Socially Awkward (18 page)

There are worse things that could happen, I realized.

It also wasn’t as fun to work out without Claire by my side. Even though I’d have to watch her effortlessly kick the crap out of my numbers and all my efforts, I preferred to have her with me rather than the alternative.
As weird as it all sounded, I just wanted things to go back to normal…

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

Life had other plans, however, and there were plenty of other things that would need changing before I could even think about “normal” again. At the top of my to-do list? Busting Tom on his not-date with a fake Facebook persona that Saturday.

The Rock Club was not my scene, but with Claire in tow, I could at least be sure to get through the door. She didn't seem to mind coming along when I told her there was a guy I wanted to meet
..
.
once I promised her it was
not
Sean O’Dwyer
. Rather, she was only too happy to help me get ready to meet him
.
I acquiesced and let her dress me, do my hair and makeup, and instruct me on how to properly flirt with a man.

"Just toss your hair lightly, like this." She demonstrated.

I tried it.

"You're gonna break your neck if you do it like that. Like this, Jen."

And we went back and forth like that for the entire T ride to Fenway Station. During the walk from the station to Lansdowne Street, Claire's tutorial shifted focus to "how to properly walk in heels."

"I really hate when these slutty girls wear these gigantic heels and can't walk in them."

I scowled at her.

"You're not slutty, Jen. Come on." She batted my arm lightly, then tucked her clutch up under her arm. "Walk like me."

She sauntered up ahead of me, her heel making contact with the gravel on a half-second before her toe, so her feet didn't clomp around awkwardly. Her arms swished back and forth against her hip-hugging pants and sequin top. Even her hips were involved in this delicate dance across the parking lot.

Just watching her made me feel clumsy and heavy.

"Now you try," she said, over her shoulder. She stopped walking and waited for me to catch up. I concentrated really hard on how to guide each heel down in front of the last, lightly sashaying back and forth as I did so. My arms didn't glide as easily and my ankles weren't exactly cooperating with the stilettos heels Claire had put onto my feet. It took about five steps before I almost twisted my ankle and fell over.

"Oh, Jen," she shook her head, visibly restraining her laughter. "You'll get it. Come on."

She linked her arm through mine and led me toward the club, as though she thought the power of her body's guidance would make me walk less like a bull. I'm not really sure that was the case, but I made it to the front door without any injuries. That's something, at least.

The bouncer took one look at Claire and stepped out of the way to let us in. He didn't even hesitate when he saw me, which I took as a testament to how hard I'd been working at the gym. In any case, we got in for free too, no cover charge at all. Going out with my super-hot sister had its advantages, I guess.

Inside, I immediately regretted my decision to set up Tom in a place like this. It was crowded and loud, with very poor visibility. If Tom was here, there was a good chance I'd never even know it. Now what? I scanned the room desperately, from the crowded neon-lit bar counter to the smoke machine spewing onto the dance floor across the room. Lights, music, smoke... and alcohol. Perfect plan, Jen. Perfect plan.

"Let's get a drink while we look for this guy," Claire said, dragging me behind her. I tried to stop her, arguing that the bar was way too crowded and we should wait for it to clear out. "Have you ever been to a club before? The bar never clears out, Jen."

But for Claire, that didn't seem to be a problem. She scooted her way in between two big guys, who were only too happy to get out of her way. One of them even offered to pay for her, just like that. If I wasn't going to get a free drink out of the deal too, I might've been annoyed at how easy things always seemed to be for Claire. Just because she was pretty, life just handed her things. Not fair. But I pushed the thought away, accepted my Dirty Shirley (that's a spiked Shirley Temple, for those of you who prefer the hard stuff) and followed Claire back out to the dance floor. We found one of those tall tables without chairs available and Claire fought off a couple of would-be suitors, then turned to me.

"So where are we supposed to meet this guy?"

"I'm not sure..." I scanned the room again, finding only a tangle of sweaty bodies on the dance floor and a crowd of half-drunk
en
onlookers. Did people really come to these places to have fun? "He just said to meet him here. What if he couldn't get in?"

I thought about the bouncer stopping Tom at the door. Would he pull a jerk move and keep him out, based on his looks? Big, strapping guy who could be the bouncer himself? I craned my neck toward the door instinctively, but couldn't make out any faces. A few people passed through the door toward the bar and then I caught the confused look of a tall man with black hair that looked an awful lot like Tom.

Show time.

I swallowed a gulp of my Shirley, straightened my spine, and looked my sister dead in the eye. "Claire, I'm going to do something right now that you might hate me for." Her eyebrow lifted. "But please understand that I only did this because I love you and want what's best for you. Okay?"

