I had passed all my classes, but I had failed in my mission to figure Darcy out, even if I’d made some progress. And now I had to wait two whole weeks before I’d get another chance. I was more pissed off about it than I thought I’d be.
After school I stopped by Jake’s house. Before he’d gotten sick, we’d had plans to go skating this evening. The weather was getting cooler outside, cool enough that we didn’t have to worry about keeping to the shadows for fear of spontaneously bursting into flame. This was my favorite time of year. It was true that in Phoenix it never snowed and we didn’t get the autumn leaves changing colors and falling off the trees stuff, but while the rest of the country was inundated with snow, we could go outside with shorts on and have barbecues in the middle of December.
When I got to Jake’s house I found that he had no intention of cancelling our plans.
“Aren’t you sick?” I asked skeptically.
He waved me off and started fiddling with his skateboard. “That was hours ago.”
I waited for him in the living room. “Planning on trying something new?” I asked, noting the smaller wheels he was tightening onto his deck. Those were his trick wheels, the ones he used when he felt like trying something exotic. It had been a while since he’d used them.
“If the muse descends,” he said as he worked. “How are you?”
“Fine,” I shrugged.
He put his shoes on and gave me one of his famous I-don’t-believe-you looks, but he didn’t say anything as Aunt Gardiner came downstairs. “Here to recruit your cousin again, I take it?” she asked as she plopped down on the couch with a laptop.
“Yep.”
“What’s wrong? Are you sick too?”
“What do you mean?”
“You look sallow.”
“I’m okay,” I told her.
She gave me almost the exact same face Jake had.
A loud pop followed by a hiss of water came from the kitchen. “Jake!” called Uncle Gardiner. “Got a minute?”
“I told him he needed to hire a plumber,” Aunt Gardiner sighed.
“Be right back,” Jake groaned. He kicked off his shoes and ran to the kitchen.
“So what’s her name?” Aunt Gardiner asked as soon as we were alone.
“Who’s name?”
She wagged a finger at me. “I’ve been around long enough to know when a boy is thinking about a girl.”
I’d forgotten how intuitive my aunt was. “Her name’s Darcy, and she’s just a friend.”
“And Godzilla’s just a lizard,” she said with a laugh. “Let’s hear it.”
I told her about Darcy, how much we couldn’t stand each other the first time we met, and how now it seemed like she sometimes wanted to be friends and that I couldn’t make any sense of her. I even mentioned her bad history with Gabby, though I didn’t go into detail about it.
My aunt gave me a sympathetic look. “Sounds like you really like this girl.”
“Does it?” I asked. “She’s really more of a friend than anything else, if that.” That was a total lie, but I didn’t feel like I could accurately explain what was going on between Darcy and me.
“Elliott, for such a smart kid you sure can be dumb,” said Aunt Gardiner. “You just need to be honest with yourself. And stop overthinking everything. It’ll all work out in the end.”
Jake came back out, his pants rolled up past his ankles. “Sorry I took so long. Let’s go.”
Aunt Gardiner’s words stuck with me all the way to the park. Be honest with yourself. Was I not?
Runner . . . lost . . .
Was being dishonest with myself part of that? Was I running from the truth?
The park was crowded when we got there, like it always was on Fridays. I was glad to be on my board, with the breeze running over my skin and my beanie pulled low on my head, feeling the clunk-clunk of the wheels underneath my shoes as I weaved in and out. Here I was in my own element; here I had no worries. It was refreshing to not have anything to solve or figure out. Or run from.
Jake skated beside me. “So I took this aptitude test in career development,” he said as we kicked and pushed around the course. “Turns out I’d make a decent veterinarian.”
“I believe that,” I said. “You’ve adopted every animal known to man. It’s like Noah’s Ark at your place.”
He laughed. “Yeah, well . . . what about you?”
I paused, adjusting my beanie. “Still working on that.”
“You know, you don’t have to get it right the first time,” Jake said. “If one thing doesn’t work out, it’s okay to try another. You’re not locked into whatever you choose forever if you don’t want to be.”
His words gave me pause. I’d never thought of it like that before. But I realized he was right. Making a choice wasn’t an end-all be-all. There could be do-overs. I wasn’t signing my life away by making a decision. I hopped off my board and started for the bench to think it over, my mind heavy with this new knowledge.
That was the exact moment that Liam, with his arm wrapped tightly around Gabby’s waist, chose to stroll onto the park. I froze. Our eyes met, and he too went still. His hand fell from Gabby’s waist, and she rushed away, her longboard—which, I couldn’t help noticing, was still in near perfect condition—in tow.
A decision. I had to make one. Now. To turn around and leave, run from my problems like I’ve always done, or go out to meet them.
