When You Were Everything Page 13

  I’d never done well with gray areas—with almosts and sometimes and maybes. I liked to know who my friends were and that they’d be there if I needed them, no matter what. So it was an uneasy balance—this new half friendship—but it was one I was working at because I didn’t think I could handle losing Layla completely.

  I no longer expected Layla to be waiting for me near my locker, and that day, like most days, she wasn’t. But when I walked into homeroom, for the very first time, Layla was sitting at the back of the class with Sloane.

  Something weird happened in my chest when I saw the empty chair next to my normal seat. Some strange, shooting pain that I couldn’t ignore. I bit my lip against the ache of it as I walked slowly to my desk and sat down. I could hear Sloane and Layla talking behind me, but I didn’t turn around.

  The only thing that made me feel better in moments like these was daydreaming about London. When Layla had chorus rehearsals on Tuesday and Thursday afternoons, I added to the growing list of landmarks I wanted to visit. Whenever I ate lunch on my own, I’d read about the history of the Globe Theatre. So that first day when she didn’t sit with me in homeroom, I pulled out my phone and did a cursory search for weekend trips you could take from London proper. And at the very top of the list was Paris, France.

  I wanted to turn around and confront Layla then. To ask her if she was still planning to come visit me in London, or if she even cared enough to. I wanted to send her a text and ask why she decided to sit at the back of the class all of a sudden, but I was starting to wonder, if I never texted Layla first, would she text me at all?

  I didn’t turn around or send that text. And I tried my best to ignore the acute and stinging pain in my chest at the sound of their laughter. The second that class was over, I went to my next one without waiting around to see who Layla would choose. I was getting tired of not being chosen, when for so long, I’d been Layla’s obvious and only pick.

  Still, I kept my eye on my phone all morning, hoping for some kind of explanation, some acknowledgment of this latest, agonizing change. But nothing ever came.

  * * *

  —

  I comforted myself with the fact that at least I wouldn’t have to suffer through a lonely lunch period today because none of us would be in the cafeteria. I headed to the auditorium the moment my lunch bell rang. Layla had told me that Mrs. Steele was posting the roles for the school musical at noon.

  She was already there when I turned the corner, staring in disbelief at the paper taped to the auditorium door. I was ready to comfort her because she hadn’t gotten a part, but as soon as I touched her elbow she turned to me and said, “I…I can’t believe I got it.”

  I stepped closer to the door to see the list. The production would be a musical version of It’s a Wonderful Life and Layla had been cast as Mary, the main character’s wife. This role had lots of singing, which obviously Layla would blow out of the water. But it also had lots of regular spoken lines too.

  I couldn’t believe it either. And I knew I should have been congratulating her. I knew I should have been saying something, but the truth was, I was still worried that she’d get up onstage and she’d stutter nonstop, or worse: she’d get blocked and not be able to say a word.

  She turned to me and said, “Cleo, c-c-c-can you believe it?” She was grinning so widely and there were tears in her eyes. I didn’t know why I couldn’t just smile and tell her that it was great. It was her dream come true, just like making chorus had been, and that should have been enough of a reason for me to celebrate with her. But a dark part of me didn’t want to. A dark part of me thought of Tuesday and Thursday afternoons, of lunch, and now of homeroom. I feared this musical would be another piece of Layla’s life I’d be set apart from, and I was reminded of a few lines from Hamlet’s most famous soliloquy about bearing ills we already have, rather than flying to others we know not of.

  I didn’t want to lose any more of her than I already had.

  I finally dragged my eyes away from the sheet of paper where I’d read MARY HATCH. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .LAYLA HASSAN half a dozen times. I looked at my best friend, and I pasted on a smile.

  “It’s definitely unbelievable,” I said. “Aren’t you nervous?” My concern about her performance was real, but something else, something darker, was happening too.

  I didn’t want her to have this because of what it would mean for me.

