“You think?” she asks, helping herself to a sandwich.
“Oh definitely. Maybe sometime we should talk about what’s cool to wear, so you’re prepared,” I suggest.
“What the frig! That would be so cool!”
“Then it’s a plan,” I say, right as I spy my mom heading upstage with a microphone. I tell them bye, then hurry to stand near the front, clapping and looking appropriately proud of her. As soon as Mom is done thanking everyone for the honor of serving as their mayor, etc., I slip through the crowd and head for the bathroom.
Right before I can leave my stall, someone bursts into the outer room.
“God, Mo, I don’t know what you want me to say!” Amber sounds so upset, I’m immediately alarmed.
“I want him back,” Ambs continues. “I love him.”
My eyes widen. I keep being surprised by how serious things between Amber and Talon seem to have been.
“You love him so you can just have him, is that it?”
“He loves me too; he just feels trapped. He feels hehasto keep dating her.”
“Ugh, do youhearyourself?” Mo asks. What even is her problem? I swear I’m about to push the door open and snap at her for being so consistently awful to Amber, but I think of the ways I misjudged Mo already, and something stops me. “You love him, so it’s okay to treat other people like trash? Talon? Your best friend?”
My heart starts to beat faster.
Amber is silent a minute then starts to wash her hands. “I don’twantto hurt Zadie. Neither of us does. We just want to be happy.”
What does any of this have to do with me?
“She is going to be hurt. She’s going to be devastated,” Mo says.
“We didn’t ask for any of it to happen,” Amber insists, “and it’s honestly been really difficult for us too.”
“Oh my God,” Mo says with a groan. “Please spare me thedetails of how inconvenient your friend’s coma has been for you and her boyfriend. You and Jason are not star-crossed lovers. You don’t want me to tell you what I think you are.”
Amber sighs as they both move toward the door. “You don’t have to be such a bitch.” They’re still talking as they leave.
I sink down onto the cover of the toilet, unable to move for at least five minutes.
Amber and Jason.
Amber. And Jason.
That’s who Amber has been in love with all this time. That’s who she’s going to the University of Maine for instead of New York.
Hersoulmate. Everything inside me wants to fall apart.
I do the opposite.
I fix my makeup, go back out into the large hall, and run right into my mom and a group of women. “Zadie! Let me introduce you to the ladies who are behind this…”
I barely hear a word she says, but I know I’m smiling and shaking hands and nodding. “Mom, I’m going to leave,” I whisper.
She looks caught off guard. “Are you okay? Do you need something?”
“I’m fine,” I say, give her a reassuring smile, and start a hasty exit across the hall. Only to see the three of them—Jason, Amber, and Mo—standing in a little group right in my path.
I freeze, don’t know whether to turn around and go back into the bathroom. Or march past and ignore them.
“Zadie!” Amber says, waving me over with a huge smile.
