Firsts are memorable. First day with braces. First day without. First kiss. First real kiss. First graduation. First memorial service.
I knew the first day at my new high school would stay with me, and I tried to ignore the tightness in my stomach.
On the first day of kindergarten and maybe boarding school, everyone is eager to make friends. But at Byram Hills, there were only a handful of brand-new ninth graders. Most of the other kids had been going to the same schools together for years: Coman Hill, Wampus, Crittenden. I knew I was going to stick out.
Of course, I was used to life without camouflage. Teachers often cornered me to ask how I was doing. When I went to the nurse’s office, Mrs. Abrahams encouraged me to lie down while shooing other girls back to class with just a Tums or Tylenol. And once, when I had a borderline grade in history, the teacher rounded my A- to an A—a tribute, I suspected, to my mom, her fallen friend.
I appreciated the support of the community. But I always knew the day would come when I would no longer be marked “handle with care.”
The first day at Byram Hills High School might be that day.
• • •
“Is it too late to change your mind?” Kiki asked on the phone.
“Yes. School starts in two days. I’m pretty nervous actually.” I’d spent my entire life on the same Upper West Side block, and while I liked the idea of spreading my wings, that didn’t mean I was ready to fly.
“Nervous is normal. Remember the first day of middle school? We were worried about having more than one teacher. And you were worried about getting lost.”
“I’m still worried about getting lost.”
“If you get lost, you’ll have an excuse to talk to random hot guys.”
“What are you worried about?” I asked.
“Massive assignments. I’m not exactly the queen of time management. And I hear lunch is crazy short. Wait, you have to pay for lunch now, right?”
“Pay?”
“Aisha went to public school before she came to Halsey, and she said she always had to start eating while she was still in line because otherwise she’d run out of time. She said she’d pull up to the lunch lady with her wallet and, like, three crumbs on her plate and an empty milk carton.”
“I hope that’s an urban myth.”
“Or suburban one?” Kiki lowered her voice. “I’m also worried about going to school without my Spanish tutor.”
“I can help you on the teléfono. And you’ll do fine without me.” Just saying this made my throat close up.
“Remember our middle school uniforms and how Principal Milliman made me do the fingertips test?” That drove Kiki crazy. The longer your arms, the longer your skirt had to be. Kiki complained that she was penalized for having long arms. “Now we can wear whatever we want—except sweatpants or words on our butts. But that means it’ll take forever to get dressed every day! I’ll have to get up at dawn.”
“I still haven’t decided what to wear. It’s anything goes—even words on your butt. Not that I’m going to show up in shorts that say, ‘Juicy.’”
“Speaking of, how is Sam?”
“You are gross, you know that?”
“Yep. Gross and proud of it! Answer the question.”
“He’s fine. I met some of the guys on his track team. They started preseason.”
“Do they all wear short shorts?”
“One shaves his legs.” I didn’t tell her that Peter, a pole-vaulter, seemed nice, but Jayden, the leg shaver, was obsessed with his “core” and big on making lewd comments about cheerleaders.
“Don’t let Sam shave his legs!” Kiki said.
“I won’t! He wouldn’t!”
“So did you ever talk to Alexa about Sam?”
“You kidding? Alexa and I barely talk about anything.”
I told her about Alexa finding us at the windmill, and I must have turned it into a funny story because Kiki couldn’t stop laughing. But it didn’t feel funny to me. It was hard living with a girl who pretended I wasn’t even there—especially since, for so many months, it had felt as if I wasn’t.
• • •
I needed advice. Was there some unofficial Byram Hills dress code—an ideal top, right kind of jeans? What about earrings? Hoop, dangly, stud?
Alexa was in the kitchen, making a peanut butter–banana sandwich, so I asked, “Do you remember your first day of high school?”
She acted as if I were a mosquito she could hear but couldn’t see. I waited, and she finally said, “Yeah. The principal said, ‘From now on, your grades count,’ which was bad. But a lot of guys got hot over the summer, which was good. For me, though, it was same kids, new building. For you, it’s more complicated. Obviously.”
