Same Difference (9780545477215) (17 page)

Now, at least, she realizes the night is over.

 

A heavy silence blankets the car ride back to Cherry Grove, even though the radio pumps a happy summer song, the kind that is supposed to make nights like these feel infinite. Chad takes corners too fast. He can't drop me off quickly enough.

“You're going home, too?” Rick whines when Chad pulls into our cul-de-sac and Meg starts to scoot out.

“I'll call you later,” she says, kissing him fast on the cheek before climbing over his lap.

I cringe as I'm getting out of the car. I want to tell Meg not to bother. I want to tell her to go and be with Rick. I pass Chad's windbreaker through the open window. He just stares straight ahead, so I drop it on his seat.

They peel out. The sound of screeching tires is ultraloud.

“Emily, come on.” Meg's trying to stay patient. “I worked so hard to plan something fun for us tonight!”

My heart sits in my throat, cutting me off from taking deep breaths. “Why? Why did you do that, Meg?” I'm yelling. And we both look around for a moment. Our fight echoes through Blossom Manor. My mom's bedroom light flicks on. Sure, we've had little tiffs before, but nothing like this. Nothing so absolute, where I didn't see a way out.

Meg backs away from me slowly. “Why are you acting like this?” She shakes her head. “You think I forced Chad to come tonight? I didn't, Emily. He was totally down to hook up with you. Rick and I barely had to say anything about it. He knew you liked him and he was interested.”

“I was never interested!” I say. “I was just tired of being the third wheel with you and Rick, okay?”

“So now you're mad at me because I'm dating Rick? I'm sorry if you're jealous that I have a boyfriend but …”

“Jealous? Of Rick? Are you kidding?” But my throat tightens up when I hear the twinge of hesitation in my voice, and the fact that Meg doesn't look at me means she hears it, too.

But it's not just about Rick. Maybe it used to be, but it's become so much more.

Meg pulls off her tortoiseshell headband. “Whatever. I'll deal with it. I'll smooth things over with the guys.” It's not that she's comforting me — she's just tired. “I just hope things won't be totally awkward the next time we all hang out.” Her last sentence hangs in the air like a warning, like this isn't going to happen again. She's standing up for them, not me. And then she does something she's never done before. She walks away without saying good-bye.

“S
oooooo,” Mom says. “Is everything okay with you and Meg?”

“Everything's fine, Mom.”

“Good.” She taps her steering wheel. “Because I thought I heard you girls fighting last night.”

“We weren't fighting,” I lie.

Mom and I sit in silence as her blinker ticks away the uncomfortable seconds. The 12:30 p.m. train from Philly glides into the station as we turn into the parking lot. Mom sighs and opens her mouth like she wants to get into it with me. I glance over at her and try to stare her down into a concession. Does she really want to get into this now?

“Fine, Emily,” she says. “Whatever you say.”

The train doors ding open and Fiona climbs down the steps of the first car. She's got on a red slip dress with a purple cardigan, black fishnets, and black round-toe heels. Her hair matches the cardigan, dyed purple. You wouldn't think purple could be summery, but the shade is exactly the color of grape ice pops that come in long plastic sleeves. And the long lock is stripped to a flat blond.

Fiona sees the convertible and races over. My mom's eyes get wide, and then she quickly slides on her sunglasses.

“Hello, Mrs. Thompson,” Fiona says as she approaches the car. She doesn't climb right in, even though I get out of the convertible and hold the door open for her. Instead she walks around to the driver's side and gives my mom a very firm handshake.

“Hello, Fiona,” Mom says, smiling. “I'm so glad you decided to visit us.”

“Are you kidding?” Fiona says, climbing into the back. “I had to beg your daughter to invite me.”

Mom eyes me over the tops of her sunglasses, like I am a terrible hostess. “I think Emily was afraid you might be bored coming to Cherry Grove.”

“Hardly,” Fiona says with a snort. “I can't wait to see this place with my own eyes.”

I get in the backseat next to Fiona and play Cherry Grove tour guide, pointing out the huge cement mass of the mall, the red-and-black movie theater, my Starbucks, the Putt Putt Palace.

“Oh my God, your town has its own miniature golf course? Cherry Grove is like freaking Disneyland!”

