The Secret Sisterhood of Heartbreakers (14 page)

“He’ll be okay,” Gil said.

The broken necklace lay in the grass, a delicate gold chain on which was a small black key. Lucy reached for it. But a fist closed around it first. “Not for you,” Liza said. And she slapped the back of Lucy’s hand.

“I was just trying to . . .”

“Not for you,”
Liza said. She handed the necklace back to Olivia who quickly slipped it into the front pocket of her giant leather bag.

Lucy stared at the guy, who was still moaning on the ground. Her heart was hammering.

Liza stood over him, nudged his shoulder with the toe of her boot, and slowly turned her beer upside down, right over his crotch. The beer spread out over his shorts. “Tasted like piss anyway,” she said.

But Olivia shook her head, reached out, and gently moved Liza’s hand away. “Come on, ladies, let’s go back inside.” Olivia looked down then one last time at the body on the grass. “Good-bye, Ricky,” she whispered. His eyelids fluttered at the sound of her voice.

H
ours later, Lucy lay in bed, cheek pressed to her purple flower pillow, brain stretching, skull pounding, as though her head had eaten an enormous meal that it did not know how to digest.

So much had happened at the party, but that’s not what she was thinking about.

She was not thinking about the way Colin had looked at her, while girls all over the party were staring at him, which he seemed not to notice. Or how a guy had started hitting on her while she was in the bathroom line (which incidentally Colin had seen and was probably the reason for his hasty exit, which Lucy actually felt a tiny bit bad about). Or about how three separate guys had asked for her phone number. Or how funny it had been to be a ray of sunshine for the dude in the
I’LL STOP FROWNING WHEN THE WORLD STOPS SUCKING
T-shirt. And then moments later to be a very deep and introspective wallflower for the perky party host.

She wasn’t even thinking about the wonderful moment when Olivia dropped her back at home and said that the next night they had something “really special in store for her,” in a way that felt like a promise. A promise that
meant
something.

No.

What Lucy was thinking about, lying in her bed, as the sun came up on that early Saturday morning, a day that was supposed to be her first day as a nonvirgin, her first time waking up in a bed curled against Alex, was this:

Everything she’d done during her entire relationship with Alex had been wrong.
Starting with that first googly-eyed look she gave him, right up until yesterday at school.

The problem wasn’t that she’d loved him too much; it was that she hadn’t loved herself enough. She’d never really understood why he liked her. She tried to be a nice person, and Tristan said she was smart and funny, but Alex was
Alex.

So to make up for the great distance between what she was and what he was, well, she just ended up doing whatever he wanted all the time, complimenting him constantly, and telling him over and over how he was the most wonderful person the world had ever known.

She’d been his biggest fan.

But he didn’t need a fan.

Looking back now, she realized he’d often shrugged off her compliments the way one might do with those of an overly doting aunt.

He wanted the world to be more interesting and exciting. What he was looking for was not a soft place to land, but a cliff to jump from and someone to fly through the air after.

Suddenly Lucy knew that with such intensity that she sat straight up in bed, heart pounding.

She could be the lurch, the tingle, the breathless feeling of hurtling into vast empty space. She could be that free fall. Starting now.

Lucy reached for her phone; she had an idea.

She wrote a text.

Alan, great meeting you too. Sneaking in tonight was fun, but if you think that’s crazy just you wait. . . .

She sent it to Alex before she had a chance to change her mind.

Then took two deep breaths. She counted to five. Then wrote another.

SORRY!! Oops, meant to send to someone else. Hope I didn’t wake you up
J

Was that too obvious? Would he know she’d meant to send it to him all along?

A second later her phone buzzed, which meant Alex was sitting right there with it. Which he almost never was. Lucy gasped. What was he even doing
up
?

It’s cool.

What did that
mean
?

Her phone buzzed again.

Glad you had a fun night tho. Oh, and don’t worry, I was up anyway. Couldn’t sleep. . . .

Lucy’s breath caught in her throat.

The old Lucy would have texted back immediately, asked him why, suggested warm milk, wished she had enough guts to offer to sing him a lullaby.

But the new Lucy wouldn’t.

So the new Lucy didn’t.

Instead she just tucked her phone away and forced herself to concentrate on the feeling of speeding through space, of the wind rushing by her. Of pulling that into herself. Of sending it back out.

“D
o you need help steering that thing toward your mouth hole, my friend?” Tristan pointed to her motionless fork, and grinned.

