanging out with us. I wondered, a little
numbly, if my friends would leave this chair open for me when I stopped hanging out with them, or if someone else—like Tricia—would start sitting there. Trying to push away the visual of Tricia literally taking my place, I set everyone’s drinks in front of their normal spots. If I was going to confuse and alienate all my best friends, I’d figured that the least I could do was buy them coffee first.

I took a sip of my iced latte and checked the time on my phone. My friends weren’t due to arrive for a few more minutes yet, and I wanted to just stay in this moment for a little bit longer. Everything was going to change all too soon, but for right now, as far as everyone else knew, everything was status quo.

I took another sip, grateful for the caffeine that helped me feel a little more awake, and let out a long breath slowly, like I did before I went onstage. I tried not to think about what was about to happen, instead concentrating only on the grizzled sailor on the Stubbs sign, the rain that was lashing the plate glass window, and the fact that, for a few minutes more, I could pretend that nothing in my life had changed.

The bell on the door jangled, and Ruth came in, looking half drenched, squeezing water from her ponytail. She smiled when she saw me and headed over to our spot. I smiled back automatically, then felt something very cold grip my insides when I realized the enormity of what I was going to have to do. My smile faltered, and I looked down at my Stubbs cup to try and regain my composure.

“Hey,” Ruth said, settling into her wooden chair and pulling it a little closer into the circle. “Can you believe this weather? My umbrella died halfway across the parking lot.”

I swallowed hard. “That sucks,” I said, but I could hear how not-normal my voice sounded, how strained and shaky. Ruth looked at me sharply, concerned, and I knew she’d heard it as well. “I got you your
ush
,” I said, gesturing toward her small soy latte with one pump of vanilla. The vanilla was a new addition, and I had been thrilled to see it, as it said to me that Ruth was willing to let go of her routines and try new things. I thought it was no coincidence that she’d changed her drink around the time she’d started officially dating Andy.

“Thank you,” Ruth said, digging in her purse for her wallet.

I shook my head. “On me,” I said firmly. “Really.”

Ruth glanced up at me, maybe again hearing something in my voice I hadn’t intended for her to. “Okay,” she said, dropping her wallet back in her bag. “Thanks, Mad. You didn’t have to.”

“I did,” I said quietly. Ruth had lifted her Stubbs cup halfway to her lips, but now she stopped and set the cup back on the small table in front of her.

“Maddie,” she said, using the nickname in one of its few permitted circumstances. She leaned forward, looking concerned. “What is it? Something’s wrong.”

I looked at my former BFF, and current FF. Despite everything that had happened with us, she was still the person who knew me best, and I didn’t think I was a good
enough actress to deny this and have her believe me. I just looked at her in silence for a second, all too aware that these were the last moments of our friendship.

“Maddie?” Ruth asked. “Come on, you’re scaring me.”

“Just promise me something,” I said, the words rushing out. I looked down at my Stubbs cup, knowing that if I kept seeing Ruth’s worried expression, I was going to break down and tell her everything. And she would undoubtedly make a pro and con list and would assure me that we could figure it out together.

“What?” Ruth asked, still looking concerned and now looking confused, as well.

“I just …” I took a shaky breath and made myself keep going. “I hope that you and Andy stay together. I hope you guys are really happy. And I hope that you can be there for Schuyler and Lisa.”

“Why are you talking like this?” Ruth asked, looking more and more confused, and no less worried. “What’s going on?”

Before I could deflect that question, the bell jangled again, and I looked up to see Schuyler and Lisa rushing in, both looking fairly waterlogged.

“
Mon Dieu
,” Lisa grumbled, shaking the water from her curls, which had expanded to about three times their normal size, “did I suddenly move to Seattle?
C’est ridicule
.” She flopped down dramatically on the couch, then leaned forward when she saw her drink. “
Pour moi?”
she asked, and I nodded. “
Merci!”
she said, smiling at me and picking up her cup.

Schuyler looked around the coffee shop anxiously, twice, before sitting down next to Lisa and picking up her drink.

“What?” Lisa asked, turning and looking around as well. Ruth and I followed suit, and the only other person currently in Stubbs—he looked like one of the laptop-tethered college students who had recently descended on the coffee shop—clearly thought we were staring at him (which, technically, we were). He blushed bright red and accidentally knocked over his coffee, then gave a little yelp as the coffee headed toward his laptop. He hoisted it valiantly out of the path of the coffee, which then, unimpeded, ended up soaking the front of his pants.

I turned away from the spectacle—I had a feeling it was going nowhere good—and back to Schuyler, who was doing a terrible job of appearing nonchalant. “Shy?” I asked.

“It’s nothing,” she said, fiddling with her coffee cup lid. “I was just checking to see if Connor—or
Roberta Briggs
—was here.” She said Roberta’s name in the same way that people normally said
anthrax
, or Lisa said
Euro Disney
.

“Why would you need to wonder about that?” Lisa asked. “
Pourquoi?
Check your Constellation to see where he is.”

“I can’t,” Schuyler said. “He’s not on it anymore.”

This was surprising enough to cause silence to fall at our table, and for me to nearly forget that, soon, I would
have to steer the conversation in a very unhappy direction. “Wait, what?” I asked, baffled.

“I don’t understand,” Ruth said, brow furrowed. “He’s not on Constellation?”

“No,” Schuyler said miserably. “He’s not on Friendverse, or Status Q, either. It’s like he’s just
vanished
. And I have no idea where he is, or what he’s doing, or who he’s doing it with.” As soon as she said this, Shy turned the same color as her hair. “Not like that,” she said quickly. “I didn’t mean it like that.” Then she paused, and her complexion suddenly changed direction and started heading back to pale again. “But
OMG
,” she said, looking stricken, “do you think—”

“
Un moment
,” Lisa interrupted. “I still don’t understand why Connor would do that.” She turned to Ruth and me, eyebrows raised. “Do you think it’s possible that he joined a cult?”

I took a sip of my latte, thoughts racing. Connor had
left
. Connor had just cut himself off from what constituted a social life at Putnam High. It had never even really occurred to me that you could do this—or that you would want to. Even after the hacking incident, I had never even considered leaving Friendverse. It just wasn’t an option.