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“Well, that’s great,” Dad said. “I guess you won’t need me to pick you up tomorrow.”
“No, I will. You have to drive me to her house because Caro can’t let anyone see me and her hanging out at school.”
“I’m sure that’s not the case,” Dad said in a too-hearty voice that made even him look like he wanted to wince.
“Your father can drop you off,” Mom said, and then changed the subject to the latest company Dad was trying to work with, putting her hand on top of his.
I figured that meant all the phone calls that hadn’t led to a glittering social life let her see this wasn’t a big deal.
As usual, I was wrong.
When I got home tonight, Mom was waiting for me, and as soon as I came in she said, “So, how was it? Did you have fun?”
I shrugged.
“What did you do?”
I looked at her. “We drove to Millertown. We picked up a bowling trophy for her dad, and then we got cheese fries. Then she drove me home, and here I am. Now I’m going to go work on the presentation we have to do tomorrow.”
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I walked off before she could say anything else. I didn’t want to talk about the afternoon with her. I just—I don’t know.
It was fun. I had fun. The trophy me and Caro picked up—it was unbelievable. It was almost as tall as I am, and on top there was a guy standing with his arms in a victory V, one hand holding a bowling ball. We started laughing as soon as we saw it, and when we were eating our fries, she said, “Mom’s already made my dad swear to keep it in the basement,” and then imitated them arguing about it.
I laughed so hard my sides hurt.
We didn’t talk about school, we didn’t even talk about Beth or Mel. We just . . . we just got a stupid trophy and ate fries, nothing really, but the whole time I didn’t feel as bad as I usually do. I didn’t hate myself so much.
Mom didn’t quit, though. She came up to my room a few minutes later and said, “Well, I think it’s great you went out. And you know what? I was thinking that this weekend we could go to Oasis and get our hair cut.
Maybe we could even go to their spa, make a day of it.”
“I’m growing my hair out.” Julia always cut my hair.
She was really good at it, and I know she would have had her own salon by the time she was twenty, just like she 218
always said, and it would have been way better than Oasis.
(Even if I never have been there.)
“Oh. Well, maybe we could go to the mall or something instead.”
“I don’t think I can. And look, I have a lot of homework, and the presentation is tomorrow, like I said, and I ate already, so I—you know. I need to focus.”
Mom didn’t do anything for a moment, and then she nodded and left.
I thought maybe Mom would come back and ask me to do something with her again, but she didn’t. I went downstairs later to get a soda, and she and Dad were sitting at the kitchen table, holding hands and talking.
They didn’t even look up when I came in. They didn’t seem to notice me at all. Totally familiar territory, and exactly what I wanted. It just didn’t feel as great as I wanted it to.
I know things will go back to normal after tomorrow.
Caro won’t talk to me after the presentation, and it looks like things are getting back to how they were with Mom and Dad. It’s good. It’s all really good. It’ll all be like it was. Like I deserve.
But then why . . .
Why do I feel so bad?
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T W E N T Y
MEL AND CARO ended up doing all of the talking during our presentation, which was fine with me. I hadn’t thought about what a class presentation really meant.
How it was a whole standing-in-front-of-an-entire-room-of-people (annoying people, but still) thing. It was like being at a party, only worse because it was school, I wasn’t drunk, and Julia wasn’t there.
If there was a way I could have bolted out of class and gone and gotten a drink, I would have.
I suppose I could have. I could have walked out of class, out of school, and found a drink. But I didn’t. Of course I didn’t. I was too scared to move. I stood there, too tall, too quiet, tugging at the ends of my too-red hair, and missed J so much it felt like I couldn’t breathe.
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