“Not exactly.” I take it in for myself. Putt Putt Palace is way cheesier than I remember from when Meg and I would come here in middle school. The place is filled with bad knockoffs of Disney characters, like a Mickey Mouse with drunk eyes that look in two different directions and a Little Mermaid statue whose hair is the wrong shade of red. A fountain spits foggy water. I can almost smell the mildew from the AstroTurf carpet.

“We should totally go there tonight!” Fiona says.

“Maybe,” I say. As much as Fiona is excited to traipse around Cherry Grove, I kind of want to lie low, especially after what happened last night. Hopefully Fiona brought a bathing suit like I asked so we can hide out in my pool. Suddenly, the whole making-fun thing doesn't seem like such a good idea. Maybe because July is already half over, and there's barely three weeks of the summer program left. Then I'm back here, full-time.

“Emily thought you might want T.G.I. Friday's for lunch, Fiona,” Mom says.

“Not that it's good or anything,” I clarify. “I just thought it would be funny.”

“Oooh!” Fiona says. “I've never had T.G.I. Friday's before. My mom is going to flip when she hears. She's very anti the whole chain fast food thing.”

Even though we're obviously not nine years old, we force the hostess at the podium to give us red balloons and goody bags. Inside are crayons and a coloring book. Fiona and I draw madly on it, ignoring the cartoon burgers and dancing sodas by blackening the pages with tracings of our hands. Then we draw each other's faces without looking down. They look squiggly and weird and wonderful.

Mom peers over the top of her menu, trying not to obviously look at what we're doing. But she is looking.

When we're done eating, the waitress brings my mom the bill. Suddenly, Fiona's face gets tight. She kicks me under the table.

“I don't have any money to give your mom for lunch,” she whispers.

“Don't worry about it,” I say. “She wouldn't take your money anyhow. It's our treat. Welcome to Cherry Grove.”

Fiona looks relieved and then her face suddenly lights up. “So guess what? My mom sold a whole bunch of her new paintings to a gallery owner she knows.”

“Wow! That's great!” I say.

“I know. She really wants to meet you, by the way. She feels bad that she's been working so hard on her paintings this summer. But now that everything's sold, she should be around more often.”

When we drive into Blossom Manor, Fiona says, “This is where you live.”

“Yeah.”

“You're loaded. You know that, right?”

I shrug my shoulders.

Mom turns onto our cul-de-sac and my stomach drops. Rick's truck pulls away from Meg's house and Meg is on her way up the front steps. When she sees my mom's convertible, she starts walking over toward my house. Her pace slows and she stops halfway across the street, right on the manhole cover, when she sees Fiona in the back of the car.

“Oh God,” I say under my breath.

“What?” Fiona says. She looks over my shoulder at the girl in the middle of the road. “Who's that?”

“Nobody.” I don't want this to happen right now. I unbuckle my seat belt the second Mom puts the car in park and leap out. “Just keep walking.”

“You're not going to say hello to Meg?” Mom interjects, with this look on her face like I am the worst friend, the worst person in history. She doesn't know anything, though. She has no idea what's been going on.

“You never tell me about Meg!,” Fiona says. “Let's go say hi.” I'm afraid of the smile she's got on her face, like this is going to be fun.

“Hey, Meg,” I say when we get to where she's standing.

“Hey,” she says back. “You must be Fiona. It's nice to finally meet you.” She's 100 percent happy, sweet Meg. There's not a trace of the turmoil from yesterday.

It makes me mad that Meg refuses to see what's going on. But Fiona is a piece of undeniable proof. And I know with my new friend, I am daring her to say something. I am issuing a charge to her to try and overlook this one.

Try to pretend that this isn't happening, Meg.

Fiona's quiet for a second. I see her eyes jump from my
E
necklace to Meg's
M
necklace and back again. A wry smile spreads across her mouth, and she says, “Charmed.”

Meg's smile doesn't waiver. “Is Emily giving you the grand tour?”

“Oh yeah,” Fiona snickers. “I've gotten all the highlights.”

“Well, despite what Emily might say, it's a really nice town,” Meg says, as if she needs to do damage control or something, to protect her beloved Cherry Grove from me tarnishing its image.

“I didn't say anything that bad,” I snap.

