Текст книги "P.S. I Still Love You "

Автор книги: Jenny Han

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Текущая страница: 2 (всего у книги 18 страниц)

3

AFTER PETER DROPS ME OFF, I run inside to tell Margot and Kitty everything, and I feel like a purse bulging with gold coins. I can’t wait to spill.

Kitty’s lying on the couch, watching TV with Jamie Fox-Pickle in her lap, and she scrambles up when I come through the door. In a hushed voice she says, “Gogo’s crying.”

My enthusiasm dries up instantly. “What! Why?”

“I think she went over to Josh’s and they had a talk and it wasn’t good. You should go check on her.”

Oh no. This isn’t how it was supposed to go for them. They were supposed to get back together, like Peter and me.

Kitty settles back on the couch, remote in hand, her sisterly duty fulfilled. “How did it go with Peter?”

“Great,” I say. “Really great.” The smile comes to my face without me even intending it, and I quickly wipe it away, out of respect for Margot.

I go to the kitchen and make Margot a cup of Night-Night tea, two tablespoons of honey, like Mommy used to make us for bedtime. For a second I contemplate adding a splash of whiskey because I saw it on a Victorian show on PBS—the maids would put whiskey in the lady of the manor’s hot beverage to calm her nerves. I know Margot drinks at college, but she already has a hangover, and besides, I doubt Daddy would be into it. So I just put the tea, sans whiskey, in my favorite mug, and I send Kitty upstairs with it. I tell her to act adorable. I say she should first give Margot the tea and then snuggle with her for at least five minutes. Which Kitty balks at, because Kitty only cuddles if there’s something in it for her, and also because I know it frightens her to see Margot upset. “I’ll just bring her Jamie to cuddle with,” Kitty says.

Selfish!

When I go to Margot’s room with a piece of buttered cinnamon toast, Kitty’s nowhere in sight and neither is Jamie. Margot’s curled up on her side, crying. “It’s really over, Lara Jean,” she whispers. “It’s been over, but now I know it’s over for good. I th-thought that if I wanted to get back together, he would too, but he d-doesn’t.” I curl up next to her, my forehead pressed to her back. I can feel every breath she takes. She weeps into her pillow, and I scratch her shoulder blades the way she likes. The thing to know about Margot is she never cries, so seeing her cry sets my world, and this house, off its axis. Everything feels tilted somehow. “He says that long distance is too h-hard, that I was right to break up with him in the first place. I missed him so much, and it seems like he didn’t miss me at all.”

I bite my lip guiltily. I was the one who encouraged her to talk to Josh. This is partly my fault. “Margot, he did miss you. He missed you like crazy. I would look out the window during French class, and I would see him outside on the bleachers eating his lunch alone. It was depressing.”

She sniffles. “Did he really?”

“Yes.” I don’t understand what’s the matter with Josh. He acted like he was so in love with her; he practically went into a depression when she was gone. And now this?

Sighing, she says, “I think . . . I think I just still really love him.”

“You do?” Love. Margot said “love.” I don’t think I’ve ever heard her say she loved Josh before. Maybe “in love,” but never “love.”

Margot wipes her eyes with her sheet. “The whole reason I broke up with him was so I wouldn’t be that girl crying over her boyfriend, and now that’s exactly what I am. It’s pathetic.”

“You’re the least pathetic person I know, Gogo,” I tell her.

Margot stops sniffling and rolls around so we’re lying face to face. Frowning at me, she says, “I didn’t say I was pathetic. I said crying over a boy was.”

“Oh,” I say. “Well, I still don’t think it’s pathetic to cry over someone. It just means you care about them deeply and you’re sad.”

“I’ve been crying so much I feel like my eyes look like . . . like shriveled-up raisins. Do they?” Margot squints at me.

“They are swollen,” I admit. “Your eyes just aren’t used to crying. I have an idea!” I leap out of bed and run downstairs to the kitchen. I fill a cereal bowl with ice and two silver spoons and come running back. “Lie back down,” I instruct, and Margot obeys. “Close your eyes.” I put a spoon over each eye.

