“Here you go,” I say, sitting his glass down in front of him.
“Thanks.” He takes a sip of his juice, and then sits the glass down on the table. He licks a stray drop of juice off his lips, then starts pulling his puffy vest off. Luke is practically undressing at my kitchen table. I take another sip of my drink and try not to stare. In the living room, I can hear Katie reciting the lines to The Cutting Edge along with the actors.
“Listen, Devon, I didn’t come here to talk about the project.”
“Oh,” I say, acting cool.
“The other day, when I asked you to hang out, I just … I wanted to know if you said no because you really had to babysit, or if you said no because you just didn’t want to hang out.” He rushes on. “I’m cool either way, I just kind of need to know.”
“Why?” I ask, stalling.
“Because if it was really because you just had to babysit, I’m going to ask you out again.” He smiles.
“Oh.” I quickly run through the options in my mind. I really do like Luke. But if I go out with him, Kirn’s going to tell everyone that I made up the fact that Jared is my boyfriend. And then it’s not going to matter if I’m going out with Luke, because he’ll dump me, anyway.
The phone rings then, saving me from having to come up with an answer. I leap to the phone in the kitchen, hoping it’s one of those survey people who makes you answer three million questions about what radio station you listen to or what kind of cereal you eat.
“Hello?” I say, trying to sound friendly and like the type of person who has unlimited amounts of time to spend on the phone, answering questions for strangers.
“Hey.” It’s Mel.
“Hi, Mel,” I say. “What’s up?”
“Working on the math homework. What are you doing?”
“Um, nothing really. Having some grape juice. Luke’s over.”
“Luke’s there?” she asks, sounding confused. “I thought you had to babysit Katie tonight.”
“I did have to babysit Katie,” I say. “I mean, I do have to babysit her. I AM babysitting her.” I wonder if my sprained toe is somehow compromising my ability to talk. “But Luke’s here. We’re having grape juice.” We’re having grape juice? I did not just say that. Luke holds up his glass and smiles uncertainly. Maybe this thing with Luke will just resolve itself. I mean, obviously he won’t want to date a crazy person.
“But you have a friend over,” Mel says, sounding almost mad.
“It was kind of unexpected.”
“Fine,” Mel says. “Call me when you’re done dealing with things that are unexpected.” And then she hangs up on me. I stare at the receiver in shock. Mel has never hung up on me, ever. In fact, if you asked me, “Who is the person least likely to ever hang up on you?”, I would have answered Mel.
“She hung up on me,” I say to no one in particular, still looking at the receiver.
“Is she mad at you?” Luke asks.
‘Apparently.” I replace the phone back on the cradle and sit back down in my chair. I feel dazed.
“How come?”
“I—m not sure,” I say. “I guess it’s because we haven’t been spending all that much time together lately. I’ve just been busy with Lexi and … other things.” Other things = my fake boyfriend and Kim trying to ruin my life.
“That must be hard for her,” Luke says. He picks up his grape juice and drains the rest of it. “You hanging out with all these new friends.”
“But I’ve tried to include her in everything I’m doing,” I say. “I always invite her anywhere I go.” But as I’m saying it, I realize it isn’t exactly true. Sure, I invited Mel to sit with us at lunch, but that was more for my own security. And I pretty much told her she couldn’t come to Jared’s house to work on the project. And then there was the time I went to the mall with Kim and Lexi …
“It’s still probably hard for her,” Luke says. “To have to share you. She’s probably used to it being just the two of you. Plus weren’t you away all summer? She probably just misses her friend.”
“Yeah,” I say, feeling a lump rise in my throat. Spraining my toe is probably the universe’s way of punishing me for being such a terrible person. It would serve me right if I got a disgusting toe fungus that spread from my toe to my entire body and killed me. And then of course no one would come to my funeral since I’m such a horrible friend. I feel my eyes start to water.
“Oh, hey,” Luke says, “don’t cry.”
“I’m not,” I say, wiping my eyes with the sleeve of my sweater. He gets up from the other side of the table and comes over and sits in the chair next to me. He takes my hand.
