I don’t know how to form the words to explain to El that not only did I get my first kiss, but it ended up being a full-on make-out session. She’d already be pissed at me for not telling her about my feelings for him in the first place. And even though neither of us said that what happened last night was a secret, it feels like one.
It’s stupid, I guess, because El would never think this, but I feel like last night was so completely unfathomable. A boy—a totally hot boy who girls stare at—kissed me, like really kissed me. It was the type of kiss that leaves you short of breath. I don’t know how to talk about that with my best friend. Not to mention that if I told her about last night, I’d also have to tell her how the night ended. With Bo promising that this would never happen again and with me mortified by the thought of his hands touching my body.
I don’t want to tell her any of that, though. As foolish as it is, I want to preserve her good impression of him because I guess a little part of me thinks that despite how last night ended, he and I might somehow still stand a chance.
But a chance at what? At being boyfriend and girlfriend? The idea is so ridiculous to me that I can’t even imagine what that might feel like to hold someone’s hand in public.
It’s not that I feel unworthy. I deserve my happy ending. But what if, for me, Bo is a high point and, for him, I’m a lapse in judgment?
I need Lucy.
The credits on the talk show begin to roll and El wipes a few stray tears from her cheek. “Oh my God,” she says. “Oh my God. That was so sad. They love each other so much and they can’t help it. And society will never understand.”
“Are you on the rag or something?”
“You’re a real shithead sometimes, you know that?” She stands with Jake. “I’m putting him up. You want to hang out for lunch?”
I smile. “I better go home. I want to dig through some of Lucy’s stuff before my mom gets home. She started cleaning her room out a few weeks ago.”
I follow El to her room as she lowers Jake into his cage. He nestles himself beneath his heat lamp. The light clings to his scales, and he revels in it.
After a few minutes, El says, “Will?”
“Yeah.”
“Luce used to wear this bee brooch when we were kids. Do you remember that? The one she’d wear on her winter coat when she picked us up from school?”
My mouth goes dry. I nod. She wore it on the collar of her winter coat. This was before she was at her largest, but still pretty big. The coat was black and drab and obviously purchased for the sake of utility without any thought of fashion. It’s the type of sacrifice you make when you’re a bigger person. Her brooch, though, was like the sun peeking through dark clouds. She’d call us her bee-utiful girls and take us for hot chocolate on Mondays, because Fridays didn’t deserve all the attention.
It was funny. I used to think of myself as a Monday and Ellen as a Friday. But Mondays and Fridays were just twenty-four-hour stretches of time with different names.
“If you see that brooch—and only if you don’t want it—would you mind keeping it for me? Not that I’m, like, owed it or anything, but I always really loved it.”
“Yeah,” I say. “I’ll be sure to look for it.”
Since the day she died, I’ve felt that Lucy was only mine to memorialize and that if I faltered, I’d be letting her down in the worst kind of way. The realization that she wasn’t just mine comes as a painful relief.
ELEVEN
I will not kiss Bo Larson. I will not think about Bo Larson. I will not kiss Bo Larson. I will not think about Bo Larson. It’s a mantra that repeats over and over again in my head, and whenever I’m by myself, I even say it out loud.
A few hours before I leave for work on Monday afternoon, my mom asks me to fill a prescription for her, because she’s scared the pharmacy will be closed when she gets off work.