He Loves Me...He Loves You Not (4 page)

“No. All of the belts are picked over. Looks
like you did, though.”

“Dude. The sale rack is like a smorgasbord of
fashion fantasticness. Now come on. I’ll try on the clothes and you
can tell me if they look okay.” I open my mouth to protest, but she
doesn’t let me get a word out. “Oh no, you’re going to suffer
through this whole girl to girl shopping experience with me. This
is the only store I want to go to. Then we can go to Hollister or
wherever it is you want to go, deal?”

I sigh, defeated. “Deal.”

Outside the dressing room, Rosa leaves a huge
pile of clothes in my arms. “I can only take in six at a time.”

“You better hurry,” I say impatiently as I
sit down on a round pleather ottoman.

“I’ll be as quick as I can.” Then she dashes
off and whips through the curtain in the last open fitting
room.

“Having fun?” I hear him. I’d know his voice
anywhere. Henry. He’s also got a stack of clothes in his arms and I
bust out laughing.

“I should be asking you that.”

“Well if you were, the answer would be
no.”

“How long have you been in here?”

An eye roll. “Too long.”

“Was that you who was watching me?”

A seductive smirk. “Maybe.”

I touch a frilly hot pink top in his pile and
hold it up to his bronzed arm. “Yeah Henry, hot pink isn’t your
color.”

He shakes his head. “Very funny.”

“Ro!” I shout. “How’s it going in there?”

“Meh!”

I guess that means not so good.

Henry’s staring at me. I feel his eyes on me
and butterflies bounce around inside of me. I turn toward him,
beaming. “What?”

“Nothing. I’m just looking at you. Do you
have a problem with that?”

“You’re not just looking, you’re
gawking.”

He laughs and Rosa shouts, “Can you bring my
next six?”

“Hey!” I snap. “I didn’t sign up to be your
servant!”

“Just bring me the clothes,” she groans.

I stand outside of her dressing room and hand
her the next six items. She stacks the three of the six she already
has in my arms when I hear a high-pitched voice. “How does this
look, babe?” His girlfriend.

Then Henry’s reply, “Good, babe. It looks
good.”

I’m clenching my teeth. I don’t why their
interaction bothers me so much, but it does.

I’m frozen in my spot staring blankly ahead.
“Okay,” Rosa says. I don’t move. The reflection of the lights in
the mirror is fuzzy and that’s all I’m focused on. “Ry?”

I can’t hear her. My heart stops beating. Her
voice is fading. All I hear is,
“Good, babe. It looks real
good.”

“RILEY!” Rosa shouts so loud that the
chandelier hanging above us shakes.

Several pairs of eyes turn toward us and I’m
embarrassed. “Do you always have to be so loud,” I comment.

“When I’m talking to you and you’re not
paying attention—which is ninety five percent of the time lately,
yes I do.”

“I pay attention to you.”

“Really? Then why did it take me like five
minutes to get your attention.”

“I just have a lot on my mind, okay. Give me
the rest of your clothes.”

“I did. You’re holding them.”

I look down at my arms. “OH.” Then I look
over at the ottoman and Henry is gone.

My heart sinks. “Come back,” I whisper.

Stay with me. Love me.

“What?” Rosa asks from inside the fitting
room.

“Nothing, Rosa. I was just talking to
myself.”

I return to the ottoman and sit down. Then I
glance around the store to see if maybe Henry is still here. I’m
paralyzed. They are in the front of the store and Henry is fetching
a top from a really high rack for her.

My cheeks are hot. My veins are pulsing. Is
this what jealousy feels like? I don’t like it. I’m staring at the
floor, my vision blurring around the white tiles. I’m perplexed.
Henry. Henry. Henry.
He’s filling up every part of my
subconscious mind.

A set of feet come into my view and I look
up. Rosa comes into view. She’s wearing a floral dress that’s
adorned with a matching tan belt. She spins around, clutching the
edge of the dress like a silent film star. “Well, what do you
think?”

