Steering the Stars (23 page)

____________

      
Just as I pressed send on the email to my brother, my stomach growled angrily. Apparently one could not survive on pretzel M&Ms and granola bars alone. It seemed I was going to have to go downstairs.

       I set my laptop aside and looked out my bedroom door. The house still felt empty and I guessed that Felicity and Michael had taken the girls out to dinner.  As if on cue my stomach growled again. I was going to need to make the trek to the kitchen to make some real food—well, in my case, a sandwich was probably as real as it was going to get. To put it bluntly,
Master Chef
was never going to ask me to compete.

       As usual, I felt like a snoop searching through the pantry just off the kitchen. It didn’t matter that Felicity had told me multiple times to make myself at home. It was just hard when her house felt like exactly that. HER house.

       Our fight or whatever you wanted to call what we’d had last Saturday hadn’t helped at all. Things were just so awkward between us and I had no idea how to go about making them better.   

       I found some bread and then I moved to the refrigerator and located ham and sliced cheese and a small jar of roasted red pepper spread. I spread everything out on the counter and got busy stacking. I liked to alternate the slices of ham and cheese so it took a while. I had just placed the bread on the top of my sandwich creation when I heard the front door open. That sound was followed by a chorus of high-pitch giggles.

       “Hello?” I called out as I put the top on the red pepper spread and put it back into the refrigerator.

       “Hannah!” Chloe and Grace skidded around the corner and careened into me.

       “Oof!” I caught them in my arms and they laughed even louder.

       “What are you doing?” Chloe asked, blinking up at me through the lenses of her pink glasses.

     
 
I pointed to my sandwich. “Just making some dinner.”

       “But we brought you back food!” Grace cried. She turned her head to look down the hall. “Mummy has it.”

       “Oh,” I said, glancing at my sandwich.

       “Don’t worry about it, Hannah,” Felicity said as she entered the kitchen carrying a bag in one hand. She was still dressed for work. “I’ll just put it in the icebox for later.”

       “Thanks,” I mumbled half-wondering what was in the bag. It smelled like it had a lot of garlic and there was definitely butter in there. My sandwich seemed puny by comparison.

       Before I could admit defeat and trade out the sandwich for whatever Felicity had brought home, Michael walked into the kitchen and everyone started to go about their evening routine.

       Chloe and Grace wanted ice cream—strawberry for Grace and chocolate for Chloe. While Michael scooped the ice cream into two small bowls, Felicity set the timer on the coffee pot so it would be ready in the morning. Then Michael started to get ingredients together for his daily breakfast smoothie.

       All the while, they asked me questions. They wanted to know about school and my writing and even about the squash team. Everyone was being nice enough, so why was I so ill at ease with them? Was it just my imagination or was Felicity giving me weird looks?

       I took small bites of my sandwich and answered their questions and tried to be polite but, let’s face it, I was completely aware that I was an outsider looking in.

       “I think I’m just going to eat the rest of my sandwich upstairs,” I said when I just couldn’t take it any longer. “I actually have some homework to finish.”

       “You’re sure you won’t stay for some ice cream?” Michael asked politely.

       I was already standing and my plate was in my hand. “I’m sure. Thanks for asking though.”

       Felicity didn’t say a thing. But I did feel her eyes on me as I padded out of the kitchen toward the stairwell. When I was back in my room I made sure that the door closed behind me.

       Still holding my sandwich plate, I sighed and plopped back down on the bed.

       That’s when I saw that while I was downstairs, a new email had come in. I assumed it was something else from Henry, but then I read Caroline’s name.
Speak of the devil…

       I took a bite of my sandwich and excitedly wondered if she had an update on Operation Cupid.

To: Hannah<
[email protected]
>

From: Caroline<
[email protected]
>

Date: October 8

Subject: Let’s revisit the alien abduction theory

Hey! I meant to tell you that I saw Owen last night. He was weird. It was weird. It was like he didn’t want to see to me and then he told me to ask you about it?? What is he talking about?

____________

       I reread Caroline’s email with a sick feeling swishing around in my gut. I set my barely-touched sandwich on the plate and flopped onto my back.

       “Crap,” I muttered to the ceiling.

       I had been able to confide in Tillie about my feelings for Joel, so why couldn’t I tell my best friend?

       She would understand. It was Caroline.

       Okay, yes, this was exactly what she’d been afraid of before Owen and I started dating. She had worried that things would be weird between the three of us if we broke up. And, here we were, broken up and things were weird. Owen was avoiding her—and
me
. And I was keeping secrets from her.

       Basically, it was a hot mess.

       I couldn’t do anything about Owen, but I could at least suck it up and tell my best friend the truth. But not over email. That was for suckers. I would have to tell her face to face.

       Decision made, I opened my Skype account, found her in the contact list and pressed the video call button.

       After a few rings, the sound changed. The video was fuzzy at first, but then Caroline’s face appeared out of the static. “Ello Govna!”

       A lump of nerves was balling in my stomach, but I tried to make my lips form a smile. “Hey!”