She nodded, skeptical, but followed me toward the door. Pushing through bodies as we went, I almost
lost track of him and went right by
.
Correcting my course and moving fast, I
almost collided
with him.
I reached out and grabbed his arm to keep from falling over.

"Jen?" he asked. "Claire! What are you doing here?"

"What are
you
doing here?" Claire asked, her voice growing edgy. "I thought you said you had a family thing to go to."

"It...uh...got canceled." Was it just me, or was he panicking? "So, I'm glad we ran into each other."

I crossed my arms, staring him down. "Tell her why you're really here, Tom."

He looked at me, blinking, as though he'd forgotten I was standing there.

Claire nudged me. "Stay out of this, Jen."

"I'm sorry, but I can't. Tom is here to meet someone. Aren't you, Tom?"

His mouth gaped; he was
at a total loss. It was like he couldn't tell if he was busted yet or not.

"What are you talking about?" Claire scoffed. Then, as realization dawned, she grabbed my arm. "You were here to meet Tom."

"Sort of. Right, Tom?" I turned back to him, his mouth still
hanging
wide open. "Didn't you come here to meet Olivia?"

"What is going on?" Claire's voice had turned deadly. "What did you do, Jen?"

I opened my clutch,
extracted
the printout
of our
Facebook messages, and handed them to Claire. Her eyes scanned the words
in wide-open shock
. As she read, her fingers tightened on the pages, her knuckles turned white. When she was finished, I expected her to rail at Tom, drag him outside and break up with him on the spot.

Instead, her steely glare turned on me.

"How could you do this? Why would you do this?" Her voice was low, her words deliberate and slow. She crumpled the pages in her hands, her eyes fiery, and threw them at me. "You're my SISTER, Jen!"

And then she walked out of the club, leaving Tom and I staring at each other. His expression went blank for a moment then he opened his mouth to speak, caught my eye, and snapped it shut again.

"This is your fault, you scum bag," I said to him, keeping my eyes on my stiletto heels. "I can't believe you would show up."

"So..." He started to speak and I looked up at him. It was too loud in here for me to get every word clearly unless I could see the speaker's lips moving. "You're Olivia?"

Heaving a sigh, I pushed past him and ran out of the club, hoping to catch my sister. I'd achieved my objective, clearly, and shown Claire what a piece of crap her boyfriend was. But instead of her thanking me or even dumping him over it, she'd just left me here. Wouldn't she want to know what kind of man he was? Wouldn't she appreciate the efforts?

Why would she just walk away?

****

I didn't expect to get back to my apartment and find all of Claire's things missing. She'd stripped her bed, pulled her food from the fridge, and even taken down the wall calendar she'd bought me for my work desk. Claire had left the apartment exactly the way she'd found it:
solely occupied
. I assumed she'd gone back to her apartment, something she could've done days ago with her ankle now heeled. Why she hadn't gone back before, I didn't understand. Not that I minded. It was nice to have Claire livi
ng with me for these weeks. Already,
I missed her.

In the next few days, I didn't hear a word from her. My mother had talked to her, so I took some small comfort in the second-hand report from her. Claire was back at her place, her ankle was fine, and she was busy with work. Too busy to make it home for Easter. Ouch.

I'd been to the gym a couple of times too, but Claire wasn't there. According to Noah, she had called to cancel her membership and tried to cancel mine as well. I didn't realize she'd been paying for me to have a membership all this time; I'd honestly thought Tom was giving us free sessions as a personal favor. She couldn't cancel my membership completely, but she did cancel the automatic billing to her credit card. So when I went for my first workout after that horrible night, I had to pay first. I'd have been happy to pay all along; that wasn't the problem. Rather, I knew how deep a wound Claire had sustained if she was doing petty things like this.

Tom and Claire were also over and, thus, Tom was refusing to work out with me at all. Not that I asked him too. I just happened to look over Noah's shoulder into the appointment book and notice that my name had a note next to it, written in permanent marker: "Do Not Schedule with Tom."

I guess I couldn't blame him for that. At least he was still letting me step foot inside his gym.

"What happened?" Noah asked one day, braving the inevitable storm of tears he must've sensed was coming. As soon as the words were out of his mouth, I was bawling. He pulled me to him--the first affection I'd gotten from him in weeks--and I just cried it out. When I caught my breath again, I looked at him.

"I can't talk about it yet, okay? I have to fix it first."

He nodded, because Noah always seems to understand me. I'm not sure how, he just does it. He didn't ask me again after that and I just pushed it from my mind, focused on writing my paper and finishing my last semester of school, and tried to keep to routine as best I could. What else was there to do, anyway? This would all pass eventually and Claire and I would put it behind us.

I just needed to give her some time.

