It was all about this girl who was sitting in a car with her best guy friend after a movie. And they’re just sitting there, talking about the movie and all kinds of other things, but all the girl can think about is how bad she wants the boy to kiss her. And it’s this weird running loop in her head, where everything is completely normal on the outside, but inside she’s just freaking out. The whole story takes place over, like, ten minutes, but it feels much longer because of the girl’s thoughts.
My teacher loved it—she gave me an A plus and told me it was one of the best-written things she’d read in her five years of teaching the class. She told me I had a great imagination and an aptitude for writing.
I believed her about the aptitude for writing part, since I’d always scored really well in English and on any kind of verbal standardized tests. But the imagination part I wasn’t so sure about.
I mean, nothing in the story was really made up—the exact thing had happened to me when Liam had driven me home from a movie the weekend before. It was this twisty sci-fi indie movie that Izzy had refused to see with him, and we talked about the characters and the plot and if the premise really worked, and I sat there the whole time wishing more than anything he would kiss me.
The only thing in the story that had been made up was the ending—in the story, the boy reached over and unhooked the girl’s seat belt and kissed her and it was perfect. In real life, Liam had looked at the clock and said it was getting late and he needed to get home so he could call Izzy before he went to bed.
I got out of the car and went inside and threw myself down on my bed and stared at the ceiling for a while, and then I opened a fresh Word document and wrote the story. It made me feel better, like I was rewriting the ending of my life or something.
After that, I started writing more about me and Liam, and somewhere along the way I realized my little stories would make a pretty good book. It’s more than halfway written now, and I think when it’s done I’m going to try to do something with it, like send it to publishers and see if there’s any interest.
“No one’s going to steal your writing,” Liam says. “I promise. Those hackers are just looking for passwords so they can send out a bunch of phishing emails from your account. If you reset your password, it should be fine.”
“Thanks,” I say. “Because yeah, it would totally suck if my writing got out there.” Especially to you, I think. Ha-ha.
By the time the bus pulls into the airport, I’m starting to think listening to that email might not be such a good idea. I know I sent it as a way to set a deadline for myself, to make sure I told Liam how I felt before graduation. But when you really think about it, nothing good can come of it.
I mean, if he says he doesn’t feel the same way, I’m going to be upset, and it’s going to ruin not only the rest of my trip, but probably the rest of my senior year. If he says he does feel the same way, then I’m going to have to figure out a way to tell Izzy.
But the biggest reason not to tell Liam is because I don’t like the way all this obsessing is making me feel. My life is about more than Liam. Yes, I like him a lot. Yes, I might be in love with him. Yes, it’s hard to see him with someone else and pretend I only like him as a friend, especially when I think he and I are perfect for each other.
But do I really want to spend the whole trip obsessing about him like this? It’s ridiculous.
The bus lurches to a stop, and Liam stands up. “You ready?” he asks.
“Yes,” I say firmly, grabbing my bag and following him down the aisle.
It’s all settled.
Email or not, deadline or not, some secrets are just supposed to stay that way.
TWO
BUT AS WE WALK INTO THE AIRPORT, MY phone starts buzzing.
I look down.
Before graduation, I will . . . tell the truth.
Crap. Lyla, Quinn, and I set those dumb emails to repeat all day so that we couldn’t ignore them.
Wait.
Lyla, Quinn, and I . . . that means those two are probably going to get their emails today, too! My heart leaps. I’m always looking for an excuse to talk to Lyla and Quinn. They were my best friends until we got into a stupid fight a couple of years ago, and I’ve never really gotten over it.
“Are you okay?” Liam asks. “You’re acting kind of out of it.”
“I’m fine!” I say a little too brightly. “I’m just . . . ah, you know, afraid to fly.” It’s a lie. I’m not afraid of flying. I love to fly. I bring one of those little masks you wear over your eyes and I fall right asleep. I like knowing I’m up in the sky, floating through the clouds and not even really being able to tell unless the plane hits some turbulence . . . it’s very soothing, everything being blocked out.