It was morning and there was Lucy, sitting with Tristan in their favorite booth at Pancake Land, totally unable to eat her pancakes. She knew she’d done a good job the night before. But she’d woken up that morning to the ticking of the clock on her nightstand, with a ticking in her belly too, suddenly all too aware of the passing time, which she’d let herself ignore up until now.

Tick tick tick.

It was the start of the fourth day. How had she squandered so many of her seven days already?

Tick tick tick.

Time was passing much too fast.

Tristan reached out, grabbed the soggy pancake piece off her fork, and popped it in his mouth.

Lucy pressed her hand to her belly. There had been four days since her heart had been cracked open. And somehow she’d managed to survive them. But only because she had had hope and time. She was quickly running out of both of them. . . .

“So what happened to
you
last night, eh?” Tristan said. “Dog ate your homework?” He grinned.

Lucy shook her head. “I’m really sorry, I . . . ,”
was trying to get these magical girls to give me some potions,
“. . . completely forgot.”

“It’s okay, you’ve got a lot going on up there.” He lifted his coffee and motioned toward her head. Then drained the last sip. A half second later a cute red-haired waitress appeared to refill his cup. She gave him a big, blinky-eyed gaze and brushed against his arm as she walked off.

Lucy gave him a look. Tristan shrugged. “What?” He opened his eyes wide and grinned. “The service is just really good here!”

At least half the waitresses at Pancake Land had crushes on Tristan, a fact he vehemently denied (but only denied as a joke, since it was so completely obvious).

“So what’d you end up doing anyway?” Tristan grabbed a handful of sugars and ripped the tops off, dumped half in his coffee and the other half directly into his mouth.

“I was hanging out with . . . those girls actually . . . ,” Lucy said. “We went to some party.” It was funny how normal it sounded when she put it just like that.

Tristan raised his eyebrows. “Hey, good for you, dude. If popular movies and TV shows have taught me anything, that’s how a person’s supposed to get over a breakup. Get out there and do a bunch of Jell-O shots off strangers. Nice.”

“Ha-ha,” said Lucy. “No, it wasn’t like that. It was weird.”

“Cuddle party?”

“The party was just a regular party, it’s just . . . what happened at it was a little funny. . . .” Could she tell him this part? She blushed.

“Spill it, blushy.” Tristan smiled. “Sounds like someone met a boooooooy.”

Lucy blushed more. “Three guys asked for my number.”

“Awesome!” said Tristan. He raised his coffee and waited for her to clink with her peppermint tea. “Good for you, kiddo. Total hotties?”

Lucy just smiled and shook her head. How much was she allowed to tell him? “I’m not actually trying to date anyone. It was more like . . . practicing.”

“Huh?”

“Practicing stuff with boys, I guess.”

“Practicing for the purpose of what? If you’re not trying to date anyone . . .”

Lucy shrugged. She definitely needed to stop here. “Those girls were helping me,” she said, as though it was an answer. Even though it obviously wasn’t.

“So what’s the deal with them anyway? That little one seems nice enough, but I always sort of got the feeling that something
odd
was going on with the wolfy-faced one and the hot one.”

“Well, they’re . . .” Lucy paused. “They’re, yeah, they’re definitely weird.”

“Look, Lucy,” Tristan said. His expression went suddenly serious. “If they’re recruiting you into a lesbian sex cult you can tell me.” He paused. “So long as they let me join too.” Tristan drained his coffee cup again.

Lucy had a sudden troubling thought. “Promise me you’ll never date any of them,” she said.

“Um, okay?” Tristan said. He raised his eyebrows. “I definitely won’t ‘date’ them, especially not the big, hot one.” He made air quotes around “date.” Then winked. “But seriously, when do I get to hang out with your new buds?”

“Soon,” said Lucy. Even though she didn’t mean it.

“Want to invite them to the fair tonight? I will make a special exception for our Lucy-Tristan Tradition if you want. Big-hottie looks like she has good aim. Maybe she can win me one of those giant teddy bears I’ve had my eye on.” Every year since they first became friends, Lucy and Tristan went to their town’s fall fair together on the first Saturday of the school year.

“Oh, Tristy . . . ,” Lucy said.

Tristan’s face dropped. “You can’t go?”

Lucy shook her head. “I’m so sorry. . . .”

“S’okay,” he said. “This girl Janice wanted to do something tonight anyway so . . .” He looked down at his phone and pressed a few keys. Put his phone down.

They stared at each other for a second. It was awkward. Things between them were
never
awkward.

“Well,” said Tristan. “What are
you
doing tonight, Miss I’m-suddenly-too-busy-and-important-for-important-traditional-friendship traditions?”

Lucy frowned.

“I’m joking my friend, joe-king. Do what you gotta do.”

