Steering the Stars (32 page)

       “Never mind,” I muttered.

       “You can’t do what, Hannah?” he repeated. “You can’t do me?”

       I shook my head. “That’s not what I meant.”

       “Then what did you mean?”

       “I don’t know, Joel. Things are just not good for me right now.”

       “Hannah…” I could tell he was frustrated. He lifted his arms and pushed both of his hands into his short black hair. His cheeks puffed with a held breath.

       “Just forget it,” I said even though it was obvious neither of us would. “Forget everything.”

       Joel looked down at the floor and then back to me. This time I saw something like resolve on his face. He took my hand in his and turned it over. His index finger gently traced the lines on my palm. “I have an idea. It’s Friday, so why don’t we skip practice this afternoon and go find those last few noses in Soho.”

       “I can’t. I skipped practice on Tuesday,” I reminded him.

       “So what?” he said. His finger made a bunch of oval loops on my skin. “You don’t care about squash.”

       “Yeah, but I just bailed on one of Mr. Hammond’s tests. I think I should show up for practice. Which, now that I think about it,” I said, looking over my shoulder to the classroom door, “we should get to the gym. School’s been out for like ten minutes.”

       Joel didn’t seem to care if we were late. “Or how about this? I read about a dinner theater in Shoreditch in one of my mom’s magazines,” he told me as he drew a star into my palm. I shivered.

       “Apparently, they do readings of Grimm’s fairy tales by candlelight. It’s supposed to be fun and a little bit creepy. Maybe we could do it tonight.”

       Dinner theater made me think of Caroline. I wondered how she was doing with rehearsals. “I don't know…” I pulled my hand away and rubbed it against the fabric of my school blazer. “It sounds cool but I just don't feel much like doing anything.”

       Joel opened his mouth to speak but my phone cut him off.

       “Just let me turn the ringer off,” I said as I yanked my bag around my body and dug out my phone. When I saw the name flashing on my screen, I couldn’t believe it. Everything else vanished from my mind.

       “Owen?” I answered.

       “Hey, Hannah.”

       Relief punched my chest. I closed my eyes and smiled softly. “Thank God. Give me two seconds.”

       I met Joel’s eyes and pointed to my phone. Then I turned from him and walked to the opposite corner of the classroom to give myself a little privacy.

       “Are you still there?” I asked nervously. I was glad he had called me back but Owen and I hadn’t spoken or had any contact since our break-up. I wasn’t sure how awkward it would be.

       “I’m here,” said a familiar voice.

       “Thank God. I know things are strange with us but I’m so glad you called. I just don’t know what to do about Care. We had a huge fight last weekend and now she’s not answering any of my emails.”

       “Why don’t you just try calling her?”

       “I’ve tried but she doesn’t answer. Does that sound familiar to you?” I asked pointedly.

       Owen gave a groan which turned into shallow laughter. “I guess I deserved that one.”

       “You do, but honestly I don’t want to get into that now. What happened with us, well, I think it was meant to happen.”

       He was quiet for a second. Then he said, “You’re right. I have a lot to tell you but we can get into that later.”

       I smiled. “So Caroline.” I said, bringing the conversation back to point. “She won’t answer my calls or my emails. All I want to do is apologize, but I don’t even know what I’m apologizing for and it’s impossible if she won’t talk to me! She’s mad I told my brother about her crush on Miles.”

       “Uh-huh,” he said.

       “But I don’t get
why.
It’s like, I’m not really sure what I’m supposed to be apologizing for.”

       “Hannah,” he said in a chastising tone.

       “What?”

       “You are one of the smartest people I know. Are you really that blind or are you just choosing not to see what’s right in front of your face?”

       “I don’t…” I shook my head. “What do you mean?”

       “Caroline doesn’t like this Miles guy.”

       “But she said—”

       “She
likes
Henry.”

       I sat down in the nearest desk chair. “Noooo...”

       “Yessss,” he said, stretching the word out like I had.

       “She would’ve told me.”

       “Would she?”

       I thought for a minute. Would my best friend have confessed that she was crushing on my brother? On Henry?

       A flood of memories washed over me. Caroline and Henry singing karaoke together every summer when we stayed at the cabin. Caroline and Henry staying up all night watching movies together, long after I was too sleepy to keep my eyes open.

       Everything clicked into place. “
Ohmigod.
”

       Owen laughed. “Just had a revelation, huh?”

       My brain was spinning. “Um, you can say that again. This explains everything.”

       He laughed some more. “Now you know. So what are you going to do about it?”

       “I don’t know yet but I’ll figure it out. I will fix this,” I vowed. And I would. I just wasn’t sure how to go about it. “Thank you, Owen. After everything… Well, you know you’re the best.”

       His voice dropped an octave. “You are too, Hannah.”

       I smiled. Maybe things would never be the same with Owen, but maybe one day we’d figure things out. “Talk soon?”

       “I hope so,” he said before hanging up.

