Envy - 2 (25 page)

Kane looked back and forth between the two of them.

“It doesn’t
look
fine” he said hesitantly, walking toward Beth, who was now slumped against the wal , her head in her hands. He put a hand on her shoulder. “Beth, are you—”

“Don’t touch her,” Adam snapped, knocking Kane’s arm away roughly.

“What’s your problem?” Kane asked, turning to face him.

“You were,” Adam said. Suddenly, he punched Kane in the face, hard, knocking him to the ground. “But not anymore.” As Kane moaned in pain and Beth looked on in horror, Adam slowly turned his back on them and walked away.

“She’s al yours now,” he cal ed over his shoulder. “You two deserve each other.”

Kane lay on the ground for a moment, moaning—with a few smal whimpers thrown in, just for effect. (Not too many, though—it wouldn’t do to have her thinking he was some kind of wimp.) Then he slowly pul ed himself up and walked over to Beth, who was frozen in place, staring after Adam’s disappearing figure.

Kane said a silent congratulations to Kaia and Harper—apparently, everything had gone like clockwork. His turn now.

He put a comforting arm around Beth, trying to stil her heaving sobs.

She leaned against him for a moment, burying her face in his chest and crying.
It’s going to be a bitch to get all of that snot out of the fabric
, he thought.
But after all this hard
work, what’s a little more?
So he held her, wishing his hands could stray downward, but he held back, just rubbing her shoulder blades and making comforting noises. Patience, he counseled himself.

“Beth, maybe you want to go inside and talk?” he final y suggested.

At the sound of his voice, she looked up in alarm, almost as if she’d forgotten he was there. She twisted away from him.

“I—I have to go,” she said, wild eyed, backing away from the restaurant.

“Okay,” he said quietly, trying to calm her down. It unsettled him, somehow, to see her like this. It wasn’t that he felt guilty, he insisted to himself. Or that he couldn’t stand to see her hurt. It was just—unsettling. Guys and crying don’t mix, he decided. That was al . “Let me get my keys. I’l drive you home,” he offered.

“No—no!” she yelped. “I just need to be by myself. I just need to go.”

“Beth, I’m not letting you wander out there by yourself,” he said in alarm. “Not when you’re … like this.” But it was too late—she’d run off into the darkness.

Once she was safely gone, he shook his head and shrugged. So he’d have to wait. Another day, maybe two. Not a problem. He could be patient. Now that everything was in place, there was nothing standing in his way, he just had to wait.

She’d come back.

They always did.

Harper was antsy. She knew she should study—she might not care about the SATs, but it couldn’t hurt to spend a couple hours at least
looking
at her books, just so she could say she’d done something.

But she was too excited to concentrate. She couldn’t just sit there and study, not while she was stuck in this weird limbo between triumph and actual y reaping the benefits of her victory. She couldn’t sit stil , couldn’t stay inside—she wanted to dance, to leap, to drink, to show the world that she was the girl who had everything.

She wanted, in essence, to go out.

Adam was off somewhere with Beth, breaking her heart, she hoped.

Kane, if he was smart, was lurking about, ready to pick up the pieces.

Miranda, she was pretty sure, wasn’t speaking to her. A problem for another day.

She supposed she could cal up some of the girls, just choose some names at random from her cel and sucker them into going out—but she didn’t want that. She didn’t want to have to make up an excuse, to have to pretend that today was just another day when in fact today was
the
day, the start of everything, the day the world was about to open up for her. She wanted someone who would celebrate with her—and know what she was celebrating.

With surprise, she realized what it was—she wanted Kaia.

As she whirled under the lights of Grace’s only “dance club”—a large and half empty bar that played cheesy eighties hits on Friday nights, Kaia was surprised to discover that she was actual y having something akin to a good time.

Jack Powel was in for the night. Friday nights were his, and his alone, he’d informed her, and she’d figured that meant she’d be spending a quiet night at home watching TV

and painting her nails. (Let these smal -town losers study for the SATs—she’d aced the test last spring with the help of Ivy Bound, an intense one-on-one prep program for mediocre rich kids. So Kaia couldn’t care less what happened in the morning.) And then Harper had cal ed, and here they were, downing poorly mixed Cosmos and flailing their arms around to old-school Madonna—two material girls out on the town. For what it was.

And why not? Hadn’t they triumphed over the forces of good and managed to win the fair-haired couple over to the dark side? Harper looked happier than Kaia had ever seen her, and Kaia knew it was more than the vodka.

So let her be happy, Kaia thought. She doesn’t deserve it, but then, who the hel does? Why not Harper? Why not al of them?

Harper swung her arms around Kaia and they belted out the lyrics of the chorus together, at the top of their lungs.

“Don’t get any ideas,” Harper shouted, trying to make herself heard over the music. “I stil can’t stand you!”

“Don’t worry, the feeling is mutual,” Kaia yel ed, grinning. She spun around and raised her arms above her head, twisting and turning to the steady beat.

It was a scene Kaia would have been hideously embarrassed to witness back in New York, much less participate in—the only people who danced to eighties music were bridge and tunnel chicks trol ing for men in the big city, and men with gold teeth and bad breath looking for their next lay.

No, the number one rule of her life in the Big Apple: Only losers look like they’re having fun. Boredom is the new chic.

