The Secret Sisterhood of Heartbreakers (16 page)

“That’s Max,” Olivia said. “He
really
loves Liza. It’s quite sweet.”

“Okay? You want reasons? Do you have a pen? A notebook? This might take a while.” Liza laughed. “Number one, your voice is too soft. Two, you always look like you need lip balm even after you’ve just put on lip balm. Is there something wrong with your mouth? Do you have a mouth disease? And three, the lip balm you use smells bad, like medicine. Which was only one of the many things wrong with kissing you by the way, which we will discuss more extensively when we get to items eleven through twenty-five. Number four, every time you told a joke you’d look at me after, like checking to see if I thought it was funny. Five, you have freckles.”

“Wait,” Lucy said. “Why are we watching this?”

“This is your prize! You get to watch Liza break a heart.”

“But I don’t . . . ,” Lucy started.

“Ssh,” Olivia said. And she pointed toward the screen.

“But . . .” Max said. His voice sounded strange, shaky. “You told me you liked them.”

“Well, I don’t. Six, you gave me too many presents. Seven, I hate your belt. Eight, you’re allergic to lemons. . . .”

Lucy stared at the screen where Liza was still listing and Max now seemed to be crying. A cold heavy weight sank in Lucy’s gut. These girls broke hearts, she
knew
that. She’d seen Ethan post-heartbreak and had felt, if not good about it, at least generally okay. Ethan was strong and a jerk and Lucy could see how his broken heart might help both him and the world. But this was different. All Lucy needed to know about Max she already knew—he was sweet and he was weak. And Liza was shredding him to pieces. And nothing about it was okay.

Lucy couldn’t watch any more. She had to turn away.

Olivia was leaning back in the chair with her legs up, smiling at the screen as though she were watching a favorite TV show.

“Why doesn’t she stop now?” Lucy said. “He’s obviously already crying. Why doesn’t she just take his tear and go?”

“What’d be the fun in that? Now, ssh. My favorite part is coming.”

Lucy felt hot chills run up the back of her neck.

Olivia held one finger to her lips and pointed to the screen.

“. . . change,” Max was saying, “if you’ll just give me a chance, just a couple of weeks, I think I can. I promise I will . . .”

Liza let out a cruel laugh. “Do you even know how pathetic you sound right now?” She tipped her head to the side. “I don’t mean that rhetorically. Like, this is an actual question. Do you?”

Max stopped moving.

“Because if you doooon’t”—Liza stretched the word out, grinning—“I could just show you the video.” Then she leaned over and whispered something to Max, who jolted upright. She pointed directly at the camera. “See it up there? Wave to the camera, Maxie.” Max turned toward it, his hands over his mouth, his warm brown eyes full of pain. He turned quickly away.

“You’re taping this?” He sounded scared.

“Yup! But not just this, honey. If you want something to cry to later, let me know and I’ll send you some files. I’ve recorded everything we’ve ever done together.”

“Everything? Wait . . .”

“Yes, Max, even
that
. Really powerful cameras come really small these days. You’d be surprised at some of the places a person can hide one. They’re quite expensive but well worth the price, I’ve found. Speaking of expenses, how much do you think those rich parents of yours would be willing to give you to, say, keep this tape or some of your other greatest hits from accidently being played at the next Van Buren school-wide assembly?”

“You wouldn’t actually do that.” His voice was shaking. “You’re not that cruel.”

Liza laughed, then reached out and stroked his hair. “Oh, lover, I don’t think
either
of us believes
that
.”

Lucy turned toward Olivia. “She’s not serious, is she?”

“Well, of course she is,” Olivia said. “Don’t look so surprised, sweet cakes. There are many benefits to being a Heartbreaker—making magic is only one of them.” Olivia shrugged. “We do this to pretty much all of our targets.”

Lucy’s entire body was suddenly ice cold.

“You do? All of you?”

Olivia nodded.

“Even Gil?”
Lucy pressed one hand to her lips and another to her belly.

“Of course. You should watch the recording of this one she did six months ago. The guy basically went insane, threatened to
kill himself.
I mean, of course he didn’t, but still, it was amazing. Gilly was the one who figured out how to hook up our newest camera so it streams to the internet. That way Jack and B and our other friends can watch from home. I mean we don’t tell them what we use the tears for obviously, but it would be a crime to let all
that
go to waste.” She pointed toward the screen again where Max was hunched over the table crying into his hands. “That’s some high-quality reality TV right there.”

Liza was standing over him, staring into the camera. She made a mock frowny face. Then she winked at the camera, then mimed kicking Max in the butt.

Olivia began to laugh and it was not the tinkling of bells but something louder, harsher. Lucy looked at her. Gone was the cool and calm, wise and otherworldly Olivia that Lucy had known. In her place was a beast, red faced, head tipped back: a hiccupping, high-pitched hyena wail emerging from her wide-open mouth. There was nothing beautiful about her now.

