The Unexpected Everything (37 page)

•  •  •

“I can't believe you went
mountain biking
.” Toby laughed as she shook her head.

I raised my head slightly, but every muscle in my body protested, and I lowered it again. It was two days since Clark's big “surprise,” and now, in Toby's bedroom, I was still feeling the aftereffects. I'd spent the night before—when everyone else had been playing a very high-stakes game of chicken in the pool—sitting in the hot tub. “Clark's from Colorado,” I explained. Even talking hurt. Even
breathing
. Needless to say, I had not been a fan. It was a sport for crazy people, and I was never going to do it again. “They think things like that are normal.”

“I wouldn't do it,” she said definitively.

“You totally would,” I said, mostly to her ceiling, since it hurt too much to lift my head. “Don't you think you would in a second if Wyatt asked you?”

When she didn't respond after a moment, I forced myself to sit up, inch by painful inch. “Tobes?” I called before I'd sat all the way up, hoping she was still in the room and I hadn't just been talking to myself. But she was there, twisting her hands together, in the way I'd learned long ago meant she was upset about something. “You okay?”

Toby bit her lip, then came over to the bed and flopped down next to me. “I talked to Wyatt,” she said, her voice quiet as she pulled at a loose thread on her comforter.

“Oh,” I said, my heart sinking as I realized from her tone that this wasn't good news. Otherwise, I would have heard about it immediately, with lots of big-smile, star, clapping-hands, and heart emojis.

“Yeah,” Toby said, pulling at the thread harder now. “I figured that you guys had been telling me to forever, and what's the worst that could happen? So I asked him if he wanted to hang out sometime, just the two of us.”

“And?”

“And at least he didn't pretend not to understand what I was talking about,” Toby said with a sigh. “He just said that he thinks I'm great, but he's interested in someone else.”

This made my sit up straighter, and a second later I regretted it immediately, as my abs felt like they were on fire. “I'm so sorry, T,” I said, trying to reach out to hug her but giving up when I realized it wasn't going to happen.

“Yeah.” Toby sighed as she gave me a sad smile.

“What did Bri say?”

“Just that it's better to know. And she's right. Now maybe I can start to get over him.”

“Who's this girl?” I asked. This honestly had shocked me, and I figured it had to be someone he worked with, since Wyatt was hanging out with us every night. Unless—and this seemed like a real possibility—it was just what he'd told Toby to let her down easier.

Toby rolled over onto her side and looked at me, her expression anguished. “I don't
know
. I didn't really feel like I could ask. So then we had the world's most awkward hug, and I pretended I was getting a text and told him I had to leave.”

I took a breath, to suggest getting ice cream, or coffee, something to take her mind off of this, when I realized maybe she didn't want to be distracted from it. That maybe this wasn't something she wanted me to try to fix. Maybe she just wanted me to be here. “Hey,” I said, nudging her with my foot, which was one of the few things I could move without searing pain, “so what are you thinking?”

Toby gave me a slightly trembly smile, then took a breath and started to talk. I just lay there next to her, as the afternoon light starting spilling across the room, and listened.

“Are you guys ready for this?” Palmer asked, clapping her hands together. She was standing next to the statue of Winthrop Stanwich in the fading sunlight, and she was practically bouncing up and down.

It was the last week in July, which meant it was finally the night I'd been looking forward to all summer—the night of the scavenger hunt. We were all there—me, Clark, Tom, Palmer, Bri, Toby, and Wyatt. Toby was sitting next to me, while Bri sat on the nearest picnic table, and the boys seemed to be trying to figure out who could get injured the fastest, as they swung, standing up, on the playground swings.

Palmer grinned and pulled out three sheets of paper, which she fanned out and held up. “Three teams of two,” she said. “Same items on all of them. You guys have two hours.”

“What do we win?” Toby asked, looking only mildly interested. Ever since the Wyatt rejection, she'd been a little more quiet and sad, like she was a dimmer version of her usual self. I watched her look over at him as the boys jumped off their swings and came to join us, but then immediately look away again. In contrast to the rest of the summer, she'd been
avoiding being alone with Wyatt whenever possible.

