“I’m so tired of reading about rich, straight, white men and their angst! Like it’s some epic drama. Please.” Mal threw uptheir hands. “Plus, I’ve been really busy withMixxedMediastuff, and I just—” Mal almost saidforgot, but that wasn’t true. The number of pages they were meant to have read each day haunted them in the moments before falling asleep, the red triple-underlined notes in their planner lurking in the back of their mind. “I haven’t wanted to do it.”
It was a little more honest than Mal meant to be. Even the words leaving their lips felt like a rebellion. But it was true: Theyhadn’t, not when there was interesting work to be done for the zine—and there was always work to be done for the zine lately.
“I get you,” Maddie said graciously. “I do.” But the look she gave them was so careful Mal could feel it on their skin as the siblings walked side by side. They couldn’t tell whether it was Maddie’s gaze or the autumn breeze making their cheeks feel cold.
“It’s just unusual for you to blow off English homework,” she finally said after half a block filled only with the huff of Mal speed-walking. “If it was math, sure, whatever, but English is yourthing, Mal.”
Mal shrugged.
“Just—are you okay?”
“Yes.” Mal didn’t even have to think about it, because this was the only acceptable answer.
“It’s a bit of a crunch right now is all,” they went on, when Maddie grew quiet again beside them. “Everything will calm down after. And it’s only one assignment.”
Thiswas only one assignment, at least. There was also about two weeks’ worth of math homework, half ofHamletwaiting unread at the bottom of their backpack, and… whatever was going on with this outfit. Still, they nodded firmly at Maddie—and at themself. As much as it was Mal’s job to show up for Maddie, they knew it was Maddie’s job to make sure they stayed on track. And theywould! They’d get back on top of things. They wouldn’t let her down.
“Next weekend is the zine layout party, so I’ll be a little weird until that’s over, but after, I’ll be back to normal. Pinkie promise.”
Mal held out their pinkie to their sister. Maddie considered it for a while. Then, reaching out, she hooked her pinkie through Mal’s, catching it despite how it bobbed from walking too fast.
“Okay, deal. I’ll wait until after next weekend to worry about you,” she said, her grin light and playful. “You’ve got until after my game next Saturday.”
Mal blinked, their pinkie still looped with Maddie’s even as they got closer to the front gates of school. “Your what?”
Maddie laughed, clearly thinking Mal was joking. When Mal didn’t laugh back, she said, “The first game of the season? Next Saturday? Literally on that field right over”—with the hand still awkwardly joined to Mal’s, she gestured at the soccer field at the far end of the grounds—“there?”
“Shit,” said Mal.
They dropped Maddie’s pinkie and, turning awkwardly on the spot, flung their backpack around so they could unzip it. Digging out their planner, they flipped to this weekend’s spread.
“I didn’t write it down,” they said.
“What?” Maddie asked, confusion clear in her voice.
Mal tapped their Saturday, which was covered entirely with notes: lists of things to do for the zine, who was responsible for which part of the layout, which snack would be brought by which person. It was flagged, too, with several Post-it notes of various neon colors covered in Emerson’s untidy scrawl, some of them functional (REMEMBER TO BRING GLUE STICKS!!!) and others less so (a bad doodle of Prince Pringles holding a coffee mug). There was only enough time for all these things because Mal had requested time off at Dollar City for a reason they couldn’t remember.
Wait.
Mal pulled one of the Post-it notes back, the one that reminded them so supportively it bordered on aggressive thatYou! Can! Do! It!!!There, in black ink and handwriting much neater than the frantic scribbles they’d made over the course of this week, was written:MADDIE—HOME GAME—NOON.
Thatmust have been the reason Mal had requested time off.
“Shit, Maddie, I’m sorry,” they said in a rush. “I—well, it—” They gestured at the mess of their notes. “It got lost under allthis.”
Maddie stopped walking just shy of the school’s gate. For a moment, her face flashed with a look so disappointed Mal could see the shades of their mom in their sister’s features. Their stomach dropped.Theyhad put that look there.
But it was gone just as quickly, replaced with a smile that even Mal could recognize was not entirely genuine. Maddie shrugged. “That’s usually the plan is all. You always come to my games.”
The Plan. In the rush of everything, Mal had strayed from The Plan. That was supposed to be thepointof all this: to keep it together long enough to follow Maddie out of town. But they’d gotten so caught up in the coffee- and Pop-Tart-scented world ofMixxedMediathat they had forgotten to even follow Maddie to her first game of the season.
They could kick themself. And theywould, later, zoning out in Mrs. Grimes’s class. But right now, they had to make this better.
“I’m so sorry, Maddie,” they said first. And then: “I will be there, I promise.”
“No, I—” Maddie started and then stopped, letting her false smile slip into a frown. Mal couldn’t tell whether it was at them or herself. “I’m really excited for you and the zine. Like,reallyreally. It’s cool to see you… I don’t know,doing thingsagain. So if you need to be there, be there, okay? I don’t want to make things harder for you, Mal.”
“You? Never.” Everything else? Maybe. But never Maddie. “I’ll be there with bells on. Pinkie promise.”
