It’s funny how you sometimes don’t realize something until you’ve said it aloud. I haven’t done anything truly outlandish since I said “no” at work, but each little thing has chipped away at the veneer I’ve spent a lifetime polishing. Even if I somehow end up back at Infinity Designs, management will never again trust me to be their ultimate yes-girl. Elena will always know my perfectly flat stomach gets rounded when filled with alcoholic milkshakes. Enough people have seen my freckled cheeks that they’ll know I’m wearing foundation if they don’t see them. These things might be small, but they’re still irreversible.
“I don’t think there’s any such thing as who you are,” Deiss says. “So, I wouldn’t worry about getting back to it.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, it’s all fluid, isn’t it? You walk around in this body, but that changes according to what you eat, or your level of physical activity, or the years that pass. And inside, especially, there’s nothing constant. Every moment, you’re making a different decision. If you decide to start hitting strangers in the face, you’re a person who hits strangers in the face. It doesn’t matter if you spent the last ten years of your life behaving like a saint. Nobody you hit in the face is going to thank you for the good you did yesterday. To them, you’re just the asshole who clocked them with a right hook.”
“Is that meant to be reassuring? The fact that no amount of correct behavior protects against an isolated moment of bad behavior?”
“Not particularly.” He laughs. “I’m just making a point. Tonight, you were scared of elephants. But tomorrow, in the light of day, you won’t be. And you’ll look at me through those cool green eyes, and I won’t be able to imagine that you’ve ever been afraid of anything in your life.”
I smile, liking the person he sees me as: someone trustworthy and without fear.
“Speaking of the elephants,” I say, “I don’t hear them anymore.”
“They left a few minutes ago.” He gets to his knees and unzips the flap, peering outside. “Probably to get some sleep, which we should do as well.”
I nod despite my disappointment at the sight of him crawling out of the tent. I didn’t mean to imply that I had no more need of him now that we weren’t under siege. Still, he’s probably right. We don’t need a repeat of the other night, with one of us passing out on top of the other.
“Thanks,” I say as he begins to zip up the tent behind him.
“For what?”
For trusting me with your secret. For saving me from a panic attack. For making it feel okay to leave my job and attempt to strike out on my own.
“For showing up,” I say simply.
He winks at me for the first time since freshman year, the day we met on the lawn. “That’s what friends are for.”
THEN
Phoebe was never one to pass up a dare. Still, I didn’t think she’d do it. I didn’t think she could. Slate Devers was standing no more than ten feet away from his precious skateboard, an energy drink gripped tightly in his hand like he was scared it might jolt into the air and pour its power into someone else’s mouth. Little did he know something much more important to him was about to be yanked away.
I would’ve felt sorry for him, but he was an asshole. There was no other word for him. I imagined the girls he dated convinced themselves he was edgy, but I’d heard him yell at enough of them to realize he was truly awful, that the ripped clothes and ornate tattoos were a deliberate shield to distract people from looking any deeper. My smile widened as Phoebe pulled his skateboard out of the grass and onto the paved path.
“Hey!” The energy drink must have done its job because Slate whipped around with the reflexes of a snake. “That’s mine!”
“I know.” Phoebe grinned, putting one foot on the board and taking off.
The laughter bubbled up, bursting out of me as he began to run after her. Next to me, Simone’s hands had gone over her mouth, trying to hold it in, but Deiss and Mac had given in to loud guffaws. There was something about the way Phoebe rode, her arms waving all around her like she was having a party, while Slate ran desperately after her, shouting for her to stop. I kept expecting her to yell back at him, to explain that it was just a dare and she was bringing it right back, but she didn’t. Her left leg just kept pumping against the pavement, pulling her farther away from him and out of sight.
“Ride-ola free-ola!” Phoebe hollered as she zipped away.