You Should See Me in a Crown(37)
When Mack starts to bound up the front walk, I shove my phone into my pocket and shut the door behind me. I meet her outside before she has a chance to come and knock. My stomach swoops a little when I realize she was probably going to do the whole “date” thing: ring the doorbell, greet my grandparents, promise to have me home before curfew.
“Oh, wow.” She stops suddenly as I rush out to meet her. I smile, because I honestly can’t help it. Not when she’s looking at me like I’m something really and truly special. “I don’t think I’ve seen you wear an outfit that makes you look like you’re in high school. You look, um—”
“Yeah. Well, you too.”
Because, like, wow. She looks amazing.
She looks like she does every day, but with a twist. She’s got on a tie-dyed KEEP INDIANA WEIRD T-shirt that she’s cut into a crop top underneath her oversized camo jacket, which looks like it came straight from an army-surplus store, and over some black denim high-waist shorts with black fishnets underneath. She also has on a pair of those high-top Chucks with the rainbow platforms that Miley Cyrus designed for Pride forever ago. It may not be much in other places, but here, it makes Mack a beacon—drawing attention and making a statement wherever she goes.
When I get into her car, she turns to me and bites her thumbnail.
“Okay, so I lost all my cognitive skills for a minute back there. What I meant to say is that you look amazing. And you changed your hair.”
I reach up to touch my puffs. It feels strange, even to me, to be touching curls instead of a tight ponytail. “Yeah, I thought it might be a little too Princess Leia.”
“No way, I think they’re awesome!” She looks over at me quickly. “And if Princess Leia were a black girl from central Indiana with amazing taste in music and even better taste in shoes, I have to say, I think the franchise might actually then be worth all the sequels and prequels and reboots.”
My cheeks sort of hurt from how hard I’m cheesing.
“Well, you look like you’re a pro at this. I feel outmatched by how seriously concert ready you are.”
She bites at her lip before replying. “You have a standing invitation to come to any concert with me from here on out. You’ll have me beat in no time.”
And I don’t know if it’s a real invitation or not, but God I want it to be.
“Mack,” I say, sort of quietly under the sound of Kittredge playing over the speakers. I’m almost surprised when she looks at me, eyes bright. She reaches for the volume and turns it down immediately. “You should know that nobody outside of my best friends knows I, um. Well, that I’m …” I motion between us wordlessly.
Mack eases the car onto the highway that leads to downtown Indy. I can’t make out her expression. Her face flashes between surprise and disappointment and then settles on a simple nod.
“I get it. I totally get it. This isn’t the most tolerant place on Earth, for sure. And I bet it’s even harder for you because you’re not only queer but you’re also black, and I’ve been reading a lot of Kimberlé Crenshaw, so, like, intersectionality and all that definitely makes it harder. I mean, it’s not ideal, of course, but your safety—”
“Mack,” I interrupt, and she looks at me again. She hasn’t rambled like this since we first met, and it scares me a little, makes me think that with one sentence I’ve undone all the good that’s been building between us for the past few weeks. She laughs nervously.
“Sorry, wow, yeah, sorry. I thought I was cured. I figured I’d suddenly stopped putting my foot in my mouth every couple of minutes, but nope. Apparently not.”
I don’t even think about it, I just reach over and put my hand on hers where it rests on the gear shift. She thinks I’m worried about my safety, but that’s not entirely the truth. I don’t think I’m at risk of any hate crimes in Campbell or anything, but it would ruin my campaign, just like—judging by her current ranking of nineteenth—it’s currently ruining Mack’s. It would ruin my chance at Pennington and at saving my grandparents’ house, and that is unacceptable. So instead of the truth, I keep asking questions.
“Are you really okay with keeping this between us? I don’t want to, um, push you into anything you don’t want.”
She flips her hand over in mine and squeezes.
“I don’t want to be back in the closet, you know? It took a long time to be able to feel confident in my sexuality.” I swallow a lump in my throat. If this setup doesn’t work for her, I convince myself that it’s good to know that now. “But I’m not going to ask you to come out before you’re ready if it means you’ll be unsafe. I would never do that to you.”
And there it is again. Unsafe.
I don’t correct her. I just nod.
“On another note, I think after you meet the guys, you might not want to see me anymore anyway,” she adds after a beat. She smiles at me again. “They’re a little hard to handle.”
“Yeah, I mean—” I look over at her. “Hold on. Are we meeting the band? Is that what you meant when you said you needed to pick me up early, because you had a surprise?”
I’m not one of those people who gets super weird about meeting celebrities, but I’m just saying, a girl could use a little warning before something like that.