“I didn’t say that, either.”
I sighed. “How come when you want your parents to tell you what to do, they don’t, and when you don’t want them to tell you what to do, they do?”
“Secret parenting classes,” he said, then passed me the Thin Mints. “They teach you all sorts of things, including where to hide the cookies so your daughter can’t find them.”
Three cookies and a hug later, I went back upstairs. Bendy was still sawing logs and I threw a pillow over my head as I curled back up into bed.
I had to decide.
So I did.
The next morning, I found both my parents in the kitchen, looking oddly expectant. My dad must’ve filled my mom in on current developments. “So,” I said. “Who’s up for a trip to New York?”
37 “This is the long way down, and our lives look smaller now.…”
—AFI, “Summer Shudder”
I’VE NEVER BEEN TO NEW YORK. I’ve always wanted to go and I’ve imagined how it would be: buying little dresses at Marc Jacobs, dashing in and out of yellow taxis, and dancing at clubs so underground that they don’t even have names. Forget the tourist sights. Catch you next time, Statue of Liberty.
It didn’t quite happen like that.
MTV and Evan’s record label and my parents hashed out the details of my appearance like they were on the Supreme Court. At first, my parents didn’t want me to miss school on Friday to fly out, but then they relented, and then my mom refused to let MTV’s wardrobe people get ahold of me because, as she put it, “I’ve seen what you people do to these girls.” If my mother had her way, I’d be wearing a turtleneck, a parka, a snow hat, jeans, and boots on national television.
Um, no.
And then I had to tell James about my decision.
The day after the video first aired, we were in my car after school, sitting in the parking lot and waiting for traffic to clear out. “God, don’t do that,” he said, pulling my hand out of my mouth as I chewed on a cuticle. “It makes me crazy when you do that.”
I snatched my hand away from his but didn’t resume chewing. “You could just say, ‘Audrey, please don’t do that,’ you know. You don’t have to lecture me about it.”
Yeah, we weren’t exactly in the best of moods. The video was still first and foremost on James’s mind, while New York was on mine. “All these girls kept coming up to me in history class,” he said, shaking his head at the memory, “and they were like, ‘Was that really you in the video?’ I mean, girls never spoke to me before in their lives, and now this.”
I shrugged. “Welcome to my world.”
“One of them even tried to sit in my lap!”
“Look, I have to tell you something.”
“And all of her little friends were doing that stupid girl giggle, too.”
“Evan called me last night.”
James looked at me like I had shot him. “Evan? Ex-boyfriend Evan?” I think he was feeling the same way I had felt after I saw Sharon Eggleston getting all lovey-dovey on him.
“Yeah. Him.” I took a deep breath. “MTV is doing this big thing in New York this weekend and they want me to come out for it. Do an interview with him on live TV.”
James snorted and glanced out the window. “And you told him to fuck off, I hope.” When I didn’t say anything, James looked at me. It was like hearing a wave just about to crest in the ocean, the sort of silence that indicates all hell is going to break loose.
“I told him that I’d go and do the interview,” I finally said.
I had thought that James would get all flushed and upset, but just the opposite happened: All the blood drained from his face. “You’re going?”
“Yeah. My mom and I are leaving on Friday morning.”
“You’re going to see the same guy who made a video that basically trashed both of us?!”
“I’m not going to see him, I’m going so all of this will just die down! And besides, the video was probably the director’s idea, not Evan’s.”
“Do not defend him,” James shot back. “And you think by going on MTV that this will die down?” He laughed a short, bitter laugh. “Excellent plan.”
“Yeah, actually, it is!” I said. “If people see me and Evan talking and not trying to kill each other, then maybe they’ll get over it! Maybe they won’t think I’m this evil horrible girl who cheated on her boyfriend with you!”
“You’re out of your mind,” James muttered. “This is gonna launch you through the stratosphere. Nothing’s gonna die down. Quit lying to yourself!”
“Look, I’m doing this for us, okay?”
James turned to look at me. “No, you’re doing this for you. But if that helps you sleep at night, fine. What the fuck ever.”
