Identity Crisis (7 page)

I blink, then read it again to make sure I'm not imagining things. OMG. OMG. OMG. Win VIP tickets? Be guaranteed to sing the duet with Viggo? Within seconds, Knucklies like Juniper77 and DaisyFlour84 are buzzing like crazy over the news, with rumors of everything from a surprise appearance of the band to the official release of “Inner Beauty” off their new album. Only one thought pops into my head.
I have to tell Declan.
My fingers trip over one another as I pound out a message to him in all caps at light speed, proper spelling be damned. Why oh why did he have to lose phone privileges for whatever he'd done? I only hope he's in front of his computer this early in the morning, since if I were homeschooled, I'd sleep late for sure.

KnuckLise99
: DEC!!! BRASS KNUCKLES TIX GIVEAAWAY AT PRU CENTER TODAY!!! CHANCE TO SING IWTH BAND. WE MUST GO!!

I copy the text of the message from the band, so he can see what I'm babbling like an insane person about just in case he missed it. And then I wait, hoping for a reply. Gloriously, I see his username fill in and it looks like he is typing a reply.

DecOlan
: holy cannoli!

KnuckLise99
: don't say you're still grounded. there must be a way! do I have to come kidnap you??

DecOlan
: lemme think . . .

I wait and wait and wait. What's taking him so long? Finally, he replies and what he types back knocks me off my knees.

DecOlan
: yep! my parents are going to a homeschooling meeting then out to dinner. i think i can swing it without them knowing.

KnuckLise99
: awesome!

DecOlan
: ok. it's a date.

A date?

Gulp. A date.

Is that what I want?

As much as I've been longing to meet up with Declan, now that it's actually about to happen, I'm not so sure. Chatting online has been easy so far. Like somehow, I became a wittier, more charming version of my real-life self. What if in person, I turn into a conversational dud? Or we don't connect? Too late, I think of all the horrible things that can go wrong when two people finally meet face-to-face. Body odor and sweat stains. Bad breath and bad chemistry. Inept tongues and awkward gropes. Maybe it was better to be free from all that. Keep what we have perfect, just the way it is.

Am I really ready for a date with Declan?

Declan suggests we meet at the visitor's information booth in the center of the mall, and I go wake up my mom to ask for permission to go.

“Alone? Into the city?” She mumbles from under the covers, groggy from working the late shift.

“I'll get Maeve to come,” I lie.

“You'll come home right after?” she says sleepily. “It is a school night.”

I leave out the bit about meeting a boy there, since I know that would change everything. Knowing my mom, it'll be the same old spiel
, boys can't be trusted, boys are slimebags
, all the things I already know and don't really feel like hearing again. Especially since this could be different. This
is
different. This is Declan.

Instead, she has to give me another kind of reality check. “You know, honey, the chances of winning are really slim, right?” she says gently. “I just don't want you to be disappointed . . .”

“I know. I won't be,” I insist, even though I can tell she doesn't believe me.

“Okay, fine. Good luck,” she says, giving me a kiss, and rolling over back to sleep.

Since I'll be coming straight from school, and this is now officially a date, I change into my best skinny jeans with my favorite Knucklies T-shirt. I blow out my hair, swipe some dangling silver earrings of Elena's that she left behind on her dresser, and even remember to bring some lip gloss.

There is just one problem.

Maeve.

What do I tell her? What will she think? I never actually told her about Declan, and now, it feels way too late without hurting her feelings. Maybe it would be better to tell her about him after we've actually met, anyway. See how things go. Make sure the whole thing doesn't turn out to be a disaster.

When I get off the bus, I find her waiting for me in our usual pre-school meeting spot by the front steps, trying to inhale a granola bar before first bell.

I take a deep breath. “Guess what?”

She peers at my bubbly expression through her glasses and hazards a guess. “Eva Winters caught the bubonic plague and classes are all canceled?”

“No, better,” I insist. “Brass Knuckles is giving away two tickets today.”

Her eyebrows arch in disbelief. “Really?”