“You win eternal glory,” Palmer said excitedly. She pulled out a battered trophy on a pedestal, shaped like a cup. “And this trophy.” When none of us responded, she smiled. “Okay, and here's a sweetener. Winner gets to choose the terms of their prize. Within reason.”

“What does that mean?” I asked.

“What do you want?” Palmer countered. “Like for example, if Toby wins, and she wants it as her prize, I drop our emoji bet and she can go back to texting for real again.”

Next to me, Toby had gone very still. “Really?” she asked, suddenly sounding much more awake than she had for the past week. “You mean it?”

“So like, if we win, we could make the winning team pay for all our meals at the diner for the rest of the summer?” Tom asked.

“Or we could play guitar without anyone complaining?” Wyatt asked, widening his eyes at me.

“Both sound fair,” Palmer said with a grin. “You guys ready to learn your teams?”

“Wait,” Toby said, and I saw she was looking over at Bri. “We don't get to choose?”

“The cup chooses,” Palmer intoned. She dropped pieces of paper into the cup and swirled it around. “Well, I mean, technically I choose, but you get the idea.” I had just looked at Clark, when Palmer pulled the first two names from the cup. “Clark and Tom,” she pronounced as Bri and Toby said, “Tark!” simultaneously.

“Next,” Pamer said, reaching into the cup. I saw Toby look
around at the four of us who were left, her expression growing worried, and I had a feeling the last thing she wanted was to be paired with Wyatt.

“Bri and Wyatt,” Palmer said, and I could practically feel Toby relax next to me, turning her head away when Wyatt walked up to Bri, holding up his hand for a high five, saying something that made Bri laugh. “And that leaves Andie and Toby,” she said, dropping the papers back in the cup.

“We're going to crush this, right?” I asked, smiling at her, secretly hoping this was what Toby needed to get out of her funk.

“Right,” Toby said, blinking at me. Then a look of fierce determination came over her face, and I had a feeling that the possibility of being able to text for real had raised the stakes for her. “I mean, yes!” She took a step closer to me. “Seriously, Andie,” she said. “My boss doesn't understand emojis and thinks I'm making fun of him when I text. I
need
this.”

“So this is like a quest, right?” Clark asked, looking thrilled, while next to him, Tom did a series of limbering-up exercises.

“Kind of,” Tom said as he bent from side to side, then started running in place.

“Can we call it a quest?” Clark asked, his voice getting a little higher, the way it did when he got really excited about something. “I've always wanted to go on one of those.”

“Here we go!” Palmer said, placing three papers down on the table in front of her. Then she backed away, turning her palms like a croupier to show us they were empty. “Best of luck to all teams. You have two hours. Your time starts . . . now!”

We all ran for the table, and Toby grabbed our sheet and ran
away with it, gesturing for me to go with her. Tom grabbed a sheet and dashed off, and I looked at Clark. “Good luck,” I said, raising an eyebrow at him.

“May the best team win,” Clark said, and then pulled me in close to him, dipping me into a Hollywood-style kiss. I giggled, but my laughter soon faded as I started kissing him back for real.

“Hey!” I broke away and looked over to see Toby standing in front of me, waving the paper in my face. “Come on. We're wasting time. And you're fraternizing with the enemy!”

“But the enemy's so cute,” I said as Clark pulled me back up to my feet and gave me one more quick kiss before running off to join Tom, glancing back once and waving to me.

“That might have been part of their strategy,” Toby said as she snapped her fingers in front of my face. “Get you all distracted and then they get to sweep in and take the win. Well, not on my watch. I'm not losing my chance to start using actual words again.”

“What do we have?” I looked at the list Palmer had typed up.

