Then Everything Happens at Once, page 10
Maybe he’s afraid I’ll think he’s ugly?
What if he is ugly?
No. There’s no way. Last year I had a crush on Brian, a guy Rianne and Lara rated as the ugliest guy in our grade, but we were paired up for a project and he would tell me all kinds of random stories instead of actually working, which was how I realized his voice is really attractive, and his smile gave me chills. At least for a couple of weeks. I know Freddie is like, typical hot, but my eyes also appreciate a lot more than that.
Unless Alex is gross. What if he doesn’t brush his teeth?
“Tsk-tsk,” Garrett whispers, nodding at my phone. “I won’t tell on you, though.”
“Don’t talk to me!” My words are a hissed whisper. “I’m trying to pretend you’re not here.”
“Why? I’m not even doing anything.”
I ignore him, trying to pay attention to the teacher, but my body vibes in a bad way. I spend the rest of class trying to come up with believable ways to be let out of class early, never settling on a plan. When class ends and everyone goes stampeding out, Garrett takes his sweet time.
“Why are you here? Who changes schools in March?” I ask him.
“It’s a really simple story. I got expelled from St. Peter’s before Christmas,” he says. “Well, not exactly expelled. But it was strongly suggested that I get the hell out. So now I got three Grade Eleven credits to finish by June, then I’m supposed to redo all of Grade Twelve next year.”
His candidness has me pause, but only for a moment. “But how are you in an advanced class if you’re such an idiot?”
“I didn’t say I got expelled because I’m an idiot,” he says. “Well, I am an idiot, but not in the intellectual sense. But no worries and shit, B, because I got a backup plan if my brain cells fail me: I’m gonna cheat on you for tests.”
I roll my eyes and push to my feet.
“And we’ll be partners for group stuff, but you’ll do all the work, obviously,” he adds.
“I will drop this class.”
“No, you won’t. I think we’re gonna have a great year together, B,” he says. “Well, half a year. But hey! We’ll be together next year, too. You’re the only friend I’ve got.” His mouth twists with a grin full of mischief and turdiness, then he points at the chair I was sitting in just a moment ago. “Is that butt sweat?”
Of course, I look, and there’s nothing there, because I make a point to get up in a way that would wipe the chair, but the fact that he just mentioned that butt sweat on a chair is a thing—I run my hand along my backside.
“Nah, I’m just messing with you,” he says. “You’re good.”
I walk away convinced I am not returning to this school.
Fourteen
Bookworm Café makes the best whipped cream drinks, like this strawberry shortcake cream-blended drink I’m addicted to, and they’re never stingy on the crumbly topping. As Lara and I walk in through the main bookstore entrance, I scan the coffee shop area to the right: three girls, no boys. The door that leads to the office or staff room behind the counter is open, but there’s no guy back there that I can see. Something that was clenched inside me releases.
I’m now full of a mixture of relief and disappointment, feelings that are quite familiar to me and that always seem to go together.
“I’ve got to tinkle,” Lara says.
“I’ll wander.”
I pull my shoulders back, adjust my shirt, fluff my hair, and add a layer of neutral-pink gloss to my lips. While Lara pees, I head for the stationery section, where I browse the journals, my eyes widening at the price tags. I am physically unable to stop checking my phone. I can’t decide who I’d most like to hear from: Freddie or Alex.
Fifteen minutes later, I take a seat on one of the chairs scattered through the bookstore and send Lara a text.
[Baylee] Did you fall in the toilet? Do you have diarrhea?
She doesn’t respond. I continue sitting here, thinking about Freddie’s voice notes and the things he asked me to think about.
[Baylee] Are we avoiding each other now?
[Freddie] No. Sorry. I just needed some time to figure stuff out.
Figure what out exactly? I thought I was the one who was supposed to be thinking.
Am I stupid? Am I not seeing something super obvious, right in front of my face? I want to believe that Freddie wants what I want, and I even send a wish into the universe that he becomes my secret—but I know better.
[Baylee] Look, whatever it is, I’m fine with it.
[Freddie] Maybe I shouldn’t have said anything. It’s way more complicated than I thought.
[Baylee] You can’t take it back now.
[Freddie] I know. I should’ve spent more time thinking it over.
[Baylee] I mean, why can’t the two friends just be a secret? Then other people’s feelings wouldn’t get in the way.
[Freddie] You think that would be better than honesty?
[Baylee] Honesty is for the two people involved. Everyone else can just mind their own business. Just please stop being weird with me.
In my fantasies, it’s a given that Freddie wouldn’t want his friends to know of his interest in me. It’s better this way, because then I can daydream about us tucked away somewhere private, and my mind can’t intrude with ridiculous, soul-crushing scenarios of Garrett or Trey laughing at Freddie for walking away from a girl like Jess in favor of a girl like me.
I assumed I’d be a secret. I’m okay with it.
He starts to type a few times, but nothing pops through.
There’s a skinny white guy with fluffy blond curls sitting almost directly across from me. Well, he’s not exactly sitting, more like sprawled over the chair. He looks about my age. He sighs loudly, letting his head fall back into the void behind the back of the chair.