“Yeah, at the Pru Center downtown. After school.” I tell her all about how the winner also gets to sing a duet with Viggo Witts. “And I'm going to win. I can just feel it.” I do a little spin and hug myself.

She snorts at my optimism. “You, plus every other equally delusional fan. What are the odds? One in 10,000? I can see you've really been paying attention in math.” Maeve's commitment to pessimism has bonded us this year, but this particular time, her lack of faith annoys me. Plus, I've already heard this lecture from my own mother.

“I don't care. I just know I will. I have to.” Don't they see this was all meant to be? The fender bender. Me, not getting the tickets. The concert giveaway. Winning front row seats, better than anything we would have scored on Ticketmaster or even StubHub. I will take Declan and get to sing with Viggo, and the two of them will both fall madly in love with me and fight over me, right up there on stage. I am going to just will this to happen. The power of positive thinking, right?

She purses her lips, like she is thinking hard, then grins apologetically. “Okay, fine. Clear eyes, full hearts, can't lose, right? I'll come. Double your chances, at least.”

Wha-at?

“Don't you have practice?” I squeak in alarm, my voice peeling high, and I hope she doesn't notice. “You just made the team.”

“I know. I can probably skip out, just this one time . . .” Maeve wags her granola bar at me. “Besides, I know you can't find your way to the mall without my superior navigational skills.”

This was true. I'm directionally challenged, even using Google Maps.

“But won't your coach kill you?”

She shrugs. “Tamara can tell her I have a twenty-four-hour stomach bug or something. Or, I know! I'll say there's another Jewish holiday. Tell her I have to go to services for . . .” she pauses, then snaps her fingers “Simchat Torah!”

“But I thought you and Maya Gomez are competing for a spot on the first string. You don't want to give her an opening.”

Now she is eyeing me suspiciously, as if noticing for the first time my lip gloss. “Do you . . . not want me to come or something?”

“No!”

She doesn't buy it, her eyes drinking in my smoothed hair and silver earrings. “Okay, spill it. What's going on?”

“Nothing!”

“Then why do you look all Glamour Shots today?” She gestures vaguely to my earrings and my hair. “Class photos aren't until
next
week.”

“I don't!” I protest vigorously, shaking my head, which only makes my earrings jangle louder, betraying me.

“Are you going with someone else?”

Damn! She knows me too well. “Um, no.” I say, caught, stumbling over my words. I take a deep breath. I am busted. Might as well 'fess up. “Well, yes. Actually. Not going with exactly. More like meeting. But—”

“Who?” she demands, hurt, like I have another BFF stashed away somewhere.

“No one. Just this guy.”

She is clearly taken aback. “A
guy
? An actual member of the male species? One you have not told me about?”

I regret all the times Maeve heard me swear off the XY chromosome for good. I stumble over my words. “He's just another Knucklie, and we're going to meet there to try and win tickets.”

“Do I know him?” she demands.

“No, he doesn't go here.” I try to sound casual. “I met him . . . on the fan page.”

“I can't believe you're ditching me for some guy.”

“I'm not!” I protest. “You have practice! And—”

Maeve gasps. “Wait. Is he in college? Is that why the big mystery? You little vixen—”

“No, he's our age. He's homeschooled actually.”

She absorbs this information, then asks, “Is he hot, at least?”

Yes
. “I don't know,” I shrug. “I guess. I've only seen his picture.”

She tires of my evasion and cuts to the chase. “Answer me this: Annalise Bradley, do you have any intentions of ever seeing this person naked? Yes or no?”

I blush against my will.
Naked
? I was counting on the fact that there was no risk of getting physical at all. “No! I don't know. I've never met him. We've been chatting online. That's all.” The description is a betrayal; I know it, and she senses it.

“How long?”

“What?”

“How long have you been chatting with this mystery man?”

I hesitate. “Every night this week.”

She snorts in exasperation. “Oh my god, Annalise. How could you not tell me this?”

“Sorry, Mom.” In fact, it had been pretty easy to hide Declan's existence from my actual mother, who spied on my Lamebook account as one of my “friends,” but hadn't wised up that everyone I know has moved on. Plus, lucky for me, she's been super-distracted lately, spacing out on basic stuff like replenishing my cafeteria account, which forced me to scramble for lunch money twice.