CHAPTER NINETEEN

“That may not have been the best idea you’ve ever had…” said Lyla the next morning. We sat together in a local bagel shop, having breakfast over a round of intense studying. And by intense studying, I mean we were hacking through my life with a metaphoric chainsaw. My life, Lyla said, should have been her research project.

I reminded her often, though, that my life sort of had
become
my research project.

“What was I supposed to do?” I said helplessly, as I tried to control how much cream cheese I smeared onto my onion bagel. This was
so
not diet-approved, but I felt like I’d earned it. Hey, wasn’t it better than skipping right to the breakfast pastries?

“For starters, you could’ve sat down and talked to her.” Lyla took the knife from my hand when I’d finished and began slathering her own generous portion of cream cheese onto her bagel. “I hear that works better than embarrassing people in public.”

“I was trying to embarrass Tom, not Claire.” The words were muffled around my mouthful of forbidden breakfast carbs. Cream cheese has protein in it, right?

“I’m sure you did that, too. But making them face off like that…” she paused, chewing a few times before continuing. “It’s just not cool, my friend. Not cool.”

“Is that why she’s mad, you think?”

“That’s probably part of it. I’d be willing to be she’s also a little pissed at you for orchestrating the whole thing.”

“Well that’s just not fair.
He
started it, Lyla.” I wanted to shove this entire bagel down my throat, but realized that was probably inadvisable. Instead, I took a long chug from my coffee cup. Some of it dribbled down my chin and onto my open notebook. “I just wanted her to see for herself.”

“I know, hon. And Claire will figure that out too… someday.”

“Gee, thanks for the pep talk,” I said dejectedly.

“Hey, you screwed up. We all do it at one point or another. Now, you just have to wait it out and give her a chance to let it go.”

“Do you also write greeting cards? I think you’re an untapped resource,” I frowned at her.

“Don’t shoot the messenger, my friend.
I don’t make the rules,” Lyla raised her hands in surrender, and I let her off the hook for now. We turned our breakfast conversation back to matters of our education and left the life advice for another time. Mostly, I just didn’t want to admit that she was right.

****

I knew Claire needed some time… And I especially knew that hounding her would only make things worse. In my mind, we’d be upset about the incident for a few days, maybe a week or two, and then we’d be able to hug and make-up. One day, years from now, this would be a great story we’d tell our kids and just laugh about together.

“Did I ever tell you about the time your Auntie Jen pretended to be someone else so she could catch my boyfriend cheating? No? Oh, listen to this…” Claire would say. I’d be right there, laughing along with her, interjecting the occasion bit of dialogue or impersonating Tom’s deer-in-headlights expression.

One day.

Of course, I never in a million years expected Claire to retaliate. In my mind, I did for Claire what I would have wanted her to do for me. I'd exposed Tom for what he really was and spared her heartache later down the road. She would have stayed with Tom until she caught him cheating on her, maybe months or even years later. Was that really what she would have preferred? I knew I was in the right and she would see things my way. Eventually.

Instead, Claire hacked into Olivia's profile and had turned the monster against its creator.

I guess that's what I get for using the same password for everything.

The day I found out, I tried to log in and kept getting kicked out. I tried to reset the password and have an email sent to my own account, but that didn't work either. Claire had changed the email address to her
s
, so I couldn't do a thing about it. So I logged in as myself and tried to view her profile that way. First of all, I wasn't even friends with Olivia any more. She hadn't blocked me, but she had unfr
iended me… f
rom myself.

The craziness of that sentence threw me for a loop, but I pressed on.

Olivia had uploaded some new photos as well--all of Claire. She'd updated her status pretty regularly and started writing some very smutty comments on a few guys' walls. Claire had assumed the identity I'd created and blown her up in my face. Scrolling through the rubble that was now Olivia's Facebook wall, my jaw fell open wider and wider with every line. And then I stopped scrolling when I reached one particular conversation, between Olivia/Claire and Sean.

SEAN: See you Friday, right? So glad you can come out finally!

OLIVIA: I'll be there. What should I wear for you?

SEAN: Something red and sexy. Hahaha Whatever you want!

OLIVIA: If I wear anything at all....

I wanted to vomit all over my keyboard. First, about the crassness I'd just read for myself. Second, because Claire was going after something she thought I wanted. Me, her own sister!

Well, if Claire and Sean wanted to be together, let them have each other. They were both stuck up, too pretty, and too freaking perfect to date anyone else anyway. Right? They deserved each other. What the hell did I care?

More importantly, why did I care?

****

So that’s where I’m at, today. I’ve got one man convinced he’s going to
travel to photo shoots with me
, another trying to kiss me in the gym, and a third trying to cheat on my sister… with me. And only one of them actually wants the real Jennifer.

My sister hates me, because she thinks I’m the one ruining her life for a change, and I can’t find a way to show her that what happened was actually a good thing. If not me, then who?

