Текст книги "I Love Him, I Love Him Not "

Автор книги: Ella Martin

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Chapter Three

“So you and Tim didn’t hang out yesterday?” I said to Bianca as we walked to our European history class together. “Your text said he was coming over.”

“And he did,” she replied, “to pick up Brady so they could go look for car parts or whatever. He knew I’d made plans with you.”

I frowned, feeling a little guilty. “Sorry. I thought you were ditching me.”

“Trust me, I’d much rather hang out with you than go with them to that creepy junkyard.” She shuddered. “But anyway, I ended up cleaning my room, so that made my mom happy.”

Jake was in class when we arrived. I was surprised to see him there already; he usually met me outside my geometry class so we could walk together. I’d figured he’d been asked to stick around after Spanish or something. But he was in his seat at the back of the room, a sullen look on his face.

“What’s up with Jake?” Bianca asked.

I shook my head. “I don’t know.”

She pursed her lips. “I’m sure he’ll tell us at lunch.”

I was skeptical. Jake shared a lot of stuff with me that he otherwise kept hidden from the rest of our friends, but I said, “Maybe.”

“Is your mom still going to that conference?”

“What?” The sudden change in topic startled me. “Oh, yeah,” I said with a quick nod, “in Vegas. And get this: Dr. Griffin’s going with her.”

“Really? That’s kind of crazy,” she said, heading for her seat.

I put my backpack beside my desk before I headed toward Jake and kicked his shoe. “Hey.”

He looked up and gave me a weak smile. “Hey, yourself. I heard you sent Jorgensen off the edge this morning, and he almost took your phone away.” I scrunched up my nose and made a sour face, and he chuckled.

“It’s totally stupid,” I said, folding my arms across my chest. “I don’t know why anyone’s even talking about it.”

“Because you’re the girl who gets away with it all.” He pushed his hair out of his face. “Don’t worry. By the end of the day, I’m sure the word’ll be that he confiscated it and gave you a month’s detention, too.”

I snorted. Stories had ways of turning into larger-than-life events as they circulated the Westgate breezeways. That was another reason Ally’s blog was so well read. She was a trusted source.

“So what really happened?”

“Nothing,” I said. “He totally singled me out for no reason.”

He raised his eyebrows. “None at all?”

I kicked his shoe again before I said, “I may have been, like, half a minute late.” I paused. “And it’s possible I was texting Ally during announcements.” Jake snickered, and I said, “What? It’s not like I haven’t done worse.”

“You bend the rules,” he said, lifting his shoulder. “I get it.”

I crouched down beside him, careful to pull my skirt over my knees as I grabbed the back of his chair to steady myself. “So what’s up? Are you okay?”

He was still for a second, and I wondered if he’d heard me until he hung his head and shook it. “Not really.” He took a deep breath and exhaled. “We broke up. And I think it’s for good.”

It took a moment to process what he’d just said. At first I thought he was talking about him and Clover, or maybe some other girlfriend I didn’t know about, but as soon as I realized he meant Ephemera, I grabbed his hand and squeezed it. Ephemera had been his world for the last couple of years. We all thought they’d be one of those bands that started in high school, stayed together forever, and went on to be huge.

“What happened?”

Jake shook his head again. “I’m not a hundred percent sure. I just know Keith and Zack had it out late last night.” He began rubbing the back of my hand with his thumb, something he did whenever I held his hand while he was nervous or scared about something. “Keith told me this morning. I guess it was pretty bad.”

“I’m sorry.” It pained me to see him like this. He was sullen and despondent, not at all his usual self.

“Clover thinks it’s for the best,” he said, and I froze at the sound of her name. I’d always been the first person Jake would turn to about stuff like this. Since when had she become his main confidante?

“Show some hustle, Mr. Miller,” Mr. Jorgensen called to someone from the open door at the front of the class as the bell rang. I hurried to my desk and slid into my seat as a lanky classmate loped into the room. “I’ve seen you on the basketball court, Shawn,” Mr. Jorgensen said to him. “I know you can move faster than that.”

My lip involuntarily curled up in a sneer. Mr. Jorgensen was usually way more relaxed and didn’t reprimand people for tardies and stuff unless they were excessive. It was almost as if he’d woken up that morning with a resolve to hand out as many detentions as he could that day.