I’m detached. I can’t fully focus. “It looks
great.”

“I think so, too,” she says excitedly.

Our conversation is interrupted with, “Well,
well.” A high-pitched feminine voice. A voice I know all too well.
Callie Banfield, Henry’s girlfriend. I meet her gaze and she sneers
at me. “
It
, don’t you know this a girls store? You don’t
belong here.”

I narrow my eyes and scowl. I open my mouth
to answer, but Rosa beats me to it. “Bitchzilla, don’t you have a
village to terrorize or something?”

Callie scowls and shakes her head. Henry
comes up behind her and hands her a few tank tops. She stomps into
the dressing room with a huff and Henry sits down next to me. I
look away.

“Ry?” There’s a gentleness in Rosa’s tone and
I know she’s wondering if I’m okay.

I glance at her. She makes a silly face and I
smile. Then she motions to her body. “So is this dress a yay,
then?”

“Definitely.”

“Cool. I’ll be out with the next in a few.”
She turns her back to me.

“Ugh.” I hope she doesn’t hear my distasteful
groan. I’m so over this shopping trip. She doesn’t hear me. She
slides back into her fitting room, with a gleeful sashay.

The cushion on the ottoman dips down as Henry
scoots closer. Hidden by the piles of clothes in our hands, he
laces his fingers through mine. His touch shocks me. A surge
travels through my body and jumpstarts my heart.

And my heart stops again when I pull my hand
away.

Henry leans closer, whispering into my hair,
“Why did you do that?”

“Because,” I say in a low voice. What I don’t
say is because I’m tired of being your dirty, little secret.
Inside, I’m a piece of loose-leaf paper and he’s stuffing me into
the shredder. I’m slivers of white falling into a trashcan.
“
She’s
in the dressing room.”

He shrugs. “So. She can’t see. We have all
these clothes in our laps.”

But I want her to see. “Just don’t.” My voice
is cold and harsh. He looks at me, baffled.

He furrows his eyebrows. “What’s wrong?”

Again another cold yet short response.
“Nothing.”

I’m not a sideshow affair. I’m not a secret
locked in a dark closet. I’m a person. I have feelings. I matter.
Does he even care how I feel?

“Riley,” he murmurs. Just the sound of him
uttering my name tortures me. All of the mixed emotions I’m feeling
fight for the other one to be precedent. Love is the front runner,
jealousy is second, and anger is coming up third ready pass up
jealousy.

“Just stop, Henry.”

I can’t look at him. My eyes are watering and
as I focus on the floor, tears free fall making tiny dots of
wetness on the white tiles.

“Ry.” He touches my hair. So soft. So
gentle.

“Henry!” Callie snaps.

Henry yanks his hand away from my hair.
“Yeah, babe.”

Babe. Babe.
Such a cute pet name. A
pet name that he’ll never say to me. I can’t breathe. And I swear
that my organs are shutting down.

I hate myself for loving him. I hate myself
for being charmed by his beautiful smile.
Hate. Hate. Hate.
You’re a fool, I think. And you deserve to feel the way you do.

I know that’s harsh. To completely blame
myself when this is just as much Henry’s fault as it is mine, but
then I think if I wouldn’t have been such a weak person this would
have never happened.

If I would have only just said hi the day I
met him. I wouldn’t have let myself fall in love with him. The
truth is, I’ve been crushing on Henry since the third grade.

Even as a nine year old there was something
gallant about him. He’d stand up for other kids on the playground.
Be friendly with everyone. He was selfless.

One time in particular, I remembered him
snapping at T.J Johnson when he pushed Matt Fischer into a chain
linked fence.

When I was younger I was ten times quieter
than I am now. But, every now and then, I’d see Henry and he’d
flash me his brilliant smile and I’d end up blushing.

I’m gritting my teeth when I look up.

Callie glances between Henry and me. “What
are you doing, Henry? Why are you touching her hair?”

I narrow my eyes at Henry. I’m wondering if
he’s going to tell her the truth.

