I got an A. Written right below it was, “Only one in the class! Great work!” The last time a teacher wrote anything about me that ended with a ! and was positive, I was in middle school.
After all that, I figured my day couldn’t get any worse.
Or stranger.
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I was totally wrong.
Mel and Beth are together. Like, actually doing the whole boyfriend-and-girlfriend thing together. I found out in English, when they walked into class holding hands. Corn Syrup came in right after they did. She looked fine. We broke into our groups and she argued with Mel and totally ignored me. She would have ignored Patrick too, if he’d been there, but he wasn’t.
It was like yesterday and the stuff she said never happened. Was it all an act? Or—wait—maybe some sort of plan to—oh, forget it. I have no friends, no life, nothing.
Beth wouldn’t waste her time trying to get me. I’m not worth noticing. And Corn Syrup certainly wouldn’t do anything on her own. Yesterday was . . .
Yesterday, she was probably just high from the fumes of her hair products or something.
Caro really did seem fine about the Mel and Beth thing. Mel was acting kind of weird though. He ignored me except to ask if I knew where Patrick was (like I’m his keeper) and spent all of class arguing with Caro and giving her these looks, like he was trying to ask her a question without saying anything.
Beth walked by just as Caro looked like she was going to say something to him, and ran her fingers along the back of his neck. Mel immediately got that stupid glazed-152
over expression guys get when they’re thinking about getting laid.
I glanced at Caro, and she was just smiling away, grinning at Mel and Beth like they were adorable and not nauseating. I suppose if they’d started going at it she would have offered up her desk for them to use.
Beth said—to Corn Syrup, obviously, and not me, “So, what about Friday? Did you ask about Joe?”
“Not yet, but it’s been, like, all I’ve been thinking about since you told me,” Caro said, and if her smile had gotten any wider her face would have cracked. She turned to Mel. “Can you find out if Joe’s going to be at Tammy’s party?”
“Joe Regent?” Mel sounded shocked. Joe was this honors guy who somehow managed to make the foot-ball team. He was a big deal for them, but to me he’d always be the guy who told Julia her eyes were “like velvet” and then got all teary-eyed after she laughed at him.
Caro nodded. “He’s hot, and I want to know if he’s coming because . . . you know.”
Mel frowned, and when the bell rang, he bolted into the hallway. Beth looked so pissed that I laughed out loud.
She didn’t even glance at me, of course, but Caro did. Her eyes were narrowed and unhappy-looking.
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“He probably went to look for Patrick,” she told Beth.
Her eyes were wide and happy again.
“Yeah, I know that, Caro. I don’t know why Mel still hangs out with him. What are you wearing to the party?”
“I don’t know. I totally need your help.” She smiled, jammed her book in her bag, tossed her hair back, and walked out with Beth. Still the perfect follower except her left hand, hanging by her side, was curled up tight, an angry silent fist. I walked behind her and Beth all the way down the hall, and Caro’s hand never unknotted.
That’s when I knew why yesterday happened.
Yesterday, when Caro followed me, when we hung out, Mel and Beth were already together. They must have hooked up after the movie, and I’ll bet anything that yesterday morning was when Caro found out. It would be just like Beth to wait and tell her at school. To say,
“Oh, I thought I told you! I mean, everyone totally knows already,” and then give her every single detail so she could watch Caro’s face. So everyone could see Caro’s face.
Caro came after me to get away. That’s why she was so upset. It wasn’t because of what I said and later, us hanging out—it wasn’t about me. It was about her wanting to pretend she wasn’t going to go along and act like everything was fine. I was safe to talk to, safe to vent at. It was 154
middle school all over again, except this time she didn’t even have to worry that Beth might find out. The thing is—
The thing is, I thought Caro maybe wanted to be friends. Not hang-out-in-school friends or anything like that, but just . . . I don’t know. That maybe we might talk sometime or something. I thought—I thought we did talk yesterday. I thought we talked for real.
I am so stupid.
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124 days
J,
I swear, today has actually been three days. Every day has been like that lately.
Things with my parents are horrid. We’ve talked about me skipping school (How’s it going now? Do you think you know why you skipped?) so much I almost want to tell them about Corn Syrup to get them to shut up. But I don’t want their pity, J. I want them to just stop trying. They keep looking at me, smiling these brittle, scared
