Lucky Girl Read online

  Maddie’s face finally clears and she lets out a small laugh. “I can’t ask him for a ride to school.”

  “Why not?” I ask, but I’m only half listening. I’m mostly focused on my phone, on trying to write something friendly but final. That was an awesome summer, but I think we should see other people this year. I stare at the words, wanting them to be less lame but not knowing how to fix them. I try adding a thumbs-up emoji and then delete it.

  Maddie leans over again, trying to see what I’m typing, and I panic. I hit Send, feeling virtuous and idiotic and relieved and confused, all at the same time.

  I cling to the feeling-virtuous part. This is going to make Maddie happy, we’ll have a fun junior year, and I’ll be the friend she can turn to for boy advice again.

  She needs me. I’m helping her.

  My thumb is still hovering over the screen when she grabs for my phone and cries, “Let me see!”

  I just hold it up high and shout, “It’s done! Your turn!”

  “No!” she shrieks. “I can’t! You can’t!”

  She’s still trying to pull my hand down and I squirm, sliding the phone across the carpet and then full-on tackling her.

  “Give me your phone!” I yell.

  “Ack! No!” She’s screaming and laughing and I manage to pin her long enough to grab the cell behind her.

  I hold it at arm’s length, out of her reach, and then stop. “Crap, you need his number, right?” But as I’m saying it I’m also unlocking her screen and opening her texts, and that’s when I see that she doesn’t need his number.

  They’ve already texted.

  I drop the phone like it’s a snake and Maddie’s laugh dies in the air between us.

  A text exchange shines up at us, resting in the pool of the fancy Spanish scarf on the floor.

  All I can see are the words cool party from Cory.

  “Rosie, I’m the worst,” she says.

  I can tell she’s too afraid of me to move, to grab or turn off the phone, but that’s fine because I’m not reading anymore. My eyes feel dull and blurry.

  “It’s okay,” I say. I know the words are true, somewhere in the future, but I can’t make them sound right. “It’s obviously fine.”

  Then she finally takes her phone and tosses it across the room, letting it land near mine over by her closets.

  “Let’s just watch the movies,” she says. “I missed you so much, I don’t care about stupid boys. I couldn’t even talk to a stupid boy before I met you! You’re way more important than all that crap.”

  “I know,” I say. I can’t stop staring at the scarf. I’m doing a horrible job being cool about all this. How can I feel so uninterested in Cory and at the same time, so hurt that Maddie already has his number?

  “Seriously, it was just a stupid text. Please don’t be mad. Please?”

  I sigh, looking up at her worried face. “I’m not mad,” I say, and at least for a minute I’m sure I really mean it. “You’re way more important to me than Cory could ever be. He was just a summer thing, and it’s over. Okay?”

  She studies my face for a minute, then nods. I reach over and pull her into one of those awkward we’re-both-sitting-cross-legged hugs, and it’s not enough, but I think it makes things feel a little more normal.

  “Do you need another Coke?” she asks, pointing at the food we’ve barely touched.

  “Nah, I’m good. Let’s just watch the movies, like you said. It’s been way too long since I got to see you on a Saturday night.”

  She grabs my hand and squeezes it, another one of those things that only Maddie can do, and with her other hand she lifts the remote and turns on the screen.

  We laugh at all the usual parts and shout our favorite lines along with the characters. When the first song comes up, we sing like we always have, and I look over at my best friend and feel really, really good. I missed her so much. And now I’m really doing it, I’m really being the better friend I thought I could be. Maybe it’s still just boy stuff, but I don’t know—it feels good.

  Then this thought flashes through my mind, that I’m lucky. Lucky that Maddie’s still so insecure. Because seriously, there’s no way she needs my help with boys anymore—if she just looked in a mirror, she’d know that. Didn’t she see the way Cory made a beeline for her? The way he gave her his number? Hasn’t she noticed that life is different now? I’ve had some time to get used to the stares, the attention, so I guess maybe it’s all still new to her. Still, though.