I wanted her to say, “Don’t worry. It’ll be fine,” or “Byram Hills is cool. You’ll see.” Something. Anything.
Instead, she picked up her sandwich and started to walk away. Then she turned and added, “If you have any other questions, just ask your boyfriend.”
It was the first time Alexa had called Sam my boyfriend. Lately, his name hadn’t been coming up because he hadn’t been coming over. Not that I blamed him. Awkward! We saw each other mostly at the club or his house or…the windmill.
“Alexa, Sam and I—”
“Save your stories for someone who gives a crap, okay, Sofa?”
“Okay,” I said and watched as she headed off to varsity volleyball practice.
That night at dinner, Dad asked Alexa which she liked better: basketball or volleyball. She acted as though she were doing him a giant favor by answering and said she liked the volleyball uniform better but was more “invested” in basketball.
“Volleyball is all about team play,” she explained. “As a setter, my job is to make hitters look good, which means I can play a perfect game and barely get noticed. In basketball, as point guard, it’s much easier to stand out. And who doesn’t want to stand out?”
I thought, I don’t.
• • •
“I sent you an email before dinner,” I mumbled to Kate the next day as I stacked plates in the dishwasher.
“I answered it.” She smiled as she pushed through the swinging door with a bowl of sliced mangoes and blackberries.
I’d written:
Dear Kate,
I hope you don’t think this is dumb because I realize I could ask you directly, but do you have any advice on getting through the first weeks of a new school? On a 1 to 10 scale of nervousness, I’m about a 7. I wish I could be invisible tomorrow.
I also want to say thank you for everything. I keep wanting to say it in person, but it never comes out, partly because I don’t want to seem like a suck-up in front of Alexa and partly because it’s easier to write stuff than say it. Anyway, thank you for everything!
Oh, and I don’t think of you as “Dear Kate” or “my father’s girlfriend” anymore. I think of you as my friend, and that feels really good.
Your fan and friend,
“Catlover”
After dinner, I read her reply.
Dear “Catlover,”
Thank you for everything too: your email, your sweet presence in our home, and all you’ve done to welcome me into your life. These things go both ways, you know.
I feel blessed that your dad is a “package deal” and that falling in love with him meant I’d have the privilege of becoming your friend. And I’m your fan too. (I mean that.)
As for general advice:
1. Be kind and friendly, and stay open-minded.
2. Give yourself a few days to figure out which kids you want to get to know and which kids to keep at a distance.
3. Speak up in class and do the homework. Some teachers decide right away who is or isn’t a good student.
4. Join activities—yearbook, theater, sports, student council, etc.
5. When asked about your old school, don’t go on and on about how great it was.
6. Have confidence that the qualities that helped you make friends in the past will serve you well again. They will.
7. Since you’re going from all-girl to coed, don’t be too shy…but don’t be a flirt. ;-)
8. Stay in touch with old friends. A few will be friends forever. (Like Kiki!)
Gotta go because I’m making dinner. (Red pepper lasagna! Can you smell it?)
Oh, and you can talk to me anytime, anywhere, online or in person, okay?
Your friend and fan,
Kate
PS There’s no such thing as an Instant Family, but even Coco and Pepper seem to be moving in the right direction, don’t you think?
It was good to read her words, and I appreciated the long response.
But was she right about the cats? Pepper was younger and more playful than Coconut and had taken to hiding around corners. When Old Coco came plodding along, Pepper’s little butt would quiver in anticipation, and he’d leap out and pounce in a surprise attack. Coco would hiss, they’d have a cat spat, and Pepito would scamper off to plot his next ambush. It wasn’t fierce, but they weren’t exactly curling up for catnaps.
I guess pepper and coconut weren’t a natural mix either.
Did Kate think Alexa and I were getting along better than we were too?
• • •
The night before school started, I heard Alexa on the phone with Amanda. Amanda was a senior, so she was allowed to park her car at school and was offering Alexa a ride. Alexa’s door was closed, but I could hear every word, and I’ll admit, I was taking my time getting a towel from the closet.
