You Wish (26 page)

“Look, you’re, um, awesome, but I just don’t feel sparks anymore. I think we need to break up.”

His eyes search mine as his face remains expressionless.

“Is that really what you want?”

“Yes. It is.”

He nods, but he doesn’t move away from me. I feel like he’s staring at my lips, like he wants to kiss me again to convince me to change my mind. “I can’t say I’m surprised. You’ve been acting weird for days.”

I clear my throat because it’s like he doesn’t realize he’s still so close to me. “And also, Ann . . . she likes you. You should give her a shot.”

One eyebrow goes up. It’s hard to see because his face is so close to mine. “Ann? Really?”

I nod. I wish he’d back up.

“Maybe.”

Huh. That was entirely too simple. He stands up, and I feel like I can breathe for the first time in ten minutes. “I guess I’ll catch you later,” he says, and then walks away.

I watch him leave, feeling a little bit bad but also suddenly, gloriously free, and then I turn around.

Ben is standing there, in the middle of the hall, watching me. His expression makes guilt tear through me.

He looks betrayed, his blue eyes staring right at me, accusing me. His shoulders, behind that perfect, ribbed navy sweater, are slumped.

I don’t understand it, but he looks hurt. Like I hurt him. Stuck a knife in and twisted.

And now I know.

I know that during the moment at the track, when I stared at him and he stared back, he wanted to kiss me as much as I wanted to kiss him. That he cursed that helmet just as I did.

That maybe he
does
count each time we touch.

He shakes his head, slowly, and then spins around and walks the other way.

And as I watch him disappear around the corner, I can’t help but wonder if this is the exact moment where I officially lost everything.

32

I DON’T SLEEP
at all that night. Not a single, solitary moment. I listen to the rain outside my open window, listen to the snores coming from Ann, and try not to toss and turn, because I know I’ll never be comfortable no matter how I lie.

As soon as the sun rises over the Cascade mountaintops, I climb out of bed and throw on jeans, an old T-shirt with a rabid-looking unicorn, and a plain black hoodie. I sweep my boring brown hair back into a ponytail as I head out into the backyard to get the pony.

She’ll be gone in a couple of days, and I’ve spent this whole time wishing she’d disappear. So I might as well give her one nice morning. I’ll take her to the park down the street and let her eat all the grass she can for the next hour or so, until I have to drag my weary butt to school.

I swing open the door to the shed, and the pony bursts out.

I crinkle my nose as I step into the shed to find the rope halter Ann made for her.

I sure hope that the poop magically disappears at the same time as the pony. So gross.

I slip the rope onto the pony and wrestle around with it until it vaguely resembles something that will keep her from running away. I guess that’s ironic since I’ve spent this whole time wishing she
would
run away.

I let her take little snatches and bites of grass as we drift to the gate and cross in front of the house.

We don’t get anywhere near the park, though, because there’s a car in the driveway.

A voice drifts over me. Someone is standing on the front porch. “Kayla.”

Even after all these years, all this time, I know exactly who it is. I don’t have to turn and look.

I stand there, one hand gripping the rope, twisting it around, as I stare at the dew-covered grass.

I take in a few slow, calming breaths and then turn to face him. His dark hair has started to gray, so that it’s salt-and-pepper, which catches me off guard so much I can’t stop staring at it, thinking that he’s old now, that he’s aged. It’s been seven years, and yet he seems so much older.

He’s wearing dark, crisp blue jeans with a light sweater and a sports jacket and some kind of fancy leather loafers with tassels. He looks like a total yuppie.

“Hi, sweetheart,” he says, his Italian accent more pronounced than ever. He smiles at me. It makes a few crow’s-feet appear around his eyes. Laugh lines. I want to know who he’s been laughing with.

“Dad,” I say, my voice shaky, unsure. I hate it. I want to be nonchalant, confident, unaffected by him being here. Instead I feel myself spinning around and around inside. Am I happy he’s here? Excited to see him? Or do I want him to leave? And why is it so hard for me to know which one I want?