It took a few minutes for the class to settle down, and then our teacher launched into his lecture. It began with a quick review of the nineteenth century, mostly stuff on the last semester’s midterm exams, and by the time he started covering new material on the twentieth century, my brain automatically tuned him out. It was pure luck that I heard the question he directed toward me.

“And the result of the built-up tension related to this resurgence of imperialism through the European powers was what, Miss Nicoletti?” He stared at me as though his sharp, hawklike gaze could look into my brain and know what I was thinking.

I wracked my brain and blurted out the first early twentieth century event I could think of. “Um, World War I?”

“Correct.” His mouth curved downward ever so slightly, as if he was disappointed he didn’t catch me daydreaming. I exhaled quickly through my nose, feeling annoyed. Hadn’t he busted me enough already today?

“That will be our focus for the month,” Mr. Jorgensen said to the class. “The Great War, as it was called, lasted four years. I think we can devote at least four weeks to studying it.”

I raised my hand, and my teacher stilled before calling on me. “I thought World War I started because some Russian prince got shot.”

Mr. Jorgensen smiled in that indulgent way teachers did when talking to an exceptionally dense student. “No, no,” he said. “Not a prince. Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria was of Prussian descent, not Russian.” He practically smirked when he corrected me. “And no, though some people cite his assassination as the catalyst for Austria-Hungary’s declaration of war against Serbia, it was really nationalism and imperialist policies that, over time, caused tensions to reach that proverbial boiling point.” He glanced around the class. “That will be on the test.”

I nodded as if I understood, and he turned his attention to other students. Since I’d already been called on to answer one of his questions and had followed it up with an obligatory one of my own, it was doubtful Mr. Jorgensen would call on me again that period. After a quick glance over my shoulder at Jake, I tuned out my history teacher’s droll, monotone voice and let my thoughts drift to Clover, wondering how she’d heard about Ephemera’s split before I did.

Chapter Four

“But, Mom,” I whined into my phone as I walked toward the cafeteria, “he completely embarrassed me in front of everyone, all because I was sending Ally a text.”

“I thought you weren’t supposed to use your phone in class, anyway,” she replied. Then, to her assistant, she said, “Karen, this has all the notarized statements Garcia wanted. I need you to messenger this to him, and then would you get me the Franklin deposition before you go to lunch? Thanks.” There was a brief pause before she spoke again. “Did Ally get in trouble, too?”

“No, but—”

“So you’re upset about getting caught.”

“That’s so not the point,” I said, growling in frustration.

“Well, I see he didn’t confiscate your phone,” she said. “Did he give you detention?” Another pause. “Please tell me you don’t have detention today. I need you home right after school.”

I made a face at my phone before I said, “No, I don’t have detention.”

She let out a heavy sigh, and I could picture her lips pressed tight together in a straight line. “Talia, sweetheart, I don’t know what you expect me to do.”

“I thought you talked to the school about cutting me some slack.”

“Yes, regarding your hair,” she said, correcting me. “That’s the only exception I asked Martin to make.”

Martin. She was on a first-name basis with my principal. I tried not to gag.

“What I did not do,” she continued, “is insist upon the right to brazenly break rules at your discretion, especially when you’re doing so right under your teacher’s nose.”

“But—”

“You are not a special snowflake, honey,” she said, “and even if you were, the same laws that apply to all other snowflakes would still apply to you.”

“Meaning?”

“Meaning you need to follow rules like everyone else. There can’t have possibly been anything so critical this morning that you had to tell Ally right away.”

“You’re—”

“So I’m certainly not going to drop everything and run to Westgate because Mr. Jorgensen hurt your feelings and censured you in front of your class.”

“But that’s not—”

“I am buried in stuff I need to get finished before I leave for my conference. We’ll talk about this later.”

“But—”

“Talia.” Her clipped tone held in it a finality that let me know the matter was no longer up for discussion. “We will discuss this later.”

“Ugh,” I said as I ended the call. I shoved the phone into my pocket.

“That sounded like a fun conversation,” Keith said, startling me. I didn’t know how long he’d been walking beside me. He was close enough to hear most of my side of the call but far enough away that I didn’t notice him.

“You have no idea.” I glanced around. “Aren’t you going the wrong way? Why aren’t you over by the grove?” Even as I asked, I knew the answer. Zack and his other friends hung out at a small copse of dogwood trees near the faculty parking lot. If things got as heated between them as Jake had said, Keith wouldn’t be welcome.

