Midnight Sun(14)

I wince. “It didn’t come up.”

“What do you mean, it didn’t come up?” Morgan yells.

I clap a hand over her mouth. Dad definitely does not need to know I (a) like a boy who (b) asked me to hang out with him after (c) I neglected to tell him about my craptastic medical condition. She sticks her tongue out and starts licking my hand until I drop it from her face.

“I mean,” I say in a whisper, hoping she’ll get the hint to tone it down in here, “he didn’t ask me if I had a genetic disorder where sunlight will kill me and I did not say yes.”

Morgan starts to say something else, but I jump back in before she can start giving me a hard time again.

“Listen to me. When people find out you’re sick, you stop being a person and become, like, a cause. And it ruins everything.”

For once in her life, Morgan can’t think of a snappy comeback. She just nudges me with her foot. I understand she means, Dude, I know. It sucks. I give her a little smile because I know she knows, at least as best she can. She sees how much I struggle with not being able to do the things I want to do. But we also both know there’s not a damn thing either of us can do about it.

“I promise I’ll tell him. The next time I see him, okay? Not that I know when that will be…”

“Oh, I do,” Morgan tells me, jumping up off my bed. “You know the annoying guy who works with me at the ice cream shop?”

“The nerdy one you hate? Who is also clearly in love with you?”

“Eww, will you stop saying that?” she protests. “And, yes, Garver. His parents are out of town and he’s throwing a party tonight and he told me to bring friends. So I’m gonna bring you, and you’re gonna bring Charlie.”

Tonight? I’m so not prepared for this. I need some time to find just the right outfit, maybe get a haircut, and, I don’t know, buy some makeup and figure out how to apply it since I don’t usually go anywhere that would require a fancy face and have zero clue where to start.

“What? No, no, no. I can’t—that’s not—don’t I have to wait for him to call me or something?”

“Totally.” Morgan nods. “And then his squire will send a note via pigeon asking if you’d like to merge your kingdoms. What is this, eighteenth-century England? You’re a hot, young, badass woman in charge of her own life, and you text him whenever you damn well please!”

She tosses me my phone. “Just be confident. Give him the facts.”

I stare at the phone. My mind is as blank as the screen. There’s no way I’m doing this.

“If you don’t text him, I will,” Morgan warns.

I know she’ll make good on the threat, so I start typing. I go with the first thing I can think of, no editing or second-guessing myself. Hey, my friend is having a party tonight if you want to come. I hit send before I can chicken out.

“But play a little hard to get,” Morgan says the minute my message shoots into the stratosphere.

Fine. I type some more. I don’t care if you come or not. Send. There. All better.

“And make sure he knows he’s not the only reason you’re going,” she continues.

I have lots of friends, I quickly add. Geez, why does this have to be so complicated?

Morgan grabs my phone and reads my masterpiece. She groans.

“What?”

“Remember the dead cat?”

I nod.

“This is the same,” she tells me.

“No, it’s not!” I screech.

“He’s going to think that not only do you not like him, but you actually hate him,” Morgan tells me.

“Fix it, then!”

Before she can start cleaning up my mess, my phone buzzes. Morgan glances at it and then back up at me. She’s grinning.

“Never mind. Well played, my friend. Well played.”

“What?” I’m more confused than ever. “I seriously don’t understand how any of this works.”

She holds up my phone so I can read the screen. There’s Charlie’s reply. I’m in.

I can’t stop smiling. I don’t know how it worked or why, but it did. “Now we have to convince my dad to actually let me go,” I whisper, aiming a thumb at my closed door.

“Leave it to me,” Morgan says, and runs out of my room to talk to him.

I catch up with her just in time to hear him saying, “I don’t think it’s a good idea, Morgan. I don’t know the parents, we don’t know what kind of party it is, Katie doesn’t even know these kids.”

He’s rushing around the kitchen, emptying the dishwasher, putting away dishes, straightening up the cutlery drawer, anything but making actual eye contact.

“I know Garver!” Morgan protests. “I work with him. He’s a complete goober. This is gonna be a tame, safe, parent-friendly party.”

My dad stops the busywork for a second, a smile lighting up his formerly worried face. “That sounds so boring! How about I order Chinese and put on Netflix—”

“Dad!” I bark. It comes out harsher than I intended it to. My father’s face crumples. I can’t stand how his entire existence seems to hinge on protecting me from the most benign things on the planet. I’m eighteen, not a toddler who might go barreling into a glass coffee table or tumble down the stairs if she’s left to her own devices too long. The sun won’t get me. I can go to a nerdy party without disaster striking. I need him to understand this.