Page 21 of Wish You Were Her
“I know,” Jonah said stiffly, avoiding eye contact and busying himself with receipts. “Sorry if I seemed…”
“It’s all right, son. She’s only here for the summer. I’m sureshe makes lots of boys nervous, you won’t be the only one. Can you just pretend to be nice for a summer?”
Somehow, the word “pretend” irked Jonah. He felt prickly about it. “Fine.”
“I can do all of this. Go and meet Simon. It’s Saturday night.”
Usually Jonah would protest and stay to show his commitment, but when George dismissed him, he made swift work of grabbing his things and leaving the shop behind. He walked to the arcade for Saturday Night Debrief with Simon, trying not to get worked up about George’s gentle reprimand.
Simon was usually a little hard to handle when he was with their other friends from school. It rekindled the immature side of him, in a way that Jonah struggled to find amusing.
At eight o’clock, the sun was still out in Lake Pristine and as many people were heading out to the beach as returning from it. The lake was a constant source of distraction during the hot summers in town. People were shutting up their shops and running with great urgency, desperate to cool off in the water.
Soon the marquees for the festival would be arriving, and before long the maze would open for its summer season.
Jonah felt some of the day’s stresses slipping away as he reached the arcade, which was already filling with Lake Pristine’s younger crowd. He heard Simon before he saw him and gravitated toward the sound of his laugh.
Simon was in their usual booth with his friend Skye, and her friend, Kerrie. The latter hurriedly fiddled with her hair on noticing Jonah.
“Evening, troops,” Jonah said.
He was about to slide in next to Simon when his friend held up a hand.
“Someone else is coming, sit next to Kerrie.”
Jonah exhaled wearily. He knew exactly who Simon was anticipating.
“I’m really nervous to meet her,” Kerrie said conspiratorially.
“I’m not,” scoffed Skye. “That show she’s on is pretty terrible.”
“They killed her off,” Jonah offered.
“Yeah, well, I’m not surprised. She wasn’t very good on it.”
Kerrie frowned anxiously, glancing at her friend. “You said yesterday you’ve never seen it.”
Skye stalled but rallied in an instant. “Yeah. I stopped watching. It’s a drag, Kerrie. Lots of people think so.”
Jonah was about to roll his eyes but as he perched on the edge of the booth there was suddenly a presence next to him. Allegra had obviously gone home to change, because she was no longer wearing the sundress from earlier. Instead she was in denim shorts and a band shirt, with her hair scraped up. She looked effortlessly chic.
“What’s a drag?” she asked, with an impish, knowing smile.
Skye, if she had been a different kind of girl, could have laughed off her own insecurity and taken the moment as an opportunity to make an interesting friend. But she was not a different kind of girl.
“Just talking about a TV show,” she said, looking Allegra up and down, slowly.
The latter didn’t mind. She continued to smile sunnily and then turned to hold her hand out to Kerrie. “Hey, I’m Allegra. Nice to meet you.”
Jonah watched Kerrie’s hand tremble as she reached out to take the one being offered to her. “I’m Kerrie. It’s… it’s literally so cool to meet you.”
Jonah saw what felt just like his own annoyance flash across Skye’s face and he was surprised by how distasteful it looked.He wondered if he seemed as bitter when he reacted to the sycophancy.
“I love your rings,” Allegra said to Kerrie, nodding at the girl’s fingers and smiling.
“Oh, my God, you can have all of them,” Kerrie babbled, laughing a little too hard.
Allegra slid in next to Simon, who was gesticulating frantically for her to do so. Jonah felt another familiar pang of irritation.