“They help themselves to the towels,” Alexa was saying, “they turn lights on and off, and they eat whatever’s in the fridge. I swear I’m gonna start labeling my yogurt. Or I should just hand the girl a map—she has no concept of boundaries! She puts her hands all over everything. Literally. Even Sam!”
Amanda must have laughed because Alexa kept going. “My dad used to obsess about deer-proofing the garden. Well, he should have wolf-proofed the house! Gregg keeps rearranging everything. The kitchen drawers? Yesterday, it took me ten minutes to find a spatula. I’m, like, dying here.”
I tiptoed into the bathroom clutching a fluffy Baird towel because we had given all of ours to Goodwill. What did Alexa expect me to do? Drip dry? And yes, Dad could be a neat freak. Would it be better if he were a slob?
I wished I had the guts to barge in and yell at her. She had no idea what it was like to lose a parent!
I got in my pajamas and found Pepper. It still took forever to fall asleep.
The next day, I put on a black tank top, jeans, leather boots, and my mom’s pearl stud earrings. Amanda picked up Alexa, and I crossed the street to wait for the big yellow school bus. It all felt sort of familiar because of TV and movies but foreign too. And surreal. And lonely.
Two older girls were at the stop, discussing their schedules and not looking at me. When the bus came, I took a seat toward the back next to an older girl who didn’t acknowledge me except to move one inch closer to the window.
The bus ride was mercifully short, and at 8:00 a.m., I attended an assembly about regulations, lockers, clubs, and advisors. I didn’t see Sam, so I just sat down and tried to blend in. Who were these hundreds of kids? The boys looked so big. The girls all greeted each other with shrieks and hugs.
A bell rang, and I went to my first class: English. During attendance, the teacher, Mr. Greer, said, “Wolfe? Many authors are ‘wolves’: Thomas, Tom, Tobias, Virginia, Naomi. It’s a fine literary name.” I appreciated that but wished he’d said it to me alone. Calling attention to my name was not going to help me stay beneath the radar.
In bio and algebra, heads also turned, and I tried to look harmless as kids whispered, “She’s the new girl.”
Was I new? I didn’t feel new. Sometimes, I felt old.
Lunch was burgers topped with small, slimy blobs of gray goo. It made me miss the food at Halsey, but at least I’d remembered to bring money. Still, it was hard walking into the crowded cafeteria not knowing where to sit. The tables were all full, and as I carried my plate and water glass, I wished I could spot Kiki and Natalie and Madison.
Was my outfit okay? I was the only girl wearing boots.
A group of loud girls beckoned me over, and I sat with them, grateful. One took out her retainer, wrapped it in a napkin, and placed it on her lunch tray. I remembered when Kiki threw hers out by accident. She and a janitor had had to go through two garbage cans to find it.
The girls quizzed me about New York and Broadway shows, and one asked if I ever ran into famous people. “Sometimes, at my old school during drop off and pick up,” I replied, then downplayed this and hoped it hadn’t sounded like boasting.
One girl started talking about her cousin’s birthday the previous weekend. She’d invited seven friends to a restaurant but wanted only six to sleep over. So she asked the chosen six to drop their sleeping bags off early and not to tell the seventh except—surprise, surprise—she found out!
Everyone laughed, and I tried to smile, but it wasn’t funny, was it? Who were these girls anyway? By having lunch with them, did it seem like I wanted to join their clique? Or were they auditioning me?
The two girls across from me were identical twins. Their auburn hair matched their eyes, and I couldn’t see how anyone could possibly tell them apart. “I just got the new Fifteen,” Twin One said. “Sofia, don’t you like, live, in Dear Kate’s house?”
“Yes…”
“Guys, guys, you have to hear this!” She jumped up and started reading: “‘Dear Kate, I’ve been noticing how beautiful a lot of my friends are, and since no guys ever like me, I was wondering if there’s a chance I might be bi or lesbian.’”
Twin Two shrieked, grabbed the magazine, and pretended to read the response. “Dear Lesbo, If your BFF is your dream date, you should start sexting her right away!”
Everyone cracked up, and my face was burning. My letter got published? Oh God, just kill me now.
“What’d she really answer?” another girl asked.
