When the song is over, Kassie flops into the chair next to me to rest her feet. “Can you believe I actually won?” she asks, slightly out of breath.
“Of course you won. You’re Kassie freakin’ Byers. That crown looks good on you,” I say on best friend autopilot. I reach to straighten it on her head, but take a shaky breath when I realize what I’m doing. What I always do with Kassie: dismiss her shortcomings and forgive her instantly. But she lied. She’s lied to me about Renner for four years.
This feels too big to ignore. I don’t know why she lied to me, but I need to confront her. Now.
“It suits J. T. too,” she says, as he chats with his adoring fans.
I inch my chair closer to her. “Hey, speaking of J. T. . . . Remind me. What happened with you two?”
She fidgets with her rose corsage, plucking off a dead petal. “Nothing. We made out forever ago. That’s all.”
“Right. It’s coming back to me now. And you never had feelings for him?”
She presses her mouth into a thin line, eyes wide, as though she’s a thief caught midheist. “Why would you think that? Of course I don’t have feelings for J. T. You know how much I love Ollie.” I don’t doubt her love for Ollie. I’ve been reminded of it every minute of every day for the past four years. But that’s not what I asked her.
I sit up straight, spine steeled as it all falls into place. “That wasn’t my question. Did you ever have feelings for him?”
“I . . . um . . . I . . .” She looks flustered. Kassie never looks flustered. “Hasn’t everyone had a crush on him at some point?”
“You didn’t actually turn him down, did you?”
She scratches her arm nervously. “Um . . . well.” Her face says it all.
I storm out of the gym. The air in the hallway is fresh. I sag against the cool brick wall, face in my hands, trying to make sense of this.
Kassie lied to me. For four years she lied. The question is, Why? And the bigger question is, How is all this possible? How could Renner have told me before? Was our conversation—our entire time as thirty-year-olds—actually real? There’s no way. Is it possible I knew, deep down, that she was lying to me? Possibly.
Kassie bursts into the hall, and I finally get the guts to grill her. “Why would you lie about that, Kassie?” I ask, standing to match her height.
She bites her lip and looks down. A crystal from her dress has fallen at her feet. “Because I was embarrassed. And you liked him.”
The image of her face when I told her Renner asked me to homecoming flashes through my mind. Her expression was unreadable. “That’s why you were mad when he asked me to homecoming.”
“I—I . . .” Her voice trails away, at a loss for words.
I shake my head and cross my arms. “And when he ditched homecoming, you lied and said he was with another girl.”
She gives me a knowing look. “I’m sorry, Char. I panicked. And in my defense, I did hear that rumor. It’s not like he was some saint.”
“But you were with Ollie. Why did it matter?”
“I don’t know . . . It was stupid. I was still jealous and bitter that he turned me down. It wasn’t even that I liked him, I swear. But no one had rejected me before and it got to me. I got over him pretty much right after that, especially when Ollie and I got more serious. I always felt like shit for lying about it. Believe me, there were so many times I wanted to tell you but there was never a right moment and—”
“I’ve hated Renner ever since . . .” I think about how mad I was at him. How loyal I’ve been to her even though she blatantly lied to me all these years. I can’t even look at her. I can’t believe she’d lie to me. And most of all, I can’t believe Adult Renner was right.
“You can’t blame me for hating Renner. How many times did I beg and plead with you to stop holding your stupid grudge against him? And don’t act like you hated him all because of me. You have an entire list of reasons you hate him, do you not?”
“Only because of homecoming!” I make an effort to lower my voice. “I just can’t believe you’d do something like this . . . You were supposed to be my best friend.”
She lowers her chin in what appears to be genuine remorse. “I’m so sorry. It was beyond wrong and immature to let a guy affect our friendship. I know that now.”
I don’t doubt she’s truly sorry. Kassie has never been one to apologize, even when she knows she’s wrong. And while I can try to forgive her for the past, I don’t know that it’s enough to repair us.