Yolo (36 page)

SnowAngel:

Maddie!

SnowAngel:

Pick! Up! The! Phone!

SnowAngel:

*rips hair out*

SnowAngel:

will u at least txt me back, then????

SnowAngel:

cuz girl, I talked to Ian, and you have some explaining to do. BIG TIME.

SnowAngel:

plus I am worried about you and I love you and I am worried about you!

SnowAngel:

goddammit, Maddie. call or txt when u can.

SnowAngel:

I'll be waiting.

zoegirl:

what? does he have piles of money hidden away that we can use to buy a plane ticket?

SnowAngel:

no, and he thought it was weird that I even asked.

SnowAngel:

not weird as if it was a bad idea. weird cuz he had no idea how upset Maddie is.

zoegirl:

how cld he not know how upset . . . ?

zoegirl:

duh duh duh. because she's been keeping it from him. truly keeping it from him, even more than I could have imagined.

zoegirl:

Angela, I'm starting to wonder if Ian knew *any* of it. did he know that Maddie and Zara don't hang out anymore?

SnowAngel:

I mentioned that to him, just in terms of “. . . yeah, and she's not going out with her friends, and she's not even sure they ARE friends . . .”

SnowAngel:

he gave me the blankest look and said he didn't think she'd ever really gone out with them.

zoegirl:

what???

SnowAngel:

so I told him about the casino and the roller derby and the other insane adventures she's had, and he knew about NONE of them.

SnowAngel:

he thought I was making stuff up to mess with him. he thought I was just being random!

SnowAngel:

is Maddie hiding stuff from us too? is she leading a double life???

zoegirl:

I don't know, but if I had to guess, I'd guess yes.

SnowAngel:

and confused!!!

SnowAngel:

this has nothing to do with Maddie, but she's going to be ok(ish), and I wanted to tell you.

SnowAngel:

Anna heard some girls talking at the Zeta house, and she found out that the girl who dressed up as a nurse is a junior named Kylie.

SnowAngel:

Anna talked to her, and Kylie wasn't exactly thrilled, but she didn't turn Anna away either. she said she'd rather not know.

SnowAngel:

anyway, Kylie is seeing a counselor. she's not dropping out of school or anything and she's staying in the sorority, even. Anna said that Kylie looked bewildered when Anna asked that question, like she didn't see how the two things connected.

SnowAngel:

maybe they don't for her. but for me they did.

SnowAngel:

but this next part makes me happy. Kylie told Anna it meant a lot, the note. knowing that she hadn't been . . .

SnowAngel:

SnowAngel:

knowing that it cld have been worse, but wasn't.

SnowAngel:

*deep breath*

SnowAngel:

ok. done. thought you'd want to know, that's all.

SnowAngel:

yeah, Maddie. we know you don't want to talk. whatever. but YOU know you're being stupid (I love you!) and self-sabotaging (still love you! will always love you!)

zoegirl:

me too, Mads. love and love, even though you have some major explaining to do. but right now that doesn't matter. we just want to know you're ok.

SnowAngel:

type a dot or something if yr there.

zoegirl:

a dot? do you mean a period?

SnowAngel:

a dot or a period or anything! the tic-tac-toe board, even.

SnowAngel:

###

SnowAngel:

see how easy?

zoegirl:

that's not a tic-tac-toe board, Angela. you do know that, right?

zoegirl:

but never mind. Maddie's not typing anything, so . . .

SnowAngel:

I think we shld tell her anyway.

SnowAngel:

I hope you're reading this right now, Maddie!!! BECAUSE IT IS IMPORTANT!

SnowAngel:

Zoe? you start.

zoegirl:

well, Angela and I Skyped for hours last night. at the end, we added Ian to the call too.

zoegirl:

and we put it all together—all the stories you told us.

SnowAngel:

we know they're not true, not a single one.

SnowAngel:

which means u were lying to us

zoegirl:

a lot

SnowAngel:

and when we figured it out, we felt pretty dumb. because remember that one time when I even said to you, “Whoa, Maddie, your life is like a movie”? haha, you must have laughed yr head off at that.

zoegirl:

or not. I tossed and turned all night, and it came to me finally that you probably *wanted* us to figure it out, and maybe you've been sad that it's taken us this long.

