Only Mostly Devastated Read online

  “Oh, you know. It’s a hospital. Glad it exists, but always gladder to be leaving it.” Aunt Linda lifted her handbag and nodded toward the living room. “Just let me put my things down, I’ll be two seconds.”

  “I hope you’re hungry,” Mom said to her retreating back.

  Aunt Linda’s voice was bright and cheerful as she replied. “To be honest, Cathy, I don’t remember what hunger feels like.”

  Mom rolled her eyes, then caught sight of me slumping back down at the dining room table. “How’s the salad coming along?”

  “Oh, fine.” I reached for the peeler again.

  “Sorry we interrupted your call.”

  I nodded, not trusting myself to reply without getting all emotional again. I’d just really wanted to talk to Ryan and Hayley. So much had been uprooted. I just wanted something that felt normal.

  Mom pushed down on my hand to get me to let go of the peeler. “Ollie, you need to relax. You’ll have plenty of opportunities to talk with your friends. Everything will be fine. I want you to practice some mindfulness.”

  “No, Mom—”

  “Yes, Ollie. With me.” Experience told me I’d best play along. Fighting would take longer than giving in at this point. “Now, I want you to picture all the things you’re grateful for. This lovely big house that costs an eighth of the rent of the one in San Jose. How’s that for a start? Big houses, and clean air, and having your parents around to cook you a nutritious meal … are you experiencing the gratitude?”

  “Oh, totally.”

  “Oliver, I don’t want any of your sarcasm. Picture your fingertips. How do they feel? How does the wood feel underneath them? Ollie?”

  “Mom, honestly I feel a little claustrophobic right now.”

  She took her hands off my shoulders with a sheepish grimace. “Sorry. But work with me here, Ollie. You need to be relaaaaxed, and caaaallmm.”

  See, Mom has some ideas about the world. She’s not super religious. Just more, I guess … spiritual? Basically, she believes in a Great, Ethereal Being out there in the universe that gives us whatever we want as long as we pretend that we’re totally happy and satisfied and positive. If we’re angry about something, though, it gives us more of it. A Great, Ethereal, petty-as-fuck Being, casually chilling out in the universe.

  Which could’ve abducted Will, now that I thought about it.

  Not that I cared about Will anymore, right?

  Well, if I kept saying that, maybe the Great, Ethereal Being would make it so.

  It took me so long to assemble a decent first-impression outfit for my introduction to Collinswood High that I practically sprinted downstairs, intending to dive straight into the car. My plans were thwarted, though, when I found both my parents in the kitchen, determined to put together breakfast for me. And, to my dismay, they wouldn’t take “no time” for an answer.

  They’d decided on scrambled eggs. Which sounds simple, and fast. And it probably is, when you don’t go through three failed batches. By the time they managed to produce an edible meal between them, the floor was littered with meal detritus in the form of eggshells, burnt toast, salt, pepper, and errant smudges of butter. It was apocalypse by breakfast.

  I inhaled the eggs as quickly as I could, dripping butter down the front of my jacket in the process. Fantastic. I debated changing, and ended up abandoning it altogether. I sprinted to the car, nearly tripping over my own feet.

  First day, the very first day, and I was going to be so late.

  I made my way to school with all the speed of a ninety-year-old on their way to bingo night. Not my fault, I might add. I just happened to hit every single red light. Straight flush. How lucky can a guy get?

  Luckier than even that, it would seem. I was apparently the very last person to get to school, because every single parking space was occupied. Swearing, I turned down the blaring music and crawled around the Collinswood High parking lot.

  No spots.

  Still no spots.

  And yet, somehow, still no empty spaces even after five full minutes of scanning. This was simply joyous.

  Finally, I found a place, right at the edge of the lot. It was under one of those trees that drop sappy, sticky blossoms over everything in the vicinity. Silver lining: shade. Not-so-silver lining: I’d be spending the weekend with a hose and rag in my driveway in exchange for the privilege of parking here. Did I accept the trade-off? Well, put it this way: I was late enough by then I’d have parked on top of a portal to hell if it meant I could stop circling this damn lot.