“Something boring, I’m sure. The questions are the best part,” Twin One replied.
I knew what Dear Kate had answered. When I’d read her words in February, they’d been a comfort. But I never expected my letter to become a read-aloud.
“You think she makes up the questions?”
“Probably. What’s she like anyway?”
“Yeah, tell us,” Twin One said. “I mean, Dear Kate gives out all this advice, but her own kid’s a piece of work!” She laughed.
“Shut up. You’re talking about Sofia’s sister,” said Twin Two.
“Not her blood sister.”
I mumbled that I liked Kate. A girl next to me got up, and a good-looking guy sat in her seat. He had black, tousled hair and curly, dark eyelashes. “Hi,” he said. The twins seemed excited by his presence. “I’m Zack.”
Wait, wait, was he addressing me? Since when did good-looking guys talk to me?
He kept smiling, and I felt embarrassed and confused. Was it possible I’d gone from ugly duckling to decent-looking swan without any notification? Then again, if he was talking to me, did it have anything to do with me—or just my newness and New York–ness?
“I’m Zack,” he repeated. He was wearing a white button-down shirt, and I was surprised to notice that he had little curls of black chest hair. “This is the part where you say your name,” he prompted, “which, I hear, is Sofia.”
“Sorry. I’m Sofia.” I must have been pink.
“By the way, I’ve been there.”
“New York?”
“Sofia. The capital of Bulgaria. You know what Bulgarians do? They shake their heads side to side when they say yes instead of nodding.” He shook his head, and the girls at the table laughed appreciatively.
Was I supposed to shake? Nod? Laugh?
I looked up, and there, across the lunchroom, was Sam. My heart lurched, and I gave a discreet wave. He waved back, and I wished he’d come over. I wished he were sitting next to me!
How were things going to change for us now that we were in the fish bowl of high school? It was one thing to hold hands in sunlight and moonlight, but what about fluorescent light?
I liked that with Sam, I didn’t feel like the girl whose mother died or the girl from New York City or the girl who lived at Dear Kate’s. I just felt like myself.
The bell rang, and everyone headed off to class. In history, a girl behind me whispered, “Yeah, she lives in Alexa Baird’s house. You know, that bitchy basketball player?” I wanted to say something, but what? That it was my house too? (Was it?) That Alexa was a sweetie pie? (She wasn’t.)
My last class was Spanish. I’d placed out of freshman and sophomore Spanish and was put into AP Spanish with ten seniors and two juniors. One was Alexa. It was the first time I’d seen her at school, and I wasn’t sure if that was normal (Byram Hills was bigger than Halsey) or if Alexa had spent the day avoiding me.
The seats formed a semicircle. Alexa sat at one end between Amanda and Mackenzie, and I sat at the other. They were all three wearing pastel tops, jeans, and sandals. In a clear Colombian accent, the teacher, Señor Muñoz, said we were going to focus on short stories by Cervantes, Borges, Quiroga, Cortázar, Rulfo, and García Márquez. But first he wanted us to get acquainted: “Vamos a tomar unos minutitos para hablar de lo que han hecho ustedes este verano. Empezamos con usted, por favor.”
Cool. The classic what-I-did-this-summer assignment except out loud and in Spanish. It might even help me get to know everyone. I was glad I was at the end of the semicircle and would go last.
Around we went. Most kids started by saying their Spanish had gotten rusty, but everyone came up with something. When Alexa spoke about her six weeks in las montañas de Canada, Señor Muñoz congratulated her on keeping up her language skills. He looked pleased, and Alexa did too.
More kids took their turn, and then the teacher turned to me. “Y ahora usted. Su nombre, por favor.”
I gave my name and said I’d moved from Manhattan to Armonk. I did not mention kissing in a windmill, falling off a bike, moving in with Alexa, or taking Mom’s ashes to Spain. I did say I was contenta, happy, at Byram Hills and that everyone seemed muy majo—very nice.
“Pero no entiendo. ¿Cómo se hace que usted habla español tan bien? ¿Usted es española?” The teacher wasn’t curious about my city-to-suburb move. He wanted to know if I was Spanish.
