“Whatever,” I say. I snap my phone shut and take a deep breath. After a few seconds, I turn back around and head back to the truck. I cannot wait until this trip is over.
courtney the trip
Day One, 1:47 p.m.
I’m going to throw up again. “I’m going to throw up again,” I tell Jordan, feeling it rising up in my throat. We’re back on the highway now, and he signals and pulls over quickly to the side of the road. I open the door and lean out, throwing up onto the pavement. This is so disgusting. Seriously. I hate throwing up. I have this really bad phobic fear of it. I go to great lengths not to throw up, and until today, I hadn’t thrown up since the fourth grade. Fourth grade! That’s like eight years. It’s a real phobia, too. Throwing up, I mean. I know no one likes to throw up, but it’s proven that some people are really scared of it. Like me. And some celebrities. Matthew McConaughey, I think.
“You okay?” Jordan asks, and I feel his hand on my back.
“Yeah, I’m okay,” I lie, wiping my mouth on the back of my hand. Gross, gross, gross. I’ll bet his MySpace girl never throws up all over herself when they’re together. I’ll bet they’re too busy having sex to eat anything that might cause her stomach to get all sketch.
“You sure?” Jordan asks. “You don’t look okay.”
“Gee, thanks,” I say, slamming the door shut.
Jordan hands me a napkin. “Uh, here,” he says, “you might want to wipe your mouth.”
I take the napkin from him and turn away, wiping the drool off my mouth. Have I mentioned this is really disgusting?
I throw the napkin into the ashtray and push the seat back again, reclining all the way back. It’s actually very easy to trick yourself into not throwing up. You just lay back, perfectly still and straight, close your eyes, and try not to move.
“Hey, Court?”
“Yes?” I ask, trying not to move my mouth in case it sets off some kind of motion wave to my stomach.
“Listen, I think maybe we should check into a hotel somewhere,” he says, sounding hesitant, like he doesn’t want to piss me off. “You’re obviously sick, and you need to rest.”
“I’m fine,” I say. “And besides, it would mess up the schedule.” Is he crazy? We’re already way behind thanks to his lollygagging this morning. Plus the traffic. Plus the long bathroom lines at the rest stop. Plus my throwing up.
“Are you sure?” he says, “Because I saw a sign a few miles back for a Days Inn coming up.”
“It. Would. Mess. Up. The. Schedule.”
“Okay,” he says, looking at me out of the corner of his eye. “Are you sure?”
“YES.” Of course I’m sure. I’m not going to let throwing up stop me from getting to college on time.
Two miles later, after we’ve had to pull over three more times so I can throw up, he pulls off at the next exit and follows the sign that says DAYS INN. I don’t stop him.
So this is really awkward. Jordan’s checking into the Days Inn, which is a completely and totally unscheduled stop, and the front desk clerk has assumed we want one room. This place is kind of sketch (the clerk asked us for how long we wanted the room, and I think he meant in hours), and there are some very scantily dressed girls standing outside. Which is weird, because it’s four in the afternoon. Definitely not late enough for prostitution. Although maybe I’ve been conditioned by the media to think prostitutes only come out after midnight. Like this one special I saw once about hookers who frequent truckstops. They call them “lot lizards” and they only come out at night.
“Yes,” Jordan says. “We’ll take the one room.”
“No,” I say. “We’ll take two.”
The guy looks nervously between the two of us. “No, we won’t,” Jordan says, turning out to look at me. I’m sprawled in one of the chairs in the “lobby,” which is really a foyer. I have vomit on my shirt, my hair is coming out of my ponytail, and on the way in here, I almost fell over and Jordan had to take my bag. “Court, you’re sick. I’m not leaving you by yourself.”
“Fine,” I say. “But two beds.”
“Of course,” Jordan says, rolling his eyes.
Of course two beds. I forgot for a moment that Jordan has a girlfriend. One who he obviously loves enough to leave me for, which means there’s no way the thought of sharing a bed with me would have crossed his mind. For the first time, I wonder what his girlfriend thinks of the fact that Jordan is here, on a trip with me. She’s probably one of those super-secure girls who is all confident in her relationship. How annoying.
