“Sure.” My stomach was starting to hurt. Running away from Cory was giving me an ulcer.
“Seen any shooting stars yet?”
“Not yet.”
Cory smelled like cologne and beer and sweat, and oddly enough, it wasn’t a bad combination. The crickets were so loud and the party seemed really far away.
“So, Conklin.”
“Yeah?”
“Are you still seeing that guy you brought to prom? The one with the unibrow?”
I smiled. I couldn’t help it. “Conrad doesn’t have a unibrow. And no. We, um, broke up.”
“Cool,” he said, and the word hung in the air.
This was one of those fork-in-the-road kind of moments. The night could go either way. If I leaned in just a little to my left, I could kiss him. I could close myeyes and let myself get lost in Cory Wheeler. I could go right on forgetting. Pretending.
But even though Cory was cute, and he was nice, he was no Conrad. Not even close. Cory was simple, he was like a crew cut, all clean lines and everything going in the same direction. Not Conrad. Conrad could turn my insides out with one look, one smile.
Cory reached over and flicked my arm playfully. “So, Conklin… maybe we—”
I sat up. I said the first thing I could think of. “Shoot, I’ve gotta pee. I’ll see you later, Cory!”
I scrambled off the trampoline as fast I could, found my flip-flops, and headed back toward the house. I spotted Taylor by the pool and made a beeline for her. “I need to talk to you,” I hissed.
I grabbed her hand and pulled her over by the snack table. “Like, five seconds ago, Cory Wheeler almost asked me out.”
“And? What did you say?” Taylor’s eyes were gleaming, and I hated how smug she looked, like everything was going according to plan.
“I said I had to pee,” I told her.
“Belly! Get your butt back over to that trampoline and make out with him!”
“Taylor, would you stop? I told you I wasn’t interested in Cory. I saw you talking to him earlier. Did you make him ask me out?”
She gave a little shrug. “Well… he’s been into you all year and he’s been taking his sweet time asking you out. I might havegentlypushed him in the right direction. You guys looked so cute on the trampoline together.”
I shook my head. “I really wish you hadn’t done that.”
“I was just trying to take your mind off things!”
“Well, I don’t need you to do that,” I said.
“Yes, you do so.”
We stared at each other for a minute. Some days, days like this, I wanted to wring her neck. She was just so bossy all the time. I was getting pretty sick of Taylor pushing me in this direction and that direction, dressing me up like one of her shabbier, less fortunate dolls. It had always been like this with us.
But the thing was, I finally had a real excuse to leave, and I was relieved. I said, “I think I’m gonna go home.”
“What are you talking about? We just got here.”
“I’m just not in the mood to be here, okay?”
I guess she was getting sick of me too, because she said, “This is starting to get old, Belly. You’ve been moping around for months. It’s not healthy…. My mom thinks you should see someone.”
“What? You’ve been talking to your mom about me?” I glared at her. “Tell your mom to save her psychiatric advice for Ellen.”
