You Have a Match(87)

I sit up on the couch, trying to clear my head and decide what to say. I should tell her how much this hurt me. I should tell her how I spent the last few months tiptoeing around her and Leo both, nursing the kind of ache I couldn’t tell anyone about, least of all the two people it affected most.

But I can tell she already knows that. And making her feel worse isn’t going to do anybody any good.

“No, you haven’t.”

I just watched an entire lifetime of friendship get imploded by a misunderstanding. I’m not going to let this rock us. We’ve got way too much behind us and way too much ahead to lose it over something that I think—I hope—can still be fixed.

“I’m fixing this, I swear. I was on the phone with Leo last night. I was trying to reach you, but someone found him for me and I told him everything,” she says in a rush. “Just—so he knew. Why there was weirdness. If there was weirdness.”

“A surplus of it,” I say. It’s a relief, weirdly, to be open about it with her. I’m dying to ask her what Leo said—an even vainer, louder part of me wants to know what Leo said about me—but I know it’s not Leo I need to ask about. “I was … mad when you told me what you did. And I didn’t give you a chance to explain.”

Connie lets out a sigh. “Well—I guess part of it was that so many things have been changing, and I just wanted to—hit pause, you know?”

“Yeah,” I say after a moment. “I know.”

The relief of hearing that seems to speed her up, making her words trip over each other on their way out. “It kind of felt like the two of you were going somewhere I’ve never been, and—if I’m being honest, might not ever really want to go,” she says. “I’ve never really had feelings like that for anyone before, I guess, and I … I didn’t want you guys to get wrapped up in it and leave me behind. We’ve all been so busy as it is.”

It’s like we’d been driving in the same car for ages, and only just looked down and saw the hole in the floor—like we could convince ourselves everything was still okay, as long as we were chugging along in the same direction we’d always been. I try to remember the last time Connie and I really talked to each other, really talked, without homework or extracurriculars or a phone screen in our way, and I’m coming up empty.

“Well, you know what? We’ll change that. Spend more time together this year, like we used to,” I say. “I’m going to have more free time. So if you find some, we can just … hang.”

“You’re not gonna third wheel me?” Connie’s voice is light, even if there’s still a slight wobble to it. “Not gonna make me the Harry to your Ron and Hermione, the Peggy to your Steve and Bucky, the PB&J cinnamon rolls to your brothers and any other living creature—”

“I’m gonna go ahead and cut you off right there,” I laugh. “Connie, nobody could ever third wheel you. You’re like four wheels all on your own.”

“This is a fact.”

I press the phone closer to my face, as if she can feel the intention and it will make my words count for more than they already do.

“And even if things change—I mean—I guess what I’m trying to say is, things were going to change no matter what. Leo’s going off to school. You and I are gonna peel off somewhere in a year, too. But that doesn’t have to be a bad thing. After Hermione and Ron got together, Harry and Ron were still best friends.”

“Did you just … willingly make yourself Ron in this metaphor?”

“That’s how much I love you, Con.”

“Well, shit.” She sniffles into the phone, relieved. “And Abby—I mean—I know I’m not exactly the patron saint of budding relationships right now, but I think … well. Even my meddling didn’t stop you two from feeling things for each other. I really think it could work out.”

“You know he’s leaving.”

And like that, Connie is back in full Mom Friend splendor, the words so firm that I can hear her hand land on her hip for emphasis. “Abby, you’ve waited your whole damn life to get out of Shoreline and see the world. I’m pretty sure there isn’t anywhere either of you could go that the other one wouldn’t follow.”

I’m not so sure about that, but I am sure I’ll do whatever it takes to find out.





thirty-six




It turns out scoring a farewell tour back to camp is as easy as asking my parents for a lift. That, and Mickey wasn’t kidding—there were full-blown rumors circulating that I’d been eaten by a bear, so Victoria encouraged a drop-in before the whole of Phoenix Cabin turned the place upside down trying to find out the truth.

I’m expecting to see Finn hanging out at the front desk in that lazy way he always does in the morning, but he isn’t there.

“He’s got a flight to Chicago tonight,” Jemmy informs me, after she and Izzy and Cam finish squeezing in a hug made awkward only by how vigilantly all three were avoiding my cast.

“Yeah,” says Izzy, popping the top off a pen with her molars. She gestures for me to hold out my wrist, and starts signing the bright blue plaster. “But he seemed pretty happy about it.”

So am I. I hope it works out between him and his mom. I have a feeling I’ll be hearing from him and find out soon enough.