16 Things I Thought Were True (19 page)

“That,” I tell her, “is the nicest thing you've ever said to me.” And then I smile. “But I won't tell Jake. And I would never force you to choose. He's a big boy. You're a big girl. Well, in theory. You're actually kind of a miniature person.”

She rolls her eyes again. “You're not very nice to sick people, are you?” Her voice is lighter now. Happier.

“She's totally not,” Adam agrees. “She's kind of nasty.”

She glances at Adam. “Aren't you supposed to be at Tinkerpark, bossing people around?”

He pushes his glasses up on his nose. “I'm going in later to work. I rescheduled my time so I could soak up your sparkling personalities.” He gestures at the two of us. “My aunt is being pretty awesome about my schedule.”

Amy's smile fades quickly and she turns to Adam. “Do you mind if I have a moment alone with Morgan?” I have a flashback to my mom saying the same thing, and my heart swoops.

“Of course not.” Adam walks back to the bed and leans down and kisses her on the cheek. “I'll see you out there,” he says to me as he leaves. I watch him go, and when I turn back, she's still holding her cheek where he kissed her.

“He's good stuff,” she says to me. “You should stop hiding your relationship with him at work. How would that make you feel if Adam was doing it to you?”

“You're right,” I tell her and grab the chair in the room and pull it close to the bed and sit. “I am the jerk once again.”

“You're not so bad.” She stares at me. “I want you to do something for me,” she says. “For both of us. And you're not going to like it. But I want you to do it anyway.”

And then she tells me what it is.

16. Potatoes are only good for baking.

#thingsithoughtweretrue

I'm tempted to tell Theresa I don't need my usual break when she comes to relieve me in the gift shop. Amy was absolutely right—I don't want to do what she asked. But as much as I'm dreading it, I have to go through with it. I want to be able to tell her how it went as soon as she's out of her surgery.

As I walk toward the staff room, super slow, I type a new tweet.

Hermits
have
no
peer
pressure
, I type. I put my phone away and sigh. I look forward to this as much as I do getting my annual pap smear. But Amy wants me to do it. I figure the bravery required from me is nothing compared to what she's going through with her cancer and upcoming surgery. I don't really get exactly what she hopes I'll accomplish, but whatever.

I stop outside the staffroom, breathe deeply, and then before I can run the other way, I strut inside with my head held high, ignoring the jumpiness in my stomach. From the corner of my eye, I see a red shirt at the table closest to the door. He's leaning back in his chair with his legs splayed out in front of him. But with my chin held up, I don't see his feet right in my path. In slow motion, I start the trip. A déjà vu swirls around my head, but before I fall all over the floor, I grab onto the arm of another red shirt boy walking toward the table.

I smile at him with relief. He's a very nice-looking red shirt boy, with firm and round muscles. He pretends to drag me into the seat with him, but I regain my footing and stand straight up. “Thank you,” I manage and he grins.

“Sorry 'bout that,” says the boy with the trippy feet.

“No. I totally meant to do that,” I say and spontaneously wink. “I wanted to check out those biceps.” I pat the arm of the guy who caught me and the rest of the guys at the table laugh. It's with me though, and not at me, and though my cheeks burn and the little girl inside me longs to run and cower in the corner, I think of Amy.

Use
your
Twitter
voice, out loud,
she told me.
Don't hide in the bathroom anymore. Let people see who you are.

One of the girls at the end of the table tilts her head, watching me and narrowing her eyes. I would recognize that look anywhere. The mean girl gleam. Her lips turn up, but the expression is pure evil. I lift my chin and prepare myself.

“Aren't you Morgan McLean?” she asks sweetly.

I force myself to look her straight on. “That's the rumor.”

She giggles. “And there's plenty of those about her,” she whispers to her friend. She either thinks I'm deaf or she doesn't care if I hear. I know which one I'd pick.

“I've already heard most of them,” I tell her. “And they're all lies. But thanks for caring.”

She glares at me and then starts singing the song, under her breath.

All the eyes at the table are on me now. I lower my eyes and breathe deeply. I could walk away, tail between my legs—let her win. But I think of Amy, lying on a table, getting her spleen cut out of her body with a sharp scalpel, and I look at the mean girl and smile, showing all of my teeth. And then I turn around and whirl my hips in a circle. “Wiggle, wiggle, wiggle, YEAH,” I sing.