  I ripped my keys out from the ignition and launched myself out of the car. Except I vastly overestimated my skills of dexterity. In other words, I may have failed to properly unhook my left arm from the seat belt before leaping out the door. Which may have resulted in me being yanked backward with enough of a jolt to throw me into the car’s side, and then to my knees like a human pinball. God almighty, this morning was some sort of sick joke.

  In the brief seconds I spent slumped on the concrete, one arm dangling above my head in a seat belt sling, I had an epiphany. Everything happened for a reason, and somehow, something out there had been looking out for me after all. That’s why I was running so late. So, when I made a spectacular idiot out of myself, I’d have precisely zero witnesses.

  While I was in the process of practicing mindful gratitude and disentangling myself from the seat belt I realized I was, unfortunately, mistaken. The Great, Ethereal Being of the universe hated me after all. Because a girl stood two spots over, clutching her books and staring at me.

  She was pretty, in a polished, “it’s the first day of school and I want to impress” way, dressed in a blazer, skinny jeans, and high-heeled boots. Her dark brown skin was totally pimple-and blemish-free, her lips wore a swipe of clear lip gloss, and her curls sat fluffy and voluminous on her shoulders.

  Well, this was mortifying.

  “I,” I called out to her, “am fine. Just to clarify.”

  The girl shifted her rather large pile of books to lock her own car. “That’s a relief,” she said. “I was concerned for a minute.”

  “No need.” I straightened and grabbed my backpack off of the passenger seat. Semi-smooth recovery.

  “That’s okay then.” The girl shot me a quick smile, then turned her attention back to her car. I figured the conversation was over, and started the awkward journey past her. As I got closer, though, I realized why she was staring at her car. Her clicker thingy wasn’t working.

  Obviously, I couldn’t afford to be any later on my first day. But it so happened I was quite the expert in the operation of clicker thingies. So I couldn’t very well justify walking past without helping, right? Not least of all because it might further anger the Great, Ethereal Being of the universe.

  “Can I give it a shot?” I asked as I reached the girl.

  She hesitated. Which was fair, given what she’d seen of my competence levels so far. I straightened and tried to twist my face into an “I’ve totally got this” expression. It must have worked, because she shrugged and passed me her keys. “Go for the gold.”

  Stepping around to the front of the car, I brandished the clicker and pressed as hard as possible. For good measure, I focused on gratitude and positive thinking, with a dash of mindfulness thrown in. To my great relief, the headlights flashed, and the car locked.

  As far as I was concerned, that was me mostly redeemed in the eyes of this morning’s only witness. Score one for Ollie. Ethereal Being: three billion. The gap was closing.

  The girl raised her eyebrows, impressed. “Thank you.”

  I went to pass the clicker back to her, but her hands were kind of busy with the stack of ten or so books balanced in the crook of her arm.

  “Um, do you need a hand with all that?” I asked as we hurried on. The redbrick school building loomed in the distance, all menacing and intimidating. It was three stories high, with practically acres of freshly trimmed grass between the parking lot and the entrance, cut through the midd
le by a steep pathway lined with flagpole after flagpole. Why was Collinswood High so enormous? Collinswood was a teensy little pond, and it had no business boasting a school building that could house an ocean’s worth of fish.

  The girl laughed. Ouch. Shut down, much? “You wanna carry my books to class?” she asked. “What is this, the fifties?”

  “Not all your books,” I said. “Just maybe one or two of the light ones.” I pointed to the two paperbacks on top. “You could probably manage the rest without me.”

  “I think I can manage all of them without you, thanks all the same.”

  If it had come from someone else I might’ve been offended by that, but this girl had a way of half-smiling that made me feel like I was in on a joke with her. I decided I liked her. I hooked her key chain through one finger and held it up. “Guess I’ll walk these to your class, then?”

  “Actually, that’d be really great.” She offered me a brilliant grin, which I caught and threw back to her. Up this close, she smelled like sugary flowers. “So, guessing you’re new,” she continued. “That, or you’re a seriously tall freshman.”

  “Nope. A regular-sized senior. I’m Ollie. I just moved here from California, I guess. Kind of. Possibly temporarily, possibly for a while. Depends on some family stuff.”