“What do you guys talk about?”

Human nature; the afterlife; the meaning of it all
. “Just stuff.”

“And now you're going to meet him?” Her eyes narrow in suspicion.

“At the mall.” I emphasize the last word, knowing where this is heading. It's not like we haven't had a million school assemblies about predators chatting us up online. “In public. In front of a thousand people. Like you just pointed out. Seriously, Maeve. I mean, if he was making stuff up, why would he be willing to meet me?”

“Well, I'm just saying. Have you ever actually talked to him? Heard his voice?”

“Well, no . . .” The words tumble out of my mouth as I hastily explain. “He's grounded, and his parents took away his phone.”

“So no FaceTime. Don't they have a land line?”

Hello, 1983? “I'm not—”

“What about Skype?”

“Oh my god, Maeve, I'm not Skyping him!” Thank god neither of us had ever suggested that. Then I'd have to worry if I had something in my teeth or a looming zit on my face every time we talked. Plus, the angle of my video cam distorts like a funhouse mirror, making my boobs look as big as my head.

“I'm just saying, how do you know anything he's told you is true? Don't you know the first rule of the Internet? Everyone lies on the Internet! My aunt says everyone on Match.com is an inch taller, five pounds thinner, and ten years younger than they are in real life.”

“I've Googled him, Maeve. There's tons of mentions in the local papers. With pictures and everything.”

There had been one, with the caption, Declan O'Keefe, 11, Homeschooled Boy Wins Worcester County Chess Tournament, that showed him looking a lot younger and endearingly scrawny, all elbows and ears. And another article, about homeschooling kids who meet up at some engineering club, that quotes his dad, Patrick, boasting about his brilliant son, Declan.

“Hmph.” Maeve grunts, and I can tell she is giving in. A little. “Okay. But I'm going to call and check on you. I'm sneaking my phone into practice.”

I nod assent, wondering where on earth she will stash it. Her shoe? Her sports bra?

She is silent, thinking.

“So are you taking him if you win tickets?” she finally demands. “Or me?”

Shoot. I hadn't thought of that. Having to choose between the two of them. I dodge the question.

“I thought you said I had no chance, remember?” I smile weakly, but she gives me a stern look, like she is on to me.

“I don't get it,” she says finally, shaking her head. “You have Cooper Franklin all over you. You told me yourself. Why are you even wasting your time with some online geek?”

“He's not a geek.” I say, regretting I had ever mentioned Cooper's behavior to Maeve. “And Cooper's like that with everyone. He'd flirt with a tree stump.”

“He doesn't flirt with me,” she says, her mouth twisting. “I guess I'm not even stump-worthy.” Maeve is convinced that none of the preppie guys at our burb school get her dark humor and she's destined to be single until college.

“Maeve—”

“No, it's fine.”

Maeve, even Maeve, who knows me better than anyone, still doesn't get it. With Cooper, with any guy at Dansville, I'll never know what they're really after. My body? My backstory? Or me? But with Declan, I know for sure none of those things matter. Our connection goes beyond the physical plane, it is pure.

So what if it's based entirely on pixels?

Can I help it if I was totally caught off guard this morning?

It was practically dawn, for one thing. I was still in bed when I heard Annalise's message ping me. My mind was still sleep groggy. But I knew this day was coming. With all the online flirting we'd been doing, it was only a matter of time before she suggested a meet up, even though the distance between her and Declan was kind of a haul and he was supposedly still grounded. How could I say no without making her suspicious?

Panicking, I had texted Eva what to do and she responded immediately with her usual certainty. TELL HER YOU'LL MEET HER THERE! TELL HER IT'S A DATE. MAKE UP EXCUSE AFTER.

When I get to school, Eva stomps up to me while I'm locking up my bike, looking irate. I'm positive something has gone wrong. My chest spasms; whatever she's about to say can't be good. So far, she hasn't bothered to follow the online chats, but did she read that last comment about Amos? Or worse, have we been found out? Did Annalise figure out what we're—