The flush in my cheeks deepens. “Oh, just talking to Amanda. She whacked me in lacrosse practice, and we were joking that no would know she did it,” I say, the lie gliding off my tongue seamlessly.
I turn away quickly, walking into the pizza shop as a wave of self-loathing crashes over me. I don’t want to be like my mom. I don’t want to be a liar.
“Do you know what bugs people the most?” Lane asks as we sit down at a table with a red-and-white checked tablecloth.
“No. Tell me what bugs people the most.” I tense inside, dreading the answer. He’s mad at me. He’s going to tell me through one of his facts.
“Hidden fees,” he says, shaking his head, and laughing. “Followed by not getting a person on the phone, then tailgating, then incomprehensible bills, then dog poop left on the ground.”
“Seems relatively minor. All of it,” I say as I open a menu.
“Want to split a cheese pie? I’ll forgo pepperoni for you.”
“You’re the best. Thank you for your abstinence.”
He orders when the waitress comes by, adding two Diet Cokes. “You better make hers a double,” Lane adds, and winks at the waitress. It’s a joke, and she doesn’t get it, so she kind of just stares at him from behind her wire-rimmed glasses. Her sandy brown hair is pulled back in a tight ponytail. Lane waves a hand in the air. “Just two Diet Cokes, please.”
She nods and walks away, writing the order on her pad of paper.
“Sheesh. What’s the world come to when you can’t make a joke about a soda? See, that would be one of my pet peeves. That would be my biggest annoyance. Lack of appreciation and understanding of sarcasm.”
“That is indeed irksome,” I say.
Lane scratches his right hand across his jaw, a Godfather-like gesture, then adopts a Marlon Brando tone. “So, what can I do for you?”
I give him a look.
“You called this meeting,” he adds.
I shrug one shoulder. “What? Now I have to have a reason to hang out with you? I thought we just hung out,” I say, even though I can feel the tension, it’s real, it exists, it’s the shadow between us right now. I relent. “Fine, I know you’re pissed at me because of last night, because of the letters. But look, I had to do it. I have to get things sorted out in my life. And that’s why I want to be totally direct here.” I reach into my backpack for the letter I found under the doormat this morning. I unfold it, smooth it open on the tablecloth, and explain how, when and where I found it.
He turns it around, reads the words from Balzac, then the handwritten words. K, I’d really like to see you again.
“Weird. Who do you think wrote it?”
The waitress brings us our sodas and Lane takes a drink.
“Who do I think wrote it?” I ask, furrowing my brow.
He nods. “Yeah. It’s a little weird, don’t you think?”
I hold his eyes with mine. “Lane.”
“Kennedy.”
“Didn’t you …” I start to ask.
“Didn’t I what?”
“Well, you call me K. You knew I was leaving the letter. You know the Balzac is my favorite.”
He doesn’t say anything right away; just taps the table with his fingers. “Balzac,” he says, lingering on the name of the writer. “Such a funny name, don’t you think? Do you think everyone teased him on the playground with that name?”
It’s like I’m in an alternate universe and the Lane I thought I knew has been misplaced, and been replaced by this slightly off version who doesn’t quite fit into the old one’s skin.
I stare directly at him. “Lane, did you leave this letter for me?”
He looks me in the eyes finally, his crazy hazel-green-brown eyes meeting mine. “You want to know what annoys me most? If they had called me for that survey, I’d tell them what annoys me most. Lack of directness,” he says.
“But I’m being direct. I’m being totally direct.”
“Right. And I would do the same. If I had feelings for you, I’d tell you. I wouldn’t leave a letter on your doorstep. A letter meant for a married woman.”
Red rushes to my cheeks. I hold my hands up, the sign for surrender. “All right. Got the message.”
He stands up and pushes his chair back. All I can figure is I’ve made him so mad he’s going to leave. But he walks around the table and sits next to me, pulling a chair closer to me, so close he’s got one of my knees between his legs.
“Are you just going to remind me you don’t like me or something?”
“Do you want me to like you?”
I don’t know how to answer or what to answer, so I don’t. If I felt off balance this morning walking to school, that was nothing compared to how I feel now. The whole world is tilted on its side and I’m not seeing or feeling or thinking straight.
“Do you?” he asks in a softer voice. “Because if I liked you, I would tell you. I would be direct. I would be up front,” he says staring hard at me. He places a hand on my leg, and his voice softens. “I would ask you to prom.”
He waits for me to say something. His words are his confession.
“But you said,” I start to say, but I’m stuttering and sputtering. “You said I was your closest friend. That you wanted to go as friends.”
“If I were being direct, I’d tell you right now that that’s all true, but yes, there is more to it than that. So much more,” he says, the last words in a heated whisper.