He forces his words out. “She had something
in her hair.”

Coward. Coward. COWARD!

I stand and walk into an empty fitting room.
I don’t want to fall apart in front of him. Well, it’s not
necessarily because of him. I don’t want to cause a scene and I
know if I stay out there any longer I will. Inside, I’m an
abandoned building, smashed by a wrecking ball. Hunks of my
concrete walls crash into the ground and separate into smaller
pieces. All that’s left of me is particles lingering in the air.
I’m dust.

“Ro?” My voice cracks and I swallow hard,
trying to conceal my emotion.

“Hey, you!” She’s always so bubbly and happy.
It’s one of the reasons why I love her. “You decide to try
something on?”

“Yeah.” Another quiver of my vocal
chords.

“I can’t wait to see how you look in it,” she
tells me.

Only she never will, because the only reason
I came into the dressing room in the first place was to ball my
eyes out into the t-shirt I’m holding.

Chapter 5

“
When love is not madness, it is not
love.” ~ Pedro Calderon de la Barca ~

I think I’m starting to lose it. My mind.
Like One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest style.

I’m not sure if I can do this whole casual
thing with Henry. I’ve got to end it. Ever since we left the mall,
he’s all I’ve thought about, and hearing him talk to
her
has
made it even worse.

Callie will be there—in school. Up until now,
every time I’ve seen Henry he hasn’t been with her,
like at the
same time with her
. She was at the party the other night, but I
didn’t see them together. I didn’t hear the way he talks to her.
But I did today. And I didn’t like it.

I’m not a jealous person. I’m not, I swear,
but this fling with Henry is making me think things I normally
wouldn’t think and do things I normally wouldn’t do.

On the way home from the mall, Rosa drives
through a rural neighborhood. There’s a man outside mowing the
lawn. I close my eyes and hear the lawnmower buzzing in my mind.
The blades twirl in a circular motion as it cuts, slices, and mauls
the grass. Then I see Henry so vividly in my mind. He was doing the
exact thing the first time I met him and the flashback plays out
like a movie in my head.

I see his radiant smile, the dimples in his
cheeks, his tan skin with beads of sweat skimming down his chest. I
sigh and close my eyes. That hot pre-summer day in May changed my
relationship with Henry Garner forever. Why did he have to talk to
me? Why couldn’t he have just kept cutting his damn grass and left
me alone?

I’m so caught up in my memories of Henry
Garner that I almost miss my phone ringing. It rings out the toll
of the bells and buzzes. It buzzes right off my nightstand onto the
floor. It’s Henry. I want to see him. I need to see him. Somehow I
feel like tonight will be our last liason. Our last entanglement. I
am going to end this tonight.

I answer the call. “Hello.”

“Hey,” he says. There’s amusement in his
voice.

“What’s up?”

“Can I pick you up?”

I glance at the clock. It’s eight. I might be
able to swing this if I tell my Mom I’m going to Rosa’s. “Yeah, but
hurry. My mom isn’t going to let me stay out real long.”

“I’ll be there in ten.”

I’m downstairs in a flash. Mom is at the
computer in her office. She absorbed in this dating website she
recently joined. “Five foot three?” There’s a hike in her voice.
“No. No. That’s way too short.”

“Mom?” I hang through the door.

“Hi Riley. Do you need something?”

“I’m going over to Rosa’s for a little bit.
I’ll be home in an hour.”

She waves me off. “Have fun. Don’t be too
late.” As I walk out the front door, I hear her mumble, “Investment
banker, how nice.”

It’s humid out. The wisps of hair on the nape
of my neck moisten and start curling. I’ve been waiting five
minutes. Every second that passes feels like a year. Has it been
ten minutes, yet? Has it?

I feel a thrill—excitement—a rush of
adrenaline. Mostly I feel like Juliet, sneaking out in the dead of
the night for a secret rendezvous with her beloved Romeo. We’re a
lot like Romeo and Juliet, Henry and I. We’re a Shakespearean
tragedy.