Gimme a Call (30 page)
Authors: Sarah Mlynowski
We hold hands along the way and then run for the swings.
As soon as we get there, we both start showing off, pushing higher and higher—until my sandal flies clear across the park.
He laughs and jumps off the swing to get it.
“Sandal found!” he hollers, and holds it out toward me Cinderella-style. I slow to a halt.
“What about Ivan?” he asks.
“Ivan and I are … over.”
He places his hands over mine, leans down, and kisses me.
His lips are soft and light and sweet, and everything else disappears except for the kiss and the moment. The perfect kiss in this perfect moment.
chapter fifty-five
Friday, June 6
Senior Year
The doorbell rings and I’m not even dressed yet.
But yay! Prom people are here! Excitement flutters down my back and to my toes. I wonder who it’s going to be. My friends? Tom? Harry? Bryan?
No matter who it is, I’m going to have a great night. I will take whatever comes and enjoy the moment.
Even if it’s Celia.
But I really hope it’s not her.
“Mom, Dad, can you get it?” I call. I pull on my beautiful silver dress from Raffles and my original heels. My original red heels. How about that? They look really cool with the dress. Who would have thought?
Now what jewelry should I wear?
I think of the bracelet I shoved into my purse. Even if he’s not here, I know it will look just right.
Bryan is waiting for me at the bottom of the steps. I catch my breath. He looks absolutely adorable—absolutely
dimples
—in his tux.
“Hi,” he says, pulling me into a hug. “You’re gorgeous.”
“Thanks,” I say, inhaling his scent. “You too.”
“You guys both look amazing,” Mom says. Meanwhile, I can’t believe how amazing
she
looks. Not as glamorous as Millionaire Mom, but her hair is in a bouncy ponytail, her skin is glowing, and she’s back to a size 6. “I can’t believe how quickly time has passed,” she continues. “It seems like just yesterday Bryan rang our doorbell and I gave him my apple brownies.”
“I do love those brownies,” Bryan says wistfully.
“Lucky for you I packed you guys a snack,” Mom says, and hands me a box. A box that’s labeled Banks’s Bakery.
Huh?
“Thanks, Mrs. Banks. You’re the best. Dev, everyone’s already in the limo. We should go. Mrs. Banks, do you and Mr. Banks want to take some pictures outside?” He glances at his watch—the silver watch I got him for graduation. But if I never returned the watch, then how …?
“Of course,” Mom says. “I think he’s just out back with Maxie. We were trying to keep her out of Devi’s hair.”
Maxie? We got a dog?
“Dad!” I holler. “We’re going outside.”
Bryan takes my hand and leads me out the door.
The driver is standing beside the car, wearing a suit and a black cap. Tall, dark, Italian, handsome. He looks familiar. Where do I know him from?
Oh. My. God. It’s Alfonzo! Oh, no, must hide him before my mom comes out! “Excuse me,” I say. “Um, this is going to be a while. You should just sit and wait in the car. No need to stand around.”
He gives me a smile and a wink before disappearing into the car.
Yeah, I know I’m done manipulating other people’s lives, but no need to tempt fate.
Karin and Stevey, Tash and Nick, and Joelle spill out of the limo.
They all look amazing. Joelle’s wearing the cool purple dress she made, Tash is drop-dead gorgeous in a slinky black dress, and Karin is stunning in a low-cut red taffeta number. While her nose has definitely been altered, her boobs and lips are still au naturel. Guess it’s my job to make sure they stay that way.
“So, I’m officially here on my own,” Joelle says, throwing her arms in the air. “I thought Kellerman was going to ask me for sure, but too late now.”
Tash lets go of Nick and puts her arm around Joelle. “It’s enough about Kellerman,” she chides. “You broke up with him two years ago. You need to move on.”
“No kidding! But you know it was the biggest mistake of my life!”
I giggle. I can’t help it. I guess Tash was right. She does like being the tortured artist after all.
“Here come your dad and Maxie,” Karin says, waving to the front of the house.
I turn to see my dad helping a little girl in a pink dress and high pigtails down the steps. We must be babysitting a neighbor’s kid—not that I recognize her. Not that I recognize my dad either. He’s beaming and tanned and wearing jeans and a T-shirt. No bathrobe in sight. Although he is wearing his Mickey Mouse slippers. I wonder what changed for him. He looks so happy. And when did my parents decide to open a bakery, anyway?
“Your little sister is adorable,” Joelle tells me.
My … what?
chapter fifty-six
Friday, May 23Three and a half years later
“Maxie, be careful!” I say. I hold my almost-three-year-old sister tightly by the hand. She’s about thirty seconds from spilling her ice cream over everything. Guess who she got her klutziness from?
“Sorry,” I say into my cell. “Karin, you still there?”
I’m standing in the mall, by the circular fountain. I’d promised my parents I’d take Maxie to get a toy golf set this morning. She’s obsessed. My dad’s been working on her swing during his mornings with her, before his afternoons in the bakery.