       I dropped the phone to my lap and stared out the classroom window into the London sky. I couldn’t believe I hadn’t seen it before. The truth was so insanely obvious.

       Caroline liked Henry. God, she’d probably liked him for most of her life and had been too afraid to tell me.

       I laughed and turned to tell Joel everything I had just learned. But there was no one else in the shadowy classroom. I was all alone.

I had already resolved to spend the evening holed up in my bedroom watching some of my favorite movies. I wouldn’t let myself think about my ongoing fight with Hannah or the dance. Or about how Henry had been avoiding me at school for the past two weeks. Or that our morning rides had stopped and he’d dropped out of working on the play. No, I wouldn’t go there tonight.

       Instead, I’d focus on the here and now. Which was, in this case, a plan to stuff my face with pretzel M&Ms, salty snack mix, popcorn, microwave pizza and chocolate-chip cookies. To top off the junk food extravaganza, I’d purchased Rocky Road ice cream and a twelve pack of soda from the grocery store this afternoon.

       Dad, I guessed, was on a job. That was just as well because we still weren’t speaking to each other. Also, I didn’t want anybody to witness the epic display of gluttony that was about to take place. It wouldn’t be pretty.

       I settled on the bed with my laptop and snack stash and pulled up Netflix. A “new message” notification blinked in the corner of my screen but I ignored it. It was probably something else from Hannah but I wasn’t ready to talk to her yet. I wasn’t sure if I’d ever be ready.

       Remembering my decision not to think about Hannah or all of the other problems in my life, I clicked on
Sixteen Candles
in hopes that Samantha Baker’s disastrous sixteenth birthday would somehow make me feel a little less depressed about the current state of my existence.

       Five minutes into the movie, Aspen gracefully jumped up onto the bed. After turning in a circle, she laid her head down on my lap and stared at me with pale blue eyes. For a moment, I assumed she was being sweet and snuggly and I curled farther into her warmth. Then I remembered the open bag of pretzel M&Ms next to me. Damn dog just wanted to mooch some of my candy.

       “Little beggar,” I said, pushing her muzzle away from the bag. She blinked at me and I laughed and patted her head. “You’re lucky you’re so cute.”

       Outside my window I heard the distinct sound of an engine cutting off and a car door slamming. Aspen heard it too. Her ears perked up and she bolted off the bed and out of the room.

       Was Dad back?
If so, I didn’t want to bump into him in the hallway. Setting aside the bag of M&Ms and pausing the movie playing on my laptop, I walked over to the window and used my finger to pull my white curtains apart.

       Henry’s car was parked in front of my house.

       “What in the...?” I said under my breath as I watched him get out. It was dark, but even through the shadows, I could see that he was wearing a suit.

       I undid the window lock and heaved it open. Poking my head out, I shouted down, “What are you doing here?”

       He startled at the sound of my voice but quickly recovered. He lifted his face and when he saw me with my head hanging out of the window, he smiled cautiously.

       “You agreed to go to Homecoming with me,” he hollered back up to me.

       “No, that was before,” I uttered, disbelieving. “We decided to call it off.”

       “I already had the suit.”

       “But I—” I glanced back into my room. “I’m not ready.”

       “You have a dress, don’t you?”

       I had two actually. Not speaking to my father also meant no truck. There had been no way for me to return the two dresses to the mall in Tulsa. “Sort of.”

       “Then you better
sort of
get ready. And fast. The dance has already started.”

       “But—” It felt like the whole world was moving. Or maybe I was just that shocked. “We aren’t even talking. Are we?”

       Henry dropped his head and sighed. “Care, you were mad at me and I was mad at you but I’m done with that. You like Miles and I’m going to help you,” he said soundly. “Whether you believe it or not, I am your friend.”

       A strange sensation stabbed me in my middle. Henry still thought this was about Miles… “Henry, I appreciate the gesture, but I—”

       “I’m not leaving. Do I need to get my boombox and hold it over my head until you get dressed and come down?”

       He’d remembered my favorite scene from
Say Anything.
That made me crack a smile. “You wouldn’t.”

       “I would,” he stated confidently. “And I have the boombox to prove it. It’s in the car. Do you want to see it?”

       “No!” I couldn’t even imagine what my neighbors would think if he actually did start to play loud music. I couldn’t risk it.

       Knowing I was caught, he laughed. “You wouldn’t believe how hard it is to get one of those dinosaurs.”

       “Just… wait there.” I slammed the window shut and backed away from it.
Was this really happening?

      
I ran down the stairs and flung the front door wide. Henry was waiting on the porch, making a show of getting comfortable. Now I could see how incredibly handsome he looked dressed up like this. He had shaved and smoothed his normally wayward hair back from his forehead. His eyes were sparkling under the porch light.

       My pulse hiccuped violently. It’s not that I’d never seen him in a suit before but… I’d never seen him in one that he’d put on for
me
.

