Broken Hearts, Fences and Other Things to Mend (30 page)

back at the screen and realized we were now in the fairy- tale

world of the story, Westley and Buttercup at the beginning of

their star- crossed romance. “It’s Hallie’s favorite, though. She

used to watch it all the time.”

“Oh yeah?” I asked. Hallie hadn’t ever mentioned it when I’d

known her, but maybe she’d gotten into it after the summer I

knew her. That year, we’d mostly watched and rewatched
The

Parent Trap
.

“Yeah,” Josh said, but his voice was distracted, and his eyes

were glued to the screen.

I looked there too and soon was lost in the story— love and

princes and pirates and giants. When I’d seen it before, I’d mostly

been focused on the romantic parts, not the revenge aspect of

the story, Inigo Montoya’s burning desire to fi nd and punish the

six- fi ngered man who’d wronged him.

“Here’s what I don’t get,” Josh said when we were about an

hour in. I turned my head toward him and it hit me again just

how close together we were. I could have reached over and touched

his cheek without extending my arm. But this didn’t make me

ner vous or anxious, like my realization in the car after the pool

party had. Maybe it was the result of stomach troubles, or that

fact that it was almost 2 A.M., but mostly I just felt comfortable

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and relaxed, all the while still able to appreciate how good he

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could make a sloth T-shirt look.

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“What don’t you get?” I asked around a yawn.

“Westley and Buttercup,” he said. “Even though he’s going

under another name, shouldn’t she realize who he is? If he’s her

one true love and all?”

I could feel my pulse start to beat a little harder at the base of

my throat, and I took a moment before answering, choosing my

words carefully. “I don’t know,” I said. “I . . . think that sometimes

people have reasons for not telling the truth about who they are.

And does it really matter? When she realizes who he really is,

she’s okay with it.” I crossed my fi ngers under my head, knowing

full well that I was talking more about myself than Westley pre-

tending to be the Dread Pirate Roberts.

“Of course she is,” Josh said, his voice getting slower and

more sleepy. “She loves him. It doesn’t matter what his name is.”

“So,” I started. I suddenly felt much more awake, and was no

longer paying attention to the movie at all, even though we were

almost at the fi re swamp, with the Rodents of Unusual Size,

which had always been my favorite part. “You think that even

though he’s not telling her the truth about who he is, it’s okay?”

“Sure,” Josh said, and I looked over and saw that his eyes were

drifting shut, his long eyelashes casting shadows on his cheek.

“Of course.”

I took a deep breath. I didn’t know if it was the potential de-

hydration making me a little loopy, but I suddenly had a feeling

that Josh would understand. I wanted to tell him, right now, who

I really was, even though it went against everything that I had

been planning. I suddenly wanted him to know the real me.

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“Josh,” I whispered. “Can I tell you something?”

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When he didn’t respond, I sat up a little more and looked over

at him. But his eyes remained closed, and I noticed that his

breathing had turned slow and even. I knew I could have woken

him up to tell him, but as the seconds passed, I lost my nerve. I

turned the volume on the TV down slightly and lay down again,

holding on tight to what Josh had just said. That it didn’t really

matter what you called yourself. So maybe when he found out the

truth, he’d understand that some deception was necessary for a

larger purpose.

I closed my eyes too, and just let the story wash over me—

revenge and deception and true love and misunderstandings,

everyone on their way to an eventual happy ending— until I fell

asleep as well.

O O O

When I woke up, the movie was over and the TV was scroll-

ing through its screensaver images, close- ups of fl owers and

insects and ocean waves. I sat up, stretching out a crick in my

neck, and noticed that it was morning, early pale light stream-

ing through the windows. I looked over at Josh, whose eyes were

still closed. For just a moment— before this turned into creepy

stalkerish sleep- staring—I took in the sight of him on the couch.

His hair was sticking up, he had a crease on one cheek from the

leather pillow, and the too- big sweatpants had slipped down

slightly, revealing a strip of fl at, toned stomach.

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Josh opened his eyes, and I jumped, looking away and picking

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up the remote, pretending to be very interested in how it worked.

“Hey,” he said, stretching and giving me a sleepy smile.

I looked over, like I was surprised to notice him there. “Oh,

hi,” I said, in what I hoped was a casual, I-wasn’t-just- staring- at-

you tone.

“What time is it?” he asked, yawning.

I squinted at the clock on Bruce’s entertainment system.

“Seven thirty.”

Josh sat up and ran a hand over his eyes. “I’d better get going,”

he said. “I’ll just grab my stuff from upstairs.” He headed toward

the staircase, then turned back and glanced at the TV. “I guess I

missed the Rodents of Unusual Size, huh? They were always my

favorite part.”

Josh left before I could respond to that, and I tried to tell my-

self fi rmly that it didn’t mean anything. It was probably lots of

people’s favorite part. I picked up our discarded glasses and put

them in the dishwasher, checked my refl ection in the toaster, and

was glad to see that I looked better than I had last night. This

seemed encouraging, though the truth was, if I’d looked worse, I

think it would have meant I needed to call a doctor, or the morgue.

