Playing Nice (27 page)

"Thanks," I say as we walk back to Alex's truck. I take my napkin and wipe away the chocolate outlining Alex's mouth. "I needed this today."

"I'm glad." he says, licking his lips. He pauses and his nose curls up.

"What?" I ask.

"I won't ask you what happened last night, if you promise me one thing."

"One thing?" I say.

"That maybe we could do this again?"

It's a punch in the gut. One Alex doesn't know he even swung. Matt's voice rings in my ears and I feel his finger graze my forehead
. Maybe we can do this again?
It brings the pain back. The pinpricks turn into a gash, bleeding all over the ground.

And I have to find a way to clean it up.

I muster a smile, but can't bring myself to say anything.

I toss and turn all night until the pain radiating down my arm and into my chest gets so bad, I can't sleep. All I can see is
them
. All I can feel is Matt. And all I want to do is call Lil. I get out of bed and sit at my desk. Pulling the box of poems from my bottom drawer, I rifle through the pages. How many were inspired by Lil? And Matt? I want to burn them all, but I know it wouldn't solve anything. Because once something is out in the ether it's there. I could burn my entire house to the ground and the earth would still hold its memory.

***

My knees rattle so badly as I walk into English class that I think they might break off on their own and run in the opposite direction. Everyone is talking about my outburst, but I've lived with their words all year and they're nothing compared to seeing Lil. I erased every last one of her voicemails and texts. I can't decide if I don't care what she has to say or if I'm not ready to hear it. I know I don't want her to sit next to me. I don't want to see my best friend and know we could sit in class and send texts about boners and thongs and internally laugh until I'm smiling on the outside, too.

I walk into the room and see Alex sitting in Lil's seat. I breathe for maybe the first time today and go to my desk.

"Hi," he says out of the corner of his mouth.

"Sick of sitting in the back?" I ask.

"I thought it's time I take back what's mine." He smiles. "And I wanted to give you this."

He places a card on my desk. I stare at it, half intrigued by what's inside, half worried I might not deserve whatever it is. Alex made me feel so much better yesterday, but when I went home I was swallowed again by Matt and his empty words and Lil with her mouth on his.

I grit my teeth, not because I don't care about Alex, but because I'm not sure I deserve him caring about me the way he does, and open it.

Break a leg, but don't break an arm. You owe me another date to the batting cages. Love, Alex
.

"Thank you," I say, fighting to find the right reaction. Happy. Sad. Cute. Not Matt. Beautiful. Not Matt. Sleeveless Undershirts. Not Matt. And he signed it
love
. Matt never said that once, and here Alex has written it like it's as easy as breathing.

But Matt did say he wanted to marry me and that he liked me and thought I was really pretty. And then he made out with my best friend.

At that moment, Lil walks into the room. I sink into the ground, below my desk, below the school, into the pits of hell. A fiery, prickly feeling overtakes my entire body and I want to jump out of my desk and attack her or I want to scream at her or hug her because she's the one person who can make me feel better. Except she's the one who did this to me.

She walks past Alex and me, straight to the back of the class. I can barely breathe as she passes. I don't dare look up at her.

"So," Miss Everley says as she stands at the front of the classroom, her hot pink bra strap sticking out from her black lacy top. "Who can tell me why Jane Austen named the book
Pride and Prejudice
?"

I hope Ms. Everley doesn't call on me. I couldn't care less about Jane Austen today. Elizabeth didn't have to deal with Mr. Darcy making out with her sister Jane because no one kissed back then. They all sat around looking pretty and sewing things and waiting for a hot, loaded guy to come sweep them off their feet. Everyone was just a bunch of X's waiting for their Y's.

My phone buzzes in my bag and I pick it up.

Damn it. Why did I have to pick up? Why did she have to be funny and make my stomach rumble with the idea of laughing? My finger hangs over the reply button. I want to go back to the way thing were. I want to go to her house after the audition and lie on her couch and listen to the Ramones. I want to watch her smoke and wish she would stop and think that we were placed on this earth to be in this moment together. I want to hear her sing again.

But we can't. Nothing can erase what she did.

I delete the message, just like I did all the others.

***

"Marty Hart. You're up next," Mr. Spector, Minster High School's drama coach, yells onto the stage. He's sitting in the audience, a clipboard propped on his beer belly.

I clutch my sheet music in my hands and walk out into the lights.

"You signed up for Rizzo?" he asks.

"I sure did," I smile. It's one of the main rules of auditioning. Always smile. Even if your life has been smashed to pieces. That, and never wear baggy clothes. Stage lights add pounds. I opted for tight black pants and a hot pink T-shirt.

"Well, get on with it." He waves his hand in the air. "I've got to meet my wife at the Inn Between in twenty minutes. It's fried chicken night."

I take a few deep breaths as I hand Ronny Whipple, the short sophomore accompanist, my music. I picked the song weeks ago; filing through Lil's record collection, I pulled out an album with a girl on the cover. She was dark and serious and covered in leather.
Joan Jett and the Blackhearts
, Lil said over my shoulder
. Nice choice
. I downloaded the album when I got home.

Closing my eyes, I imagine Rizzo. I think about the poetry she probably has stashed in her room and the tears she won't let herself cry. And right before the song starts, I think of Matt.