  I would love to say that I only realized how terrible my question sounded after I said it. But that wasn’t true. I knew the question would wound her ego. I knew it would add to the tally of all the tiny ways we’d been hurting each other for months: She didn’t answer when I called, so I ignored her texts. She sat somewhere else during lunch, so I didn’t wait for her after school. She ignored the things I said, choosing to trust Sloane instead of me, so I spoke up less and less. She’d broken dozens of promises to me, so now here I was, breaking her heart.

  Layla’s smile fell and I could see the shock—the hurt—in her wide brown eyes. But I didn’t have a chance to fix it, though I almost instantly wanted to. She didn’t have a chance to say anything to me either, because a moment later, Sloane was beside us, screaming.

  “Holy shit, girl! I knew you could do it! This is so freaking amazing.” Sloane gripped Layla’s shoulders and shook them. “Aren’t you excited?”

  Sloane had the reaction I should have had. She was saying all the things I should have said. But fear for Layla’s almost certain humiliation was a wretched virus in my stomach, making me feel sick. And all the little betrayals were there too, ruining me from the inside out.

  The smile slowly returned to Layla’s face, the light to her eyes. She turned away from me so quickly that her bag banged into my shoulder. I stumbled a little, knocked off balance, and she didn’t even notice.

  It felt like the perfect metaphor for the last few months: me pushed aside again and again, and Layla enveloped in the comfort of new friends.

  But that day—that moment—was the first time I felt like I might deserve it.

  THE STACKS, PART II

  For the rest of the afternoon, it was me who avoided Layla. I knew I needed to apologize for the way I’d reacted to her getting that part in the play. But I wasn’t sure what to say to make things right.

  She still hadn’t texted me, even after seeing her in the hall in front of the auditorium. But I swallowed my pride and texted her first.

  Can you meet me in the library after school? We can do our homework in the stacks.

  I stared at my phone waiting for her reply, and to my surprise it came only a few minutes later.

  Sure.

  I crossed my fingers that she wasn’t as mad as I thought she was going to be. Her answer was short, but she could have easily ignored me, said no, or made up some kind of excuse and she didn’t. It was a good sign, I told myself.

  After last bell I speed walked to the library, and it was crowded with kids. I hadn’t thought about it, but it was finals season. I edged around a few people near the entrance and headed into the stacks near the back of the library, to the corner where Layla and I always studied.

  The aisles were a little busier than usual too, with kids checking out books like they’d forgotten the library was there until that day. But to get to Layla I hopped over the dropped backpacks and squeezed by people still wearing theirs despite the narrow aisles.

  She broke into a smile the second she saw me, which I wasn’t expecting.

  “Hey,” I said, slipping my backpack off and smiling back. “Crazy how many people are in here, right?”

  She was still wearing her bag, like she wasn’t planning to stay, and as I slid my notebook out of my backpack, I paused, noticing. I looked up at her.

  “So. Chorus g-g-g-got invited to this big C-C-Christmas recital that’s going to be at Lincoln Center!” Layla squealed quietly. “A bunch of high
schools—” she started, but her excitement seemed to steal her voice for a second. She shook her head like she could shake off the block that was causing an extra-long pause in her speech. She started again. “A bunch of schools are ssssinging and it’s going to b-b-be awesome, but Mrs. Steele is adding another d-d-d-day of chorus rehearsals to our schedule to prepare.”

  Which meant Layla would have chorus practice three days a week, and once rehearsals started for the musical, that would leave no after-school time for us to hang out at all. I felt the disappointment tugging at different parts of my face.

  “So I’m basically never going to see you, once the musical stuff starts,” I said. And I thought my voice would sound sad. But it sounded like I was pissed instead. I shoved my notebook back into my backpack and didn’t look at her.

  “Why d-d-didn’t you congratulate me? Or, I don’t know, say anything nice? It’s a really b-big deal that I got that p-p-part. I thought you would understand that mmmmore than everyone—how important it was to me.”

