I love school dances. I love getting dressed up with my friends and dancing the night away.
“Then freaking go,” she says, pulling open the door to the theater. “Seriously, Grace. It’s like you have no control over your life anymore. Are you really gonna let your psycho boyfriend take this away from you?”
Her voice is raised as we enter the lobby and I wince. Gideon catches my eye and I fall into the dark wood of them, forget that your best friends and my best friends are watching as we stare at each other, as Gideon leaves the people he was talking to mid-sentence. As I float away from Nat. We break out into simultaneous smiles, giddy and reckless.
I can’t breathe. It’s like an entire battalion of soft winged things have settled all over my skin. Like I said, when I fall, I fall hard.
“Hey, you,” he says when he reaches me.
I force myself not to touch him. Not to throw my arms around him and press my lips against his, and what am I thinking, I’m a terrible person, I’m leading him on and hurting you and— “Hey yourself.”
He reaches into his pocket and hands me papers folded into a small rectangle. Another one of his epic, wonderful, smart, talented, perfect letters. It’s his turn to give me one—I wonder what he’ll say about my ode to Radiohead, what he’ll think about all my confusion regarding … everything. Home and school. You. I wonder if he’s read between the lines, how much I like him, but how I can’t say that because it’d be wrong. We can’t be together.
When I reach out to take the note, he holds on to it a second longer, waiting for my fingers to settle against his. It’s unspoken, these secret ways of touching each other. No one will see. We can pretend that we don’t even see. I look up and he’s watching me blush, a question in his eyes.
But I can’t answer it, I can’t.
“Did you write me a book?” I tease.
“Working on it.” He grins and I slip his letter into my pocket.
Kyle and Peter come up, eyes like X-rays, and without intending to, Gideon and I step away from each other. I feel frazzled, certain they can see everything I’m starting to feel for Gideon right there on my face.
“Hey … guys,” Peter says, looking from me to Gideon. I sort of hate Peter now.
“Hey.” My tone is deliberately casual. “Only two more shows. Can you believe it?”
Kyle shakes his head. “It’s so freaking crazy that this is it—the last one.”
“There’s still the dance concert,” Gideon says.
Peter shakes his head. “Doesn’t count. Not like this.”
Huge things are happening in the world—terrorism, refugees, disease—and yet here I am, obsessing over my small, stupid problems. Seriously, my boy troubles are nothing. But they feel like freaking everything.
Soon Miss B is corralling everyone onto the stage. I lead the actors in their warm-ups, doing tongue twisters like “You know New York, unique New York, you know you need unique New York.” My favorite one is from Hamlet: “Speak the speech I pray you, as I pronounced it to you, trippingly on the tongue.” I leave the actors to their stretching and running of lines and I lose myself in checklists and lighting cues and yelling at the crew, and for the first time in days I feel like myself.
But then the show is over and my mom is late and I have too much time to think about you. What are we doing, Gav? Why can’t we let each other go?
“Where’s your ride?” Gideon asks, coming to stand beside me.
I’m in front of the theater, leaning against one of the Greek-style pillars. I should have taken Nat up on her offer to drop me off at home, but I assumed my mom was already on her way.
I breathe out a frustrated sigh. “Who knows?”
“I just so happen to own a vehicle that could transport you to any location you so desire,” he says. “I even put it through the car wash yesterday, so you’d be in for a treat. I only clean Fran on the night of the full moon.”
“I’m not sure which is weirder—the fact that you named your car Fran or that you base your car washes on the lunar cycle.”
“What can I say? I’m a man of mystery.” He nods toward his beat-up VW Golf. “Come on. Your carriage awaits.”
Like you wouldn’t totally freak out about me getting a ride home from Gideon.
“My mom’s on her way, but thanks anyway.” I smile. “I’ll have to meet Fran some other time.”
Gideon sets down his bag and stretches his arms over his head. “Well, all good things are worth the wait.”
I don’t think he’s talking about his car. He moves closer and I shiver a little when his arm brushes mine. Stupid girl, stop it.
“You don’t have to wait with me,” I say.
Don’t go.
“I’m not waiting with you. I’m … taking a break. Before I go home. I might meditate here after you leave.”
I raise an eyebrow. “That is such bullshit.”
He laughs, soft. “Yeah.”
We stand there for a little, quiet.
“Grace—”
“Don’t,” I whisper. I know what he’s going to say. It’s time and it can’t be because I don’t want to break any hearts.
“We have a situation,” he says quietly. “You know that.”
I cross my arms, hugging myself. “I love him.”
I don’t look at Gideon as I say this. I don’t want to see the look on his face.
“I know that. But you’re not in love with him—and that’s where I come in.”
I turn to him, staring. He just said it all out loud, just like that.
And the world didn’t fall apart.
“I can’t break up with him,” I say.
“Why?”
“I don’t know.”
Kill. Myself.
“Try,” Gideon says, gentle. “Try to explain it to me.”
“It’s been so hard,” I whisper. “And we both keep saying that once I graduate, it’ll be okay. I mean, you know my parents, how strict they are.”
“Yeah.”
“And, like, if all those rules weren’t in place, maybe everything would be fine.”
“Okay … but there’s still the question of—”
He points to himself.
“I know.” I stare up at the stars, wishing I had courage. Wishing I could take his hand.
My mom pulls up then and I give her a quick wave.
I grab my backpack, relieved and disappointed at the same time.
But Gideon, I’m learning, doesn’t give up so easily. He hands me a note written on the back of the rehearsal schedule.
“Sweet dreams, Grace,” he says.
He’s walking away before I can say anything else.
Grace—
Did you know there’s a place in Zagreb, Croatia, called the Museum of Broken Relationships? I read about it in National Geographic. People from all over the world send in objects and tell the story of their breakups. Isn’t that sort of sad and weird and beautiful?
G.
I FIND MYSELF wondering what I’d send in after you and I break up. That’s the scary thing—not if we break up, after we break up. Gideon knows me better than I realized.
The star necklace, I decide.
G—
It is sad and weird and beautiful. I can’t help but think this is a hint of some kind.
—Grace
Grace—
Hint? Who, me?
G.