Envy Part 20

"Don't worry, the feeling is mutual," Kaia yelled, grinning. She spun around and raised her arms above her head, twisting and turning to the steady beat.

It was a scene Kaia would have been hideously embarra.s.sed to witness back in New York, much less partic.i.p.ate in-the only people who danced to eighties music were bridge and tunnel chicks trolling for men in the big city, and men with gold teeth and bad breath looking for their next lay.

No, the number one rule of her life in the Big Apple: Only losers look like they're having fun. Boredom is the new chic.

But here? There was no one to see her-no one who counted, at least. There was only her, Harper, the flashing lights, the drinks, the steady beat and the vibrating floor. She closed her eyes and let the music fill her up, sweeping over her and carrying her body away.

Adam had left a sweatshirt in her room the last time he was there. The last time-maybe it was just that, the last time he would ever be there. Beth moaned and curled up into a tight ball, burying her face in the soft cotton of the shirt. It still smelled like him.

She closed her bloodshot eyes and breathed in deeply, letting herself pretend, for a moment, that he was in the room, lying down beside her, his arms around her, that she was safe.

But it was no use. Her bed was empty-and a sweatshirt, a scent, a thinning memory, was all she had left.

It came in waves: the sadness, the terrifying feeling of being completely alone, completely out of control. It came in waves-she'd heard the phrase before, but never really understood what it meant. That when they came, the powerful feelings swept over her, knocking her down and tossing her about as if she'd been caught by the blast of a wall of water. It lifted her off her feet, spun her, slammed her into the ground, and dragged her, tired and teary and confused, to sh.o.r.e, to safety, to the relative peace that would rule until another wave swept in and knocked her down all over again.

There were moments, brief moments, where she thought she would be okay, that all the pain and sorrow sweeping over her would end, that it would drag her down, but not forever. And then there were other moments, long, interminable moments, when she feared she would drown.

He was drowning-in anger, in despair, in indecision, in regret.

Had he done the right thing?

Was he a complete hypocrite? Sleeping with someone else and then dumping on Beth for doing the same? Had he made a horrible mistake?

Adam sat on the floor of his bedroom, door shut tight, loud music drowning out the rest of the world-if only it could drown out his thoughts. But they were too loud.

In front of him sat a pile of pictures, pictures that Beth had given him over the past couple years, pictures of the two of them together, happy.

There they were in the mountains, and there, in another, curled up together on the couch. Beth, cheering in the stands at one of his basketball games. Beth, cheeks flushed, eyes radiant, balanced on her toes to give him a kiss on the cheek. Beth, elegant and lovely, in her silver evening gown at last year's spring formal.

He held the last picture in his hands-it had always been his favorite and, until this evening, had sat on his desk in a silver frame. It had been taken just after they'd started going out. They were in the park. It had been a rare, beautiful day-cool air, brilliant blue sky. Even the gra.s.s had seemed lush and green. Adam had swept Beth up in his arms, dangling her above the ground, and she was laughing, trying unsuccessfully to get away, her hair billowing in the wind, her face filled with joy-his face filled with love. It was how he always thought of her-open, happy, laughing, so in love with him, so hopeful about the future. She'd believed in them-believed in him.

He held the picture, wondering: Had he made a mistake? Thrown away something too precious, too perfect to lose?

But then he remembered that these weren't the only pictures, that these images no longer told the whole story. He looked out the window, to Harper's dark bedroom only a few feet away, and remembered who he could count on-and who he couldn't, who had taken everything good in his life, everything he'd thought was real, and stomped on it. Destroyed it.

This picture in front of him that he'd loved so much-it was a lie. Everything he'd loved had been a lie.

He tore the picture in half, right down the middle, and threw it aside.

He was done with lies, forever.

CHAPTER.

14.

The next morning Harper ran out the door at eight a.m. sharp to meet Adam, who was driving her to school for the dreaded test. She was still hungover from the night before, and she expected he'd look even worse, but instead, Adam was clean shaven and bright-eyed, and had a wide smile on his face. Too wide, Harper decided, but if he wanted to pretend nothing had happened, she'd respect that and go along with it. For a while.

"Excuse me while I have a heart attack," he joked when she climbed into the car. "Harper Grace? On time? Will wonders never cease?"

"Hold the applause and let's get going," she sighed, squinting in the bright morning sun. "The sooner we get started, the sooner we can get this thing over with."

"Amen to that," he agreed, and shifted the car into gear.