“Does this really work?”

“I saw it in a magazine.”

When the spoons warm up against her skin, I dip them back into the ice and back onto her face, over and over again. She asks me to tell her what happened with Peter, so I do, but I leave out all the kissing because it feels in poor taste in light of her own heartbreak. She sits up and says, “You don’t have to pretend to like Peter just to spare my feelings.” Margot swallows painfully, like she has a sore throat. “If any part of you still likes Josh . . . if he likes you . . .” I gasp in horror. I open my mouth to deny it, to say that it feels like forever ago already, but she silences me with her hand. “It would be really hard, but I wouldn’t want to stand in the way of that, you know? I mean it, Lara Jean. You can tell me.”

I’m so relieved, so grateful she’s bringing it up. I rush to say, “Oh my gosh, I don’t like Josh, Gogo. Not like that. Not at all. And he doesn’t like me like that either. I think . . . I think we were both just missing you. Peter’s the one I like.” Under the blanket I find Margot’s hand and link my pinky with hers. “Sister swear.”

She swallows hard. “Then I guess there’s no secret reason for him not wanting to get back together. I guess it’s as simple as he just doesn’t want to be with me anymore.”

“No, it’s as simple as you’re in Scotland and he’s in Virginia and it’s too hard. You were wise to break it off when you did. Wise and brave and right.”

Doubt creeps across her face like dark shadows, and then she shakes her head and her expression clears. “Enough about me and Josh. We’re yesterday’s news. Tell me more about Peter. Please, it’ll make me feel better.” She lies back down, and I put the spoons back on her eyes.

“Well, tonight at first he was very cool with me, very blasé blasé—”

“No, go all the way back to the beginning.”

So I go back further: I tell her about our pretend relationship, the hot tub, everything. She keeps taking the spoons off so she can look at me as I tell her. But before long her eyes do look less puffy. And I feel lighter—giddy, even. I’ve kept all these things secret from her for months, and now she knows everything that’s happened since she’s been gone, and I feel so close to her again. You can’t be close to someone, not truly, with secrets in between you.

Margot clears her throat. She hesitates and then asks, “So, how does he kiss?”

I’m blushing. I tap my fingers on my lips before I say, “He kisses like . . . like it could be his job.”

Margot giggles and lifts the spoons off her eyes. “Like a male prostitute?”

I grab one of the spoons and tap her on the forehead with it like a gong.

“Ow!” She snatches for the other spoon, but I’m too quick and I’ve got them both. We’re both laughing like crazy as I try to get in another gong on her forehead.

“Margot . . . did it hurt when you had sex?” I’m careful not to say Josh’s name. It’s strange, because Margot and I have never talked about sex before in any kind of real way, because neither of us had a point of reference. But now she does and I don’t, and I want to know what she knows.

“Umm. I mean, the first couple of times, a little.” Now she’s the one who’s blushing. “Lara Jean, I can’t talk about this with you. It’s too weird. Can’t you just ask Chris?”

“No, I want to hear it from you. Please, Gogo. You have to tell me everything about it so I’ll know. I don’t want to look like a fool when I do it the first time.”

“It’s not like Josh and I had sex hundreds of times! I’m not an expert. He’s the only person I’ve done it with. But if you’re thinking about having sex with Peter, make sure you’re careful and you use a condom and everything.” I nod quickly. This is when she’ll get to the good stuff. “And just be really sure, as sure as you can be. And make sure he knows to be really gentle and caring with you, so it’s special and it’s something you can look back on with good feelings.”

“Got it. So, like, how long did it last from start to finish?”

“Not that long. Don’t forget, it was Josh’s first time too.” She sounds wistful. Now I feel wistful too. Peter’s done it with Genevieve so many times, he’s probably an expert by now. I’ll probably even have an orgasm my first time out. Which is great, but it might’ve been nice if we both didn’t know what we were doing instead of just me.

