The Secret Sisterhood of Heartbreakers (13 page)

Olivia was standing right next to Lucy; she could feel her breath when Olivia whispered, “For anything more than that first spark, you shouldn’t be asking yourself what is he like or what does he like, but what is he missing. What is he insecure about? Show him you have what he lacks or lack what he wishes he didn’t have. Or that you can appreciate the parts of him that no one else seems to or the parts he hates but feels stuck with.”

Olivia motioned with her chin and they looked back up at Gil. “You’re cute enough not to need the jokes though.” She said it not like she was giving him a compliment, but like she was just stating a fact.

“I know,” he said. “I’m a spicy-hot man steak.” He flexed each of his skinny arms and kissed his walnut-sized biceps.

Gil stared at him, blinked, and did not smile, just shrugged. Then turned and walked back to her friends.

“Okay, so on one hand what Gil just did was a little off-putting. The thing is, he’s a guy who’s used to being in control socially, who’s used to being a step ahead of everyone. And what she just did shook him out of that. He’s trying to seem unaffected,” said Olivia. “But look at the tips of his ears.” His ears were bright red. He said something to his friend, then scratched the back of his neck. “Five-four-three-two . . .”

Olivia whispered “one” and the guy looked up at Gil’s back. And the tips of his ears got redder.

“He’s a guy who’s used to being told his best quality is that he’s funny,” Olivia said. “He’s probably convinced himself that being funny is more important than being hot, that hot guys are idiots anyway. He has decided not to want what he thinks he can’t have, which is hotness. It’s something a lot of people do as a defense thing, decide they don’t want something just because they think it’s un-gettable. But Gil has just given him the idea that maybe it’s okay to want it. Look at how he’s standing now. His back is straighter and his shoulders are back farther. His perception of himself is already changing. If we stand here for long enough, he’ll find a reason to come over. He’ll find it impossible not to.”

“If Gilly wanted to she could have him sobbing onto his skinny little arm in a month,” Liza said. She put her arm around Gil.

Olivia shook her head. “Two weeks. When someone’s whole perception of himself shifts because of how you see him, you suddenly become very, very important. When people love you, it’s because you’ve made them fall in love with themselves and the rest of the world. And that’s not accomplished through telling them how wonderful they are, but through making both them and the world seem more how they wish it was. Show the bored-by-everything guy how exciting life can be if he’s with you. Show the dumb guy who’s insecure about his dumbness that he understands the world on a primal level that no one else quite gets. This is a long-term thing; you can do that for your entire relationship.”

“But what if . . .” Lucy took a breath. “What if the person is someone you already know? So . . .” She coughed and looked down. “So meeting you can’t be what changes things for them?”

Olivia shrugged. “It’s never too late to start things over. People have awfully short memories when it comes to feelings. They’re practically goldfish.”

“And while you’re making him suddenly feel like the guy he always wanted to be,” Liza said, “little fishy won’t even feel your hook sinking deeper and deeper into him, all the way to the center of his heart. Which is where your hook will stay. Until you decide to yank it out.”

Lucy winced.

Gil leaned in close. “Just because you know where a soft spot is doesn’t mean you have to aim for it. You don’t ever have to do anything you think is wrong.”

“It’s not
about
right and wrong.” Olivia shook her head. “It’s about nature and how it works.”

“Besides”—Liza shrugged—“it’s fun.”

“We kind of have . . . different philosophies about some of this,” Gil said with a small smile.

“But this is all so . . .” Lucy stopped. The idea that something that felt so magical could have a formula, a recipe, struck her as both fascinating and terrible.

“It feels weird to think about it like that,” Gil said. “I know. But there are a lot of things that feel like magic just because we don’t understand them yet. But understanding them doesn’t make them less magical . . .” Gil’s phone buzzed and she looked down at it. When she looked up, Olivia said, “Now?”

Gil nodded.

“All right then. Good luck, Popsicle,” Olivia said. “We’ll see you in a bit.”

Liza and Olivia started walking toward the back patio. On the way, Liza snatched a guy’s drink right out of his hand. He smiled and followed them.

“Come on, Lu,” Gil said. “You’re . . .”

“Gil?”

Gil turned. Lucy turned too. There was a guy standing there, staring at her.