The whole ride was like that-pleasant small talk, strange and unnerving only because it was so utterly and completely normal. As they pulled into the lot, they pa.s.sed right by Beth's car, but Adam said nothing-maybe he hadn't noticed.

The car pulled to a stop, and they got out. Harper took a deep breath. "Well, should we go face our future?"

She began to walk toward the school, but Adam grabbed her hand and pulled her back to the car.

"Wait," he said, smiling. "I have a present for you."

He pulled a small, hastily wrapped package from his pocket and handed it to her. She ripped off the wrapping.

"A new cell phone?" she asked, surprised.

"To replace the one I broke," he explained, blushing. "Sorry, again."

"Oh, Adam, you know, I don't care about the phone," she a.s.sured him. "I mean, thank you-this is so sweet, but-how are you doing?"

He shrugged and looked away. "Okay, I guess."

She took a step closer to him and put her hands on his shoulders, forcing him to look her in the eye. "How are you really doing?"

Slowly, carefully, as if afraid it might hurt, he smiled. A real smile, this time.

"I think I'm really okay," he told her. "Now."

And he leaned toward her, and they kissed, and it was sweet and soft and perfect-and again, she forced herself to push him away.

"Adam, I told you-," she protested.

He wrapped his arms around her waist and pulled her close to him, bending his lips to her ear, and whispered the words she'd been waiting so long to hear.

"I don't want revenge," he promised. "I want you."

She didn't think it would hit her so hard.

One minute, Beth was on her feet, barely awake, barely functional, but still upright, moving forward.

And the next, there they were, Adam and Harper, locked in each other's arms.

It was as if all the breath was sucked from her lungs, all the energy leeched from her body. The world narrowed to a pinhole vision-all she could see was him, with her, those familiar hands all over another body. She knew every inch of him, could almost feel what he was feeling as Harper wrapped herself around him. She wanted to throw up-instead she staggered, would have collapsed, but a pair of strong arms caught her halfway to the ground.

Kane.

"Beth, you look terrible," he said, helping her up and putting his arm around her. She leaned against him gratefully.

"Thanks," she said weakly as they shuffled toward the school. "A girl always likes to hear that." She did look terrible, she knew that. She'd cried all night, and it showed. When she'd looked in the mirror this morning, she had barely recognized the pale, gaunt face looking back at her with dead, hopeless eyes. "You don't look so great yourself," she added, gesturing toward the angry, enflamed skin around his left eye.

"You should see the other guy," Kane joked-then looked appalled, as he realized what he had said. "Beth, I'm sorry, I didn't mean-"

"It's okay." But it wasn't. It might never be.

"Beth, I want you to know, if you need-"

She put up a hand to silence him.

"Can we not do this now? I just need to-I just need to make it through the test."

It was as far ahead as she could bear to look. The future, which started in three hours, would take care of itself.

Three hours.

One hundred eighty minutes.

Too many questions to count-and a whole future riding on every answer.

Miranda bit nervously on the eraser of her number two pencil. Maybe she should have spent a little more time studying and a little less time partying. Too late now.

Kane tapped his toes, checked his watch, and waited for the time to run out. After all that time pretending to be an idiot, it was almost a pleasure to run through the test, fill in all the answers with ease, and kick back and relax. But he wished the clock hand would move just a little faster. He had things to do.

Kaia filled in the bubbles at random, making pictures with the dots and trying to spell out as many words as she could with the letters A, B, C, D, and E. Who knew, maybe she'd score even better this time. If so, she could patent the method and drive the Ivy Bound a.s.sholes out of business.

Harper fidgeted. This sucked. Stuck inside, alone, trapped behind a desk, when Adam sat somewhere behind her. Was he watching her? she wondered. Did he finally want her as much as she wanted him? As soon as this thing was done, they were heading home-her parents were out for the day, and she and Adam had a lot of catching up to do. Now it was just a matter of running down the clock.

Adam didn't want to be there. The test didn't mean anything to him-he wasn't going anywhere, test or no test. He knew that. So why waste his time? He watched Beth, a few rows in front of him, her blond head bent intently over the page. I hope it was worth it to you, he thought bitterly. It had all started with this stupid test. I sure as h.e.l.l hope it was worth it.

The numbers and words swam in front of her, blurred by tears. Beth's mind was fuzzy with fatigue, and it was all she could do to keep her heavy lids from slipping shut. To sleep would be such bliss-to forget all of this, to forget about him, a few rows back. Was he looking at her? Or was he looking at Harper? She didn't even know how many sections she'd already finished, only knew that the test had dragged on forever-and that her answer sheet was still almost completely blank.

