The phone rang and rang. Nine weeks, I thought to myself. The internet said nine weeks was an okay time to do it. At least I wasn’t too late. At least I wasn’t in denial for months, like Mom was, or paralyzed by distress. At least I had Ava to call, and money from my ice-cream job, and a bus ticket to a town far away. I was better off than a lot of people. There were so many ways it could have been worse.
In case of emergency, says Wilda McClure in How to Survive in the Woods, enumerate your advantages.
I stood in the snow and enumerated, and on the eighth ring Ava picked up the phone.
49
“HEY, LADY,” SHE SAID.
I swallowed hard. “Hey,” I said.
“Are you still coming tomorrow?”
Her voice was cheerful. It was hard to get used to the new Ava. Sometimes the change still startled me. I went through a real shitty time in high school and I’m sorry I inflicted that shittiness on you, she’d written in her letter. I think in some ways I was jealous because everyone loved you so much, and I felt like I came second to you and Max. I’m sorry about your dad and sorry you had to find out in such a horrible way. If you ever want to talk about it, I’m here, even though I understand if you don’t like me very much anymore.
I shivered. The truth was, I never wanted to talk about it. Not with Mom, not with Ava, not with anyone. It was too disgusting. It made my skin creep. And even though Ava had taken back some of the terrible things she had said, in my worst moments I still felt like an interloper.
Ava was waiting for me to answer.
My voice trembled. “Yeah.”
Snowflakes were falling around me in dense flurries. The houses on the street were quiet and dark.
“What’s wrong?” Ava said.
I didn’t answer.
“Annabeth,” she said more sternly, “what’s wrong?”
“I need a favor,” I said.
50
THE NEXT DAY, MOM DROVE ME to the Greyhound station to catch the bus to Maple Bay. It had snowed all night, and the fire hydrants wore fat white hats. Parked cars had sheets of snow draped over their windshields. They looked like hospital patients.
“Did you remember your toothbrush?” Mom said. She acted happy on the drive, but I could tell she was as nervous as I was. She hugged me and I tensed involuntarily, afraid she would detect my still-undetectable condition through both our snow coats.
“Give Pauline a hug for me,” said Mom. “Ava too.”
“I will.”
She gave me a twenty-dollar bill for no apparent reason and kissed me on the cheek. “Love you, Annabean. Have fun up there.”
“Love you too.”
51
THE BUS RIDE TO MAPLE BAY had a million stops. Every bus station had the same crumbly look as all the others, a concrete lip where people waited with their overstuffed bags, dirty yellow lights. Every highway exit had the same fast-food restaurants and gas stations. I slumped against the window and tried to pick out a tree or plant, some green thing my heart could curl its tendrils around and try to befriend. Why had we done this? I thought to myself. If nobody loved it, why? It was insane to build places that nobody loved. It was insane to cover all that was green and tender with parking lots and garbage bins.
I wondered if anyone else felt that way, or if I was just a freak. As the bus huffed and belched and pulled back onto the highway, a loneliness overcame me that was worse than anything I’d felt all year.
Midway through the morning, Noe texted me.
are you still mad at me?
i didn’t realize you thought i was promising to go with you.
i thought we were just talking and having fun.
It was so like Noe to wait until a time when we wouldn’t see each other for several days to start a dialogue like this.
i don’t know, I texted back.
it was the way you came back from the gym expo
and didn’t even bother to talk to me
like i should just adapt to your plans
A few seconds later, a string of texts from Noe came back.
i don’t want you to adapt to my plans
you should always do what you want, k?
you’re so incredible and smart
you don’t need me to tell you what to do
I stared at my phone. I didn’t have the energy to contradict her or call out all the truths she wasn’t acknowledging. It was easier to snuggle into the familiar ritual of flattery and reconciliation; easier to be lovable Annabeth, pliant and understanding, than to let out a more disruptive version of myself. I thought of the sunny afternoon when I told her about Oliver, and tears pricked at my eyes.
i know, I typed back.
i just got scared
i don’t want to lose you
you won’t lose me
we’ll visit all the time
i’ll come stay in your dorm room
and you’ll come home on breaks
: )
steven says you’re fascinating, btw
we talked about you for like an hour
aww
he was all, “she’s an undercover badass!”
and i was like, “i know!”
you guys are the best
oh
bus is stopping
have to pee
talk soon
talk soon
In a McDonald’s bathroom noisy with flushing toilets and keening hand dryers, I splashed cold water on my face, shook out my stale ponytail, finger-combed my hair. Beside me, enterprising women were brushing their teeth, putting on lipstick, taking swipes at their armpits with deodorant sticks.
“You done with the sink?” a woman said, elbowing in beside me and planting her enormous purse on the water-spotted countertop.
“Yeah, sorry,” I stuttered. I wished I could feel as confident as her. Swing my purse around. Take out a can of perfume and spray it at myself with such gusto that anyone in a six-foot blast radius must duck or be scented with Eau de Sex Sugar.
I trudged back to the empty bus, climbed on, and rummaged in the overhead bin for How to Survive. The seats with their detritus of squashed sweaters and half-drunk soda bottles looked like the little shrines people make at gravestones; plastic flowers gone crooked and leaky from wind and rain.