The guys at the table whoop and clap. I keep dancing and turn to face them. They're smiling at me and laughing. With me. Even the other girls. But not the mean girl. She glares, and her eyes get even narrower. “Oh my God,” she says. “That was so embarrassing. Dancing around in
boy's
underwear, having
everyone
see it.”

I just don't care anymore if she doesn't like me. I care a little that she's basing her feelings on something that isn't really me, but I'll show her. Me. Twitter girl personality.

“I happen to have sensitive skin,” I joke. “I'm allergic to girl's underwear.”

She rolls her eyes but I smile at her. I don't have to take it, not from girls like her—not from anyone really. I am who I am. I don't need her approval. I'll own what I did. Who the hell is perfect? Sure, my mistake got broadcast all over the world, but I'm willing to put it behind me. “At least I wear underwear,” I shoot at her, the same way I'd sass Josh or Jake, people who don't intimidate me. I'm tired of intimidation.

“Burn,” the guy with the muscles says and grabs me by the waist and dips me back, and then he stands, lets me go, and makes a muscle man pose. “I'm sexy and I know it,” he shout-sings.

Another girl from the table jumps up and starts singing along with him, and the two of them groove out while others start hooting and clapping.

“Man,” calls the guy who almost tripped me, “how did you make your underwear swing around like the guys in that video?”

“I put a potato in the front,” I tell him. “They're not just for baking anymore.”

They all laugh and whoop. Refusing to hide and be embarrassed is working.

“You have a nice butt,” someone else says, and there's a wolf whistle from the table. My cheeks burn but I keep smiling.

“You're, like, super famous. I heard they mentioned the video on Jimmy Fallon's show.”

The kids at the table buzz with questions and comments about my so-called fame. I'm shocked to hear that these people actually admire me because of the video going viral. I've been hiding and they thought I was being a snob. I guess it proves something. The reality TV generation—we're kind of an odd one.

I glance over and see the mean girl pretending to be interested in her fake nails. I realize she's actually jealous of my attention. I almost feel sorry for her. Almost.

The guy who tripped me stands and walks to the next table, grabs a free chair, and brings it back, putting it down beside him and patting it. “Sit with us, dancing queen.” I'm pulled down to the empty seat as the kids talk among each other about the number of people who saw the video. None of them seems to remember or comprehend the extent of my humiliation. This is completely not what I thought people were thinking.

I'm embarrassed that I'm kind of digging the kids swarming over me. It's not such a bad thing to have gorgeous guys telling me my butt is cute. Most of these kids go to my high school, and a few of them are in the super popular group. Lexi would freak
out
if she knew they were sucking up to me now. I imagine telling her. All I have to do is call her back. We could be hanging out with them our senior year. Things would go back the way they were. Better. We'd be the it girls we always wanted to be.

It would change everything for us.

And then I look around.

I remember why I'm really here, why I'm doing this. It's because of Amy. Because she asked me to take back my life, to stop hiding. Sure, it's awesome that I'm being embraced instead of ridiculed, but honestly, it could have gone either way.

It wouldn't have mattered. I'm not the same person I was. Because of her. And yes, because of me.

I glance across the room to the table where the managers hang out, ostracized by the rest of the staff. No one wants to hang with fun-suckers. Adam is at the table, chewing a sandwich, watching me and pretending not to be. He pushes his glasses up his nose and I smile, thinking of his lips—and how much I like him. And how incredibly true and brave Amy is and what a good friend she is to both of us. A real friend.

“Thanks,” I say to the guy who got me the chair as I stand. “But I came here to sit with my friend.”

I wave at Adam and he looks around to make sure I'm waving at him and then he lifts his hand. The uncertainty makes my heart fill with a fierce protection.

“You're friends with Goggles?” someone says.

His nickname.

“That Adam dude is a dickhead,” someone adds.

I smile. It doesn't matter what these people say about us. It really doesn't. “They pay him to be a dickhead,” I say. “And he's an awesome kisser.” The table falls completely silent and then I walk toward Adam. The smile he's trying to hide behind his sandwich is the best thing I've seen all day.

Hunter, another younger manager, grins at me when I sit beside Adam. “Oh, look who's joining the cool kids table. It's Adam's girlfriend.”

Adam pushes his glasses up on his nose. “Yeah. It is,” he says and puts his arm around me.