“I hate reading. I hate books. I hate you, Mom.” He says the last part louder. There’s a lady browsing the self-help books one aisle over, but she doesn’t flinch at this guy’s whining.
Now he plays with an eyelid, trying to fold it over. It’s disgusting, but once he has one flipped and staying in place, he starts with the other. I stare at him, thinking about how I would never consider letting someone like him kiss me.
I don’t think I would.
Well . . .
Am I even allowed to have super-rigid standards? What would it say about me if I acted all shallow and picky? Shouldn’t an inexperienced fat girl like me be empathetic when it comes to other people’s shitty qualities? But would the version of me who loves herself make a list of “must-haves” and “must-not-haves,” turning people away until that perfect person showed up? Is that what loving myself should look like—not settling? Simply knowing that I’m worth it and deserve nothing but the best? What if the best is a loser who flips his eyelids over?
God—I hope this isn’t Alex.
No, it could never be him, because an employee behaving this way at their place of work wouldn’t have a job for as long as Alex has worked here.
“What is the look on your face about?” Lara says, patting my shoulder as she arrives at my side. I nudge my chin up toward the guy and his creepy eyelids. He’s now chanting the word mom and moaning in annoyance, gazing around him to creep people out, I suppose.
“I’m trying to determine if that turd over there could be my new crush,” I say.
“Ew,” she says. “Please.”
“But what if I love him?” I say. “Look at those skills.”
“Oh right—he should put that on his résumé.” Lara and I stare at him another minute, then she calls out to him. “Hey!” He raises his head slightly, blinking his gross lids at her. “That is offensive, and you’re going to get pink eye. But can I take a photo?”
He shrugs, readjusting one of the lids as it threatens to unfold. “Whatever.”
Lara takes the shot, shaking her head as she inspects it. “Rianne needs to see this.”
“She does,” I say. “But tell her he’s mine and she can’t have him.”
We laugh, listening to Rianne’s voice note response as we head to the café. Lara orders a huge herbal tea, while I go for the strawberry shortcake drink.
“Are you drinking tea because your stomach hurts? Is that why you were in the bathroom for fifteen minutes?” I ask as we wait for our order at the other end of the counter.
“Stop!” She swats my arm. “I kind of lost track of time texting the guy.”
“I should have figured.”
Lara’s plain, hot-water drink is ready to be picked up within seconds. My drink is a little more elaborate, and I watch as one of the girls behind the counter pours ingredients into a blender.
“Did Freddie tell you about his car?” she asks, not waiting for me to chime in. “He got it detailed at that place over on Thorne yesterday—”
“Yes, I know that.”
“Did he tell you that when they heard what happened, they gave him an excellent discount?” Lara asks.
“No, he didn’t. That’s nice of them,” I say.
She shrugs. “I thought that would make you feel better, because you were so worried about the mess.”
“Well, thanks.”
My drink appears on the counter, looking like twelve hundred calories of deliciousness. Lara and I head to our usual spot, which is taken, so we choose the table next to it, figuring that when the laptop guy packs up, we can hop over and reclaim our rightful place.
For a moment, I consider laying all the Freddie stuff out on the table, feeling so desperate to have a levelheaded outsider’s opinion on the situation.
“Isn’t Trey such a jerk?” Lara says.
“Yes, but are we surprised?”
“He could really cause problems for me, if he doesn’t get over it.”
“It’s literally been four days since you guys broke up—maybe some time just needs to pass? You guys have broken up for weeks before. Maybe he thinks this is that again.”
“Yes, but I was still texting him when we were broken up those times. This is different. I haven’t talked to him at all, except for this morning.”
“Has he been texting you?”
She tips her head back in exaggerated exhaustion. “All the time!”
“Maybe he just needs to find a new girl to text with.”
Lara shrugs. “Maybe he does. Maybe I should throw Taylor his way.”
“Ew, no. You can’t do that. Then she’d be hanging around with us,” I say.
Just then a guy comes out of the back room. A tall white guy with short dark hair. He’s thin, but his arms are ripped with muscles. We’re close enough to the counter to hear him speak with one of the girls behind the counter, something about next week’s schedule and how he can’t close on Thursday.
It could be Alex, if he suddenly decided to change his hair color from blond to black-brown.
“Why are you drooling over that guy and being so obvious about it?” Lara whispers, then her mouth falls open. “Oh. My. God. Is this him? Is this the guy?”
“Stop it,” I say, turning my head. “Let’s go.”
When I imagined sneaking a look at Alex, it wasn’t with Lara questioning me about it at the same time. It was supposed to be private and safe.
She holds her hands out, like What the hell? but she gets up to follow. I grab my drink and my jacket, then I motion for Lara to hurry up and do the same. She stares at me like I’m being super pathetic, but she slips her coat on anyway. We head off and I am almost safe.
“Excuse me?” Lara says, making me stop and turn around. She’s moved to the counter, where the possibly-Alex guy is jotting things down on a piece of paper.
“Oh, sorry, I’m not working right now,” he says.
“That’s okay. I’m actually just wondering if you know my friend,” Lara says, pointing at me.