“So what if I do it for me?” I shot back. “Is that bad? Is it so bad that I’m the one who finally gets to make a decision about what’s happening in my life?”
But James wasn’t having it. “Do you know how long I waited to date you, or even just talk to you? Months, Aud, okay? Months. And now this asshole comes back into your life and you’re running back to him, like he never did anything to you! And here’s me, standing like a fucking idiot at the Scooper Dooper, just like before, only now everyone knows me and they know my name and who I am. The moron who got dumped by you.”
I was livid. “Um, excuse me? Did I say I was dumping you? It’s just an interview, not a major life decision!”
“It’s an interview with your ex-boyfriend!”
“Hey, here’s an update, chief. You can’t tell me what to do!”
“Yeah, no shit!”
It was terrible. It was a hundred times worse than our fight over Sharon Eggleston. We were both yelling by this point and people were walking past the car and trying to see what all the commotion was about. “All right!” I finally yelled and tried to catch my breath. “People are looking at us.”
“People are always looking at us,” he growled.
I sighed. “If this gets in the tabloids, I’ll die.”
James began gathering his bag out of the backseat. “The fucking tabloids. We’re arguing about your ex-boyfriend and all you can think about is what everyone else will think.”
“Where are you going?” I said as he shoved his history text into his bag.
“Home. I’ll get a ride with Pierce. Or with Jonah. Whatever. I just want out.”
I watched as he got out and slammed the door shut, then cut through the eucalyptus trees toward the street. People were still watching my car, and I started it up and zoomed home before anyone started to take pictures.
There was no way I was apologizing, either. The Sharon Eggleston thing was my fault, and I’d admitted it, and I’d gone way out of my way to fix it. But this one was all James. He could call me.
But the phone wasn’t ringing.
For the next two days, school was the scariest place I had ever been (except for that one time two summers ago when I accidentally got stuck in the circle pit at Warped). Victoria and I still weren’t talking, James was ignoring me, and walking through those school doors and not knowing who I was going to talk to that day was terrifying.
I was still seeing James and Victoria at school, but I was only catching brief glimpses. Jonah was by Victoria’s side all the time as she studiously ignored me in the halls, but one time, when she was getting something out of her locker, he gave me a secret little wave and one of those “’Sup?” head nods. But instead of making me feel better, it made me want to cry. I couldn’t even do that, though, because if anyone saw or heard, it’d be online in a matter of hours.
Thursday, the day before I left for New York, I was doing the same math problem in my SAT book over and over again, furious that I couldn’t get the right answer, when I felt someone watching me. I turned around and saw Tizzy standing there with a gift in her hand, looking at me with shining eyes. “Hi,” she said in a loud whisper. “Can you talk?”
I gestured around with my hand. “There’s no one here. You do
n’t have to whisper.”
“Oh, right. Right,” she added in a normal voice. “I just saw James walking down the hall. He’s soo cute, Aud! You’re so lucky!”
Apparently she hadn’t heard. Not that it was strange to see James and me apart at school, since I was already apart from everyone, not just my boyfriend. “That’s me,” I said with forced cheer. “Lucky. Just too damn lucky.”
“I know.” She smiled wider and passed the gift to me. “Um, here. This is for you.”
“Me?” I repeated. The box was beautifully wrapped, almost like someone had done it professionally. “Tizzy, you really didn’t have to get—is this Christmas paper?”
“Yeah. I kept trying to give it to you before Christmas, but I couldn’t find you, and then I got the flu and…well, I heard you were going to New York and I just thought, gosh, I better give it to you in case you love it there and end up staying!” She smiled wider. “So merry Christmas two months late!”
I could feel tears pricking at the corners of my eyes. I was officially the worst person in the world. I tried not to think of all the times I had made fun of Tizzy or just blatantly ignored her clumsy enthusiasm. “Um, Tizz, I’m really sorry, but I don’t have a gift for you.”
“Oh, that’s okay! Really! It’s not a big deal at all!”
But it suddenly felt like a huge deal.