“You don’t regret it, do you?”

“No. I don’t think so. I think I’ll always be glad it was with Josh. No matter how it’s turned out.” This is a relief to me, that even now, with eyes red from crying, Margot still doesn’t regret having loved Josh.

I sleep in her room that night like old times, huddled beside her under her quilt. Margot’s room is coldest, because it’s above the garage. I listen as the heat clicks off and on.

In the dark next to me she says, “I’m going to date a bunch of Scottish guys when I get back to school. When else will I have another opportunity like that, right?”

I giggle and roll over so we’re face-to-face. “No, wait—don’t date a bunch of Scottish guys. Date one from England, one from Ireland, one from Scotland. And Wales! A tour of the British Empire!”

“Well, I am going to school to study anthropology,” Margot says, and we giggle some more. “You know the saddest part? Josh and I will never be friends like we were before. Not after all this. That part’s just over now. He was my best friend.”

I give her fake-wounded eyes to lighten the mood, so she won’t start crying again. “Hey, I thought I was your best friend!”

“You’re not my best friend. You’re my sister, and that’s more.”

It is more.

“Josh and I started out so easy, so fun, and now we’re like strangers. I’ll never have that person back, who I knew better than anyone and who knew me so well.”

I feel a pinch in my heart. When she says it that way, it’s so sad. “You could become friends again, after some time has passed.” But it wouldn’t be the same, I know that. You’d always be mourning what once was. It would always be a little bit . . . less.

“But it won’t be like before.”

“No,” I agree. “I suppose it won’t.” Strangely, I think of Genevieve, of who we used to be to each other. Ours was the kind of friendship that makes sense as a kid but not so much now that we’re older. I suppose you can’t hold on to old things just for the sake of holding on.

It’s the end of an era, it seems. No more Margot and Josh. This time for real. It’s real because Margot is crying, and I can hear it in her voice that it’s over, and this time we both know it. Things have changed.

“Don’t let it happen to you, Lara Jean. Don’t get too serious to where things can’t go back. Be in love with Peter if you want, but be careful with your heart. Things feel like they’ll be forever, but they aren’t. Love can go away, or people can, without even meaning to. Nothing is guaranteed.”

Gulp. “I promise I’ll be careful.” But I’m not sure I even know what that means. How can I be careful when I already like him so much?

4

MARGOT’S OFF SHOPPING FOR NEW boots with her friend Casey, Daddy’s at work, and Kitty and I are lazing about watching TV when my phone buzzes next to me. It’s a text from Peter. Movie tonight? I text back yes, exclamation point. Then I delete the exclamation point for sounding too eager. Though without the exclamation point, the yes seems completely unenthused. I settle on a smiley face and press send before I can obsess over it further.

“Who are you texting with?” Kitty is sprawled out on the living room floor, spooning pudding into her mouth. Jamie tries to steal a lick, but she shakes her head and scolds, “You know you can’t have chocolate!”

“I was texting with Peter. You know, that might not even be real chocolate. It might be imitation. Check the label.”

Of all of us, Kitty is firmest with Jamie. She doesn’t immediately pick him up when he’s crying to be held; she sprays him in the face with a water bottle when he’s naughty. All tricks she’s learning from our across-the-street neighbor Ms. Rothschild, who it turns out is kind of a dog whisperer. She used to have three dogs, but when she and her husband got divorced, she got to keep Simone the golden retriever, and he got custody of the other two.

“Is Peter your boyfriend again?” Kitty asks me.

“Um. I’m not sure.” After what Margot said last night about taking things slow and being careful with my heart and not going to a point of no return, maybe it’s good to exist in a place of unsureness for a while. Also, it’s hard to redefine something that never had a clear definition in the first place. We were two people pretending to like each other, pretending to be a couple, so now what are we? And how might it have unfolded if we’d started liking each other without the pretense? Would we ever have been a couple? I guess we’ll never know.