  That was my opportunity to say sorry. To say that I was proud of her and that I couldn’t wait to see her up there, doing her thing. But I was suddenly filled with a hot kind of anger about losing even more time with her—time that she didn’t seem to mind not being able to spend with me. She clearly wasn’t thinking about that. She only cared that I wasn’t immediately over the moon for her regardless of the complications—regardless of what it meant for us.

  I couldn’t bring myself to say any of the things I knew I was supposed to say. And as pissed as I was about everything, I’d rather she hear the awful truth from me than embarrass herself in front of the entire school.

  “You can’t blame me for being surprised,” I said. And it was like I’d flipped a light switch, the way Layla’s face changed. It turned into the hard, mean one she’s always used for protection. I knew I would cause her pain, but I kept talking, because for the first time in weeks she was acting like she could hear me.

  “I just mean that I wouldn’t expect someone with a speech impediment to get a lead role in a stage show. And I know you’ve been working with this new speech therapist, but that smooth-talking voice you use? How sustainable is it? Can you speak like that for two full hours? Have you thought about that?”

  Her face got even tighter, even meaner. I reached out to put my hand on her shoulder. I said, “Layla, I’m asking you this stuff as your friend.” I frowned and waited until her eyes locked with mine. “I’m trying to look out for you,” I said, lying and telling the truth at the same time. I didn’t know you could want to hurt and protect someone simultaneously until that moment.

  She moved away from my hand. “Wh-wh-what about all the times when I t-told you I wanted to be on B-B-Broadway and you said I totally could? What about all the times you told me I had a great voice? Was that all a lie? D-did you never believe in me at all?”

  “Layla,” I started. But she stopped me again with a hand held dangerously close to my face.

  “So. What you’re t-t-telling me is that you’ve never t-taken me seriously?”

  I blinked slowly and took a deep breath as I pushed her hand gently away from me. I said what I said next slowly and seriously, looking right at her.

  “I don’t think it hurts to dream.”

  It was the truest thing I’d said to her in days.

  “You know what?” Layla said. She took a step away from me. “Sloane was so right about you.”

  I took a step forward to stop myself from talking too loudly. “What does that mean?” I hissed in her direction.

  “It means since the b-b-b-beginning of the year I’ve been trying to d-defend you, to tell her that you’re a g-g-good person, that you didn’t mean anything b-by it when you accidentally let Todd into the party. That she should try to get to know you b-b-because even though you’re a little pretentious, you mmmean well.”

  “Pretentious?” I said, insulted.

  “Oh please, Cleo.” Layla rolled her eyes. “You listen to jazz-age music almost exclusively and you unironically qu-qu-quote Shakespeare. You don’t even watch TV. You’re über p-pretentious. And look, I’m not j-j-judging you for that. I try my hardest not to-to-to judge anyone ever b-because it’s how I was raised, okay? But this? Shooting d-d-down my dreams as they c-come true and assuming I’m going to ffffail before I’ve even tried?”

  Layla’s dark eyes filled with tears.

  “That’s sssomething I will remember, Cleo.” She picked up her bag.

  “I think I need some time to think about all of this,” she said, in her high-pitched, singsong stage voice. She didn’t stutter at all. “I’m not going to text you for a while. I need time to clear my head and focus on the play.”

  And all at once, I was as mad as I’d ever been in my entire life. I wanted to rip books from the shelves and launch them at her. But I just spoke in my regular voice instead of whispering. People stared, but I didn’t care.

  “Whatever, Layla. I’m not always just going to be here, waiting for you like a lapdog or something. You don’t get to be friends with me only when it’s convenient for you.”

  She didn’t say anything back. She just walked out of the library with her head down, her thumbs moving quickly across the screen of her phone. I knew she was texting Sloane. I knew she was talking about me, telling Sloane that she’d been right to hate me from the start.