Fiona slings an arm around my shoulder. “You can't blame Emily for being disillusioned. I mean, she's been practically living in a city now for the whole summer. She's made new friends, she's one of the best artists in class,
and
she's got a new boyfriend. You should see Yates! Did she tell you that he's in college?”

Meg looks at me like she can't even process what's going on. She shakes her head, defiant. “I don't think you know Emily at all. As much as you might want her to be like you, she's just a regular girl.” Even though Meg's still talking to Fiona, she moves her eyes over to me. “School is going to start in September and everything will be back to normal.”

My mouth drops open. How could Meg say something like that? Something so humiliating in front of my new friend?

I want to step forward. I want to fight back, take her on, show her that she doesn't know me at all anymore. But the fire, the passion, and the confidence, isn't in me. It's in Fiona. And even though Fiona is right next to me, I'm aware that there will be a point when she won't be.

I run as fast as I can away from Meg. Knowing I can't go far, that there's really no escape, doesn't slow me down at all.

“Emily, wait!” Fiona calls after me.

I sprint across the lawn, up the stairs, and straight to my room. Fiona's footsteps pound behind me.

The whole place feels like a cage.

I want to get rid of everything in here, all the things that tie me to being a person I hate.

I tear through my closet, ripping my clothes off the hangers. I jam them down inside my white wicker trash can. Of course they don't all fit but I like the feeling of stuffing them inside, hearing the delicate wicker snap and pop from the force. I punch them down down down.

Fiona stands in my doorway, watching. She doesn't try to stop me.

But it is completely unsatisfying, too. I know deep inside that this isn't trash, and tomorrow the maid will come and do my laundry and all my clothes will be hanging back up where they once were. And the summer will eventually end and I'll be back in Cherry Grove and everything will be like it used to be except much, much worse. I start to cry. I fall on my bed and smother my face with my stupid rosebud comforter.

“She's wrong about you, Emily.”

“Is she?” I sound desperate and scared. I hate it. “Look at this place. This is who I really am. It's pathetic.” Tears stream down my face.

Fiona glances around. “I remember this. From your sketchbook,” she says. “But this isn't you, Emily. Maybe it used to be, but not anymore. And you don't have to pretend like it is.” Her hand runs over the wall and stops on a seam, where the rosebud wallpaper doesn't exactly line up. “You've got to start fresh.” She slides her nail underneath and slowly rips a piece away from the wall. A long, lean strip.

I walk over to my bookshelf, and though it takes a few jumps, I manage to grab hold of one of those ballerinas. It slips free from my hands — and I let it. It shatters on my floor.

I finally feel a release.

 

Three hours later, my room is unrecognizable, transformed to the sounds of Romero-on-repeat. Fiona's done a bunch of shadow tracings on every available surface — doors, my dresser, the hardwood floor. I've reconstructed my ripped rosebud wallpaper into larger flower shapes and glued them to the rough walls. Now Fiona's pulling stuff out of my closet. I'm holding a garbage bag open.

The old Emily is officially gone.

My parents keep walking by my closed door, mustering the courage to see what's going on. When they finally knock, Fiona shouts, “Come in!”

It swings open, and there's Mom and Dad and Claire. Claire runs in and says, “Wow!” My parents, both absolutely stunned, stand in the doorway.

“I, uh—” I stutter.

“We did some redecorating,” Fiona explains.

Dad starts nodding. Slow at first, and then faster and faster. “Okay, okay,” he says.

“Emily,” Mom says, like she needs to make sure it's still me. She looks around the room, frightened.

I know that I have to say something. I have to start speaking up for myself. “Mom, it just … didn't feel like me in here.”

“I want to redo my room!” Claire shouts.

Mom moves past her, over to the trash can and sees the smashed ballerinas. She picks up one long, graceful, disembodied arm. And then she spins around and walks right back out.

Dad leans against the doorframe. “We'll talk.”

He drags Claire out with him and closes the door.

My heart finally starts beating again.

“Holy shit, your parents just freaked out!”

“Dad will be okay, but my mom.” I sigh. “I wish I had a mom like yours,” I say. “Someone who'd understand.”

“Who cares if they understand? Artists can't worry about what other people are going to say.”

I nod, but the aftermath suddenly closes in on me. I know now that there's no turning back.

Not with my family, not with Meg.