“Yo, no, pero mi mamá, sí era.” I’m not. But my mom was.
Past tense. Oh no! I’d done exactly what I’d hoped to avoid: I’d announced that my mother was dead.
Nobody picked up on it. All they noticed was that the new girl was fluent (something everyone at Halsey already knew) and that while the teacher was impressed with Alexa’s Spanish, he was blown away by mine.
“¡Pues, bienvenida! ¡Va a ser un gran placer tenerle en clase!” he said, welcoming me and telling me that it would be a great pleasure having me in class.
Alexa shot me a dirty look as if my being bilingual were some show-off-y stunt I’d just pulled to put her down.
Once again, I seemed to have accidentally trampled all over her turf. When the bell rang, she knocked into me on her way out, as if I were invisible.
And this made me realize that I’d been wrong. I did not want to be invisible.
But what did I want?
• • •
That evening, Kate, Alexa, Dad, and I drove to La Manda, a nearby Italian restaurant. We settled into a booth, and Alexa went to wash her hands. “Order for me, Mom,” she said. “You know what I like.”
Kate nodded, and I noticed that she looked exhausted.
I was tired too. I’d been on all day, and Alexa’s offhanded request set off feelings of hurt and envy. I didn’t want to fall into the quicksand of wishing I had a mom who knew what I liked and would do her best to get it for me. Don’t go there, I told myself. Alexa wasn’t being insensitive—I was being oversensitive.
The waitress took our order, Alexa returned, and Dad asked, “So, girls, how was school? Sofia, you first?”
“Good.” I studied the place mat: a map of Italy. “I didn’t get lost, and I met a lot of people.” I didn’t mention that I’d felt lonely at the bus stop, awkward at assembly, and mortified at lunch. And I didn’t say that lunch was mystery meat and tater tots (which made me miss Halsey’s grass-fed beef and organic vegetables). I also didn’t say that even though I’d forgotten to bring a change of clothes for kickball, gym was still less excruciating than it had been in middle school. Dad was waiting for more. “Oh, and my world history teacher, Mr. C, is ridiculously cute.” I looked at Alexa, hoping we could at least agree on that. Alexa’s face stayed blank.
“How about you, Alexa?” Dad asked.
Alexa gave a rundown of her classes and said she might want to do her junior author paper on William Golding since Lord of the Flies was one of her favorite books.
Lord of the Flies? Did she think of herself as Jack?
“Oh, and let’s see,” Alexa continued, “in AP Spanish, there’s a new kid, a freshman, whose Spanish is perfecto. It’s kind of an unfair advantage actually.”
Alexa looked at me.
My spine tingled. “Señor Muñoz was very impressed with Alexa’s Spanish too,” I offered.
Alexa gave me a withering look.
“When does volleyball start?” Kate asked, changing the subject.
“First game is next week. A home game against Dobbs Ferry.”
Kate turned to me. “Are you trying out for a sport, Sofia?”
“No.” I was glad there was zero chance of my outshining the family athlete, especially at a school where sports seemed to reign supreme. At HSG, being involved in sports or theater or orchestra or Model UN or newspaper or yearbook all offered about the same cachet. At Byram Hills, I sensed that being a jock or cheerleader conferred extra coolness points.
Kate asked if any activities appealed to me. “At some point, I might do parliament,” I replied. “But for now, maybe chorus?” I looked down at the paper map because just saying this out loud was a big step. “I’ll also join the Spanish club. If people want to go to the city to see a movie in Spanish, I can arrange that.”
“No problema, right?” Alexa sneered.
The waitress appeared with a pizza. “Watch out!” she said. “Don’t burn yourselves!”
• • •
I phoned Sam at 10:00 p.m., and he said, “Bottom of the ninth. Can I call you right back?”
“Not tonight.” I laughed. “I’m going to sleep. But I’ll stop by tomorrow after your practice, okay?”
At 5:15 the next day, Sam opened his front door. “You made it through the first two days!”
“More or less,” I said. “But I never see you.”
“It’s a pretty big school.” He kissed me. “Sorry. Do I smell? I just ran ten miles and was about to shower. You can shower with me,” he said with a sly smile.
