The Start of Me and You (33 page)

I smiled over at Tessa. At the start of the year, I never would have guessed she’d let new people in—let alone make real friends out of Max and Ryan. But here she was, fan getup and all. Caring. When the baton made it to Ryan, we screamed and clapped until he crossed the finish line in first place. He slowed to a jog, catching his breath. After a moment, he looked up to the stands and gave us a wave.

We all waved back. And standing there with my friends, I felt a kind of contentment beneath the twinges of loss—a steadiness that I’d fought for.

“I’m gonna grab a drink,” I told Tessa. “I’ll be back before Tyler’s race.”

I trotted down the bleachers and ducked underneath them, taking a shortcut to the concessions. As I popped out on the other side, I bumped into someone. I didn’t even see her until our shoulders connected: tall, athletic, brunette.

“Oh gosh, sorry,” I said. I was looking at Leanne Woods, hidden in the shadow of the looming bleachers. Only, she
didn’t look quite like Leanne Woods, ex-girlfriend of Ryan Chase. She was as pretty as ever, and even up close, she didn’t seem to have pores. But her eyes were glassy as she glanced over in Ryan’s direction and wiped a finger under each lower lid. Once she did, she straightened up.

In fact, she looked me right in the eyes and said, “Hey, Paige.”

I couldn’t remember if I’d ever talked to Leanne before, and I was surprised that she knew my name. We weren’t on bad terms, but we ran in completely different circles and even had different classes. I shoved my hands in my pockets. “Hey, Leanne.”

She shifted, clutching her purse close to her side. “How are you?”

“I’m okay. How are you?”

She shrugged, her eyes wandering off in the distance again. I wasn’t sure if our conversation was over, so I stood stupidly until she focused on me again. “I’ve seen you around with Max Watson a lot this year.”

That
I wasn’t expecting. “Oh. Uh … yeah.”

“You guys are cute together. We haven’t always gotten along, but that’s only because he’s protective of Ryan. And I could be a real bitch to him.” Leanne laughed ruefully, smoothing her makeup again.

“Max and I are actually just friends,” I said. Or trying to be, these days.

“Too bad. Everyone would love to see you happy with someone, after everything with Aaron.”

“Oh,” I repeated, flustered. “That’s, um. That’s really nice, Leanne. Thanks.”

She shrugged again. “It’s true. Everyone wants good things for you.”

At that point, I was completely dumbstruck. Ryan talked about this—how Leanne would say whatever she actually thought. I’d always assumed everyone in school felt nothing but pity. Leanne seemed to think I had a whole “everyone” of well-wishers.

Leanne’s eyes found Ryan again and then slid over to Tessa. “He really likes her, doesn’t he?”

I bit down on my lip. After how nice Leanne had just been to me, I hated to admit how unwavering Ryan had been in his pursuit of Tessa. Leanne read my silence as a ‘yes,’ and she sighed. “Of course he does. She’s smart and gorgeous.”

Because Leanne was being so open with me and because I had always wondered, the question jumped out of my mouth. “Why’d you end it with him anyway?”

“Ha,” she said, her voice bitter. “I don’t know. I felt trapped. I wanted to shake things up, take a risk. It was like life was too perfect, you know?”

“Not really,” I said flatly.

“Well, it’s not now. So great job, me.” With one final
wipe of her eyes, she turned away. But she glanced back, over her shoulder. “Don’t tell anyone, okay?”

Before I had a chance to agree, she walked away, headed toward the parking lot. Even though she was the one who broke up with Ryan, I felt for Leanne. Brokenheartedness is a sisterhood with involuntary membership. I’d keep her secret like I kept all the rest.

The last week of school felt like sleepwalking. I moved from class to class, taking pages full of notes to keep me sane. Teachers handed out final assignments, and I tried to pay attention. When thoughts of my grandmother sneaked in over class lectures, I focused on screen-writing school, which made me feel so connected to her. Or I added to my packing plan, even though one suitcase was already full.

Max slid me one note in class that week, and, even more than the sunshine bending through classroom windows, it felt like summer. New starts, warmer days—even if we were in different cities. At home, I glued the tiny paper airplane to the edge of my collage. Max’s hopefulness and wonder had become a little piece of me, somehow. He belonged there, among all my other favorite things.

When I sat down to write thank-you notes, the ones for Mrs. Chase and Max’s mom were easy enough. I expressed how grateful I was for their kindness—for the lasagna and
flowers, respectively—and how much it meant, to be thought of. But I wrestled with how to thank Max for everything he had done for me. In the end, I chickened out and wrote a note almost identical to the others. I meant to pen the same sign-off—“Sincerely”—on Max’s card, too, but my hand tried to write an
L
. An
L
and three other letters. It was true whether I wrote it or not. That’s the confusing part of falling for a friend: I loved him the way I loved Tessa, Morgan, and Kayleigh—protectively and completely. There were just so many feelings layered over that foundation.

I stared over at my collage.
Love extra
, my grandmother had said.
Even if it means you hurt extra, too
. Fine, then. I threw my first note to Max in the trash and began again—truthfully this time. This was it: the one way I could say what I needed to.

Dear Max,

I made a plan at the start of this year, and I thought everything would be fine if I just stuck to it. There -were some good ideas on there—-ones that led me to QuizBowl and to screen--writing school. But other parts of my plan -were misguided—-things that I -wasn’t ready for or that just -weren’t right for me.

