Secrets & Lies: Two Short Stories (2 page)

He took off his wet blazer and handed it to me. Underneath he was wearing a plain white dress shirt. And he looked pretty good in it. Without the blazer, I could actually see the shape of his arms, and I wondered if he’d been taking advantage of the campus gym. Honestly, I thought he should ditch the blazer altogether. It wasn’t doing him any favors. But, hey, people make weird-ass fashion choices. There was a period of time when I thought purple skinny jeans were an essential fashion piece.

“This isn’t, like, dry-clean only, right?” I asked, holding up the blazer.

Toby shook his head. “No. Do you really think I’d wear one of my nice blazers to a party?”

“Well, Toby, most eighteen-year-olds don’t wear blazers to a party. Period.”

“Touché.”

I plugged in the hair dryer and switched it on, pointing the stream of hot air at the blazer, which I’d stretched flat over the toilet lid. It was too loud for us to talk, so Toby just stood off to the side, leaning against the wall while I worked. A few minutes later, his blazer had gone from drenched to just a little damp. I turned off the hair dryer and put it away.

“That’s as good as it’s gonna get tonight,” I told him.

“That’s fine,” Toby said. “I can’t really keep wearing it, anyway. With how it smells. I’ll just put it in Jeanine’s car and wash it when I get home. Thanks, Casey.”

“No prob,” I said, waving my hand. I sat on the edge of the sink, facing him. “To be honest, that was more enjoyable than the rest of this party has been. I mean, it’s not that the party is, like, lame or anything, it’s just that it—”

“Feels like you’ve been here a million times?” Toby offered.

“Yeah. Exactly. Like a rerun of a TV show you’ve seen on cable over and over again. You know every story line and every quote, and even if it’s a great episode, it just isn’t exciting anymore.”

“I feel the same way,” he said. “I didn’t go to many parties in high school. Just a few. And I admit, I had fun, but they were all pretty much the same. It’s hard to believe that was just a few months ago.”

“Right?” I said. “It’s like everything is different—”

“But exactly the same.”

We looked at each other, then laughed.

“I’m glad I ran into you tonight, Toby,” I said. “I don’t know if B ever told you, but I was actually pretty pissed at her after she broke up with you.”

“Really? Why?”

I shrugged. “You just seemed liked a good guy. I had a good time tagging along with you two.”

“You mean you and Jessica enjoyed sitting in the backseat, making fun of us.”

“Exactly.” I swung my leg forward, playfully kicking at his khaki-covered legs.

OMG. Was I flirting with him?

“So I take it her new boyfriend isn’t as fun to mock?” he asked, grinning.

“Wesley? He’s great, but I don’t have nearly as much fun tagging along with them. I always feel like a third wheel. Even if Jess is around.”

“I know how you feel,” Toby said. “I’ve been single all semester, but my roommate got a girlfriend the first week of school. She practically lives in our dorm room, and sometimes I seriously consider sleeping at the library just so I don’t have to feel like I’m intruding on them.”

“Dude, I’ve had the same issue at school. My roommate started dating this guy from her biology class, and it’s like they’re fused together now. Like if they’re apart for more than three seconds, they might actually die. Sometimes it’s seriously like, WTF, why are you making out right in front of me? Don’t you want some, like, privacy? Luckily, Wesley and B have never been that bad, but it still sucks to feel like everyone’s just being polite and don’t really want you around.”

“I have a hard time imagining anyone not wanting you around,” he said. “But I know how you feel.”

“What’s wrong with us?” I asked, picking up my can of beer, which I’d left next to me on the sink, and taking a drink. I offered it to Toby then, and he took it. “We’re cool, funny, good-looking people. How do we always end up being the third or fifth or seventh wheels? Hell, I’ve even been a ninth wheel. If my life were a semitruck, it would topple over.”

Toby took a long swig of my beer, then stepped forward and put the can back on the sink, his arm brushing across mine. “Maybe we just need to find our matching wheels,” he said. “And maybe we’ve overextended the metaphor here.”

“Maybe just a little.”

He laughed. Then I laughed. And I don’t know if it was the beer starting to go to our heads or the slow, sexy R&B song playing beyond the bathroom door or the fact that we were both single wheels, but the next thing I knew, I was leaning forward and he was leaning in and his hands were on my waist and mine were in his hair and then…

And then I was kissing Toby Tucker.

This definitely wasn’t a rerun. Nope. This was a totally new, never-before-seen episode of my life.

When I woke up the next day, I had three thoughts. They were, in this order:

I had a good time last night.

Wait… did I really make out with Toby?

OH MY GOD, I am the worst friend ever.

It was enough to make me bolt upright in my bed, which wasn’t a great idea. I hadn’t had quite enough last night to have a full-blown hangover, but I wasn’t feeling my best, either. The sudden movement made my head spin. I groaned.

And so did B.

Which was how I remembered that she’d stayed over last night. Jess had dropped us off here after the party, and we’d crashed about five minutes after walking in the door.

She rolled over, rubbing her eyes. “Mmm. What time is it?”

“Uh…” I glanced at the clock by my bed. “Just after eleven.”

“Ugh.” She sat up. “This is one of the million reasons I hate parties. I always stay out too late and feel like shit the next day.”

“Yeah,” I agreed. But I wasn’t really listening.

I guess she could tell.

“Something wrong?” she asked.

“No. Not at all,” I said.
Except that I made out with your ex last night and I know you’d be super pissed if you knew.
It’s not that I thought B would be jealous or that she still had feelings for Toby or something. She’d moved on a while ago, and she seemed pretty happy about it. Still, though, there was a rule. An unspoken but totally valid rule. You did
not
hook up with your friends’ exes.

I mean, I was totally over Aidan Wilmot, the boy I’d dated freshman year of high school, but I still wouldn’t be happy if B or Jess suddenly decided to stick their tongues down his throat. It would just be too weird.

“No, everything’s fine,” I said again. “Why do you ask?”

“Uh, because you sprang up like the house was on fire. And now you’re acting kind of strange.”

“Oh, that… um, no. I just remembered that Mom wanted to go have lunch in Oak Hill, then do some Christmas shopping, and I said I’d go with her. I’d better start getting ready.” I jumped out of bed and headed for my closet. Behind me, I heard the mattress creak as B got to her feet.

“Should I call my dad and ask him to pick me up?” she asked.

When I turned around, she was putting on last night’s wrinkled clothes. “No. Mom and I can drop you off. No problem.”

“Okay. Thanks.”

Mom was eating a bagel and wearing her embarrassing Christmas sweater when we got downstairs.

“How was the party?” she asked. “I heard the two of you sneak in.”

“Fine,” I said, popping a few pieces of bread into the toaster for me and Bianca.

Mom raised an eyebrow. “Just fine? That’s all I get?”

I shrugged. I wasn’t exactly eager to talk about last night’s events. Not with my mom and not in front of Bianca. Luckily, Mom noticed what time it was and became too busy hurrying us through breakfast to persist in her questioning.

Ten minutes later, all three of us were out the door.

***

After we dropped B off, Mom and I headed to Oak Hill, the next town over from Hamilton and the closest thing we had to a “city” until you reached Chicago. It wasn’t much to brag about. A ridiculously tiny shopping mall. Two or three chain restaurants. A Greyhound station. Oak Hill did have one thing I was grateful for, though: Cindependent, a terribly named but totally awesome independent movie theater.

I’d only ventured in there once or twice during high school. I always kind of thought indie flicks were only for pretentious hipsters. But over the past couple months, my perception had changed. So on our way to lunch, I asked Mom to pull into the parking lot so I could run inside and grab a ticket for the afternoon showing of a new French film.

After we ate at a little café inside the mall, Mom went off to shop for gifts, and we promised to meet in front of the mall’s main entrance around six that night. I headed for the little salon next to Sears to get my hair cut. Being a broke college student, I hadn’t had the cash to keep up with cutting my hair, so it had grown from its pixie cut all the way to nearly my shoulders. And a ton of it was made up of dead ends. Ew.

I flipped through a few stylebooks, deciding to do something different. Instead of going back to the pixie cut, I pointed the stylist to an asymmetrical look where the longest pieces would fall near my chin. I couldn’t stop looking in the mirror as she cut away the blond strands, and when she was done, I just kept staring. I wasn’t the bragging type, but it looked pretty badass.