I pushed him. “Hey, Sam, how come you didn’t come over at lunch yesterday?” I had not meant to bring that up so soon.
“I wanted to give you some space. And you had Zack breathing all over you. I could see you blushing from across the room.”
“Zack?!” I was blushing because a girl had read my humiliating email out loud. “I could care less about Zack!”
“Good, because he only cares about himself.”
“I wanted to talk to you. That’s why I waved.”
“I waved back. Sofia, it goes both ways. You could’ve walked over.”
“I walked over just now. That goes both ways too.”
He nodded. “I’m sorry. I know I haven’t been to your house since Alexa got back. It’s just—it still feels like her house, you know?”
“Believe me, I know.”
We headed up to his room. “So you’re at a school with real live boys. How’s it feel?”
“They’re everywhere!” I laughed. “They’re, like, two lockers away! And they travel in packs.” I almost mentioned a boy on the bus whose T-shirt said, “Beneath this shirt, I’m naked.” Instead, I said, “My math teacher is hard of hearing and—”
“Mrs. K? She should’ve retired ages ago!”
“Well, the boys all sit in the back and make fun of her. I was shocked. Halsey girls are well behaved. You know, straight out of Madeline.”
We sat on his unmade bed. His room was so different from mine—my new one or old one. I studied his sound system, Yankee license plate, Rolling Stone magazines, fish tank, heaps of dirty clothes. On his shelf were cross-country medals and plaques and team photos. On the wall, a South Park calendar was still open to August. Was this a “man cave”?
“I joined chorus,” I said. “And one girl was really friendly. Gracie?”
“Yeah. Gracie’s nice. Dresses a little funny.”
“She’s in your grade, right?”
He nodded. “What about the work?” he asked. “Challenging enough for you?”
“What’s hard is learning everyone’s names.”
“I can help you there.” He got out a yearbook, The Arch, and we snuggled close.
Smack! What was that? We both heard it. Something had hit his window. A rock? A baseball?
We ran outside and spotted an injured blue jay lying on its side.
“Poor thing!” I said. It had flown straight into the living room picture window—just beneath Sam’s bedroom.
“Happens. Birds around here are pretty dumb. They get dazed and confused. I think this one’s still alive though. I bet it’ll make it.”
We stood a few yards away from the bird and watched as it slowly blinked, twitched, and righted itself. Soon it began to hop and flutter its wings. All at once, it flew off.
I was absurdly relieved.
• • •
I wanted to make things better between Alexa and me, so I figured I’d go to her next home game.
When I got to the gym, I saw Kate in the bleachers. I sat down next to her and was surprised when she apologized for Alexa’s recent “prickliness.” Recent? Alexa had been a cactus from the start.
But this week, I found myself worrying about Kate. She seemed so worn down. Was living with two feuding teens taking its toll?
Kate had on a baggy T-shirt that said “BHHS 25.” She said she’d gotten it as a prize for having traveled the shortest distance to her twenty-fifth reunion. “The person who traveled the farthest got the same prize—and he came all the way from Brazil!”
“That’s not really fair,” I pointed out.
“Life isn’t,” she replied. “But that’s not news, right?”
“I guess not.” I looked around the gym. “I can’t picture myself going to a twenty-fifth reunion.”
“You might end up going to two of them.”
“Two?”
“Halsey and Byram Hills. Private schools do their best not to lose alumni. They never know who’ll become a big donor.”
“But I’m not at Halsey anymore. I’m not a Survivor.”
“Oh yes you are, Sofia.” Kate looked right at me. “You really are.”
I nodded, pensive. Was I? In science that day, Dr. Pavlica had mentioned the speed of light, and I’d heard “the speed of life.” While he was going on about E = mc2, I was thinking again about how crazy it is that life just speeds along, sunrise after sunrise, season after season. Whether you’re totally miserable or insanely happy, the months keep coming, crashing like waves. There are no do-overs, no backsies, and bad stuff happens. But then I thought, Wait. Good stuff happens too. And sometimes, even a kiss can slow time down. I gave myself credit for that tiny epiphany. And for realizing that I wasn’t a closed-down middle school kid anymore. I was in high school. High school!