“Oh, wow!” he said. “I can’t believe it’s really you.” He grinned at her from behind thick glasses. He was wiry and small, unremarkable looking, except for the fact that his face was blooming into a face-splitting smile. Lucy could practically see the light coming off of him, shimmering gold.

“Hey,” Gil said. There was something strange in her tone, something Lucy couldn’t place. “Good to see you. But we were just on our way somewhere.”

“Okay,” the guy said. He paused. “But I miss you, you know.” He smiled again, but the light was gone from it now.

“We’ll hang out soon, okay?” Gil said. But it was obvious that she didn’t really mean it. Gil’s face was expressionless.

Lucy stared at the guy’s back as he walked away. After a few seconds, he turned and waved. He looked so sad.

“Who was that?” Lucy said.

“Will,” Gil said. “We were best friends once.”

“Did you . . . ,” Lucy started to ask. She bit her lip. She wanted to ask if Gil had broken his heart.

“The opposite.” Gil smiled. There was no bittersweet sadness there, nothing in that smile but teeth. “I made the mistake of falling in love with him. I loved him for years, and he loved me too, but only as a friend. And there was nothing he could do about that. So he . . .” She pointed to her heart. “He didn’t mean to.”

“And that’s when you became . . . ?”

“That’s when I became a Heartbreaker. My Chrys was this friend of his who I didn’t know very well but who always had a crush on me. I still feel bad about that; it really hurt him. We don’t have the same rule about Chryses that we do the rest of the time. Anyone’s fair game for that.”

“And you and Will aren’t friends anymore?”

Gil shook her head. “We couldn’t be,” she said simply. “Will never even knew what happened, that he broke my heart and all that. I think he just thought we grew apart.” She cleared her throat. “Anyway!” She took Lucy’s hand. “Come on. Someone’s here to see you.”

“To see me?”

“Yup,” said Gil. “Let’s go get him. I think he’s nervous about coming inside.”

Gil led Lucy toward the front of the house.

They passed a girl and a guy talking on the stairs.

“It was really awesome though,” the guy was saying. “Like they didn’t end up taking our tickets so we got to use them again the next time.”

“You know, that’s like this time my sister and I . . . ,” the girl started to say.

But the guy kept talking. “And so the next time, we went in but we had to change the date on them. I have a friend with really neat handwriting so he . . .”

“They’ve just met,” Gil whispered, “and he’s really nervous. He likes her and he’s trying so hard to impress her. She thought he was cute at first but now she’s thinking he’s a narcissistic ass because he won’t let her get a single word in. In three minutes, she’ll get up and pretend to have to go to the bathroom and she won’t come back. Which is too bad because they would have been perfect for each other. But that will be it. Or would have been . . .”

Gil pulled what looked like a case of mints out of her pocket. As she walked by, she dropped a tiny, black pellet into the guy’s drink. He didn’t notice.

“. . . we ended up getting to go backstage, which I was so excited about.”

The guy brought his cup to his lips and took a sip. He put the cup back down and opened his mouth. But no words came out. He opened his eyes wide.

“That’s cool. My sister and I got to go backstage at a Monster Hands show last week,” the girl said. “It was . . .”

Gil linked her arm through Lucy’s and pulled her away. “For five minutes he’ll be silent, and she’ll finally get a chance to talk. And if they manage not to mess it up, they will fall madly in love.” She grinned at Lucy. “Oh, look!” Gil pointed. “There he is.”

Standing under a tree near the end of the driveway was Colin from the day before, playing with the strap of his red plastic watch.

Gil leaned over and whispered in Lucy’s ear. “Just do what we taught you, okay?” And then she gave her a little push.

“You’re not coming?”

Gil shook her head. “He’s here to see you. I’ll just be over there on the phone. If it starts going badly, just motion to me and I’ll come help, okay?”

Lucy felt her stomach tighten. She didn’t want to do this. But Gil was watching and Gil had the magic. Which meant that if she wanted Alex back, somehow this guy was the route to him. So Lucy would try her best. She had to.

Lucy studied Colin, took in all she could.

He was slouching the way he had been the day before, like someone who didn’t know how tall he was. And he had his shoulders slightly raised, like he was bracing himself for something. He was fiddling with his watch uncomfortably. So what did that all mean? It meant he didn’t feel the six foot two inches of his height. He didn’t feel powerful. He felt small. He was scared and uncomfortable.