I don't move as I sing, just close my eyes and let the song talk for itself. I don't know if I love Matt or like him or hate him. All I know is that I hate how I feel right now, like my heart is bleeding and no Band-Aid or stitch or patch could heal it. I clench my fists so hard with every note I sing that my nails pinch my skin.

Every word comes from the deepest place in my soul, and as I sing my thoughts into the air, I'm lighter. Like when Lil cut my hair and I knew beauty had nothing to do with what I look like. Like when I wrote my first poem and understood the quiet person silently screaming in my mind. Like the first day I met Lil and she saw me, the real me, and wanted to be my friend.

When Ronny hits the last chord of the song, I breathe. From the back of the auditorium, someone starts clapping.

"That was an interesting song choice," Mr. Spector says as he packs up his clipboard. "The cast list will be up on Friday."

I squint my eyes to see past the stage lights and find Alex in the back row, his hands smacking together and a smile as big as the moon on his face.

And in this moment, I think Shakespeare and Jane Austen were wrong. Maybe love isn't about torture or pain. Maybe I shouldn't want to be a Juliet. After all, Lil
is
right; she ends up dead in the end.

***

After my audition I go home exhausted, half of me wanting to break down in tears and the other half lighter than ever because I told the world how I feel about Matt and now I can let it go. I gave my last breath on the stage and now all I want to do is close my eyes and wait for the next sunrise. I stare at the TV and watch a show on the Discovery Channel about a man who lived with bears. He even dresses like one and tries to talk in a growl. I'm pretty sure I've seen this one before and the bears eat him in the end. For some reason, animal instinct or something, they turn on him and the friends he thought he had become his enemy.

I stare at his worn-out face and stringy shaggy hair. He wants to look like a bear. He wants to
be
a bear. But what he doesn't understand is that he will never be something he's not, no matter how much, even in the depths of his soul, he believes he is. His skin and eyes and hair tell a different story and maybe if he looked in the mirror and tried to find himself in himself, he wouldn't have ended up dead, eaten by the thing he thought he was.

You're better, Marty
. Lil's voice comes through the confusion and I think I understand now. She's right. I've been healed, and now I am better.

My mom walks in the back door wearing her Shady Willows golf shirt and khakis. I wonder if she's a bear man, dressed to look like a volunteer but really a vulture. Maybe if she admitted she's a vulture, we'd get along better.

"How did the audition go, honey?" she asks. She sets her keys on the key holder and hangs her black Kate Spade handbag on the same hook she always does right by the back door.

"I think I got the part."

"Well, you were born to play Sandy." She takes off her penny loafers and puts on her slippers.

"Actually, I auditioned for Rizzo." I wait for my words to sink in. For my mom to realize that I think I was born to play a different part in this world than the one she expects.

"No matter what part you get, I'm sure you'll be wonderful."

I sit up on the couch and look at her, sitting at the granite island she had put in the kitchen so she could have proper cooking space. Something's not right. Mom's back is hunched and she's rubbing her temples like her brain hurts.
Posture tells people how you feel about yourself, so sit up straight
, her words ring in my ears.

"Are you okay, mom?" I ask as I walk into the kitchen.

She shakes her head, hair falling in her face. "Mrs. Schneider was admitted to the hospital. She's not doing well. I'd be surprised if she makes it through the weekend."

"Oh," I say. "I'm sorry." She might be a mean, smelly old lady, but death sucks, no matter who you are.

"It's not easy working at a place where people come and go," my mom says. "I hated watching your grandma all alone, but she insisted on living there. She knew we couldn't take care of her. But that doesn't change the fact that people shouldn't die alone."

I stare at my mom, sitting looking so lost in her beautiful kitchen, and realize she started volunteering at the retirement home after my grandma passed away. In that moment, my world tilts and spins and twirls so much that all of a sudden I see things clearly.

"You do it for her?" I ask.

My mom looks at me. "Everyone copes with death differently, Marty. I miss your grandma as much as you do. Maybe more."

"Why didn't you ever say anything?"

"Would it bring her back?" my mom asks. "The best thing I can do for her is help others." She gets up and walks over to me. With her perfectly polished fingers, she tucks the mahogany strands of hair that are falling in my face behind my ears. "Just promise me you'll pull your hair back so people can see your face when you play Rizzo."

I breathe and smell the lilac candle my mom bought last week. It's sitting on the counter, flame flickering gently. And then I hug my mom because she needs it, because she loves my grandma, because maybe she isn't a vulture. Maybe she's sad and trying to find her way in the dark just like I am.

"Thank you," she whispers in my ear.

***

When the cast sheet goes up and when I walk to my first rehearsal as Rizzo and when I stand on stage opening night, Alex is there with me. And he tells me I'm beautiful again. Only this time he kisses me afterward. And I let him. His mouth moves with mine; I feel the sweet taste of our lips coming together, and I know my grandma would be proud. Alex knows me, inside and out, because he took the time to care.

Lil told me I should find someone like Alex. Someone who'd be there for me and want me and know me. And she was right about Matt. My stomach still flip-flops when I see him in the halls, but then I remember that I want someone who says words that mean something because I'm someone who speaks words that mean something.

Lil never takes her seat back and eventually she stops calling and texting. A hole settles in my heart then, but for some reason, I can't bring myself to fill it with her again. Maybe it's the memory of what she did, maybe it's that I've learned only she can love herself; I can't do it for her. Maybe it's that I'm scared to be friends with her again.