“Since when are you afraid to fly?” Liam asks. “You love flying.”
“Usually I do,” I say. “But, ah, the terror alert level was raised this morning.”
He wrinkles his forehead. “No, it wasn’t.”
“Yeah, I think it was. I saw something about it on Twitter.”
“That would be a really big deal,” he says. “So I think we would have heard about it.” He reaches over and takes my bag from me. He’s such a gentleman. Most guys my age wouldn’t even notice that I have a bag, and here Liam is, taking it from me so I don’t have to carry it. He’s so sweet.
“Well, maybe not,” I say.
“Maybe we wouldn’t have heard about it?”
“No, maybe . . . maybe I got it wrong,” I trail off lamely. Wow. I really am acting a little crazy today. I think it’s because I’m too in my head. Usually I work my problems out by talking them through with someone. Like Liam. Or Izzy. But obviously I can’t talk about this problem with either one of them.
I try to imagine what they would say if I asked them about it, if I wasn’t talking about Liam, if it was some other guy I was in love with. Liam would probably tell me to go for it. He would say, “Any guy who doesn’t like you back isn’t worth it, Aven” and “You have to take some risks, Aven” and “I can’t believe you’ve been in love with this guy for years and you haven’t told him, Aven.” It’s weird, thinking about Liam giving me advice about some imaginary guy and telling me that if a guy doesn’t like me, he’s not worth it.
Izzy would tell me to keep my mouth shut. She’d say that if a guy liked me, he’d let me know, that there’s no way any teenage boy could go years being friends with a girl and not tell her how he really felt.
“I’m going to go grab a soda before we board,” Liam says. “You want anything?”
“No, that’s okay.”
He leaves, and I take a deep breath and look around the airport. I pick a seat in the middle of the boarding area and sit down. I’m all jittery, though, the calmness I was feeling this morning apparently deciding it was done with me.
A few seconds later, someone taps me on my shoulder, and I’m so keyed up I almost scream.
But it’s only Izzy.
“Hi,” I say. “Where’ve you been? We were looking for you when we got off the bus, but we couldn’t—”
“Can I talk to you for a second?” she asks, cutting me off. Her eyes look a little wild.
“Oh,” I say. “Um, yeah, sure.”
She glances around, like she’s looking to see if someone’s watching us. “Where’s Liam?” she asks.
“Oh,” I say. “He went to get a soda. Do you want to talk to him, too?”
“No!” Izzy shakes her head vehemently. She grabs my hand and grips it so hard I’m afraid she’s going to leave marks. “I can’t talk to Liam. I . . . I need to talk to you alone.”
“Okay,” I say. Wow. She sounds serious. And whatever she has to tell me must have something to do with Liam. Something she doesn’t want him to hear. Is she going to break up with him? Is she going to dump him right here in the airport, before we even go on our trip?
Will Liam be upset? Will I have to console him the whole time we’re in Florida, stroking his hair and letting hi
m listen to sad music? I’ll order him pizza and get beer somehow, letting him eat and drink his sorrows away, until finally we’ll fall into bed together, our limbs intertwined, our lips just inches from touching.
“I always thought you were too good for her,” I’ll whisper.
And then he’ll kiss me.
Of course, I don’t want to be his rebound. Or his drunken hookup. That would defeat the whole purpose. So maybe we won’t hook up that night. My fantasy changes to one of me consoling Liam all night, until he finally feels well enough for a walk on the beach the next morning, the kind of walk that involves a splash fight and him picking me up and twirling me around before setting me down gently on the sand. The kind of walk that ends with Liam pushing my hair off my face while he gazes down at me, his eyes on mine as it hits him in that moment how perfect we are together.
“We can’t talk here,” Izzy says, pulling me out of my fantasy. “We need to go somewhere private.”
I glance around, but there’s really nowhere private to go when our whole senior class (minus Stori Knolls and Taylor Racine, who couldn’t attend due to disciplinary action against them for a huge scandal that involved shoplifting and filing a false police report) is surrounding us.