I paid, leaving a nice tip, then headed out to the center of the mall, where a set of benches formed a large square. There was a long line of parents waiting to take their kids’ pictures with Santa in the middle of the square. I sat down and pulled out a magazine I’d brought along. Normally I would have been all over the shopping, but Mom had placed me on a no-shopping ban until after Christmas to keep me from buying anything she may have already gotten me as a gift.

Between pages of celebrity gossip, I checked the clock on my phone, waiting for the time when I’d need to catch the bus over to the theater. I’d just finished an article about a pregnant TV star when I heard someone say, “Casey?” and looked up.

Toby, dressed in khakis and a dark blue blazer, was weaving his way around the Santa line, carrying a few shopping bags. He smiled as he headed toward me. My heart sped up. Partly from guilt because we’d made out last night and partly because… well, we’d made out last night, and I’d kind of maybe really liked it. Which just made me feel guiltier.

“Hey,” he said when he was standing in front of me.

“Hey,” I repeated.

“You changed your hair,” he said. “I really like it.”

“Oh, thanks,” I said, tugging on one of the chin-length pieces. “I didn’t think boys noticed that sort of thing.”

“I don’t think we do most of the time.” He gestured to the bench. “Mind if I sit?”

“Uh, sure. Go ahead.”

He put his shopping bags on the ground, then sat down beside me, leaving a few inches of space between us. It wasn’t enough space to keep me from feeling nervous, though.

“So what are you doing here?” I asked.

“Running errands for my parents. Dad needed a few new belts and Mom needed some socks. Now that I’m home, I get the honor of shopping for them.”

“Fun.”

“It’s not so bad. What about you?”

“I had lunch with my mom, and now she’s Christmas shopping and I’m just kind of hanging out.”

Toby nodded. He opened his mouth, shut it, then opened it again. “So, uh… about last night…”

I stiffened.

He blushed. “I was thinking we—”

“Should probably just forget about it?” I offered. “I mean, we were drinking and talking about wheels and—”

“Actually, I was going to say that I was thinking we should go out,” Toby said. “On a date.”

“Oh.”

“But I guess if you…”

“Toby, I’m sorry,” I said. And I meant it. He was such a nice guy. Like, genuinely nice, not the fake nice a lot of guys pretend to be just so they can play the victim. Toby was wonderful, and he just kept getting crapped on. First B. Now this. I felt terrible.

“No, it’s okay.”

“I really did have a good time with you last night,” I assured him. “I’m not just saying that. But it’s just… it’s weird. You used to date my best friend, and I don’t think she’d be okay with us kissing and going on dates and… I’m sorry.”

“Casey, it’s okay. I get it,” he said.

“Can we still be friends?” I asked. “I know that’s a freaking cliché of a thing to ask, but I’m serious.”

“Sure.” And it sounded like he actually meant it. “We can be friends.”

“Great.” I glanced at my cell phone, lying on the bench beside me. “Oh, shit. I have to go catch the bus.”

“Where are you going?” he asked.

“Cindependent. There’s a French film showing there that I—”

“You’re seeing that, too?” he asked.

“Yeah,” I said. “Wait—you’re going to see it today?”

“I have a ticket to the afternoon showing. I didn’t know you liked foreign films.”

“I didn’t until recently. But I had this French professor this past semester who was just this really awesome woman, and she got me to watch a few French movies, and I’ve been hooked. I’ve tried to convert B and Jess, but it just hasn’t worked.”

“If you’re going right now, then why don’t I drive you?” he offered. “We’re seeing the same movie at the same time. There’s no point in you wasting money on the bus.”

“If you don’t mind, that would be great,” I said. “Public transportation in this town sucks.”

So we went to the theater together. Then we sat together. Then we left the theater together. And when Mom called to ask where I was, I told her Toby would give me a ride home. We were having such a good time talking about the movie that I suggested we grab a bite to eat and continue the conversation. So we did. Toby drove us to—appropriately—a French restaurant, where we sat and gushed about the actors’ abilities and the director’s vision and all that jazz.

And once we were done with that, we just started talking. About everything. Anything.

“Do you still cheerlead?” Toby asked, taking a sip of his water.

I nodded. “Yeah. I’m thinking of quitting, though. It’s not as fun as it used to be, and with my class schedule, I just don’t really have enough time.”