I was in no shape to be going out with anyone because I was unbalanced, and he knew I had the panic attacks and they weren't getting better, in fact they were getting worse, and I was really sorry, I should never have kissed him back and had he ever heard of Rabbit Fever?
"Ruby." Noel interrupted me.
"Huh?" I hadn't finished explaining.
"Look. I understand if you can't go out with me. But you could at least tell me the truth about it."
"What?"
"Tell me the real reason. I mean, haven't we been friends long enough that I deserve the truth?"
"I don't know what you're talking about."
"The problem is not the situation with Nora."
"Yes it is," I said. Because it was.
"Ariel saw us. You know she'll tell Katarina and all those guys, and it'll get back to Nora by the end of tomorrow. That's a done deal and nothing we do or don't do is going to change it. Nora is going to know."
It wasn't what I wanted to hear. "Maybe she won't tell," I said.
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"This is Ariel we're talking about," Noel reminded me.
Okay. He was right on that. "But maybe Nora will forgive me if she knows it was just once. If she knows how sorry I am and how I never meant to hurt her."
Noel sighed. He and I both knew that probably wasn't true. She had told me outright not to steal him, and back in sophomore year, Nora had been furious at me when I'd kissed the wrong boy. She hadn't forgiven me for months that time. A second infraction would be even worse.
But I was trying to be a good person. It was completely against my nature-but I was trying. Couldn't Noel see? And even if Nora wasn't going to forgive me, at least Meghan might. More important, I had to be able to forgive myself--which I never would be able to do if I became a flat-out boyfriend stealer.
"You're not being straight with me," Noel said.
"What do you mean?"
"Be honest with me about why. That's all I'm asking."
"I'm trying to be honest!" I said. "I have bad mental health!"
"I saw you with Jackson this afternoon at the library," he said. "I was on the mezzanine." Oh. Oh no.
"You were making out by the circulation desk."
"No we weren't."
"I saw you," Noel said.
"We weren't making out."
"Okay, let's call it a clinch. Can we call it a clinch?" His voice was bitter.
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"No, it was a hug."
"Look, if you're back with Jackson now, whatever, that's fine. I just want to know now, so I don't have to hear it through the Tate Universe rumor mill."
"I'm not back with him."
"It's obvious something was going on, Ruby, and it was only like two hours after you'd been with me. I have to say, I felt sick watching you."
Oh no oh no oh no.
Noel was the only guy in the whole school who didn't think I was a slut. The only one who said he knew for sure that I hadn't done all the things people said I'd done.
And now, I knew he was thinking maybe I had done those things. What is more slutty than making out with two different guys on campus in the same day?
"It was a hug," I repeated. "He was hugging me."
"I don't care about the technicalities," said Noel. "I just know there's no way I can compete with Jackson Clarke. Not in cross-country, not in popularity and obviously, not with you."
"Noel, I-"
"I just wish you'd been straight with me. When you called me tonight, I wish you'd said, 'Hey, Noel, I'm back with my ex-boyfriend. Sorry.' I wish you'd been truthful."
"I was!"
"Come on. You made up this excuse about Nora when obviously that situation is already going to be what it's going to be, and then you talked about your panic attacks, and both of those are just a front. Because what it's all about is Jackson Clarke."
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"Noel, please."
"I'm hanging up now, Ruby," he said. And the phone went dead.
It did not escape my notice that he'd said the same thing to me as Doctor Z.
That it wasn't all about Nora. It was all about Jackson. Was that really true?
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16.
I Encounter Horrible Feet
Roo,
I got all your messages on my cell. I got your e-mail and your note. But I don't know what to say. I've liked Noel for so long, and you were my closest friend. I know you have mental health issues, but I still don't see how you could do this.
I really, really don't want to talk about it with you. Please, just leave it be.
Nora
--e-mail, received by me, Thursday morning.
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i had left Nora a note in her mail cubby Wednesday after my panic attack. I had called her four times and when I couldn't reach her, finally, I'd sent a long e-mail explaining that nothing more was happening with Noel and I was desperately sorry.
By way of answer, I got the e-mail above, Thursday before I left for school.
I told Meghan the whole thing while she was driving me to school. The Seattle rain was pouring, like it always does in winter, and we were inching through traffic.
"Wait, back up," said Meghan, slurping vanilla cappuccino. "You like Noel?"
I nodded.
"You've liked him all this time?" I nodded again.
"Am I blind?" she said, pulling onto the freeway. "Because I had no idea. This is a major news flash on the Meghan end."
"I tried to tell Nora," I said. "But she just asked me to stop liking him. So I wasn't exactly advertising it."
"Oh, that's fair of her," said Meghan sarcastically.
"I was trying to be a good friend."
"You can't stop liking someone you like," Meghan reasoned. "Was he a good kisser?"
"That's what you want to know? I've ruined my life."
"Well, was he?"
"Yes, but I'm never kissing him again anyway, so it doesn't matter. Ariel will have told the whole school by now."
"I don't think Nora will stay mad," Meghan said
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thoughtfully. "It's not like Noel was ever going to like her back."
"You think not?"
"Obviously not."
"You were always so encouraging to her about him."
"I didn't want to squash her hopes," Meghan said, "but I could tell by how he acted at Crystal Mountain that he knew she liked him and wasn't interested."
"Really?"
"Don't worry. Nora will realize the truth of the situation and be over the whole thing before lunch. Listen, if I were you, I would have done the exact same thing."
Yeah, but Meghan was a girl who hadn't had a single female friend until last year. And for good reason.
"Look at it this way," she went on. "Noel likes you, you like Noel. Neither of you can help it. It just happened. You can't angst so much about it, you have to follow your feelings."
"It didn't just happen," I said. "I flirted with him. I wrote him notes." I wrote him notes about my boobs. "I'm a bad person."
"You are not." Meghan squeezed my knee. "You just liked a guy and you could tell he liked you back, so you acted on it."
I shook my head. "I did to Nora exactly what Kim did to me last year," I said. "I stole the guy she liked." My cappuccino was going cold in my hand. I was too upset to drink it. "What kind of person would go out and do the exact same thing that ruined her whole life when someone did it to her?"
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"Nuh-uh." Megan honked at a small blue sports car that had cut in front of her. "That is not what you did."
I hunched into my anchor coat. "It pretty much is."
"Roo, you and Jackson were going out. You had been going out for months."
"So?"
"Nora just liked Noel. She barely even talked to him on the phone or anything. If she thinks that's anything like the same as you and Jackson, she is seriously inexperienced."
But the thing was--Nora was seriously inexperienced.
"She's not going to be mad for long," said Meghan confidently. "We're all friends. Give her a couple days, and clear things up with Noel and everything will be fine. Maybe you should send him flowers for V-Day. I'm thinking of sending some to Mike. And maybe Don."