SnowAngel:

we made a list:

SnowAngel:

first u told Zoe that you were a card player with mad skills. we had to IMDb that one after we figured out the others, cuz I've never seen it. Zoe has, but it was a long time ago.

SnowAngel:

anyway, you got that from the movie about the genius MIT kids who figured out how to rip off casinos by counting cards, didn't u?

zoegirl:

“21”

zoegirl:

that's what the movie was called

SnowAngel:

then came your stint as a roller derby queen. I still can't believe Zoe believed that.

zoegirl:

well, you believed me when I told you about it, Angela.

zoegirl:

and can't you see Maddie as a roller derby queen?

zoegirl:

you'd be a fabulous roller derby queen, Mads. you'd rock those high sports socks, and you look awesome in pigtails.

SnowAngel:

that was from “Whip It,” right? about the girl who felt like a freak in her small town but made new freak friends in a roller derby league?

zoegirl:

and then you almost went surfing, but there was a shark alert. “Soul Surfer”? about the girl who got her arm bitten off?

SnowAngel:

I
that movie, btw.

zoegirl:

and then right around the time Doug broke up with me, you magically became a character in “The Hangover,” from the scene when the guys woke up in a hotel room and found a tiger in the bathroom.

SnowAngel:

a tiger that they had to return to that scary dude, which is what you claimed that you and Zara and the Esbees were doing.

SnowAngel:

jesus, Zoe. we really *were* stupid, weren't we?

zoegirl:

yep. except . . . she's Maddie. she made it all sound possible.

zoegirl:

you ARE a good liar, Mads, though I'm not sure that's a skill to be proud of.

zoegirl:

and then the ghost hunting night. “Ghostbusters”? “listen, I smell something”??? Ian told us that you two can shoot quotes back and forth from that movie forever.

SnowAngel:

and then back to Vegas, sans tiger, only you didn't really get on the plane because—surprise!—the guy you were with was scared of flying and needed anxiety meds.

zoegirl:

the three of us saw “Bridesmaids” together. God.

SnowAngel:

and you laughed so hard when everyone got food poisoning from that sketchy Brazilian restaurant.

SnowAngel:

I'm surprised u didn't claim u had to take a dump in the middle of the road.

zoegirl:

and then, last but not least, Halloween. I did the zombie crawl, Angela went to a party, and you? you—supposedly—went to a lecture given by the son of a mad scientist WHO THOUGHT HE COULD REANIMATE DEAD PEOPLE.

zoegirl:

omigosh.

zoegirl:

Ian figured that one out, too. he said the two of you watched “Young Frankenstein” over the summer and loved it.

SnowAngel:

which is awesome. yay, movies.

SnowAngel:

but Maddie, your life *isn't* like a movie, is it? your life is stolen from a bunch of different movies.

zoegirl:

it's you sitting around watching Netflix all the time.

zoegirl:

AND it's you totally reneging on the yolo oath.

SnowAngel:

but we're not here to yell at u. right, Zo?

zoegirl:

no. but we are upset.

SnowAngel:

VERY upset.

zoegirl:

mainly we just want u to be ok.

SnowAngel:

so be ok. please?

SnowAngel:

and we ARE going to get u to Atlanta over
Thanksgiving. we haven't worked out every last detail yet, but we will. tell her, Zoe.

zoegirl:

we will. Angela's stubborn, if you haven't noticed. she's forcing me to be gutsy and not give up (normally YOUR job!), so that's what I'm going to do.

SnowAngel:

Zoe, Maddie's still not saying anything.

zoegirl:

no, she's not.

SnowAngel:

Maddie?

SnowAngel:

just one little dot? plz plz pretty plz?

SnowAngel:

. . .

SnowAngel:

. . .

zoegirl:

. . . . . . . . .

SnowAngel:

le sigh.

zoegirl:

we're here for you, Maddie. just know that.

SnowAngel: