Broken Hearts, Fences and Other Things to Mend (13 page)

increasingly terrible notes to give. I caught up with Rosie, and

went “running”— also known as an early- morning bagel trip—

with Bruce. This was surprisingly fun, as he was developing a

movie about a teenage girl and seemed to see anything I could

tell him about my life as hugely important.

But mostly, I did my best to conceal my true identity and tried

to fi gure out how to become friends with Hallie. I even had fi les

on my computer (I had learned my lesson about writing things in

notebooks that could go missing) labeled BECOME FRIENDS WITH

HALLIE and SOPHIE CURTIS 2.0. I had written down everything I could

remember about Hallie from when we were eleven, like the fact

her favorite cake was vanilla with strawberries and that she could

hold her breath underwater for almost a minute.

I made my Friendverse profi le private, with crazy security con-

trols, and deleted my picture from my profi le, so that basically

you couldn’t see who I was, or even what I looked like, unless you

were already one of my closest friends. Then I got Sophie— the

real one— to do the same. I tried to tell her why, but I’d called

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when she was in the middle of a makeout session with her barista

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(why she always answered her phone during makeout sessions

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was a constant mystery to me), and I don’t think she understood

why I needed her to lock her profi le and remove any picture that

might come up in a Friendverse search. But when I checked the

next day, the picture on her profi le was of a jumbo- size frozen

yogurt, so I knew that at least part of my message had gotten

through.

But unfortunately for my become- friends- with- Hallie plan,

it looked like she had taken the same precautions as I had. Her

profi le was super private, and I could see only the smallest wisps

of information about her. She still lived in New York, though now

it looked like she was in Manhattan and not Brooklyn, and she

went to one of the fancy private schools. She was taken— the

Friendverse terminology for being in a relationship— though it

didn’t identify by whom.

My Google searches of her also turned up no relevant infor-

mation. Josh popped up pretty frequently, always related to some

sports triumph at Clarence Hall. But there was almost nothing

on Hallie. I even tried searching “Henrietta Bridges,” but with-

out any luck. I realized this might not have been so unusual for

Hallie— very little showed up when you searched for me, mostly

because both my parents were convinced that if I had too much

of a presence online beyond my Friendverse page, Internet pred-

ators would show up at the door. But surprisingly, there was also

very little about Karen. She hadn’t written any books beyond the

fi rst one, which was now out of print. It didn’t seem like she’d

remarried, but the Manhattan address and the private schools

certainly seemed to indicate the Bridges were doing better money-

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wise than they had been when I’d known them . . . though I realized,

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with my eyes burning from too many hours staring at the com-

puter, that I had absolutely no idea what had happened with

them over the last fi ve years. Maybe both Hallie and Josh were at

school on scholarship. Maybe some rich uncle had died and left

them a fortune. Maybe Karen had found a second career in in-

vestment banking. I had no clue, and it appeared that I certainly

wasn’t going to glean anything from Hallie’s bare- bones profi le.

After staring at her profi le for two days and getting no real

answers, I was tempted to call Ford and see if he could hack into

it. Bruce’s son was a computer genius and went to some whiz- kid

school in Silicon Valley during the year. I knew that it might be

possible for him to gain access to Hallie’s profi le, but I stopped

myself before I even reached for the phone.

Since the whole point was to win Hallie’s trust, I didn’t think

I should be simultaneously spying on her electronically. But un-

fortunately, this meant that all I had to go on were the most basic

of facts about her life and what I could get from the profi le picture—

Hallie in a yellow T-shirt, smiling at someone just out of frame.

And though I had Josh’s number, I hadn’t called him yet. Know-

ing that he was Josh Bridges, and not just some guy with a nice

neck who I’d met on the train, made the possibility of being friends

with him more tricky. Also, now that I’d met Hallie again and as-

sumed my best friend’s identity, my priorities had shifted and I

knew I had to focus on trying to make things right with Hallie.

“Sophie!” the barista yelled. When I didn’t respond to this, she

waved the drink at me, and I snapped back to attention, reaching

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for it.

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“Right,” I mumbled, as I collected my drink and a straw.

“Thanks.” I headed out into the afternoon sunlight. Not wanting

to take a chance with either the tiny sports car (I had as much

experience driving a stick shift as my dad did) or the SUV that

could comfortably seat a baseball team, I had decided to go by

bike. My dad had bought a used one for me at Beachside Bikes,

and from there I’d ridden down the street to the coffee shop. It

hadn’t taken very long— the downtown was small, basically just

one street lined with stores and restaurants. After checking that

my bike hadn’t been stolen by local Hamptons thugs, I wandered

up the street, looking at the beach boutiques that had their sale

racks out on the sidewalk, trying to fi nd anything that looked

wearable.

“Gem!” I turned instinctively at the sound of my name, then

froze. Hallie was walking down the street toward me, holding a

small girl with each hand. She nodded at me, and I nodded back,

even though my heart was racing. Had someone just called my

name— my real name?

“Hey, Sophie,” Hallie said easily, with a smile.

I gave her a shaky smile in return. “Hi,” I said. “How are—”

“Gem!” The girl holding Hallie’s right hand yelled this, point-

ing right at me, and I realized she was the one who’d spoken

before. I just blinked at her, wondering if she was one of those

psychic kids that I had seen on
Psychic Kids
. How did she know my

name?

“No, Isabella,” Hallie said, bending down so she was more at

her level. “That’s
Sophie
.”

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The girl just frowned at me, clearly not impressed with this

explanation.

“Sorry,” Hallie said with a shrug as she straightened up. “She’s

become obsessed with that old cartoon show— you know,
Jem and

the Holograms
? I guess you remind her of the lead singer.”

“Oh, right,” I said, as I tried to laugh in a carefree manner,

hoping she couldn’t see just how freaked out I’d been. But after

a second, I remembered that Jem had
pink
hair. Like, neon pink.

And this girl thought I looked like her? I brushed my bangs back,

suddenly a little unsure about this color choice. “Sure.”

“Anyway, this is Isabella, and this is Olivia,” Hallie said, lift-

ing up the hand of the other girl. “We were just going to get some

ice cream.”

“Oh, cool,” I said, bending lower so that I was at the girls’ level.

They looked like twins, around six, and I felt myself relax a little.

What ever else was going on, I was totally comfortable with kids. I

had always been good with them. “What are your favorite fl avors?”

I asked. I leaned closer, like I was sharing a secret with them, and

whispered, “I like vanilla with rainbow sprinkles.”

I smiled, but the girls just looked at each other, then back

at me, their expressions skeptical and a little disdainful. It was

hard to tell behind her pink heart- shaped sunglasses, but I was

pretty sure Olivia rolled her eyes at me.

I straightened up, a little unsure. I’d never gotten that reac-

tion from kids before, but maybe these two were just the excep-

tion. Or maybe in the Hamptons, you were already jaded and over

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“So,” I said to Hallie, “are you . . . I mean, are they, um . . .” I

had been about to ask if she was babysitting— which I’d assumed—

but I suddenly realized that, for all I knew, Hallie might have got-

ten some siblings or stepsiblings in the last fi ve years.

“I’m babysitting,” Hallie said with a laugh. “Our neighbors some-

times ask me if I can watch them.”

“Got it!” I said. I smiled at the girls again, and they just stared

back at me, stony- faced.

“Are you getting anything?” Hallie asked, and I realized she

was looking past me to Sur la Plage, the bathing suit boutique I

was standing in front of.

“Oh,” I said, following her gaze into the shop. It looked like a

really fancy store, and frankly, I’d never understood spending a

lot of money on swimwear, since between chorine, salt water, and

sunblock, it seemed like your suit was going to get wrecked pretty

quickly anyway. Bruce’s second wife had not seemed to share this

philosophy, and had spent her time by their pool in Malibu fully

made up and decked out in jewelry, never once going anywhere

near the water. “No, just window- shopping.”

“Well,” she said confi dentially, taking a step closer to me. “This

place is great. I just got two bikinis from here.”

“Cool,” I said, deciding to keep my opinions on pricey bathing

suits to myself. “I’ll have to give them a try.”

“Ice cream,” Isabella whined, tugging on Hallie’s arm.

“Sorry,” she said, giving me a tiny eye- roll as she started to

move away with the girls. “But it was nice to see—”

“I’ll walk with you,” I said hurriedly, falling into step with them.

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“If that’s okay.” After spending the last few days trying to engi-

neer this, the opportunity to get to know Hallie better had prac-

tically dropped into my lap, and I didn’t want to waste it.

“Great,” she said, dropping the girls’ hands and letting them

walk on ahead of us. “You probably don’t want any, though.” She

nodded at my plastic cup. “Since you have your coffee.”

I nodded, relieved beyond belief that I’d given the barista the

right name. “Right,” I said, making sure to turn around the cup

so that the
Sophie
faced out. “I’m all set.”

We walked in silence for a moment, and I kept sneaking little

glances over at her, still not quite able to believe this was hap-

pening. Here I was, after all these years, with Hallie Bridges. And

there was no lingering tension or awkwardness between us.

She was almost exactly my height, so I was able to get a clear

view of her by just turning my head slightly to the right, and I

pushed down my sunglasses so she wouldn’t see me staring at

her.

Her hair was down again, and she was wearing shorts and a

T-shirt that looked much- washed and read LENIN AND MCCARTHY.

It was a band that Sophie really liked, but I’d never gotten into,

since it had always seemed a little overly hipster to me. There

were like twenty band members, and I was pretty sure that one

of them played the lute.

In contrast to the informality of her T-shirt, Hallie was carry-

ing a designer tote bag and was wearing stacked espadrille wedges,

also designer. And of course people didn’t stay the same— I cer-

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tainly looked and dressed differently than I had when I was

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eleven— but I was having trouble reconciling the girl next to me

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with the Hallie I had known, who had refused to carry a purse

and seemed to live in her ripped cutoffs and Keds.

“So do you live around here?” she asked, her voice friendly but

polite— the kind of voice you used when talking to a stranger.

“We’re staying not too far,” I said. “In Quonset.”

“Oh, cool,” she said. “We’re in Southampton, but I just love

this area. And plus, the girls like this ice cream parlor.” She

stopped walking, and I realized we’d arrived at a storefront that