COTTON BALLS
1 POINT

THIS LIST, NOTARIZED
20 POINTS

BLUE GUM BALL
4 POINTS

ARTICLE OF FORMAL WEAR (MEN'S OR WOMEN'S)
10 POINTS

FIREFLY
12 POINTS

BURNT SIENNA CRAYON
5 POINTS

HAT THAT'S NOT A BASEBALL CAP
7 POINTS

BELL
1 POINT

BOOK
1 POINT

CANDLE
1 POINT

A SQUARE YOU EAT
5 POINTS

SOMETHING IN A JAR
5 POINTS

SOMETHING ALIVE
7 POINTS

SOMETHING WITH A BOAT ON IT
5 POINTS

AN ACTUAL BOAT
10 POINTS

SOMETHING HOT
3 POINTS

SOMETHING COLD
3 POINTS

DICTIONARY
3 POINTS

PICTIONARY
6 POINTS

SOMETHING THAT LIGHTS UP
7 POINTS

ITEM THAT STARTS WITH Z
9 POINTS

COIN FROM BEFORE 1980
5 POINTS

DINER MENU
10 POINTS

BUSINESS SLOGAN WITH A PUN
5 POINTS

PIZZA WITH THREE TOPPINGS
5 POINTS

NAPKINS
2 POINTS

BOTTLE OF SODA
2 POINTS

ICE CREAM SAMPLE SPOON
3 POINTS

THRILLER DANCE, FROM BEGINNING TO END
12 POINTS

I stared down at the items on the list, thinking about the strategy I'd been refining. I wouldn't make the same mistake I did last time by going for the big-ticket items. This wasn't about getting everything on the list. This was about getting the most points and winning Toby her texting freedom back—not to mention freeing me up from trying to figure out what three dancing girls, a cat, and a frowny face meant.

“Okay,” I said, reading the list once, then once again. I watched Bri and Wyatt take off toward his truck and Tom and Clark start to run for Clark's SUV.

“What's our plan?” Toby asked, running her hands through her hair.

“I think we go with home-court advantage,” I said. Toby just looked at me blankly. “My house is down the street,” I clarified, and she started nodding. “I say we go there, get what we can, and we're already ahead of the game. . . .” I reached into my pocket for my keys, but it was empty. I frowned, starting to get a bad feeling as I reached into my other pocket. “Oh, no.”

“What?”

I turned in the direction Clark had run, but of course, he and Tom were long gone. “Clark took my keys,” I said, suddenly understanding the dip kiss. I was trying to stay mad at him, but I was actually just impressed with his technique. I hadn't seen it coming. “We need to take your car.”

“Bri drove me,” Toby said, her eyes getting wide. We both turned to Palmer, who was sitting on top of the picnic table. “Palmer, we need your car,” Toby said, running up to her. She grabbed Palmer's purse, then started shaking the contents of it out onto the table.

“Tom drove me,” Palmer said, frowning at the pile of her possessions Toby was currently rifling through. “Looks like you guys will have to figure out something else.” Palmer held up her phone so that we could see the timer counting down. “One hour and fifty minutes, guys. Tick-tock.”

Toby and I looked at each other, and I realized there was just one thing to do. I pulled off my flip-flops and nodded down the road. “My house,” I said, taking a breath. “Ready to run for it?”

•  •  •

“DAD!” I screamed as I barreled into the house, Toby at my heels. A second later, I realized how that sounded. “Everything is fine!” I yelled a moment later. There was no need to give my father a heart attack.

“No, it's not!” Toby yelled, though a little less loudly than me. “We need help!”

“What's going on?” my dad called. A moment later he hustled into the foyer, where we were trying to catch our breath. The run we'd done to get to the house had been enough to remind me that walking large dogs, while nicely toning my biceps, had not actually done much to improve my running ability. He took in the sight of us, and his expression grew more alarmed. “You two okay? Hi there, Toby.”

“Hi, Mr. Walker,” Toby said, still breathing hard, her face pretty much the same color as her hair.

“We're doing a scavenger hunt,” I said, handing my dad the paper, which had gotten more than a little wrinkled during our dash to my house. “Were you doing something?” I asked, suddenly noticing that my dad's reading glasses were sticking out of his shirt pocket.

“No, just looking at something for a friend,” my dad said as he glanced down at the paper, absently smoothing it out. His eyebrows raised. “This is a pretty challenging scavenger hunt.”

“Palmer,” I said by way of explanation, and my dad nodded. “And we have to win.”

“We really do,” Toby said, the gleam back in her eye. “It's
essential
.”