I chose the latter, and made myself march toward the bench. Liam swallowed, and met me halfway. We sat on opposite sides, neither of us acknowledging the other for a full thirty seconds. Finally, he cleared his throat.
“This isn’t going to be weird, is it?” he asked, looking dead ahead, fiddling nervously with his hands.
A little late for that, isn’t it? I thought.
“Why would it be weird?” I asked as I shifted my board back and forth underneath my foot. Other than because of the fact that you’re dating a girl that I had been sort-of-but-not-really courting, a fact which you were well aware of. Or that not only did you keep it a secret, but—
“I mean, she said the two of you weren’t ever an item,” Liam stammered.
“That’s true,” I agreed blankly. “We weren’t.”
I wanted to be angry. I tried to be. At both of them. Her for doing . . . whatever it was she’d done, and him for going along with it. But I couldn’t be.
Gabby, struggling to maintain her balance on her mint condition board, skated toward our bench and ground to a messy stop just shy of Liam’s shoes. She hopped off and leapt into his lap, where she curled into a giggling ball. “How’d I do, babe?” she cooed.
“Perfect,” Liam said into her ear. She wrapped her arms around his neck and pulled his face to hers. I averted my eyes while they started a slobbery game of tonsil tango, but even when I couldn’t see the gory details, I could hear it all perfectly fine. It sounded like someone was taking a plunger to a sink. I felt like doubling over and hurling.
When they were finished Gabby sat up and looked dead at me. “Hey, Elliott,” she said, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand. “What brings you here?”
“Skating,” I said simply.
“Me, too,” she said. “Well, that and my boyfriend, here. He’s been showing me the ropes. Isn’t he adorable?”
Adorable was not the word on my mind at the moment, but I stood up and said, “Sure, whatever,” hopped on my board and pushed off before I actually did throw up.
Gabby and Liam. Dating. I never would have seen that coming. Maybe Jake was right. She could really like him and they could end up making each other really happy. I hoped that ended up happening because somebody around here needed to be happy and it sure didn’t look like that somebody would be me.
I skated lazily around the course, punctuating my trail with the occasional manual or an ollie or two. I was too lost in thought to do anything more.
Jake rushed over to join me, worry written all over his face.
“You handled that well,” he said.
“What’d you expect me to do, beat him up?”
“Well . . .”
I didn’t want to beat him up. I found myself suddenly thinking of Romeo, of all things. He’d thought Rosaline was the only one for him, right up until the moment he saw Juliet, at which point he forgot Rosaline completely. That was exactly how I felt about Gabby. I just couldn’t feel bad about her being with Liam, because I had found someone better. I just didn’t know who that was. Or, did I?
Dar—no. I refused to even think of her that way. She was a puzzle, a mystery, a problem. That was the only appeal she held for me. She was arrogant, pretentious, and selfish. She was rude, conceited, and irritating. And . . . she was annoyingly good-looking. Sure, we sort of got along, when she felt like being nice. Sure, I sort of liked being around her. And sure, she sometimes seemed to like being around me, too. But—
Be honest with yourself.
“Ugh,” I said aloud.
“What?” asked Jake.
“Nothing, just . . . no.” I groaned and angrily popped my board into the air. Darcy would just love that, knowing I thought she was cute. That would make her smug little day. Smug, smug, smug. Darcy and her smugness. Gabby and her duplicity. Girls, it seemed, were the root of my problems lately.
I threw myself into the air. I knew I’d blown the ollie before I came down. I landed badly, and the nose of my board shot up and cracked my shin like a whip. I bit back the urge to swear and tried it again. This time I landed on my ankle. For some reason, I couldn’t land the trick. Over and over again I fell flat on my butt. And it wasn’t like I was doing anything fancy. I couldn’t even nail a simple kickflip. Same thing every time. Pop, crash, scrape.
Crash and burn.
Each time I gritted my teeth and climbed right back onto my board. I wasn’t putting any thought into it, I just kept throwing myself into the air, and I kept landing on my butt.
Crash and burn. My freaking life story right now.
“Dude,” came Lucas’s voice. I looked up to see both him and Kyle skating toward me, with Jake not far behind. “You alright?”
“Why does everyone keep asking me that?” I wondered aloud, scraping my sorry self from off the ground yet again.
“Sorry about my brother,” said Kyle for the thousandth time. “Douche move, all the way.”
I looked over my shoulder to see that they were making out again. “It’s fine, really. Not his fault.” I kicked onward, and they trailed me, Kyle and Lucas on either side of me, Jake bringing up the caboose.
“You know something, guys? I think I’ve figured out my problem: girls.”
