Broken (11 page)

There was a voice inside that wondered if that was just what I needed so people could really see me. Could that be the reason I had signed up for enough AP classes to be a college freshman? I was trying so hard. There were some new things about school. While the uniforms were much the same, the faces looked different.

“Get a load of the Salem witch trials over here,” Sierra texted me.

Frenchy had dyed her hair jet black. And stopped all of her Fake Bake. It was a little dramatic. I caught an eyeful of her questioning Courtney, who seemed to be ready to go.

“I'll catch up with you soon, Milan,” Courtney said to me as she bolted from the table.

“What did Frenchy say to her?” I texted Sierra.

I smiled and said, “It was nice meeting you,” to Courtney. That's all I could do: smile. I had barely talked to the girl.

“We'll talk soon, Courtney!” I winked at her.

“I think she worried that Courtney was her replacement,” Sierra responded.

I wondered what Frenchy might do if she broke into Sierra's phone and read all the texts about her.

They were both equally smart and pretty—and just as witty, in differing ways. We all had on our silver charm necklaces. Sierra and I had gotten cotton-candy pink manicures the other day. I usually kept my nails long and rounded. Sierra kept hers
squared and long. Frenchy had them paint hers vamp-red and cut them down low to the finger tip.

“I'm getting hungry.”

“Ditto,” Sierra said.

“Uh. Here we go again. I thought you had expanded your lame slang repertoire!” Frenchy said.

“Okay, who's getting lunch with me? I want a sandwich and maybe two sushi rolls,” I said.

Some girl covered my eyes. My heart started to pound. I wouldn't know one thing that anyone said. I ripped them off my face. There was a blue Tiffany's box on the table in front of me. What was this? Sierra threw me a look of despair. The girl put her hand around the box. I noticed her nails were the same color as Frenchy's. When she unwrapped the ribbon around the box, I noticed the sunlight caught the heart charm on her bracelet. It was supposed to be silver and lavender, but hers was kind of tainted. Undoubtedly, it had to be Cara.

She sat next to me. I nearly jumped out of my skin. That bracelet looked strikingly similar to the necklace I had picked out for the twins and me to wear the first day of school. My eyes slowly crept up from the bracelet on Cara's wrist to her blazer jacket to the necklace—my necklace around her neck!

“Gonna open it, doll face?” she said. I smiled. Why? Our friendship was peculiar. She was always there, around, somehow. I still didn't know how she knew I went to the hotel with Merek.

I reluctantly pulled the lid off what used to be a wonderful sight to see. I gently placed the top over the white ribbon that lay beside the box. There it was: the silver charm bracelet that matched our necklaces. I looked back at Cara. She grabbed her charm necklace. So I did the same. She smirked. Sierra was right. We shouldn't have gotten one for Frenchy. There was something going on between them.

“I scooped up one of these for everyone as, like, a gift, you know,” she said. What did that mean … “you know”?

“Thanks,” I said. I closed the box.

We were going to have to do something about her. Cece was obviously scared of Cara. I couldn't say exactly why, but it was everything I didn't know about her that sent a chill down my back.

Merek came over to our table. He looked handsome. His hair was cut low in a Mohawk. He had on a crisp pressed short-sleeve shirt and nicely creased black trousers. “Why is your blazer inside out?” I asked him.

“Like Will Smith.”

“Babe,
Fresh Prince
was like 20 years ago.”

“I saw it last night. I think it's phat. Plus this looks cool on me. Why are you throwing shade?” he asked.

“I'm not. I am stating a fact, though.”

“This is for you.” He handed me a latte, then he gave me a kiss on the lips. He looked me in the eyes expectantly. I should've known my role by now.

“Pumpkin! This is the sweetest,” I kissed him. Then I sipped my latte. It was a perfect mix of pumpkin, caramel, and soy. I had switched my flavor over the summer. I used to be a mocha girl.