Right at me. I die a little inside. Actually, I die a lot.
Fifteen
I just booked it, said nothing, and ran toward the exit as fast as my heels would allow. Now I step outside, unsure where Lara is, but 100 percent set on running away without her. This is so typical of her, totally bold and spontaneous with absolutely zero consideration for the fact that we are not part of the same world. She cannot do that to me. This might’ve ruined everything.
I press my back against the cold brick and pull my phone out.
[Baylee] I’m sorry for taking off, but this is too awkward.
Alex’s response comes almost right away.
[Alex] What do u mean? What’s going on?
[Baylee] I didn’t want it to happen this way, if we were ever going to meet, that is. But Lara just doesn’t think.
It takes a minute before his response comes.
[Alex] Don’t worry. It’s not me.
Huh?
[Baylee] ???
[Alex] The guy ur friend Lara is talking to right now. It’s not me. That’s Andre. I was actually in the back room, stocking.
I shove my phone into my pocket, staring around me in a panic. Occasional shoppers rush back and forth from their cars and Bookworm’s main entrance. Lara is still in there, and I’m out here alone, standing a little farther down the strip mall.
[Alex] I’d actually been thinking about us meeting. That’s what I wanted to talk to u about tonight, except . . .
Except I’m the fat loser who took off, while my super-pretty, charismatic friend stayed behind.
[Baylee] Except you didn’t realize this is who I’d be in real life?
[Alex] Except I sort of realized a little while ago that u assumed I’m a guy and I never corrected u.
What? I read the text five times.
[Baylee] You’re a girl?
[Alex] Yes.
The despair and total embarrassment I was feeling disappear in an instant.
Alex is not a guy.
I pull up the photo I’d saved, the one where he—she is holding the textbook. I guess I totally assumed she was a guy.
But this doesn’t have to be a big deal. That photo plus the other ones on her Instagram are of someone hot.
All the girls at my school are so typical with their girliness, but I’ve seen the type of girl who makes me tingle the same way Freddie does. I follow some of them on Instagram, and although I haven’t seen all of Alex, it feels like she could be like that. It feels like maybe nothing has changed?
Unless her photos are deceiving.
What if she’s not boyish at all? What if she’s super girly, smells like pretty perfume, and isn’t even into girls—let alone fat ones?
I’m so confused, and the hope is slowly evaporating.
[Alex] This isn’t the way I wanted things to go, but it just got harder and harder to tell u.
[Alex] R u still there . . . ?
[Alex] I just thought u were a really cool person. I don’t want u getting the wrong idea.
There’s the confirmation that I was totally getting the wrong idea.
Getting the wrong idea is what I do best.
I was so busy turning Alex—a faceless internet font, a rando DM presence—into some version of Freddie who would actually see me and want me, that I didn’t even stop to consider the fact that this person might just be looking to make a friend. After all, I’m the quirky fat girl who has no trouble making friends. Wasn’t that always the more likely scenario?
Now I’m replaying all the conversations we had, all the comments she made. It all feels very different now. Everything that sparked butterflies in me now seems so innocent.
All that cryptic shittery I laid on her about her best friend and the sexual tension stuff—that’s why she got weird with me. That’s when she realized I had a crush and that I’d blown an innocent interaction up to be some romantic thing.
How could I seriously think this person would be into me?
[Alex] Can I come out and talk to u?
[Baylee] No! Don’t. Please don’t.
[Alex] . . .
I thought I was finally meeting someone whose attention was on me for something more than friendship, only to find out that, once again, I just made it all up. It’s always one-sided.
[Alex] Lara is on her way out now, BTW.
Nothing was happening before, and nothing is happening now. I am used to this. There is huge disappointment, but the relief is not far behind. Relief that I won’t be thrust into some brand-new situation I wouldn’t know how to handle anyway.
I tuck my phone into my coat pocket, take a cleansing breath, and wait for Lara to appear.
I can’t believe I’ve been talking to a girl this whole time.
“You loser!” Lara cries when she sees me. “That wasn’t even him.”
“Thank god.”
“That guy’s name is Andre, and he’s kind of cute,” she says. “And super chatty.”
“I can’t believe you would do that to me,” I say.
Lara looks taken aback by my tone. “What do you mean?”
“It could have been Alex!”
“That’s the guy’s name? I was trying to ask Andre about the other guys he works with, but he had no idea what I was talking about. He kept saying there’s only this old guy named Charles who works on Thursday mornings.”
“Can you stop?” I say. “You totally put me on the spot.”
“I was just trying to help,” she says. “Nudge you along a little.”
“I didn’t ask you to. I asked you to follow me out the door.”
“You’re being kind of dramatic, Baylee,” she says. “It wasn’t even him. Nothing happened.”
“What if it had been him? What were you trying to do?”
“A nudge—I told you.”
Or was she trying to make sure all Alex would see was her?
I need to drop this, because none of it matters now. “Can we just go? It’s freezing out here.”
We head for the bus stop in more silence than usual.
“Can you bring your Grade Nine yearbook tomorrow?” I ask her.
“Why?”
“Can you just please bring it?”
