Me You Us (20 page)

“Come on, Jak. I didn't have half the school on my roster.”

“And that
formula
?”

“It's not real, Jak. Mr. Kimbrough created it. The ­Galgorithm was just a silly name I made up for my services. The whole thing is silly.”

“Your
services
?”

I realize this is having the opposite of the intended effect and making me sound even
more
creepy.

“Not services. My . . . assistance.”

“It couldn't have been
that
silly a thing, Shane. You kept it a secret from me.”

She's got me there.

“Jak . . .”

“I thought we told each other everything.”

“We do. It was just this one dumb thing that I didn't even think was
worth
telling you. I had
one
secret. Sue me.”

I contemplate
why
I didn't tell Jak about everything in the first place, years ago. I wonder if, just maybe, these feelings I have for her now have been there all along. Maybe a part of me has always been in love with Jak. Maybe
that's
why I didn't want her to judge me for what I was doing.

“He used it on me,” she murmurs.

“Huh?”

“That thing. The Galgorithm. Adam used some of that stuff on me. He's one of your clients, isn't he?”

I hesitate.

“Was. Yeah. I guess that's another thing I should have told you.”

“So you tricked him into liking me?”

“No! Not at all! He liked you all on his own. In fact, he didn't even
tell me
that he was interested in you. I actually kinda got mad that he went behind my back to talk to you. He did it by himself.”

“But he used the stuff
you
taught him.”

“Jak, it doesn't really work like that. Every case is different.”

“Case.”

“I don't mean it like that. I mean just because Adam used to be a client doesn't mean I taught him how to hit on you.”

That doesn't sound much better.

“But then all of a sudden he was over me and into Rebecca. Was that you too?”

“No! I mean . . . not technically.”

“Why, Shane? Why did you get involved?”

This is not the moment to tell her how I feel. Not here. Not like this. I can't drop a bombshell like that on her now. It's not fair. It will feel like an excuse. It will put all the pressure on her.

“Why, Shane?” she repeats.

I shrug. I feel awful. I never should have gotten involved in Jak's dating life, no matter what I was thinking at the time.

“I thought I did something dumb at the party,” she says. “I thought that was why Adam didn't like me anymore.”

Jak is more upset about Adam than she was letting on. But mostly, I can tell, she's disappointed in me.

She rotates away from me again. She's crying. I have not seen Jak cry since we were little kids. It's heartbreaking.

“Please don't cry.”

“Am I not enough for you?” she asks.

“What do you mean?”

“Am I not enough for you? Is your life so empty that you need to fill it with other people's problems? You've been MIA for months. Why do you think I got the Fitbits and the gym membership? So you would actually hang out with me. But this is how you've been spending your time? I counted on you. Do you know how much that hurts?”

“Jak, all of this is behind me. The clients, the cases, the formula. I gave it up.”

“Well, it's not behind me. I . . . I don't know. I thought we had something special.”

“We
do
have something special.”

She starts to sob. She shakes her head. “No. Not anymore. You've changed. You're different now.”

“I'm not, Jak. I'm still the same. It's me, Shane the Mane. Please stop crying.”

She wipes her nose on the sleeve of her shirt like a little kid. So damn endearing.

“You're not the same. I liked the old Shane. I liked baggy-jeans Shane. Pocket-protector Shane. That Shane was all right.”

“I'm still that Shane!”

“That Shane wasn't too busy for me. That Shane didn't backstab me. That Shane was my best friend.”

I get off my ab ball and get down on one knee in front of Jak so she is forced to look at me.

“Please, Jak. Don't do this.”

“
I
didn't do anything, Shane.
You
did this.”

“We can work this out. We always do. We can still be besties.”

“We can't,” she says. “You lied to me. You kept secrets from me. You betrayed me.”

“One day we'll look back at this and laugh.”

“Maybe
you
will,” she says as she stands up.

I'm still on my knee on the floor. She takes her Fitbit off and gives it to me. I feel like she is handing me her bloodied heart on a platter.

“Don't talk to me anymore. Don't call me. Don't text me. I don't want to know you.”

“Please,” I say. “Jak, let me make it up to you. I can make this right.”

“I thought I was different,” she says. “I thought you treated me better.”

“You are! I do!”

“Yeah, well, I hope your next best friend is more understanding.”

And with that she walks out of the room, but not before shutting off the lights and leaving me in the dark.

THE PAST WEEK OR SO
has been a blur. And not the good kind of blur, either. A really, really bad blur. Devastated by the Galgorithm exposé and my falling out with Jak, I've tried to avoid my other classmates as much as possible. Fortunately, AP exams were administered at the middle school in ­Kingsview, which kept me away from much of the high school population for a few days. On the other days, I stayed home, either claiming to be studying or faking sick.

I think my exams went fine. I felt strangely in the zone during the tests because it was a bit of relief from the chaos in my personal life. Who knew that humiliation and heartbreak could be a substitute for Adderall.

Meanwhile, the baseball team has begun its playoff push, led by my archnemesis Harrison. I have stayed far
away from the games, of course. I don't really care about baseball anyway, but am secretly rooting for us to maintain this winning streak. It keeps Harrison focused more on charging the batter's box at the tiniest provocation and less on charging at me.

We've reached mid-May and there's only six weeks of high school left, but I feel totally numb. Being without Jak has been the hardest part. She's completely shut me out. Won't return my texts. Blocked me on Insta. Something that has been a part of me my whole life is now suddenly gone; I feel like I'm missing a limb. I've tried to apologize to her every way I know how, but nothing seems sufficient.

My feelings for Jak have not diminished or wavered in any way. If anything, they've only intensified. I love her and I want to spend every waking moment we have left together, which makes our rift that much more painful. She's totally disappeared from my world. If absence makes the heart grow fonder, then my heart has grown as fond as possible and is about to burst out of my chest.

