“Sure,” I replied with a shrug and walked down the hall.
“Wait,” Dad called.
I turned, trying not to be a dick. My therapist, Cecilia, said I needed to be easier on my dad. That I was misplacing my frustration. “Yeah?”
“Are you going to botany club tonight?”
I nodded.
“Pick you up at five.”
With a wave, I turned to head toward the bathrooms.
Okay, so it might have been nice to wear shorts when it got hot as Hades in this freaking school, but I didn’t need Dad poking his nose around. I already felt like I was living in a fishbowl with Ms. Melrose telling him about therapists.
The warning bell rang, and I looked toward the ceiling, frustrated I hadn’t had a chance to piss before going to videography class with Mr. Davis. That was the one class I didn’t want to miss any part of.
I hitched my backpack over my shoulders and walked through the crowd of students toward the videography classroom. One of the girls in the botany club waved at me on my way there.
“Hey,” she said, “are you coming tonight?”
“I have to miss it,” I said.
35
BIRDIE
Confession: I got my nose from my father, and my mother gothersfrom the plastic surgeon.
I used my best handwriting to write a note in the card for Anthea’s baby shower.
Mara stood beside me in a pretty russet dress and shifted in her heels. She looked so pretty with her brunette hair in loose waves and bright red lipstick painting her lips. “I’m glad you could help her,” Mara said. “I wish I would have had someone like you when I was in high school. When I dropped out, my principal told me I’d be a single mom working at the diner by the time I was twenty.”
I shook my head. “I can’t believe the way some people treat children.”
“Me neither.” She shifted the rings on her hand, clearly uncomfortable.
I tucked the card in the envelope. “She’s going to make something of her life, you know. Go somewhere else. Experience things I’ve never even dreamed of.”
“Don’t do that,” Mara said. “Don’t undermine what you’ve done.”
“What’s that?” I asked, my eyes feeling hot. I hadn’t heard from Cohen all week. I’d been threatened to be fired. I was living in my friend’s guest bedroom. This was not the life I’d ever imagined for myself.
“You’velived, Birdie,” she said, her hands on my shoulders. “You went to college, had a serious relationship, lived somewhere other than your parents’ mansion. Why would you feel any less than the amazing woman you are?”
I shook my head as I taped the card to the wrapped gift. “It’s not just that. Headmaster Bradford practically threatened to fire me if Ideignedto discuss colleges with this one student.”
Only Mara could look that disgusted and beautiful at the same time. “They’re threatening to fire you when you’re changing lives? And you’re sure you want to work there?”
I picked up the present and began walking toward her front door. “The apartment manager said they don’t have an opening at that other building for a month. So unless I want to lie and tell them I have a job that I don’t anymore, losing this job is out of the question.”
“You know you can stay with me as long as you want,” she said, letting us out the front door and locking it behind us.
“I know, and I’m grateful—you know I am—but I’m embarrassed, Mara.” I held the present against the car with my hip so I could unlock the door. “Look at me. The only thing I own is this car, and it’s already well over a hundred thousand miles. I’m in student loan debt up to my eyeballs because I didn’t qualify for financial aid,andI don’t have a boyfriend.”
“Cohen could be your boyfriend,” she pointed out as she sat next to me in the car.
“Allegedly.” I buckled my seatbelt and turned my key in the ignition. It fired up, and I pulled out of her driveway. “After what happened, he’s probably not interested. No, I just need to help Cohen find out what’s going on with Ollie and then get him out of my head.”