Any Other Girl (2 page)

Suddenly, I remembered what she'd said to me at the party. “
Real classy
.” She'd seen me, I realized. Seen me talking to Braden outside. Maybe he hadn't been the one to tell on me, after all. “You have it all wrong, Shay.”

She folded her bare, caramel-colored arms over her chest and smirked at me. “Oh,
do
I? Tell me, then, Kat. What exactly do I have wrong?”

I opened my mouth to speak then closed it again, unable to come up with an acceptable answer. Maybe there wasn't one. To me, the way I'd acted with Braden wasn't any different from the way I'd acted with Chris Newbury in Miranda's dining room, or the rest of the boys at school—just harmless, playful flirting. Shay knew how I was, knew about my reputation when it came to boys, but she'd always accepted me at face value. She'd believed in me . . . until I gave her a reason not to.

“We were just talking,” I said, frustrated tears throbbing at the backs of my eyes. “It wasn't anything more than that, I swear. You
know
me, Shay. I act like that with all the guys. It's no big deal.”

Shay wasn't like me. She didn't relish the weight of many sets of eyes on her. She didn't seek attention or enjoy an audience. I knew her anger at me had completely taken over when she thrust a finger in my face and started yelling at me in front of everyone.

“No big deal? Braden isn't just some random guy at a party, Kat. He's my boyfriend.
My boyfriend
.” She turned her face to the side and blinked a few times. She hated crying. “I can't believe I was actually stupid enough to trust you.”

“You
can
trust me,” I said quickly. Pleadingly. “I'm your friend, Shay. You know I'd never—”

“Even after hearing what everyone said about you, I gave you a chance.” Shay spoke over my words like I hadn't even uttered them. “And this is how you pay me back for two years of friendship? By flirting with my boyfriend the minute I turn my back? Screw you, Kat.” She turned and stormed away, leaving me there on the grass, the center of everyone's attention just like I always craved.

Their gazes made me feel ashamed. Naked.

“You know,” Cassidy said as we both stared after Shay, who was disappearing quickly down the sidewalk, her black ponytail swinging behind her. “I'm glad you're going to be at your cottage for the summer, Kat. I think we all need a break from you.” With that, she turned and went after Shay, catching up to her at the crosswalk.

Together, they crossed the busy street and headed toward the Starbucks on the corner, arm in arm. I watched them go as the crowd milled around me, already back to whatever it was they'd been doing before the drama started. They gave me a wide berth as I stood there, half in shock and unable to move. Like I was some kind of disease. Like my very presence was stressful and exhausting, something people needed a vacation from.

Summer couldn't get here fast enough.

chapter 2

T
he only time my parents ever fought was when we were packing to go somewhere.

“Bryce, we don't
need
the bread maker,” Dad said, trailing Pop into the kitchen, his face pink with exasperation. “It's just two and half months. We'll buy loaves of Wonder Bread at the corner store.”

“Wonder Bread?” Pop said, aghast, as if Dad had suggested we dine on rat poison all summer. “That stuff's not even
bread
. It's loaded with preservatives. Besides, Kat can't go a day without my oatmeal bread. Right, Kat?”

“Sure.” I was sitting at the small table in our small kitchen, painting my nails Bubblegum Pink and trying to stay out of it. All I could think was,
I'm getting too old for this.

“Besides,” Pop said as he unplugged the bread maker and coiled the cord with uncharacteristic neatness and speed, “we also don't need socks, and you packed ten pairs. It's summer, Mark. Time to trade in the power suits for shorts and sandals.”

Dad sighed and ran his hands through his perfectly groomed black hair. “Fine, bring the bread maker. Bring the food dehydrator too, while you're at it. You never know when we might want a batch of preservative-free beef jerky.”

“Exactly,” Pop said, hugging the bread maker to his chest with the kind of affection he reserved for two things: me and his vast collection of kitchen appliances.

Ignoring him, Dad turned to me. “All ready for tomorrow, Katrina?”

I nodded and swiped another layer of Bubblegum over my pinky nail. When it came to packing for our annual summer-long stay at our cottage on Millard Lake, my technique lay somewhere in the middle of both my fathers'—economical and practical like Dad, bringing only what I needed and maybe a few “just in case” items, and excessive and sentimental like Pop, wanting to transfer all the bulky, unnecessary objects of daily life to our new location. And unlike both of them, my packing had been done two days ago. I may have been getting too old to spend summers in the middle of the woods with my family, two hours away from the city and my life there, but that didn't mean I wasn't anxious to get away.