Hot acid flooded Lucy’s insides. She shook her head.

“But you said that when you break hearts you’re doing a good thing, giving a gift. How can that . . .” Lucy pointed to the screen, to where Max’s shoulders were shaking. “How can that be a good thing? How is that a gift to him?”

“Weeell, yeah about that.” Olivia laughed again. “I guess that’s all sort of subjective, isn’t it? But, look at it this way, it’ll definitely be a gift to our wallets! And we will be helping support the local economy when we spend Max’s parents’ money.”

Lucy’s heart was pounding so hard she could feel it in her teeth.

“Hey,” Olivia said. She gave Lucy a nudge. “You know what would be funny? If someone came into the courtyard right now and ‘discovered’ this little scene. You should do it, fruit tart. Just go back through the main room through an orange door off to the side.” Olivia was nodding. “Oh, poor Maxie, he’ll probably die of embarrassment. It’ll be so awesome.”

Lucy pressed one hand against her stomach.

“Go on then,” Olivia said. She was no longer smiling. “Surprise the little loser. And then come back here and we will finally give you everything you’ve been waiting for.”

“Everything?” said Lucy. Her voice sounded hollow.

“Yes,” Olivia said. “Everything.” She looked up and their eyes met. “And just so there’s no mistake. That means the magic.”

Lucy’s heart was hammering as she stood. She walked toward the ladder and began the long climb down. She could not believe what she was about to do. She knew she had no choice. She walked through the main room. She stopped outside the orange door. She could hear muffled voices coming from inside. Across from the door was a white cement beam. Lucy reached into her bag for something to write with, and closed her fist around a marker: the green Sharpie she’d gotten for her game with Alex.

She uncapped it, and onto the white cement she scribbled out a message.

It’s going to be all right.

She stopped and looked at those letters. Max would see this when he came in from the courtyard, heart wrecked, feeling all alone. And maybe, for a moment, just a moment, some tiny part of him would be able to believe it.

Lucy pressed her fist to her heart.

Then at least someone would.

She walked out into the night without looking back.

I
t was only when she was halfway down the street that Lucy’s heart and brain stopped racing enough for her to realize that she was out in the middle of nowhere, and there was not a single person she could call to come and pick her up. Tristan thought she was at home. Her parents were still out of town. And she didn’t have enough money with her for a cab. And that left who?
Alex?

Lucy shook her head.

No, she would walk. According to her phone, it would take her a little over five hours to do it. Fine, so that’s what she’d do.

Lucy kept going, all alone through that dark night, too angry to feel afraid.

Her phone vibrated with calls from Olivia. But there was not a single thing Lucy could imagine wanting to say to her right then. Or ever again.

Lucy shut her phone off. She walked on dark quiet roads, the only sounds an occasional car passing in the distance, the occasional hoot of an owl. But all the while she could not get the sound of Max’s ragged cries out of her ears, and she could not get her ache for him out of her heart.

A
round nine Lucy woke enough to register her parents pulling into the driveway, back from their trip upstate. Then she was pulled back into the same dream she’d been having all night in which a conveyor belt made of old, scratched leather carried a parade of bloody hearts toward a set of giant copper gears. Each heart had a bomb inside.
TICK TICKTICK.
In the dream Lucy knew there was a message for her, from Alex, in one of those ticking bomb hearts. The message was something he desperately needed to tell her, but the only way for her to get it was to stand there and wait for each heart to explode.

BOOM BOOMBOOM
. The hearts blew, covering Lucy with their blood.

Boom boomboom.
Lucy’s mother was knocking on her door. “Are you in there, honey? It’s almost noon.”

It was only then that Lucy opened her eyes. Sat up with a start. She grabbed her phone before she even took a breath. She turned it on.

Nothing but texts from Olivia.
DELETE, DELETE, DELETE, DELETE.

“YES!” Lucy shouted. “Getting up now!”

She felt as if she hadn’t slept at all.

Downstairs, her dad was standing at the stove. Her mom was next to him holding a plate of grilled cheeses. “There’s our girl!” her mom said, enveloping Lucy in a cheddar-scented hug.

Her dad waved his spatula. “Hope you’re hungry.”

“We went a little bit overboard at the farmers’ market near our bed-and-breakfast this morning.” Lucy’s mom motioned toward a stack of paper-wrapped chunks of cheese, huge loaves of bread dusted in flour, piles of peaches and radishes and tomatoes and cucumbers. “We had such a lovely time I guess we just wanted to bring it back with us.”

“I think we are probably breaking some important fancy food rule frying up all these
artisanal
cheeses, though,” her dad said. “I’m so ashamed.” He was grinning.

“Well, call us a couple of crazy rule-breakers then!” her mom said. She bumped Lucy’s father with her hip, and he kissed her on the cheek.

