Page 58 of Fraternizing with the Enemy
Shame practically burned me, even though the stain on her pants wasn’t my fault. “Maisie, it’s no big deal,” I began, trying to make light of it as I stepped closer. “I’ve never seen you cry, you know. Not even when you broke your arm in the fifth grade. And you’re crying over your shorts?”
“Of course you wouldn’t understand it,” Maisie snapped, still not looking at me. “You don’t know what it’s like to be humiliated.”
I couldn’t help but scoff a little at that.Did younothear what my label was?“Sorry, Maisie, but you don’t have the market cornered on humiliation.”
“And you have no right to tell me whether or not something’s embarrassing.” Maisie finally turned to me now, glaring her puffy eyes at me. There was pure anger in them, despite the tears. The sight of both emotions had me freezing. “If it were just my friends, it’d be one thing, but it’s the fact that it’s you and Jade and freaking even Connor out there that makes it worse. And you know it.”
Don’t cry over them, Maisie, I wanted to say, but those exact words wouldn’t come. “Who cares what they think?”
“Hypocrite.”
I flinched in surprise, the air leaving my lungs in a silentwhoosh. “Excuse me?”
“Youcare what they think. You always have. Don’t be hypocritical and pretend that isn’t the case.” Maisielowered her paper towel and tightened her fist around it, and in that moment, the tables turned. Our popularity status meant nothing in that moment, not with the hateful look in her eye. Then again, with her, status never truly mattered. “You were voted Most Likely to Peak in High School, right? I guess they knew what they were talking about.”
Out of everyone at Brentwood, it made sense for Maisie to think that. To look at me and see nothing more than a girl destined to wave pom-poms and rule the top of the social pyramid. She’d been a casualty of my climb to popularity, and she had every right to believe it.
But hearing it from her hit differently—like falling from a cheer stunt and having the air knocked out of me. It wasn’t some Top Tier girl in the same boat, or a random nobody who didn’t know me. It was Maisie Matthews. And if she said it, then maybe it was true.
I guess they knew what they were talking about.
The shame I’d felt a moment ago swamped me again, nearly sucking me under its wave. There wasn’t anything I could say—no defense would hold water against her.
And that’s the truth, an insidious voice whispered in my head, sounding a lot like my own voice—mixed with Jade’s.You can go to arcades and date the enemy, but you’ll never be able to escape what you did. You’ll never escape the truth.
Without another word, I turned and practically ran from the bathroom before the pressure in my throat migrated to my eyes. I ran into someone on their way to the door, bumping them in the shoulder—were they holding sweatpants?—as I stumbled past.
“Did you go check on her?” Jade asked irritably as I sank down at our table.
I immediately picked up my drink, ignoring my trembling hand. The ice water did nothing to quell the fire in my throat.
“Did you even order the pizza?” Jade turned and looked at the counter. “I thought I saw you talking to someone?—”
“Some guy was trying to flirt,” I barely got out, swallowing hard. My water slipped in my fingers, and I almost followed Maisie in spilling all over my shorts. But water was better than bile, which rose in my throat. “T-The girl said she’d deliver it.”
I passed Landon his card back, but didn’t look at him. I didn’t look over to try and find lane twenty-two, either. Instead, I focused on our bowling alley screen. “Where’s Reed? It’s his turn.”
The pizza came to our table less than ten minutes later, fully paid for, but it was the worst pizza I’d ever tasted in my life.
Jade laid on my bed Friday after school, propped up by my light blue pillows and collection of well-loved stuffed animals. She had my goose from Logan propped against her knees, staring at it curiously.
I sat at the desk just underneath my window, applying my foundation. It was a little before five, and the bus to Chesterville for the away game would leave Brentwood at five-forty-five. Jade’s makeup was already done—I’d slaved over her glitter shadow first—but I still had time to finish mine. She said she didn’t feel good enough to help me.
I looked at Jade in the small mirror I was using, but she didn’t notice. After the cola waterfall at the bowling alley last night, Maisie’s group left with three frames left to bowl. Jade had let go of my random act of kindness when I checked on Maisie in the bathroom, but I still couldn’t help but wonder if she thought about it.
I couldn’t help but wonder what she’d say if I told her I saw Logan yesterday.
The butterflies in my stomach stirred at the thought of him. Even now, my hand tingled with the pressure ofhis skin against mine. Just the mere thought of his name in Jade’s presence felt terrifying—like she could somehow read my mind in that moment.
“Where did you get this?” she asked suddenly.
I glanced over my shoulder to find her fiddling with the goose’s legs. “Uh?—”
“It’s new, right?”
“My, uh, mom picked it up from somewhere.”
“It’s lame.” Jade flicked its leg. “Like something you’d find in a claw machine or something.”