“What do you mean, you’re not sure?” Kitty presses. “Shouldn’t you know if you’re somebody’s girlfriend or not?”

“We haven’t discussed it yet. I mean, not explicitly.”

Kitty switches the channel. “You should look into that.”

I roll on my side and prop myself up on my elbow. “But would that change anything? I mean, we like each other. What’s the difference between that and the label? What would change?” Kitty doesn’t answer. “Hello?”

“Sorry, can you say that again at the commercial break? I’m trying to watch my show.”

I throw a pillow at her head. “I would be better off discussing these things with Jamie.” I clap my hands. “C’mere, Jamie!”

Jamie lifts his head to look at me and then lies back down again, nestled against Kitty’s side, still hoping for pudding, I’m sure.

In the car last night Peter didn’t seem troubled by the status of our relationship. He seemed happy and carefree as always. I’m definitely a person who worries too much over every little thing. I could do with a bit more of Peter’s roll-with-it philosophy in my life.

“Wanna help me pick out what to wear to the movies with Peter tonight?” I ask Kitty.

“Can I come too?”

“No!” Kitty starts to pout and I amend: “Maybe next time.”

“Fine. Show me two options and I’ll tell you which is the better one.”

I dart upstairs to my room and start going through my closet. This will be our actual first date, I want to wow him a bit. Unfortunately, Peter’s already seen me in my good outfits, so the only thing to do is go for Margot’s closet. She has a cream sweater dress she brought back from Scotland that I can put with tights and my little brown boots. There’s also her periwinkle Fair Isle sweater I’ve been admiring; I can wear it with my yellow skirt and a yellow ribbon in my hair, which I’ll curl, because Peter once told me he liked it curled.

“Kitty!” I scream. “Come up and look at my two options!”

“On the commercial break!” she screams back.

In the meantime I text Margot:

Can I borrow your fair isle sweater or your cream sweater dress??

Oui.

Kitty votes for the Fair Isle sweater, saying I look like I’m wearing an ice-skating outfit, which I like the sound of. “You can wear it if we go ice skating,” she says. “You, me, and Peter.”

I laugh. “All right.”

5

PETER AND I ARE STANDING in line for popcorn at the movies. Even just this mundane thing feels like the best mundane thing that’s ever happened to me. I check my pocket to make sure I’ve still got my ticket stub. This I’ll want to save.

Gazing up at Peter, I whisper, “This is my first date.” I feel like the nerdy girl in the movie who lands the coolest guy in school, and I don’t mind one bit. Not one bit.

“How can this be your first date when we’ve gone out plenty of times?”

“It’s my first real date. Those other times were just pretend; this is the real thing.”

He frowns. “Oh, wait, is this real? I didn’t realize that.”

I move to slug him in the shoulder, and he laughs and grabs my hand and links my fingers with his. It feels like my heart is beating right through my hand. It’s the first time we’ve held hands for real, and it feels different from those fake times. Like electric currents, in a good way. The best way.

We’re moving up in the line, and I realize I’m nervous, which is strange, because this is Peter. But he’s also a different Peter, and I’m a different Lara Jean, because this is a date, an actual date. Just to make conversation, I ask, “So, when you go to the movies are you more of a chocolate kind of candy or a gummy kind of candy?”

“Neither. All I want is popcorn.”

“Then we’re doomed! You’re neither, and I’m either or all of the above.” We get to the cashier and I start fishing around for my wallet.

Peter laughs. “You think I’m going to make a girl pay on her first date?” He puffs out his chest and says to the cashier, “Can we have one medium popcorn with butter, and can you layer the butter? And a Sour Patch Kids and a box of Milk Duds. And one small Cherry Coke.”

“How did you know that was what I wanted?”

“I pay a lot better attention than you think, Covey.” Peter slings his arm around my shoulders with a self-satisfied smirk, and he accidentally hits my right boob.

“Ow!”

He laughs an embarrassed laugh. “Whoops. Sorry. Are you okay?”

