In Real Life (4 page)

“Whaa?” Grace spits out a few of the Pringles bits.

“Ew, Grace.”

“Sorry,” she says, wiping chip crumbs off her face with her sleeve. “I think I must be in the wrong yard. What did you say?”

I take a deep breath and let it out slowly, thinking about each and every word before I say it. “The three of us. Spring break. Let's drive to Vegas tomorrow and go see Nick's show. The show is a big deal, and I want to be there.”

Grace processes what I'm saying, and I think I actually see the wheels in her head turning. Grace, who spent her teen years sneaking out her window to go to punk rock shows on school nights. Grace, who came home from a show once, talked to a hot guy she'd met there online for a few days, and said, “He has a brother your age, you guys should talk,” before ditching the hot guy and moving on to the next dude. Grace, who constantly tries to get me to do something, anything, outside of what is expected of me. To break any rule, no matter how small.

Her smile almost overtakes her entire face.

“Are you saying what I think you're saying?” Lo hops out of the pool, grabs a towel from the end of Grace's lounge chair, and whips it around herself, all within what seems like half a second. She stands toe-to-toe with me, her long hair dripping on my feet. “Are you, Hannah Cho—perfect student, daughter, and citizen—for real suggesting that we secretly drive to Las Vegas, Sin
freaking
City, to see this dude you've never met in person without telling our parents where we are?”

I stick the penny into my back pocket. “Screw them,” I say, but I wince as soon as the words escape. “No, I don't mean that. I love Mom and Dad. I mean, screw the rules. Screw people telling me what I can and can't do.” I feel energized. Alive. “It's just one night. Drive out tomorrow, go to the show, stay the night in a hotel, drive home the next day. They'll never even know we aren't here.”

Grace's excitement practically explodes off her face as she rushes from the lounge chair and gathers me into a tight hug. “I knew it! I knew you had it in you! There were times I wondered if there was any way we were actually related, but I knew you'd do something completely illegal and make me proud one of these days.”

Lo joins in the hug, too, but she's still drippy from the pool, so we both shake her off. That does nothing to deter her excitement, though. “I've always wanted to go to Vegas,” she says, hopping from one foot to the other. “And I've always wanted to witness you breaking through the chains of your good-girl shackles and letting Crazy Hannah out to play. It's going to be Girls Gone Wild up in here!”

“Don't get it twisted,” I say. “I have a cardigan collection. I'm not exactly the Girls Gone Wild type.”

“Oh no,” Grace says. “If we're doing this, we're doing it right. We'll raid Lo's closet for you. She has all that hoochie wear—”

“Hey, now,” Lo breaks in.

“And we'll get you looking so hot, you won't even recognize yourself. Oh, and Nick … damn, he's going to die when he sees you.”

“Settle down, you guys.” Hands in the air, I back away from Lo and Grace, who both look at me like I'm some kind of arts and crafts project. “It's not like that between us.”

Grace breaks into a loud, hearty laugh. She's so caught up in it, she falls back onto the lounge chair.

“What's so funny?” I ask.

“Of course it's like that between you two,” she says as she tries to pull herself together.

I look to Lo to help me out, since she knows Nick and I are nothing more than friends. She doesn't know about all the feelings that have started to surface when I listen to his playlists, but she knows I've had a long string of boyfriends over the past few years, so it's not like I'm that girl pining away for her guy best friend. In fact, the past month or so is the first time I'd been single in a long time. It's taken some time to get over the Josh Ahmed disaster, since I thought he was going to be
the
boyfriend. I mean, I don't want to get involved with someone before I leave for college. It's not like I have feelings for Nick, or he has feelings for me. No.

So, yeah, I expect Lo to defend me to Grace, who's been at UCLA and playing house with her ex and probably doesn't realize how non-Nick-centric my life actually is. But instead, Lo walks up to Grace, slips a wet arm through my sister's, and says, “Oh yeah, Hannah. You've got it bad.”

*   *   *

The reality of what I have just committed to do sets in after Lo runs home to gather her hoochie wear and I'm left alone in the living room with a very excited Grace. My sister bounces on the couch, poking at her cell phone, while I wear a trail of trauma into the carpet with my pacing.