“I’m just going to hang out at home tonight,” Lucy said. “My parents are away this weekend, celebrating their anniversary.”

“Georgie and Suzanne doing the happy couple thing again?”

Lucy nodded. “For the next ten minutes at least. So I think I’m just going to relax tonight, eat a lot of ice cream on the couch or something. Sulk alone.”

“You want a sulking partner? I’ll text Jan-Jan back, tell her I’m busy. There was something I wanted to show you anyway. This cool thing I think you’ll really like . . .”

Lucy’s stomach tightened. “If you were there I wouldn’t be alone then, now would I?” She tried to make her voice sound light.

Tristan blinked and scratched his head in mock confusion. “I don’t follow . . . ,” he said. He moved his hands back and forth between them and moved his mouth around and squinted and shook his head. Then grinned.

Lucy picked up her camera and snapped a picture, Tristan, head tilted to the side, eyes squinting, pointing at the lens.

“All right, enough with the picture taking, Ms. Clicky. Finish your pancakes. . . .” He reached out with his fork, stabbed a pancake, and brought the entire syrup-dripping thing into his open mouth. “Orfsomfonefish going to finif them forfyoo.” A line of syrup dribbled down his chin. Lucy lifted her camera again. The flash went off the moment before the syrup hit the plate.

T
ristan dropped Lucy off at home, where she spent the next few hours pacing from room to room, putting on makeup, and trying to sing loud enough to drown out that clock. It was how the background sounded to everything she did:
Tick tick tick.
But there was just no drowning it.

Finally, Olivia picked her up. And then a few hours after that, Lucy was standing with Olivia and Liza and Gil in front of an old theater.

“What’s this place called?” Lucy asked.

“It isn’t called anything,” Olivia said. “This is where Pete lives.”

“Wait, seriously? But what about . . . ?” Lucy pointed to the line of people snaking around the building.

“He has a lot of friends,” Olivia said, and she shrugged.

Lucy looked at the people, each one of them so perfectly
something
in their leather, vinyl, fishnets, tattoos, thick bangs, cat’s-eye glasses, tuxedo pants, bloodred lips. Lucy stared down at her yellow eyelet dress and little brown purse and the camera around her neck with the
SAY CHEEZ
camera strap and shook her head.

She glanced back up at the giant building. There was what appeared to be a box office out front with a very skinny man inside wearing a top hat.

“Who’s that guy?” Lucy asked.

“Scarecrow.” Lucy felt Gil’s arm link through hers. “Not a real guy. Don’t believe everything you see here tonight,” Gil said. “This is a strange place and funny things can happen.” She turned toward Lucy and gave her a meaningful look and pulled her forward.

Olivia led them up past everyone to the front of the line. “Oh, so I guess they think they’re
special
,” someone in line called out.

Lucy turned. Three girls were glaring at them.

“Oh, honey, it’s not that we
think
we are,” Liza said. She blew them a kiss off the tip of her middle finger.

At the front of the line, standing next to the box-office scarecrow, was a guy a few years older than them, in a white tank top, all big, square jaw and rippling muscles, and thick, dark hair.

“A pleasure as always, ladies,” he said to Olivia and Gil. His voice was so slow and deep it sounded like a recording of a regular person’s voice played back at the wrong speed. His eyes settled on Liza. “And you,” he said. “Get up in this.” He pointed to his massive chest.

Olivia and Gil walked forward, pulling Lucy with them. But she turned back and watched as the guy wrapped his enormous arms around Liza’s shoulders and pulled her in for a hug. In his arms, Liza looked positively tiny. “God, I’ve missed you.” He stuck his nose in her hair and smelled it.

“That’s Scott,” Gil whispered.

“It
is
?” Lucy stared at them. “As in the guy on the phone?”

Gil nodded and pulled Lucy forward again.

There was an angry-looking girl in a tiny black dress and turquoise heels guarding the door. Olivia leaned over to whisper something to her. Olivia’s white hair brushed against the girl’s black locks. Lucy snapped a picture. The girl turned and kissed Olivia on both cheeks, then stepped back to let her inside. She did the same to Liza and Gil. And even Lucy.

They went down a dark hallway that led into a huge room with a high-domed ceiling. It looked like the type of place where you’d go to hear a symphony or an opera except there were no seats. “A lot of famous people sang here back in the twenties when this place was first built,” said Olivia. “And lucky us, there’s an amazing new singer doing her debut performance here tonight.”

“Who?” Lucy looked up at the stage. Thick, red velvet curtains hung from a twenty-foot ceiling. Thousands of pinpoint lights hung from the ceiling on invisible threads, making it look like the room was full of tiny floating stars. The place was empty except for a few guys walking back and forth carrying giant pieces of sound equipment.

