“Did you know?” Vivian asks their mom.
“Well,” Mom says, looking to Ron for a way out of this, “not that it was happening again!”
“Wow,” Vivian says.
I’m beginning to think there’s more to what’s going on right now than I’m aware of.
“What you were talking about at the diner,” Vivian says, looking so disappointed in Maggie it makesmewant to hide behind the tree again. “That was about him.”
“I wanted to tell you!” Maggie says, pushing away the open white umbrella that a server is trying to hand her. “But I just... What else can I say but sorry?”
“I’m not sure,” Vivian says, raising her voice over the rain. “MaybeI don’t know why I decided to date the one guy in the world who’s ever broken your heart. Maybe that would be helpful for me to hear?”
“Don’t mean to be a party pooper,” Misty says, “but I think we’d all be best served shifting this conversation to somewhere beneath the canopy.”
“I’m sorry,” I say, choosing to ignore Misty, as it seems everyone else standing here is also choosing to do, “but can we go back to that last part? Because itsoundedlike Vivian said I was the one guy in the world who’s ever broken her heart. But that definitely feels like something that Maggie would’ve told me.” I turn to Maggie. “Right?”
She’s still crying. She doesn’t seem angry anymore. Just sad.
“Maggie, right?” I repeat. “Can you catch me up on what the hell is going on?”
Maggie chokes back another sob and shakes her head, looking like she’s just climbed out of a carnival dunk tank. In the distance, there’s a clap of thunder. “Layla wasn’t the one you dumped that night,” she says. “It was...” She can’t get out the name so she just gives a weak nod in Vivian’s direction.
The yard spins. I almost topple over.
“Why did...” I say once I’ve regained my balance. “This isn’t a joke?”
“No,” Vivian says, her voice cold.
I can’t look at her.
“So you lied to me,” I say to Maggie.
“I don’t know,” Maggie says. “It just...”
“You straight-upliedto me. As if this shit isn’t hard enough already.”
“I know! I know it’s terrible. But people always like Vivian more than me. And I worried that you’d... I did it wrong. I’m sorry, Carter. I’m so sorry.”
“You sat there,” I say, “and watched me give a big apology to Layla Banerjee, knowing she wasn’t even the right person!”
“I was gonna tell you that afternoon—”
“But you didn’t.”
Maggie shrugs and shakes her head, crying too hard to speak.
“This is...” I don’t know what else to say.
I need to leave.
“Apologies to all if I ruined this special day,” I say, too overwhelmed to look anywhere but at the grass as I back away. I came here to put myself out there, and instead, I seem like a complete idiot.
“Carter, wait,” Maggie says.
I break into a jog, then a run, then a sprint, feeling the weight of my waterlogged tuxedo.
Guess I’m soaked too.
