Page 27 of Notice Me, Jameson Hart
“Good unexpected or bad unexpected?”
Rita bites her lip, considering. “I don’t know. I never thought about him in that way. He’s always been Robbie Pryor, you know? Your goofy brother, who makes terrible puns.”
“He also apparently carries backpacks and waits with people in snowstorms.”
“Stop trying to sell me on your brother!” But she’s smiling. “This is weird. Now I’m going to be all awkward around him.”
“Welcome to my world. Population: me and, now, you.”
Rita shifts on her bed, and I can see her switching into practical mode. “So,” she says, examining her now-dry nails, “I started my college application essays.”
Ugh.The words ‘college’ and ‘essays’ make me think of the one hidden in Adam’s closet. Stanford. California. Three thousand miles away. I’ve done my best to forget about it, but whenever I do, something happens or someone says something pertaining to college, and it comes screaming back.
Rita raises an eyebrow. “You okay? You look like you swallowed a lemon.”
I force a smile. “You know how much I hate writing.”
“Please, you wrote a ten-page analysis of Sondheim’s use of dissonance for fun last month.” She leans closer to the camera. “Kevin, what’s going on?”
The weight of Adam’s secret presses against my chest. It’s getting harder and harder to breathe. I’m going to explode if I don’t talk to someone about it.
Rita waits patiently for me to answer, knowing me well enough not to push.
“I found something.”
“Found what?”
“A Stanford application in Adam’s room. It’s only half-finished.”
Rita’s eyes go wide. “Stanford? As in California, Stanford?”
I nod miserably. “He’s been working on it in secret. The personal statement talks about wanting to be more than just a triplet.”
“Oh, Kevin.” She smiles sympathetically. “That must have been hard to read.”
“The worst part is, I get it. I understand wanting to be your own person. But he’s lying to us. To me and Robbie. We’re making all these plans, and he’s…going along with it.”
“Maybe he hasn’t decided yet. You said the application was half finished.”
“Maybe.” But I know Adam. Once he sets his mind to something, he sees it through to the end. The fact that he’s even considering Stanford means part of him has already left. “I don’t know what to do, Rita. I can’t keep pretending I don’t know.”
“You have to tell him.”
“He’ll be furious.” I close my eyes, imagining the confrontation. “He’ll say I was snooping, which I was. He’ll say I violated his privacy, which I did.”
“But keeping this secret is going to eat you alive.”
She’s right. I’m a worrywart. Soon, I’ll lose sleep. Then, I’ll start picking at my food. I won’t be able to concentrate on anything. Even my usual escape into fantasy will feel hollow when reality has such a massive secret lurking in it.
“What if he goes?” My voice cracks. “What if he leaves us?”
“Then you’ll adapt. You’ll miss him, but you’ll adapt.”
“We’ve never been apart. Not really. We shared a womb, for crying out loud.” I laugh, but it comes off as more of a sob. “How do you separate from someone who’s been there since before you were born?”
Rita’s quiet for a moment. “That’s exactly why he needs to try.”
Her words pack a wallop because they’re true. We’ve been the Pryor boys our whole lives. Adam needs to find out who he is apart from that.
