My Only (8 page)

As I finished my toast, I could feel it just sitting in my stomach. Aaron had been after lots of girls. I didn’t know what was different about this one, but I knew something was. Olivia was not only pretty, but there was something so natural and honest about her. She might have been accepted by the cool kids in school, but she didn’t act like one of them. At least not to me.

I must have been making a face because Aaron swal owed his mouthful of food, cocked his head to the side, and then asked, “What?” I decided not to play stupid. “I thought you were messing around with Kel y and Maya.” He gave me a one-shoulder shrug. “I like Kel y, and Maya’s awesome, but Livia is, like, I don’t know.” I knew. Olivia was something new, something that most of the males at Lakeside High School were interested in. He just wanted to be the first to get to her. It would up his social status. I didn’t want that.

“What?” he asked me again. I kept my eyes fixed on the crumbs of my toast. “What’s that look for, Adam?”

“There’s no look.”

“Bul shit.” I risked a glance. He was staring at me, his jaw set to the side as he used his tongue to clean out the little bits of food that had wedged themselves in the crevasses of his teeth.

It was hard to be a twin. While I didn’t think we looked alike, there had always been this silent connection. It was hard to be dishonest. I knew immediately when he was lying, and likewise, he could tel when I was leaving something out.

“You like her.” I looked away, which was al the confirmation he needed. “You like her.” When he inhaled deeply, I retrained my eyes on him. His expression was a bit amused, but I couldn’t tel if it was because he thought it was funny that I liked her or if it was because I’d never real y liked a girl before.

“Adam, you’re turning bright red.”

I took a sip of my juice then chewed on the inside of my bottom lip.

“So if you like her, ask her out.”

My chest tightened and my mouth went dry.

“Does she like you?”

“I don’t know,” I managed to whisper.

He pushed away from the table and stood. He lifted his empty plate and slapped me on the back. “Wel ,” he said. “Find out and then ask her out.” I concentrated on finishing my juice as he ran the water to rinse his dishes.

As he was leaving, I stood up, intent on cleaning up. “But don’t wait too long,” he cal ed over his shoulder. “If you’re not going to at least try,
I’m
going to.”

I contemplated the conversation with my brother al morning. I’d never liked the same girl as Aaron. He’d implied that he was wil ing to back off to give me the chance at her first. It seemed wrong to think about Olivia like that—like something to bargain for—but if Aaron was going to put aside his drive to date her, I would happily let him.

She waved at me in first period again, then at lunch, and then as Casey and I walked out onto the field for practice we saw her walking toward her car. She saw me and waved, the keys jingling in her hand.

“Oh, my God, dude,” Casey whispered. “She total y likes you!” I twisted my neck to glance at him, but he pushed me, so I turned back to see Olivia. She’d stopped looking our way and was nearly to her car. “Go over there and talk to her. Ask her to watch practice or something.” For a moment, I thought about it. I imagined myself running over to her, leaning against her car like Aaron would. Being confident as I asked her to stick around. Touching her arm as I said something funny.

But as she unlocked her door, I knew I wouldn’t do any of it. “She won’t want to watch marching band practice,” I said as I turned back.

I tried to ignore my friend as he continued to talk about how I was wasting an opportunity, and how he was so disappointed in me, and how Olivia was just waiting for me to go flirt with her. But when we reached the field, he said, “If you don’t, I’m going to go talk to her. And not for you, but for me, because maybe she’s real y smiling at me.”

I turned on him. “Shut up about Olivia. You don’t like her. You like Hannah. Spend your energy on her. And shut up about me talking to her.
You
don’t talk to
Hannah
.”

I moved to the school’s tenor drums and adjusted the carrier. When we played home games, parades or competitions, I used my own drums, but for practice I made do with the beat-up set.

“The difference is that Hannah doesn’t give me a way in like Olivia’s doing with you.” I kept working and ignored him. Final y, he walked away, mumbling. I pushed al the noisy chatter in my brain to the side and concentrated on the task at hand: keeping a beat while moving my feet.

Thursday I didn’t look up in first period to see if Olivia waved at me. I spent my lunch in the library going over my Physics notes, and I lingered by my locker after school was finished in order to avoid seeing her as I walked out to the field. I was being stupid. I knew that, but I couldn’t help it. It felt like there was tremendous pressure to do something with Olivia.

