The Code for Love and Heartbreak - Jillian Cantor Page 0,87
He gives me a little shrug, and a smile, and I wish I were sitting next to him because I know I’d feel better if I were, if somehow it felt like we were still in this together. Co-presidents.
“In third place,” the judge says. “Elizabeth High with their project: Recoding Space.” An all-boy team jumps up, and goes up to the stage to claim their trophy.
“In second place,” he says. “Highbury High with their project: The Code for Love.”
“That’s us,” Ms. Taylor says, clapping her hands together. And it doesn’t quite sink in that it’s us until she says it. Second place. We haven’t won. “Go on.” Ms. Taylor gives me a gentle push on my shoulder. “Emma, go up with the others and accept your trophy.” It’s not until she says that, that I realize they’ve all already stood, that they’re walking up toward the stage without me, and I have no choice but to stand and go up there with them.
My head is buzzing and the lights on the stage are too bright, and I feel weirdly like I’m walking through fog as I take my trophy and shake the judges’ hands and go take my place up onstage with the rest of my team. I stand next to Robert, who looks happy, and then look down at my sneakers, unwilling to meet George’s disappointed eyes.
“And first place,” the judge says. “New Haddenfield High with their project: Recode and Recycle.” The word recycle bounces around in my head, and I think about George’s animated Karma Can.
“Recycling,” Jane says pointedly to me as she walks by me to get off the stage when the ceremony is over, and she might as well be saying that she hates me. That she’s sorry she was ever friends with me. That I’ve made a mess of everything. That we won’t be going to nationals, and it truly is all my fault.
Chapter 31
Ms. Taylor tries to give us a pep talk when we board the bus, saying how we should all be so proud and second place in the entire state of New Jersey, out of forty-seven teams, is nothing to sneeze at. And she points out the fact that if we had gone with the recycling app we may have scored even lower, as we definitely scored points for originality with The Code for Love. But no one says anything in response, and she gives up and sits down in the front as the bus driver pulls out of the parking lot. I put my headphones back on, and the ride down I-95 feels interminable. Seventy-three minutes might as well be seventy-three days.
I’m sitting near the front, so I’m the first one off, and I don’t even say bye to Ms. Taylor before walking briskly through the parking lot to my car. “Emma, wait!” George calls after me, and it’s only then that I remember I’m supposed to drive him home. I really, really don’t feel like talking to him right now. Or hearing his blame, his I told you so. I don’t care what Ms. Taylor said about recycling; this is my fault. But I’m not going to just leave him stranded in the school parking lot, either.
I sigh and get in the car and unlock the doors. He gets in the passenger seat. “Emma—” he says.
“I know,” I cut him off. “And I don’t want to hear it, all right? Let’s just not say anything right now.” I drive out of the parking lot and turn onto Highbury Pike, hoping traffic is light and I can get to George’s house to drop him off fast. If I move the wrong way I feel like I might just spontaneously erupt into tears, and I don’t want to do that in front of George.
“What do you think I’m going to say that you don’t want to hear?” George says softly. I glance at him out of the corner of my eye and he’s frowning.
“You know...recycling.” I repeat the word the way it sounded in Jane’s voice, like it’s something sacred.
“I wasn’t going to say anything about recycling. And besides, Ms. Taylor’s right. Your idea really was more original.” George shrugs, and I’m surprised he’s not mad, like Jane. “What I was going to say was, that I guess coding club is over for us. Forever. And that now we can forget all about The Code for Love.”
It’s funny the way this project consumed us all year, and now, just like that,