Just Listen

* * *

For the rest of the day, you could just feel the pre-holiday-break restlessness in the air, everyone counting down until vacation officially began.

After finishing my exam late, I headed to my locker, then to the bathroom, which was empty except for a girl who was leaning in close to the mirror, putting on liquid blue eyeliner. Soon after I went into the stall, I heard her leave, and I thought I was alone. When I came out, though, Clarke Reynolds, in jeans and a truth squad T-shirt, was leaning against the sink.

"Hi," she said.

My first instinct was to look behind me, which was crazy, as well as kind of stupid, as I could see in the mirror there was no one there.

"Hey," I said.

I stepped around her, to the next sink down, and turned on the water. I could feel her watching me as I rinsed my hands and pumped the soap dispenser, which was empty as always. "So," she said, as again I realized there was no stuffiness to her voice whatsoever, "are you okay?"

I turned off the water. "What?"

She reached up, adjusting her glasses. "It's not really just me asking," she said. "I mean, it is, obviously. But Owen's wondering, too."

Hearing her say Owen's name was so strange that it took me a moment to wrap my mind around it. "Owen," I repeated.

She nodded. "He's just…" She trailed off. "Concerned, I guess, is the word."

"About me," I said, clarifying.

"Yeah."

Something wasn't right here. "And he asked you to talk to me?"

"Oh, no." She shook her head. "He's just mentioned it to me a few times, so I got to wondering, and… then I saw you today. After lunch. You were leaving the library, and you just looked really upset."

Maybe it was because she'd brought up Owen. Or because at this point, I really didn't have that much to lose as far as she and I were concerned. Whatever the reason, I just decided to be honest. "I'm surprised," I said. "I didn't think you'd care if I was upset."

She bit her lip for just a second, something I suddenly remembered her doing a million times when we were younger. It meant I'd caught her off guard. "Is that what you really think?" she said. "That I don't like you?"

"You don't," I said. "You haven't, since that summer with Sophie."

"A

"Yeah, but—"

"Yeah, but nothing. You don't like me, A

I just stared at her. "But you won't even look at me in the halls," I said. "You never have. And that first day, on the wall—"

"You hurt my feelings," she said. "God, A

"I tried to talk to you!" I said. "That day at the pool."

"And that," she shot back, pointing at me, "was the only time. Yeah, I was mad. It had just happened! But then you never came around, you never called. You were just gone."

It was like Emily saying "I'm sorry" to me, a total reversal of how I saw things, which seemed crazy and impossible to process.

"So why now?" I said. "Why talk to me now?"

She sighed. "Well," she said slowly, "I have to be honest. Rolly's a big part of it."

Rolly, I thought. Then I remembered that night, him clutching those waters. Tell Owen he was right about everything, he'd said, so excited. "You and Rolly?" I said.

She bit her lip again, and I could have sworn she blushed, but only for a second. "We're talking," she said, reaching down to tug at the hem of her truth squad T-shirt, which, now that I noticed, looked awfully worn for someone who had only just seen the band for the first time a month and half earlier. "Anyway, that night at the club, when he got you to introduce him to me, you said that I hated you. It got me thinking about everything that had happened with us all those years ago. And with Owen talking about you… you've been on my mind. So when I saw you today, and you were—"

"Wait," I said. "Owen talks about me?"

"He hasn't said all that much," she told me. "Just that you guys were friends, and then something happened, and now you're not. Forgive me for saying so, but it sounded, I don't know, a little bit familiar to me. If you know what I mean."

I felt myself flush, imagining Clarke and Owen discussing me and my avoidant behavior. How embarrassing.

"It's not like we discuss you," she added, as if I'd said this aloud. Which was another thing that I now remembered about Clarke: She could always kind of read my mind.

Clarke was worried about me. Emily was apologizing to me. This was a weird day.

"So are you?" Clarke asked now, as a group of girls came in, cigarettes already out, their faces falling when they saw us there. They grumbled, huddled, then walked back out, presumably to wait until we'd left. "Okay, I mean?"

I just stood there, wondering how to answer this. I realized that for the last few weeks I hadn't been missing just Owen, but also that part of me that had been able to be so honest with him. Maybe I couldn't do that here. But I didn't have to lie, either. So I went for the place I was working toward always: the middle.

"I don't know," I said.

Clarke looked at me for a moment. "Well," she said, "do you want to talk about it?"

I'd had so many chances. Her, Owen, Emily. For so long, I'd thought all I needed was someone to listen, but that wasn't really true at all. It was me that was the problem. I did this. And now, I did it again. "No," I said. "But thanks anyway."

She nodded, then pushed off the sink, and I followed her out of the bathroom. In the hallway, as we prepared to go our separate ways, she reached down to her bag, pulling out a pen and scrap of paper. "Here," she said as she scribbled on it, then handed it to me. "My cell number. Just in case you change your mind."

Her name was written beneath it, in the hand I still recognized—clean, block-print, the same little swoop on the final E. "Thanks," I said.

"No problem. Merry Christmas, A

"You, too."

As we walked away from each other, I knew I probably wouldn't call her. Still, I unzipped my bag, stuffing the paper in with the card Emily had given me. Even if I never used either, for whatever reason, it was nice to know they were there.

Another holiday, another trip to the airport. Just like I had about a year earlier, I sat in the backseat, behind my parents, as we headed down the highway, a plane rising from one corner of the windshield to the other as we took the exit. Whitney had stayed home, ostensibly to get di

"There she is!" my mother said, waving as my sister appeared wearing a bright red coat, her hair pulled back in a ponytail. Kirsten smiled, waving back as she walked toward us, the wheels of her suitcase whizzing across the floor.

"Hello!" she said, immediately reaching up to hug my dad, then moving on to my mom, who was already teary-eyed, the way she always was at arrivals and departures. When it was my turn she hugged me tight, and I closed my eyes, breathing in her scent: soap, cold air, and the peppermint of her shampoo, all so familiar. "I am so happy to see you guys!"