Sweet Evil (The Sweet Trilogy #1)(86)

I nodded and she grabbed my arm, suddenly animated again.

“Oh, my gawd, I totally think he was the guy checking you out in the hall at the party!”

“Oh, yeah, I forgot about that.”

“Wanna come over and hang out sometime?” she asked. I opened myself to the pastels of her hope and gladness, letting them surge with my own.

“Sure. Maybe you can help me with my stupid hair.”

I pulled at the long bangs. As she lifted layers of my hair with her fingers, checking it out and complimenting the style, I marveled about the nature of humanity, and how something as lovely as friendship could stem from something so hideous.

There was a lot to be said for having a female friend. My toes looked better than they ever had. Veronica was insistent they be painted if I was going to wear flip-flops. We had some of our best conversations sitting on the floor of her bedroom as she leaned over my feet with a bottle of polish.

“Scott hasn’t talked to me at all since that day,” Veronica said one late October afternoon as she applied a coat of sparkly blue polish. “That’s fine by me, though.”

It had been over a month since the cafeteria showdown. I’d worried that the situation would only escalate from there, but after a frenzied flurry of gossip, Scott dropped it, and talk died down. I heard he was dating a girl from another school.

I’d finally started hanging out again outside of school with Jay and Veronica, but I preferred being at one of our homes instead of going out. I was always on the lookout for whisperers when we went somewhere like the mall, paranoid about my two friends being targeted. Or me seeming too chummy with humans. Veronica swiped more polish across my toenails.

“Tell me what it was like with Kaidan,” she said.

I felt excited at the initial thought of him, and then sad. Sometimes the longing was so overpowering I’d think of him for hours at a time. I told Veronica about our kisses and how he’d tease me in that flirty way. But there was too much I couldn’t explain.

“You still love him, don’t you?” She didn’t wait for an answer. “How long has it been since you’ve seen him?”

“Three months or so.”

“We’ve gotta find you a new man.”

“No, I’m good. I don’t want anybody.”

“You still want him. That’s the problem,” she said.

I did still want him.

“What about you?” I used the same diversion tactics as I did with Jay, even though I didn’t want to talk about the shady guy she’d been dating.

“I think he’s starting to get impatient with me.” She looked down and started painting her own toes again, which were already perfect.

“You’ve been together only a few weeks,” I pointed out.

“I know, but it seems like it’s been longer ’cause we see each other every day and talk on the phone every night, and last night he said to me, ‘I don’t see what the big deal is. It’s not like you’re a virgin.’” She mimicked his mopey boy voice.

I thought about Veronica’s relationship with Mike Ramsey that had spanned our entire ninth-grade year, and I felt defensive for her.

“He shouldn’t say that to you. It’s still a big deal, whether you’re a virgin or not. Don’t do anything with him out of guilt.”

“I’m not. I mean, he’s not trying to be mean or anything. He told me... he loves me.”

I’d tried telling her when they first got together that he gave me a bad feeling, but she seemed determined not to see it. And now he was telling her he loved her when he’d never shown an ounce of pink emotion in her presence. I tried to keep the upset feelings out of my voice.

“Those are just words, Roni. If he loves you he’ll show it by waiting.”

“Yeah, right—how long did you make Kaidan wait?”

I rubbed at a smudge of polish on the skin inside my toe.

“We never did it. We just kissed and stuff.”

“Seriously?” She blinked at me and I took the polish from her, twisting the cap back on so it wouldn’t spill on her ivory carpet. “So you’re still a virgin, then?”

“Yes. Contrary to popular belief.”

Her eyes lifted to her childhood collection of unicorn statues on a shelf.

“Sometimes I wish I still was. Not something you can take back, though.”

She pushed her thick hair behind her ear. Her bob had grown down to her shoulders and was now dyed black with one purple streak in front. She cleared her throat and straightened her legs.

“You’re, like, religious, right?” she asked.

“Yes.”

She began giving off strong gray vibes of mixed negative feelings. I pretended to focus on my own toes still, giving her a moment to collect her thoughts.

“Do you think badly of me?” she asked. “I mean, about all that stuff last year?”

I looked at her, confused. “What stuff?”

“You know.” She pulled at a strand of carpet. “The abortion.”

My heart stammered. I remembered vaguely how the rumor mill had been going at the beginning of our sophomore year about someone getting an abortion, but I never poked around for details.

“I don’t think badly of you, Roni.”