I give him a hard elbow to the side, and he’s still laughing as we walk into the theater—which is when we see Genevieve and Emily coming out of the ladies’ room. The last time I saw Genevieve, she was telling everyone on the ski trip bus how Peter and I had sex in the hot tub. I feel a strong surge of panic, of fight or flight.

Peter slows down for a second, and I’m not sure what’s going to happen. Do we have to go over and say hi? Do we keep walking? His arm tightens around me, and I can feel Peter’s hesitance too. He’s torn.

Genevieve solves it for everyone. She walks into the theater like she didn’t see us. The same theater we’re going into. I don’t look at Peter, and he doesn’t say anything either. I guess we’re just going to pretend like she isn’t here? He steers me through the same set of doors and picks our seats, far left toward the back. Genevieve and Emily are sitting in the middle. I see her blond head, the back of her dove gray dress coat. I make myself look away. If Gen turns around, I don’t want to be caught staring.

We sit down, and I’m taking off my coat and getting comfy in my seat when Peter’s phone buzzes. He pulls it out of his pocket and then puts it away, and I know it was Gen, but I feel like I can’t ask. Her presence has punctured the night. Two vampire bite marks right into it.

The lights dim, and Peter puts his arm back around me. Is he going to keep it there the whole movie, I wonder. I feel stiff, and I try to even my breathing. He whispers in my ear, “Relax, Covey.”

I’m trying, but it’s sort of impossible to relax on command under these circumstances. Peter gives my shoulder a squeeze, and he leans in and nuzzles my neck. “You smell nice,” he says in a low voice.

I laugh, a touch too loudly, and the man sitting in front of us whips around in his seat and glares at me. Chastened, I say to Peter, “Sorry, I’m really ticklish.”

“No worries,” he says, keeping his arm around me.

I smile and nod, but now I’m wondering—is he expecting that we’re going to do stuff during the movie? Is that why he picked seats in the back when there were still free seats in the middle? Panic is rising inside me. Genevieve is here! And other people too! I might have made out with him in a hot tub, but there wasn’t anyone around to see. Also, I kind of just want to watch the movie. I lean forward to take a sip of soda, but really it’s just so I can subtly move away from him.

After the movie we have an unspoken understanding to hustle out so we don’t run into Genevieve again. The two of us bolt out of the theater like the devil is on our heels—which, I suppose, she sort of is. Peter’s hungry, but I’m too full from all the junk to eat a real dinner, so I suggest we just go to the diner and I’ll share his fries. But Peter says, “I feel like we should go to a real restaurant since this is your first date.”

“I never knew you had such a romantic side.” I say it like it’s a joke, but I mean it.

“Get used to it,” he boasts. “I know how to treat a girl.”

He takes me to Biscuit Soul Food—his favorite restaurant, he says. I watch him scarf down fried chicken with hot honey and Tabasco drizzled on top, and I wonder how many times Genevieve has sat and watched him do the very same thing. Our town isn’t that big. There aren’t many places we can go that he hasn’t already been with Genevieve. When I get up to go to the bathroom, I suddenly wonder if he’s texting her back, but I make myself push this thought out of my mind tout de suite. So what if he does text back? They’re still friends. He’s allowed. I’m not going to let Gen ruin this night for me. I want to be right here, in this moment, just the two of us on our first date.

I sit back down, and Peter’s finished his fried chicken and he has a pile of dirty napkins in front of him. He has a habit of wiping his fingers every time he takes a bite. There’s honey on his cheek, and a bit of breading is stuck to it, but I don’t tell him, because I think it’s funny.

“So how was your first date?” Peter asks me, stretching back in his chair. “Tell it to me like it wasn’t me that took you.”

“I liked it when you knew what kinds of movie theater snacks I like.” He nods encouragingly. “And . . . I liked the movie.”

“Yeah, I got that. You kept shushing me and pointing at the screen.”