Lucy tried to force a smile.

Every so often, usually right after a vacation or a holiday, her parents did this happy couple thing. They would make jokes and cook together and kiss each other when they thought no one was looking and giggle if anyone was. But it was not to be trusted. The happy couple thing was always followed by the angry couple thing, which was then followed by months of barely speaking, which always culminated in the announcement that they were getting a divorce. Which they never did, because then the cycle would start all over. This was just how it was—always changing, nothing ever solid. Ordinarily, seeing them so giddy would fill Lucy with a particular pang in her chest. But in that moment, Lucy felt nothing but a sickness in her stomach over what she’d seen the night before and the ever-present emptiness of missing Alex.

Lucy’s father looked up. “So I guess you were partying it up pretty hard while we were gone, huh? Sleeping until noon? Wooweee!” He was smiling, kidding.

“Ha-ha, you know me,” Lucy said. Only the thing was, they didn’t, and they hadn’t in an awfully long time. “Did you have fun?”

“Oh yes,” her father said. “Except for the two-hour drive home in a car that smelled like ripe Brie!”

“And we missed you, of course,” said Lucy’s mother. “Are you feeling better, honey?”

“I’m . . . ,” Lucy said. She stopped. How did her mother know?

Her mother smiled expectantly.

It was then that Lucy remembered her fake stomachache.
That’s
what her mother was referring to. That’s all she knew about. Stomachaches and small talk, that was the extent of their conversations now.

When Lucy was younger she and her mom had been close, but lately things had changed. When Lucy first started dating Alex, her parents had been talking about divorce, radiating miserable gray clouds, and it just felt unfair to bring her manic giddiness into a house that felt like that. Besides, it was private and precious and there was part of her that had wanted to keep all of it just for herself.

And now she would keep her pain to herself too.

Lucy looked up at her parents. They were staring at her, identical grins plastered on their faces.

“Yes,” Lucy forced herself to say. “I sure am.”

A little while later, Lucy and Tristan were at Uncle Smooth’s, the smoothie place they often went on Sunday afternoons.

“Are you sure you’re okay?” Tristan said again. “I’m not trying to be pushy here, kid. But I thought a night of ice cream was supposed to make a person feel
better
not worse. Unless they have lactose issues. And you kind of look like crap . . .”

“Thanks,” she said.

“The prettiest crap!”

Lucy tried to stick out her tongue. Oh, if only she could tell him all of it.

“Maybe you’re suffering from a lack of banana blueberry peach protein?” He stuck out his cup.

Her phone buzzed. Another text from Olivia, the third she’d gotten in the last hour.

DELETE.

“Looks like you’ve got yourself a very persistent suitor, Ms. Wrenn. One of the guys from the other night?”

Lucy shook her head. “Olivia,” she said. And she shook her head again.

“Dear Lucy,” Tristan said in a jokey high-pitched voice. “Pillow fight later? Make sure you invite your hot friend Tristan!”

Lucy shook her head.

“They’re . . . I don’t think I’m going to be hanging out with them anymore.”

“What happened?”

Lucy pressed her lips together. “I just don’t want to be friends with them anymore is all.”

Lucy’s phone buzzed again. She clenched her teeth. “I wish they’d leave me
alone
!”

It was then that she looked down, her finger on the
DELETE
button, but her heart exploded when she saw what it was.

Lucy raised her hand to her lips.

Did anyone make a recording last night? I need a copy of that.

It was from a number she didn’t recognize.

“What’s in there?” Tristan said. He pointed to her phone, which she was trying to hide in her lap. “Those girls begging you to come back?”

“Not sure,” Lucy said. She tried to shrug. But she was sure. She was so sure her hands were shaking.

“Speaking of people, y’know, doing things. So, that girl Janice from last night?”

A second later, her phone buzzed again.

Btw finally caved and got a new phone, new #.keysarehardtotexton

Her entire body was tingling. This message was from Alex. It had to be.

PS Ur my 1st text

The hammering in her chest was almost unbearable. It felt like her heart was about to crack clean through her ribs.

Lucy typed,
I’m honored!!
But then deleted it before she hit
SEND
. That’s what the old Lucy would write. She was not welcome here anymore.

“Go on, Tristy,” Lucy said.

The new Lucy typed.

Not sure about recording. Things got kind of crazy afterward . . .

Lucy hit
SEND
. Tristan was still staring at her.

“I’m listening,” Lucy said.

“. . . so I get to her house,” Tristan was saying. “And . . .”

Lucy nodded. She squeezed her phone. New message.

So what are you up to? Maybe you could sing something for me? Are you around next weekend?

Lucy felt her face burn and her mouth spread into a smile. She was so happy and relieved, she thought she would cry. But no.

Lucy shook her head and took a deep breath. Maybe he wasn’t trying to be flirty. Maybe he just felt sorry for her. Or maybe this was his way of trying to be her friend. . . .