I met Josh by the front door. He was carry ing his clothes from

the night before and still wearing the sloth shirt and meerkat

pants. “Okay if I wash these and bring them back?” he asked.

“Seriously,” I said, “take them. Nobody will even notice they’re

gone, I promise you.”

“Okay,” he said. He tossed his keys on his palm a few times.

“Well . . . thanks for letting me convalesce here.”

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“Anytime,” I said. I moment later, I reconsidered. “Actually,

no. I hope this never has to happen again. In a good way.”

“I agree,” he said. “Stay away from lobster.”

I laughed at that. “Right back at you.”

“Well,” Josh said. He gave me a smile, and I noticed that the

pillow crease was still on his cheek. He looked a little pale, and I

knew from the toaster that I did too. But I kind of liked it. It was

like proof that we’d been through something, together. “Good

morning.”

I smiled back. “Good morning, Josh.”

He pulled open the door, waving once to me before heading to

his truck, which was still parked haphazardly from when we’d

abandoned it and dashed full- out for the house. I shut the door

behind him and then leaned back against it.

I closed my eyes for a second, turning over the events from

the night (well, the nondisgusting ones) in my head. Somehow,

things seemed different now. Like we’d moved on to something

new from when he’d picked me up, which felt like a lifetime ago.

I tried to tell myself that maybe this was what always happened

when you shared a food- poisoning experience with someone, and

then recuperated together watching an ’80s movie. It just felt

like, in the space of a night, something had shifted. To or from

what, though, I wasn’t sure.

But I didn’t think my still- recovering brain would be able to

come up with an answer that could be trusted. I pushed myself

off of the door and set off in search of some ginger ale.

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Two days later, I stood in the doorway of the sitting room that

had been repurposed as my father’s offi ce for the summer.

My dad was hunched over his laptop, muttering dialogue to him-

self, with the occasional elbow fl ap, which seemed like proof he

was maybe getting a little too into this penguin movie.

I had spent most of the last two days inside, existing on ginger

ale and saltines, working my way back up to plain bagels, though

food in general still wasn’t very appealing. When Bruce, Rosie,

and my dad had returned, Rosie had taken charge and ordered me

back to bed, even though I wasn’t really sick any longer. But it was

nice to be taken care of— even though Rosie’s defi nition of care-

taking included giving me lectures on how eating shellfi sh coated

in mayo, outdoors, had just been asking for trouble.

Josh and I had been texting back and forth, but we hadn’t

made any plans to see each other again, and I was kind of glad.

Reliving the night in the cold light of day, it had all seemed extra

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embarrassing, not to mention a little confusing, and I was glad

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not to see him for a few days, happy to hang around the house,

where I knew all the food was safe.

But it was not lost on me that I seemed to be spending an

awful lot of time this summer getting into humiliating situa-

tions and hiding in my various bedrooms to recover from them.

It did bother me, however, that this was becoming a defi nitive

pattern and it wasn’t even July yet.

Since my dad seemed absorbed in his work, I knocked twice.

I’d found a note from him under my door that morning, asking

me to come and see him when I got up. I had a feeling this meant

that he was late on the script, since when he was running be-

hind, Bruce confi scated his phone, changed the Wi- Fi password,

and refused to tell him what it was, so that he wouldn’t have any

distractions from his work.

My dad started and spun around in his chair, his expression

relaxing when he saw me. “Oh, Gemma,” he said, giving me a

tired smile. “I thought you were Bruce, demanding a progress

report.”

“How’s it going?” I asked, then when my dad winced, added,

“You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to.”

“You know what, kid?” he asked, taking off his glasses and

rubbing the bridge of his nose. “There are some days where I just

want to toss this whole crazy business and write another novel.”

Since my dad hadn’t even so much as mentioned going back to

books in fi ve years, I wondered just how bad this screenplay was.

But before I could say anything— or fi gure out a noninsulting

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way to ask this— he motioned me inside. “Come in,” he said. “I

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think we need to talk about something.”

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I felt myself freeze. These were never good words to hear from

my parents, but especially from my dad, who never wanted to

talk about anything signifi cant. He’d left most of the heavy lift-

ing, parenting- wise, to my mom. As a result of this, my dad and

I got along great, mostly because we only talked about fun stuff—

movies and trivia and gossip about the famous actors who gave

voices to his sloths and turtles.

The timing of this also seemed particularly ominous. Had

he somehow found out that I’d had a boy stay the night? Even

though we’d just been on parallel couches, I had a feeling my dad

would not be okay with it. I found my eyes darting upward to the

ceiling. Did Bruce have some crazy security system installed or

something?

And then I realized my dad might be talking about another,

much bigger secret. Had he found out, somehow, what I’d been

doing here this summer— pretending to be Sophie and trying to

mend fences with Hallie? Getting involved with the Bridges once

again? I had always planned on confessing to my dad what I’d

done that summer— in theory, anyway— but didn’t want to until

I’d resolved things with Hallie.

I took a few tentative steps into the room. “Um, about what?”

“Two things,” he said, turning in his chair to face me more

fully. He sighed, his expression regretful. “We have to go to L.A.

in a few days,” he said. “We’ll be there for a week or so.”