My grades are slipping. My project is imploding. And my professor thinks I’m trying to half-ass my way to a passing grade on this project. If she only knew what I was going through, maybe she’d have a little bit more compassion for my situation.

Meanwhile, all those efforts to lose weight are being quickly derailed. I bought Twinkies at the grocery store yesterday and, I’m not proud to say, there is only a half a box left in my cabinet. I thought about torching the rest of it, but then I thought my parents might not appreciate me accidentally burning down the house.

Also, plastic wrappers smell disgusting when you light them on fire.

And since I’m too embarrassed to
face Noah at
the gym, I haven’t been able to work out in several days. I can already feel my muscles atrophying as we speak.

How did all of this go so terribly wrong?

And how can I make it all right again?

****

When I co
me to the end of my harrowing tale of internet fraud and
sisterly betrayal, my mother does
n’t say anything for a long time.  She sip
s
her tea thoughtfully, like it
’
s a fancy wine to be sniffed and considered. Stari
ng at a blank wall, she just ta
k
es
little sips and d
oes
n’t respond.  For a moment, I th
ink
she ha
s
n’t heard
a single word I’ve said. Just as I’m
about to poke her to ge
t her attention, her eyes shift
back to me.

“
So things aren’t going so well,” she says finally.

“And that’s l
ess than helpful,” I snap
. Catching her eye, I relax my fisted hands, stretching out my tightened fingers. “Sorry, mom. I didn’t mean that.”

My mother fold
s
me into he
r arms, hugging me to her. She runs
a hand along my hair, the way only mothers can. “
I’m glad you told me everything, honey.
I need
ed
to know what’s going on if I’m going to be helpful.”

I sit there for a quiet moment, just enjoying the comfort of having my mother understand and not pass judgment. We both know there are things to resolve here, but she’s handling it like a pro.

“I think there are some things you need to take care of, Jen,” she sa
ys
, matter-of-factly.
She points to my chest. “By exploring what’s going on in your heart.”

“Okay…” I dra
w it out, expecting more.

“Let’s start with this project.” 

I groan, but she k
e
ep
s
talking.

“You took a picture of yourself and made it look like… Claire?” she ask
s
. I d
o
n’t li
ke her tone, but I nod
anyway. “And then, you tried to make a man who was in love with a fictional person fall for you instead, by using your sister to be the bad guy and turn him down.”

“When you say it like that,” I sniff
le
, looking away from her. “It sounds…”

“It doesn’t sound very good, that’s for sure.”

"I'm not a psychoanalyst, and I certainly wouldn't try to analyze my own daughter if I was, but..." Mom's eyes scan the blank wall, looking for the right words. "Jennifer, I think you need to take a good, hard look at yourself and how you feel about who you are."

I blink
at her for a quiet moment. "Are you saying I need to change?"

"No, not at all," she trie
s
to smile, but it look
s
weak to me. "What I'm saying is that you might want to spend some time thinking about yourself, doing something for yourself. You're young and beautiful..."

I snort
, but she ignor
es
me.

"And you have so much to give to the world.  What you're doing academically is great, and your father and I are so proud of you. But, in the long run..."

"I should b
e more like Claire?" My voice i
s shrill, my temper rising.

"Jennifer," Mom's voice turn
s
harsh in response, a well-practiced tone thanks to my rebellious teenage years. "You know perfectly well that's not what I'm getting at.
I have two daughters who are very different and whom I love for their individuality. Claire does what’s right for Claire. You need to learn what’s right for Jennifer, whether it’s a project, a boyfriend, or a new career. You’re the only one who can get the answers you’re after, honey.
"

I s
i
nk back into the couch, my hands falling limply into my lap.  "So you think I'm just a big, giant mess?"

"I think you're a smart girl who needs to learn to love herself for who she is. There's a lot to be said for independence and self-confidence, Jen. And right now, with the way things are in your life, you've ended up relying on a fake identity from the comfort of your parents' house to build a social life."

"That's not true," I straighten again, genuinely offended. "This was for a project! And y
ou know why I live here, Mom. It’s because it makes financial sense
, not because I'm dependent on you and Dad. Come on, give me some credit."

"I'd like to see you go out once in a while, make some new friends."

"I have friends!"

"Then have them over once
in a while," she folds
her arms, considering me. "Do something that makes you happy."

After a moment of my not saying anything, she lean
s over and kisses
my cheek. Mom clear
s
the
tea cups away, loads
them into the dishwasher, and br
ings
me a box of tissues to dry away the tears from my eyes. I
di
dn't even known I was tearing up.

"Jennifer, it's time to find out who you really are. I think you should consider moving out of here, into an apartment with a friend or something. You can't hide in your books and behind an internet identity forever."