I liked her. I
really
did, but I wasn’t an idiot. I wasn’t going to try to go out with her. She was nice enough that I thought she’d say yes if I asked her, but it would be out of pity and nothing else.

Friday morning, however, I couldn’t avoid her. She sat down in Jesse Rainer’s seat. Mr. Bel man hadn’t started class yet. I swal owed hard, feeling caught and trapped. “I was going to stop by last night after work.” Out of the corner of my eye, I saw her smile. I couldn’t force myself to look at her directly. “My night at work would’ve been so much better if I could’ve taken my break with you.” The fact that she’d said “with you” and not “with someone” wasn’t lost on me. In fact, it was what pushed me over the edge, al owing me to actual y look at her for the first time this morning. “I had practice.”

“I know. I wish you didn’t, though.”

God, how I wished I had some of my brother’s cool, col ected calm right about now. How did he talk to girls like this al the time? I glanced over at Aaron. He was twisted in his seat, one hand draped on Maya’s desk, pretending to listen to her talk, but I could tel that he was paying attention to what was happening over here.

“It’s over in October,” I said without looking at her. “Marching band, that is.”

“Then you’l work more?”

I turned to her and nodded. Her hair was up today, changing the way her face looked. It sent waves upon waves of jitters through me.

“And you have a game tonight?”

Again, I nodded.

“I think I’m going to come. I guess games are big events around here.”

“Yeah.”

“So, listen, I have a quiz in history today. Would you help me study at lunch? We haven’t had much time to work together, so my notes haven’t real y improved and I thought . . .”

I looked back at Aaron, whose face was now expectant. He nodded to me, silently tel ing me that while he might not have heard every word, he knew that this was a defining moment. He wanted me to take the opportunity to spend time with her.

The thought that if I took too long he would make his move was biting at the back of my brain. “Yeah, okay, sure.”

“Real y?” Her voice was as hopeful as her expression. I didn’t understand it. Did she not realize that every guy in school wanted to spend time with her?

“Yeah. I said I’d help you with history.”

We looked toward the front of the classroom as Bel man stood. “Nice of you to join us, Mr. Rainer, and just in the nick of time.” We looked up to see Jesse waiting next to Olivia, obviously wanting to sit down in his seat. She stood and said, “Thanks, Adam, you’re the best.”

I tried not to think about the pressure of everything as school dragged on and lunchtime approached. Now that Aaron knew, my feelings for Olivia seemed even heavier. Casey would make fun of me, that much was a given, but we had an understanding that for guys like us, liking pretty girls was going to be nothing more than crushes. But with my brother knowing, he was going to force my hand. Either I was going to go after Olivia or he was.

In the library, my stomach settled down and I started to relax. In the moments she and I were together, just talking, I wasn’t stressed. Our conversations were easy for the most part. It was when I wasn’t with her that my anxiety flared. It was when I was thinking about her—or over-thinking about her—that I was the most nervous. When it was just us, it felt like it was meant to be like this, like I was just her ticket to a good grade.

It just felt like we were friends. And I liked it. I didn’t want the pressure of potential y asking her out and most likely being rejected, so I pushed al of that away and decided to simply enjoy being her friend.

“You mean I have to just memorize it?”

The despair in her voice was priceless. I nodded dramatical y. “I’m afraid so.” Tapping her notebook, I said, “And get better at taking notes, because these are . . . al over the place.”

“So if you’re al smart and stuff, what’s the quiz going to be like?”

“Probably a few multiple choice, a few short answer, and a smal essay question. They’re trying to prepare everyone for col ege.” She groaned then laid her forehead against the open book on the table. “No wonder it’s so annoying.” Regardless of wanting to date or not, I stil wanted to know more about her. “Do you know what schools you’re applying to?” Raising her head, she shook it. “I bet you have everything al planned out, right?”

“No. Not a clue. Aaron does though.”

Olivia sat al the way up. “Real y? Where does he want to go?”

“Duke. His back-up schools are Notre Dame, even though we’re not Catholic, and the University of Michigan.”