  She doesn’t know what it means, yet, to look the way she looks. She still thinks she needs my help, even though she obviously got Cory all by herself.

  No matter what I think I’m bringing to this friendship, Maddie would be completely fine without me. I should be happy that she just doesn’t know it yet.

  “Ayla, go see if your sister is coming with us.”

  “Do I have to?” she whines. “She never comes; can’t we just go?”

  “Ay—”

  “It’s okay, Beth, I’ll go.”

  I flop over on my bed and groan, wishing my family would have their conversations about me somewhere else, or at least realize that I can hear them. I can hear Dave coming down the hall right now. He taps lightly on my door, probably hoping I’ve gone back to sleep since getting home from Maddie’s. Since leaving another conversation about whether I want to go to Mass today. I don’t want to discuss it with him any more than I did with Mrs. Costello, but I take a deep breath and yell, “Come in,” in as not-shitty a tone as I can manage.

  “Oh, hey, you’re up.”

  Dave’s head is poked through a small opening of the door, his black hipster glasses slightly askew where they’re leaning against the wood.

  I wave an arm over my fully clothed body, though whether I’m agreeing with him or pointing out that actually, I’m not up, I’m lying down, I’m not sure.

  He’s easier than Mom, though, and doesn’t take offense at stuff like that.

  “We’re heading to Mass in a few minutes. You can catch a ride, if you want?”

  “I have to work later,” I say. And I would so much rather lie around the house until then, I don’t add.

  Dave nods. “I don’t think we can leave a car—your mom has a shift, and you know how mine—”

  “I know.” Dave’s car is really nice and he doesn’t like me driving it. Sometimes I wonder if he’ll let Ayla drive it when she’s old enough—if he doesn’t trust me because I’m not really his kid. But probably it’s just that I’m not a great driver under the best of circumstances, and Dave’s car is a stick shift. He did try to teach me a few times. I could drive, mostly, but not in a way that didn’t scare the crap out of both of us.

  “Okay, well. We’ll see you at dinner? Or maybe we’ll stop by to watch you work.”

  This makes me smile, and he does, too. Mom doesn’t go for ice cream in the middle of the day. And lately, Ayla has gotten all health-conscious in this way that’s making even normal meals kind of a nightmare. I won’t be surprised if I have the frozen waffles all to myself pretty soon.

  “Light a candle for me,” I say.

  He laughs. “Will do.”

  A few minutes later I hear the garage door opening, and I pull out my phone. Oh, look, Cory and a bunch of the football guys went to the lake. I think I spot Alex’s shoulder in one of the photos, but it’s hard to tell. Cory’s everywhere, though—cannonballing into the water, posing for a shot with his arms flung around Marcus on one side and Brianna Kelly on the other. Brianna’s been dating Brian Greenburg for years. The only thing grosser than their matching names is their waiting-for-marriage rings. Which they got in ninth grade, when, hello, no one should be doing it yet.

  Still, I wonder if the photo will make Maddie worry. Or if she wishes she’d gone to the lake, like I’m sort of wishing, even though I’m not really into getting my hair wet with a bunch of senior jocks.

  I hope what I saw at that party on Friday was the Cory that he’s capable of being. I hope h
e acts like a horny dude-bro with me because he thinks I like it. Or—okay, maybe I don’t hope that. But it would make me feel better about handing him over to my best girlfriend if I thought he’d be a gentleman with her. Not send late-night texts that are clearly just code for NOW will you have sex with me? Or do some more of that other stuff we’ve been doing?

  I go to texts and erase all of Cory’s old messages, then send a quick What up to Ryan. Then I get in the shower and spend a long time there, letting the steam lift off all my conflicting feelings about everyone. I take an extra-long time drying my hair and putting on makeup, too, telling myself it’s practice for before school tomorrow. The truth is, it just makes me feel better. To be as pretty as possible. To know I look really good, maybe better than the other girls I’ll see today. Pretty enough to hook up with whoever I want, whenever I want. Prettier than all the other girls.