“Where are we going to stay? How are we going to get a hotel without Mom and Dad knowing? The only money I can use is that ‘for emergencies only' credit card, and I seriously doubt this is up there with car problems, fire, or bodily harm.”

Grace looks up from her phone. “Hey, you deciding to do something crazy is a five-alarm emergency in my book. We need to jump on it before you change your mind.”

I shoot her a dirty look, but she waves it off.

“I'm texting Nick.” I reach over to the coffee table to pull my phone off the charger. “Maybe he knows where we can stay.”

“No!” Grace stretches across the couch and grabs my phone before I can reach it. “No texting. This should be a surprise.”

“Why?”

“Because it's more fun this way. Imagine the look on his face when you show up at his show. He's going to flip.”

I feel wrongness down to my gut when I think about doing something this big, this game changing, and not cluing Nick in. My stomach tightens like a fist at the thought of keeping this secret, even if it's only for twenty-four hours and even if it's a fun secret. I tell Nick everything. Well, almost everything. But I tell him more than I tell anyone else. Even Lo.

But then I let myself picture this scene Grace has set up: Nick at House of Blues with the band. Onstage, playing guitar. Seeing me in the crowd. The instant of recognition. The smile. The hug. The excitement.

This is the moment that launched a thousand daydreams, the moment I thought I gave up forever once I decided meeting Nick was never going to happen and gave the relief power over the regret.

I can keep a secret for one night if it means getting that experience.

“Okay. Fine. Surprise.” I pull my hair out of its bun, shake it loose, and then wrap it up again. “But that doesn't solve the hotel problem.”

Grace hops up from the couch, hands me my phone, and slaps me on the butt. “Oh, I have that handled. Thanks to
Rocker.
”

“
Rocker
? How?” I have no idea how Grace's internship at
Rocker
magazine equals hotel, but I'm all ears.

“Well, this internship was an issue between me and Gabe, as you know—”

“One of many, yes.”

Grace rolls her eyes. “Anyway, since we broke up, I've totally thrown myself into things there. I've been trying to pitch some story ideas,” she says. “I figured since they're full of experts on L.A. music there, I could do some research on the Las Vegas scene or something. Local Vegas bands. My editor loves that kind of stuff.” She looks so pleased with herself, and it's comforting to see a look of confidence on her face again. This breakup almost broke Grace; I thought Gabe had taken that confidence when he left.

“You're an intern, though,” I say. “You make coffee and copies, you don't pitch story ideas.”

She digs around in her distressed leather purse and pulls out some memo or something. She yanks a hot pink sticky note off it and shoves it in my face. “Check this out.”

Scribbled across the sticky note is
Great story idea, Grace! I'd love to see more like this from you.

I shake my head and toss the sticky note back at her. “So?”

“So, I just texted my editor and told her I was heading to Vegas. Apparently she's some kind of high roller at Planet Hollywood, and when I told her I wanted to do research for a story idea while I was there, she complimented my ambition and offered up her discounted rate. Can you believe that?”

“Well, a discount is great, Grace, but what about the rest of the cost?”

“Girl, I know you hoard your allowance. Don't act like you're all poor. And Mom and Dad left me grocery money for the week. I think this is a much better cause.”

“Better than food? You'll starve without a bottomless supply of Cheez-Its.”

“This is worth it.” Grace elbows me. “Don't say I never did anything for you, little sister.”

I collapse back onto the couch. This whole thing, my whole stupid idea, had just seemed like talk until now. But now that we have a hotel room … are we really going to Vegas?

“I don't know,” I say. “I know I never say this, but I think I'm wrong. We're going to get in trouble. Mom and Dad'll find out. Nick won't want me there. I'll find out he's some old pervert or something. This is a terrible idea. Let's just stay home and Netflix it up instead.”