  Well, gee, are you sure that was awkward enough, Ollie? If you try really hard, you could sound even weirder. Don’t settle for halfway, here.

  The girl didn’t seem to notice the word-vomit. “I figured you weren’t from around here. Your accent and all. Anyway, I’m Juliette. Where’s your homeroom? I can take you, if you want.”

  Hey, I wasn’t the one with an accent. In fact, Juliette had even more of a Southern drawl than most of the other people I’d met so far. If I had to guess, I’d say Juliette had originated from farther south. So, it seemed someone else wasn’t from uh-ree-ound hay-err. I’d have to ask another time, though: Juliette had reminded me how late I was. I racked my brain to access the memory of my homeroom teacher. It had blurred together with the twenty other names I’d tried to memorize. “Um, I’m with Ms. Hurstenwild, I think.”

  “Oh, snap, you’re with us! That makes things easy. Follow me Ollie-oop.”

  “Ollie-oop?”

  “Ollie-oop. Alley-oop. Roll with it, ’kay? It sounds cute.”

  “For a three-year-old, maybe,” I protested, but Juliette didn’t seem to hear me. Convenient. She picked up her pace and powered up the path, through the glass sliding doors, and down several empty hallways. I hurried after her, cheeks flushing. Great. Everyone was already in class.

  She stopped short somewhere in the maze of classrooms and nodded toward a door. Right. She had no hands.

  As expected, a sea of unfamiliar heads turned as I walked in. Awesome. To my relief, Juliette stepped in front of me. “Hey, Ms. H. Sorry I’m late. Ollie was lost, so I stopped to help him.”

  Way to throw me under the bus, Juliette. Ms. Hurstenwild, a middle-aged woman with an underbite and a neck that was too thick for the high collar of her shirt, didn’t seem pissed though. “I’ll give you a pass today, Juliette, but you’ll have to get creative for me to fall for that for the next hundred and eighty mornings.”

  Juliette headed straight to an empty desk. How did she know which was hers? How would I know where I was meant to go? “I wouldn’t dream of it, Ms. H,” she said. “I’ll only blame it on Ollie for two weeks, max.”

  Ms. Hurstenwild turned to me. Self-conscious, I crossed my arms over my chest. Was I supposed to introduce myself here? Was I supposed to insist that Juliette did not represent me?

  “Good morning, Oliver. Glad to see you found your way here.”

  Oh. That wasn’t so bad. I managed a smile. I managed to breathe. I even managed to ignore the rest of the students staring at me. For a few seconds, anyway.

  Ms. Hurstenwild gestured to the back of the classroom. “You can take that seat. We’re going over some housekeeping things to kick off the term.”

  I scanned the faces at first, then, overwhelmed, I settled for staring at the floor. It wasn’t that I was hugely shy or anything. I just … I mean, come on. No one relishes feeling like a zoo animal, right?

  Luckily, I made it to my desk without anyone throwing popcorn at me, which was a great success as far as I was concerned. Ms. Hurstenwild started talking about hall passes and library access, and I probably should’ve been paying attention, but my gaze kept wandering around the class. There were thirty or so students. On the surface, they weren’t any different from the kids back home. Only your usual distribution of pretty to plain, self-assured to awkward, skinny jeans to boot cut to miniskirts. But while the class might not be any different from the ones back home, I could be. Different, that is. I was a blank slate now. Anything could happen from here on out. Any of these people might become my best friends or worst enemies by the end of the year. I was totally in charge of my destiny. Whatever move I made today might make or break the year.

  But no pressure, right? As long as I didn’t get tangled in any more seat belts, and tamed my use of the English language, I should be okay.

  “Should” being the key word.

  Suddenly, I realized Ms. Hurstenwild had stopped speaking, and people were moving. I froze—was it first period already? There hadn’t been a bell? But before I could react, Juliette had plopped her butt on the front of my desk. She had two girls with her. One was tall and curvy, with thick eyelashes straight out of a Covergirl advertisement, and cool brown skin. She was decked out head to toe in brand-name workout gear, from her wool sweater to her three-quarter yoga pants. The other girl, in a slight contrast, wore a pale lavender, frilly dress, that shouldn’t have worked with her equally pale skin but somehow did, paired with a leather jacket and Converse. That, plus the heavy eyeliner and slumped posture, made her the spitting image of half of my friends back home. Unfortunately, she was the only one of the girls who looked less than impressed to see me.