“That man in front of us was getting mad.” I hesitate. I’m not sure if I should say this next thing I want to say, the thing I’ve been thinking all night. “I don’t know . . . is it just me, or . . .”

He leans in closer, now he’s listening. “What?”

I take a deep breath. “Is it . . . a little weird? I mean, first we were fake, and then we weren’t, and then we had a fight, and now here we are and you’re eating fried chicken. It’s like we did everything in the wrong order, and it’s good, but it’s . . . still kind of upside down.” And also were you trying to feel me up during the movie?

“I guess it’s a little weird,” he admits.

I sip my sweet tea, relieved that he doesn’t think I’m the weird one for bringing up all the weirdness.

He grins at me. “Maybe what we need is a new contract.”

I can’t tell if he’s joking or if he’s serious, so I play along. “What would go in the contract?”

“Off the top of my head . . . I guess I’d have to call you every night before I went to bed. You’d agree to come to all my lacrosse games. Some practices, too. I’d have to come to your house for dinner. You’d have to come to parties with me.”

I make a face at the parties part. “Let’s just do the things we want to do. Like before.” Suddenly I hear Margot’s voice in my head. “Let’s . . . let’s have fun.”

He nods, and now he’s the one who looks relieved. “Yeah!”

I like that he doesn’t take things too seriously. In other people that could be annoying, but not him. It’s one of his best qualities, I think. That and his face. I could stare at his face all day long. I sip sweet tea out of my straw and look at him. A contract might actually be good for us. It could help us to head problems off at the pass and keep us accountable. I think Margot would be proud of me for this.

I pull a little notebook out of my purse and a pen. I write Lara Jean and Peter’s New Contract on the top of the page.

Line one I write, Peter will be on time.

Peter cranes his neck to read upside down. “Wait, does that say, ‘Peter will be on time’?”

“If you say you’re going to be somewhere, then be there.”

Peter scowls. “I didn’t show up one time and you hold a grudge—”

“But you’re always late.”

“That’s not the same as not showing up!”

“Being late all the time shows a lack of respect for the person who’s waiting for you.”

“I respect you! I respect you more than any girl I know!”

I point at him. “‘Girl’? Just ‘girl’? What boy do you respect more than me?”

Peter throws his head back and groans so loudly it’s a roar. I reach across the table, over the food, and grab him by the collar and kiss him before we can fight again. Though I have to say, it’s this kind of fighting, the bickering kind, not the hurt-feelings kind, that makes us feel like us for the first time all night.

This is what we decide on.

Peter will not be more than five minutes late.

Lara Jean will not make Peter do crafts of any kind.

Peter doesn’t have to call Lara Jean before he goes to bed at night, but he can if he feels like it.

Lara Jean will only go to parties if she feels like it.

Peter will give Lara Jean rides whenever she wants.

Lara Jean and Peter will always tell each other the truth.

There’s one thing I want to add to the contract, but I’m nervous to broach the subject now that things are going smoothly.

Peter can still be friends with Genevieve, as long as he is up front with Lara Jean about it.

Or maybe it’s Peter will not lie to Lara Jean about Genevieve. But that’s redundant, because we already have the rule about always telling each other the truth. A rule like that wouldn’t be the truth anyway. What I really want to say is Peter will always pick Lara Jean over Genevieve. But I can’t say that. Of course I can’t. I don’t know a ton about dating or guys, but I do know that jealous insecurity is a real turnoff.

So I bite my tongue; I don’t say what I’m thinking. There’s only one thing, one really important thing I want to be sure of.

“Peter?”

“Yeah?”

“I don’t want us to ever break each other’s hearts.”

Peter laughs easily; he cups my cheek in his hand. “Are you planning on breaking my heart, Covey?”

“No. And I’m sure you’re not planning on breaking mine. Nobody ever plans it.”

“Then put that in the contract. Peter and Lara Jean promise not to break each other’s hearts.”

I beam at him, relieved as anything, and then I write it down. Lara Jean and Peter will not break each other’s hearts.