Conversations About Me Jordan Had with His Girlfriend (A Deluded Fantasy by Courtney Elizabeth McSweeney):
Jordan: So I’m stuck going on this trip with Courtney.
Mercedes: Okay.
Jordan: Just so you know, nothing’s going to happen.
Mercedes (starts taking her clothes off so she and Jordan can have sex): I know.
Jordan: You want to have sex again? We just finished two hours ago.
Mercedes (climbs on top of him): Yes. (Pauses.) This Courtney girl or whatever her name is, she’s not cute, is she?
Jordan: No.
Mercedes: Cool.
Jordan picks up our bags and starts down the hall. “Room 103,” he says, reading off the card the front desk guy gave him. I’m concentrating on making it down the hall without passing out, since the floor seems to be spinning. I’m watching my feet (which are cased in very cute purple sandals) as I move one in front of the other, trying not to lose it. One. Two. Step. Step. Ha, like that song by Ciara. “I love it when you one, two step.” Although I don’t think Ciara was trying to keep herself upright while walking down a hotel room hallway with her ex-boyfriend who she was still in love with when she wrote that song. I think Ciara was having dance parties and fun and all sorts of really good things that had nothing to do with nausea or horrible road trips.
I lean against the door frame as Jordan slides the plastic card into the electronic sensor that will let us into our room. A green light flashes and he holds the door open for me. I push by him, and as I do, my chest brushes against his, and for a second, I lose my breath, but then I’m past him and it’s over. I slide onto one of the beds and drop my bag onto the floor.
Whoever was in the room before left the air conditioner on full-blast, and it feels good. I’m hot. I lean back on the bed and close my eyes.
“You okay?” Jordan asks, plopping himself down on the other bed.
“Yeah,” I say. “I’m fine.”
He picks the remote off the floor and turns on the TV. The sounds of ESPN come blaring out of the speakers.
I pick my suitcase up off the floor and head to the bathroom without telling him where I’m going. I take a long, cool shower, then change into a pair of soft pink pajama shorts and a black spaghetti-strapped tank top. I feel much better. I pull my cell out of my purse. Three missed calls. My dad. Jocelyn. And Lloyd.
Shit. Lloyd. I almost forgot about him.
Whatever, I’m not going to think about that now. La, la, la. Just going to call Jocelyn back. I dial her cell number.
“Hey,” I say when she answers. “Did you call?”
“Yeah,” she says. “I wanted to see how you were feeling.”
I hear the sound of car horns honking in the background.
“Uh, Joce?” I ask. “What are you doing?”
“I’m tailing B. J. to McDonald’s,” she says, sounding satisfied.
“Tailing B. J. to McDonald’s?” I repeat dumbly. She can’t be serious. Who does that outside of Veronica Mars?
“Yeah,” she says. “I’m following him to see if he goes to Katelyn’s.”
“Who?”
“Katelyn Masters. Who he hooked up with freshman year?”
“Why would he be going to see Katelyn Masters?” I ask, confused.
“Because she left him a MySpace message that was semi-flirty, and then today he was very vague about what he was doing. So I headed over to his house and waited outside unti
l he left. And now he’s at McDonald’s, and I’m following him to see where else he’s going.” MySpace is seriously going to be responsible for everyone losing their minds.
“Aren’t you afraid he’s going to see you?”
“No, not at all,” she says. “I’m staying far enough behind him, and besides, I’m in my mom’s car.”
“Why are you in your mom’s car?” Jocelyn has a perfectly good car, a black Honda Civic, which her parents bought her a few months ago as an early graduation present.
“Duh,” she says. “Because I don’t want him to figure out I’m following him.”
“Hey, Joce?” I say, trying to sound gentle. “Wouldn’t it be easier just to ask him where exactly he’s going?”
“Courtney,” she says, sighing in exasperation. “I can’t ask him! He’ll think I don’t trust him.”
“You obviously don’t.”
