A Tale of Two Besties (25 page)

I left the bathroom and wandered over to a table piled high with bright red cups and poured myself a glass of punch, making sure to sniff it first. As alternative as this party was, I wasn't going to risk it: getting wasted is the kind of stupid activity that can cross all social barriers. Luckily, the punch was clean. I stood and waited for Lily to run out of the bathroom and up to me with tear-stained cheeks.

After a couple of minutes, I poured myself another glass of punch. And then waited some more.

And some more.

And some more.

By the time I'd drained my fourth cup of vicious red Kool-Aid, a half hour had passed and I had to go to the bathroom—for real this time. Maybe I would find Lily still in there, quietly sobbing in a stall. I felt a stab of guilt. I hadn't wanted her to be that
upset
.

I shouldn't have worried. The moment I swung the bathroom door open, I heard a familiar voice speaking animatedly, clearly mid-rant.

“. . . don't know what's gotten into her!” Lily's back was turned toward me, but the group she was talking to—Nicole, Jane, and even Drew—all stood facing the ladies' room door. They were all clearly surprised to see me, but when Drew perked up and tried to alert Lily to my arrival, Nicole subtly tapped him and hushed him up. “But, I promise you, Jane, Harper's super grateful for the invitation. I know she's having such a good time. She can just be kind of . . . not the best, socially. And I really didn't want to embarrass her by mentioning the dress code, especially when I saw that what she was wearing was so . . .
conceptually challenged
. But really, thank you thank you thank you so much for inviting her. I couldn't think of anywhere else to take her for her birthday, so you really saved me.”

Part of my brain was telling me to go, just leave it be. But I was stuck; rooted like one of those ancient mosquitoes caught in amber from
Jurassic Park
. Drew let out a nervous, uncomfortable laugh, and Lily finally turned around. The shock on her face was enough to let me know that she'd assumed that I'd left the party entirely, and that I was the last person she was expecting to see. Her friends looked embarrassed and started making their way to the door to leave us alone in our own personal version of bestie hell.

“Er, well . . . good chat,” Nicole said, breezing by me, her steely wings cold on my shoulder. “I've got to go mingle. See you later, Lily!”

Jane and Drew followed, looking at least a little apologetic, and the door swung shut behind them.

“Hey.” Now that we were alone, the echo of my sullen greeting rang dully against the linoleum floor.

“Hey, lady!” Lily was laughing nervously, pretending to do her hair in the mirror. “There you are! I was about to come looking for you. But then I got caught up talking to Nicole, and . . .”

“Save it,” I cut her off. “I was just coming to see if you were okay. But I should have gotten the hint a long time ago. You are doing just fine without me.”

Lily's eyes started to water, but I threw out my hand, palm up.

“No! Just . . . no.” I felt ice cold. “You can cry later. I am really sick of protecting you from all the bad feelings in the world, Lily! Especially right now, because those bad feelings you're sensing? They're coming from me.”

She still wasn't looking at me, but I could see her reflection in the mirror above the sinks. Her lips were moving, and I knew she was just drowning me out with whatever whispery mumble-jumble she was reciting to herself. I pressed on anyway.

“I can't believe you were talking about me. That's such a mean-girl thing to do.” I folded my arms and tapped my toes impatiently, blocking the bathroom's exit. If this was about become a toxic drama zone, then so be it: Get out the quarantine gear, don't let anyone else inside, because this was going down. “It's like this school has totally changed you into this completely different person, and I don't recognize her at all!”

“I wasn't . . .” Lily interrupted.

“Stop it!” I forgot myself and yelled . . . and I'm not a yeller. “Don't do your ditzy little ‘Oh I didn't know what you were feeling because I live in my magical world of la-la fairies!' thing! You know you haven't been there for me since you started Pathways. Did you know that I had my very first kiss with Derek Wheeler? I mean
Derek Wheeler
? The
smelly kid
?! And everyone at school has seen what I look like pretending to be drunk, and it's not cute! Like Derek ‘Smelly Kid' Wheeler gets to look down on me with his stupid girlfriend Kendall, and I can barely get anyone to talk to me. And it's
not okay
that you're my best friend and don't know any of this because every time we text or talk on the phone, you just respond to everything with these fake-cheery replies that just gloss over everything real, and prevent us from having an
actual
conversation about real feelings. It's like you're avoiding me without actually avoiding me and it drives me crazy! And it's also not okay that I have to feel weird about the fact that I'm hanging out with Tim without you. And it's not okay that all you care about is that bully Nicole and her stupid NAMASTE club!
We had a
pact about not changing to fit in
!
Or doesn't that mean anything to you anymore?”

