Page 5 of I Hope This Doesn't Find
“Thanks,” Rosie says, without glancing up again. “Much love.”
I swallow, her previous compliment threatening to make its way back up. But that’s fine. It’s no big deal. Certainly no reason to get worked up. I make a mental note to run to the school printers this afternoon before I head off to my mom’s bakery. It’ll push back my already tight schedule by about thirty minutes, which means I’ll have to shorten my evening run to only five miles or eat dinner while I work or maybe both, but really, it’s not an issue.
I take another deep breath, though it sounds strained to my own ears, and a little frantic, like someone who’s been underwater too long coming up for air right before diving down again.
No big deal at all.
•••
I’ve already pulled out my notebooks and written down today’s date when Abigail Ong waltzes in as if she isn’t seven minutes late.
I would ask her to at leasttryand be more subtle, but that would be asking the impossible. Abigail is basically a walking glow-in-the-dark exclamation mark, with her platinum-silver hair and rolled-up skirt and platform combat boots, which are really just stylish stilts. They thud over the carpet as she makes her way toward me. Ms. Hedge has told her off multiple times for not wearing proper school shoes, but then Abigail ended up writing a five-page thesis about why her bootsdidin fact meet all the requirements for school shoes, complete with a proper bibliography and everything. I don’t think she’s ever put so much effort into any of her actual essays before.
“I’ve arrived,” Abigail announces to the class in general.
Our history teacher, Ms. Rachel, glances up from her desk. “That’s nice. Take your seat, Abigail.” No other teacher would be so chill about it, but that’s one of the reasons why Ms. Rachel is universally adored. The other reasons being that she’s in her twenties, she throws Christmas-themed pizza parties at the end of every school year, and her surname sounds like a first name, thereby creating the illusion that we’re on a casual first-name basis with her.
“I’m giving you half of this period to work on your group projects,” Ms. Rachel tells Abigail. “Of course, seeing as it’sdueby nine o’clock, I would assume that you’re pretty much finished. But I like to be generous.”
Abigail offers the teacher a mock salute, then drops into the chair beside me.
“Hello, darling,” she says. She started calling peopledarlingironically last year, but it seems to have entered her permanent vocabulary. The same goes forbamboozled,vexed, and the random, self-invented phrasefumbled the birdie.
I finish underlining the date with my ruler so it’s perfectly straight. This is like my version of drugs. “Hi,” I say. “Do I really want to know why you’re late?”
“Why else? My sister got into a fight with Liam again, so he canceled last minute. I had to walk two-point-five miles here in these heels.” She kicks out her boots for emphasis.
“Have you considered, I don’t know,notrelying on your sister’s on-and-off boyfriend for your daily commute?”
“Liam drives a Lamborghini.”
“So?”
“So I’m a fan of expensive cars.”
I snort. “You’re such a capitalist.”
“I like to think I’m supporting the people contributing to our economy.”
“I rest my case. And it’s not like he bought that car with his own money,” I point out. “He’s a fuerdai; his parents probably gave it to him for his twentieth birthday as a little bonus to go with his new villa in Sanya. But money aside, I just feel like he’s sort of a red flag.”
Abigail raises a hand in protest. “He isnot—”
“He has a literal red flag hanging in his car.”
“Okay, but you say that about all men, everywhere,” Abigail says. “You don’t trust any of them.”
Maybe she’s right. I definitely don’t trust Liam, but I guess I should also give him some credit: He’s the only reason Abigail and I are friends in the first place. When he started dropping Abigail off at school three years ago, someone had misunderstood the situation and spread the rumor that Abigail was dating a guy way older than her for money. As with anything else at Woodvale, it’d traveled to basically everyone—including the receptionists—by the end of second period. Even though we’d never exchanged more than a few words with each other before, I hadn’t been able to resist stopping by her locker during a break to ask if she was okay.
She was, shockingly. In fact, she found the whole thing hilarious. I was surprised someone could genuinely not care what other people thought of her when her situation was my very worst nightmare; she was surprised that someone could genuinely care about a random stranger and sacrifice their own free time to comfort them.
So we spent recess chatting, and then the next period, and then the last hour of school, at which point it only made sense for us to exchange numbers and continue the conversation at home.
“I’m telling you, he’s not a bad person. I have, like, perfect gut instincts when it comes to this stuff. I’ve correctly predicted the breakup of every couple in our year level so far, haven’t I?” she’s saying. She rummages through her bag—I swear I hear something cracking inside it—and tugs out a blunt pencil, a crumpled worksheet from last year, a bag of sour worms, and her lunch for the day. It must have been packed by her mom; the bread crusts are removed, the carrots are cut in the shape of hearts, and there’s a sticky note that saysYou’re a star!Her parents are big believers in positive messages, but they’re also just big believers in Abigail. Before visiting her house, I’d assumed that kind of unconditional love and support only existed in old sitcoms. “Oh, how was the parents’ tour, by the way?”
“I lost,” I say bitterly. I keep my voice as quiet as possible, because I’d rather die than let Julius overhear me admitting defeat.
“You lost?” Abigail repeats, laughing. “You can’tlosea tour—”