I realize now that I could never have planned some of the best things that have happened to me this year. One of them is you. I’ll always be grateful, for the cookies and everything -else.

Your friend,

Janie

Chapter Twenty-Six

With only a few minutes left in Thursday’s class, Ms. Pepper dropped a bomb.

“As you all know,” she said, pacing across the front of the room. “I have tried this year to force you all to get to know both literature and each other. So, your last project is a little unusual. Has anyone heard of PostSecret?”

There was a collective, indiscernible muttering from the class.

“For those of you who don’t know,” she explained, “PostSecret is a community art project. People anonymously send their deepest secrets, on postcards, to the man who runs the site, and he posts new ones online every week.”

The class was abuzz, speculating what this had to do with our project.

“PostSecret epitomizes Keats’s principle of truth and beauty for me,” she continued over the noise of the class. “That’s what I wanted for you this year: to see literature as a way to understand your fellow man, to find kernels of truth and the scopes of beauty. So, as a final effort on the behalf of that cause, you will each be creating an anonymous postcard for tomorrow. For display purposes.”

The class became outright noisy, everyone protesting the idea of publicly disclosing their secrets. I was glad Max couldn’t see my expression—the panic that accompanied the idea of confessing my one last secret.

“Now, before you freak out,” Ms. Pepper said, raising her voice over the commotion. “Hear me out. There are four rules. First, the secret must be something that you have never told anyone. Secondly, so I don’t get fired, please keep the secret reasonably school appropriate. I’ll be screening them. Third, the secret can be about anything, as long as it is true. It doesn’t have to be a dark or serious secret.”

The release of tension from the class was audible, sighs and
whew
s.

“For example,” Ms. Pepper offered. “I actually, genuinely wish that my dog, Grendel, could talk to me.”

The class chuckled.

“Or …” She stood before us, her face solemn. “I could
write that I believe teenagers have much more to offer the world than most adults would have them think.”

The class stayed silent. I think we all knew how truly she believed that.

“And, as for the last rule,” she said, “turn them in to me tomorrow when you get to school. In the morning, people, okay? I’ll mark you with a pass grade, and I’ll put them up around the classroom after I screen them.”

The bell went off overhead, and everyone scurried to collect their things.

“Sounds cool,” I said to Max as I scooped up my binder and book from my desk. We walked into the flow of people in the hallway.

“Yeah,” he agreed. “I’m kind of bummed that I might miss it.”

“Oh?” I asked, tensing up. Was this the last time I would see him in English class? The last time I’d see him before he left for the summer? I thought I’d have more time.

“My mom and I are leaving for Florida tomorrow, so she’s picking me up sometime after third period so we can go straight to the airport without leaving my car here.”

“Ditching the last day of school, huh?” I tried to joke but I somehow managed to sound as disappointed as I felt.

“Yeah. She really wanted to get a vacation in before I leave for the summer.” He used his free hand to push his glasses up, and I caught myself smiling at the familiar tic.

“Well … that sounds fun,” I said. We were almost at the point where our paths diverged.
Now or never
, I thought. And, somehow, I felt the same surge of confidence that I had in our QuizBowl semifinal match. When you accept that you’ll lose sometimes—and how freeing it is to keep trying anyway.

I stood in front of him, heart beating in my chest and throat and cheeks. “Last walk from class, I guess.”

“I guess so,” he said.

“Oh,” I said, as if I’d forgotten. “Here. Thank-you notes. For … funeral stuff. I mailed Mrs. Chase’s, but I figured I’d just hand off yours and your mom’s in person.”

“Oh,” he repeated, taking the two white envelopes from me. “Okay. My mom makes me write these, too. Every Christmas and birthday since I could hold a pen.”

We stopped at the spot where our directions split.

“Well,” I said, “I’m really glad you had to switch seats with Ryan.”

He smiled a little, staring down at his Chuck Taylors. “Yeah. Me, too.”

“Otherwise I never would have known,” I said, pausing to swallow, “that I’m such a Jane after all.”

He looked down at me now, green eyes searching mine.
Come on, Max,
I wanted to scream.
I’m the Bennet sister who was too shy to admit her feelings
. Nothing registered on his face.

“Okay,” I said, before embarrassment could creep in. “See you tomorrow, maybe.”

“See ya,” Max said.

I came home that afternoon to a note from my mom, asking me to pick Cameron up at dance. My mom trusted me to drive her car, and she was on a date with my dad. Somehow, since the previous fall, this had become almost normal to me.

I picked Cameron up from dance at seven, and we drove in silence. Cameron turned the radio on after a few minutes, and I drummed my hands against the steering wheel, trying to think of a secret I could submit to Ms. Pepper. I’d opened up to so many people that I had no real secrets left. Sure, I hid my feelings for Max from him, but I’d made my peace with that. I’d had the guts to get us on the same page, and that was enough. Same page. Same Paige.

And suddenly, I knew what I had to do, what would inspire my secret. I thought of my face in the mirror at the beginning of the school year, the one that was so desperate for change. And it had changed.
I
had changed, and it was more than bangs and more than my parents’ reconciliation or my grandmother’s death. It was a new group of friends, it was freedom, learning, failing, grieving. It was getting back to my old self and defining a new self at the same
time. There was only one thing waiting for me, standing between who I was and who I wanted to be. It had been here this whole time, but only now was I ready.