The Beginning of Everything(46)

“I’m fine,” I lied.

“No, you want everyone to think you’re fine. There’s a difference.”

I shrugged and didn’t say anything. Cassidy shivered, and I pulled her closer against me.

“Do you think they’re together?” she mumbled, her cheek pressing warmly on my neck.

“Who?”

“Toby and Austin.”

I was fairly stunned by the question, because things like that just didn’t occur to me.

“Why would you think that?”

“I don’t know.” Cassidy shrugged. “Just an impression I had. But I could be wrong. Austin doesn’t quite seem the type.”

“And Toby does?” I didn’t realize it was a rhetorical question until I’d asked it.

It was strange, thinking that Toby might be gay. It made an odd kind of sense, but it didn’t bother me, or anything like that. He was still Toby, our fearless captain.

It wasn’t long before Toby and Austin came out of the bookshop.

“We should head back,” I said, in case they were up for walking another mile or two.

Cassidy kept giving me these glances out of the corner of her eye as we walked back to the Fail Whale, as though she thought I should say something, but no way in hell was I going to ask Toby to bring the car around.

“Backseat!” Austin called, scrambling for it. He stretched out, folding his arms across his chest. “Don’t wake me.”

Toby rolled his eyes. “I’m not driving back with all of you jerks sleeping. Faulkner, get up front.”

I’d already reclaimed my seat from the drive up, and a nap sounded awesome, like maybe I could sleep through the ache in my knee.

“Actually, I’ll keep you company,” Cassidy said, climbing into the passenger seat.

Our eyes met in the rearview mirror, and I shot her a look of gratitude before tossing my hoodie over my lap like a blanket and drifting asleep on the crowded lanes of the 10 East.





20


CASSIDY TOOK ME shopping over the weekend at a secondhand clothing store. It was in this group of vinyl shops and vegetarian restaurants a couple of blocks from the big luxury mall, a place I’d driven past dozens of times but never thought to stop and explore.

There were weird sculptures everywhere, which Cassidy called “art installations.”

One art installation in particular was made of rusted barrels, and I suggested that maybe they should uninstall it, which made Cassidy laugh. Her hair was down, the way I liked it best, falling over her shoulders in loose waves. She’d put on a pair of boots with big heels, and the extra height made holding hands feel different, as though she was closer, and easier to reach.

She dragged me into a narrow store bursting with secondhand clothing. I halfheartedly flicked through a rack of T-shirts, more people-watching than shopping. There was a blonde girl with dreadlocks and a nose ring behind the counter, and an Asian guy with tattoo sleeves and stretched earlobes standing outside the dressing room.

“Oh my God, perfect!” Cassidy exclaimed, holding up some sort of blue feathered monstrosity that might have been either a coat or a bathrobe.

“No,” I told her.

“You’re trying it on!” she insisted, laughing as she put it back.

After a while, it became clear that Cassidy was teasing me with the worst things she could find.

“That is a black T-shirt,” she informed me, looking at what I was holding. “Come on, Ezra, I’m not going to do it for you. You need to express yourself. You’re not an Abercrombie button-down and baggy jeans.”

I stared down at the black T-shirt, realizing that Cassidy hadn’t dragged me to a shop so she could make me buy some new jeans. She was determined to help me figure out who I wanted to be, now that I sat with the debate team and participated in flash mobs and snuck into college lecture halls. And I could see her point. If I didn’t want to hang out with my old friends, I probably shouldn’t keep dressing like I did, especially since I’d dropped enough weight over the summer that nothing in my closet fit anymore.

“Got any suggestions?” I asked, because that seemed safe.

“Hmmm.” She sized me up as though enjoying a private joke. “How about a leather jacket?”

When I dumped my pile of clothes onto the counter to pay, the girl with the dreadlocks smiled at me.

“Awesome jacket,” she said, ringing it up. “You should wear it with the black jeans.”

“Yeah, okay,” I said, taking out a credit card.

“Just not with that shirt.” She laughed as she rang up my purchases and stuffed everything into a bag.

“You’re sure you didn’t want the feathered bathrobe too?” Cassidy teased as we climbed back into my car.

“Nah, it would just make Toby jealous.”

“So jealous,” Cassidy agreed.

A car was waiting for my parking spot, riding my ass so I could barely pull out.

“Seriously,” I muttered. “Why is the world filled with douche-bag drivers?”

“Well, you are under a tree. Maybe he’s just a schattenparker,” Cassidy said, turning on the radio. She hit my presets, getting three stations of commercials in a row before giving up.

“What’s a schattenparker?”