  And it totally works, just like always. Every guy who comes into DQ that afternoon practically loses his eyeballs trying to check me out. My shorts are tight and I’m extra friendly, and I’m getting away with not wearing the baseball cap because Joel is working this shift, too. He’s staring at me the most.

  It’s not as fun to see the dads’ reactions, obviously, but I don’t really care. Cost of doing business, as Dave would say. Though I’ve never seen Dave look at anyone but my mom. I think he might be the only guy in this sad suburb who actually likes his wife better than whatever teenage girl just walked by in cutoffs.

  “You’re gonna melt the ice cream,” Joel says when we hit a lull in the traffic. “I mean, you always look cute, but today . . .”

  I smile at him, and he clears his throat. It’s harmless enough, flirting with Joel. I kind of like how there’s this invisible wall between us, both because of his age and the fact that he’s my boss.

  “Should I put on a parka or something?” I tease. I even jut out one hip and do a little pose, which I know makes him look at my legs again. It’s funny, how powerless people can be. How predictable. How I never get tired of it.

  He shakes his head and laughs. “I have payroll stuff to do in the back.” With another look at my hips, he shakes his head again. “Try not to hurt anyone out here, okay?”

  I do a pouty face, and he bites his lip. I could probably ask for a raise and a promotion right now and get both.

  Instead I just wave as he swings through the door to the back, and when I hear the office door click shut, I pull out a cup and fill it with M&M’s.

  Maybe I didn’t learn anything new and exciting this summer, but hey. I haven’t forgotten any of my old tricks, either.

  5

  “I CAN’T BELIEVE you’re wearing a fedora.”

  Ryan checks his reflection in the rearview mirror of his car and looks a little smug. “Maddie says everyone in Spain wears them. And you know I look good in hats.”

  “Yeah, but your best quality is your modesty,” I say, poking him in the arm.

  “Did she get you that scarf?”

  I touch it self-consciously. I don’t usually wear things like scarves, at least not in the summer. And definitely not to school. But when I tried it with the flowery, flowy dress I put on this morning, it looked perfect.

  “Do I look like I’m trying too hard?” I ask.

  “Harder than the guy rocking this Spanish fedora, you mean?”

  I laugh. “You can’t wear it into school, you know.”

  “Pshh. How unfair is that? I don’t understand how we’re supposed to remind everyone that their best friend didn’t go to España.”

  “You can share my scarf,” I offer. “We could wind it around both our necks.”

  “Which won’t look weird or choke us to death at all.”

  I grin. “At least I’d always know where you were.”

  His eyebrows shoot up. “I don’t know if that’s something you really want to know, babe.”

  I poke him again. “Thanks for driving my sad, car-deprived ass, by the way.”

  Ryan flips on his turn signal and leans over the wheel, looking both ways. We’re just a block from school now. Our house is so close to Midcity that Mom thinks I should walk, but she doesn’t understand how pathetic that would be. Plus, thanks to Ryan, I’m not sweaty, my hair is intact, and this conversation is distracting me from the first-day-of-school nerves that always hit me way harder than they should.

  “Young lady,” Ryan says in a haughty voice, “there are kids your age who don’t even have a smartphone. Think of how privileged you really are.”

  “Yeah, yeah, yeah.”

  “Besides,” he adds, his voice back to normal, “look at this so-called senior parking lot. One more car in here and then what? I’m parking across the street? Or on the other side, with the teachers and lowerclassmen?”

  “Uh, Ry, we’re not seniors.”

  “Please,” he says, and with a last, swift jerk of the steering wheel, we have a prime spot right next to the side doors. “What are they going to do, ticket me?”

  We grab our bags and Ryan bares his teeth at me. I shake my head—no food—and he does the same for my teeth. Then I point at his hat, which he takes off and chucks into the backseat.

  And now we’re officially juniors.

  Maddie’s been here for an hour already, doing student council stuff and missing our annual tradition of arriving together. It doesn’t take long to find her, though, since it turns out that “student council stuff” means “handing out IDs and locker assignments in the front hall.”