“The bathroom,” Izzy declares. She practically wrenches my arm out of my socket pulling me toward the restrooms, which are surprisingly deserted.
There’s a woman washing her hands at one of the sinks, but that’s about it. Still, Izzy insists on looking under every single stall door, making sure no one’s there, listening.
“I don’t think anyone’s in here,” I offer helpfully, but she just shoots me a look and continues with her detective work.
Wow. She must really not want anyone to know what it is she’s about to tell me. Can it really be that bad? Maybe she cheated on Liam! Maybe she cheated on Liam and now she’s going to break up with him so she can be with her new guy.
I’ll bet it’s John Travers. She’s always flirting with him during lunch, stealing chicken tenders off his plate and pretending she’s into the weird heavy metal music he’s always listening to. Also, I’m pretty sure she stole some pictures of him from the yearbook office. She had these printouts of him that fell out of her notebook a few weeks ago, which I thought was kind of weird. She’s not even on yearbook, but her friend Sarah is, and she probably—
“Come on,” Izzy says, pulling me into a stall.
“Okay,” I say, shaking my head once we’re inside. “This is awkward. Can’t we just talk out there?”
“Someone could come in,” Izzy says. And that’s when I notice her blue eyes are filled with tears. They’re even more blue when they’re all watery like that. Liam has blue eyes, too. Which means that if the two of them ever had a kid, their child would have blue eyes. I have brown eyes. Which means if I had a kid with Liam, it might have blue eyes, but most likely it would end up with normal old muddy brown. We learned all about it in tenth-grade biology.
I wonder if that’s why Liam’s predisposed to be with Izzy instead of me. Maybe it’s just simple genetics. Like he needs to be with someone who has blue eyes to keep his genes relevant or something. It’s like how girls are attracted to strong guys because they’re the ones who will be able to keep the population going. Although I’m not sure how having blue-eyed children is good for evolution. Maybe it’s more about protecting what you have.
Quinn would know. Quinn, my ex–best friend, is into all that science-y stuff. She wants to be a doctor, and she’s going to Stanford in the fall. At least, that was her plan. I try not to think about the fact that I haven’t talked to Quinn in two years, that I have no idea if her college plans have changed, if she even wants to be a doctor anymore.
You’ll talk to her this weekend, a little voice in my head whispers. After what you did with the room assignments, you’ll be forced to.
But I push that thought out of my mind immediately. I should really only be dealing with one friendship issue at a time. Not that Quinn’s my friend anymore. But still. I need to deal with Izzy, and the fact that she’s standing right here in front of me, looking like maybe she’s about to burst into tears.
“Iz,” I say. “Sweetie, what’s wrong?”
“It’s Liam,” she says. She takes a deep breath, and I can tell she’s trying really hard not to cry. “Aven, you can’t tell him what I’m about to tell you.” She shakes her head vehemently, like whatever she’s about to say is some kind of state secret or something. “I feel awful asking you to keep a secret from him, but I don’t know what else to do. I don’t have anyone else to talk to about this, and I’m at my wit’s end.”
“Okay,” I say automatically, starting to feel really concerned. I know I was hoping that maybe Izzy cheated on Liam, but that was just a fantasy. I don’t want Izzy to be hurting. I don’t want her to be this upset.
“I think Liam’s cheating on me,” she says.
“What?” I shake my head. “Izzy, that’s crazy.”
“Is it?” she asks. “Is it really?”
“Yeah. Liam would never do that to you.” It’s true. I’m not just saying that to make her feel better. Liam would never cheat on anyone. He’s too good and perfect.
Izzy gives a bitter little laugh, which is actually kind of disturbing. It makes her sound slightly deranged.
“Um, well, why do you think he’s cheating on you?” I ask gently.
