“What?” My words got stuck in my throat, like I’d swallowed a wad of peanut butter. “Yeah. I’m fine.”
That seemed to be enough for Nikki as she pressed Play on the show, but even after an entire episode had gone by, the tightness in my chest had yet to disperse. I took a steady breath, and then another, but it was still there. I studied the way she absentmindedly twirled her hair.
She gave me a quick side-eye after she realized I’d been watching her and not the show, and I quickly dropped my gaze to my phone. There was my text from Brooklyn, still open and unanswered. I locked my phone and left it unanswered.
For now, I needed to be present for her. No distractions, and no guilt.
>> <<
Prior to going to Otter House, Nikki had a well-kept, high-maintenance blond routine. She’d found a hairstylist she liked at a trendy salon downtown called Tempest, complete with trendy plants (real? fake? who was to say) on every shelf and trendy, modern furniture. She went every three weeks, making sure to send me pictures every time she sat in the chair with foils in her hair, looking stunningly extraterrestrial.
Lula, her hairstylist, didn’t ask questions as to why Nikki’s roots were so grown out and why she hadn’t come by in over a month. I’d prepared for it, ready to jump in with a well-practiced lie about how we’d been visiting a cousin’s cousin in Florida and stayed longer than we intended to, but it never came up.
I couldn’t pretend I understood the embarrassment aspect of it, but to watch Nikki squirm with the shame of it all hurt me in a different way. Almost secondhand, like putting your hand a little too close to the fire but not quite getting burned.
Instead, the two of them carried on yapping about who knows what while I sat in the empty salon chair beside them, refreshing and refreshing and refreshing my email.
Since he was clearly undeterred from my radio silence yesterday, a text from Brooklyn popped up on my screen.
BROOKLYN KELLER (like the bridge):we should do movie night friday or something
BROOKLYN KELLER (like the bridge):if you’re up for it
BROOKLYN KELLER (like the bridge):need to start your reeducation of decent films and all
I smiled—the kind of smile that comes a littletoonaturally andtooeasily—and it was noticeable.
“Whoare you texting?”
Nikki had spun around in the salon chair, the foils in her hair crinkling as she tried to move her head toward me.
“No one.” I pulled my phone into my chest.
She gawked as she sat back in her chair. “You’re a terrible liar. It’s that guy from Otter House isn’t it?”
“What makes you think that?”
“Because the face you’re making is the same face you made when he came up to us that day.”
She smirked a conniving smirk at me, and if I wasn’t so taken aback, I would have almost been impressed.
“You’ve clearly learned your keen perception skills from me.”
Her expression softened, and she nodded, more to herself than me. “You don’t have to keep this kind of stuff from me, you know.”
“I’m not,” I answered a little too quickly.
She scoffed and shot me an unamused look, despite how hard it was to take her seriously looking like half a girl and a half a radio transmitter.
“Don’t give me that look,” I warned.
“Okay butseriously.” Nikki slapped her palms down on the thighs of her jeans. Last summer, she and Mom had spray-painted bright-yellow smiley faces on the knees. “If you’re talking to a guy, I want to know, mostly for my own selfish reasons so I can live vicariously through you. Since I am, obviously, not talking to anyone.”
The subtle sting of that last sentence was what got me to surrender.
“Fine.” I groaned. “We’ve hung out a few times. Asfriends.”
“Uh-huh.” Nikki nodded and rolled her eyes. “Friends.”