“Look, I’m sure you can work it out, whatever it is. Haven’t you guys been friends since, like, second grade?”
“Yes,” I say, which makes me feel like I want to cry even more. How could I have let something so stupid get in the way of a friendship I’ve had since second grade?
“So you guys will be fine,” he says. His finger is making little circles on my palm. “You just have to let her cool off a little bit, and then have a talk with her. Let her know you still care. Maybe do something nice for her?”
“You think?” I ask, trying not to sniff.
“Definitely.”
“Maybe you’re right,” I say, trying to think of something nice I can do for Mel. Sometimes people at school decorate each other’s lockers for their birthdays, or if someone has a big game or something. Maybe I could decorate her locker tomorrow for no reason. Just as a BFF kind of thing, to let her know that I care.
“Thanks,” I say.
“No problem,” Luke says. We sit there for a second, not saying anything, just holding hands.
The phone rings again, breaking the spell, and I leap up from my chair.
“No, Lexi,” I hear Katie saying from the cordless phone in the living room. “Devon can’t talk right now because she’s in the kitchen with her boyfriend.”
Oh, God. “Katie, I got it,” I say. “Hang up.”
“Okaaay,” Katie sings. The phone clicks off.
“Devi!” Lexi says. “What are you doing? And who’s over? Did you and Jared make up?”
“Me and Jared?” I ask before I realize that Luke can hear. I glance over to the table, but he doesn’t appear to have noticed. Or if he did, he hasn’t reacted.
“Yes!” Lexi says. “Katie said your boyfriend was over.”
“Is it okay if I grab some more juice?” Luke asks, standing up and heading to the refrigerator.
“Yes, that’s fine,” I say.
“Ohmigod, is that Luke?” Lexi practically screams in my ear. “Devi, what is going on, are you two going out now?”
“No,” I say. “No, um, we’re working on our project.” Luke pours some more juice into his glass, and then fills mine as well. How sweet.
“Oh,” Lexi says, sounding disappointed. “Well, don’t feel bad.”
“Um, don’t feel bad about what?” I ask. This is getting stressful, the phone always ringing when Luke is sitting in my kitchen.
“That your love life isn’t going that well.” Lexi sighs. “Mine isn’t going so well either.”
“Uh, it isn’t?”
“No,” she says, “It isn’t. I hung out with Matt tonight. We went to play DDR again at the mall, and I thought we had a good time, but he said he’d IM me later and he hasn’t.”
“That sucks,” I say, glancing over to the table where Luke is looking at the paper on which he sketched out our skit. He’s bent over the storyboard, looking at it intently. I can’t believe I never realized how hot he is. Much hotter than Jared. And much smarter, too. And nicer. And I bet he doesn’t have Star Wars book covers, either.
“Hello!” Lexi’s saying. “So what should I do?”
“Um, well, does he have an away message up?”
“Are you even listening to me?” Lexi asks, exasperated. “He doesn’t have an away message up! And I’ve IM’d him six times and he hasn’t replied.”
>
Six times? Yikes. “Wow.”
“I know! It makes no sense whatsoever. Listen, do you want to go to the mall tomorrow? I want to get my hair done, and we can talk about this more.”
There’s a click on the line, and Lexi’s mom’s voice comes over the phone from another extension. “Lexi? Are you on the phone?”
“Yes,” Lexi says, sighing.
“Well, please get off. I have to schedule a tanning appointment, and the salon is about to close.” She clicks off.
“Ugh,” Lexi says. “Anyway, so do you want to go tomorrow?”
“Sure,” I say “Oh, and, um, before you go, have you had a chance to talk to Kim yet?”
“No,” Lexi says, “but I’ll try to IM her tonight, since she’s obviously the only one I’ll be talking to on instant messenger.” Such a drama queen, that Lexi.
“Okay, thanks,” I say. I hang up the phone. And when I turn around, my mom’s standing in the kitchen, her hands on her hips. She’s looking from me to Luke and she doesn’t look happy.
chapter nine
“Nothing is going on!” I say. “Mom, you are freaking out over nothing.”