“Don't you
dare
put this on Nicole!” Lily's eyes flashed. “Look, I am sorry that I've been, like, a less attentive friend than I could have been. But Pathways is making me feel really good about myself! You say that I've changed, but this is the real me! For once, I finally feel like everyone likes me for
me
, and not just for being friends with
you
!”

I could see I was pushing Lily farther away, and I could hear how jealous and paranoid I sounded, but it was like I was having an out-of-body experience, unable to stop myself from barreling down this toxic route. “Nicole is a garbage person, Lily! And she
is
a
bully
! She's just stealing your look and using it to bully everyone to dress exactly the same! She's turned something creative and unique into a “brand” to sell a product . . . you! And she's a vegan who eats shrimp!
SHRIMP!
” I was on the verge of a full nuclear explosion, and I didn't care who heard. “Are you really going to stand here and tell me you don't see a hypocrisy problem with that?”

“They're barely animals.” Even Lily looked a little confused by her logic.

“Shrimp is meat, I don't care how small their brains are! And,” I continued, unsure if I would ever be able to stop, “no offense, but her entire
ish
is phony! This whole NAMASTE thing? It's not about anything! It's just an excuse for her to lord over a meaningless club, like they have in any other school. It doesn't put you above anyone else, and it doesn't give you the right to start treating your real friends like compost!”

Lily snorted and turned away to face the mirror instead of me. Wasn't that just a giant metaphor for our friendship now? The thought had me digging my nails into my palms.

“You know, you don't just get to win fights because you're good at crying,” I said, turning my heart to stone.

“You say I treat my friends like compost?” Lily turned on me, eyes blazing through her tears. “What about you? Here you are complaining about how alone you've been this whole time, when you've just admitted that there's been one very specific person by your side this entire time. Or are you so busy feeling sorry for yourself you can't even stop and see that Tim, my
ex-boyfriend,
is totally in love with you?”

I heard someone push open the door to the bathroom. “Occupied!” I screamed. “Use the boys' room! Or hold it in!” Whoever it was fled pretty quickly. “So that's what this is about,” I said, shaking my head. “You're still not over Tim. And you're blaming me? What, because a guy I've known my whole life is the only person in my entire school who will deign to hang out with me?”

“No! That's not what I meant! I don't even know why I said that.” Lily groaned and pressed her head against the wall, slightly banging it in frustration.

I took a breath to keep my hands from shaking. “Here's a quick question Lily: Why are you so scared what everyone is going to think of you if they find out you hang out with a lame,
normal
person like me? Because I never cared what people thought when I hung out with you!”

That finally got Lily away from her mirror, and she came stalking up to me so fast I took an accidental step backward.

“Oh, so you should get a medal because you were
so brave
for being my friend all these years? You think that I'm like one of your stray dogs and I need you to take care of me? Is that how you think about our friendship? That it's just some
chore
?”

I folded my arms in front of me. “Well, it's certainly not been very fun recently, has it?”

Lily drew herself up tall, to the highest height of her tiny, fairy-girl frame. “If that's how you really feel, than maybe you should just leave,” she said in a calm voice that didn't match her tear-stained face.

“Fine. Stay blind,” I sputtered. “I'm out of here. Tell your mom I took an Uber home. Thanks for the awesome birthday party,
Gawkward Fairy
. I hope you and your new friends will be very happy together.”

No reply, though this time I wasn't going to wait around for my former best friend to revert to her old, quirky self. I had my phone out of my pocket and was booking a taxi before I'd even turned to the exit. But I didn't leave before taking off Lily's “thoughtful” gift and throwing it at her feet. She could jump up and down and tear that necklace to pieces—what was it to me?

Five minutes later, I was speeding down the 101, asking the driver to put on some music—any music—to drown out the thoughts raging through my brain. He responded by flipping on a Ukrainian Sirius channel, which actually served as the perfect distraction.

I didn't even look back, not once, and didn't even let myself cry until we were safe on the freeway.

It had been fourteen hours since my big fight with Harper, and I was spiraling down a dark, endless-seeming rabbit hole. It had been half a tortuous day since the party, in which exactly zero bytes of information had been traded between us. Maybe there were some messages lost up there in the cloud somewhere, but I had no idea what kind of
Inception
-level security was necessary to enter the incorporeal info-cloud. Does it involve Google? Because I do know how to Google.

I clung to my hope that this would turn out to be just a Wi-Fi-based issue of miscommunication, two ships filled with emojis, passing in the night, buoyed by the soft caress of the information waves of the . . . cloud.

I really, really needed someone to explain to me what
the cloud
was.