       She was moving into her desk chair, getting into position. Behind her, I could make out the posters on the walls of her bedroom. “I didn’t know you’d be calling!”

       “I know,” I said, nervously smoothing my wet hair back. “I wasn’t sure if you had play rehearsal today but I thought I’d try.”  

       “No rehearsal—and thank God,” she added, laughing.

       “Still that bad?”

       She curled her upper lip. “I don’t even want to talk about it.”

       “Yuck.”

       “Yuck is right.”

       “So…” I needed to get to the point. I needed to tell her about Owen but I wasn’t even sure where to start. “What are you up to?”

       She paused so that I could hear the music playing in the background. “I was listening to Ed’s new single and thinking about what he might be like in real life.”

       “You’re obsessed.”

       “I readily admit that.”

       “You’re crazy. You know that?”

       “Ed is everything,” Caroline said solemnly. “His lyrics... His accent… His music… And, of course, there’s the fact that he’s a redhead and we gingers must unite.”

       “Well, of course,” I teased her.

       “Tell me, what’s new with you? Any squash traumas?”

       “Every day I have practice there’s a new squash trauma.”

       She laughed. “That’s how I feel on stage. What about that writing project you were telling me about? Any ideas yet?”

     
 
“Not really. I’m still playing around with some stuff, but nothing I come up with is really… congealing.”

       “It will.”

     
 
“Maybe…” I rubbed my eyes. “Care, I’ve got to be honest. Something happened.
”
   

     
 
“Yeah?” Caroline asked distractedly. She was reaching for something that was on her bed. Off camera, I heard what I thought was Aspen coming into her room.  

       I looked up at the ceiling of my bedroom and took a breath.

       This was it. I was sick and tired of keeping secrets. I was done with half-truths and uncertainty. Before I lost what little courage I had, I blurted out, “I met someone.”

       She was only quiet for a second but it was a long second. “What do you mean?”

       “I met a guy.”

     
 
“You met a guy?” she repeated the words back to me slowly.

     
 
“Yes,” I said. “Do you remember me mentioning Joel, the guy I hit with my racquet on the first day of school?”

     
 
She hesitated. “Yeah, I remember.”

     
 
“We, um, went out. A few times actually.”

     
 
“Like on a date?”

     
 
“Well… I mean yeah,” I admitted, “like a date.”

     
 
She was quiet. The lump in my stomach hardened.  

       “Caroline?”

       “I’m here,” she said. “I’m just trying to figure this out, Hannah. What about Owen?”

       “That’s the thing.”

       “What’s the thing? I don’t—”

     
 
“Everything is off with Owen, okay!” I shouted.

       There was a stunned silence. Caroline’s mouth was moving, but no words were coming out. After a moment, she swallowed and asked, “What?”

       “Owen and I haven’t even talked in over a month. He won’t respond to my emails. He won’t take any of my calls.”

       “I…” I was watching her try to fit together everything I’d just told her. “What do you mean?”

       “What do you think I mean?”

     
 
“W-well,” she stammered. “Did you guys break up?”

       “I don’t know,” I admitted.

     
 
“You don’t know?” she asked in disbelief. “Hannah, you’re either together or you’re not.”

       “You don’t understand, it’s not that simple!”

       “You’re right. So explain it to me,” she said. “I thought we told each other everything and now I’m finding out that I missed this huge, massive, life-altering thing. I’m surprised is all.”

     
 
My shoulders slumped. “It was like telling you made it real and I wasn’t sure… How can I possibly be in a relationship with someone who isn’t even taking my calls?”

       “Wait a second. Back up and tell me what happened.”

       I sighed. “Well, it started with me not being able to say I love you.”

       “Wait a second—” she said, shaking her head, “—you’ve been with Owen since forever.”

       I nodded.

     
 
“And you haven’t told him that you love him?” she asked, horrified. “I just assumed…”

       My eyes started to well. “I
do
love Owen. At least—I think I do. But not the way he wants me to. Not the way I want to.”

       Caroline’s whole face softened. “Okay, I understand. So, what happened when you couldn’t say it?”

       “Well, it was right before I left and we had this huge blowout. And we haven’t talked since.”

       “All over the I love you thing?”

     
 
“No… there was more.”

       “What was it?” she asked, her voice laced with concern. “London?”

     
 
“Yeah. He didn’t want me to go and he told me so.”

       Caroline moved her head from side to side. “I knew he was struggling with you being gone for a whole year, but... I didn’t know it was that serious. God, it’s Owen. I figured he’d get over it because you’ve been together for, like, I don’t know… forever and he cares about you.”

       “Does he?”

       She blanched. “Of course he does.”

       “If you care about someone, you don’t hold them back, do you?”

       “No, but…”

     
 
“You want them to chase after their dreams even if it means you get left behind,” I continued. “You certainly don’t play a guilt game and when that doesn’t work, cut off all forms of communication with them.”

     
 
She considered this. “And that’s what Owen did?”

     
 
“That’s what Owen did,” I said on a sigh.