He took hold of my hand. I was relieved. Would he take me away from this world? For a few moments, could I forget my broken heart and drown myself in the guy who wanted to give me his heart? I gracefully stepped down from my chair. I placed my hand through my wristlet clutch handle and I grabbed my cell. Merek put his arm around my waist. He slowly pressed his fingers into my side and swept them across my shirt softly. It kind of tickled. I looked at him and smiled. He looked into my eyes and for a second I felt lost. I felt like maybe I had it all wrong. Was he for me? Maybe I knew nothing about destiny. Maybe my feelings were playing Jedi mind tricks on me.

I noticed he was moving his fingers across my side in the same motions. 1-2-3-4-5-6-7-8, and then again 1-2-3-4-5-6-7-8. I felt like he was playing me. “What's up?” I asked him. He held on to me tightly as we walked to the back staircase.

“Guitar. I want you to hear me play. You know my lyrics. Let me play for you.” he said. I had to look away.

“I do know that you play guitar. I … I'm not ready to hear my songs.” Like the most absurd excuse ever! It was a reminder of things I would never be able to do: listen to him play the guitar, hear the sound of his voice, hear the inflections of his accent. Suddenly, I felt so inadequate. Then I thought of Mama, and I quickly snapped out of my realm of self-pity. I had much to be thankful for.

Had I taken Merek's love for me for granted in thinking that I would leave him for Noel? People shouldn't be traded as pawns on a chess board. I didn't want to grow up and become like Daddy. I was starting to get a headache. I let out a deep sigh.

“What's wrong? Why aren't you ready to hear me play?” Merek asked.

“Nothing. It's just the first day of school,” I said.

“My brother and the band just got back from Cali. We're practicing later on tonight. Come?”

This was going to be like me going to a concert and pretending I knew what's going on. I couldn't read lips 30 feet away!

“Baby, I don't know.”

“I need my girl there. With you there, I'll play better. It is going to be all good.”

“Come play for me at the apartment. Just you and me.” The words just came out of my mouth. I was always compromising. But how could I just say no? I wanted to make my boyfriend happy. I didn't know anything. Isn't that what a girlfriend was supposed to do?

“You want me to give you a private concert?” he asked.

“Yes.”

He kissed me. “Are you going to tell me why you won't come later?” he asked.

“No. I want you to let it go.”

He put his fingers through my hair and held my face. “You are so precious.” That was the moment. The most confusing moment of my entire life! In that moment, he had taken my breath away. That was something I thought only Noel could do.

I just wanted to drop down to the floor and cry. I surrendered to love. I didn't understand any of it. I felt wrong for loving Noel, but how could it be wrong and me love
him so much? I felt wrong for not loving Merek more than I loved Noel, because he loved me and he deserved it and I could be happy with him. I wished someone had told me the rules. I just kept fouling out of the game left and right. How was I to win? Who did I really want to be with?

He kissed me softly. Every time we kissed, it was different. This one was gentle. Slowly, my headache went away. And that was lunch.

Registration had the bright idea of giving me study period in the middle of the afternoon during seventh instead of at the end of the day. Merek and I spent half the period at the library going over our coursework from each syllabus. Then, well, it was him and me, kiss and kiss.

Eventually, I'd crack down and give him what he wanted: another serving of me. One of these days would be a second go-around. It wasn't bad at all. That wasn't it. It just wasn't everything I had dreamed of. But I was a good girlfriend. Perfect. I kept my boyfriend happy. And people at school liked to see us together. We were a power couple, like my mom and dad. Tears welled up in my eyes at the thought of my mother.

“Are you okay, princess?” he asked me.

I shook my head yes. He kissed me on the cheek. Then he kissed me on the lips. As we sat there, making out in the school performance arena, I found myself becoming bored. I wore Mama's throwback Gucci watch. It was from the '70s. As long as you changed the battery, it still worked. I checked my watch once. Then he moved to the other side of my neck. When he wasn't looking, I checked my watch again. I was
flabbergasted! Only two minutes had gone by. It felt like we'd been at it for 20 minutes. I'd had enough.

“Baby, I have to stop by my locker and see my counselor,” I said. It was true. I needed to talk to my counselor about starting my college applications and I needed to stop by my locker to get my books.

“Okay.” He kissed me on the lips. He walked me to my locker.

When we arrived at my locker, Cara was standing next to it. I checked my watch. It was 10 minutes to the bell. Was she staking out the place? “Hi there, doll face. You forgot this at lunch.” She handed me the bracelet she bought.

