“You deserved it.”
“We were happy then,” she said. “And I ruined it. I’m sorry.”
That memory had made me grin. But the apology…something about it didn’t sit right with me. I had wanted it before. Now I wasn’t so sure.
“It wasn’t your fault, Nelle,” I told her. “It wasn’t our fault. Neither of us can blame ourselves.”
After that, we finally fell asleep.
I don’t know who was more surprised the next day, the twins or Spencer, who had been planning to drop in to see our parents and instead found all of us having breakfast at the kitchen table.
I was ready to go back home, so I made sure the conversations were kept short, and by nine, we were all in the car. Or everyone except for me was. I had the trunk open and was stuffing Nelle’s things inside. My parents came out to say goodbye, looking doubtful.
“Be careful on the road,” Mom said. “And stop and eat something.”
“Sure.”
“Call when you get in,” Dad added.
“All right,” I said.
When I closed the trunk, they surrounded me. “Honey, we’re sorry,” Mom said. I wanted to respond, but I didn’t know how I felt. It wasn’t anger—at least, I didn’t want it to be—but something inside me was resistant to just pretending the last two years hadn’t happened. To avoid any discussion of it, I hugged them both and got inside, and they wished everyone a pleasant trip.
I fell asleep several times on the ride home. Mike and Sue sang songs on the radio together. At first, Nelle refused to join them—she always had been a little self-conscious—but at some point I woke and heard her screaming so loud, I thought she’d burst a lung. I tried sticking my fingers in my ears, but it was pointless.
Jack called while we were on the road. I got Sue to turn down the volume and responded. “Please tell me you’re back home,” I said.
“Indeed. You know what’s not, though? You. Not to mention my car. I thought you’d be back by now. You’re in trouble. Though if you’ve managed to find a way to get rid of Mike and Sue forever, I might let you off the hook.”
“Sorry, Jack. We’re almost there.”
“Don’t say you’re sorry. This relationship’s full of surprises, that’s what makes it fun. You want to tell me what the emergency was?”
I looked over at the rest of the group. Everyone was staring away, but I could tell they were all eavesdropping, the gossips. I remembered Monty raging around like a monster, and I almost lied to Jack to keep him from worrying, but I remembered our agreement: no more lying.
“Don’t get mad,” I said. “It’s not as big a deal as it sounds like, it’s just…” Slowly, tentatively, I told him everything that had happened, leaning my head against the window. Jack didn’t reply or interrupt me, and that only made me more nervous. I needed to know if he was upset, and what kind of mood he was going to be in when we made it back. When I was done, everyone else in the car was as eager to know his reaction as I was.
“Are you angry?” I asked.
“I don’t know,” he confessed. “If I’d been aware of what you were doing, I probably wouldn’t have let you use the car. That was dangerous, it could have gone bad.”
“It didn’t.”
“But it could have.”
“But it didn’t!” Sue shouted. “Stop being so dramatic.”
Jack sighed.
“Give Sue some credit,” I told him. “She’s the one who put Monty on his ass.”
“OK, I guess I’m starting to like her a little better.” We got off the phone soon afterward, and my excitement built up right until the moment when we were pulling into the parking lot. We had dropped Nelle off on the way—her parents had paid for a hotel room for her until she could find a place to stay, and she said she preferred to be alone when she heard how many people were living in our apartment. I didn’t blame her—she probably needed the solitude after all she’d been through.
“So that was the famous friend your ex cheated on you with,” Sue said in the elevator.
“I can understand why,” Mike said. “Sheishot. Don’t be offended, you’ve got a way better personality, but…”
“Shut up, idiot,” Sue snapped and nudged him with an elbow.