Keith shrugged off my question. “I figured I’d check out the cafeteria. Maybe try it out and see why Jake likes hanging out there.” He grinned and elbowed me, and I laughed.

The din of too loud conversation greeted us before we even reached the cafeteria. Once we crossed the threshold, scents of cleaning solvents, cheeseburgers, pizza, ketchup, burritos, and sweat combined into a rank stench that made my stomach turn. The feeling only lasted a few seconds, though, and by the time we’d passed the first table, I didn’t even notice it anymore.

I led Keith through the maze of bodies and tables to where my friends were sitting. Jake’s best friend Finn was in his customary pose, staring at his open laptop with a half-eaten sandwich in one hand while he typed with the other. Ally sat beside him, munching on celery sticks and studying a script. Jake’s stuff was there beside Finn, but he was out of sight.

“Hey, guys,” I said as I tossed my backpack into an empty chair across from Finn.

“Hi,” Ally said, her eyes focused on the words in front of her. She’d been cast in the lead role of Roxy Hart in Westgate’s spring production of Chicago and was still working on memorizing her lines. She crunched into another stalk and turned a page.

“You’re looking good, Katz.”

Ally coughed, choking on her celery as she looked up. “Hi, Keith,” she managed after a quick drink from her water bottle. She closed her script and hurried to consolidate the stuff she had spread out on the table. “What’s going on? Are you slumming it today?”

“Something like that.” He slid into the seat beside her. “I swung by the garage on Saturday, but you weren’t there.”

“Yeah, Freddie told me.” She fiddled with the pages of her script and smiled. “I was there yesterday, though. He said you were asking about space to work on a rebuild?”

“Hopefully,” Keith said, “if I can get the car.” The two of them launched into a discussion about something beyond my comprehension, and I tuned them out.

Across from me, Finn seemed oblivious to the rest of the world. Finnegan Marks had been Jake’s best friend for as long as I could remember, though they were an unlikely pair. Jake saw school as a necessity; his grades were something that needed to stay solid if he wanted to keep playing music. But Finn was the academic overachiever, the guy who took classes over the summer to get ahead in various subjects and obsessed over his GPA and how it ranked against others’. He was the only sophomore not taking any regular tenth-grade classes, and he’d been given permission before winter break to take the AP Calculus AB exam in May, which was probably why he was so engrossed in whatever was on his screen.

I tapped his laptop to get his attention. “Where’s the other half of the brain trust?”

“Getting food,” he said with a tilt of his head in the direction of the cafeteria line. He typed a few more keystrokes before he adjusted his wireframe glasses and looked up. “I heard you almost lost your phone.”

Stories had a strange way of veering far from the truth the more they circulated around Westgate’s halls. Finn knew better than to believe anything he’d heard. I narrowed my eyes at him before I turned on my heel and headed toward the line, Finn’s laughter ringing behind me. Jake intercepted me as I approached it, an obscene amount of food balanced on his tray.

“What’s all of this?” I said. “Did you skip breakfast again?”

“You’re having a bad day,” he said, grinning. “I thought I’d buy lunch.” He tried to blow the hair out of his eyes but wasn’t having much luck, so I reached up and brushed it back for him.

“Thanks.” I grabbed a bottle of water and a large cup from the tray to help lighten the load. “You didn’t need to.”

“I know.” He flashed a toothy grin.

Something about his smile made my insides grow warm and my pulse quicken. I blinked a few times, and the feeling left as quickly as it came. I stepped aside for him to pass, and then followed him back to the table, wondering what was wrong with me.

Chapter Five

Dr. Griffin’s car was parked in front of the garage when I got home later that day. Our two-story cottage-style house was in one of Playa del Lago’s older neighborhoods, the kind of subdivision where all the houses had cookie-cutter floor plans and nearly identical landscaping. I was pretty sure everyone owned similar cars, too, and the black Lexus blocking my spot looked right at home among its brethren.

I didn’t mind my mother’s boyfriend. He was probably the only guy she’d dated that I liked, even if it was weird I knew him first as a therapist. I’d only had one session with him before I’d started seeing Dr. Brinkley, but it was still bizarre. I made it a point to be extra careful whenever I talked to him.

I dropped my backpack at the foot of the stairs and strode into the living room where he usually hung out whenever he came over. “Hey, Dr. Griffin,” I said as I entered.