So then, how should she respond? Liza would probably write something flirty and mean, like,
Only in your dreams . . . the dirty ones.
But more clever than that. And Gil would probably just write back a smiley face. And Olivia would write . . . what
would
she write?

It didn’t matter what those girls would do. They were evil. And she was done with them.

“. . . so then she’s just standing there about to, I don’t know, perform this dance number, I guess,” Tristan continued.

Lucy stared down at her phone. She had to text back fast, while he was still in whatever mood he was in that made him send that text message in the first place, which must be a weird one since it honestly didn’t even sound much like him. But what to say?

“. . . and I didn’t want to hurt her feelings but . . .”

Lucky you, I think I am . . . ,
she typed back.

A second later:
Lucky me indeed. Friday night? ; )

Lucy’s mouth dropped open into an O and she brought her hand up to her lips. She gasped.

“. . . I feel like maybe she read one too many of those magazines that tell girls all guys love spontaneity or something,” Tristan went on, “because when she was done . . . Lucy, are you okay?”

Lucy couldn’t hold it in any more.

“Alex just asked me out for Friday.” she blurted out in one breath. “Look!” She held her phone out so Tristan could see.

“This is from him?” He sounded confused.

Lucy nodded.

“And you asked him to meet us here?”

“No. . . . What are you talking about?”

Tristan pointed. Lucy turned. There he was, Alex—her love, her heart, her everything, walking right into Uncle Smooth’s. Was he looking for
her
?

Turn around . . .

She clicked
SEND,
licked her lips, and tried to force herself to take a deep breath.

She stared at the back of Alex’s head, waiting for him to turn. He was up at the front talking to one of the guys at the counter. He reached for his wallet.

Tristan was staring at her. “Wait, so you’re dating again? When did that happen?”

Lucy’s phone buzzed.
Why?

i’m sitting right behind you . . .

Lucy waited, staring at the back of his head. He didn’t turn.

Lucy stood.

Tristan raised his eyebrows.

Up at the counter Alex was paying for a big smoothie. Then he turned and started walking toward the door. As he passed their table, Lucy poked him in the side.

“I’m right here!” she said.

Alex looked down. “Oh, hi, Lucy.” He looked up at Tristan. “Hey man.”

Tristan nodded. “Hey.”

Alex stood there, just sucking on his smoothie.

“Oh, hey, I got your text about the concert last night,” he said easily. “I was on the phone though, so I didn’t see it until this morning.” He held up his phone.

Lucy stared at it. The green packing tape, the Sharpied-on numbers. “But I thought you just got a new . . .” She stopped as
clickity-clickity-click
the pieces joined together in her head.

Her phone vibrated again.

I am looking and looking but I don’t see you . . .

Lucy raised her hand to her lips.
Oh no.

“So.” He turned toward Tristan. “How was she? I kind of can’t imagine her doing something like that.”

“Well . . .” Tristan paused. “I’m sure she was amazing at whatever it was she was doing, but I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“He wasn’t there,” Lucy said quietly. And then, quickly, “So, um, what are you up to today?” Her voice was too high. She coughed.

“I’m talking about the performance last night,” Alex said. He looked confused, then suspicious. “You know, the thousand-person concert? You weren’t one of those thousand people?”

“No,” Tristan said. “I wasn’t.” His face was toward Lucy, but he wasn’t looking at her. He wasn’t looking at anything.

“Weird, man.” Alex turned to Lucy. He tipped his head to the side. “Where did you say this concert was again?”

“Just this place, this old theater, some guy lives there.” Lucy bit her lip. “It didn’t have a name.”

“Okaaaaaay,” Alex said. He stretched out the word and let it dissolve into nothing. He gave her this look,
this look.
And despite her inability to decode most of the facial expressions he made during the entire course of their relationship, the meaning of this one was clear: he thought she was lying. For a moment he looked like he actually felt sorry for her. Then shrugged. “Well,” he said. “I’m off. Going to the darkroom to develop some rolls of film so . . .”

Tristan was looking down, and Alex was looking away. Lucy was drowning. “Wait,” Lucy said. “Wait!” She reached into her bag and pulled out a black canister. The film from last night. “There are photos in here. From the concert. Can you throw them in with yours? I have some pictures in there that I want to work on in class tomorrow so . . .” He would see the pictures. He would see the pictures and he would know the truth.

“Um, sure,” Alex said. He shrugged one more time. “See you guys later.”

Hot, sick, liquid panic rose up the back of Lucy’s neck. Her hands were shaking. Her phone vibrated and she left it alone.

“I don’t understand,” said Tristan. It sounded like his throat had shrunk and there was only a tiny opening for the words to get through. “What was he talking about?”

There was so much she wanted to say right then.
So much
but she couldn’t.