Karin sighs into the phone. “I was saying that I can’t believe you guys broke up! It’s so depressing! I thought you two would get married for sure.”
“I know,” I admit. “We still love each other. It’s just that we’ve been together for almost four years! And with him going to Montreal and me going to New York City, we think it’s time to spread our wings. You know, test out life without the other.”
“But why? You like life with each other!”
“I know,” I say. “I just thought … I don’t know, I thought it would be good for us. Help us grow as people. And he agreed with me eventually. But we’re not breaking up this second. Only when he leaves. And I’m still planning on visiting him in Montreal.”
“But you’re still going to prom together?”
“Of course! I wouldn’t miss prom! Are you insane?”
“Are you sure it’s the right thing to do?” she asks.
“I hope it is. It feels like it is. But I don’t know.”
Luckily, I’m going to have a busy summer to distract me. Working at Bella, and spending as much time as possible with the girls before we all split up, packing for college, helping plan Maxie’s Little Mermaid–themed birthday party in July, and then meeting Maya for a week in Italy. And Mom and Dad are even closing the bakery for a week and we’re all going down to New York City to find Maya and me a two-bedroom apartment before she starts law school and I start college. We’re going to be roomies!
“It sounds like you know what you’re doing,” Karin says. “Time will tell, I guess.”
How true. I wish I could ask my college self … kidding! The weeks back in freshman year when I spoke to Ivy seem like forever ago. Sometimes they feel all hazy, like a dream.
“Are you almost done at the mall?” Karin asks. “We have a ton of parties to get to today. You only get one senior skip day.”
“We’re leaving in two minutes,” I promise.
Maxie pulls at my shirt. “Devi, I can’t—” Her ice cream is precariously perched on top of the cone. It is not looking safe. I watch as it starts to slip in slow motion.
“No!” I cry, and leap toward it with my hands out.
My cell phone soars into the fountain. Whoops.
I sigh. I try to reach for it but it’s too far in. Crapola.
“Stay here,” I warn her. I roll up my jeans, kick off my flip-flops, and climb in.
Maxie giggles hysterically.
“Funny, am I?”
“Hee-hee-hee-hee-hee-hee!” She continues giggling, her short brown pigtails bouncing from side to side.
“Here it is,” I say, picking it up and wiping it against my shirt.
I hit the power button, but it doesn’t work. Neither does the one, the two, the three, the four …
I hit send. It rings.
“Hello? Hello?” someone says.
“Hello?” I say. “Who is this?”
“It’s Devi,” the person says.
Omigod! It’s me! I’m calling myself as a freshman! Today’s the day! How could I forget!
“Fourteen-year-old Devi?” I ask disbelievingly.
“Twenty-one-year-old Devi,” the girl says slowly. “Oh. My. God. I don’t believe it.”
It can’t be. Can it? My heart leaps. “Ivy?” I ask. “Is that really you?”
“Yes!” she exclaims. “I was just thinking about you! I’m in the campus bookstore and you’re not going to believe who I just—”
“Wait!” I cry. “Don’t tell me anything.”
Pause. “You’re right. You’re so right.”
“I think … I think I dialed the wrong number.”
“Yes,” she says slowly. “I think you did.”
And then I hang up.
Oh. My. God. That was close. I should just throw the phone back into the fountain. Get rid of it for good.
Or …
I slip it into my purse. You never know. I might want to talk to her one day.
Anything’s possible.
Sarah Mlynowski is the author of the Magic in Manhattan series:
Bras & Broomsticks, Frogs & French Kisses, Spells & Sleeping Bags
, and
Parties & Potions
. She also coauthored
How to Be Bad
and has written several adult novels. If Sarah could talk to her younger self, she’d tell her to be nicer to her parents, to keep more diaries, and to not, under any circumstances, trim her own bangs. Originally from Montreal, Sarah’s current self lives in Manhattan and can be found online at
sarahm.com
.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2010 by Sarah Mlynowski
All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Delacorte Press, an imprint of Random House Children’s Books, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.
Delacorte Press is a registered trademark and the colophon is a trademark of Random House, Inc.
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Mlynowski, Sarah.
Gimme a call / Sarah Mlynowski. —1st ed.
p. cm.
Summary: After accidentally dropping her cell phone into a fountain at the mall, fourteen-year-old Devi Banks starts to get phone calls—and an earful of advice on how to live her life to avoid making disastrous choices—from her seventeen-year-old self.
eISBN: 978-0-375-89651-4
[1. Dating (Social customs)—Fiction. 2. Conduct of life—Fiction. 3. High schools—Fiction. 4. Schools—Fiction. 5. Telephone—Fiction.] I. Title. II. Title: Give me a call.
PZ7.M7135Gi 2010
[Fic]—dc22
2009020020
Random House Children’s Books supports the First Amendment and celebrates the right to read.
v3.0
Table of Contents
Chapter One - Friday, May 23 … Senior Year
Chapter Two - Friday, September 9 … Freshman Year
Chapter Three - Friday, May 23 … Senior Year