But as morning turned into afternoon, my emotions churned through a whole life's worth of cycles. At first I was furious at Harper for saying those terrible things about me and my friends, and mad that she didn't even try to listen to what I had to say. Then I was annoyed because she refused to answer her phone all night when I was calling to ask if she was all right. Like I'm sorry we had a fight but we're not
animals
. We need to let one another know that we got home safely!

Then I was scared: What if something terrible had happened to her? What if our fight was the last conversation we'd ever have together? Then, guilt: I shouldn't have let her take an Uber home by herself. What if her driver didn't have his license, or abducted her and took her back to the headquarters of his weird Manson cult! Then I felt so much shame for being so snappy with her in the bathroom, which led to me feeling angry again that she had ridden me so hard about Nicole and my new friends.

I was totally spiraling. I needed a break before I went completely insane.

That afternoon I decided to give Mom a break from my frantic pacing and headed out for a ride on my bike. I debated riding by Harper's place, but I didn't want to look like a stalker, so instead I veered right and went to the only spot in Los Angeles where I knew I could find my Zen: Yogurt to Be Kidding Me.

Okay, so I'm just like everyone else. I love fro-yo. Sue me for being
obvious
. I used to be a big Pinkberry-head, then for about six months I went through a brief love affair with Menchie's iced-coffee-flavored confection, with little chocolate sprinkles dotted on top. After that, it was Yogurt Stop because of all the flavors and glittery names (“Hallelujah! It's Raining Red Velvet Men” and “Shake Your Salted Caramel Booty” were my two favorites), but that place became a paparazzi feeding pool after a bunch of the
Real Housewives
and Rachel Zoe started bringing their kids in for treats and some quick and easy paparazzi exposure. Plus, eating all those thick concoctions almost daily eventually made me gain five pounds—it might as well have been real ice cream. My backup fro-yo stop those days was Yogurt Piazza for red velvet and original mixed in with bananas, berries, and drizzled with some chocolate. And The Big Chill, and, oh, Studio Yogurt, which closed and it was so heartbreaking because they had the cheapest prices and the biggest portions and it was amazing.

Which was why it was no less than a small miracle when I found Yogurt to Be Kidding Me over the summer. I thought I'd died and gone to low-cal frozen treat heaven. Yogurt to Be . . . was owned by this cute Korean couple who ran the shop out of an unassuming basement in the Brentwood Place Shopping Plaza. Warm, low lighting glowed from the Edison bulbs strung around the dispensary, and the tables were made from dark cherry wood instead of the usual glaringly white Formica. The
ambience
, to use a Yelp term, was quiet. I liked how no-frills it was, because it added to its magical hideaway charm. It wasn't self-serve the way that most yogurt shops are these days. Instead, you just told one of the owners what size you wanted and picked from the mercifully brief list of toppings, all of the natural fruit and nut varieties. The only sauce they offered was honey, and they only served one flavor of yogurt: original.

But best of all, the place wasn't even listed online, and it had very little foot traffic—which was why it was especially strange to walk in on a Sunday afternoon to find Stephanie Adler sitting in one of the shop's four seats, her blond hair framed by a halo of soft sunlight filtering down from the lone small window above the door.

Great.
The last thing I needed right now was one of Harper's friends giving me the stink-eye, so I ordered a small, unadorned fro-yo and sat as far away from her as I possibly could. Which wasn't very far: the one thing Yogurt To Be . . . had in common with its competition was its lack of space. I pretended to study my required NAMASTE text,
Be Here Now
, but it was just a confusing bunch of nonsense
(where else was I but here? Now?)
. I really liked the pictures, though. Maybe it would make more sense once I was fully enlightened. Then, a voice cut through my attempt at meditation.

“Original?”

Sure enough, Stephanie had noticed me.

I frowned and exaggeratedly put my finger in the book, trying to give her the impression that I was too busy to talk, and swiveled my head in her direction. “Excuse me?”

Stephanie motioned to my fro-yo and quirked her eyebrow.

“Oh, yeah,” I said. “It's the only flavor they have.” I put my nose back in my book; I wasn't in the mood to talk, but my body language didn't deter her at all. I could hear the rustling of her backpack as she got up to sit across from me. Funny, I always thought of Stephanie as more of a purse person, but when I finally did look up to meet her gigantic smile, I saw that she'd made some major changes to her style, even since the last time I'd seen her in the park. She was wearing boy shorts and a wifebeater and was sporting the beginnings of some serious dreadlocks.

