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I squint and raise my eyebrows at his suggestive tone.
“Everyone said you were fast, but I hadn’t seen it for myself yet,” he corrects himself. “You’re pretty fucking talented.”
“Thank you.” I blush, wiping the sweat from my brow, realizing suddenly how ridiculous I must look running in my full school uniform. “It was a little unplanned,” I try to explain, brushing at my outfit, but my voice cracks and I feel the rush of tears returning.
“Are you alright?” he asks, crushing any hope I had that I’d managed to keep my distress under wraps.
“Fine!” I call back too quickly, not sounding the least bit convincing. “Totally fine! Just…uh…just needed to run some things off.”
“I actually looked for you at lunch today,” he tells me.
“Really? What for? I thought you didn’t eat in the cafeteria with the rest of us,” I tease, still catching my breath.
“I was kind of hoping once you saw my secret lunch spot that you might join me there more often,” he explains. “After you didn’t show back up, I thought I’d come to you. But…then I saw you run off.” He waits for me to respond, but I’m too embarrassed. “I take it you don’t like Emmett having lunch with his ex.”
“Not just any ex.” I laugh bitterly. “Vivian. The wicked bitch herself who has made it clear she has every intention of getting him back.”
“What does Emmett say about all of that?” Malcolm asks with a sympathetic smirk.
“Doesn’t matter. He’s still hanging around her,” I mutter. I grow quiet, feeling like I shouldn’t be talking to Malcolm about all of this. It’s humiliating enough as it is and I don’t need his pity.
Maybe I need someone better than Emmett. Not better…but more than him. Someone who can be wholesome and available. Someone easy. The thing I vowed I didn’t want. I do want Emmett, and I don’t want to change him. Not now that I understand him better. But I wish there weren’t so many other things that came with him. I wish that being with him didn’t mean feeling alone so much of the time. Always longing and yearning in a way that is hardly ever fully quenched. Maybe I love him too much. Could that be the problem?
He winces and looks to his shoes, realizing he’s probably treading on a touchy subject. “Hey, sounds like you could use a break from all the WJ Prep bullshit,” he says finally, after a long, awkward silence. “Wanna come to Ritzville with me?”
Ritzville. Jameson’s cheesy amusement park that I have secretly wanted to go to the entire time I’ve lived here. It’s high school date central, and I’ve spent many nights imagining riding to the top of the Ferris wheel with Emmett and making out with the nighttime view of the town lights twinkling behind us. Of course, it’s just been one disaster after another, and it never seemed like a realistic dream until recently. But whenever Emmett and I haven’t been on the hunt for clues about his sister, we’ve been fucking or fighting over Vivian.
And now Malcolm wants to take me. I know I should say no; it’s too much like a date. I would have a complete meltdown if Emmett and Vivian went to Ritzville together, even if it was as innocent as me spending time with Malcolm. But as the memory of seeing them in the hall together replays in my mind, I suddenly want nothing more than to go with him. I need the distraction, and Emmett needs a reminder of how jealousy feels.
“Okay.” I nod with a smile. “Let’s go.”
* * *
When I was little, sometimes a carnival or fair would set up at the mall near where we lived in Oklahoma. We would drive past it and I would see all of the lights whirling around with screaming, laughing children. The smells of fried foods and cotton candy would waft through the air, luring me in. I would see little girls walking hand in hand with their dads and wish that I knew who my father was. By the time Brendan came around, I’d decided I was too cool for the carnival and wouldn’t let him take me. He wasn’t who I wanted to go with, anyway. Not then. It feels ironic now that once again, I can’t come here with the person I want to the most. Only this time, I guess I’m desperate enough to go with whoever is willing.
I eye the giant spinning Ferris wheel as we pass, drifting back to all of my fantasies about it and wishing it was Emmett walking beside me right now.
“Do you wanna go on that thing?” Malcolm asks as he studies my face.
“No, that’s okay,” I lie. I do want to go. But going with him feels like too much of a betrayal somehow.
We pass twirling teacup rides and airplanes whooshing screaming kids around the air in a loop. The carnival workers heckle us as we walk past, daring for us to come shoot a water pistol at a target or throw darts at balloons. If this were a movie, I imagine Malcolm would play one of the games and win me a ridiculous, oversized teddy bear. And he probably would in real life if I asked him. He seems eager to cheer me up.
Malcolm tries everything to get me to let go and have a good time, but I turn everything down. I can’t seem to pick myself up enough to be in the mood for anything. I finally agree to play that game where you throw a ping pong ball into fishbowls and win a goldfish if you land one in. I throw the balls listlessly. And of course, because I don’t care, one of my balls swirls around the top of the bowl and plops right down into the surface of the water above the unsuspecting fish.
“Shit,” I murmur.
“Hey!” Malcolm exclaims proudly. “Look at that!”
“One goldfish for the lady!” the worker announces. “Coming right up!”
“No!” I belt back. “No goldfish for me!” I turn back to Malcolm. “Come on, let’s go.” I tug his arm and rush him away before they can stick me with the fish.
“Wow,” he chuckles. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen someone run so fast from a
fish.”
“Everything’s a mess,” I groan. “I can’t deal with a fish right now. I can barely keep up with the rest of my life. The last thing I need is a life depending on me to take care of it.”