“Can I open the gift now?” I asked her. I didn’t care if there was a decaying head in the box, I was going to make the biggest deal out of her gift.
“No!” she said. “Don’t open it now! I’ll get all embarrassed and sweaty and weird! Just, you know, I thought you might like it! You can wear it on MTV or whenever you’re mad at Evan. Or whatever.”
“Well, can I call you after I open it?” I pulled out my phone and started to make a new entry for her, and she eagerly read off her digits as I programmed them into my phone. “Just don’t call after nine,” she warned, “’cause, you know, my mom goes to bed like crazy early.” She shook her head and rolled her eyes. “Totally uncool.”
I smiled. “Before nine. Got it.” Then I stood up and gave her a hug. “Thanks again, Tizzy,” I told her. “Really. That’s so nice of you.”
“Oh, you’re sooo welcome! I mean, it’s all good! Have fun in New York! I’m gonna be watching, don’t worry!”
“I will,” I said, then cleared my throat before my voice could crack.
“Okay, well, um, see you later!” She pulled her backpack higher up on her shoulders and waved goodbye like she was flagging down a plane. She waved until she turned the corner, and I fell into the chair with a heavy sigh and picked up her gift.
It was so nicely wrapped that it broke my heart.
I undid the paper carefully, like my mom always does when we have relatives over to open gifts. A pale blue shirt was inside, and when I shook it out and held it up, I saw the lettering on the front: I LIKED YOU BETTER BEFORE YOU SOLD OUT.
I spent the rest of the afternoon trying to keep tears from dripping all over my stupid SAT book.
By the time my mom and I boarded the plane to New York, I was ready to take off. It had taken me hours to pack the night before, since I didn’t know what I wanted to wear, and I saw them fling my suitcase onto the plane from my window seat in first class. Say what you want about MTV, and I certainly do, but they know how to fly a girl and her mother in style. “They should be flying you first class,” my dad grumbled when he found out. “They’re gonna make millions in advertising off this.”
Next to me, my mom checked her seat belt for the thirty thousandth time. I had forgotten that she was a nervous flyer and mentally braced myself for all the white-knuckled gripping she would be doing for the next six hours. “So,” she said with false enthusiasm. “Are you excited? Ready to take off?”
I looked out the window again and thought of everyone else my age who was getting up, driving to school with their best friend, making out with their boyfriend or girlfriend before the bell rang. I thought of how much I wanted to be like them again.
And I thought of James’s words to me.
“I just want out,” I told my mom. “So let’s go.”
38 “Live through this and you won’t look back.…”
—Stars, “Your Ex-Lover Is Dead”
“WHAT I DON’T UNDERSTAND,” my mom kept saying on Saturday morning at our hotel, “is how you managed to get your entire closet into that suitcase.”
“Lots of squishing,” I replied as I flung three more shirts and a pair of jeans onto the floor. The room was big, but way too small for living with my mother, who liked neatness and order and sweater sets.
Let’s put it this way: She’s not an accessorizer.
“Just wear that nice pink sweater that Grandma sent you for Christmas,” she suggested.
“Didn’t bring it,” I said, burrowing through to find my tights.
“The one thing you didn’t bring,” she sighed. “And it’s so pretty on you. Hey, if you can, you should say hi to Grandma on-camera today. I know she’s watching, she’d love it.”
“Mom!” I finally cried. “Please! I’m about to be on national television! It’s like my entire fashion life has been a dress rehearsal up to this point. I’m not going to look like I fell into the Gap, okay?”
She just looked at me. “You’re nervous about seeing Evan, aren’t you?”
How does she do that? Because until she said it, I didn’t even know I was nervous about seeing Evan, but my mom was right. “I guess,” I sighed. “Maybe. I don’t know.”
“Did something happen with James?” she asked. “Right before we left?” She already knew about my fight with Victoria, but it must have been dubbed a Sensitive Issue by my parents, because neither of them was bringing it up.
“We had a fight,” I admitted. “About me coming here.”
“What did he say?”
