It’s late by the time I get to Seeley’s.
She was with her mom shopping for “funeral clothes” all evening, and I had to have dinner with my dad first and let him know I was sleeping over. He’s coming to the funeral tomorrow too. I knew he would, but he’s letting me sleep over anyway because he’s cool like that. Also, he knows if he didn’t say yes, I would most likely sneak out anyway.
I climb up the tree, careful to skip the most rotted steps. Her dad already replaced the ones that ripped off after I fell, but I don’t trust the rest of them. If I learned anything today, it’s that even things that look great on the outside can be total crap underneath.
Seeley’s window is closed when I get to it, the airconditioning probably making the place subarctic as usual, but I can still see her through the curtains. I crouch down to get a better view, watching her sketch away in her pad. Her dark hair is pulled away from her face with four brightly colored clips, and she’s in her favorite gray tank top and kitten pajama pants.
She looks up at me and smiles the kind of smile that you could just fall into forever and still never get sick of. I take a breath and smile back, sliding the window open and crawling inside. My foot gets a little tripped up on the sill, and I land on the floor with a less than graceful thump.
“Hi, Elouise,” Seeley’s dad calls from the other side of the closed door, and I laugh as I dust myself off before going to join Seeley on the bed.
She pulls out one of her earbuds and hands it to me. I pop it in, stretching out next to her and resting my head on my arms. It’s a song I’ve never heard before, quiet and slow; a sad man singing a sad song to the whine of his guitar. She’s drawing her two favorite superheroes kissing, and watching it all come together with this man crooning in my ear feels kind of . . . perfect.
I scoot a little closer, loving the way her arm brushes against mine as she sketches, so warm and alive, and I imagine her creativity sparking through her veins like magic. I don’t know what I did to deserve her.
Seeley finishes up, dropping her pen onto the pad and pinning it between the two covers. Her laugh comes out like a quiet huff. “What are you staring at?”
“You,” I answer honestly. I roll to my back, which pulls the cord of her headphones tight against my face. Awesome.
She smiles again and pulls it out of my ear, taking hers out too and tossing them up on her nightstand. “How was work?”
“Hot,” I say.
“How was your thing with Jessa?”
“Strange.” I bite the inside of my cheek, deciding how much to divulge. “Honestly, it was kind of a disaster. One second she was promising me all the free fries I could eat, the next she was accusing me of faking being your girlfriend, and then she was back to begging me not to tell anybody what I saw.” I tip my head to see Seeley better. “Did you know her mom used to be a waitress?”
“Wait, what?”
“Yeah, I didn’t either. Bananas, right? I can’t picture Mrs. Holier-Than-Thou walking into Dylan’s Diner, let alone working in it.”
“No, back up. Jessa said she knows we’re faking?”
“Not really knows, more like suspects.”
“Shit, this isn’t good.” Seeley starts messing with the clips in her hair, like she does whenever she gets really worked up.
I watch her for a second, narrowing my eyes. “Why are you freaking out?”
“This is bad. If she tells Nick we’re faking and he believes her, it’ll blow any shot you have with him.”
“I actually still kind of feel weird about the plan anyway.” I flip onto my stomach and prop myself up on my elbows. “But we shouldn’t be worrying about this tonight, tomorrow is your—”
“I don’t want to talk about my grandma.” She huffs. “What do you mean you still feel weird? This isn’t more woe is me stuff, is it?”
I sigh. “It feels like I’m being all manipulative and sketch.”
Seeley laughs. “That’s because you literally are being all manipulative and sketch.”
“What should I do?”
“We have to break up, I guess.” She grabs her sketchbook again and starts frantically drawing another figure. I can’t tell yet what it is, but I can tell by the way her pencil digs into the paper she’s upset.
“We don’t have to,” I say.
Her head snaps up. “What do you mean?”
I can’t really place the look on her face, but it makes my brain feel kind of itchy and warm. “I don’t know. I think breaking up right now is a bit of an overreaction. I don’t think we need to, yet. Let’s stick a pin in it and see what happens.”
Seeley goes back to sketching, creases forming on her forehead. “Stick a pin in it?”
“Yeah, I mean we have your grandma’s thing tomorrow, and then we have the fireworks and the bake sale all coming up. I think we should take a minute and think about how everything should play out, you know?”
“Okay.” Her hand freezes for a second, and then goes back to shading the curve of what I think is going to be a flying shield. “I mean, if that’s what you want.”
“Cool,” I say, flipping around so my head is on a pillow. I pull out my phone and check on our fund-raiser. “Hey, look, we’ve been shared sixteen times and got some new donations.”
“What are we up to now?”
“Eighty-seven dollars.”
“Great, only one million, nine hundred and ninety-nine thousand, nine hundred and thirteen dollars to go.” She sighs and sets down her drawing, crawling up the bed to lay beside me. She reaches over and flicks off the light. “Tomorrow is going to be a long day. We should get some sleep.”
I don’t say anything, but I can feel her still looking at me. I move closer again, making our arms touch.
“Good night,” she says. Her voice pitches up at the end like it’s a question.
I feel like I should say something deep here, something important and relevant that will carry us through all the weirdness of tomorrow, but when I open my mouth, all that comes out is: “Night.”