It shouldn’t be a big thing. I never knew for sure that Star was my note taker, I only ever hoped. And assumed.
ZED: We can’t all slack on our Assignments. It’s not fair to the group.
@SSHOLE: Agree. I told off my principal in front of the entire school. I’m suspended for three weeks. I can’t be out here alone.
STAR: But dude, what did you get out of that, you know?
@SSHOLE: Respect.
AGNES: He doesn’t know yet. He doesn’t know how it will all play out. None of us do. But his principal was a jerk. And @sshole got to speak the truth. It’s like, opening doors and letting the good stuff come in, you know?
BITTY: I need to hear something good before I do this.
STAR: I don’t think you should do it.
ROXIE: Me! You guys said I should crash that audition, and I did, and I have an actual professional paid gig now. Like, I’m an actress. A real one.
There’s a chorus of support for Roxie, and I relax enough to eat half of a raspberry ricotta scone Paul likes and Cate hates. It’s not so busy at Tea Cozy right now, and Paul keeps looking over here, so I don’t have much time. I’ve got on cords and a turtleneck sweater of Paul’s. I could not look like less of a slut, so I’m ready, I guess, to do this. I pretend to be typing something very official and school-like, but Paul’s not an idiot, so I have to scan through the rest of the conversation quickly so I can log off. He’s ringing up the last three people in line and raising his eyebrows at me.
ZED: I’ll give you one last try, Star. You do it in the next three days, and you get a free pass. Since you’re such a longtime member.
STAR: We BROKE UP. Like, we aren’t even together. Much less getting engaged.
ZED: Just to see what will happen.
STAR: That’s not okay!!!
ZED: Because you trust us. Because you believe in what we can do together. Because life’s really hard and we’re figuring it out as a team.
AGNES: Bitty and I are a team, both doing our Assignments today. Feels better knowing we both are taking risks. Like we’re holding hands or something. Cyber hand holding.
STAR: You don’t have to do it. You too, Bitty. You don’t have to do it.
There’s more to read, but Paul reaches over me and closes my laptop. My heart jumps, and it’s amazing that I can get so sucked in by LBC that I forget where I am and who’s there and what I’m supposed to be doing.
“It’s a school day,” he says.
“Yes,” I say, and give him a shared Paul and Tabby smile, but he’s not buying it.
“You have any idea how much trouble I’m in with Cate? And now you want to get me in even more trouble? What’s going on with you? Get to school.” Paul has new wrinkles around his mouth and eyes and streaking across his forehead. He’s older than I thought he was, older than he used to be. He’s not joking.
“You’re really getting yourself . . . together,” I say. He’s retying his apron and getting ready to bake another round of scones, and I know he wants me to be on my way, but I want to stare at him, this man who used to be a friend and is now my dad.
“You didn’t give me much choice,” he says, and I try to place what the smell is, coming off him, that’s replaced the skunky-sweet smell of weed. It’s chocolate and flour and coffee on his breath, and nothing else. Soap, maybe. “I believe that is what they call reaching your own personal rock bottom.”
“Plus the baby,” I say.
“I think we did pretty well with you,” Paul says. “You like the right books. And the right bands. And you don’t play sports. And you don’t spend too much time on your hair or anything. I’d call it a win.”
Paul packs my stuff up for me. I guess he can tell I’m sort of paralyzed. He offers to drive me to school, but I can get myself there. I can do what I need to do. I have to. Because my last Assignment made Paul get his act together. It’s working. LBC is working.
AGNES: Assignment completed.
I want to read more—I missed her secret and Assignment yesterday in the buzz and fury of my own life—but I’m already shaky behind the wheel today, shaky in my whole life today, so I decide to not look at my phone and drive at the same time.
Twenty-Three.
I have the Ziploc of weed in my backpack and my hurt from how Jemma has been treating me and Jemma’s locker combination. I have Life by Committee on my phone, in my pocket, and unlike the rest of the kids at Circle Community living their boring drone lives, I have purpose.
And, like, justice.
And for a few glorious moments my head is held high and my shoulders are back and I think I am doing something dangerous and earned and powerful that will change the entire structure of the world.
Dictators must feel this way. And scientists maybe. The super-smart ones. And gods, I guess too. I seriously doubt people feel this way from yoga or self-help books or meditation or even love. Because love didn’t end up making me feel powerful at all. I felt small in its shadow. It was bigger than me.
Yes. Yes, this is much better than love.