Unfriended (36 page)

“Got everything?” Nate asked as he killed the engine and I opened the passenger-side door of his truck.

“I think so,” I said, peering into my canvas bag. For whatever reason, I had been assigned chips as my bonfire food. My bag was stuffed with them, all the normal varieties, as well as a bag of something called “Yumm Crisps” that my mother had brought back with her from the UK.

“Let’s go!” Travis yelled. He pounded on the back of my seat with one hand and scrolled through his phone with the other. “Olivia’s been here for, like, ten minutes already.”

I rolled my eyes but stepped out of Nate’s truck, pulling my seat forward so that Travis could get out. My brother had wasted no time in taking full advantage
of the snacks—and rides—promised due to our phone swap. But since he was largely to thank for getting Nate and I back together again, I didn’t even mind that much.

Travis climbed out, and I shut the door behind him. The night was still warm, the sun just beginning to set. “See you over there,” he called behind him, already speed-walking across the sand to his girlfriend.

I met Nate at the front of the truck, and he took my hand in his. But that didn’t seem like quite enough for me, so I stretched up and kissed him. Since we had gotten back together, things were very good between us. It wasn’t like we’d never been apart—I definitely felt what the separation had done to us. But as it turned out, all the changes were good.

Before, the thought of being without Nate for two days had sent me into a panic. But now, it was, oddly, easier to be separated from him. Not that either of us liked it, but our break had proved that we could be apart from each other and still be okay. It was why I was no longer worried about Nate heading to Yale in the fall. We’d weathered so much already; I was sure we could handle an LDR. Plus, I’d been doing research online, and New Haven was supposed to have Connecticut’s best pizza, which was just an added bonus—even though I hadn’t yet been able to find out what the pineapple situation was.

Nate and I were just a little more serious about each other now. We’d seen what we stood to lose, and both of us seemed committed to making sure that didn’t happen again.

But even though we were back together, I was very conscious about not letting myself get lost in him as I had earlier this summer. I wanted to have more of a balance between Nate and my friends. Sunday night was now, in perpetuity, for my friends. I didn’t think it was a possibility, but I wanted to be sure that I would never take them for granted—or put a relationship before them—ever again. And so far, it seemed to be working.

Nate and I broke our kiss, and I traced my finger over his cheek, kissing him once more and then hugging him tight, hearing the chips in my bag crunch as a result.

“So,” Nate said as we stepped apart and he took my hand, kissing it once, and then interlacing his fingers with mine, “who’s going to be at this shindig?”

“Oh, just the usual suspects,” I said as we headed over to the small patch of beach that was ours for the night. I glanced over at the Second Concession Stand and shook my head. “Kavya and Justin were supposed to come by when he finished work,” I said with a laugh. “So they’ll probably show up around eleven.”

I had been a little worried that Justin would be holding a grudge as a result of the freezer detainment, identity theft, and phone stealing. But by the time I talked to him about it, he and Kavya were officially an item, and he seemed so thrilled about this that I wasn’t entirely sure that he knew who I was when I was trying to apologize to him.

And since On A Blender had been closed for the last two weeks, Kavya and Justin were getting to spend a lot of time together. I’d been really concerned about the
fruit in our freezer thawing, then freezing, and thawing again, and had left an anonymous tip with the health inspection office. So while the “freezer malfunction” was looked into, we were all temporarily jobless. Daryl and John had picked up some extra valet shifts, and Justin had switched concession stands with Mark, solely so he could spend the entire workday customerless and making out with Kavya, who seemed to be adjusting to unemployment just fine. In my jobless interim, I had started helping Ruth with the Volturi, which meant the amount of laundry I had to do had increased threefold. But I got to spend the whole day with my once and current BFF, which made up for all the juice boxes that were constantly being spilled on me.

As Nate and I got closer to the bonfire, I could see that maybe Travis had been right to be hurrying me along, as it seemed like everyone else had already arrived. Travis was standing off to the side of the group with Olivia—who appeared to be sporting several lanyard necklaces.

Ruth and Andy were standing at the edge of the group as he gestured to the sky to point out a constellation—an actual one. Schuyler and Connor, virtually inseparable since getting back together, were holding hands despite the fact that they were both also trying to eat burgers. Dave and Turtell (who had fully embraced Dave’s obsession, and was using his mechanic skills to pimp Dave’s small rides) were racing their dune buggy mini trucks across the sand while Kittson and Lisa stood apart, laughing about something. Brian
McMahon and Sarah’s boyfriend, Zach, were watching the race closely, in a way that made me think that there was a small wager in play. Jimmy and Liz were, as was to be expected, making out furiously on a blanket while, nearby and paying them absolutely no attention, Ginger was carrying on a conversation with Mark and Sarah. John was playing the guitar—badly, I could hear, even from over here—while Daryl tried to roast marshmallows on a stick, seemingly unaware of the fact that the stick—and the marshmallows—had caught fire. Dell was standing slightly apart, talking to Peyton, who, I had noticed, was smiling a lot more lately than she ever seemed to before.

As I looked around, I felt a wave of affection for them all. Now that I knew what it was like to be without them, I knew how much they meant to me—and how lucky I was—in a way I never had before.

Schuyler waved to me and Nate with her burger hand, and Daryl waved with his flaming stick, sending a shower of sparks flying dangerously close to Sarah’s hair.

“Shall we?” Nate asked as he squeezed my hand once, then four times, then three times.

I squeezed his hand back, and gave him a smile. “Let’s,” I said. And hand in hand, we walked across the beach to join my friends.

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… The Road to Friendship

MADISON M.

PUTNAM, CT

AGE: 17

SOUNDTRACK:
A Story to Tell Your Friends/Every Avenue
QUOTE OF THE DAY:
“The final mystery is oneself.”
—Oscar Wilde

THIS IS ME:
Maker of smoothies.
Girlfriend of Nate.
Drinker of iced lattes. Enjoying the summer.
Suddenly and worryingly addicted to Yumm Crisps.