“Oh, yes! I’m starving, and this game issoboring.” Kristen hops up and cuts across a few empty seats in front of us to get to the stairs.
Kristen, Hannah, and I make our way down the bleachers, not even attempting to talk over all the noise. Hannah is walking a few steps ahead of me, so I can’t even see her face to temperature check.
“Isn’t this so exciting?” Kristen coos, coming up behind me. She loops her arm through mine, pulling me closer for warmth. Even though we can’t see our breath, the air is chilled enough that I wish I wore more than a sweatshirt.
“The game issoexciting,” I say, hoping my sarcasm isn’toverflowing. The fact that she just called it boring a few moments ago, whenshe’sthe reason we’re all on this sinking ship, didn’t escape me.
“Not the game. I want to know what you think of Maurice!”
As we slow to a stop at the back of the line for the concession stand, Hannah catches Kristen’s question and turns her full attention to us. Her eyebrows are raised, doubling down with her own curiosity.
God, what I would give to shrivel up into a raisin…
“Isn’t hehot?” Kristen prompts when I don’t immediately gush over him.
“I mean, he’s good looking,” I say, knowing that’s the wrong answer for both people with me right now.
“Why are you so pressed about him anyway?” Hannah asks, all the polite friendliness from before gone. “If you think he’s so hot, why don’t you date him?”
Crap.I hear the challenge in her voice and wonder if Kristen caught it too.
“Because he’s Clarity’s soon-to-be boy—”
“No, he’snot,” I say, because that’s definitely not the truth.
Kristen rolls her eyes, and when I look over, I see Hannah’s eyes widen, almost ready to roll out of her head.
“Ithink he’s going to be her boyfriend, if she just gives him a chance,” Kristen says, giving me a long stare before looking to Hannah. “But, for now, I’m hoping Clarity will just get to know him, maybe even let him be her date to the festival you two are planning.”
“Adate?” Hannah repeats, spitting out the word.
“This is not happening,” I assure Hannah and remind Kristen. Kristen opens her mouth to object. “Itoldyou I’m not dating right now. I told you I don’t want to do this, and you set me up anyway? You ambushed me!” I turn to Hannah and choose my words carefully, painfully. “I’m so sorry, I had no idea she was going to do this—”
“Why are you apologizing toher?” Kristen cuts in.
“Because I invited her to come to this game to get to know me and get to knowyou, and you turned her into a fifth wheel.”
What I really want to do is focus on Hannah. Focus on her lips, pressed together so hard that they’re draining of color. I want to focus on smoothing out her face’s hard lines, ones that I’ve seen before but never because of me. I need to tell her that Maurice means nothing, that this blind date wasn’t my idea, that I truly, truly didn’t sign off on this.
But I can’t do any of that in front of Kristen. I ball my hands into fists instead, my fingernails digging into my palms.
“Look, Clarity,” Kristen says, her voice as quiet as she can get with a football game going on and a marching band riffing every time there’s a play. She stands squarely in front of me, hands on my shoulders, and it’s impossible not to look her in the eye. “I’m sorry for springing this on you, and I’m even sorry to you”—she says to Hannah—“if I’ve ruined your night or made you uncomfortable in any way.” Then she turns back to me, her blue eyes glowing under the fluorescence of the floodlights. “I didn’t think you’d pull your head out of your textbooks or your committeelong enough to actually check someone out. And youpromised.” Her brows tip up and her bottom lip pouts with the reminder. She turns to Hannah. “Don’t you think Clarity deserves to find love? Or, at least, to have a little fun this semester?” Kristen reasons.
A pocket in my chest breaks. If the line hadn’t already been crossed, Kristen posing that question to Hannah, right to her face, hops us firmly to the other side. I hate it. I hate this night. I hate Kristen’s dumb plan. I hate watching Hannah’s walls break—the ones she’d built to guard herself whenever Maurice would show up.
“She definitely does,” Hannah agrees, her voice so quiet I doubt Kristen heard it.
The Ridgeway Ravens lose. Maurice and I exchange numbers, and I leave with Hannah. By the time she’s driving me home, I’m paralyzed with uncertainty.
“What are you thinking?” I whisper, though the sound takes up every spare inch of space in Hannah’s silent car.
Her face is red, and her mouth is fixed in a line that keeps scrunching up.
“What do you care?” she asks, a dark, bitter laugh falling out in between her words. The sound is almost unrecognizable coming from her.
“I do care,” I say, though I know that’s not enough.
“Really? Because you have ahilariousway of showing it.”