“Hannah,” Grace says, grabbing my hand. Her eyes are serious and sad. “I need this. I need to get out of here. I haven't felt like myself since…” She doesn't finish her sentence, but she doesn't need to. Even though Grace doesn't live with us anymore, and hasn't since she left for college, she still spends a ton of time at home, and I saw firsthand how devastating her breakup with Gabe had been. Gabe was a crappy boyfriend, controlling and stubborn, and my strong-willed sister bent to his demands and became a different person. When he left her, he left her crushed. Little pieces of Old Grace are emerging from the rubble, but it's taking longer than any of us expected for her to put herself back together.

“I know.”

“I just … I know this is for you, but it's for me, too.” She lets go of my hand and absently tugs at the silver Tiffany key necklace around her neck, a gift from the A-hole himself. I wish she'd stop wearing it. “I want to go to Vegas so I can do something besides sit around and think about him, you know?” Her voice gets quiet. Distant. Then, just as quickly as her funk came on, she snaps herself out of it and lets the necklace fall against her chest. “Look, you know what I'm talking about. You just had a breakup, too.”

Yeah, Josh Ahmed, my most recent perfect-on-paper boyfriend, and I had called it quits back before Christmas. But Grace and I both knew my breakup was amateur hour compared to hers.

“Fine. We're going.”

“Fabulous,” she says, her face lighting up. “I am so excited for you to finally make out with this guy tomorrow night.”

“Grace, you need to get over this idea. I'm so not making out with him.” I shove her hard on the shoulder. “I told you, it's not like that with Nick.”

But it's not like I've never thought about it.

 

CHAPTER

4

FOUR MONTHS AGO

Truth bomb: I actually thought about Nick like that a lot.

Like, all the time, really. But I made myself pretend I didn't, and somehow I believed my own lies, which doesn't even make any sense when you think about it.

It all started when I broke up with Josh Ahmed.

“Hey, Ghost,” Nick said after picking up the phone on the first ring. I don't remember how or when it happened, but at some point, he'd gone from being someone I chatted with online now and then to someone I texted occasionally to the first person I called when I needed to talk.

“Are you busy?”

“What's wrong?”

I knew I sounded desperate. I was desperate. I had just run out of my boyfriend's house. Shaken up and on the verge of tears, I was trying as hard as I could to hang on to my sanity and my dignity and my self-esteem. They were all slipping from my shaky grip, but now I had Nick. He would help me feel better. He always did.

I panted into the phone, trying to catch my breath.

“Talk to me, Ghost. Are you all right? What's going on?” I could tell Nick was scared for me. His voice sounded hesitant. Gentle. He had no idea if I was being attacked or set on fire or abducted by aliens.

“Hold on, okay? Talk to me for a minute. Tell me what you're doing while I walk home.” It was dark, and the streets were empty. Josh had picked me up earlier, and when I dashed out of his house so quickly, I forgot I didn't have a way to get back home—easily thirty minutes on foot—without him. But a long walk would be good for me. I could pull myself together on the way home.

“Um. I went out to dinner with Alex and his new girlfriend,” he said. “She had a friend in town, so he wanted to show off and take them to this ridiculous restaurant at Caesars Palace. So overpriced—and of course, he made me pay for myself
and
the friend. She loved it, though. I guess that's good, even though I was a total weirdo, as usual.”

“What's her name?” I was surprised by the flash of jealousy I felt when he mentioned this random girl. But I was also thankful for the twinge, because it slowed my breathing, held back the crying for now.

“The friend? Kate.”

“Was she cute?”

“I don't know. She couldn't stay off her phone. I'm pretty sure she wanted to make me disappear.”

That calmed me even more. “What did you order?”

I kicked a rock down the sidewalk as he described his chicken tacos in great detail, glad for the distraction and the company on my strange walk of shame.

“That sounds good,” I mumbled.

“It was.” He coughed. “Are you okay now?”

“I just broke up with Josh.”

“Oh, Ghost. I'm sorry. What happened?”

“Can I ask you something personal?” He knew almost everything about me, but it was an unspoken thing that the
real
personal stuff was off-limits between us. He mentioned his girlfriends, but never in detail. He knew I'd had boyfriends, but I didn't divulge too much about them. But he was the only person I could talk to right now, so I needed to cross that line. I wasn't ready to talk to Grace or Lo or anyone who knew Josh in real life.