I pull out my phone and take a picture of the two of us at the table so I can show it to Amy later. “You making new friends?” he asks, gesturing to the table of red shirts.

“Nah. I just tripped on the way in. Amy made me face them. And she made me use my Twitter voice out loud. It worked. I think they actually liked me.”

“They've always wanted to like you. You're famous.” He smiles. “Amy also ask you to Harlem Shake the masses?” He grins. “This girl can dance,” he says to Hunter.

“I heard,” Hunter says with a grin.

Adam smacks him, and it makes me like him even more.

There's a new text on my phone, so I open it.

A few seconds later, she wrote one again.

The happy bubbles in my brain begin popping.

“What's up?” Adam asks as he sips at his Coke. He's learning to accept my phone habit, which bodes well for our future.

I hold up the phone and show him the message. He lifts his eyebrows, takes another bite of his sandwich, but doesn't comment. He chews, watching me type.

“I forgive you,” I type. But that's not the whole message. I type more.

She has to deal with what she did, as much as I do. I glance at Adam, dying to add something about my fabulous new boyfriend. And my new best friend. But I think of Amy. And how brave she is. And I want to be a little more like her. I press send and let her go. And then I tuck my phone in my pocket.

“It's not fair,” I tell Adam.

“What Lexi did?”

“No. Amy. She's done nothing to deserve being sick. Nothing.”

He nods and I lean closer to him, wishing we could make her better.

My phone beeps again to let me know I got another text. I glance at it, frowning when I see it's from Jake.

17. In the end, people get what they deserve.

#thingsithoughtweretrue

Adam holds my hand. “It's going to be okay,” he says for the millionth time. I can hardly breathe. Jake's not picking up his cell phone or answering my frantic texts back. I've tried the home line, but no one's answering that either. I want to scream at Jake for not picking up.

It's my mom. I know it. My mom and I haven't talked since the fight. Not really. She's been falling all over Adam, practically greeting him at the door with a shoe in her mouth when he comes to get me. Now I'm horrified how badly I've been treating her.

When we finally get home, I run through the front door. Jake meets us in the doorway, staring at us with wide eyes.

“Morgan.” He looks like he's trying hard not to cry.

“What?” My mom is dead. I know it. Her heart has gone and done what she predicted—failed. “Is it Mom?”

It's my fault. I did this. By refusing to forgive her. She died thinking I hated her, that I would never forgive her. Adam steps closer to me and his body heat warms my side. I squeeze my eyes shut. I don't hate her. Not really. I thought I had time to work things out in my head. I needed time. I planned on talking to her when I was twenty-one or something. A sob escapes from my chest. I figured I had lots of time.

Jake grabs me by the shoulder. “No. Listen to me. Mom is fine. She's with Josh.” His face is so pale he looks like he's going to be sick.

“Where'd they go? Jake, what the hell is going on?”

“Amy's parents called. They had Mom's cell number because of your trip.” Jake presses his lips tighter. “I saw her this morning. I was planning to ask her out. When she got better, you know. She's supposed to get better. She's so cute. Real. We had a, like, a…connection.” He shakes his head.

“Oh my God—Amy?” I say.

The walls of the hallway tighten and the air becomes harder to breathe. I step away from Adam, trying to get space, to breathe.

“She's gone, Chaps.” Jake's voice fades out, as if I'm listening to him from inside a tunnel. “Her surgery was moved up. She went into cardiac arrest on the table. She died almost instantly.”

I'm the one shaking my head now. “No, she didn't.”

I wrap my arms around myself. I'm freezing.

“Shit,” I hear Adam say, but he's in a tunnel too. I can't feel his warmth even when he wraps both arms around me and pulls me into his chest.

“No, she didn't.” I stare at Adam's shirt and see it's getting wet. But I'm not crying. I'm not making noise. My body makes no sense to me.

The doorbell rings. We all stare at it.

“She can't die. She's only eighteen,” I say to both boys. It's not possible. Not fair. It's not fair. Jake walks to the front door and opens it.

Lexi is standing outside. I stare at her. Jake stares at her. Adam has no idea who she is.

“You can't forgive me?” she says. She glances at Adam with his arms wrapped around me. Her eyes flash with something. Hatred? Envy? “You knew. You pretend you had no idea, that you're the innocent one. But you knew I posted that video.”

“What the hell?” Jake says.

I'm shaking. I know what she's talking about, but it's so incredibly stupid I can't even believe I thought it mattered. None of that matters. But here she is. Because it makes no sense at all.