But here? There was no one to see her—no one who counted, at least. There was only her, Harper, the flashing lights, the drinks, the steady beat and the vibrating floor. She closed her eyes and let the music fil her up, sweeping over her and carrying her body away.

Adam had left a sweatshirt in her room the last time he was there. The last time—maybe it was just that, the last time he would ever be there. Beth moaned and curled up into a tight bal , burying her face in the soft cotton of the shirt. It stil smel ed like him.

She closed her bloodshot eyes and breathed in deeply, letting herself pretend, for a moment, that he was in the room, lying down beside her, his arms around her, that she was safe.

But it was no use. Her bed was empty—and a sweatshirt, a scent, a thinning memory, was al she had left.

It came in waves: the sadness, the terrifying feeling of being completely alone, completely out of control. It came in waves—she’d heard the phrase before, but never real y understood what it meant. That when they came, the powerful feelings swept over her, knocking her down and tossing her about as if she’d been caught by the blast of a wal of water. It lifted her off her feet, spun her, slammed her into the ground, and dragged her, tired and teary and confused, to shore, to safety, to the relative peace that would rule until another wave swept in and knocked her down al over again.

There were moments, brief moments, where she thought she would be okay, that al the pain and sorrow sweeping over her would end, that it would drag her down, but not forever. And then there were other moments, long, interminable moments, when she feared she would drown.

He was drowning—in anger, in despair, in indecision, in regret.

Had he done the right thing?

Was he a complete hypocrite? Sleeping with someone else and then dumping on Beth for doing the same? Had he made a horrible mistake?

Adam sat on the floor of his bedroom, door shut tight, loud music drowning out the rest of the world—if only it could drown out his thoughts. But they were too loud.

In front of him sat a pile of pictures, pictures that Beth had given him over the past couple years, pictures of the two of them together, happy.

There they were in the mountains, and there, in another, curled up together on the couch. Beth, cheering in the stands at one of his basketbal games. Beth, cheeks flushed, eyes radiant, balanced on her toes to give him a kiss on the cheek. Beth, elegant and lovely, in her silver evening gown at last year’s spring formal.

He held the last picture in his hands—it had always been his favorite and, until this evening, had sat on his desk in a silver frame. It had been taken just after they’d started going out. They were in the park. It had been a rare, beautiful day—cool air, bril iant blue sky. Even the grass had seemed lush and green. Adam had swept Beth up in his arms, dangling her above the ground, and she was laughing, trying unsuccessful y to get away, her hair bil owing in the wind, her face fil ed with joy—his face fil ed with love. It was how he always thought of her—open, happy, laughing, so in love with him, so hopeful about the future. She’d believed in them—believed in him.

He held the picture, wondering: Had he made a mistake? Thrown away something too precious, too perfect to lose?

But then he remembered that these weren’t the only pictures, that these images no longer told the whole story. He looked out the window, to Harper’s dark bedroom only a few feet away, and remembered who he could count on—and who he couldn’t, who had taken everything good in his life, everything he’d thought was real, and stomped on it. Destroyed it.

This picture in front of him that he’d loved so much—it was a lie. Everything he’d loved had been a lie.

He tore the picture in half, right down the middle, and threw it aside.

He was done with lies, forever.

The next morning Harper ran out the door at eight a.m. sharp to meet Adam, who was driving her to school for the dreaded test. She was stil hungover from the night before, and she expected he’d look even worse, but instead, Adam was clean shaven and bright-eyed, and had a wide smile on his face. Too wide, Harper decided, but if he wanted to pretend nothing had happened, she’d respect that and go along with it. For a while.

“Excuse me while I have a heart attack,” he joked when she climbed into the car. “Harper Grace?
On time?
Wil wonders never cease?”

“Hold the applause and let’s get going,” she sighed, squinting in the bright morning sun. “The sooner we get started, the sooner we can get this thing over with.”

“Amen to that,” he agreed, and shifted the car into gear.

The whole ride was like that—pleasant smal talk, strange and unnerving only because it was so utterly and completely normal. As they pul ed into the lot, they passed right by Beth’s car, but Adam said nothing—maybe he hadn’t noticed.

The car pul ed to a stop, and they got out. Harper took a deep breath. “Wel , should we go face our future?” She began to walk toward the school, but Adam grabbed her hand and pul ed her back to the car.

“Wait,” he said, smiling. “I have a present for you.”

He pul ed a smal , hastily wrapped package from his pocket and handed it to her. She ripped off the wrapping.

“A new cel phone?” she asked, surprised.

“To replace the one I broke,” he explained, blushing. “Sorry, again.”

“Oh, Adam, you know, I don’t care about the phone,” she assured him. “I mean, thank you—this is so sweet, but—how are
you
doing?” He shrugged and looked away. “Okay, I guess.”

She took a step closer to him and put her hands on his shoulders, forcing him to look her in the eye. “How are you
really
doing?” Slowly, careful y, as if afraid it might hurt, he smiled. A real smile, this time.

“I think I’m real y okay,” he told her. “Now.”

And he leaned toward her, and they kissed, and it was sweet and soft and perfect—and again, she forced herself to push him away.

“Adam, I told you—,” she protested.

He wrapped his arms around her waist and pul ed her close to him, bending his lips to her ear, and whispered the words she’d been waiting so long to hear.