He looked at her. “Where are you hiding candy?”
She was already digging it out of her jacket pocket. “Your choice: Twizzlers or Sour Patch Kids. I was supposed to bring them back to my friend.”
Wyatt took the Twizzlers. “That’s what she gets for being rude.”
“She isn’t rude. Don’t say that.”
He opened the package and held it out to her. She shook her head.
He put a piece of licorice between his molars and pulled it away until it snapped. “It’s rude for her to get down with her boyfriend while you’re trapped in the back seat.”
Julia flushed. “They weren’t‘getting down.’” (They might be, now.) “And she wasn’t being rude. She’s just ... taking what she wants from the moment.” That was something Chloe talked about a lot. Seizing the moment. Visualizing what you wanted and then grabbing it when you could. “She doesn’t pass up opportunities.”
“She sounds a little selfish.”
Julia turned to frown directly at him. “You don’t know her. She does so much for me.”
“Sorry,” Wyatt said, looking away from Julia and biting into the Twizzler. “I guess I’m just assuming that everyone’s friends suck tonight.”
“I wouldn’t even be here, at the drive-in, if my friend hadn’t invited me.”
“Sorry,” he said again.
They were both quiet.
Then he said—“What else does she do for you?”
“What?”
“You said your friend does so much for you.”
“Oh ... well ... I don’t know.” Julia twisted her hair around two fingers. She did know—there was a long list of things that she was grateful to Chloe for, but all of them were kind of embarrassing. “I guess she just assumes that I’m up for things.”
Wyatt was listening. Waiting for her to explain. His brown eyes were open, and his eyebrows were serious.
“Like,” Julia said, “she assumes that I want to do things. And that it will be fun to have me around.”
He was still listening. This clearly wasn’t a factor in any of Wyatt Hardy’s relationships—there was no question inanyone’s mind that he was fun. She’d seen him crack up their principal.
“Like, I don’t have to prove anything to her,” Julia said. “I don’t have to wonder whether she wants me around. Or whether she’s bored with me ...”
Julia’s finger was tangled in a curl. She pulled it out and smoothed down her hair. “She texts me. And I don’t have to worry about what I text back, or if I’m texting back too much ...
“I don’t have to worry that she won’t invite me somewhere, because I’malwaysinvited. Even when she’s with her boyfriend.”
Wyatt’s face hadn’t changed. He was still just listening.
“You don’t know what it’s like ...” she said.
He moved his knee up on the bench, so he was facing her. “What what’s like?”
Julia moved her knee up, too. “Worrying about whether people want you around.”
Wyatt didn’t disagree. He chewed his candy.
Julia kept trying: “When you’re worried about that all the time with someone, you never feel like they’re really your friend. The whole relationship is justthe worry.”
The more Julia talked, the more pathetic she sounded. It felt as revealing as saying her name.