He jumped to his feet when he saw me, and I smiled. Mom said stuff like that was a show of good manners and one of the things she liked most about him. I liked him because he treated me like a regular person, not like I was twelve, the way the last guy she’d dated did. And compared to my dad and some of the other men she’d talked about, Dr. Griffin seemed the most normal.

“Hi, Talia,” he said. “Your mom’s upstairs. How was school?”

I lifted my shoulder and let it drop again as I sat on the couch. Dr. Griffin was a master interrogator; I could never be sure how to respond to his questions. It was almost as though answering something as innocent as “How was your day?” could reveal some hidden neurosis, and I’d end up spending the next hour explaining myself to him. I think he understood, though, because he never seemed disappointed if I didn’t say anything. He grinned and sat back down in one of the big upholstered chairs.

Probing questions aside, I was pretty comfortable with Dr. Griffin. Whenever I felt like talking, he was genuinely interested in what I had to say. I liked how he smiled a lot, and how his eyes crinkled when he laughed. But I especially liked how he made my mom laugh.

He rubbed his hands on his trousers and cleared his throat. “I’m glad you’re home,” he said. “I’ve been wanting to talk to you.”

My spine straightened as my senses went on high alert. Did Mom tell him about the phone? Was I going to have to endure a lecture from him, too? I decided it would be best to tell him my side of the story and worry about the psychoanalysis later.

“Look, Dr. Griffin,” I said, “it really wasn’t—”

“I’m thinking of asking your mom to marry me,” he blurted in a single breath.

That was unexpected. “What?”

“I talked to your grandparents, and they seem excited, but I still wanted to check with you first.”

“Oh.” I knew Mom really liked him; they’d been dating for about a year, so it wasn’t like they’d just met or anything. And she was happy, genuinely happy when he was around. But I was surprised Dr. Griffin asked my permission. I mean, my mom was a forty-something-year-old woman, and I was just a kid. What difference did it make what I thought?

He raised his eyebrows. “What do you think, Talia? Would you be okay with being my stepdaughter?”

“Yeah.” I nodded, slowly at first and again with more enthusiasm. “Yeah, I guess that would be cool.”

He exhaled. “Thank you.” His shoulders relaxed, as though relieved by my response, and I wondered what he would’ve done if I’d said “no.”

“And when you’re ready,” he said, “maybe you can start calling me ‘Rob.’”

I nodded even though the whole first-name thing weirded me out. I liked referring to him as Dr. Griffin. It kept an invisible wall between us. And it was easier than pretending we were friends.

The clack clack clack of my mom’s boots on the terrazzo floor announced her presence before she breezed into the room wearing what I called her Suburban Soccer Mom look: jeans, a mock turtleneck, and a polar fleece jacket with her light-brown hair pulled up into a high ponytail. Dr. Griffin stood as she entered.

“Oh, good,” she said when she saw me. “You’re home. I was afraid you’d forget and go to Jake’s after school again.”

“You’ve only reminded me about this conference a bazillionty times,” I said from my perch on the couch. And that meant reassuring her a bazillionty times that I’d be fine without a babysitter.

“That’s never a guarantee you’d remember.” She kissed Dr. Griffin on the cheek and turned to me. “Did you settle the matter with your phone?”

“It wasn’t about my phone,” I said. She raised an eyebrow. I shook my head. “Forget it.”

Mom pressed her lips together in a tight line and exchanged glances with Dr. Griffin before she nodded once. “I’ve e-mailed you our flight information, and I posted our itinerary on the refrigerator.”

“Okay.” I stood to follow them into the foyer. Mom’s rolling carry-on bag waited by the door.

“The conference is at the convention center, and we’re staying at the Hilton.”

“And the phone number and address are on the itinerary,” I said. “You’ve covered this.”

She frowned. “Well, it won’t hurt to go over it again. Are you sure you have Rob’s and my phone numbers programmed into your phone?”

I sighed and tried to hide my annoyance. “Yes, Mother.”

“Make sure you call if there’s anything you need.”

“I will.”

She paused and studied me. “Are you sure you’re going to be okay on your own this week?”

“I’ll be fine,” I promised, a hint of a smirk tugging at my cheek. “Mrs. Bassett’s next door, and Bianca’s mom said I can come over whenever I want.” I parroted everything she’d told me the previous night.