“Thanks,” I showed it to Merek and smiled. He put it on my arm. She was staring at us the whole time. “Bye,” I kissed Merek on the cheek. He left. I opened my locker to get some books out. When I closed it, she was still there, staring.

“So where's your locker?” I asked.

“Right here.” She pointed to the locker right next to mine.

“The whole row was taken this morning,” I said in disbelief.

“I have connections,” she said.

My eyes widened and I took a deep breath. “Okay. Well, I'll see you later,” I said.

“Bye-bye.” She gave me two air kisses. I headed to my counselor's office.

I thought about Cara the whole way to my counselor's office and even during the next period's calculus class. I had never been scared and yet intrigued at the same time before. I didn't know what she wanted from me, but every time I looked up, she was there.

There was this thing about being popular—you had to be exclusive. I didn't have many friends outside the usual suspects: Sierra, Cece, and Frenchy. I needed to know more about Cara. She knew too much about me. Like what the hell was the deal with those bracelets to match the necklaces we had? I was a private person. Or at least I wanted to be. I had asked Cece about Cara. Her hand quivered. She had asked me if I was serious. She said she didn't know, and she told me to act like I didn't want to know. When I asked her more questions about it, she changed the subject. I couldn't ask Sierra because she would tell Frenchy. Even though they didn't get along, somehow Frenchy always ended up getting information out of her. Sierra always had to prove she wasn't hiding stuff from Frenchy.

I had one hope. Winter. We had been friends since junior high. We started high school together, but when her parents divorced she moved with her mom to Miami. It seemed kind of ridiculous to ask her, but I knew she knew about three or four girls at the school. So I texted her after sixth period: “Hey, Winter, can you get me the rap sheet on this girl at my school? Her name is Cara. Keep it quiet, though. Guard secret with your life.”

It seemed like Cara had committed some misdemeanors before. I just didn't want to be one of them. I was a lover, not a fighter, for the record.

It was a quarter to midnight. I was becoming impatient. Cara had spent the entire evening at our house with Dimitri. I was suffocating. I caught her hovering over my plate of food before dinner. I had excused myself to the restroom to wash my hands. When I came back, she was alone in the kitchen, standing over my food. How convenient. Dimitri left her with my food. He took his plate to the dining room. I didn't eat with them anyway. My chicken did taste rather odd, though. I couldn't tell if she'd put something on it or not.

Mama always said, “
The heart never lies
.” I remembered so clearly breaking the news to Mama about skating.

I remember as if it happened yesterday. I had decided I didn't want to take figure skating anymore. I was only 12 and Mama used to come watch me at the rink every Saturday. Daddy used to come to my competitions if he was in New York. I didn't want to let my parents down, but I wanted to join the book club that Winter and some of the other girls at school had started. After one Saturday afternoon at the Pier, I came out of the locker room, carrying my skates and bag. I looked Mama squarely in the eyes and lay down the news.

“Why?” she asked.

“I want to join this book club my friends are in,” I signed.

“Milan, you know that their book club may not be forever. What if they decide not to read any more books?”

“I can join another at the library or the bookstore,” I signed.

“Okay. If it is in your heart. Baby, do what's in your heart always. The heart never lies. That's how I chose the college I went to. That's how I knew your Dad was the one. That's how I picked our apartment out. That's even how I picked out your name. If you tell me that you feel something in your heart, I will always be okay with it,” Mama said.

If Mama were here, I would ask her: “If the heart never lies, then what truth is my heart telling me?”

I sat there staring out my bedroom window at Park Avenue, feeling like I didn't really understand the world. I hoped somehow that if I didn't sleep, it would make Winter text me sooner—kind of how you don't want to sleep on Christmas Eve when you're a kid in hopes that Christmas will come sooner. In all actuality, the opposite was true. If you slept, then it seemed like Christmas Day arrived much sooner because you didn't have to acknowledge every hour that passed. I thought about doing something drastic like cleaning the cobwebs off my hearing aid and calling Winter! But I refused to become the old me. Not even for this. The suspense was building up into a series of “what if” scenarios in my mind.