“And you don’t know? Don’t you want to go where he’s going?”

I shrugged. It would be strange not being at the same school as Aaron, but separating from him was bound to happen at some point. We were close, but not so close that we would be out of sorts without each other. “A friend of mine goes to Northwestern so I’l probably apply there. What about you? Do you know what you want to study?”

With a heavy sigh, she stretched, arching her back over the chair before twirling her ponytail around her fingers. “I don’t even real y want to go. I mean, my grandparents want me to, so I’l go, but I don’t know what to study. I don’t real y like any subjects more than others.”

“But you like dancing, right?” I asked. It was the first time any verbal mention of me seeing her dance in her bedroom had been made. She shrugged, but added a nod to it, letting me know that she did enjoy dancing. “There are schools for that. You could—”

“That’l never happen,” she said. “My grandparents won’t let me go to school for dance.” I didn’t get how she could be so obviously a free spirit, but then buckle under the weight of her grandparents’ wishes. “Isn’t it your choice?”

“Yes, of course, but I’m just not going to ignore their feelings.”

I didn’t understand why they would feel anything other than happiness for her. She was good at it, and from what I saw that night she had a passion for it.

I wanted to ask more, but she tapped the book with her pen and said. “So you think I’l do okay?”

“You did the reading, right? Just stay calm during the quiz and remember what you read. And if you don’t do wel , we’l work on it and you’l do better next time.”

I picked up the paper she’d shown me earlier and read the study guide questions. If it was me, I’d be able to take the quiz without even studying.

It bothered me that I knew she was smart, but she said she didn’t do al that wel in school. I had no solid evidence of her intel igence, beyond her ability to hold a conversation, but there was a gleam in her eye that indicated she was.

“Why don’t you do wel in school?” I blurted out the question then felt crappy about it. It was blunt and I had no right to ask it, but it was out there now.

It took her a moment to digest it, her startled expression conveying what she was feeling. “I do okay.”

“I didn’t mean,” I said, hurrying to backpedal or make up ground, but it fizzled. “I mean, I know you’re smart. What . . . why aren’t you better in school? Is that why you went to boarding school? Do you have some kind of . . .?” I trailed off. I hadn’t meant to ask that either. I hadn’t meant to imply that she went to that school because she had a weak mind or anything.

Olivia took a deep breath and looked toward the window along the far wal of the library. “I don’t care about school the way you do. I mean, I want to do good, but it’s not something that matters to me al that much.”

“What matters to you?”

“Life,” she answered. Her gaze locked back on me, connecting me to her. I couldn’t look away. “Experience. People. Figuring things out. Being a good person. Those things matter to me. I didn’t go to that school because I was a disruptive kid or because I was special needs or whatever.” I had no right to ask, but I did anyway. “Why were you there?”

“Because my grandparents didn’t know what to do with me after.” Olivia paused and flicked her gaze back toward the window. “After my mother was kil ed.”

It felt like my heart stopped. I hadn’t known her long, but I’d never heard her voice so heavy like that. What did someone say after an admission like that? I thought about what people said after I told them about my own mother, but it wasn’t the same. I’d lived in Lakeside my whole life and everyone had just always known.

“I didn’t mean to push you into tel ing me anything. I’m—”

“Don’t say you’re sorry,” she said. “I hate it when people say they’re sorry. I know it’s just an expression of concern, but it’s just . . .”

“I know what you mean. My mom died when I was born.” She was looking at me now. I felt a pul that I couldn’t explain, as if my attraction to her had just deepened within the past few minutes. “People can express concern, like you said, al they want, but I look at those who have moms and I wonder if they have any clue how lucky they are. My friend, Casey, is a great guy, but sometimes he talks about his mom like she’s such a drag, you know?”

Olivia nodded. “The girls at E.R.—my old school, Emerson-Rousseau—were the same way. I couldn’t stand listening to how much they hated their mothers. Al for real y random reasons. Like one girl was pissed because her mother bought her the wrong designer handbag, and another one hated that her mother got remarried. She didn’t hate her stepdad, just her mother. I just kept wondering what they would do if they woke up one day to the cold hard fact that their moms just didn’t exist anymore.”