And a slow smile spread across Olivia’s lips and her tinkling bell laugh rang in Lucy’s ears. “You.”

Lucy’s entire body went cold.

“Welcome to your first show, rainbow cake,” said Olivia.

“But how did you even know I . . . ?”

“Remember when you were singing in the car the other day?” Gil said. “You were amazing.”

“You guys heard that?” Lucy whispered.

“Nature gave you something precious,” Olivia said. “Don’t waste it. You were meant to do this. It’s only fear that’s preventing you.”

“I . . . ,” said Lucy.

Gil squeezed her hand. “. . . will be wonderful.”

“But I can’t . . .” Terror tightened around her throat and no more words would come out.

“Don’t follow that,” Olivia said. She pointed to Lucy’s face. “It’s fear that separates the Heartbreakers from the heartbroken. It’s fear that keeps people from getting”—she gave Lucy a meaningful look—“what they want the most. If you do a good job, we have something very special to show you.”

Her meaning was clear.
This was the final step.

If Lucy wanted their magic, this is what she needed to do. If she wanted Alex back, this is what she needed to do.

So this is what she would do.

Lucy raised her hand to her lips. She didn’t even bother to try and smile. “When do I go on?”

“Pete has lived here ever since we’ve known him,” Gil said as the four of them walked across the giant room. “Apparently the place is haunted by the ghost of some magician or something.” They went through a side door. “He says sometimes at night he’ll hear the sounds of cards shuffling and”—then down a narrow hallway—“sometimes finds aces tucked in between his covers”—and up two sets of stairs.

Finally they popped out into a big room behind the stage that was filled with a crazy mass of wires and cables, laptops, soundboards, and a couple dozen musical instruments.

“I can’t believe this is your friend’s
house
,” Lucy said.

Gil shook her head. “I know, right? That’s where he sleeps.” She pointed behind a pile of spotlights to a smallish bed covered in a quilt.

“Is sleeping,” a muffled, British-accented voice called from under the covers.

Olivia poked at the lump on the bed.

It reached out one arm, hooking Olivia around the waist and pulling her down on top of him.

Pete sat up. He was a few years older than they were. He had this look on his face like a kid who’d done something naughty. Or was just about to. He was still holding on to Olivia. She swatted at his arm, turned her head, and gave him a long kiss on the lips. Her bright white hair pressed against his bright red. He let her go and she stood back up.

“What time is it?”

“Ten,” Gil said.

“Hmmm.” He rose, shirtless in pin-striped suit pants. “Hand me that, would you, love?” He pointed to Lucy, then to a white button-down shirt hanging on the back of one of the spotlights. She handed it to him. He smiled. “So is this little flower my new singer for the night?”

Lucy nodded.

“Everyone’s talking about how incredible you are,” he said.

“They
are
?”

“Well, no,” he said. “But I’m sure they will be after tonight.”

“She’s wonderful,” Gil said.

Pete nodded. “Good.” He finished buttoning his shirt. Tucked it into his pants. Let out a yawn and stretched. “All right, I’m off. It would seem I’m having all my closest friends over for a party tonight so I suppose I ought to attend to some matters of hygiene . . .” He grabbed a green toothbrush out of the top of a giant speaker.

“They’re already lined up outside,” Gil said.

“Oh, some of them have been here since this morning,” said Pete. “Someone posted something on some website that said I’d be closing the door after the first five hundred people or something.” He shrugged.

Lucy raised her hand to her mouth. “Five
hundred
?”

“I know, it’s very silly,” he said. “This place can fit a thousand at least. Especially if you put the people on top of each other, which is how they usually end up.” He waggled his eyebrows and stuck his tongue between his teeth. “Now, if you’ll excuse me . . .” He disappeared through a door in the back. Two cinnamon-colored cats marched out behind him.

A thousand people.
That was more than the entire student population of Van Buren. That was more than three times as many people as would fill the biggest concert hall in town. That was . . . Lucy stuck her hand out for something to grab on to.

“Oh, calm
down
,” Liza said. She caught Lucy’s wrist. “Making an audience love you is the same as making one person love you, but a bunch of times over. It’s honestly not that big a deal.”

Lucy sank down onto Pete’s bed.

“You could always back out,” Olivia said. “But I wouldn’t recommend it.”

Lucy looked down. Her broken heart thumped.

“So what am I singing?” Lucy asked.

Olivia smiled. “Gilly, deal with our little songbird here, Liza and I have to talk to Pete about something. . . .”

