Pushing Perfect(76)

“The same way you’ll know we’ve kept ours. We’ll just have to trust each other.”

Trust. That word was nothing but trouble.

“I suppose we’ve got a deal, then,” Ms. Davenport said.





29.


I didn’t know how to feel. Was I supposed to be relieved? My head was reeling from the mix of emotions I’d gone through, talking to her—I’d been so angry, but once she was in front of me I had trouble processing her as Blocked Sender and she went back to being my teacher, someone who was disappointed in me in a way that I still found meaningful. I’d had that brief sense of power, and I wanted it back, but I couldn’t find it. And there was still the problem of making it through nearly half the school year in her class, but I would find a way.

“We did it!” Raj yelled.

“Quiet,” I said. “We’re still in public.”

“It’s finally over,” Alex said, and I could tell she was holding back from yelling too.

But it didn’t feel over to me. “I hope so.”

“We got what we wanted,” Raj said.

“Yeah,” I said. “Mutually assured destruction. Which contains the words ‘assured’ and ‘destruction.’ The whole plan could go south at any time.”

“But it won’t,” Alex said.

“You can’t be sure of that.”

“You know this is the best outcome we can manage. We went over this, like, a million times.”

“I know.” And I did know; I was just having a hard time convincing myself that knowing was the same as it being true. “We should tell Justin and Isabel.”

“I’ll text them,” Raj said, and got out his phone.

I felt a momentary pang at the knowledge that Raj had Isabel’s cell phone number. He’d been so flirty with her that first time we all met up—was that just Raj being Raj, or had they had a thing? Was I actually jealous? I thought about the night before, the jolt of our legs touching. Yes, I was jealous. There was no point in denying it.

“We should get out of here,” Alex said.

“I agree. Let’s go somewhere and celebrate,” Raj said.

But I didn’t really feel like celebrating. I was just about to say I wanted to go home when Alex’s phone pinged with a text message. She picked up her phone to read it, and I watched a mix of emotions cross her face that I didn’t really understand.

“What’s up?” I asked. “You okay?”

“Justin wants to talk,” she said.

“Did he change his mind?” Raj asked. “Is he not on board? I told him it was over—I thought he’d be excited.”

“He is,” she said. “But he broke up with Mark, and he apologized for not being honest with me, and he wants to see if we can fix things. I didn’t think I could ever forgive him, but . . .”

“But maybe you can,” I said. “You should go talk to him. We’ve all done some things we shouldn’t have, and I think we’ve paid enough. Don’t you?”

“Maybe. I don’t know. It’s worth a shot, though. Can you guys handle celebrating on your own?”

Raj and I looked at each other. “We can manage,” he said.

“Do you need me to drop you off?” I asked.

“Justin’s at Philz, right down the street. I can just meet him there. He wanted to be close by, to make sure that we were okay. That I was okay.”

“That’s a good-friend thing to do,” I said.

“It’s a start,” she said, and left to go meet him.

“Do you want to go somewhere else?” Raj asked.

“It’s kind of nice here, actually.” The sky was pitch-dark now, and stars were visible through the trees in the little park where we were sitting. The temperature had dropped a bit, and the wind was blowing, making the leaves rustle and whipping my hair around, but I didn’t mind. More important, we were sitting pretty close together on the picnic table bench, our legs touching again, and I didn’t want to move.

“Winters here are much nicer than in England,” Raj said. “They were so dank and dreary and miserable. And cold.”

“Was there snow?” I asked.

“Once in a while. But it got dirty and gray so fast. It wasn’t pretty like you might imagine.”

I’d imagined it a lot, especially since I’d decided I wanted to go to school someplace with seasons. “Do you miss it there?”

“Not in winter,” he said. “But sometimes. Less than I used to, now that I’ve made some friends.” He nudged me with his elbow, and I nudged him back. So we were friends, then. I felt a little twinge of disappointment, but I was the one who’d insisted that friendship was the only possibility, so I had no one but myself to blame.

“I’m so glad this is over,” I said, and I was starting to mean it. “I feel like I can finally relax. Though I don’t know if this makes sense to say, but being with you guys—it’s been really fun. I mean, when it wasn’t super scary and awful. Is that weird?”

“Yes, it’s weird,” he said, and laughed. I laughed too. “But I think I know what you mean. Listen, can I ask you a question?”