“You
did
arrange for Mrs. Adamson to feed the fish this weekend, right?” Dad asked Pop, whose expression immediately shifted into that wide-eyed
uh-oh
look he used whenever he got sidetracked and forgot something crucial. Dad sighed again with an added fingers-pressed-into-forehead
You give me a headache
gesture. “Bryce. Seriously.”

Pop started making excuses, something about having to resolve an unexpected plot hole in his latest novel before we left tomorrow. I took that as my cue to retreat. Hearing my parents bicker made me feel slightly panicked, like a tiny pinprick had appeared in the safe, reliable bubble around the three of us, threatening to let in the tainted air. I knew it was normal, knew
they
were normal, but this once-a-year squabble-fest never failed to cast a pall over the beginning of summer. Luckily, they were always fine and back to their happily married selves once we got to the cottage and settled in.

In my room, I settled on the edge of the bed and carefully texted my cousin Harper, using the very tips of my fingers so as not to smudge my flawless manicure.

 

 

Her reply arrived in less than a minute.

 

 

 

 

I smiled.
Best summers start with Goody's.
It was the slogan we'd made up months ago, in our early stages of planning for the summer. Goody's, a kitschy, run-down diner that hadn't been renovated since its heyday back in the fifties, was the only restaurant within miles of our little summer cottage community. Considering my undying love of everything retro, Goody's appealed to me. It appealed to my cousin less, but she tolerated it every year because they had the best burgers in the world. And because she loved me and there was nowhere else to go.

Operation Best Summer (OBS) first originated at the end of
last
summer as the two of us sat together on my dock, waxing nostalgic about how next year was our last official summer together before Harper headed off to college and her mom sold their cottage, which was just a two-minute walk through the woods from ours. Right then and there, over melting ice cream cones from Goody's, we swore that our last summer would be the
best
summer, one that would surpass all the other amazing summers since our family started vacationing there when I was eleven and Harper was twelve. We sealed the deal by touching our ice cream cones together like champagne flutes during a wedding toast. Since then, we'd exchanged thousands of phone calls and texts, plotting ways to go out with a bang. One thing we conclusively agreed on was that it had to begin with a burger and song B6 on Goody's ancient jukebox, “Yakety Yak” by The Coasters.

Harper and I couldn't talk long because she still hadn't started packing (her mother, Carrie, was Pop's older sister, and the procrastination gene ran deep with them all). Through the walls of our undersized condo, I could still hear my dads bitching at each other in the kitchen. From the sounds of things, they'd moved on from bread makers and doomed goldfish and were debating the best time to hit the road tomorrow morning.

“It takes hours to clean and air out the cottage,” Dad argued. “The earlier we leave, the better.”

“And hit Friday morning rush hour?” Pop said. “We'll get there quicker if we leave after eight.”

I sat there staring at the poster above my bed, a black and white shot of Lauren Bacall, circa the nineteen-forties, my favorite era. Dad had introduced me to old movies when I was about ten, but
Dark Passage
was the one I remembered the best. Not because it was particularly suited to my ten-year-old tastes, but because during one of the Lauren Bacall scenes, Dad had commented offhandedly, “Women looked so classy back then.” I didn't learn what
classy
was until a couple years later, but when I did, I understood what he meant. Lauren was classy, feminine, and intriguing, everything I knew I could be. From then on, I strived to be more like her.

“You just hate getting up early. Admit it.”

“That has nothing to do with it. I just think—”

Okay, time to end this. I tore my eyes away from Lauren's sultry gaze, walked over to the window, and let out a piercing screech I was sure most of the building heard. Two seconds later, both my fathers stood in my bedroom doorway, their faces leached of color.

“What's wrong? What happened?” Dad demanded, rushing to my side as Pop hastily scanned my room as if expecting to find one of the nasty aliens he wrote about in his science fiction books.

“Oh, I . . .” I took a deep breath and placed my hand on my chest like I'd seen old actresses do when they'd “had a fright.” “I thought I saw some guy getting jumped down there, that's all. But it was just his friends playing a trick or something.”

Dad peered out my window, which faced a busy city street. “Katrina,” he said warily. “There's no one getting jumped down there.”

I shrugged and moved away from the window, satisfied that I'd accomplished what I set out to do—distract them. Distracting people in a theatrical way was what I did best. “Well, they left,” I said, blowing on my still-sticky nails.

“You scared the hell out of us,” Pop said, still searching my room for invisible threats, just like he used to do when I was little and claimed my walls were inhabited by a tiny troll who wanted to steal my breath. Dad liked the classics, but Pop preferred creepy old Stephen King movies.

