“You’re here!” Chelsea called when she saw him, sliding out of the massive round booth, her curly hair riotous around her face. They’d been dating since way back in December, which was longer than Ryan had ever managed to stay interested in one girl before; there was a tiny part of him that kept expecting to get tired of her, but so far it hadn’t happened at all. Chelsea was just really fun. When it wasn’t swim season, she played Ultimate Frisbee after school on Tuesdays and Thursdays; they went for runs through her neighborhood on Saturday afternoons and wrestled in the ball pit at Arcade World when her boss was out on his smoke break. It was cool, to be with somebody who lived so much in her body. It was cool to be with somebody who lived so much.
“How was the doc?” she asked now, perching on his lap and scraping her nails lightly through the super-short hair at the back of his neck. Ryan shivered. He’d gotten it all cut off earlier that spring—new guy, fresh start, whatever—and he still wasn’t entirely used to it.
“Good,” Ryan said, then thought a little guiltily of the lie he’d told about getting headaches. He didn’t exactly have a choice—he needed a clean bill of health so they’d let him start playing again—and it wasn’t like he got them all the time or anything. But he still felt kind of weird and unsettled about it. Doctors were like priests, Ryan thought. You were supposed to tell them the truth no matter what. “Although honestly—”
“Chelsea!” screeched Chelsea’s friend Sam from across the restaurant. “Come here! I need you to take a picture with me.”
Chelsea sighed theatrically. “Duty calls,” she said, and pecked him on the temple. “Save me a chicken finger.”
Ryan grinned at her retreating back. Chelsea was quite possibly the only person he’d ever met who was more social than he was. She was part of a big group of friends who did basically everything together, including using the bathroom. They called themselves the Magnificent Seven, which Ryan secretly thought was a little dorky. He always cringed when he thought about what Gabby would say if she heard it, then scolded himself: First of all, Gabby wasn’t really in a position to judge, seeing as how last time he’d checked she didn’t have seven friends to give a stupid group nickname to. And second of all, there was no reason for Gabby to ever find out about it, because he hadn’t spoken to Gabby at all since the night of their giant fight last winter.
Ryan felt his blood pressure rise remembering it, purposefully pushed it out of his mind; if he thought about it too much he got really angry, and he didn’t like being angry all the time. He’d trusted her. She’d screwed him. There wasn’t really anything to say about it other than that.
Instead of dwelling on it, Ryan made himself comfortable at the table, helping himself to some quesadilla and challenging Sam’s boyfriend, Ben, to a game of tabletop football with a packet of artificial sweetener. He liked Chelsea’s friends, in general; certain people would probably think they were immature, but they were chill and funny and easy to fit in with. Most importantly of all, they’d slipped neatly into the hole left by hockey this year. Not every conversation had to be a deep philosophical unburdening.
“Erin Christopher is having a party tonight,” Chelsea reported when she returned a little while later, swiping the last bit of mozzarella stick off the platter and smiling at him. “You in?”
Ryan hesitated. He’d kind of been hoping they could go back to her house and hang out a little; truth be told, lately he was feeling a little partied out. Every once in a while he missed just hanging out and talking one-on-one with somebody, the way he used to with—with—
“A party sounds great,” he said quickly, and took a giant sip of his Coke.
They signaled the waitress and got themselves organized, spent twenty minutes dividing up the check. “So hey,” Chelsea said as they headed out into the parking lot, damp pavement shimmering under the lampposts, that too-bright LED glow. “You were starting to say something earlier.”
Ryan blinked at her, surprised. “I was?”
“Yeah,” Chelsea said, unlocking her car door. “About the doctor?”
“Oh.” Ryan hesitated, not exactly sure what to tell her. It was kind of crummy of him—after all, he’d literally just been thinking that he wished they could have an actual conversation without anyone else around—but now that the chance was presenting itself he felt dumb and weirdly shy. “I guess I’m just worried, you know?” he said finally, settling himself in her passenger seat. “About what’s going to happen when I get cleared to play again.”
“Like, if you’ll be able to keep up with everybody else?” Chelsea asked.
“I—no, actually.” Ryan made a face at her. “But thanks for putting that in my brain. I guess more like, with concussion stuff, or whatever?” He thought again about mentioning the headaches, then decided against it. “I don’t know. I’m being stupid.”
Chelsea shrugged. “You’re not,” she said, putting the car in reverse, bracing her arm on the back of his seat in a move that made him feel oddly like she was the boy and he was the girl. “But I do think you’re freaking out over nothing.”
“You do?” Ryan blinked. Nobody had ever accused him of that before. It occurred to him that he didn’t actually like it very much. “I am?”
“I do and you are,” Chelsea said, all confidence. It was one of the things Ryan liked most about her, normally. “But you’re Ryan McCullough, you know? You’ve got this.” She tapped the brakes as they pulled out onto the boulevard, leaned over to peck him on the mouth. “Everything’s going to be fine.”
Ryan smiled, leaned his head back in the passenger seat. “Yeah,” he said, when he realized she was waiting for an answer, telling himself there was no reason to feel lonely all of a sudden. “You’re probably right.”
GABBY
Gabby was sitting in her favorite library carrel by the window when Shay came through the door in dark jeans and a tank top with straps just thick enough to pass dress code, her hair in a long dark braid over her shoulder. Seniors were allowed to leave campus during their lunch periods, so a lot of times she ran out and brought something back for Gabby and her to share: sandwiches or bagels or once, memorably, soup from the diner, which leaked all over the inside of her purse and left her car smelling like chicken noodle for the better part of six months.
“Hey,” Gabby said now, hurriedly closing her laptop. It wasn’t that she didn’t want Shay to know about the UCLA program, exactly—more like she didn’t want anyone to know about it. She didn’t want to open it up to debate. There was no way she could go; Gabby knew that already. Still, for some reason she hadn’t been able to stop thinking about it ever since Mr. Chan had mentioned it the other day, clutching it like a talisman in her sweaty, anxious palm.
Shay wasn’t interested in snooping over her shoulder, though. “I got in off the waitlist,” she announced, dropping her bag on the desktop. Her eyes were wide and shining. “I finally got the email.”