“Lexi,” I say, and my voice sounds calmer than it should. “This is
not
a good time.”

“Why? You don't want
your
boyfriend
to find out the truth. Adam Ranard? Really? I thought we had standards, Morgan.”

“Morgan,” Adam says, “who is this?”

“Lexi,” Jake says, and she takes that as some sort of invitation and steps inside the house.

“We go to the same school, Adam,” she tells him. I know her well enough to know it pisses her off that he doesn't know who she is. I stare at her like she's a stranger.

“I need to go,” I say. “I need to go right this minute and see Amy.”

“You can't go there now,” Jake says. “It's too late.”

“Who the hell is Amy?” Lexi demands.

“Lexi, you need to leave,” Adam says kindly, despite her earlier insult.

Jake puts a hand on my back, trying to move me to the living room. I grip my toes to the uneven tiles in the hallway, a project that we never get around to fixing. “We
need
to go see Amy.” I try to shove past Lexi, but Adam and Jake each grab me. Adam puts his arm around my shoulder again and Jake lets me go.

“Morgan. We can't.” Jake runs his hands over his short hair.

Lexi frowns, clearly not happy she's not getting the attention she thinks she deserves. “She knew,” she repeats to us all. “She pretends she didn't know, but she knew I posted that video. She could have stopped me before anyone saw it. This is just as much her fault as it is mine.”

My cheeks burn but my hand clenches into a fist.

Jake's mouth drops open and he finally looks at Lexi, stares at her really. “Are you kidding me?” he shouts. “Get the hell out of this house. Someone we
care
about just died and you're here to try and blame your stupid decisions on my sister? Go.” Jake grabs Lexi by the arm, opens the front door, and pushes her outside.

My ears are burning; my head is a mess. None of this makes sense.

My phone rings. I glance around and automatically grab it from my pocket and click it on. “Hello?”

Adam is frowning like there's something wrong with me. He's right. There is.

“Morgan. It's, um, Bob. Bob White.”

I stare at the phone. Shocked. Now?

“What?” I ask bluntly.

“Um. I want to talk to you. I've tried calling a few times and you haven't called back.”

He has no idea how colossally bad his timing is. But it's like I can't stop making things worse for myself. “That's because I don't want to talk to you.” In some far-off part of my brain, I realize he doesn't deserve such fierce anger. Am I punishing him, or am I punishing myself?

He's shocked into silence so I make it easy for him and hang up. I hear the door to my dad slam shut. I close my eyes and see Amy's face. Her disappointment. I struggle to keep in the tears. I'm ruining things. But it's what I deserve. I deserve this. I deserve to have him hate me. I'm a horrible person and I do horrible things.

“Who was that?” Adam asks softly.

“Wrong number.”

The three of us stand in the hallway, trying not to cry, not able to talk, trying to figure out what to say or do when we hear a car pull into the driveway. I follow Jake outside. Adam is beside me, his arm still around me. Lexi is gone.

Mom's in the passenger seat of Josh's car. She jumps out with the car still running and hurries toward us. She rushes at Jake—and then she runs past him and comes for me.

Adam lets me go and my hands fall to my side. “Mommy,” I whisper. She wraps her arms around me and holds me in tight. I inhale the familiar scent. She smells better; the smoke scent is gone.

“It's okay, Morgan,” she says in my ear. “Everything is going to be okay.” I cling to her like a little girl. I'd forgotten these—her soothing hugs. The hug when I didn't get the badge I wanted in Girl Scouts. The hug when the other girls made fun of me for bringing my mom for the father-daughter picnic. The hug when Greg Pierce, the boy I liked in sixth grade, asked Lexi to slow dance instead of me. The mom who had my back.

Some things have changed. Her body is bonier. Her long hair gets caught up in my teeth. But the hug is the same. And with a rush, I wish I could take back what I said to Bob. But he'll probably never forgive me.

“I had a dream about Amy last night,” she says. And I listen to her tell me her dream the way I've listened to hundreds of dreams before. And she doesn't let me go but leads me back inside the house, explaining that Amy is going to be fine now. That's she's at peace.

As short as the time was that I knew Amy, I know nothing will be the same without her. And I know I let her down. I wonder if she knows. And if she'll ever forgive me from wherever she's gone to now. I hope it's a better place. She deserves a better place.