“Sorry,” I said, feeling guilty for frightening them. Only rarely did I need to unleash my many diversionary tactics on my dads. Normally, they were meant for other people, a ploy to deflect attention
away
from my dads.

“We're just glad you're okay,” Dad told me.

He stood in front of me, lifting my chin with his index finger until our pale green eyes met and held.
Celery eyes,
my aunt Carrie called them. Unfortunately, eye color was one of the only visible features I'd inherited from Dad, whose dark good looks epitomized the straight-female lament
Too bad he's gay
. Mostly I resembled Pop—brown-haired and average with a tendency toward plumpness.

“And good job on screaming like we taught you,” he added, smiling.

I grinned and flung out my arms in a
ta-da
kind of way. One of the life lessons my dads drilled into my head on a semi-daily basis was, “When you're in trouble, scream, even if you're not sure.” But they'd never said, “When you're sick of listening to your parents fight about small appliances and rush hour traffic, scream, even if you're not sure.” Still . . . it
had
gotten them to stop bickering.

Fake crisis averted, my parents left me alone and went to bed, our safe bubble strong and intact once again. I fell asleep shortly after, visions of sparkling water and made-from-scratch burgers and unobstructed sunsets fighting for top position in my head.

 

Dad won at least part of the argument and we left bright and early the next morning, beating rush hour by a good ninety minutes. I went with Pop in his car, a Volvo station wagon he'd had since I was young enough to need a car seat. Dad followed us in his BMW, hauling little things like groceries and towels. The Volvo carried our luggage and whatever kitchen appliances Pop had smuggled in. In the rear view mirror, I could see the top of our blender sticking out of an open box.

“So I think I'll make Victor and Lydia start working
with
this new group instead of
against
them,” Pop was saying as he drove. “Especially now that Lucien is gaining strength.”

I turned a page in my
Style
magazine. “Mmm hmm.”

As usual, Pop ignored my obvious lack of interest and kept talking, using me as a sounding board to work through potential plot lines in his latest book. I didn't mind. Even though I was only vaguely aware that Victor and Lydia were the protagonists of his series and that Lucien was some sort of evil alien kingpin set out to destroy humankind, I was proud of my dad's writing success. My other dad was vice president of business development for an IT company and was successful in different ways. He made more money than Pop, but Pop enjoyed his job more. He was writing Book Six at the moment, and his modest-but-loyal fan base kept clamoring for a release date.

“You feeling okay, Noodle?”

I glanced up from my magazine, my hand flying automatically to my hair, smoothing it down. When someone asked me if I was feeling okay, I usually took it to mean, “You look like crap.” But today's hair style—luxurious waves parted to one side, inspired by Rita Hayworth in
Gilda
—still felt as neat as it had this morning after a thirty-minute tryst with the curling iron.

“I'm fine,” I said, going back to my magazine. “Why?”

His wide brown eyes followed Dad's BMW as it roared past us on the highway. Pop shook his head with amused exasperation before turning back to me. “You've been really quiet. That's not like you.”

“I've been up since five a.m. and you won't let me drink coffee.” My parents didn't know what had happened between me and Shay. I was too ashamed to tell them that I'd lost yet another friend over my inability to restrain myself.

“It's bad for you.” He said this so often, the words had turned into one of those customary, mindless phrases, like
Have a nice day
and
Be careful
. “Besides, you're always a bundle of energy even without caffeine. I thought you'd be thrilled about summer break starting.”

“I am.” I
was
thrilled. For two and a half months, I'd be free. No whispers or rumors or name-calling or dirty looks. Just my family and several acres of green space where I could revert to my childhood self and let loose.

“I am, too,” Pop said, veering onto the exit ramp for Erwin, the small, nowhere town that bordered Millard Lake. “I plan to spend the summer sitting on the deck with my laptop and making you oatmeal bread in the bread maker I was smart enough to pack.”

I laughed and put my magazine away, choosing instead to gaze out the window. We were getting closer. Through the trees I could see snatches of lake water glinting in the morning sun. In spite of what it would do to my hair, I opened the window and let the pine-scented breeze wash over my face.

Pop slowed down as we passed through Erwin proper, which took all of three seconds, and then turned onto the gravel road that led to the cottages. Dad's BMW was parked neatly in our oversized driveway. He wasn't in it, which meant he was probably inside, seeing how our little summer haven had faired during the long, cold winter.

Pop parked the Volvo and we both climbed out, immediately taking deep, synchronized breaths. Trees, vegetation, water, and not much else. Heaven. Operation Best Summer had officially begun.