My mom is not taking the whole Luke-being-over-while-I-was-babysitting-Katie thing that well. In fact, she’s freaking out. After she sent Luke home (which was quite embarrassing because she was perfectly nice about it, but you could tell she was really upset, which almost made it worse, because it was pretty obvious that as soon as he left she was going to yell at me), she sat me down in the living room, sent Katie to bed, and sent my dad upstairs to their bedroom. She sent Katie away because she wanted to talk to me alone, and she sent my dad upstairs because she saw on Dr. Phil that the relationship you have with the parent of your same sex is the most important, and that sometimes while dealing with sensitive issues, it’s important for a mom to talk to her daughter alone.
“Devon, you know the rules,” my mom says. She runs her hand through her curly hair. “You are not to have anyone in the house while your father and I are gone. You’re not to answer the door, you’re not to tell anyone you’re home alone, and you are certainly not supposed to have BOYS OVER.”
“Mom, I know,” I say. “But we were working on our project, and I didn’t think you’d mind.”
“You should have called my cell phone to check.” I actually had thought of that. Calling her cell phone, I mean. But I figured she’d say no.
“I was going to,” I say, “but then I hurt my toe while I was going upstairs and I forgot about it.” I hold my toe up to show her, but she’s not having it.
“Devon, it’s important that your father and I are able to trust you while we’re not here.”
“Mom, I know,” I say. “You can trust me. But, really, there’s nothing going on with me and Luke. I promise.” She narrows her eyes and looks at me doubtfully. I can’t believe this. My mom thinks I invited Luke over here so that we could make out while she wasn’t home. How is it that it’s so easy for my mom to think I have a boyfriend, yet it’s taking so much effort and confusion to make other people believe I have a fake boyfriend? “Didn’t you just say the other night what a great job I was doing?”
“That doesn’t change the fact that you shouldn’t have had a friend over while your father and I weren’t home.”
“You’re right,” I say, nodding. “You’re absolutely right. Which is why it’s never going to happen again. And I’m sorry I broke your trust.” Dr. Phil says teens need to take responsibility for their actions and apologize for what they did wrong. Parents are not the enemy.
“Devon, it’s not that easy,” my mom says. I’m not sure if setting boundaries is good for our parent-child relationship. Especially since it leads to me getting in trouble for things I didn’t even do. Besides, this summer, when my mom was all about being boundary-less, my life was way less complicated, and I had way cuter shoes. “You’re going to have to be punished for this.”
“Mom! Please, that is so unfair!” This is ridiculous. How can she possibly punish me for doing absolutely nothing? “We were working on schoolwork!”
“I don’t care,” she says, standing up from the couch. She crosses her arms and paces back and forth in front of me. “And if you were just doing schoolwork, then why didn’t you ask me beforehand?”
“Because he just showed up here,” I say. “You can ask Katie. I had no idea he was coming over.”
She looks at what I’m wearing. “You’re awfully dressed up for someone who wasn’t expecting company.” I put my hand on my lips self-consciously. I can still feel some of the lip gloss I smeared on when Luke first got here.
“Mom, I changed when he got here.”
“But you guys were just doing schoolwork, and there’s nothing going on between the two of you?”
I can feel myself starting to get upset, and my chest starts to get tight. “Devon, you’re grounded from the phone, your computer, and going out for two weeks.”
I start to protest, but she holds up her hand. “You can go to Jared’s this weekend to work on your project, but that’s it. You’ll come straight home.”
“Mom, you’re being really unfair,” I say, trying to keep my voice calm even though I feel like I’m going to cry.
“I’m not changing my mind,” she says.
“Fine.” I get up from the couch and walk haughtily up the stairs. Well, as haughtily as I can with my bad toe, which feels much better but is still kind of hurting. I yank my clothes off and throw them into a pile in the floor, then pull my SLEEPYTIME pajama pants and CORNELL T-shirt back on. I flip my light switch and climb into bed, not even bothering to wash my face or brush my teeth. I feel the tears start to slip down my face, and I don’t fall asleep for a long time.