“Asshole!” Jocelyn screams. “Sorry, some guy tried to cut me off while turning in to Home Depot. What were you saying?”
“I don’t remember,” I say, scared by Jocelyn’s sudden road rage.
“Oh, right, about B. J. and me. How I don’t trust him.”
“Why would you want to be with someone you don’t trust?”
“I wouldn’t. But what if I confront him on it and it turns out not to be true, and he breaks up with me because he thinks I don’t trust him?”
“But you don’t!”
“True.” She considers this. “But it could be all my own psychosis.”
“Probably.”
More car horns honking. “I gotta go—I think B. J.’s coming out of the drive-thru, and I don’t want to lose him.”
“I’ll call ya later,” I say, clicking off.
I look at the phone and consider calling Lloyd, but then I slide it back into my bag. I’ll deal with it later.
When I get back to the room, Jordan’s sitting on the bed, flipping between a poker tournament and a baseball game.
“Hey,” he says. “You okay?”
“Yeah,” I tell him. “I’m fine.” The truth is, I don’t know if I’m fine or not. Suddenly, I feel totally exhausted, like I can’t even move. I haul myself up onto the second bed, pull the covers down, and grab one of the pillows from the top of the bed. I move it to the bottom. I like to sleep upside down on beds. Plus, the way the room is set up, the TV is closer to the bottom of the bed, so it makes sense. Not that I care about watching poker. But I wouldn’t mind watching the baseball game.
“Who’s playing?” I ask Jordan. My eyes feel really heavy, and my throat feels scratchy from throwing up so much.
“The Devil Rays and the Yankees,” he says softly, looking at me. I meet his eye for a second, and then look away. Jordan and I spent almost every night this summer watching the Devil Rays on TV. And on one of our very first dates, we went to a game. Whatever. Not thinking about it. “Do you want to watch something else?” he asks.
“No,” I say, my eyes closing. “I’m really, really tired.”
“Yeah,” he says. “You should probably get some rest.”
“Probably,” I say. I must have fallen asleep in about two minutes, because the next thing I know, I open my eyes, and the clock says it’s four in the morning. Which means I’ve slept for like fifteen hours. My stomach feels hollow and tired, like it’s been through an ordeal. Which I guess it has. I let my eyes adjust to the darkness of the room. And then I realize Jordan’s next to me, sleeping, his arms wrapped around me, our legs tangled together under the blanket.
before jordan
123 Days Before the Trip, 4:30 p.m.
I’m trying to kiss Courtney McSweeney. If you had asked me six months ago if I would ever be making out with Courtney McSweeney, I would have said no, absofuckinglutely not. But here I am, trying to get her to kiss me. We’re parked in front of her house, sitting in my car, and somehow I pulled her close to me before she could get out of the car. Which she let me do. But then, when I went to kiss her, she turned her head.
“Not gonna happen,” she says, her voice muffled against my chest.
“Why not?” I ask, wondering if I’ve underestimated her. Maybe she’s a game player, one of those girls who makes you work for it. The weird thing is, I’m usually into that, but thinking about Courtney messing with my head is disappointing for some reason.
“Because,” she says. “Once you cross that line with someone, you can never take it back.”
“What do you mean?” I ask. Why would she want to take it back? I’m a very good kisser. Or so I’ve been told.
“I mean that once you kiss someone, all this other stuff comes into it, whether you want it to or not.”
“Not necessarily,” I say. I’m stroking her hair now, and all she would have to do is move her face about two inches and tilt it up, and we’d be kissing.
“It does,” she says. “It brings all kinds of drama you never have to deal with if you just stay friends.”
“Not true.” I try to pull her closer, which doesn’t really work, because she’s already as close as she’s going to get. “I’ve had hookups that haven’t resulted in any kind of drama.”
“None whatsoever?”
“Nope.”
“No broken hearts?”
“Nope.”
“No psychotic prank phone calls?”
“Nope.”
“No feeling like you wanted to throw up and/or kill her new boyfriend?”
“Nope.”
“Name one girl you hooked up with that you’re still friends with.”
“Nope.”