“You’re not . . . ,” said Gil.

“Not yet,” said Olivia. “He’s not ready.”

“Soon though,” said Liza.

Gil led them across the stage behind the curtain into a room on the other side, which contained various complicated-looking pieces of musical equipment, speakers, a keyboard, a guitar, and five laptops.

“You know the boys, of course,” said Gil. Standing amongst the laptops were Jack/Bathrobe and B/Lying on the Couch, the two Lucy had stood alone with in the apartment only a few days before, the ones she’d been too scared to talk to. Funny how long ago that seemed.

“Hello,” Lucy said.

Jack looked Lucy up and down. Then yanked down his pair of black tuxedo pants to reveal a pair of pastel yellow boxer briefs. “We match,” he said.

“Put your pants on, Jack,” B said. “You don’t want to scare her.”

Jack nodded solemnly. “My manhood scares the ladies sometimes. It’s a curse.”

“It’s not your manhood that I’m scared of,” Lucy said. “It’s the singing in front of a thousand people.”

Jack grinned.

“Ah, right, you’re our singer tonight,” B said, nodding. “A mute singer. Perfect. How very avant-garde. Hope you’re better than Jackie here. He just cannot hit those high notes.”

Jack nodded. “Again, it’s the manhood, I think.”

“Too much testosterone and all that, probably,” Lucy said. But she was staring at the opening of his shirt and his completely hairless chest.

Gil laughed. “Listen, I have to go make a phone call and I don’t get reception back here. Lucy, you’ll be okay if I leave you?”

“Of course she will be,” said B. He was grinning at her. “She’s our brand-new buddy.”

Gil kissed Lucy on the cheek. “I’ll see you out there, sweetie,” she said, then left.

B hit a button on one of the laptops and a heavy bass beat filled the room. Jack hit a button on another laptop and a beepy boopy melody joined in. B flipped on the keyboard and pressed a few keys. There was an airy whistle, and the rich, warm sound of bells, and on top of that a bluesy twang somehow mournful and hopeful at the same time. There was a heartbeat behind all of it, and she could feel it beating with her own heart.

She closed her eyes. She was somewhere else, floating through the air; she could feel the wind rushing past her face. When the song ended she opened her eyes.

“So that was it,” said B. “Like it?”

“I completely love it,” Lucy said, and meant it.

“Well that is glorious news,” said B. He clapped his hands together. “Because that’s what you’re singing to.”

B closed the laptop and Jack took a silver flask out of his hip pocket and took a sip of whatever was inside.

“Aren’t we going to practice?” Lucy said.

“That
was
practice,” said Jack. “Now shoo, we have manly matters to attend to.”

“Wait,” Lucy said. “I’m not ready . . .”

But they weren’t listening. Jack was leading her out the door, and for a second he stopped. “Oh,” he said. “And PS, when you get to the stage, make sure you stand on the X because that’s where the spotlight’ll be.”

“The spotlight?!”

The door shut behind her with a click.

An hour later the place was packed with people. A thousand? Five thousand? A
million
? All Lucy could see in every direction was a blur of bodies—dancing, bouncing, sweating. She had wandered out onto the dance floor to clear her head before going onstage, to try and deal with the hot bile that was working its way up her throat. But now she was trapped.

A giant dude in a black T-shirt stood directly in front of her, blocking her way. His thin brown hair was drenched with sweat. He shook his head in ecstatic dance and little beads of it sprayed around him in a halo.

“Excuse me,” she said. She moved right, moved left, but everywhere she tried to go, he already was. “Excuse me, please!” she said again, louder this time. She tapped him on his arm. It was wet and gritty feeling, like he was coated in sand. He looked down at her and blinked. Then just kept right on dancing.

Hot panic shot up the back of her neck. She was supposed to go onstage soon, probably any minute. But if she could not get to the stage in time, she could not go on. And if she did not go on . . .

“Birdie?”

Lucy looked up. Delicate features, dark gray shirt, black pants, hair spiked up slightly. It was Paisley and he was grinning. “Paisley!” she said.

“Hey!” He pulled her in for a hug. His skin was warm and smooth. And Lucy was flooded with relief. A familiar face, even one she’d only seen once was better than nothing. “Aren’t you supposed to be in Tokyo?”

“Missed the flight. It’s okay though, the guy who was going to fly me in ended up beaming me in as a hologram. I was watching on a webcam. People kept trying to make out with hologram-me and kept being really confused when I wasn’t actually there.” He laughed. “How are you?” He tipped his head to the side. “You kind of look like you are freaking out. You okay?”