She reaches into her purse and pulls out a packet of Swedish Fish. She rips open the packet and hands one to me. I reach out and take it, then pop it into my mouth. Izzy always has candy on hand, because she’s hypoglycemic. If her blood sugar starts to fall, she needs to eat something sweet right away or she could faint. When I first met her, I found it really annoying, the way she was always pulling candy out and eating it. Everything about her was just so damn delicate. At first I even thought she might be lying about it. Or at least exaggerating. And then one night we went to the movies and she almost collapsed on the way out. I had to buy her Sour Patch Kids and an extra-large soda.
“He’s just been acting really weird lately.” She bites the head off a fish rather aggressively. “He’s always on his phone, and he’s been making excuses to avoid spending time with me.”
“He’s been busy,” I say. “With his music.”
“No one’s that busy with their music,” she says. “And besides, since when does his music get in the way of hanging out?”
She’s right. Even when Liam would be super into making his songs, he’d always do it late at night, or invite Izzy and me over to keep him company while he worked. We’d sit and watch movies in his basement and eat snacks while he composed songs on the computer. He’d play them for us when he was done and ask our opinions, and Izzy would roll her eyes while I gave him my feedback.
But Izzy’s right. We haven’t been doing that lately. I just figured maybe Izzy and Liam were finally getting sick of me being the third wheel all the time and had started hanging out alone.
“Just because Liam wants to make music by himself doesn’t mean he’s cheating on you,” I say. “He probably just wants to be alone. Maybe he got sick of us bothering him.” It could definitely be true. Sometimes if Izzy and I get bored, our behavior starts devolving. One time we started having giggling fits and throwing gummy worms at the back of Liam’s head. It was extremely childish. Not that he really seemed to mind that much. But maybe he was just being nice.
“It’s not just that,” she says. “It’s . . . we haven’t had sex in a couple of weeks.”
“Oh.” My face burns. Of course I knew they were having sex. At least, I assumed they were. Why wouldn’t they be? They’ve been together for six months. I usually try not to think about it, although occasionally it’s kind of hard to ignore. Like a couple of months ago when I opened Liam’s desk drawer to get a pen and I found a box of condoms. I told myself it didn’t mean they were sleeping together, that Liam could be holding on to them just in case, like when they handed out condoms at school and
all the guys took them to make it seem like they were having sex, even the ones who weren’t.
But now that Izzy’s confirming it, it’s just another reminder that she has access to a part of Liam I don’t, that no matter how much Liam and I talk about his music and his family and what he wants to do with his life and politics and millions of other things, she’s the one he kisses, the one he touches, the one he apparently has sex with. And everyone knows that sex trumps everything.
“Is that . . . is that not normal for you guys?” I ask, not sure I really want to know the answer.
“Yes.” She nods. “We have sex a lot. And lately he just . . . hasn’t been interested.” Her tears finally spill over, leaving shiny tracks on her cheeks. I wish she was at least an ugly crier, but even her crying is delicate.
“That doesn’t mean he’s cheating on you,” I say. “Maybe it’s just a normal settling down. Like how they say married couples don’t have that much sex.”
“But we’re not married!”
“Yeah, but maybe it’s not about being married, maybe it’s just about being together for a while.”
She shakes her head, almost like she wants to discount the possibility that everything could be okay, that their lack of sex is just something normal. “No,” she says. “It’s not just that. He’s just been really distant lately. Have you noticed anything?”
“I mean, I’ve noticed we haven’t been going over to his house as much, but I guess I didn’t really think much of it.” I rack my brain, trying to think if I’ve noticed Liam acting differently. I guess maybe he’s been on his phone more. But has he really? Or am I just looking for things that aren’t really there?
“You have to ask him,” Izzy says, sounding desperate. “Please, Aven.”
“No way,” I say, shaking my head. “I can’t do that.”
“Why? He’ll tell you. He tells you everything.”
“No, he doesn’t,” I say, shaking my head. Still. I can’t help feeling slightly flattered that she thinks Liam trusts me enough to tell me if he’s cheating on her. “And besides, it’s a no-win. If he tells me he isn’t, you’re just going to think he’s lying so that I won’t tell you. And if he tells me he is, then he’s obviously going to ask me not to tell you. And if I do, he’s going to know.”