I study his steel-gray eyes. I don’t know what I want to see there. Answers, maybe. Yes, I want answers. But I’m not sure there’s an answer in the world that would ever make it okay to do what he did.

“I realized I missed your sixteenth birthday.”

I nod.

“And I know I’ve always said I’d get you a car when you got your license.”

I guess he did say that. Maybe. But I don’t like the way he says
always said
, as if he’s always around to say something at all, let alone that he’d get me my own car. I only talk to him on special occasions, and the last one was almost a year ago.

I feel anger build a little bit, somewhere deep inside me. “Why are you here?”

He shifts his weight, looks a little bit uncomfortable. I feel oddly triumphant. “I told you. To get you a car.”

“No.”

“What?”

“No. I don’t want your stupid car.”

“Oh,” he says, shrugging, looking a little confused and lost.

That’s it?
Oh?

I expected something more. I expected apologies, guilt, some kind of speech.

And even though I already expected it, his lack of true, deep emotion is a confirmation that he is a wish, that he’s not here entirely of his own volition. Because if you go to all that effort because you have the idea to make some grandiose gesture, wouldn’t you have a thing or two to say about it?

I wonder how long it took him to get here, how much time he spent driven by something he didn’t understand. Hours sitting on planes, hundreds of dollars, thousands of miles.

And here he is, staring at me, the one thing I wanted more than anything else, and it only makes me feel empty.

I remember all those birthdays I stared at the phone, all those times I would be apprehensive of opening the Christmas card, because I was afraid it would simply say
Dad
, when I wanted so much for it to say
Love, Dad
.

I think of all those stupid times I’d watch other people’s dads. All those times Nicole rolled her eyes about her dad, and I secretly wished I could do that, but I had no reason to. For my dad to be annoying he had to be around, and he wasn’t.

His absence seemed so much bigger than anyone else’s presence. He missed everything. He never bought Chase the BB gun like he promised, never taught me to ride a motorcycle, never helped me study for a test or watched me get ready for a school dance. Not that I’ve gone to many.

But the point is, he never got to be part of anything, and he doesn’t even care.

I guess I knew I must have wished for this at some point. Must have closed my eyes as tight as I could and wished he would come back, then blew out the candles, hoping it would really happen. I must have believed that if I wanted it bad enough, he’d appear, just like in all my dreams and fantasies.

And here he is and yet it means nothing. Because I didn’t want him here physically, I wanted him here emotionally, and that’s one thing I’ll never have. He’s never going to be that kind of dad.

And I don’t need to be that kind of daughter.

Not anymore.

“Did you want something?” I pull on the pony’s lead rope, and she steps forward.

“Um, no.” He pauses, chews on his lips. “I love you,” he says, the words sounding like a question.

The moment is awkward. I breathe slowly, listening to the silence as the words die around me.

And then I look up at him and shake my head. “No.”

I pull harder on the rope and start across the yard, the pony following me. I stop at the edge and give him another look. It might resemble pity. Maybe disgust. I don’t know what I look like, because I can’t put a finger on what I feel. But it’s not regret, and it’s not pain, and I can’t ask for anything other than that. “No, you don’t. If you love me—if you loved
any
of us, you would’ve showed it by now.” He just stands there on the porch, staring at me. “And you know what? It doesn’t matter anymore. I don’t need you.”

“Kayla—”

“No. You don’t deserve my time, and I won’t let you buy it with a car.”

I step onto the sidewalk and head down the street, the pony happily trotting after me.

It starts to sprinkle as the house disappears from my view. Maybe I didn’t wish for him to show up and say “I love you.” Maybe I wished for me to not need him, to not care about him anymore. I can’t be sure, I can’t go back and listen to myself make that wish, but the truth is, it doesn’t matter.

Because not needing him is the best thing that’s come of this, the best realization of all. It doesn’t matter if Ann and the pony and Ken and everything else disappears on Monday, after I receive the last wish.

Because this feeling of independence, of total freedom, won’t vanish. That much I’m sure of.

My happiness doesn’t rely on other people. It doesn’t depend on them needing me, wanting me, approving of me.