  “R ’n’ R!” Maddie yells, loudly enough that we actually hear her over the apocalyptic level of noise. “Come and get it!”

  We fight our way through the crush of upperclassmen and she gives us each a kiss on the cheek, which I guess is her usual thing now. At least it’s only one kiss each this time.

  “Nice scarf,” she says with a smile.

  I fluff it a little, smiling back. She still looks different, with her natural blond highlights and another boho top under a feathery necklace. But something about the box of IDs and the clipboard on the table in front of her makes the whole thing much more Maddie. Much more normal.

  She leans forward and drops her voice, asking us, “Have you seen Alex yet?”

  I shake my head, confused.

  “Everyone is freaking out,” she explains.

  “No shit,” Ryan says. “Nothing even remotely exciting has ever happened at this school.”

  Maddie rolls her eyes. “People are ridiculous. Charlotte Lewis gave this big speech to us this morning about how we’re even safer now, having him here, but we should still petition the school board for more security. Because we can’t rely on other students to protect us.”

  “What the hell does that mean?” Ryan says.

  “Right? I have no idea! Mrs. Walsh was like, ‘Uhh, okay, let’s maybe just go over the dance schedule for now.’”

  All three of us crack up. Then someone shoves me from behind, and Maddie waves as we move out of the way.

  “Charlotte Lewis is an idiot,” Ryan mutters. “You remember when she said she couldn’t watch Ellen? Because she was Christian?”

  “That was sixth grade, dude,” I point out. “You have to stop worrying about it.”

  “Whatever, you’re still mad at her, too.”

  I laugh. “Yeah, but only because she basically bought that stupid election with all those damn cronuts.”

  “Those were good,” Ryan says under his breath.

  “Hmph. She did have the best party of the summer, I guess. You totally missed it.”

  Ryan narrows his eyes at me like he thinks I’m joking but can’t tell. I’m serious, though, it was a good party. Charlotte has a huge pool, and there was catering and everything. Some of the football guys snuck in a bottle of vodka, and I ended up in the pool house with Cory, which was . . . oh, well. It was a long time ago. Like a month. Ancient history.

  We reach the part of school where the hall splits, and before Ryan leaves to go to his locker he gives me an e
xaggerated kiss on the cheek. “To Spain,” he says.

  “I don’t care what Jesus says, I’ll watch Ellen with you anytime,” I reply, kissing him back.

  “Jesus is cool with it,” he assures me, and walks away.

  I turn to find my locker and see Mrs. Walsh coming toward me, her eyes locked on my face. Anxiety pricks the back of my neck. I can’t be in trouble already, can I? She’s always really nice to me, even that time I snuck out with Paul Maziarz (well, that time we got caught). But she also has her extraserious student counselor face on.

  Then I see that Alex is walking with her, and the prickles turn into actual chills.

  “Rosemary Fuller!” Mrs. Walsh calls, suddenly all smiles. She’s stopped now, standing right next to my locker, and I have no choice but to join her there.

  “Hey,” I say uncertainly.

  “How was your summer?” she asks with a big smile. I don’t know why I get nervous around her, except that teachers make me nervous. Because they always want something from you, and in my case it’s never something good.

  “Fine,” I say. My eyes dart over to Alex, who’s just standing there, all calm. Everyone who passes us is turning their heads, getting a look at him, lifting their phones to snap photos as they walk past. It almost makes me giggle.

  “This is Alex Goode, our new addition to the junior class. Alex, this is Rosemary Fuller.”

  We nod at each other, neither of us bothering to point out that introductions have already been made. I sort of like that Alex doesn’t say anything. He does smile, though, just the tiniest bit, and heat starts to spread through my chest like ink soaking into paper. I wonder what would happen if I met someone who was famous for real. Would I faint?

  “You guys have lockers right next to each other, Rosie, so I thought you could show Alex around today?” Mrs. Walsh goes on. “And it looks like your schedules are pretty similar, too. He’s already been here, working out with the team, but he doesn’t know how to find all the classrooms, do you, Alex?”