I Kissed Shara Wheeler(30)

“A what?”

“Benjy drove us around and we picked up mozzarella sticks from every place in town. Then we ranked them on a scale of one to ten for flavor, presentation, structural integrity, and dipping sauce.”

“Oh my God. I’m so mad I missed that. Did you average the results at the end? Who won?”

“Chloe, we’re gay. We can’t do math.”

“Okay, well, next time I’ll come and make a spreadsheet.”

“This is why we need you,” Georgia says. “Once in a generation, there is born a bisexual who can do math. You’re the chosen one.”

She switches the call to her laptop and slides Georgia’s face to the side, opening up Chrome while Georgia describes how Ash almost threw up in a bush because they keep insisting they’re not lactose intolerant even though they obviously are. Georgia and her do this a lot—sitting on FaceTime for hours while they work on homework or scroll silently through their phones. What she loves most about Georgia is how she’s only ever felt completely comfortable in her company, even when she’s pissed off or stressed or insecure or weird. Everything’s easy with Georgia.

“Did you ever figure out what that card was about?” Georgia asks. “The one Shara left for you at Taco Bell?”

Ah. That’s why everything’s easy with Georgia. Because she can read Chloe’s mind.

“Popular girl wants attention, I guess,” Chloe says. Her hands fidget on the keyboard, and somehow she’s pulling up the burner email account Shara left for them. Hm. Well, since she’s here, might as well check the drafts. Maybe there’s something new since the last five times she checked. “Who cares?”

“Uh, you, like three days ago?” Georgia points out. “Like, a lot?”

“I thought you were sick of me complaining about Shara,” Chloe says. She doesn’t find any new drafts, but the editing timestamp on the one in the folder says someone logged in this morning. Suspicious.

“I mean, kind of,” Georgia says. “But getting kissed by Shara Wheeler is the most interesting thing that’s happened to either of us in a long time, so I’m kind of invested.”

“It wasn’t even a good kiss,” Chloe lies spectacularly. “Anyway, that’s Smith’s problem now.”

“Fine, starve me.”

She could tell Georgia the truth. She thinks about it, even. Georgia knows every other one of her secrets. But she feels fiercely protective of this one, even with Georgia—especially with Georgia. She’s not sure she wants to hear Georgia’s take on this situation. Georgia is the light on the dark side of Chloe’s moon, and sometimes Chloe doesn’t want to see what’s going on over there.

“Do you have time to talk about something real quick?” Georgia asks.

“Is it about the French project?” Chloe says, praying for a change of topic. “Because I promise I am doing tons of research on the June Rebellion.”

“Watching Les Mis doesn’t count.”

“I don’t see why not.”

“Madame Clark specifically said we can’t use it as a source.”

“Fine, then I’ll do other research. Like reading Les Mis.”

“Look, as long as you write your half of the paper, I don’t even care. I just want this year to be over.”

Chloe nods. “I will. Can you send me your notes so far?”

“Yeah, hang on.”

Georgia’s face disappears momentarily, and then there’s the ping of an email.

As she opens her inbox, she considers sending Shara an email enumerating all the ways she’s pissed Chloe off, but there’s no way Shara would take the bait. She’s not responding to Smith’s texts or her friends’ Instagram comments, only communicating through cryptic notes. Everything has to be a guess, a backward word you can only see by holding it up to a mirror. She won’t respond to something so obvious.

“Ooh, color-coded,” Chloe says, opening the Google Doc Georgia sent her. “I see you took my suggestions.”

“Yeah, well, at this point, fifty percent of my human interaction is in Google Docs, so I needed some structure.”

Willowgrove has a strict no-phones-on-campus rule, but most students have workarounds. One of the most popular: creating a Google Doc and giving your friends editing permission, so everyone can type in it like an unofficial group chat. It looks like schoolwork, and if a teacher gets too close, you delete everything.

Something changeable, something easily hidden …

“Chloe?” says Georgia, and she jumps.

“Sorry, I spaced,” Chloe says. “What were you saying?”

Georgia frowns, tucking her hair behind her ear. “I was reminding you that it’s due on the twenty-sixth.”

“I know,” Chloe assures her, even though somehow she thought it was the twenty-eighth. “I’ll even come to school in full French revolutionary cosplay the day we turn it in. Really sell it.”

“Cool, I’ll be Marie Antoinette,” Georgia says. “We can roll in a guillotine and do a whole historical reenactment. Anyway, there’s something I—”

“Actually,” Chloe says, clicking to create a new document. She has an idea. “I gotta go do something. Pick this up later?”