I've tried to tell Tristen that she should move on, that I'm not the right guy for her, and that she deserves better. But as much as Jak refuses to let me in, Tristen refuses to let me go.

I feel like I've been misunderstood. Not just by Jak, but by everyone who read the article about me and gasped. People seem to think that I was pulling strings and scheming behind the scenes. But all my advice ever did was stop guys from being their own worst enemies.

Right now, though, I'm learning that the benefits of all my advice are only temporary. When I spot Reed sitting in a booth at the pizza place on Hickory—the site of his and ­Marisol's first date—I immediately notice a difference in him. His posture is poor. His hair is unkempt. His T-shirt is rumpled. I'm pretty sure he's wearing those dumpy jeans his mom bought him. Probably no belt, either. In the time since the ­Galgorithm was exposed, Reed has regressed to his old self. His swagger is gone.

I join him in the booth. “Hey, man.”

“Hey, Shane,” he says, not as enthusiastically as the last time we chatted, but friendly nonetheless.

“Thanks for suggesting this,” I say. “I really needed to get out of the house.”

“No problem,” he says. “I have a lot of good memories of this place.”

The restaurant is small, only a few tables, and there's no air-conditioning, just two ceiling fans. It's hot, and the walls are red brick, so it feels like you're actually
inside
a brick pizza oven.

Reed hasn't ordered yet, so I figure I'll just wait until he's ready. In the meantime, there are some unfortunate developments that need to be discussed.

“I heard about Marisol,” I say.

Reed hangs his head.

Like Brooke, when Marisol saw the article and blog post
about the Galgorithm, she thought some of the “techniques” seemed familiar. Eventually she figured out that Reed was a client of mine. Then she broke up with him.

“It sucks, Shane.”

“Remember how one of the very first things I ever taught you was to be positive as much as possible and to apologize as little as possible?”

“Yeah,” he says.

“I think it's okay to be negative now. And also:
I'm sorry
.”

Something makes me think I'm gonna be apologizing a lot in the coming weeks.

“Hey, if it wasn't for you, I never would have been dating Marisol in the first place.”

“Still, if she broke up with you over something I did, then it's my fault. What did she say?”

“Just that she was embarrassed. And she felt like I lied to her. Like our whole relationship was based on me being creepy.”

“Have you tried talking to her since? Given her some time to cool off?”

“Right now she's not returning any of my calls.” He sighs. “I figure if I can't be with Marisol, then I don't want to be with anyone else. So I changed back to my old clothes. That way no one will ever want to date me, like it's supposed to be.”

“Don't say that, Reed. You know as well as I do that ­Marisol never went for you because you updated your wardrobe.”

“Is this where you give me the ‘it's what's inside that counts' speech? Because I'm really not in the mood.”

“Fair enough,” I say, allowing him space. “So what's the scene been like at school?”

“Oh, you know Kingsview. Everyone's got the attention span of a fruit fly. A lot of people have moved on. The baseball team is all the rage now. Some of the girls are still pissed. But you've developed quite the cult following among the, let's say, socially challenged crowd.”

This I knew. Every nerd, geek, and dweeb in town has been messaging me asking for advice.
Advice for what?
I think to myself. How to end up alone? I haven't responded to any of them.

“Have you seen Jak?” I ask.

“She's around. Kinda has a sour look on her face.”

“Hmm. That doesn't really mean anything. That's her normal look. She looks that way on her birthday.”

Reed shrugs.

“Let me ask you a question,” I say. “Me and Jak. When you were around us, did you ever think that, I don't know, maybe we could be more than just friends?”

He chuckles.

“What?” I ask.

“Are you kidding me? You two are like obsessed with each other. I've never seen two ‘friends' who more obviously want to hook up.”

“Are you serious?”

“Yes! I mean, clearly you're in love with her. Me and a couple of my Dungeons and Dragons buddies used to make fun of you on Twitter. ‘Shane and Jak equals #Shak.'”

“A hashtag? Really?”

“Hey, before you took me on as a client, I had a lot of free time.”

“How come you never told me that I was in love with her!”

“It's kind of a thing you gotta figure out on your own.”

Very, very true. Though running into Faith also didn't hurt. Either way, it doesn't matter. I ruined everything with Jak.

Reed and I stare into space for a while, each pondering our meager existence. I used to think that Reed could be my protégé. Then he swept Marisol off her feet, and I thought the pupil had become the master. Now I look at us as equals: two hopeless outcasts.

This can't be how it ends.

“Reed, you know what would be even sweeter than winning over Marisol in the first place?” I ask.

“Being a male model who women flock to without even trying?”

“Well, yeah, I guess that would be pretty sweet. But what I was gonna say was winning her back.”

“Winning Marisol back?”

“Yeah!” I say, trying to pump Reed up.

“I don't know. I think I might need to take a break.”

“I'm telling you, you could do it, Reed. You don't even need me anymore. I already taught you everything I know.”

“You really believe that?”

I can tell his confidence is buried in there, somewhere.

“Absolutely,” I say. “But this time, you do it on your terms. Don't be embarrassed about playing Dungeons and Dragons. Don't hide that from her. Don't spend hours planning and preparing. Just do it. Just like you did that day in the courtyard. That should be your whole relationship: going with your gut, being yourself, owning you!”

Reed starts to nod his head. As far as motivational speeches go, this hasn't been my finest. But I just want Reed to know that he can do it.

“Okay,” he says. “Maybe you're right. If me and Marisol were meant to be together, then we should be together, no matter what.”

“Exactly!”

“I'm just gonna talk to her, I'm gonna be honest, I'm gonna explain myself, I'm gonna apologize, and then she's gonna take me back!”