remember it or anything. I’m sorry to have brought it up. I just… I wanted to say something to you about it when no one else was around. You know, to tell you how badly I felt about it.’
I had no idea if Frida was right about what was troubling Christopher. About him having been in love with me, I mean. Maybe she was wrong. Maybe he was just still recovering from having seen a girl die right in front of him. Anybody would have been messed up from that.
Maybe Frida was completely wrong about Christopher having had any special feelings beyond friendship for me. I don’t know. I couldn’t tell by looking at his face, because he was keeping it turned away from me, just staring at my computer screen.
‘I’m just so, so sorry that that happened,’ I went on. ‘I can’t tell you how sorry I am. What happened was terrible. You must… you must miss her a lot.’
I waited, thinking he wasn’t going to reply at all, he didn’t say anything for so long.
But then he did. He said, ‘Yeah.’
And then his fingers started moving over the keyboard again.
A minute after that, he said, ‘Well, here you go. You’re all set.’
And he closed my laptop, and handed it back to me.
Just like that.
I felt my eyes fill with tears. I couldn’t help it. I couldn’t believe Lulu was wrong. It wasn’t that I’d believed her stupid theory, exactly. I mean, how dumb would you have to be to believe that all the boys in the world are a little bit in love with you? Sure, maybe it’s true for Lulu. But why would Christopher ever have been in love with me?
God, I couldn’t believe how asinine I’d been.
I turned around and stuffed the laptop back into my tote, wiping the tears away with my sleeve so he couldn’t see that I was crying.
‘Thanks,’ I said. ‘Well. See you in Public Speaking.’
I was halfway out the door when Christopher’s quiet voice stopped me in my tracks.
‘Nikki,’ he said.
I froze. I couldn’t turn around, because then he’d have seen the tears that had escaped from beneath my eyelids, and were trickling down my cheeks.
‘Uh-huh?’ I said, to the wall.
His voice was still quiet.
‘She was my best friend,’ he said.
The tears came gushing down my face, which I still kept hidden from him. Suddenly I wanted to tell him the truth so, so badly. I wanted to run over to him, throw down my bag and fling my arms around him and say, ‘Christopher, it’s me! Em! I’m not dead! I’m in here! I know it’s crazy, but it’s true!’
But I knew I couldn’t. Two million dollars.
Instead I turned around, not caring any more if he saw I was crying, and did the one thing I knew I shouldn’t — but that I also knew I had to — do. The thing I told myself I was crazy to do. The thing I’d tried to talk myself out of doing all morning, since I’d thought of it, and that I would have left without doing, if he hadn’t just said those five little words.
I reached into my tote, pulled something out of it, turned around, walked back over to him and slapped it down in front of him.
Then I turned and ran before he could ask me why I’d just dropped a sheet of glow-in-the-dark dinosaur stickers on his desk.
Twenty-five
‘Wait… ’ Lulu leaned down to undo Cosabella’s leash, which had twisted around her legs. ‘Why are we bringing pizza to these people?’
‘Because.’ I kept my gaze on the numbers above our heads as the elevator rose higher and higher. ‘I want you to meet them.’
‘Are they poor or something?’
‘No,’ I said with a laugh. The elevator stopped and the door opened. ‘I thought it would be nice to bring them dinner.’
‘Oh.’ Lulu followed me down the long hallway as I balanced the pizza box in one hand and tried to control Cosabella with the other. ‘I thought it was, like, a charity thing.’
‘No,’ I said. I didn’t want to mention the truth — that I felt bad for Lulu, because she didn’t have any parents around… or no one who cared about her anyway. Except for Katerina. But Katerina was an employee.
I felt equally badly for my parents, who I’d been sort of ignoring. Maybe pizza and a visit wouldn’t make up for three days of neglect. But it was a start. That, and the new non-Stark-brand cellphones I’d brought along for each of my parents, as well as Frida.
Besides, I thought Mom should hear some of Lulu’s theories. From a women’s studies point of view, I thought she’d find them interesting. Or at least worth further investigation.
‘I just thought eating in would be nicer than going out for a change,’ I said.
‘Oh,’ Lulu said. She rooted around in her purse, found her compact, then checked her reflection. ‘I get it. So, how’d it go with the high-school boy?’
I smiled, remembering how Christopher had yet to say a word to me about the stickers.
But he’d been looking. Oh, how he’d been looking.
‘I think I made a connection,’ I said. ‘He’s confused, but… ’ I shrugged. ‘We’ll have to see how it goes.’
‘They’re all confused,’ Lulu said with a gusty sigh. ‘So why was there a cable guy in our apartment this afternoon?’
‘We’re getting Wi-Fi installed,’ I said, stopping in front of 14L. ‘Not using modem connections any more should solve our spyware problems. For now anyway. Why? Did he ask you out?’
‘Of course,’ Lulu said. ‘But I’m supposed to go out with a Libra next and he’s a Capricorn, so it will never work.’
‘Are you ready?’ I asked her, my finger hovering over the bell.
‘I’m ready,’ Lulu said, putting away her compact. ‘But are you sure you wouldn’t rather go to Nobu? Pizza always does a number on your insides. And we could go to Cave after.’
‘My insides,’ I said, ‘are already messed up. The truth is, they’re never going to match my outsides.’ I rang the bell. ‘But you know what? I’m starting to think nobody’s insides do.’
‘I’ll get it,’ I heard Frida shriek inside the apartment. A second later, the door to my old home opened, and Frida, in sweats, with face cream all over her T-zone, stared at us.
‘Oh my God,’ she said, her jaw slack as her gaze darted from me to Lulu and then back again. ‘Oh my God, it’s… it’s… it’s… ’
‘Hi, Frida,’ I said. ‘It’s me. Can you tell Mom I’m here? I brought pizza… and my friend Lulu.’
‘I–I — I —’ Frida was so excited, she let the door bang shut in our faces. I could hear her tearing through the apartment, screaming, ‘Mo-oom! Guess who’s here?’
Lulu looked at me curiously. Then she said, ‘Nikki? How do you even know these people?’
‘Lulu,’ I said. ‘I wouldn’t even know where to begin.’
