“Apparently he’s liked you since Homecoming. And I double-checked to make sure he wasn’t talking about Jess Aberdeen, Jess Thompson, or Jess Weinberg.” Kristen finally pulled on her baby doll tee, then plopped down on the bench to lace up her Doc Martens. She didn’t take anything too seriously—crushes, homework, even the SATs. With Sara sick, I wouldn’t leave Swickley after graduation—I couldn’t. The only thing that made me feel better was the idea that Kristen might be here with me.
“He’s just not my type. Besides, things are finally happening with Ty.”
“If things were going to happen with Ty, they would’ve happened already.” Amber pointed her lip gloss wand at me. “Seriously, Jess, you’ve known him since fourth grade.”
“It’s not easy to go from friends to something more,” I said. Ty wasn’t a Patrick Kramer, one of these guys who tried to shove their tongue down your throat as soon as they got you alone. “He’s probably only just realized I like him.”
“I mean, I knew as soon as he left my house that day.” Amber raised one eyebrow. With a swipe of berry lip gloss she looked flawless—not like she’d spent the last forty minutes playing a vicious game of badminton.
“Well, he wants to ask you this Friday,” Kristen said. “Jen Klein’s having people over.”
“Friday? Two days from now?”
It felt too soon to have to make a decision. Saying yes to Patrick meant saying no to Ty, even if he hadn’t officially asked me anything yet. I couldn’t do that. I didn’t want to.
“He’s hoping you’ll come…” Amber said. “And, to be honest, we are too. It’s been like, a hundred years since you hung out on a weekend.”
I’d been to those parties before. Weaving through the crush of sweaty, flailing bodies. Cigarette smoke and people spilling shit on you and feeling awkward because I was never wearing the right thing. I’d always admired how Amber could walk into a room and make anyone her friend, how she wasn’t preoccupied by what people thought of her. Whenever someone complimented me I doubted it was genuine, and lately everywhere I went I felt skinless—overexposed.
“Come on, Millie loves parties,” Kristen said, threading her arm through mine. Millie was Kristen’s 1990 Volvo station wagon. She was pee-yellow, with ripped leather seats, but she was our portal to freedom.
“So are you in or what?” Amber finally asked, pulling on her backpack. “We’ll get dressed up, arrive fashionably late. Make a big entrance. Maybe I’ll steal some wine coolers from our basement fridge.”
Even if I didn’t like Patrick Kramer, and I didn’t want to go to Spring Formal with him, there were other perfectly good reasons to go to Jen Klein’s party. Tyler lived three houses down from her. It wouldn’t take much for him to stop by, even for just a little bit.
“Hmmm…” I smirked. “What time do you wanna pick me up?”
“That’s the Jess I know and love.” Amber wrapped her arms around me and planted a sticky kiss on my cheek.
“We’re going to a partaaaaaaay,” Kristen said as we started out of the locker room. She did a spin, then a slide, but it all looked more Elaine-from-Seinfeld than Britney Spears.
Amber grabbed my hand and we both dipped down to one side, then back up. We’d been in dance class together when we were kids, and we still sometimes did bits of our old routines. She hopped forward, leading me, when something fell out of the bottom of her backpack. It skidded across the tile and under one of the wood benches.
“I got it,” I said, kneeling.
The flat silver cartridge was just smaller than my hand, with shiny black glass on one side and metal on the other. I turned it over and pressed a button. Nothing happened.
“What’s this?” I glanced up at Amber.
Suddenly it blinked on, and I caught a glimpse of something behind the glass. But then Amber grabbed the cartridge out of my hands and started fiddling with her backpack, where a mesh pocket had come undone.
She didn’t respond until it was tucked away and everything was zipped shut. “What?” she said.
I stared at her. “That thing that fell out of your bag.”
She adjusted the knapsack so it was in front of her, her arms wrapped around it like a fake belly. She was already a few steps ahead of me when she finally spoke.
“It’s just…” Her words were slow and deliberate. “I found it in my dad’s briefcase. I was going to ask Mr. Henriquez if he knows what it is.”
“Mr. Henriquez? The Tech teacher?” I asked.
“I don’t know,” Amber shrugged. “It’s just weird. My dad’s had that job forever, and he barely says anything about it. I’ve never seen his office. He’s never home for dinner. Then I find this.”
I glanced sideways at Kristen, but she was staring at the floor. It seemed like they’d already discussed the weird contraption, whatever it was, but neither of them wanted to tell me anything. What did Amber think Mr. Henriquez was going to say? And what was she implying, exactly? That her dad was a spy? That he was having an affair?
“So you think…” I waited for the answer.
“I don’t know what to think.”
We pushed into the hall just as the bell rang. Amber waved to a few girls on the dance team. She was heading to History and I had Calc next, which meant we only had until the last set of gym doors before we went opposite ways.
“Can I see it?”
“Look, Jess, I really don’t want to talk about this anymore,” she said, heading down the stairs. “I gotta go. I’ll meet you guys in the parking lot after school.”
I looked to Kristen, hoping she’d explain what the hell just happened, but she was walking toward the science wing. Her flannel was tied around her waist, her books stacked in one arm as she waved at me over her shoulder.
“What was that about?” I called after her.
“You know Amber…” Kristen just shrugged.
Then she slipped into the AP Bio room, leaving me to replay the moment in the locker room over again, wondering why the two of them were being secretive about it. I tried to remember what the thing looked like. I’d seen that logo before, I knew I had, but on the school’s computers. Behind the glass, this one had been sleek and silvery.
An apple with a bite out of it.
5
I could hear every word of “Not the Doctor” through Sara’s bedroom door. After it became too difficult for her to go outside, she’d become obsessed with my CD collection. Tori Amos and the Indigo Girls, Jewel and Fiona Apple. We’d sit in her room listening to them, or sometimes I’d bring in my guitar and we’d have a sing-along. Lately it was Alanis Morissette. Just the week before I had to explain to her what it meant to “wine, dine, sixty-nine” someone.