Broken Hearts, Fences and Other Things to Mend (6 page)

ing his bag into place. “I’m—”

Just then, the train stopped suddenly. I was thrown off bal-

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ance, and had managed to steady myself when the train sped up

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again. I fell back— and landed right on the lap of the guy.

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“Oh my god.” I felt my face get hot as I tried to understand

what was happening. Somehow, I was sprawled across this guy’s

lap
. “I’m so sorry, I didn’t—”

“No, it’s fi ne,” he said, though I could see he was turning red

too. I tried to push myself off him, but just as I did, he half- stood,

and my hand landed on his thigh. His
upper
thigh.

“
Oh
my god.” I half- stumbled, half- fell back on the middle seat

and then scooted myself over to the window. I wanted to make it

clear that I wasn’t some kind of weird train harasser who used

sudden stops to touch the legs of random cute guys. “I’m so sorry

about that. I’m so so sorry.”

“It’s fi ne,” he said, but I could see that he was still blushing.

“Are you all right?”

“Yes,” I said. “I just . . . fell harder than I was expecting to.”

He gave me a don’t-worry- about- it smile, and I realized that

there was something about him that seemed familiar. I couldn’t

quite place him, but fi gured that maybe he was one of my friends’

Friendverse friends, someone I’d seen tagged enough in their posts

that I recognized him, even though we’d never actually met. I picked

up my latte— it had been resting on the tiny ledge by the window,

and had not, miraculously, spilled— and took a deep restorative

sip.

“Great name,” the guy said, nodding at my cup, and I realized

he was reading the
Sophie
that was written there.

“Thanks,” I said. “But it’s not—”

“Tickets!” the conductor yelled as he made his way down the

aisle. The guy then had to explain he’d already given his ticket,

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that he had been sitting across the aisle, then moved, which the

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conductor seemed to think was some massive train transgres-

sion, but he fi nally left without making the guy pay again.

“Sorry about that,” the guy said when the conductor had de-

parted. “I’m Josh, by the way.”

“Hi,” I said. “It’s nice to meet you.” I ran my hand across my

new bangs and was suddenly grateful to Sophie for dragging me

to the salon. Not that I was interested in this guy, but it was just

nice to know that my hair currently looked better than it ever

normally did.

“You heading to the Hamptons?” he asked.

“I am,” I said. I was about to tell Josh we would be in East

Hampton when I realized that Bruce might have moved in the

last fi ve years. He’d certainly gone through at least three wives.

“But I’m not exactly sure where.”

Josh smiled. “Same here,” he said. “My sister is already up there,

but the house is new— I have no idea what neighborhood it’s in.”

He stowed his iPod in the side mesh pocket of his backpack, like

he wanted to keep talking, despite the fact I had already proven

myself to be very uncoordinated. “Have you been to the Hamp-

tons before?”

“Well . . .” I started. I should have probably been prepared for

this question, but it caught me off guard. “Um, once,” I said. “For

a summer when I was a kid. But not since then.”

“Same here,” he said again. “Not even for a whole summer, in

my case. But I remember I liked it.”

“Yeah,” I murmured as I looked out the window so that he

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wouldn’t see my expression. Guilt was hitting me like a wave, and

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I was wondering, again, if I’d made a mistake in agreeing to go

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back. I had a sudden fl ash of a memory I usually tried to keep

buried— me, staring through the car window at Hallie, her shoul-

ders slumped, her face tearstained and puffy, all the while know-

ing that it was my fault, that I’d done things I couldn’t take back.

“So you’re from Connecticut?” he asked, shaking me out of

this memory. “I, um,” he continued, looking down at his feet, and

I saw the tips of his ears were turning red. “Noticed when you got

on.”

“Oh,” I said.
Oh
. I felt a fi zzy feeling in my stomach, some-

thing I hadn’t felt in a very long time, not since Teddy and I fi rst

started dating. But just as soon as it had started, it went away. I

wasn’t interested in this guy. He wasn’t Teddy, and it was as

simple as that. “Um, yeah. I’m from Putnam. Are you from Con-

necticut too?”

Josh shook his head. “I came from Massachusetts,” he said. “I

go to school there. Clarence Hall.”

I raised an eyebrow. Clarence Hall was a boarding school a

few hours from Putnam. Sophie had once dated two guys there at

the same time, and it had ended in a spectacularly bad fashion.

I’d given Sophie endless grief about it, telling her that deception

never led to anything but heartache, and she must have listened

to me, because after that, she stuck to dating one guy at a time,

even if they did sometimes overlap at the end— Sophie wasn’t the

greatest at being on her own.

“Impressive,” I said.

“I don’t know about that,” Josh said with a laugh. “I’m mostly

there because of the lacrosse team.”

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“Extra impressive,” I said, before I could stop myself. But I

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couldn’t help it— the cutest guys at Putnam High played lacrosse.

Since Teddy had opposed pretty much all sports for various ethi-

cal reasons— and I had too, in support of him— I’d never really

known any lacrosse players well, just secretly admired them from

afar.

Josh laughed at that, and I realized I liked the sound of it— a

generous laugh without any meanness in it. The conductor got

on the scratchy PA system and announced the Bridgehampton

stop— and I realized that was the one I was supposed to meet my

dad at. “Sorry,” I said, getting to my feet very cautiously as the

train slowed. “That’s my stop.” I reached for my bag from the over-

head rack, but Josh was already leaning over me, lifting it up like

it weighed nothing.