The ref blew his whistle, and the game began. Kate started cheering as the Bobcats took the lead. I did too.
“Got it!” Alexa set the ball, and the hitter spiked it to the other side, unreturnable.
“Got it!” Alexa took charge on defense, and the coach nodded in approval.
“Got it!” Alexa tipped the ball right over a blocker’s outstretched hands.
Eventually, the whistle blew for the final point. Byram Hills won, and at the net there was handshaking and high-fiving and bouncing ponytails.
Kate stood up. “Ouch. My back.”
“You all right?” I asked and told her I could show her a few yoga stretches I’d learned at HSG.
She thanked me, and we walked over to congratulate Alexa.
“You played great,” I said.
Alexa eyed me dismissively.
“Really great,” I repeated.
She made a face. “You have no idea.” She was right that I was no expert, but couldn’t she ever cut me some slack?
Kate drove Alexa and me home. It was hard to fake a civil conversation, and I sat in the back, sorry I’d even tried to show support. For all I knew, Alexa was mad that I’d infiltrated her last refuge.
“Seventeen!” Kate suddenly chimed. “Alexa, in two days, it’s your birthday!”
Alexa said nothing.
“We can go out,” Kate added. “Shall I make a reservation at the Moderne Barn? Or North? Or Truck? Wherever you want.”
Alexa stayed quiet. Was she imagining the horror of being trapped as a foursome from appetizers till flaming cake? “I made plans with my friends,” she announced, digging out her cell and texting furiously.
Kate sighed and turned on the radio, so I took out my phone and started texting too. I wrote a group text to Kiki and Natalie and Madison: “Miss you guys.” I added a frowny face.
Natalie replied right away: “Miss you too.” Then she sent a text just to me that said, “It’s not easy starting a new school.”
“No, it’s not,” I replied, choosing another frowny, and we texted back and forth, both glad, no doubt, that we could admit this honestly.
• • •
Alexa and I were brushing our teeth side by side. She was wearing a faded, oversize T-shirt that said Calgary, and I was wearing my creamy pajamas with Siamese cats on them. “Look, tomorrow’s my birthday,” Alexa began, “and I just want to say one thing: 9/11 is a sucky birthday. Even I don’t think of September 11 as my birthday. I think of it as a national day of mourning, same as everyone else. I rarely even have a party because, you know, tacky, tacky.”
I wasn’t sure what to say, and I heard myself answer, “My birthday’s December 21, which is way too close to Christmas. My mom used to give me presents wrapped in pink, then, four days later, presents wrapped in green and red. But even she sort of gave up.” Alexa stayed quiet. “I never felt like I had my own special day because there are so many random parties around Christmas. Last year, I had a Latin midterm on my birthday.”
“Boo hoo,” Alexa said and spat into the sink. “I win. 9/11 is worse. Instead of a happy birthday, it’s a crappy birthday. Even the flags are at half-mast. The year Dad left, I baked my own cake. Back then, I was into baking. Now I’m not, but Mom still expects me to do it. Oh well, who cares? Doesn’t matter. Brian will bake me an amazing cake this weekend. Maybe two.”
Alexa snapped off a piece of green floss. “Anyway, and I don’t know why I’m even saying this, but I realize I can act like a jerk sometimes. My birthday sucks, my parents are divorced, and when people meet me, they don’t see me. They see my advice columnist mom, my gay dad, and now my ‘sister,’ the ‘hot new freshman.’ A couple of junior guys are bugging me to introduce you to them.” She spat again.
“I’m sorry. I don’t even get it. Kiki’s hot. I’m…invisible.”
“Hot can happen in a hurry, Sofia, and right now, you’re the opposite of invisible. Which works both ways. A few girls think my ‘sister’ acts stuck-up and like she’s God’s gift to the suburbs because her old school is chock-full of celebs.”
What?! “I’m not stuck-up. And I’m not hot.”
“And you’re not my sister.” Alexa snorted.
