Page 64 of The Do-Over

“Well, of course not,” I said, putting my finger over the top of my straw. “But I’d like to be. I mean, happy kind ofisthe goal. Like, for life, right?”

“Well, sure, but—”

“Because happy is life’s default.” I pulled the straw from my cup, lifted it to my mouth, and moved my finger, letting the soda drip into my mouth. “Content is the baseline. Sometimes we’re not, and sometimes we’re freaking ecstatic, but happy is the default.”

“You’re absolutely wrong.” He set down his cup and looked a little bit intense. “Existence is the default. Merely existing, emotionally, is the baseline.Happyis, like, this floating, fluid thing that’s impossible to hold on to. Elusive as fuck. Sometimes you get lucky and have it, but it’s only a matter of time before it slips back out of your hands.”

I shook my head, trying to figure out how he could have such a bleak outlook. “That is the most depressing thing I’ve ever heard.”

“No it’s not.”

“Yes, it totally is.” I dropped everything on the tray, done with fidgeting because I needed to find a way to change his ridiculous mind. “According to your theory, anytime you’re happy, you have to sleep with one eye open because it’s going to implode at any moment.”

He gave a surprised little cough of laughter and rubbed his cheek. “That’s kind of the truth, though.”

“Who hurt you, Stark?” I teased, and regretted it the instant he looked at me. Because—man, oh man—there was a whole lot of sad in his eyes. For just a split second, he looked like a very sad little boy.

Then he smirked, and just as quickly it was gone. “Who shot you up with happy fairy dust is kind of the bigger question.”

“It’s not happy dust at all. I know that I’m the only one who truly cares about my happiness, so I make it a priority. You should seriously try—like,reallytry, looking at everything in a different light.”

Now he smiled. “Is that so?”

“Yes.” I smiled back at him and said, “Think about it. On a normal day, you might be thinking, ‘It sucks that I have to go to school.’?”

He said with a straight face, “I would never think that—education is important.”

“You get what I mean. On a normal day when you’re feeling less than positive, force yourself to change your thinking. Instead of ‘It sucks that I have to go to school,’ think ‘It’s such a nice day that maybe after school I will recline the seat of my truck and reada good book while the breeze smells like springtime.’?”

Now he flat-out laughed at me. “Why would I ever think something that ridiculous?”

“How about, ‘At least I get to sit next to Emilie Hornby in Chemistry—hubba, hubba.’?”

“Really with that?” he said, back to full-on sarcastic teasing with his twinkling eyes.

“Oh, like you’ve never thought the words ‘hubba, hubba.’?”

He said, “I can promise you I have not.”

“Well, what about your friends, Mr. Existence Is the Default?” I leaned on the table, wanting to learn every single thing about him, and asked, “How is it that you’re absolutely free of high school cliques and drama? I see you around school sometimes, and you appear to have friends, but I never hear about you socializing at all. Never see you at any parties, or football games, any other school functions…”

“And…?”

“And… what’s the story? Do you hang with your friends and do activities, or are you an actual hermit?”

He looked over my shoulder, like he was watching someone or thinking about something, and I expected him to give me a smart-ass nonanswer. But then he said, “I used to hang with my friends a lot more. But somewhere along the way, I stopped caring about everything high school. It just feels so… pointless. Not the learning, but all of the games.”

His eyes landed on mine and he looked… intense. “SometimesI try to power through so I’m not a ‘hermit’—as you so delightfully put it—but it just feels meaningless.”

“Oh.” I didn’t know what to say to that. “Well, maybe if you treat it—”

“Swear to God, Hornby, I will lose it if you tell me to be positive.”

That made me smile. “Well, it wouldn’t hurt, you know.”

One corner of his mouth slid up a smidge. “I think it might, actually.”

CONFESSION #14

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