What You Always Wanted (35 page)

Me:
Thank you. So much.

Angela pulls into my driveway at half past eleven and I'm happy to see my parents remembered to leave on the porch light. As much as I like our actual house now, it still freaks me out being outside in the woods in the middle of the night.

“Thanks for tonight, Angela,” I say, grabbing my purse from the floor and pulling my coat tighter around me. “Best night of my life. Seriously. Gene on the big screen. I can't believe it.”

And I can't believe it was Jesse's idea. I'm still so excited, I might not sleep tonight.

“Yay!” She claps a couple times, and I can see her face beam in the glow from the dashboard. “I'm so happy you were surprised!”

“Totally surprised.” I lean in to hug her. “Sets the bar pretty high for your birthday this summer, but I'm sure Tiffany and I can come up with something stellar.”

“Oh, we can just do a pool party or something easy. I have, like, zero hobbies to pull inspiration from.”

“Pshhh,” I hiss. “We'll just have to see.”

We air-kiss our good-byes and I sprint to the porch and up the steps. I hear Angela's tires meet the gravel of their driveway across the street as I approach the door with the key, and my foot knocks something over. A box.

A box of yellow cake mix. And next to it, a tub of chocolate icing.

My eyebrows pull together as my mouth flips into a smile. I pick them up, and my heart races when I find messy writing on the front of the box in thick black marker:

Maddie, I don't know how to bake, but I know you like yellow cake.

I didn't mean for that to rhyme. Happy birthday. From, Jesse

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

Part of me hoped things would go back to the way they were between Jesse and me. I don't think it's unreasonable, considering the movie night he set up for my birthday and the cake mix he left at my door with the note. I thought maybe if I gave it time, like Angela suggested, it would make him ache for me the way I'm aching for him. But over the following couple of weeks, nothing's different. We're cordial, and he still smiles and occasionally jokes around like we're old pals, but it's like he's deep in thought all the time.

I am too. Wondering what I could have done differently, could have said. But I only ever said what I was feeling. I never lied about anything.

It's like Jesse's permanently infiltrated my brain, and I'm forever doomed to be reminded of him everywhere I look. A hunting sticker of a deer head on the back window of someone's
vehicle reminds me of the baby deer he was so sweet to show me that morning. Any old-fashioned truck, no matter the color or condition, brings me back to our carpool days and all the wasted opportunities to get to know him on a deeper level. Kids zipping down the street on four-wheelers remind me of our adventures through the woods, which of course make me think of sparklers and midnight and kissing.

His stupid amazing kissing.

Makes it hard to focus on getting
me
straightened out when all I can think about is how much I miss
us
.

But today's practice for the talent competition is too important for me to be distracted by Jesse's ghost. It's our first rehearsal in costume and our last before the performance tonight. I have to be on top of my game along with everyone else, though Brian's also a bit scattered because Kristi's driving in from Dallas to watch.

We're performing a few scenes from the Marilyn Monroe movie
Some Like It Hot
, about two musicians in 1929 who witness a massacre, then dress in drag and join an all-women's jazz band to escape mobsters who want to kill them. Sarah masterfully arranged highlights from the first few scenes where the guys pretend to be girls, board the train with the band to head to Florida for a gig, and get to know Marilyn's character, the band's singer, Sugar Kane—the character I get to play. Sarah's directing us and playing the small role of Sweet Sue, the bandleader. Ryan plays the more serious guy, Tony Curtis's character, Joe or “Josephine,” and Brian naturally gets to play Jack Lemmon's hysterical character, Jerry, who's supposed to go by “Geraldine” but changes it to “Daphne” at the last minute.

The boys are in my bedroom helping each other fasten and stuff their bras—they refuse to accept help—and Sarah and I are waiting in the living room, fully dressed in short blond wigs and black dresses with fringe. Instead of the standard star near my eye, today I've drawn a mole on my chin to better channel Marilyn. I may or may not have also stuffed my bra.

“Okay. We need to talk,” Sarah says, setting her clipboard of notes on the coffee table. “I can't handle the moping anymore.”

I strum the ukulele we borrowed from the playhouse's prop closet. “What's that from?”

“It's not a quote, it's from me. About you. What's going on? Are you still hung up on Jesse?”

I stuff the ukulele in its case and shift on the couch, careful not to tangle any of the fringe on my dress. “I didn't realize I was moping . . .”
Outwardly.

“Well, you're not your normal chipper self. It just doesn't seem like you to hang on to it for so long. Look at all that stuff that happened with Rica that you let bounce off you. You're tough.”

I reach for my glass and take a sip of water, stalling for time as I try to figure out what to say. “It's not him
exactly
. It's more some of the things he said. Some of it stuck with me. I've just had a lot on my mind.” I run a finger along the rim of my cup. “I didn't mean for it to show.”

“What did he say?” she asks, carefully scratching the side of her head through her wig.

“That he'll never be what I want him to be.” I take a deep breath. “That he knows what I want, and he's not him.”

“Yikes.” Her eyes widen. “What does that even mean?”

“He was upset I was pushing him to be what he used to be.” I return my cup to the side table. “A dancer.”

