I don’t steer to the side of the road at the breaking of this news, but I do turn down the radio to focus in on it more. “Wait—you’re in love with Ben?”
“I was in love with Ben. The torture chamber kind of love. Oh, Lord, what I would have done for, to, or with that boy. This was before he was with Rebecca. Well, the beginning of it was before he was with Rebecca.”
I picture Ben two years ago. His swoopy hair.
“But you knew he wasn’t gay, right?” I ask. “I mean, he wasn’t, was he? I’m not missing that, too?”
“No, you’re not.” Preston stares out the window. “It was just something I tried to convince myself could happen. It was easier for me to come out if I thought there was someone to be in love with. A destination for my trajectory. I know that’s silly, and I know he did nothing to deserve it—but I had to picture some kind of future, and while I was at it, I decided to cut him out from reality and paste him into my fantasy. I felt a lot of things at that moment, and I needed to feel every single one of them. Then I had to tell myself I was done. He wasn’t going to suddenly like boys, any more than I was going to suddenly like girls.”
I know Preston won’t understand where the question’s coming from, yet I have to ask. “But what if he could’ve changed? I mean, what if Ben could’ve changed into a girl, and you could have been with him that way?”
“Rhiannon, if I’d wanted to fall for a girl, there were plenty of awesome girls around to fall for. That’s not how it works.”
Silly. I feel silly.
“I know, I know,” I say. “Sorry.”
“It’s okay.” Then he takes a good look at me. “What’s on your mind?”
I can’t tell him the real reason, but I wonder if I can try to keep it vague and still have a conversation.
“I’m just wondering why people stay together,” I say. “Why they connect in the first place, and what keeps that connection strong. I want it to be all the things inside—who you are, what you believe. But what if the things on the outside are just as important? When I was little, I was always worried I’d fall in love with someone ugly. Like Shrek. Then I figured that love would make anyone beautiful to me, if I loved them enough. I want to believe in that. I want to believe that you can love someone so strongly that none of that will matter. But what if it does?”
We’re at the mall now. I pull into a parking space. Neither of us makes a move to leave the car.
Preston is looking really concerned.
“Is this about Justin?” he asks. “Are you no longer attracted to him?”
“No!”
“Is it about…someone else?”
“NO!”
Preston holds up his hands. “Okay, okay! Just checking.”
“It was just something I was thinking about. That’s all.”
I’m letting him down. I’m letting myself down. Because I’m shutting down this conversation. I’m making it clear we’re done.
We get out of the car and head to the Burberry outlet. Preston tries on the coat and I tell him it looks amazing. We talk about clothes and classes and our friends. But we don’t talk about what’s really on my mind. Preston knows this. I know this.
I keep waiting for a text from Justin. Either he’s heard the gossip and is going to want to know who the guy was, or he hasn’t, and he’ll text to see what I’m doing.
One of the two.
Or, in the end, neither.
I think about writing to A, but I convince myself not to. I don’t want to encourage him too much. I can’t have him show up again. I need to figure things out. But how can you figure out something that doesn’t have a shape? It’s the shapeless things—like love, like attraction—that are the hardest to map.
I give in and text Justin as midnight nears. I’m sleepy and vulnerable. The night won’t let me settle down until I get rid of at least one thing that’s unsettling me. I decide to keep it simple.
Missed you today.
He doesn’t write back to me until the next morning.
Did you?
Chapter Seventeen
I get the message while I’m already waiting at his locker. The tide of emotions rises in me too fast. When he shows up a minute later, it crashes over all of the walls I’ve put up.
I hold up the phone. “What do you mean, ‘Did you?’ ”
He doesn’t look mad. He looks bothered. I am just this girl who’s in the way right now.
“If you missed me so much, then why avoid me all day?” he asks. “I feel if you were actually missing me, you would have made some effort.”
“I was with Preston! We went to the mall! Are you saying you wanted to go shopping with me and Preston? Really?”
I don’t know why I’m yelling at him, why I sound like I’m fighting when I don’t want to be fighting.
“I’m not talking about your shopping trip.” (He says shopping trip the same way he’d say gay.) “I’m talking about everything. You’re not here.”
Is he still mad at me for Ashley? Or has he heard about the mystery guy and the empty classroom?
“I’ve been around,” I tell him. “I’ve been here.” Then I decide to address things sideways. “I’ve been busy, for sure. Tests and showing new students around and everything. But I’ve been here, and if you’ve wanted to see me, all you had to do was call.”
He slams his locker door so hard it hits the locker next to his. I startle back—more at the movement than the noise.
“Can you hear yourself? All I have to do is call? Is that how it’s going to be? Should I start making appointments with you? Jesus.”
People are looking at us now. We are that couple fighting in the hall.
“I’m sorry,” I say. I’m not sure what for. I’m just sorry.
“Do you even care that I had a shit day? Did it even occur to you to ask?” he challenges.
“What’s wrong?” I ask now.
“This conversation,” he says, this time slamming his locker in the direction of closed. “That’s what’s wrong.”
It’s not just this conversation. I have done a hundred things wrong. I have become the kind of person who worries about being caught, not about what she’s done.