Mom still seemed uncertain but said, “I left you my AmEx for emergencies only, and there’s pepper spray in the top left-hand drawer of my desk.” She gave me a stern look. “Don’t use it—”

“—unless it’s absolutely necessary. I know.” We’d had to air out the house this past summer after Ally and I had decided to see what would happen if we sprayed a tiny bit indoors. Her brother Tommy had raged at us for what seemed like hours, as if choking to death and wanting to claw out our eyes to keep them from burning hadn’t been enough for us to learn our lesson.

“And no parties.”

I rolled my eyes. “I promise not to reenact some lame ’80s movie while you’re gone.”

She caressed my cheek and smiled. “You really are a good kid,” she said. “I don’t know how I got so lucky to have you.”

I smiled. I couldn’t help it. “Thanks, Mom.”

“We’ll be back Sunday afternoon.” She held me by my shoulders before engulfing me in a big hug.

I tried to wriggle free. “Dude, Mom, you’re just going to Vegas, not Mars. I’ll see you in a couple of days.”

She gave me a tight squeeze before releasing me, and a few minutes later, they were in Dr. Griffin’s car and on their way to the airport.

I grabbed my backpack and climbed the stairs to my room before I pulled out my phone and texted Jake. Mom just left.

Seconds later, I got his reply. Want me to come over? ;-)

I laughed as I texted, Dork. I flopped down on my bed and tapped out another message. So what’s up tonight?

Not long after I hit Send, Cheap Trick blared from my phone.

“I’m not letting you program ringtones into my phone anymore,” I said, answering it almost immediately. “I’m so over that song.”

Jake laughed. “Why? It’s a classic.”

“Maybe, but haven’t I had to listen to ‘I Want You to Want Me’ enough to last ten lifetimes? It’s almost as bad as ‘You Really Got Me,’” I said, reminding him of the Van Halen song he’d programmed into my phone all summer.

He laughed harder, and I could picture him on the other end of the line, doubled over. “Okay, fine,” he said when he caught his breath. “I’ll lay off the classic rock.”

“Classic rock’s fine,” I said. Jake’s music teacher was a big fan of old arena rock bands and dead musicians, and I’d often said he’d turned Jake into a music snob. “But can you pick something I haven’t had to listen to you practice nonstop? Bonus points if it’s something from this century.”

“Sure. I’ll look for something more current that isn’t all power chords or lame auto-tuned popcorn.” He paused. “You know, if it really bothers you, you can change it yourself.”

I smiled into the receiver. “But then I wouldn’t be able to give you grief.”

He laughed again. “Fair enough.”

“So what’s going on?” I said, studying the ends of my hair.

“Not much right now. Finn and I are going to play some old school computer games when he’s done with basketball.”

“On a school night? That’s not like Finn.”

“Merrick assigned us some games to deconstruct,” he said, referring to his computer science teacher. “It’s basically a lab, but way more fun.”

“Sounds riveting.”

“You should come, too. I’ve been promised pizza.”

“Maybe.”

“At least for pizza,” he said. “I know you don’t like to eat alone.”

He got me there. I could’ve invited myself to dinner at Bianca’s house, but pizza was a better offer. It wasn’t like it took much effort, but Jake knew exactly how to persuade me to do anything. It was almost as though he knew me better than I knew myself.

“Maybe,” I said. “I have actual homework to do, though.”

“What a coincidence. So do I.”

“I’ll let you know,” I said with a laugh.

“Cool. See ya.”

I ended the call and stared up at the ceiling. A tiny spider in the corner crawled along its web, and I made a mental note to knock it down later.

The setting sun cast some funky shadows of the tree branches outside my window. I watched some of the figures bobbing as if to a silent tune and thought about my mom and Dr. Griffin. I wondered if she had any idea he was going to propose to her. Was it something they’d talked about? Would it be a surprise? And then I wondered if it would all come crashing down the same way her first marriage did.

I hoped not.

The silence was eerie, punctuated only by the sound of the heater kicking on to warm the house. There was a time I would’ve begged for everything to be quiet, but this stillness was unnerving. If anything, it made echoes of my parents’ fights reverberate that much louder in my mind.

I pulled out my French homework and started working on it, pausing only to put on headphones to drown out the quiet. But even through the music, I could still hear them shouting.

I lasted ten minutes before I texted Jake to let him know I’d meet him at Finn’s house. I had to get out of there. It was the only way to escape the memories.