Lucy cocked her head to the side. She forced herself to smile and in her head she said,
I
own
this place
. When their eyes met, he blushed.

“I like your bird,” he said.

“Thanks,” said Lucy. “I’ve trained her to just sit there. As you can see, she’s really good at it.”

Colin laughed. He looked down at that floppy piece of rubber on his shoe. “So, um, how do you know Gil?”

“From school. We were in a class together last year,” said Lucy.

Colin nodded. “I think she might be trying to set us up,” he whispered.

“No way,” Lucy said. She smiled. Colin was smiling too. Lucy felt something warming inside her.

“So . . . ,” he said.

“So . . . ,” she said.

“So do you know a lot of other people here? I don’t know anyone really,” he said. “Parties make me uncomfortable, there’s so much pressure to be, y’know,
on
the whole time. It’s like being on display.”

Lucy had to bite her lip to keep herself from smiling wider. She shrugged. “But that’s what’s fun about parties, isn’t it?”
Did she sound as fake as she felt?
He looked so uncomfortable. Just the way she had at every party she’d ever been to. She leaned in. “Actually, I shouldn’t tell you this, but this here?” She motioned toward the house just at the moment that cheers broke out inside and a hot pink bra flew through the open window and landed on a bush. “This is a surprise party for
you
.” She looked up at him. He looked confused. She let her mouth spread into a slow smile. “The fact that it is not your birthday and that you don’t know anyone is meant to make it extra surprising.” She threw her arms up in the air. “Surprise!”

Colin laughed. A real laugh. He didn’t even cover his teeth this time.

“Just think about that if you’re uncomfortable: They’re all here for your party and if you feel like they’re ignoring you, that’s only because they’re gearing up for the big moment later.”

Colin was staring at her with his head tipped to the side.

Suddenly there was a commotion behind them, and Lucy turned. Olivia, Liza, and Gil were walking out of the house. Behind them was a guy in a bright red T-shirt with a bright red face. “You!” he shouted. He might have been cute if he wasn’t so red and yelling, “You, you, you, you, you.” And so obviously, sloppily drunk. “I have been
looking
for you. I thought you might be here!”

Olivia, Liza, and Gil stood on the lawn below. Olivia stared at him. She shrugged.

“Oh, so you’re going to pretend you don’t know me?” The guy snorted and sputtered. Spit was spraying everywhere. “Is that how it is?
We were together for the entire winter, Olivia! I first met you here.
” He started stumbling down the stairs. Colin put his hand on Lucy’s arm and pulled her gently back, just as the guy went tumbling in front of her.

“I don’t know.” Olivia shook her head slowly. “That was a long time ago.”

“You horrible, horrible, horrible bitch.” He was shaking his head. Behind him, everyone was staring. “And you two”—he pointed at Liza, then at Gil—“I know just who you are.” He turned to address the crowd. “Stay away from these bitches,” he yelled.
“These stupid, horrible, evil bitches will get you. They’ll take everything out of you and then when there’s nothing left, they’ll leave you to die!”

“I think it’s time for you to rest now, sweetie,” Gil said quietly to him. “Go back inside.” She reached out and put her hand on his arm.

Liza was laughing a little bit.

He started to step away.

“That’s a good boy,” Gil said. “Just keep going.”

Suddenly he lunged toward Olivia, hands out grasping blindly. Like he was trying to grab a piece of her to keep.

But before he could reach her, Gil’s thin arm slipped around his neck, and with one little squeeze he dropped to the ground. As he went down, his hand shot out and grabbed Olivia’s tangle of necklaces. A chain broke with a tiny pop and fell into the grass with no sound at all.

Olivia looked down at his crumpled face, his mouth opened in an O of surprise. She inhaled and shook her head coolly. She hadn’t noticed the necklace.

“Thanks, Gilly.” Olivia leaned over and kissed her on the cheek.

Lucy stood there, heart pounding, so confused by everything that had just happened, by every single moment of it.

Gil smiled. “I have a lot of brothers,” she said. She shrugged. Lucy looked down at the guy on the floor, curled on his side, moaning.