“What did Mac say about the video? I’m surprised he’s not glued to your hip tonight.”
I forced myself to take a deep breath. Audra would be thrilled if her parents showed this much interest in her life.
“He thinks it’s true.”
Working to keep her expression blank, she reached around me and took another bobby pin off the sink ledge. Mom had been so grateful for her high school boyfriend that she’d dated him into her late twenties. I was barely out of the womb a decade later when she began telling me what a mistake that was.
“Before I met Daddy I dated a lot of jerks,” Mom said.
“We weren’t dating,” I clarified, again. “And Mac’s not a jerk.”
“All I’m saying is there will be other boys.”
Like Mac? I doubted it.
But I didn’t say that; instead I went with “Duh, Mom. I’m seventeen. I know how upgrades work. Why settle for a Series Twenty-One when you can get a Series Twenty-Two Invisible?”
It was Audra’s line, not mine. And it couldn’t be further from how I felt. I figured Mom would whap me in mock disgust and then we’d both laugh. Dad would have laughed. Mom would have too, a few years back. Now she scraped the last bobby pin along my scalp.
“Ow.”
“Oops. Sorry. Well, I’m glad you have it all figured out.”
She thought I was serious. As if she couldn’t stand one more second of my presence, she sloppily made one last huge pin curl, then left with a “Don’t stay up too late.”
Frowning into the mirror—because I refused to cry over this again—I separated the last giant curl into four normal ones.
“Kisses.”
I’d never felt so lonely in my life.
I was in bed by nine. For maybe the first time in my life, I didn’t call out good night to my parents. I just shut my door and turned off my light. Then with the covers over my head and Teddy wedged beneath my chin, I hesitated only a click before whispering, “Call Mac.”
Fine. Somewhere in the world a feminist was gagging on her coconut water because I was calling the boy who’d just about cursed me out on the street, but would it have been better if I’d waited for him to call me? Eighteenth-century was more like it. Sometimes need ruled out circumstance. And Mac danced with me anywhere, anywhere—subway, street, cafeteria—if he knew it’d make me smile. He took me for mystery bike rides that ended in tacos and chocolate–peanut butter ices. Mac thought I was a good person, just the way I was.
Or at least he used to.
Our origin story went like this: I’d crushed on Mackenzie Rodriguez since the first day I laid eyes on him our freshman year. Forget his perfect bone structure, that soccer body, and those curls; he was mysterious, aloof, and rumored to be some kind of mathematics savant. The entire school crushed on Mac our freshman year. Nobody launched a Bet on who he’d pair off with, but considering the interest, someone should have.
And I’d have put every last credit on myself.
There was little doubt Mac liked me back. Whenever we passed in the hall or bumped into each other outside my freshie math class, our eyes locked. Beats blaring from his headphones (this was before Dr. Graff threatened suspension if she had to tell him one more time…), he’d dance that eyebrow up and give me this adorable, sexy lopsided smile. Afterwards I’d have to lean against a cubby to catch my breath, Mac peeking back at me over his shoulder as he ambled away.
Taylor Louise threw the first party that fall. Her parents went to Tulum for the weekend, leaving her in charge of their Prospect Heights brownstone. A mistake they only made once.
In my honor, Audra picked our clothing theme even though it wasn’t her turn—Love ’Em and Keep ’Em. The girls had decided a full week beforehand that Taylor’s party would be the night Mac and I got together.
It was my first high school party. We made our entrance, appropriately late. I still wonder if things would have worked out differently if we’d arrived on time. Fawn and Sharma went to scope out the kitchen, and Audra and I went in search of a bathroom. We found a line snaking through the second-floor hallway. Audy cut right to the front.
“Tiny girl bladders out here.” She pounded on the door. “Hurry it up.”
Silence. She pushed against the door. It popped open. And there was Mac. With his face plastered to Keisha Hutchinson’s.
“Ew.” To her credit, Audra did not whiplash her head to catch my reaction; instead she reached for my hand and said, “At least have the courtesy to lock the door.”
“Està roto,” Mac sang out, barely coming up for air. “Why do you think everyone else is waiting?”
I never knew if he realized I was standing there or not. Regardless, ice cream, tears, and a sleepover at Sharma’s followed. I felt worse than when I saw the McClellans’ dog get hit by that cab. I quickly got used to the feeling.
Just that fall alone, I witnessed Mac making out with Empire Quinn, Sukie Moon, and Trinity Henry. Over the next three years, almost every time I saw him outside school, and half the time in school, he was welded to a different female’s face. Girls who didn’t even go to Park Prep waited on the steps to walk him home after class. And don’t even txt me about the rumors. As if the RL version of Mac weren’t bad enough, tales of his conquests, spoken in hushed awe, circulated the grades.
Did I know Rodriguez was dating two seniors at Bloomberg?
Did I hear Rodriguez “did it” on the great lawn of Prospect Park—during the day?
You can’t help who you’re attracted to? Baloney. Try harder. Luckily, our different focus tracks kept us on different floors of Park Prep. Yet for three years straight, Mac seemed to cross my path at least once a day up on three. And every time, he would tilt an imaginary hat or execute a tiny dance step for my amusement. And every time, I ignored him entirely.
By that point, I’d gotten a rep of my own—one for not dating.
Why would I? Never mind that growing up sharing the same search engine with a boy made the entire species lose much of its charm, but I mean, was Izel Kemp worth missing Model UN or not organizing the Walk for Paws benefit? President Malin didn’t have her first serious boyfriend until she was twenty-nine and had already won a congressional seat. President Malin didn’t get married until she was forty-two. I had loads of time to date.
That’s not to say I didn’t kiss a few other guys, or, like, flirt chat, but the only person I had any interest inserting an ounce of free time into was rumored to have inserted himself into just about everybody else.
Sorry. That was gross. I couldn’t help myself.
There was no way I was dating Mackenzie Rodriguez.
Plus, he never asked.