Our eyes met in the mirror. “I never said I was,” I replied, fighting the urge to go mute.
“Look, all I’m saying is that I was an only child—not a lonely child. I was fine.”
“Me too. In Spanish, they don’t even say only child; they say ‘hijo único,’ which is how I felt. When people asked my mom why she didn’t have another kid, she’d say, ‘We got it right the first time.’” Actually, I knew my parents had tried to have another kid, but I still liked Mom’s explanation.
“Well, my mom never had to explain anything. Gay husband—spoke for itself. I’m lucky I got born.”
I looked at Alexa’s blue-jean eyes in the mirror. “Happy Almost Birthday.”
“Thanks.” She opened the medicine cabinet, got out tweezers, and began to pluck her brows. “So do you want to meet some juniors?”
“I don’t know. Maybe. But, well, Sam—”
She cut me off. “Spare me, okay? Just never mind.”
“Okay,” I mumbled. For a second, it had seemed like we were connecting.
“Tell you what. I’ll introduce you to two guys who aren’t dicks. And steer clear of Zack. He’s with someone named Zoe anyway, and believe me, Zack and Zoe deserve each other. Here’s some more free advice: if things ever go too fast with any guy, just say you have your period. Totally freaks ’em out.”
“Good to know.” I tried not to recoil. “Hey, Alexa?”
“Yeah?”
“Thanks for not hating me.”
“Who says I don’t hate you?” She put the tweezers down and gave me the tiniest trace of a smile. “To tell you the truth, I’ve been trying to figure out why I don’t hate you. I mean, the Sam thing is like a bad joke, especially since—” She interrupted herself. “But I can’t say I’m brokenhearted. Of course, it’s possible that my heart got petrified when I was a kid. Like, maybe I have a rock instead of a heart?” She glanced at me in the mirror. “Even my name got, you know, usurped. ‘Alexa, play the Lumineers.’ ‘Alexa, play Rihanna.’” She looked at me. “Sorry. I get weird before my birthday. And seventeen is…old.”
“Number one,” I began, “seventeen is not old. Number two, you have a heart. And number three, I didn’t set out to be a trespasser in your life. I didn’t ask for any of this either.”
She shrugged. “Well, next time I’m a bitch, take it as a compliment. I’m only bitchy to people I’m comfortable with.”
“You were bitchy to my dad when you first met him,” I said, surprised to hear myself contradicting her.
She laughed. “True. But that was different. I was trying to scare him away.”
“Didn’t work.”
“No. It didn’t, did it?”
Pepper leaped into the bathtub, perched himself beneath the faucet, and stared up at me.
“What is your cat doing?”
“He wants me to turn it on.”
“You’re joking.”
“He thinks he’s a bobcat.” I turned on the faucet, and Pepper batted at the stream of water with his paw, tilted his head, then licked with his quick, pink tongue. Alexa laughed, and Pepper, startled, bolted.
“A Byram Hills bobcat,” she said. “That’s our mascot.”
I turned off the tap. “Well, ’night. Don’t let the bedbugs bite.”
“Aren’t bedbugs a disgusting city thing?”
“We never had them, thank God. But okay, don’t let the deer ticks bite.”
“I won’t.” She walked out then turned around. “You neither.”
I smiled. That was about the nicest thing Alexa had ever said to me.
• • •
Right before bed, an idea came to me, so I set my alarm an hour and a half earlier than usual. I couldn’t imagine making Baked Alaska, but I knew how to make a box cake.
The next morning, I preheated the oven, combined eggs, vegetable oil, and chocolate cake powder, and poured the batter into two round pans. I let the cakes bake and cool, then iced them with a tub of French vanilla frosting Kate had in the pantry. Ta-da! I spelled out Happy Birthday Alexa with chocolate chips and added seventeen candles and one “to grow on.” Then I woke Dad and Kate.
Minutes before Alexa’s alarm was set to go off, Dad, Kate, and I stood outside her bedroom. We lit the candles, knocked on her door, and nudged it open while singing.
Alexa looked shocked, confused, and then—no denying it—pleased.
“Wow,” she said, rubbing her eyes. “Sweet.”