“Excellent point, Abby. So I know we haven’t done this in forever, and you’re both grown up and probably don’t want to spend any time with your dad, but I was thinking about taking a night hike. You guys probably don’t remember, but we used to do that all the time.”
“Dad, that was literally about four years ago,” Rachel says. “I was sixteen. I can remember things from when I was sixteen.”
“I want to go,” I say. “Rachel?”
“Despite my supposed diminished mental capacity, yes, I want to go, too.”
“You’re very funny,” Dad says. “Let me put on my hiking shoes.”
Rachel and I look to each other and burst into laughter. Dad has this ugly pair of brown sneakers he insists are hiking shoes. (They aren’t.)
“Should we ask your mom?” Dad asks, ostensibly, us, but looks right at me.
And I say yes.
CHAPTER 27
Jax wants to go to some random party on Saturday, and I decide it doesn’t sound like the worst thing in the world. I could stand to see people beyond my normal circle, but it’s safer at a Westglen party than a Village Community High one. I’m still too freshly post-breakup to see too many people from school.
“I told Maliah to bring everyone,” Jax tells me in the car. “Ya know, everyone as in Brooke.”
“I hope you specified that to Maliah,” I say. “Because everyone has never actually meant that.”
“Mal gets me,” he says.
“Uh huh. So why do you even like Brooke anyway? And you have to be specific.”
“One, she has a really good laugh. I goddamn love it when girls laugh at my jokes.”
I widen my eyes. “Girls laugh at your jokes?”
“Abby, I’ll have you know I have been very successful with the ladies,” he says. “You’d be surprised.”
“Fine.” I grin at him. “What else?”
“She’s cute, she’s smart, and she’s funny as hell,” he says. “She’s kind of like you but less …”
“Gay?”
Jax almost howls laughing. “I was gonna say difficult. You’re a lot of work. I need approximately five to ten percent less work in a girl.”
“Jax, I say this with all the love in the world, but … You’re the worst.”
I expect him to turn west in pursuit of fancier parts of town, but he’s still following Glendale Boulevard. Maybe someone’s parents live in a posh loft downtown.
“Thanks for making me go out,” I say. “I think I might occasionally need to be bullied into doing the right thing.”
“That’s what I’m here for, bullying. And, speaking of …”
He pulls the car off the street into a red zone. “This is actually weirder to do than it seemed when I helped plan it, but … You’ve gotta get out of the car now.”
“What?”
“Just trust me. You love me and I want the best for you.”
“I can’t go to the party?” I ask. “What’s happening? You’re just dumping me in … wherever we are?”
Actually, I know where we are.
“C’mon,” Jax says, though gently. “Get out of the car.”
I can’t believe I do, but I do. I regret this decision almost immediately, so I knock on his window. He rolls it down but doesn’t unlock the door.
“Give her a chance,” he says. “I’ll wait here.”
“Can’t we just go to the party?”
“Abbs, there’s no party. This is your party. Bam. Outfoxed you.”
Then he rolls up the window so I basically have no choice. I walk toward Pehrspace.
Jordi’s standing right in front, but there’s no crowd tonight. It’s just her. “Hey.”
“Hi.”
“Will you come in?” she asks, and I nod. The usual guy’s at the door, but he just smiles and waves us through. The place is empty besides us.
Jordi’s photos are still on the wall. I caught such a quick glimpse of the ones that weren’t me, but I think they’re all still up. In place of the ones removed are photographs I haven’t seen before. Each frame holds somewhere I know, though. Lemonberry’s back room. The Chandelier Tree. The sidewalk outside of Folliero’s.
“This was after you,” Jordi says. “My summer without Abby. It looks the same, but … it isn’t.”
“The photos look good,” I say quickly.
“Abby, I’m sorry,” she says. “I should have asked.”
“Yeah,” I say. “You should have.”
“I fucked up,” she says. “I wanted to have the best show possible, and … those were my favorite photos I’ve taken. And, yeah. I knew what you’d say if I asked you, and … I couldn’t have used them if you’d actually said no.”
“These pictures are just as good,” I say with a shrug. “Better.”
“You’re the only one who thinks that,” she says, and a smile slides across her face. I missed that slow smile in my life. “You’re beautiful, Abby. I just wanted to capture that.”
“And have a good photography show,” I say.
“And that. I’m sorry. I’m sorry times a million.”
“I’m sorry I didn’t let you explain,” I say, and something in her expression softens. “I feel like maybe I owed you that? I don’t know. I don’t know any of this.”
“Me either,” she says. “Obviously.”
“It’s hard to think of myself as beautiful.” I’m saying more than I would have imagined sharing with her, with anyone. “People hate fat girls. The way people talk online. The way people will just stare sometimes …”
“That doesn’t make you ugly,” Jordi says. “Fuck those people.”
“I wish it was that easy,” I say. “It’s not always that easy for me.”
“I should have realized that,” she says. “But it’s hard to when I look at you. None of that makes sense when you’re this cute.”
“I feel weird saying that what happened is okay.” I shrug some more. Suddenly it’s all I know how to do. “It wasn’t okay. But I guess it is now. Or I want it to be. Or I’m over it. Or I get it. Or I don’t think you could ever be mean to someone who didn’t deserve it. Or—”
“Abby,” Jordi says and laughs.
“Don’t make fun of me,” I say, but I find myself smiling. “I missed you! I have like a million things to say.”
“Oh, god, me too,” she says.