Sarah makes a contemplative noise.

“I wanted him to embrace all of his interests, to be proud of all of them, and he called me out for only liking half of him.” My throat burns with the threat of emotional overflow, but I swallow it away.

“Is that legit? Do you think you only liked half of him?”

I'm too afraid to answer, because that's probably exactly what I did. And that sounds horrible and selfish and stupid.

“Well, you don't want to dance anymore, right?” She pauses and I nod. “So why is it so hard for you to get that Jesse doesn't want to either?”

Gee, she's really twisting the knife. But I deserve it. “I get that he says he doesn't want to pursue it. I just had a hard time accepting it because of his skill level. He's incredible.”

“Well, you might be some crazy-good volleyball player, but because you're not interested in it, you don't play.”

This stumps me. I've never given a second thought to volleyball. I've never even played. I assume that because I don't care about it, I wouldn't be any good, but what she says makes sense. I could be awesome at it, at anything I've never tried. Anyone could.

A memory pops to mind . . . something Jesse said before we were together. “
Just because you're good at something doesn't mean that it's what you should be doing.
”

Or that you
want
to do it.

I let my head fall back against the couch. “I really am a dope, aren't I?”

Why did I ever think I could force my ideals onto him? I
can't make Jesse dance in front of people any more than he can make me take up softball. How many times did he try to tell me he didn't want to perform anymore and I wouldn't take it seriously? I kept rationalizing it in my head, blaming his negative attitude about it on his dad and what the other kids would say. But it wasn't any of that making up his mind; it was always him.

I only saw what I wanted to see.

The boys strut in with hands on their hips, wearing stockings and dresses and coats and wigs and dainty hats and
high heels
. Absolute perfection.

I buckle over in laughter, but Sarah stands and exclaims, “We're gonna win this whole thing!”

Jesse's nearly the first person I see when I get to the school's theatre. He's dressed in all black, wearing a headset and pointing people where to go. We catch eyes, and he smiles, offering a little wave. I bite my lip and wave back. I have so much to tell him. I hope we get a chance to talk tonight.

He disappears as Sarah pushes me, the boys, and our props to one of the dressing rooms, already crammed with kids and costumes and glitter and instruments and vocalists warming up their voices, not all of them pleasing to the ears. After we stow our empty instrument cases and a huge roll of paper with the outside of a passenger train car painted on it, the click of hot-pink high heels catches our attention.

“Well, look at this room brimming with raw talent just waiting to be discovered,” Rica says, crossing her skinny arms over her shimmery pink dress.

“Please,” Brian fires back. “Are you expecting to get your big break tonight? It's a high school talent show, not open mic night at some famous bar in Nashville.”

“Guess I know something y'all don't know. No surprise there.” She tosses me a nasty smirk and turns to leave. “Good luck.”

“
Good luck
?” Sarah hisses once Rica's out of earshot. “How many times do we need to say ‘Break a leg' to cancel that out?”

I breathe slowly, in and out, finding my calm. “We can't let her in our heads. Ever. She doesn't deserve space there.”

“Right, right.” Sarah nods, hiking up her stockings. “Ugh, she's just so toxic.”

I adjust my stockings as well. Sugar Kane is supposed to get caught sneaking alcohol, so I secure a small plastic flask in the band around my thigh. We go on later in the show, but I don't want to forget one of my character's only two props.

We're able to catch the first half of the show in the audience, over to the side where the performers rotate and watch. A few of the memorable acts include a pair of guys from my Spanish class who do some lasso tricks, Rica performing “Popular” from the Broadway musical
Wicked
—I hate to admit it, but she really is good and could possibly win this thing even though she's a
terrible person
—and the biggest surprise of all, Red's juggling act. He starts with a trio of baseballs and eventually ends up with five, then switches to wooden bats! The crowd eats up his showmanship, and I find myself thoroughly impressed by the whole thing. It's a shame he's so stupid when it comes to girls.

When it's nearly our turn, we gather all our props—I triple-check my flask is still secure—and wait in the dark wings, watching the profiles of the singing act before us. I'm lost in a
pre-performance trance when I feel a hand slide into my right one from behind. The familiar size and the calluses on the palm make my breath catch in my throat.

A warm whisper on the back of my neck. “Break a leg,
mi reina
.”

I close my eyes and smile through gritted teeth, refusing to get emotional. I can't do this now. I'll find him after the show. Tell him I'm sorry. That I want to make things right.

He's gone just as quickly as he came, and suddenly it's our turn. A pair of stage hands unroll our paper train across the stage, securing the ends onto music stands. Ryan and Brian shimmy onstage in their heels first, and before anything even comes out of their mouths, the audience is roaring. And we nail it. All of it. The timing, the blocking, the delivery. Better than we rehearsed. Better than I ever dreamed.

We exit the stage to fervent applause, and as we quietly hug each other but inwardly freak out about what we just did, I'm filled with a sense of accomplishment. When I was in
Crazy for You
, I never felt like anyone really saw me, like I contributed at all. I was too burdened by my inferior dancing to enjoy any of it. This time, I know this applause belongs, in part, to me.