The Start of Me and You (30 page)

Normally, knowing I’d see Max there would have calmed me a little. But it only made me more nervous.

When I’d texted him to say I wouldn’t need a ride, he’d replied with an empty “OK.” I didn’t know what I’d expected him to say, but tears itched at my eyes.
I’m a basket case
, I thought.
Who gets emotional over two letters?
But then I remembered that “no” also has only two letters. Almost everyone in the world has cried over those.

It was clear from the first five minutes onstage: we were going to lose. My brain couldn’t even fully process the questions before Noblesville answered them correctly.

“Instituted by the Clinton administration in 1994, this policy—”

Noblesville buzzed. “Don’t ask, don’t tell!”

Correct.

Their speed, compared to our openmouthed lagging, was absurd. At one point, Malcolm actually started laughing to himself, taking Max and I right with him. Lauren’s cheeks flushed pink with frustration. My parents were in the audience, so I should have been mortified, but there was nothing to do but laugh.

The inevitability of defeat was oddly freeing. There was nothing to lose, only to gain, and each question we answered became cause for celebration. Everyone else got a few in, including me. I was shell-shocked during the first round, but I recovered in the second. I buzzed before the moderator had finished his sentence: “A onetime employee of Thomas Edison—”

“Paige, for Oakhurst,” the moderator said, acknowledging me by my name card. I knew in my gut that I was
right. I’d once read a book that fictionalized a friendship between a young maid and … “Nikola Tesla!”

“Correct,” the moderator said.

“Yeah!” my dad called from the audience, leaping to his feet. “That’s my girl!”

My mom tugged him down, and the other parents laughed. I wasn’t even embarrassed.

A few minutes into our cataclysmic loss, a small crowd filed into the back of the auditorium. They were trying to be quiet, but the chairs squeaked as they sat down—maybe four or five people.

My
people. Tessa, Morgan, Kayleigh, and Ryan. I was sure of it by their heights and the silhouettes of their hair.

If I’d had any doubt, it would have been alleviated when Noblesville flubbed with Krakatoa, and Max responded correctly with Mount Tambora. There was a chorus of girlish whoops from the last row of the auditorium, and Ryan Chase’s bro-iest voice calling: “YEAH, SON!”

I dared a look at Max. He shook his head, smiling. The Noblesville captain scowled at us. They were winning, but we were having more fun.

And when Noblesville was announced the winner, I had a feeling that most of the cheers were from the losing side supporters.

Malcolm offered me his hand as I stepped down from the stage. Max trotted down to talk to his mom, who waved to
me. I waved back, cringing against the ache in my sternum. I pushed away thoughts of her watching the end of
Indiana Jones
with us, of her making snacks for me and Morgan as we studied for an English test with Max. Of her always, always hugging me when I left. I looked away. Max had been sitting right next to me for the past hour, but he’d never been so distant.

“Well, we may have lost tonight, but, overall, this is farther than we got last year,” Lauren announced. “I’m pleased.”

“We’re going to miss you next year,” I said. She was off to Johns Hopkins, where she’d be splitting her time between the conservatory and an applied mathematics major.

She blinked at me. “I’m very much looking forward to an academically rigorous college curriculum. So. I probably won’t miss this.”

“Yeah,” I said, laughing. “I know. But I had fun this year.”

I leaned forward to give her a quick hug. To my surprise, she squeezed me back. “Me, too.”

The moment Lauren walked away, hands wrapped around me from behind, my dad nearly lifting me off the ground. “I’m so proud of you, kid.”

I grinned. “I wish you could have seen us win.”

“It was fun to see you up there,” my mom said, squeezing my hand.

I didn’t have a chance to respond before Tessa, Morgan, and Kayleigh surrounded me, all talking at once. They smelled
like hairspray and perfume, and I could have burst from love for them. “What happened to the art gallery thing?”

“We made that up!” Morgan said. “Duh.”

“You lied?”

“Not exactly,” Kayleigh said. “It was just a secret.”

“Sorry we were a little late. We got lost,” Tessa added.

