Frenemies(74)

“I like the snow,” he said with a hint of his usual smirk. “So I went for a walk. But then it turned out that I was here.”

“What a coincidence,” I said.

“Not really,” he said. “I talked to Helen. She told me a few things.” He looked particularly intent. “She seems to think you’ve moved on from the Nate ordeal.”

This, then, was my favor. She moved fast.

“And then Nate talked to me,” Henry continued. “The whole way back from the Cape, in fact. He explained in excruciating detail how and why you and I could never be together, and how he’d explained this to you, too, but you seemed—how did he put it?” Henry smiled slightly. “Unconvinced.”

“Nate and Helen talk a lot.”

“They do. I’m hoping they’ll move in together and leave me in peace.”

“Today’s my birthday,” I felt compelled to tell him. The foyer was small and damp, with a cold draft, but I didn’t feel the chill. I wasn’t sure I was breathing. “I’m thirty. An adult. I have big, extremely adult plans.”

He fought a grin.

“What does that mean? A mortgage?”

“Please. I just redecorated my apartment. I’m in no position to buy a seat cushion, much less something requiring a mortgage.”

“So only partially adult plans, then.”

“I thought you were mad at me,” I said in a voice that started off strong but ended closer to a whisper.

“That’s because I was,” he replied easily. He pulled off his heavy ski gloves, one by one. “Do you realize that you always think the worst of me? Is that deliberate or what? You take anything I do or say and twist it into something ugly.”

I opened my mouth to snap back that he was the one who did the ugly things, no twisting necessary, but stopped myself.

All of the things I had been angry at Henry for could be looked at in a totally different way. He’d let me into the house because he thought I should know what Nate was doing—and in so doing, he’d violated the Guy Code, which was no small thing. (Or so Oscar assured me.) And sure, he’d rejected me that night after the sleigh-ride party, but maybe (just maybe) he hadn’t wanted to repeat our first encounter—where I was an emotional wreck and accused him of taking advantage of that after the fact.

Maybe evil, satanic Henry was just something I’d made up, to cover the fact I’d been dating the wrong friend.

“I don’t actually know why I do that,” I said eventually, and then I smiled at him. He seemed almost surprised for a moment, and then his eyes brightened.

“Maybe, going forward, you can take a breath and consider things before flying off the handle,” he said. “Just a suggestion.”

“Are we going forward?” I asked, searching his face, terrified I’d see the usual mocking expression. But his eyes were clear and completely serious.

“That’s the only explanation I can come up with,” he said, almost apologetically, though he was smiling. “Even when I’m avoiding you, here you are.”

I felt something swell in me then. It wasn’t desperate, or triumphant, or any of the things I was used to feeling around men. This was quiet and thrilling, and new. It felt like it might spill out from me, and fill whole rooms.

It felt like gladness.

“I have people over,” I told him, still in that hushed tone. “It’s a party.”

“Which I’m crashing,” he said at once, reverting to the stiff and formal tone I suddenly realized meant he was uncomfortable. “Okay. Well—”

“I’m just telling you so you’re prepared,” I interrupted him. “Because I’m asking you up again.”

“Oh,” Henry said. It took a moment to penetrate and then he said it again, in a different tone.

He swallowed, and it astonished me that someone so gorgeous could be as nervous as that little motion suggested.

“Yeah,” I said, smiling at him. “Oh. It’s Amy Lee and Georgia and their men, so it might turn ugly for you. I’m assuming you can handle it.”

“As you know,” Henry said with a lazy grin, “I can handle ugly. I live for it, in fact.”

Halfway up the stairs, I reached over to grab his hand, and curled my fingers around his like they belonged there.

He smiled down at me, and held on like he’d never let go.

Which, in that moment, I believed.





about the author

MEGAN CRANE: Frenemies came about because of the movie Mean Girls. Seriously. I went to see it with my boyfriend, who squirmed through the entire thing and couldn’t believe how nasty all the girls were to one another.

Oh please, I thought. They toned it down for nationwide distribution. The reality was much worse.

Which got me thinking. I love my women friends. I literally wouldn’t have a clue who I was today if it weren’t for the friendship, guidance, and support of the women I know. My mother, my sister, my grandmothers, my aunts, my cousins, my friends, my coworkers. They’ve all helped me create this creature I like to call me. (They also make me laugh so hard it makes my stomach hurt, which I believe to be a key ingredient in lifetime friendships.) But as Mean Girls made me consider, the women I love are only half of the story.