  “Ollie-oop, this is Niamh and Lara,” Juliette said, pointing to the L’Oreal model and the punk-looking chick respectively. Neev? People had weird names in North Carolina. “Guys, Ollie moved here from California. Apparently he could move back at any time, at the drop of a hat.”

  Goddamnit, my face was flushing. All right. My turn to speak. Maybe I should take this opportunity to prove my firm grasp on my first language. “Hi. Yeah, we spent the summer here, and my parents figured hey, why bother going home, let’s hang out here all year.”

  Niamh looked puzzled. “Really? That seems like an … unusual thing to do.”

  He shoots, he misses. “Um … yeah, no, it was … it was a, uh … a joke … we didn’t really … um … my aunt’s sick, so we’re staying here for a while to help out.”

  All three girls stared at me. I stared back at them. Then an enormous black hole opened up in the floor and I happily let it suck me into the depths of the earth.

  Lara puffed out her cheeks. “That’s a downer.” Juliette not-so-subtly elbowed her, and Lara made a show of nursing her rib cage. “Jesus, Jule, the hell was that for?”

  “So you spent the summer in town?” Juliette asked, raising her voice over Lara’s, clearly trying to smooth over the awkwardness.

  “Not right here, no. We were at the lake. This is my first time in Collinswood since I was a little kid.”

  “Oh cool,” Niamh jumped in. “I spent a week over there, too. We probably walked by each other a dozen times without even realizing. How funny.”

  “Niamh likes to spend as much time there as she can,” Juliette said. “She’s completely convinced she’ll end up in a torrid summer romance one year.”

  “Closest I got was Grandpa’s lawn-bowling buddy,” Niamh said, fiddling with her necklace, a simple rose-gold chain with a rose pendant dangling at the end. A rose-gold rose. “But he was more into me than I was into him, unfortunately. I don’t mind an older man, but I draw the line at sixty.”

  I’d seen Niamh’s necklace before—on Juliette, I rea
lized, looking between them. Yup, identical. On a hunch, I glanced at Lara. A rose glittered at the base of her throat, too, catching the fluorescent light.

  Juliette tapped Niamh’s arm good-naturedly. “That’s what I keep telling you. If you want adventure, you’re gonna have to go a little farther than the lake, don’t you think? Scandalous summer romances aren’t a thing in North Carolina.”

  I played my poker face. As far as I was concerned, I’d nailed it. That is, until Lara narrowed her eyes at me, leaned her elbows on my desk, and said, “Or not? Ollie?” I blinked. “Hmm?”

  But it was too late to play innocent. Lara gave me an evil smile and pointed right at me. “I saw that look! What did you get up to over the break? I’m assuming she was younger than sixty.”

  The flush from before would’ve been but a soft glow compared to the way I must look now. “Um … I, uh …”

  Juliette jumped on board now. “He did, oh my God. Niamh, I stand corrected.”

  Niamh pouted. “Some people get all the luck.”

  A nervous laugh burst out of my throat like a shaken soda can fizzing over. “Isn’t it time for class?”

  “Nope,” said Juliette. “Didn’t you hear Ms. H? She’s giving us five minutes to catch up on summer goss. So, please, goss.”

  Lara grabbed an empty chair from a nearby desk and sat in it back to front, lavender frills bouncing every which way. “Yeah, regale us with all the R-rated details, would you? God knows the rest of us don’t have much to report from over the summer.”

  “You don’t?” Juliette asked her. “That’s disappointing.”

  Lara waved a hand in her face. “We’re not talking about me right now.”

  On the one hand, I barely knew these girls, so should I really be sharing so much with them so early? On the other hand, they seemed interested, and I’d barely had the chance to talk about it with my friends back home in the big moving rush. If I didn’t tell someone soon, the words were going to overflow right out of my pores.

  I swallowed. “Well … maybe I did, I guess …”