“Mine too,” he said as he lifted up a red- and- black duffel with

CLARENCE HALL printed on one side and swung one bag on each

shoulder.

“You don’t have to do that,” I said, as it became clear he was

going to carry my bag for me.

“Not a problem,” he said. But when he reached down for his

own backpack, I grabbed it before he had the chance.

“I’ve got this,” I said as swung it over my shoulder and picked

up my purse. He nodded, and we made our way up the aisle, where

I saw at least three women and one guy reading copies of
Once

Bitten
. We reached the doors right as they opened, and stepped

off the over- air- conditioned train and into the warm summer

night.

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As the train pulled away behind us, I noticed that it was just

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starting to get dark outside. The air smelled familiar— fresh and

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clean, with the faintest scent of salt water and ocean behind it.

The parking lot had a few cars idling in it, and I looked around

for my father, which was made a little more diffi cult because

I had no idea what he’d be driving out here. But at any rate, no-

body waved or honked at me, so it didn’t seem like he was here

yet.

Josh looked around as well, but didn’t make a move toward

any of the cars. The last idling car picked up its passenger and

left the parking lot, leaving just the two of us and the occasional

chirps of the cicadas.

“We may be stranded,” he said cheerfully. It didn’t seem like

the prospect bothered him all that much.

“And we don’t even know where we’re headed,” I said, shaking

my head in mock seriousness. “We’re in trouble.”

“Well,” he said, with a slightly ner vous smile, “maybe if we

ever get where we’re going, I could call you sometime. I don’t know

a ton of people here.”

“Oh,” I said, and my brain suddenly went into hyperdrive.

Was he asking me out? Because then I’d have to tell him that I

was in a mourning period, couldn’t even think about dating. But

then it was like the second part of the sentence sank in . . . he

didn’t know many people. He wanted to be
friends,
I realized, re-

lieved. And I had a feeling I might be able to use a friend, since

the only people my age I knew here were Bruce’s kids, and I wasn’t

even sure they would be around for the summer. “Sure,” I said,

giving him a quick smile. “That’d be great.”

Josh pulled out his cell phone, which looked like the very new-

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est model, and paused, just staring at the screen for a moment.

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“Sorry,” he said. “I just got this, and I’m still fi guring it out.” But

a few seconds later, he located the right feature, and he punched

in my numbers as I recited them. A second later, my phone rang.

I pressed the button to save the contact, and then looked up at

him.

“What did you say your last name was again?”

He smiled at that. “I don’t think I did. But it’s Bridges.”

My own smile was extinguished as suddenly as if someone

had dumped a bucket of cold water over me— which was actually

pretty close to how I was feeling at the moment. “Josh . . . Bridges,”

I repeated, hoping against hope that maybe he’d tell me that his

real fi rst name was actually something I had never heard paired

with Bridges. Hershel or Donovan or Fred.

But Josh just nodded. “You’ve got it.”

I tried to tell myself it was just a coincidence. After all, Bridges

was a common enough name. It didn’t necessarily mean he was

the Josh Bridges I’d known briefl y, the one who was Hallie’s brother.

He hadn’t been around much that summer, so I hadn’t spent a ton

of time with him.

Which, I realized with a sinking feeling in my stomach, was

pretty much what he’d told me himself about his fi rst visit to the

Hamptons. “Oh,” I said, weakly, trying to get my bearings.

The quiet of the night was shattered when an open Jeep sped

into the parking lot, tires kicking up gravel, the song that had

been playing on the radio nonstop recently— a song about how it

would be the
summer, summer, summer to remember
— turned up

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loud. There was a girl driving the car, a girl who looked my age,

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with long blond hair.

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No,
I thought as hard as I could as she killed the engine.

Please no.

“Hey!” she called across to us. “Joshie!”

My thoughts still spinning, I handed Josh his backpack, and

he set my duffel at my feet. I was trying to tell myself not to panic,

that this was all just a coincidence. It didn’t mean that this girl

was his sister. I mean, this could have been his girlfriend.

“Come
on,
loser!” the girl yelled.

Maybe it was his girlfriend and they had a very strange

relationship.

“That’s my sister,” Josh said, and the last of my illusions were

crushed. “Coming!” he yelled toward the Jeep, but I saw to my horror

that the girl had parked the car and was heading toward us. It was

her, it had to be, but I still couldn’t quite believe it until she walked

up the three steps to the platform and was standing in front of me.

Hallie.

The girl who I tried never to think about, but who nonetheless

came into my head whenever I thought about the worst things I’d

ever done. The girl who I’d been crueler to than anyone else, ever.

The girl whose life I had tried to ruin— and had come damn close—

fi ve years before.

“Hey,” she said, bumping him with her shoulder, then shriek-

ing when he picked her up in a sudden bear hug, then dropped

her when she was still a few inches off the ground. “Stop,” she

said, but she was laughing as she whacked his arm. “Ready to go?”

“Sure,” Josh said as he shouldered his bag. Hallie looked right

at me then, full on. I saw confusion and then shock pass over her

—-1

features as she looked closer, frowning.

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