I gave her a brief and censored version. “So I don’t know if we’re broken up or what,” I said as I flopped down on the bed. “We’re not talking, which I guess is the same as breaking up. I don’t know. Everything’s all weird.”
My mom sat next to me. “Aud,” she said. “Sometimes you’re gonna have to make decisions that not everyone is going to like. But if you think it’s the right thing to do, you have to do it. Even if your boyfriend doesn’t like it. Even if Victoria doesn’t like it. Heck, even if Dad and I don’t like it. You have to start trusting yourself.”
I thought of how I had walked away from Evan as he called, “Audrey, Wait!” even though I knew I should have gone back to talk to him some more. I thought of how apprehensive I’d been about that L.A. Weekly interviewer and I how I hadn’t wanted to talk to her. And then I thought of my cute, redheaded, possibly ex-boyfriend, who I thought was dorky just because everyone else thought he was dorky.
“I feel like I keep screwing everything up,” I told her. “Every time a big decision happens, I choose the wrong thing and it just gets worse. And now I don’t have a best friend or a boyfriend anymore.”
“Are you kidding?” my mom gasped. “I’m so proud of you! You’ve weathered all of this so well. Not many adults could handle this sort of pressure, and here you are, flying to New York with your head held high.”
“Oh my God, Mom, that is so cheesy. You’ve been watching too many sitcoms.”
My mom just smiled. “I’ll let that one slide,” she said. She pulled my hair over my shoulder and smoothed out the tangles. “Look, if you don’t want to do this interview, you just tell me and we’ll be on the next plane back to California, okay? But if you really want to, then I’m behind you one hundred and ten percent. Just make sure that you’re making decisions for you, not because of what anyone else thinks.”
“Will you still be behind me if I wear those turquoise boots that I got at the swap meet?” I knew she hated those shoes.
“Of course.” She kissed the top of my head and went to stand up. “Way, way behind you.”
39 “MTV, what have you done to me?”<
br />
—Arcade Fire, “Windowsill”
FROM THE MINUTE our car got to the MTV studios, some production assistant named Amy was put in charge of baby-sitting me. She was probably only a few years older than me and had two cell phones, a clipboard that didn’t seem to have much purpose, a walkie-talkie, and a headset. She and two security guards got me and my mom out of the car and into a dressing room upstairs, away from everyone and everything.
And there were many, many everyones and everythings. The streets outside were lined with fans, some of whom had homemade signs and others who had signs that MTV had obviously instructed them to hold. The screaming was not like anything I had heard before, and it looked like the NYPD was brought in to control the crowd.
“So this is where you’ll be until we’re ready for you upstairs,” Amy rattled on as she deposited my mom and me in a dressing room the size of a closet. She talked super fast and I acknowledged her as a fellow caffeine addict. She didn’t look very New Yorky to me, either, which I confirmed later when it turned out she was from Kansas and a junior at NYU.
“Cute shoes,” she said when she saw my turquoise boots, and I had to admit, I was having a stellar fashion day. I had paired the boots with this great black dress that looked like Edward Gorey drew it, and even though I was freezing to death, it was worth it. Plus I got to wear this very mod peacoat that I can never wear in California, so despite all the drama, I was totally loving my outfit. Even though my mom was all, “Are you sure about those boots?” about a million times.
I tried to relax on the ugly tan couch and not think about how I was about to be on live national television, but it was difficult. Mostly because the Do-Gooders had arrived and Amy’s walkie-talkie kept going off with announcements like “The talent is five minutes away!” “The talent has arrived!” “The water for the talent is not in the dressing room. I repeat, the water for the talent is not in the dressing room!”
“The talent wants their M&Ms sorted alphabetically,” I said at one point, rolling my eyes. “The alent-tay wants everyone to speak pig latin for the next inety-nay inutes-may.” It still amazed me that Evan and the rest of the band were considered “talent,” much less that people were falling over themselves to bring them water. (Keep in mind that these were the same guys who once had a contest to see how much bologna the four of them could eat. And let me tell you, in a bologna-eating contest, nobody wins.)