The next morning, I’m waiting for Mel at her locker with a sign that says HAPPY BFF DAY! Get it? It’s kind of like Happy Birthday, only it’s Happy BFF day. It’s kind of corny, but whatever. I got to school an hour early and used the glitter and stuff in the art room to make a bunch of signs, and I blew up some balloons we had leftover from Katie’s birthday party last month. But Mel never shows up, and finally I have to head off to homeroom.
By lunchtime, Mel is still nowhere to be found. She’s not in school, which makes me worried. Matt, however, is in school, and seems to be blowing Lexi off. They don’t talk all through lunch, and Matt ignores Lexi to flirt with Kayleigh Trusco, who wears a C-cup bra.
When Lexi’s mom drops us off at the mall that afternoon, neither one of us is in a great mood.
“I just don’t understand it,” Lexi says, flipping through a rack of long, striped sweaters at bebe. “He kept telling me how cool I was, and how much he liked me.” She looks at me out of the corner of her eye. “Devi, can you keep a secret?” Oh, God. The word “secret” makes the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. But I nod.
“He kissed me,” she whispers. “After school, by the buses the other day. He just leaned in and kissed me.” She brushes her fingers against her lips like she can’t quite believe it happened, or is trying to remember exactly what it felt like.
“Wow,” I say, trying to relate. Which is hard, because I’ve never been kissed.
“He’s a good kisser,” she says. She starts moving the sweaters on the rack faster. Fabric goes flying by in a sea of blues, pinks, and purples, faster and faster as Lexi pushes them. “Was Jared a good kisser?”
“Was Jared a good kisser?” I repeat, trying to stall for time. “Um, yes. A very good kisser.”
“Oh, Devi, I’m so sorry,” she says, squeezing my hand. “Guys are such jerks.” She pulls two sweaters off the rack, a pink and a purple. “We are buying these,” she says. “To make ourselves feel better. These are our ‘We’re going to find better guys’ sweaters.” I look at her doubtfully. I don’t know if I believe a sweater can actually make you feel better. Especially since I’m not all that upset to begin with. Actually, that’s not true. I am upset, just not for the reasons Lexi thinks. She thinks I’m upset because Jared
dumped me, when in actuality, I’m upset for a myriad of other reasons, including but not limited to the fact that I like a boy I can’t have, I’m grounded, my best friend hates me, and somehow I’m only thirteen and living a lie.
“I don’t know if a sweater is going to make us feel better,” I say, fingering the price tag.
“It’s on sale,” Devi says. “And we’re getting them.” She glances around and pulls two shiny silver belts off the rack next to us. “And these to go with them.”
“Okay,” I say, shrugging. There goes the babysitting money I made last night. But who cares, really? The only reason I’m even here right now is because I lied to my mom about having to stay after school to make up a test. After this, I won’t be allowed out of the house for two weeks, so unless I want to spend my money on ordering pizza or bribing Katie to be my slave, I might as well spend it.
“Off to the salon!” Lexi squeals as we walk out of the store, swinging our new purchases.
“Hey, Lexi,” I ask, “did you have a chance to talk to Kim at all?”
“Yes,” Lexi says, nodding. She maneuvers around some other shoppers, a guy with a pierced eyebrow who walks right between us without even apologizing. “Hello, rude,” Lexi mutters.
“And what did she say?” I try to sound nonchalant.
“Yes, she likes him.” Lexi says. “She asked him out once, but I guess he wasn’t interested, and it’s been this whole unrequited love thing for months. Actually, Devi, I’m surprised you didn’t know that. Supposedly it’s, like, public knowledge.”
“Really?” I ask.
“Yeah. Even Jared knew, and he seems totally clueless.” My heart suddenly drops into my stomach.
“When did you talk to Jared?”
“Today for a little while. He came into my study hall to make up a test, and I was asking him about Matt. He was actually being sweet to me for once.” Great. So much for Jared ignoring Lexi and blowing her off. That boy refuses to listen to me. Which I guess actually makes him smarter than I give him credit for.