“Because
somebody
had to make an ‘emergency pit stop,’” Kayleigh said.

“Hey, I
needed
that milkshake,” Tessa said. She turned to my mom. “Can Paige spend the night?”

My mom smiled at this age-old question. “Sure.”

“I can still drive home with you guys,” I said.

“Nah,” my dad said, winking. “Go with your friends.”

I did. As we left the auditorium, Max looked up from a conversation with his mom, Ryan, and Ms. Pepper. He put his hand up in a wave, eyes trained away from me. Tessa waved back, and so did Kayleigh, but Morgan just looped her arm through mine.

Ryan held up one finger, then pointed toward the exit.

“He drove,” Tessa said. “I guess he’ll meet us out there in a few.”

“Is Max freaking kidding me with the moping?” Morgan demanded as we bustled out into the spring air. “He is being such a baby. So you guys had a fight. Big deal.”

“Seriously,” Kayleigh said. “Morgan and I fight all the time. You get over it.”

Tessa gnawed at her lip, gazed fixed on the asphalt in front of us.

“I know,” I said quietly. “I don’t get it either.”

“Has he said anything to you?” Morgan asked, looking at Tessa.

She shook her head. “No. He’s just been kind of quiet, I guess. I asked him if he was okay at lunch, and he just said he was ‘in a funk.’ But I could talk to him if—”

“No,” I said. “I don’t want to put you in the middle. He’s your friend, too.”

“Funk
that
,” Kayleigh said. We’d reached Ryan’s Jeep, and we leaned against the bumper. “We need more information. Has he said
anything
to you, Paige?”

“Not really. I get zero eye contact and one-word text messages. It’s brutal.”

Morgan held out her hand, palm up. “Give me your phone. We need to do text analysis.”

“Definitely,” Kayleigh added. “Dig for textual innuendo.”

“Be my guest,” I said, pulling my phone out of my bag. “You’ll see for yourselves that he’s giving me
nothin
’.”

I punched in my phone’s password, but as I went to click into messages, I saw that my e-mail icon had changed since I’d last checked.

“Hold on,” I said.

From NYU. Subject line:
Congratulations!
My heart’s rhythm became less of a beat and more a repeated collision with my rib cage. I opened the e-mail.

“Oh my God,” I whispered.

“What?” Tessa stepped closer.

“The screen-writing program. I’m in.”

“Oh my God,” Tessa said, echoing me.

“That is the best news!” Morgan said, and Kayleigh woo-hooed into the quiet parking lot.

I kept staring at the e-mail. It was real. They’d read my
Mission District
spec script. I’d move to Manhattan for an entire month. Assuming my parents really would let me go.

“I mean, it’s still not for sure,” I said. “My parents said they’d pay for it, but who knows if—”

“Hey,” Tessa said. “Cease and desist order on the negativity.”

“It’s not negativity! I’m being realistic.”

“And realistically,” Kayleigh said, “we are super excited for you.”

I smiled tentatively. “Thanks.”

“Are
you
excited for you?” Kayleigh prodded.

“Well, obviously, I’m excited.”

“I think she’s in shock,” Morgan said, tilting her head to study me.

Kayleigh got to her feet, standing in front of me. “C’mon. Get up. We gotta dance it out.”

She pumped her arms, rocking back and forth. “Victory dance. Do it.”

Morgan joined in with the same goofy dance. “Yep. C’mon.”

I shook my head, laughing, as a voice called out near us.

“What did I miss?” Ryan jogged toward us.

“Paige got into a summer writing program!” Morgan said.

“Nice!” he said, holding up his hand. I high-fived him, grinning. “But it seems you’re missing something. Be right back.”

He ducked into the Jeep, and music blasted out of the now-open windows.

“There we go!” Kayleigh said, right back to dancing. Morgan bumped me with her hip, and I laughed as even Tessa raised her hands up, totally into it.

