“I can’t believe it’s you,” I say.
“It’s me,” he says. His eyes slide open. “You really didn’t know?”
“Not a clue,” I say. I study his profile. He has these lips that meet just barely, like the slightest touch would coax them open. His ears are slightly big and there are two freckles on his cheekbone. And his eyelashes are more dramatic than I’ve ever noticed.
He turns toward me, and I look away quickly.
“I thought I was so obvious,” he says.
I shake my head.
He stares straight ahead. “I think I wanted you to know.”
“Then why didn’t you just tell me?”
“Because,” he says, and his voice sort of shakes. And I’m aching to touch him. Quite honestly, I’ve never wanted anything so badly in my life. “Because, if you had been looking for it to be me, I think you would have guessed it yourself.”
I don’t quite know how to respond to that. I don’t know if it’s true or not.
“But you never gave me clues,” I say finally.
“I did,” he says, smiling. “My email address.”
“Bluegreen118,” I say.
“Bram Louis Greenfeld. My birthday.”
“Jesus. I’m an idiot.”
“No, you’re not,” he says softly.
But I am. I’m an idiot. I was looking for him to be Cal. And I guess I assumed that Blue would be white. Which kind of makes me want to smack myself. White shouldn’t be the default any more than straight should be the default. There shouldn’t even be a default.
“I’m sorry,” I say.
“For what?”
“For not figuring it out.”
“But it would be completely unfair of me to expect that,” he says.
“You guessed it was me.”
“Well, yeah,” he says. He looks down. “I kind of guessed a long time ago. Except I thought maybe I was just seeing what I wanted to see.”
Seeing what he wanted to see.
I think that means Bram wanted it to be me.
There’s this twist in my stomach, and my brain feels hazy. I clear my throat. “I guess I should have shut up about who my English teacher is.”
“Wouldn’t have helped.”
“Oh no?”
He smiles slightly, and turns away. “You sort of talk the way you write.”
“No freaking way.”
I’m kind of hardcore grinning now.
In the distance, they begin shutting down the rides and turning off lights. There’s something beautiful and eerie about a darkened, unmoving Ferris wheel. Beyond the carnival, the lights turn off in the doorways of the department stores. I know my parents expect me home.
But I scoot closer to Bram, until our arms are almost touching, and I can feel him twitch just slightly. Our pinkie fingers are maybe an inch apart, and it’s as if an invisible current runs between them.
“But how are you a president?” I ask.
“What?”
“The same first name as a former president.”
“Oh,” he says, “Abraham.”
“Ohhh.”
We’re quiet for a moment.
“And I can’t believe you rode the Tilt-A-Whirl for me.”
“I must really like you,” he says.
So I lean in toward him, and my heart is in my throat. “I want to hold your hand,” I say softly.
Because we’re in public. Because I don’t know if he’s out.
“So hold it,” he says.
And I do.
33
IN ENGLISH CLASS ON MONDAY, my eyes find Bram immediately. He sits on the couch beside Garrett, wearing a collared shirt under a sweater, and he’s so freaking adorable that it almost hurts to look at him.
“Hi, hi,” I say.
He smiles like he’s been waiting for me, and he scoots over to make room.
“Good job this weekend, Spier,” says Garrett. “Pretty friggin’ funny.”
“I didn’t know you were there.”
“I mean,” he says, “Greenfeld made me go three times.”
“Oh, really?” I say, grinning at Bram. And then he grins back, and I’m giddy and breathless and kind of unraveled. And I didn’t sleep at all last night. Not even for a second. I’ve basically been picturing this moment for ten hours, and now that it’s here, I don’t have a clue what I’m supposed to say. Probably something awesome and witty and not school-related.
Probably not: “Did you finish the chapter?”
“I did,” he says.
“I didn’t,” I say.
Then he smiles and I smile. And then I blush and he lowers his eyes, and it’s like this entire pantomime of nervous gestures.
Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda
Becky Albertalli's books
- Grounded (Up In The Air #3)
- In Flight (Up In The Air #1)
- Mile High (Up In The Air #2)
- THE BRONZE HORSEMAN
- The Summer Garden
- Bait: The Wake Series, Book One
- Into the Aether_Part One
- The Will
- Reparation (The Kane Trilogy Book 3)
- The Rosie Project
- The Shoemaker's Wife
- TMiracles and Massacres: True and Untold Stories of the Making of America
- The Death of Chaos
- The Paper Magician
- Bad Apple - the Baddest Chick
- The Meridians
- Lord John and the Hand of Devils
- The White Order
- Lord John and the Brotherhood of the Blade
- The Ripper's Wife
- The Wizardry Consulted
- The Boys in the Boat
- Killing Patton The Strange Death of World War II's Most Audacious General
- It Starts With Food: Discover the Whole30 and Change Your Life in Unexpected Ways
- The Storied Life of A. J. Fikry
- The Pecan Man
- The Orphan Master's Son
- The Light Between Oceans
- The Edge of the World
- All the Light We Cannot See- A Novel
- Daisies in the Canyon
- STEPBROTHER BILLIONAIRE
- The Bone Clocks: A Novel
- The Magician’s Land
- The Broken Eye
- The High Druid's Blade
- The Assassination of Margaret Thatcher
- All the Bright Places
- The Other Language
- The Secret Servant
- The Escape (John Puller Series)
- The Atopia Chronicles (Atopia series)
- The Warded Man
- Return of the Crimson Guard
- The Line
- The Source (Witching Savannah, Book 2)
- Return of the Crimson Guard
- The Fellowship of the Ring
- The Last Town (The Wayward Pines Trilogy 3)
- The Man In The High Castle
- The Fiery Cross
- The Merchant of Dreams: book#2 (Night's Masque)
- The Prince of Lies: Night's Masque - Book 3
- The Alchemist of Souls: Night's Masque, Volume 1
- The Space Between
- An Echo in the Bone
- A Leaf on the Wind of All Hallows
- The Killing Moon (Dreamblood)
- The Crush
- IMMUNE(Book Two of The Rho Agenda)
- The Last Threshold
- The Second Ship
- The Rift
- Homeland (Book 1 of the Dark Elf trilogy)
- Exile (Book 2 of the Dark Elf trilogy)
- The Winter Sea
- The Girl on the Train
- The Escape
- The Forgotten
- The Burning Room
- The Golden Lily: A Bloodlines Novel
- The Whites: A Novel
- Be Careful What You Wish For: The Clifton Chronicles 4
- Clifton Chronicles 02 - The Sins of the Father
- Mightier Than the Sword
- The City of Fallen Angels (Mortal Instruments 4)
- The Blood of Olympus
- The Shadow Throne
- The Kiss of Deception
- Ruin and Rising (The Grisha Trilogy)
- The Nightingale
- The Darkest Part of the Forest
- The Buried Giant
- Fairest: The Lunar Chronicles: Levana's Story
- The Assassin and the Desert
- The Assassin and the Pirate Lord
- To All the Boys I've Loved Before
- The Deal
- The Conspiracy of Us
- The Glass Arrow
- The Orphan Queen
- The Winner's Crime
- The First Bad Man
- The Return
- Inside the O'Briens
- Demon Cycle 04 - The Skull Throne
- The Raven
- The Secret Wisdom of the Earth
- Rusty Nailed (The Cocktail Series)
- The Lies of Locke Lamora