She'd heard that you got six hundred points just for filling in your name ... She was going to need it.

Free at last, Miranda thought, stepping out of the stuffy school and breathing a relieved breath of warm, fresh air. But her celebration was short-lived, for what good was celebrating when you were all alone?

Harper, who she still wasn't speaking to, was a few steps ahead. When they hit the parking lot, Adam ran up to her and swept her off her feet with a hug and a pa.s.sionate kiss.

Big surprise, Miranda thought. Harper gets everything she wants. Again.

And there, only a few feet away, were Beth and-of all people-Kane. On another day Miranda might have been heartbroken-but today? Today she just accepted the new development and moved on. She was in the kind of mood where the worst case scenario seemed pretty much the only option-which meant she wasn't much surprised when it happened.

Beth looked like she'd been hit by a train (small wonder, considering the way her boyfriend, or maybe ex-boyfriend, Miranda supposed, was all over Harper). But it looked like Kane was disgustingly determined to cheer her up.

No, Miranda wouldn't waste her time worrying about Beth. Or any of them. Why should she? They all had someone-and then there was her. As always.

Alone.

Beth had pushed Kane away, and, thinking she wanted to be alone, needed to be alone, she'd driven over to the old elementary school playground, her place, the place that always felt like home.

But as soon as she stepped through the opening in the chain link fence, she knew she'd made a mistake.

Beth had thought she would want to be there. She thought it would remind her of life beyond Adam, of childhood, of happiness. But the past suddenly seemed bleak-because all that hope had led her here, to the empty present. The playground didn't wrap her in the soft arms of memory. It didn't fix anything. It was just a cold, strange place, made all the stranger by the fact that it was so familiar, that it was completely unchanged.

She was the one who'd changed.

She walked over to the swings, always her favorite spot, and sat down on one, pushing herself back and forth. Even the swings felt wrong, off. The seat was too tight, her legs were too long, sc.r.a.ping the ground. She was too old, and her body no longer remembered what to do, how to be that child who swung so high, pumping her legs, sc.r.a.ping the sky. That's what happens when you get older, she realized. You feel a little sick as the swing sways back and forth, but not enough to stop, and only at one point, when you've gone as far back and as high up as you can, and you're almost parallel with the ground, you stop in midair, then lurch back into motion a moment before your stomach does, swooping toward the ground. You wonder whether your swing could flip over the metal bar at the top, swing you all the way around, and throw you to the ground, bruised and broken. When you were a kid, you thought it could happen-but you weren't afraid. All grown up, you know it can't happen-but you're filled with fear. You swing slower, instead of pumping for the sky. You don't jump off-you slow yourself to a stop. You'd never fling yourself into the air in midswing, because you're no longer dreaming of flying. You're just worrying about how you're going to land.

This is what it means to get old, Beth thought. To grow up. To be alone.

It sucked.

"I thought I'd find you here."

It was Kane, appearing in front of her as if from nowhere. He always appeared just when she most needed someone, as if he somehow knew.

He sat down on the swing next to her.

"Should I ask how the test went?" he asked hesitantly.

She didn't know if it was the reminder of the bombed SATs or just the warmth and concern in his voice, but she burst into tears.

"I'll take that as a no," he said, and scooped her into his arms. And this time she let him hold her, let him comfort her, melted into his warm, strong body, let herself be supported by someone else-because she could no longer do it herself.

He rubbed her back, gently kissed the top of her head, and then-and she knew it was coming, hadn't she always known it was coming?-he tilted her face toward him and kissed her.

She was about to pull away. But then she thought of Adam and Harper, of facing another moment on her own all by herself, of drowning.

She was so tired, too tired to think, too tired to resist.

She pulled back for a moment and looked into his eyes. They were warm and caring. She took a deep breath, and kissed him-and let herself go.

What did she have left to lose?

Kaia stood by the fence at the end of the playground, watching and smiling.

Happily ever after, she thought-or, at least, happy for another couple weeks until the whole mess blows up in their faces.

She looked again at Kane and Beth, one of the more mismatched twosomes she'd ever seen. All four of them were flirting with disaster, and Kaia was more than happy to help things along. It pa.s.sed the time, after all.

Besides, she was good at it-making trouble, causing chaos. She may not know how to make herself happy-but she was d.a.m.n good at making other people miserable.

And she was just getting started.