       “Henry, you don’t have to do this,” I said. “You can go home.”

       “I told you that I’m not leaving without you,” he told me. “Go get dressed. You have ten minutes max.”

       “Ten minutes?”

       “Now it’s nine minutes and fifty-three seconds.”

       “What? And you call me a stubborn ass?”

       He stepped through the front door like it was his right. “Nine minutes and forty-eight seconds.”

       “Arghhh!” In a panic, I sprinted up the stairs, taking them two at a time. My bedroom door slammed shut behind me and I spun around my room. The two dresses were still hanging where I’d left them on the back of my closet.

       Green or blue?

      
I made a snap decision and grabbed the dark green one. I dug through my underwear drawer for a bra that wouldn’t show and found a pair of neutral shoes in my closet. Trying to keep my breathing under control, I clipped the bra on and slipped the dress over my head.

       Holding the shoes in my hand, I ran barefoot from my room to the bathroom where I applied deodorant and a quick coat of mascara to my lashes. There was no time for anything elaborate with my hair so I pumped a glob of styling cream into my hands, ran them through my curls and called it good.

       Henry was waiting for me at the bottom of the steps. Aspen was sitting beside him. “You look amazing.”

       “Um, thanks. You too.”

       “Do you have a jacket?”

       “I... uh—” I looked back up the stairs. I hadn’t even thought about a jacket but I knew that I had nothing that was nice enough to go with this dress. But what I did have was an idea. I blinked and told Henry, “Stay there. I’ll be right back.”

       I darted back up the stairs, but instead of turning right at the landing, I made a left and opened the door of my dad’s bedroom. I hadn’t been in here in so long but it was still the same. Traces of mom were everywhere—in the floral bedspread and the checked curtains. I noticed a half-used bottle of her perfume still on the top of the dresser. To someone who didn’t know the truth, it looked like she still lived here.

       I swallowed against the hardening lump in my throat and headed for the cedar trunk at the foot of the bed. It had belonged to her.

       I opened the lid of the trunk and carefully set aside my baby book and Mom’s music books until I found what I was looking for.

       It fell somewhere between a coat and a cape and was made from a heavy cream-colored wool. The sleeves were wide and bell-shaped and it had three large buttons just below the wide collar. It had been Mom’s best piece of clothing. She and Dad didn’t get dressed up often, but when they did, she always wore it.

       “Wow,” Henry said when I reappeared on the steps.

       I looked down and rubbed my fingers over the fabric. “It belonged to my mom.”

       “It’s perfect.”

       He was right. It was perfect.

****

I had never been to a school dance before, so I wasn’t sure what to expect. It was being held in the school gym, which Henry informed me was where all of the dances took place.

       “It’s good that we’re late,” he whispered to me as we walked in.

       “Why?”

       “Because at this point most of the jackasses have already bailed to go get wasted in the back of someone’s truck. It’ll be quieter and we can… you know, dance.”

       “Oh.”

       He noticed my face and quickly said, “But, don’t worry. I’m sure Miles will still be here.”

       “It’s not that,” I replied, flustered. “I told you before that I don’t dance.”

       “And I think I said that with me, you would.”

       I laughed and looked around. The normally dull gym was transformed. The sterile yellowish light bulbs had been replaced with colored bulbs in pink and purple and soft green. A canopy of dark blue tulle was draped across the ceiling like a fairytale sky. Stars and moons made from shiny silver and gold paper dangled down through the folds of tulle and bounced around the muted pastel light like mirrors. The effect was dreamlike and magical.

       “Oh my God.”

       Henry laughed over the loud music. “I’m a guy but even I will admit that it looks great in here.”

       I scanned the gym looking for people I recognized. In the low light it was hard to distinguish people on the dance floor but I thought I saw Alec and Emily. “If the dance committee went all out for Homecoming, I can’t imagine what Prom will be like in the spring.”

       “You’ll have to see for yourself.”

       I scoffed. “I will not be coming to prom. No way.”

       He gave a full-body shrug then led me away from the door. We skirted the photographer’s booth where couples were posing for cheesy pictures in front of a vibrant blue backdrop and a long folding table filled with cookie trays and a clear glass water dispenser on a heavy steel base and wound up at the edge of the dance floor. He gently pulled my coat off and hung it on the back of a nearby chair.

       I held myself awkwardly. I was wondering if people were watching us; if they’d seen me walk in with Henry Vaughn and worried they were having a psychotic break. He must have read my body language because when he came back, he bent his upper body toward me and said, “Relax.”

       “Easy for you to say,” I muttered, watching the couples on the dance floor. They made all of this look so easy.

       “Why?”

       “Because of who you are.”

       “And who am I?”

       I didn’t know how to describe what I was feeling. “You’re somebody.”

       He touched my bare arm. “So are you.”

       That got me to look at him.

       “And if Miles can’t see that, ” he continued, “he doesn’t deserve you.”