  So I took out my phone too. But a second later I realized I didn’t have anyone to text about her. And that fact made my eyes fill, for the first time all day, with tears.

  now

  SMALL PLATES

  At Dolly’s on Sunday afternoon, a man who has to be Pop meets me at the door, seats me, and takes my order. He’s the kind of older black guy whose face is covered in moles, and whose large, sturdy frame looks like he can lay bricks as well today as he may have back when he was in his twenties. He smells like peach pie. When I ask him about Dom, his eyes light up and the rust-brown skin around them crinkles as he grins. “He’s back in the kitchen. I’ll send him out here to ya as soon as I put your order in.”

  Now that I’ve decided to double down on my New Memories Project, with Sydney’s help, I’ve laid out a whole map of the city with a place or two we’ll need to visit each week. I pull out the notebook I’ve started carrying around to keep track of what we can do in each location. Sydney also texts me her off-the-wall ideas all the time. I write them down, though I doubt I’ll ever Climb the Alice in Wonderland statue in Central Park and scream, “We’re all mad here,” or Play the Penis Game at the Met (two suggestions that she seems especially proud of). If we follow the outlined plan, though, I’ll have exorcised Layla from all my favorite places by June.

  A few minutes after I put my notebook away, Dom slips into the booth across from me.

  “Hey,” I say.

  He grins and says, “You’re here,” like I’m some kind of miracle instead of an unremarkable sad girl.

  “I told you I come here every Sunday, Dom,” I reply, but I won’t lie—it’s nice to feel wanted.

  He pulls a few thin, folded pages from his apron pocket and slides them across the table to me. When I unfold them, I see that it’s his Macbeth assignment. I read the title, and it surprises me: “A Madman or a Man Driven to Madness? The Roles of Fate and Free Will in Macbeth.”

  I look up at Dom and he has a smirk on his face that just about ends me.

  “I thought you were going to write about ambition,” I say.

  “Yeah, I was. But after our rousing debate, I was inspired,” he muses, and I laugh. “Plus,” he continues, “I still get into the role of ambition in Macbeth’s downfall. This take on it was just much more complex. And you might not know this about me yet, but—” He leans across the table closer to me and tips his head in a way that beckons me forward. I lean toward him too. “I love complexity,” he whispers, bouncing his eyebrows u
p and down.

  Dom hops up and heads back to the kitchen, and I start reading. Even when the food arrives I don’t put Dom’s paper down. I start to see how each of Macbeth’s choices played a bigger role collectively in his death than the prophecy alone. But I don’t want to tell Dom that.

  When I lower the pages and look at the food on the table, I’ve clearly gotten someone else’s order by mistake. Instead of a burger, there are four delicious-smelling, appetizer-sized servings: a few ribs stacked like a log cabin with a sticky, sweetly scented sauce; something round and fried—a rice ball, I think; a few crunchy fried chicken wings garnished with something thin and green; and a miniature pie with a glistening crust. I look around the restaurant, wanting to explain that I didn’t order any of this, but Pop is taking an order at a table across the dining room, and the one other server is busy too. I’m just about to stand up to look for Dom when I see him coming around the counter toward me.

  “Hey, I didn’t—”

  “Order any of this? Yeah, I know. I canceled the burger and made this for you instead. I wanna know what you think.”

  I look from the plates to him and back again. “You made all this?” I ask. “For me?”

  Dom nods and steps a little closer to the table. “So I have this idea. When I visited my mom in Atlanta for Christmas, she took me to this soul food place, right? And it was damn good. But I felt so heavy after because the portions were huge.”

  He rests his arm on the back of the booth where I’m sitting, and his sudden closeness makes me aware of how little space there is between us. I also try not to get too hung up on the fact that he just casually mentioned his mother for the first time ever and I’m dying to know more about her. More about him. I just focus on filling and emptying my lungs slowly and evenly, thinking of him under trees hanging heavily with southern humidity because I can’t imagine Georgia in winter; his skin deepening under the summer sun to an even darker brown while he eats fried foods and drinks cold, sweet tea with a lady who looks exactly like him.