I text.
I call.
He doesn’t respond.
Grace tries, too, but he doesn’t answer her, either. “I’m sure it’s some stupid misunderstanding,” she assures me. But I’m pretty positive she doesn’t believe that.
After Grace goes home, I continue to replay the entire porch conversation in my head, looking for clues, trying to remember exactly when I noticed something was wrong. I ask my dad, but he’s no help. I’m so anguished, I even ask Wanda, and when I can tell by the expression on her face that even she feels pity for my desperate state, I nearly start sobbing in front of her, and that’s when I know things have gone to hell in a handbasket.
“He claimed he got a text sometime during or after your dad was telling that story,” Wanda says.
I rub the sockets of my eyes with the heel of my palms; my head’s throbbing. On top of this, I think I’m getting sick. “But why wouldn’t he tell me about it?”
“I hate to ask this,” my dad says in a gentle voice, “but did you do anything that may have wounded his feelings? Lie to him in some way that he may have found out about?”
“No!” I say. “Like cheat on him or something?”
Dad raises both hands. “I didn’t mean to imply that. Does he know about your online friend?”
“Alex?” I shake my head. “I haven’t spoken to Alex online in weeks. And I never met him in person—or even found him. He blew me off because he found a girlfriend or something, I don’t know. It doesn’t matter. We never even really irted. He was a sweet guy. We were just friends, honest.”
“No sexting or dirty photos that could have been leaked online?” Wanda asks.
“God no,” I say, and my dad practically wilts, he’s so relieved. Way to have faith, jeez.
“Just checking,” Wanda says. She’s in total cop-interrogation mode. “And Porter was the hickey giver, right?”
“Yes,” I snap. I don’t mean to, but I can’t help it.
I don’t like where this conversation is going. Before long, she’s going to ask me to submit to STD testing. And meanwhile, my dad, who’s staring absently at his sci- movies, makes a choking noise, like he just realized something, but when I ask him what it is, he waves it away.
“It’s nothing,” he says, looking dazed and almost … amused. “Whatever’s going on, I’m sure you’ll gure it out, sweetie.”
?at just makes me even more frustrated, and a little angry, to be honest. None of this is really helping, so what’s the point? I sneeze twice, and when Dad asks me if I’m coming down with a cold, I ignore him and go to my room. ?en I plug in my phone and watch it as if the fate of the entire planet depends on one small, melodic chime emanating from its tiny speaker.
I wait until two a.m., and when that chime doesn’t come, I turn on my side and stare at the wall, heart shattering, until I drift into restless sleep.
• • •
By the time my shift at the Cave rolls around the next day, I’ve made myself so sick with worry, I can’t tell whether I want to see Porter or not. I’ve been trying so hard not to use Artful Dodger tactics lately, but I hesitate in the parking lot when I see his van, and take the long way around to the employee door. ?is must be how alcoholics feel when they fall off the wagon.
When I nally do see him, it’s in the cash-out room at the exact same moment that Grace strolls in to count her drawer. My body tenses so hard at the sight of him, I’m in physical pain. Grace has taken on the role of peacemaker as she greets us, lightly complaining about how they’ve scheduled our lunch breaks, but neither Porter nor I say anything. It’s awkward. Everyone knows it.
I can’t do this. I’ve had no sleep. My mind is the consistency of wet sand. I’m pretty sure I’m running a fever, I’ve got chills, my nose won’t stop running, and my eyeballs hurt. I’m not the only one; half the staff is out with some weird, mutant summer virus that Grace is calling “the lurgy.” But I ignore how I feel physically, because I need to know what’s going on with Porter. I have to!
“No,” I tell Porter, blocking his way out of the room. “?is isn’t fair. I stayed up all night worrying. You need to tell me what’s going on right now.”
“Can we not do this right here?” Porter says, eyeing Grace.
“Where, then? I texted and called. How can I x this if you won’t tell me what I did wrong?”
“I needed to think.” Now that I’m looking him directly in the eyes for the rst time, I can see that he looks as bad as I feel. Dark circles band the undersides of his lower lashes, and his scruff looks unkempt. He looks exhausted. Good. “Maybe you need to do some thinking too.”
“?ink about what?” I ask, completely perplexed.
He glances at Grace again. “Look,” he says in a lower voice, “I just … I’m really overwhelmed right now. I need a little space, okay?”
His words sting like a thousand hornets.