The beat of the song pulsed through the evening air, and Ryan Chase stood before me. I could hardly believe I’d been so overcome by a crush on him. I actually knew him now, and he was just as great as I’d always thought. But his traits were academic facts to me now: Ryan Chase was handsome, charming, and kind. I didn’t feel those things in my chest, sizzling like neon light. He cocked his chin. “Aren’t you gonna dance?”

“Yeah.” I stood a little taller, feeling the swell of happiness through me. “I am.”

“Yeah, you are.” Without warning, Ryan scooped me up, my feet leaving the ground. I gasped, hands clutching for something—anything—until I regained equilibrium from higher up. Once I realized I was secure, I laughed,
and he spun around. I didn’t even have time to be self-conscious that he was holding me by my bare legs, his arms wrapped around my thighs.

I held my arms out wide and tilted my head up to the night sky. I felt like I could lift right out of his arms, spinning to the ground like a maple seed.

Ryan slid me down, and we pulled apart as the song hit the fast-paced chorus, and there was really nothing to lose. So I put my hands up, I swayed my hips, I shook my shoulders. I was dancing—really dancing—for the first time in almost two years.

Morgan’s laughter pealed through the air as the three of them performed some kind of do-si-do, Tessa’s blond waves shimmying with every swing. I could make out their grins in the yellow streetlights. My crazy, dancing friends. Mine.

And I didn’t feel like I’d lost a thing that night. Not a single thing.

Chapter Twenty-Three

I knew Max would dart out of English the second the bell rang on Monday. But the reality that I’d be gone for almost half the summer gave me courage: I had to fix this soon. I psyched myself up all morning, mentally scripting a conversation.
Nothing could be worse than the tense silence
, I told myself. Even talking it out had to be easier. So when the first tone of the bell sounded, I swiveled around to take my chance. I gripped Max’s arm even though he was already sliding out of his seat.

“Will you stay for a minute? Please?” Everyone was filing out of the classroom. Morgan shot me a wide-eyed look as she passed through the door.

“I have class,” Max said, not meeting my eyes.

“I know that,” I said. “Please?”

He didn’t respond, but he didn’t leave either. We stayed this way, in silence, and I fought the desire to cringe.

“I have to go make some copies. See you two tomorrow,” Ms. Pepper said, heading out the door. She wasn’t carrying any papers to copy.

“So,” I said. I moved my hand from Max’s arm. The room was too quiet, the faint hum of air-conditioning and the wall-mounted clock. “I’m truly sorry for what I said at the pool. I shouldn’t have brought those things up no matter how—”

“—traumatized you were?” He rubbed at his forehead with both hands. “Paige, I triggered some kind of PTSD for you, then acted like an asshole, after everything you’ve been through. You can be mad at me.
I’m
mad at me.”

“Well, you sort of had a point,” I said. “And I did, too. So, can we just … not be mad at each other anymore?”

“I’m not
mad
at you, Paige. I’m just—”

“Hurt?” I guessed, and the next words came out in a frustrated jumble. “Me, too, Max. But you’re not the only nonconfrontational introvert here, and I’m
trying
, so can you just look at me?”

Finally, his eyes pulled up to mine. “I’m sorry about what I said.”

“I know.” I balled my hands into fists, pressing my fingers into swampy hands. The worst was over—it had to be—and my next question would be the turning point. “So, can we just be okay now?”

He chewed at his thumbnail, and I wondered what,
exactly, he needed to consider so torturously. I was giving him a clean slate, and all I wanted was the same in return. “I think I just need … some time. And space.”

I collapsed inside myself, smaller and smaller until I wished I could disappear from my seat. What did that even
mean
? We were equal offenders in that ridiculous, poolside fight, and if anything,
I
had more cause to push him away. Now I come to him, palms up in surrender, and he backs away farther?

“Fine,” I said, picking up my things. “Well, just so you know, I got into my screen-writing program.”

“That’s great,” he said. “I got into my Italy program, too.”

The whole summer whooshed away, right there. First I’d be gone, then him.

“Well,” I managed, even though my lungs shrank inside my chest. “There’s your time and space. Maybe you should transfer back to Coventry while you’re at it.”