“That’s what I thought,” she says smugly. Although being smug really makes no sense here, because I think she really does want to kiss me. Otherwise why would she be leaning against me like that?
“You tricked me,” I say.
“So do it, then. Name one girl you hooked up with that you’re still friends with.”
“It doesn’t have to be dramatic,” I say, ignoring her request. “It can just be about…the moment.”
“I’m not good with the moment,” she says. “I’m always worried about what’s going to happen next.”
“You should stop worrying,” I say. And then I reach down and tilt her face up toward mine, and I kiss her. She doesn’t pull away. Her mouth is on mine, and our tongues are together, and my hands are on her face. And it’s really, really nice. She pulls away first, and we lean our heads together.
“That was nice,” I say, smiling.
“That was such a mistake,” she says, smiling back. And then she gets out of my car and heads into her house without looking back.
When I get to my house fifteen minutes later, my mom is sitting at the kitchen table. So much for waiting it out and hiding until I got up the courage to confront her. She’s wearing a purple sweater set and a cream-colored skirt. Which is weird. Because she looks…normal. Not like she was just fucking some random dude on the couch that her and my dad picked out for their anniversary.
“Jordan,” she says, standing up and smoothing down her skirt. Her eyes glance at me nervously and I look away. “Listen, we should talk.”
“I don’t know if we have anything to talk about,” I say simply. I’m trying to figure out the best way to work this to my advantage. I’m pissed.
“We have to,” she says. “Sit down.”
I pull out a chair from the kitchen table and plop down across from her.
“What do you want to talk about?” I look at her, and suddenly, I’m really, really scared. It’s something on her face. Because here’s the thing—up until this point, I figured it was just a random thing. Maybe her and a client were working late and got carried away. They started kissing, I came in, and she sent him home after she came to her senses. That’s how these things usually work, don’t they? I curse myself for watching Laguna Beach instead of learning valuable life lessons on The OC.
“I think we need to talk about what went on here the other night.” She bites her lip again and look
s around nervously.
“What about it?”
“Jordan, I really, really, need for you not to tell your father about what happened until I have a chance to talk with him.”
“You can’t be serious,” I say. “There’s no way I’m not going to tell Dad about this.” She must be delusional. Does she really think I would keep this kind of huge secret from my dad? How can she even expect me to do that?
“Jordan,” she says, “I have the right to be able to tell him on my own time, on my own grounds.” She tugs on the hem of her skirt nervously. “That’s the only way we’re going to be able to work it out.”
“Whatever,” I say, heading to the refrigerator and grabbing a Coke out of the side door. “I’m staying out of it. In fact, I’m totally over it.”
I leave her standing in the kitchen and head up to my room, where I spend the next two hours listening to rap music on my iPod and thinking about how it felt to kiss Courtney McSweeney.
courtney the trip
Day Two, 4:07 a.m.
I lay there for a second, not really sure what I’m supposed to do. I mean, Jordan is in the same bed with me. Wrapped around me. A part of me wants to scream, to push him off, to flip out, and possibly kick him in the balls. But it feels good. To be close to him. And I realize that I’m probably never going to be this close to him again. Ever. So maybe I should just give into it for a little while, hold on to this last thing.
I can feel his chest moving next to me, up and down with his breathing, and his arms feel strong around me. My stomach grumbles, probably because it’s empty. What a pain in the ass. I know I can’t eat anything, because if I do, I’m going to end up sick again.
I push Jordan’s hand off my shoulder. It bumps my head. Great. Why is he in this bed with me? Is it possible I got into some kind of weird delusional state because of my apparent food poisoning and then grabbed him and pulled him into bed with me? Maybe it was a fugue. We learned about those in psych class. I’m horrified.
I push his arm up and over my head, trying not to wake him up. The last thing I want is for him to be aware of the fact that we’re in this position. Maybe it happened naturally. Like in movies, when guys and girls are always falling asleep and not realizing they’re getting wrapped around each other. Maybe it’s our bodies’ way of telling us we were meant to be. Or maybe I, like, cuddle raped him or something.