19 
19 HEATHER AND I FINISHED OUR DINNER AT Butter and left. I couldn’t wait to get out of there and back to Heather’s. We didn’t talk about Paige for the entire car ride. Heather seemed to sense I didn’t want to talk about Paige—and she was right.
We got back to her penthouse, changed, and met up in her room.
“Want to have popcorn or something and watch reruns of something dumb but entertaining?” Heather asked.
“Def,” I said.
I noticed Heather staring at her phone.
“What’s up?” I asked.
“Nothing,” Heather said. She paused. “Well, I don’t know. Troy and I have been texting a lot and I was thinking about calling him.”
“You should!” I said. “Just be supercasual and say hi and ask what he’s doing.”
“Isn’t calling him like, weird, though? Would he think that was strange if I just called him instead of texting like we’ve been doing?”
I shook my head. “No way. I think he’d be surprised and happy that you called. Just do it.”
Heather got up from her chair and walked over to her phone. She put her hand on it, then yanked it back as if the phone were was hot.
“Nah, never mind. I’ll just text him later.”
Heather’s cheeks turned the same color as her bright pink T-shirt.
“C’mon. Heather Fox doesn’t get scared of anything. Call him. He might not even answer—you never know.”
That seemed to make Heather relax a little. “That’s true. Hopefully I’ll just leave a message and that’ll be it.”
“Right. And if he answers, you’re not going to be on the phone forever. Just chat a little and tell him you have to go do something. Then there won’t be awkwardness or anything.”
Heather took a deep breath. “Good idea. Okay. Whatever. I’m calling him.”
She grabbed the phone and scrolled through her address book for his number. I hid a smile. I understood how she felt about being nervous, but it was also amusing to see her this intimidated by a boy. The girl would jump stone walls, gallop her horse at top speed across a pasture, and deal with her crazy dad. But a boy? Terrified.
Heather sat beside me on her bed and held the phone between us so we could both hear. It rang once and then she pulled the phone away from her ear and ended the call.
“What are you doing?!” I asked. “You just hung up!”
“I know!” Heather flopped onto her back and covered her face with a pillow. “Omigod. I just called him and hung up. That was superlame.”
“Uh, yeah, but I think you have a little more to think about than it being ‘lame.’”
“What’re you talking about?” Heather uncovered half her face.
I held up her phone. “There’s this magic thing called caller ID. He’s going to see you called him since you’re already in his address book.”
The pillow went back over Heather’s face. “Omigod!” Her scream was muffled.
I reached over and touched her shoulder. “He might think you called him by accident. I dial the wrong people all the time.”
Heather took the pillow off her face and sat up. “Of course you do, Silver. But . . . yeeeah. Maybe he’ll think it’s a mistake and not even wonder about it. He’ll probably just text me like always.”
“Maybe. Let’s watch TV and forget about it,” I said. “Unless you really want to call him and not hang up this time.”
Heather shook her head. “No, thanks. I’ll pass.”
She got up and grabbed the TV remote. She turned on our fave channel and sat cross-legged next to me. I leaned back against her headboard, relaxing. So she might not have talked to Troy, but at least she’d called him. Sort of.
Buzz!
Heather and I both jumped as her phone lit up between us.
“It’s Troy!” Heather screeched, looking at the screen. “Omigod! What should I do? I can’t answer it!”
“You have to! Or it’ll look like you did call him and chicken out. Just answer it and be cool.”
Heather stared at the phone for another second before she grabbed it and answered.
“Hey, Troy,” she said, her voice a little higher than usual. She listened for a few seconds, then laughed.
“I was such a dork,” she said. “I started to call you and dropped my phone.”
Good line, I thought. Heather could totally do this.
I wanted to give her some privacy while she was on the phone. I motioned toward her laptop.
“Can I check my e-mail?” I mouthed.
Heather nodded, not even listening to me. She was too distracted.
I picked up her laptop and sat in the chair by the sliding glass door. I opened it and pulled up Hotmail.
Weird. My e-mail address was already typed into the box. No password, but I had no idea why my e-mail address would be in the box.
Heather doesn’t use Hotmail, duh, I reminded myself. My address was probably still there from the last time I’d checked my e-mail on Heather’s computer, days ago. In my rush to get out of Canterwood, I’d forgotten my own laptop, and Heather had said I could use hers if I needed to.
I started to type in my password.
“I’ve gotta run, Troy, talk to you later,” Heather said quickly. She tossed down the phone, ran across the room, and snatched the laptop from me.
“Hey!” I said. “What’re you doing?”
“Excuse me,” she said. “What are you doing?”
“Checking my e-mail,” I said.
Heather closed the laptop. “So you just take someone’s laptop and use it?”
“I asked you! You were on the phone and I whispered if I could use your computer. You nodded, so I took that as the universal gesture of ‘okay.’”
Heather’s shoulders relaxed. “Sorry,” she muttered. “You did ask. I just was so into my talk with Troy, I forgot I said yes. Here.” She started to hand it back to me.
“Never mind,” I said. “We’re watching TV. I’ll check it later, after I’m sure that you heard me ask you.”
Heather smiled. “Okay. Deal. I’m going to ask Helen for a snack. Be right back.”
Settling back against a couple of fluffy pillows, I shook my head. I couldn’t figure her out sometimes. I thought we were past Heather thinking I’d snoop through her personal stuff on her laptop. And it wasn’t even like I’d try to sneak away with it, lock my guest-room door, and use it. I was checking my e-mail right in front of her.
Heather walked back with a tray of food and closed the door with her foot. “TV time,” she said.
“Most def.”
And minutes later I’d forgotten about the weirdness over the laptop and we were laughing at the ridiculous antics of the latest cast of Our World: NYC.