It’s inside me, just where it was when I was little and My Little Pony reigned supreme, before life got twisted and turned upside down, before everyone else moved on and left me behind. Somehow I lost the power to be happy, but I’m taking it back.

Starting today. Today, I choose me.

33

IN PHOTOGRAPHY
later that day, I spend the hour trying to get my photo flurry to become a self-portrait. I set the enlarger up and expose one of the negatives to the photo paper for just a few seconds. Not long enough for a clear picture . . . that would take several seconds longer. Then I swap out the negative for a new one and expose that one for a few seconds. I find one of the better photos of my Converse and I expose that one too.

After I’ve run what must be a dozen negatives through the enlarger, I move over to the table and put the paper through the development chemicals, a series of pans that will turn the paper into a picture.

I’ve overexposed the photo, so I try again, this time running each negative for half as long.

And that’s when I get the desired effect: The photo looks a bit like a blob at first glance. But on closer inspection, the details start to pop out—the laces of the Converse shoes form the squiggly border along the bottom of the photo. The frayed ends of a friendship bracelet peek out on the two sides. Directly in the middle of the photo is the face of a Barbie doll, partially obscured by the bow on a shirt I’ve never worn.

But in between all that, it’s a mass of overexposed black. It looks a little like a mess, which is what I expected. By exposing so many pictures on top of each other, the photo paper has had too much light on it, turning it dark.

I stare at the photo for a while. I wonder if Mr. Edwards will like this or think it’s just a big disaster.

Because the fact of the matter is, it
does
represent me. I let everyone else’s opinions of me turn me into something else entirely. I became dark, negative, cynical. The big blob on the paper staring back at me, no identity at all.

This photo is me, in all of its ugly, messy glory. If Mr. Edwards doesn’t like it, well, there’s not much I can do about that.

I take out a sheet of photo paper, but I don’t expose anything on it. I want it to be a plain, glossy white sheet of paper.

My clean slate. Because I’m starting over.

I rip out a sheet of notebook paper and scribble down a quick explanation and then paper clip it to my photo and the blank white page and drop it in his box.

And now, my clean slate begins.

34

AFTER PHOTOGRAPHY,
I trudge up the polished wooden bleachers in the gym. There’s a mandatory pre-homecoming pep rally. I really hate these things and everything they represent, but I’m forcing myself to remain neutral.

Clean slate, clean slate, clean slate.

Kayla McHenry is not going to sit in the stands and bleat at the cheerleaders. Not today. Today, I’m going to sit up here like every other student at EHS, happy that I’m not stuck in class, enjoying a nice Friday afternoon. No matter how many “go team!” cheers I have to shout, I’m going to be just like everyone else.

Maybe I should have saved my clean slate for Monday, done the whole baby-steps thing. This is more than one giant leap for mankind. This is epic.

Plus, on Monday, all the wishes will be over.

No,
no
, I refuse to put this off.

Clean slate starts now. I swear.

I’m just glad the last two wishes will happen over the weekend. With a little luck they’ll be discreet and I can just hide out in my room, waiting for it all to end. Once they’re gone, I’m going to have to seriously figure out how to get my life back on track and undo the damage they’ve done to everyone around me.

The wooden bleachers creak beneath my feet. Some of my classmates are very clearly avoiding meeting my eyes, because they don’t want me to sit near them. They’re probably hoping I don’t bleat at them. I guess they’re not aware of my clean slate.

I’ve never been so aware of how people see me. Of the fact that I created this image. It’s like a clown painting on their face.

Except a clown can wipe it right off, and people can see the difference. For me, well, I’m going to have to prove it.

If I don’t want to be a spectator in my own life, then I’ve got to change things. And as soon as school is over, I’ll have to find Nicole and maybe we’ll patch up what we have left of a friendship. Or maybe we’ll discover we’re going different ways. But I can’t just
not
talk to her. I have to know what’s going on with her, why she’s become someone else in such a short time. And if in the end, we’re not able to see eye to eye, then fine. But at least I have to clear the air.