For the rest of May and into June, we settled into a grudging routine. They stayed away from the restaurant, and I stayed away from them at school. I tried to focus on graduation, getting our caps and gowns, rehearsing. Nicole was still spending all her free time with them and sneaking out at least once every weekend. Because she was careful not to alarm our parents, they never thought to check on her. I kept waiting for the fallout, for her to have some sort of fight with the girls, but they seemed to adore her, treating her like she was their little sister, walking with their arms around her, braiding her hair. She also seemed happy, happier than she’d been for a while. I noticed she’d started playing love songs over and over in her bedroom, sometimes softly singing along. I didn’t see her with any boys at school or at any of the parties where I occasionally saw her when Shauna and the girls brought her. But I wondered if she’d started seeing that older boy again.
With both of us working, Ryan and I didn’t have a lot of time together on the weekends anymore, but we’d leave notes for each other in our lockers, and we were counting the days until school was finished. Then we could work full-time and hopefully get a place together by the end of the summer. We were collecting things already, hitting flea markets and buying towels and dishes if Walmart had a sale. It made me feel grown up, shopping together, Ryan’s arm slung around my shoulder as we pushed the cart through the aisles, comparing prices, talking about what we needed. I could see our lives unfolding, could feel how great it was going to be. We just had to get through the summer.
*
Finally it was the end of June and we graduated. Mom cried through the whole walk-up ceremony—I was pretty sure it was in relief. There was a dry grad the next weekend, like a prom, but I wasn’t sure if we were going to that or up to the lake, where a lot of the kids would be partying. Ryan was pushing for the prom, then the party—he said he wanted to slow-dance with me and see me in a dress for once. But I was worried about what Shauna and her friends might do—a big school dance would be the perfect place to humiliate me one last time.
The week before we graduated, Amy had called me at home one night. I was surprised when my dad handed me the phone and said who was on the other end. I took the phone to the living room and said a cautious, “Hello?”
“Hi, Toni. How’ve you been?” She sounded nervous.
“I’m okay.” Why was she calling? Was it a setup? I waited for the telltale laughter in the background.
“I just wanted to say I’m sorry for how I treated you. Fiona, she’s mad at Shauna right now because Shauna’s been flirting with Max.” Fiona was another girl we used to hang out with, until she got a new car, better clothes, and started hanging out with the popular kids. Fiona and Max had been going together since the ninth grade. “So Fiona told me that Shauna told her that she was the one who really called Warren.”
“I tried to tell you that it wasn’t true.”
“I know.” Now she sounded embarrassed. “He was just so convincing.”
“I was your friend—you should have believed me.”
“The way Warren said it, it sounded so real. And then all that other stuff he told me you’d said about my family and all … It just made me so upset I couldn’t even think straight. I’m sorry I said those things about you and Ryan.”
I was quiet. I could imagine how convincing Shauna had been, but it still hurt—and I didn’t know if I could trust Amy anymore.
“Some of the stuff you said, that was harsh,” I said.
“I’m really sorry.” Her voice was thick, her nose stuffy, like she might be crying. “But you also said some mean things.”
“I know. I’m sorry too.”
“Can we be friends again? And go to the dry grad together? I’m dating Chad now, and he hangs out with Ryan sometimes at the pit.”
“I don’t know. A lot has changed.” I wanted to forgive her, but I felt tears come to my own eyes when I remembered how devastated I’d been when she dumped me, how humiliated I felt standing in the hall while she called me a liar.
She sighed. “Okay, I understand. Just think about it, please. I really miss you.”
*
I talked things over with Ryan, and he thought I should forgive Amy. Part of me still wanted to be angry, another part wanted to show Shauna she hadn’t taken everything away from me—and I had missed Amy a lot. I called her and we got together a couple of times, but it was different, and I wasn’t sure if we’d ever be close again. I was cautious now, scared to reveal anything personal to her. I did tell her Nicole and I hadn’t been getting along, and she also thought it was weird that Shauna would even want to hang out with someone younger.
“I mean, your sister’s really cool and popular and pretty, but Shauna doesn’t usually like anyone who could be competition. I wonder what will happen after they graduate. I heard that all of Nicole’s old friends are pissed at her.”
“Yeah, me too.” Ryan had told me the rumors. I felt a pang for my sister, who was so caught up in Shauna’s world she wasn’t seeing how many bridges she’d burned or what Shauna and her crew might do to her one day—how brutal they could be when they decided someone had wronged them. Then I remembered her looking away when the girls said mean things to me at the restaurant. She was one of them now, and there was nothing I could do about it.
*