#famous(23)

“Great, then you can expect amazing GIFs of squirrels acting out romance novel covers as soon as next week.”

“You’re so weird, Rachel.”

She rolled her eyes at me. It made me feel a tiny bit better. Like things were inching back toward normal.

We ate our cupcakes in silence for a few seconds. Eventually, Monique couldn’t help herself anymore.

“But you’re gonna keep an eye on it, right?”

“On what?” I knew what.

“On his profile, Rachel.”

“Why would I?”

“Oh come on. You’ve been swooning over this guy for how long now? How can you not?” Monique smirked knowingly.

“Yeah, but why would I want to be reminded of the fact that I will never, ever have a chance with him? I mean, I didn’t have a chance with him when he was the pretty-cool senior at Apple Prairie. Now that he has what, three hundred thousand followers?”

“Five, last I checked.”

“Okay, five hundred thousand. That just makes my point more valid. Now he’s all the things he was before, plus famous . . . ish. For being hot. You come on.”

“Yeah, but you’re curious.”

I didn’t respond. It had been a few hours since I’d looked at Kyle’s page, but only through sheer force of will. Maybe that’s why I had none left over to resist cupcakes.

“Besides, have you seen his flits? The boy isn’t Shakespeare.” Monique snorted. “Maybe seeing all the brilliant musings of Kyle Bonham’s brain will be the cure you need.”

“They are pretty ridiculous, aren’t they?”

“My aunt flits more interesting stuff than that,” Monique said. “‘It’s great to feel great, isn’t it, guys? Today’s awesome! Go sports!’”

I giggled in spite of myself.

I grabbed my phone and pretended I was clicking through to his page so Monique wouldn’t know it was already up. It was the last one I’d looked at.

“So?”

I scrolled down to see what he’d been doing.

“Mostly it’s a lot of ‘Thanks, so-and-so.’ People must be telling him how gorgeous he is or whatever.”

“Nothing good, then?”

“Yeah it’s all . . . wait. He just flitted, but . . . Jesus, that can’t be for real.” I refreshed the page. Maybe it was a mistake. Or was he flitting his how-this-pans-out wish list? My mouth felt like someone had shop-vac’d out every little bit of moisture. I tried to swallow.

“What?”

“Look for yourself.”

Monique walked over to stand at my shoulder, leaning down until she could see the phone in my hand.

Suddenly, she sat down on the bed, like a puppet whose strings had been cut.

“I think we might have to revise our estimate of when this is going to blow over,” Monique said.





chapter fourteen


KYLE

WEDNESDAY, 3:55 P.M.

When I walked through the door, Mom was waiting at the kitchen table, legs crossed in one of her pantsuits. The floaty feeling I’d had the entire ride home hit the ground fast. Her jaw was set so tight I could see muscles quivering. Mom: total buzzkill.

“Where have you been? I called Jim, I know you don’t work today.”

“Settle.” I threw my backpack on the chair nearest the back door. “I stayed after to talk to Se?ora, but it was only for, like, ten minutes.”

“You could have called.”

I raised an eyebrow.

“Why are you home, anyway? Don’t you have to be at the office?” Mom had always worked late, but since Carter left for school, she never walked through the door before takeout o’clock.

“I was worried about you.”

“It’s no big deal, Mom, honestly.”

“Nice try. I looked online—this is a very big deal. There are already stories about your flit on all the local stations’ sites, and on a gossip blog out of New York.”

“It wasn’t my flit,” I mumbled.

“Don’t be tedious.” She waved a hand in the air exasperatedly. “The point remains: you should have told your father and me.”

“I’m sorry. I just figured it would blow over by this morning. I mean, you saw it. It’s not even a very good picture of me.”

“Oh, I don’t know about that. I thought you looked very handsome.” Mom eased back into the spindly wooden chair she was sitting in. She’d actually been waiting for me on the edge of her seat. Mom caring that much about anything I do: definitely new.

“Not a-million-reflits-overnight handsome.”

“Okay, explain that for me.” She scrunched up her eyes, putting her fingertips to the side of her forehead. “Because I can’t understand why everyone cares so much about this picture. Why news teams care about it.”

“I think they only care that it’s popular.” I tried to say it with authority, like Carter would. She nodded thoughtfully, as though I’d said something smart.

“Well, let’s make a plan.”

Classic Mom: she would spreadsheet a party if she could. It’s probably why she was such a good lawyer; she was equal parts interrogation and list making.