Still, underneath all that skater girl grunge, Stephanie was still as bubbly as ever. Out of Harper's pre-Us friends, I had always liked Stephanie the best. But it was hard to think of Steph without thinking of Jessica, but Jessica had always been removed and cold and a little robot-y. Stephanie, though, was the first to follow Harper's lead and join in on any group activities. The only reason we weren't better friends was that she had been so glued to Jessica's hip all the time.

“I really like that they only serve one flavor here,” she said, sucking on her plastic spoon. “All those other places try to give you every possible flavor choice that you'd never want, like Strawberry Bourbon Cheesecake, or Mojito Kale or . . . Lobster. You can't even find anything resembling just plain-style anymore. It's all ‘Bitter Tart Vanilla Bubblegum.'”

“Sometimes Original is the most original.” I thought that was a very Zen comment, but when I saw the crinkle-confused look on Stephanie's face, I realized how pretentious I sounded. “Sorry, that made much more sense in my head.”

“No,” she said. “That's exactly what I meant. You nailed it.”

For the first time in a while, I could feel my face relaxing into a real smile, one that Stephanie beamed back at me with the ease of a native Californian.

“It's like those perfumes I see sometimes, there's this whole line with normal stuff like ‘Apple Cake' and ‘Vanilla Candy,' but then there's ‘Play-Dough,' and ‘Fresh Sheets,' and ‘Dirt' and ‘Library Books.'” Stephanie made a face. “Who would want to smell like an old book?”

“I actually think that sounds romantic.” My phone chimed, and I grabbed for it, thinking it was Harper.

Shoot! Band practice! I had forgotten all about it! I shoved my book in my bag—luckily, I had stashed my Lily-Fairy wings in there the night before—and looked longingly at my half-finished fro-yo.

“Was that Harper?” Stephanie asked. “Are you guys hanging out still? I never see you around anymore.”

“Um . . . no.” It was too long of a story, and the last thing I wanted to do before getting together with my Pathways friends was rehash Harper drama. I grabbed my bag, my chair making a scraping noise as I stood up too quickly. Oof, brain freeze.

“Hey, do you need a ride somewhere?” Stephanie pointed outside. “My older brother is going to be here any second. We could drop you off.”

“Actually, yeah, that would be great. Thanks,” I told her, grateful. “I'm going to my friend Jane's for band practice. She lives right around here.”

“You're in a band?” For some reason, Stephanie's look of surprise made me smile. “That's awesome. I'd love to hear you play.”

“Sure!” I spoke before I really thought it through, but Jane wouldn't mind if Stephanie came to rehearsal, right? And maybe Stephanie would go back and tell Harper how relaxed and happy I seemed with my new friends, who were all wonderful and accepted me, and then Harper would come to her senses.

Stephanie's brother Jack turned out to be way older, like in his twenties. He had Stephanie's blond hair and giant smile, but compared to Steph's unkempt dreadlocks and accompanying skateboard, he was as clean- cut as a Ken doll. His red surf shorts and yellow tee coordinated perfectly with both his Lightning Bolt surfboard and his crimson convertible. He belonged on a Tumblr called “Cute Cali Boys” or something.

When we drove up to Jane's split-level ranch house in Bel-Air, I thanked Jack and was about to jump out when Steph twisted around in her seat and watched me struggle to put on my fairy wings. “Do you need help with that?” She asked, laughing.

I felt a little embarrassed as she tightened the straps on either side. The wings were a little . . . no, at this point they were
beyond
gawkward. They were way bent out of shape and they didn't even make me feel like
me
anymore. It was more like a “Lily” costume I had to put on to go to school and for NAMASTE activities. On the weekends, I rarely even carried them on me, unless I knew I'd be running into Pathways people.

Jane was waiting impatiently by the door as we arrived. “You're late,” she admonished, wagging one matte fingernail at me. I hated being called out, for any reason, and Jane looked particularly annoyed this afternoon. She looked behind me, to where Stephanie was standing.

“Stephanie, Jane, Jane, Stephanie. Steph and I know each other from middle school. She wanted to hear us practice.”

Jane leaned in the doorway and exhaled slowly, looking Stephanie up and down.

“Hi,” Jane said to Stephanie. And then to me: “Nicole is not going to like this.” She shook her head and beckoned us in. Stephanie shot me a quizzical look, but I was just as confused as her. Why was Nicole at band practice? She didn't even approve of non-NAMASTE activities.

Jane's parents had the best basement for practice, which made total sense: Once upon a time, it had actually been part of recording studio, built after Jane's mom decided to quit modeling and self-release her first (and only) album of Afghan rubab music. Jane, Drew, and I had listened to it once, and I didn't think it was all that bad. I had especially liked the part where Sting came in to sing backup vocals on the Pashto track.