Her dad smiled, and Martha remembered the first time she’d learned about the names. She was just a little kid when her parents had taken her to the park and told her the story of the night they carved their names in together. Her dad had held her up so she could trace her fingers around the letters. “Oh well,” he said with nonchalance. “Price of progress, I suppose.”
“It’s not over yet,” Martha said hopefully. “There’s a meeting in a few weeks for the developer to present the project. After she’s done presenting, anyone who wants to can voice concerns.”
“She? They let ladies be developers now?”
Martha punched her dad playfully in the arm. He loved to tease his only daughter about being a feminist. She didn’t care. She knew he was proud of her. For an old-school guy, he was pretty new-school about a lot of things. When she’d finally gotten up the courage to tell him, Hey, Dad, I think I might like girls, he’d been quiet for a long time. When he did eventually speak, it was to say, “Well, at least you and I finally have something in common.”
Martha had laughed. Mostly out of relief. But what he’d said was true. She and her dad were nothing alike. He was a voracious reader. She was a math nerd. He was a former athlete. She once faked Morgellons disease to get out of PE. He liked country music. She liked anything but. And yet, she loved him so much that sometimes it scared her. How was it possible to love one parent so much more than the other one? There was something so obviously screwed up about it that she knew something must be wrong with her.
“Hey, Dad,” she said, trying to sound casual. “I was thinking that maybe you’d want to go with me. To the meeting. We’re all going to say something and so are a bunch of the other seniors. I think it would mean a lot to hear from someone whose name is already there. You’re kind of a part of history.”
His look was tough to read. “I don’t know, Patsy. You’re the good speaker.”
Martha knew it was more complicated than that, though. These were memories that Martha wasn’t sure her dad wanted to hang on to. She nodded and tried not to look disappointed. Sometimes she wished her dad was the kind of guy who would swoop in and save the day for her. Other times she liked that she was the kind of girl who didn’t need him to. She looked over at him, and he smiled at her briefly. Then he picked up his book and went back to reading.
CHAPTER THREE
AVA FELT tense during the weeks leading up to the city meeting. Not that this was anything particularly new or different. She basically existed in a constant state of feeling slightly anxious about something, so it was hard to tell how much of this was related to the fact that her friends were forcing her to speak at the meeting and how much of it was just her brain chemistry. She blamed at least some of it on the college counselor who had visited everyone’s homeroom and scared the crap out of them with information about deadlines and essay topics and their last possible chance to retake the SATs. She mostly blamed her friends, though. They were the ones making her talk in front of a group of people.
When they arrived at the auditorium on that Thursday night, the room was already packed. Because of “unusually high interest” in the meeting, everyone who wanted to speak was required to sign up before it started. The girls were directed to a long line that snaked the length of the room. CJ crossed her arms in an irritated sort of way and counted the number of people in line ahead of them. The meeting was limited to two hours, and that meant that not everyone who signed up would be able to talk.
“It’s going to be tight,” CJ said.
Thank god, Ava thought.
She could feel Jordan glance over at her. “Hey,” Jordan said. “You okay? You look…”
The sentence did not need to be finished. Ava looked exactly how she felt. Like she was going to pass out. Or hurl. Or maybe both. Probably both. She shoved her toes against the edges of her shoes and held them there for a count of five. This was something her therapist had told her to try in moments of stress. Sometimes it actually helped. Today was not one of those times.
Martha gave Ava’s arm a squeeze. “It’s okay. You don’t have to talk if you don’t want to.”
“Yes, she does,” CJ said abruptly. Long ago, CJ had decided that it was her job to be the “tough love” best friend. She saw it as an admirable quality. Ava was still on the fence. CJ was always pushing her to do things that were out of her comfort zone. Just last week she’d forced her to submit one of her paintings to a local gallery. Ava knew there wasn’t a chance in hell that the Coventry Art Gallery would pick the painting of a high school amateur over all the professionals and more experienced artists who would be submitting, but sometimes it was easier just to do what CJ said rather than argue.
“I’m sorry, Aves,” CJ said. “I know you hate this. But you’re going to thank me later.”
Ava seriously doubted that. But it was impossible to slow CJ down once she got excited about something. If there was a problem, she wanted to solve it. The girls were only twelve when CJ dragged them to their first protest. Ava contributed the artwork for their signs. That was the extent to which she was comfortable sticking it to the man.
“Look at her,” Martha said, pointing to Ava. “She’s like… an unnatural color.”
“She’s not an unnatural color.” Ava could feel CJ’s eyes on her, evaluating and processing. “Okay, maybe she’s slightly paler than her regular color. But only slightly.”
“I’d say it’s dramatic,” said Jordan.
Ava clenched her eyes shut while her friends argued about her. She wished she could just astral project right the hell out of there. When she opened her eyes, she was disappointed to discover that not only had her soul not left the room but that Logan Diffenderfer was walking up to them. Great. That’s all she needed right now. Even worse, he had his camera around his neck.
“Hey,” he said to Jordan. “I’ve been getting some great shots for the paper.”
“Good,” she said. “I’m thinking front-page spread for sure. Let me see what you’ve got.”
He held up his camera and clicked through a few images. Ava had to admit that he was good. She’d never say it to his face, but secretly she loved his work. Jordan complained that his shots were often too artsy for the paper, but Ava loved them. His photos weren’t just beautiful. They told a story.
He clicked forward and paused on a picture. Oh god. It was a picture of her. She really did look pale. Logan lowered his camera, and it seemed like he was about to say something to her. Ava was thankful that Martha jumped in before he could.
“Hey, Diffenderfer,” she said. “You weren’t in AP Physics today. Mr. Young said you’re dropping it.”
Logan glanced down at his camera. “Yeah.”
“Why?” Martha asked.
Logan hesitated and a commotion stirred up in the line ahead of them. He looked pretty relieved about the distraction. Ava recognized the look. It’s how she felt every time something happened that took the focus off of her.
They all turned and saw that a couple of their classmates were arguing with the woman supervising the sign-in sheet. It was getting loud. “We have rights,” someone said. It was Kaia Huber. She was one of the best writers in school other than Jordan.