Kyle frowned. “I’m not following.”
“More specifically, pretty girls,” I explained. “Even more specifically, getting caught up in the pursuit of said pretty girls. So, really, not girls at all.”
I’d known that, and yet I’d failed to heed my own knowledge. I was no better off than Liam or Kyle or Lucas, chasing girls and nothing else, like some Neanderthal. I had deceived myself into thinking I was different, like I was better than they were because I wasn’t doing the same thing, when in reality I was, only I was doing it covertly, like a coward, under the pretense that I was just trying to figure them out or I just saw them as friends. Well, no more. From here on out, I was—
“Why is Darcy here?” asked Lucas. He skidded to a halt, and I followed suit. There was no way she would be here. She hated skating.
But, there she was, watching us. Her face was blank, but she appeared to be looking right at me. There was no sign of Liam or Gabby. They must have run off the second she’d shown up. I wondered if I should’ve done the same.
Not knowing whether or not it would be rude to pretend I hadn’t seen her, I decided to be civil, and jogged to where she waited with her arms crossed. “Hello,” I said uncertainly when I’d reached her.
She gave me a not-so-quick once over. “How are you?” Her voice was refreshing.
“Why do you care?” I asked, just to get on her nerves.
She bit her lip. “You literally just fell in the exact same way a dozen times. I’m surprised you’re coherent.”
I laughed. “Sorry to disappoint.”
I pulled my beanie off and walked away. She fell into step beside me. “You know, I still don’t get why you skate. You know what’s going to happen. You’re going to fall, again and again. And yet you get up and go right back. Do you think it’s brave or something?”
I stopped and turned to face her. “No. I think it’s fun. I mean, it’s not like I’m trying to get an endorsement like some of these other guys. I guess, I just do it for the clarity.”
She frowned. “Clarity?”
I didn’t know why I felt compelled to answer her questions, but I did it anyway, as always. “Every story is at its most basic a protagonist overcoming obstacles to achieve a goal. In real life, goals change, obstacles are insurmountable, and you don’t always know who the good guys or the bad guys are. With skating, the goal and the obstacles are always the same. Nail the trick. Get from point A to point B. That’s it. It’s simple.”
She cocked her head to one side and gave me a thoughtful expression. “I never thought about it like that.”
I laughed. “I probably think about it too much.”
She smiled. “Well . . .” She reached into her purse and withdrew an unopened Gatorade. “Here, are you thirsty?”
I eyed the blue bottle warily. “I’m fine, thanks.”
“Are you sure? You really should stay hydrated. You need to replenish your electrolytes before you go into shock and die.”
“Do you always keep a random Gatorade in your purse?”
She looked away like she was embarrassed. “No, I . . . thought you might need it.”
I thought you might need it. Had I heard right? Sometimes Darcy could be civil. Sometimes she could approach being nice. But looking out for my well-being? That was new territory for her. Surely there was a catch, something I was missing. Maybe this was all an elaborate prank.
“Is this some more of that niceness you’re working on?” I asked her.
“A sprinkling of it, yes.”
I hesitated, but she held the Gatorade out to me and refused to move it. Darcy didn’t strike me as the type to pull a prank. Nor did she seem the type to take no for an answer.
Was it poisoned?
I sighed and took the bottle from her. “If you insist . . .”
“I do.”
I opened the bottle and she watched me drain half of it.
“It is brave, by the way,” she muttered. “At least, I think so . . .”
I was positive I had heard wrong this time. Being considerate and complimenting? She was definitely charging into a new frontier now. I didn’t know what to say to that.
She cleared her throat. “So, my cousin is in town and we’re having a bonfire tonight at Bridget’s. You should come.”
I was sure this was a prank now. “You actually want me to come to your house?”
She brushed aside a few strands of hair and looked up at me. “I wouldn’t have invited you if I didn’t.”
I pulled my beanie back over my head. “I’ll think about it.”
Darcy’s face soured. “Must you be so fickle?”
I smiled. “Maybe.”
“Well, you can come or you can not come. I don’t care. I was only trying to be friendly.” Her voice was lacking its usual severity.
“Friends usually have something in common.”
Darcy started to say something, but she only turned her nose up, turned on her heel and marched away. I watched after her, grinning to myself. Her attitude was less annoying now and more . . . amusing. And as for her invite, I had decided to accept the moment she’d asked. I wanted to meet this cousin of hers. Maybe they could shed some light on Darcy’s mysteries—like her strange behavior just now, being nice to me. I still wasn’t sure how I was supposed to feel about it.
Be honest with yourself.
I felt an odd sense of anticipation. I couldn’t explain the effect she had on me, but I liked it either way. That, at least, was the truth.