you noticed, but I’m not fifty-five years old. I don’t exactly want to listen to NPR, Grandma.”
Maya had no idea why she couldn’t stop talking. She liked Grace. Grace was fine. She had done nothing but drive Maya to meet their brother and buy her Starbucks on the way. But Maya had done the same thing when she and Grace first met at Maya’s house, her words coming out rapid fire, talking and talking, making fun of Lauren and her parents, never letting Grace get a word in edgewise. Please like me was what she had wanted to say. Please be my friend.
Maya didn’t have a lot of friends. There were girls she knew at school, but they mostly just said hello in the hallways, sometimes talked before class began and the teacher hadn’t yet arrived. Her old school had been kindergarten through eighth grade, and that was back when she and Lauren were inseparable, even dressing alike when they were really young. She hadn’t needed many friends because she had Lauren.
That had changed on the first day of ninth grade, when they were suddenly in two different schools and Maya found herself the odd girl out, surrounded by girls who had been learning together since preschool.
And having a mom who drank made it hard to bring anyone home after school, or to invite them over for pool parties or slumber parties. Maya hadn’t brought a friend over in years. Claire was the exception, but even she was rarely there.
Maya had eaten a lot of lunches alone those first few months. The sound of other girls giggling would make the hair stand up on the back of her neck. Are they making fun of me? she would wonder.
It turned out she wasn’t the only gay kid at school, and she was never harassed or teased—but she found she didn’t know how to be affectionate with friends. Would they think she was hitting on them if she just hugged them hello? Would she make it weird just by being herself? It hadn’t mattered with Lauren, but at her new school, Maya found herself holding back, using sarcasm as affection until it became habit, until it became who she was.
“Are you always like this?” Grace said, interrupting her thoughts. “Seriously, are you? Because I swear I’m going to pull over and put you in the trunk if that’s the case.”
Maya just sipped at her drink. If Grace thought she was the first person who had threatened to put her in the trunk for being a brat on a car trip, she had another think coming. “Am I like what?”
“Annoying,” Grace said.
Maya shrugged, turning her face toward the passenger window. “Yes.”
“Maybe you should cut back on the caffeine.”
“You’re just not used to having a sister,” Maya told her, then sat back in her seat and put her feet up on the dashboard. Grace swatted them down.
“Did you hear yourself?” she said. “You just called me your sister.”
Maya pretended to sigh happily. “Next thing you know, we’ll be going to Sephora and talking about boys—well, you will, at least—and sharing clothes. It’ll be like a movie.” She sipped at her drink again. It was getting to the perfect stage of meltiness, where the sugar and caffeine came together in a glorious adrenaline spiral. Another five minutes and Maya could probably launch herself to the moon.
“Are you serious?” Grace said.
“About the clothes sharing? No, I was just exaggerating.” Her eyes moved from Grace’s shoes (flip-flops from Target; Maya had the same pair, but in blue) to her jeans (way too big, what the hell?) to her sweater (the beigest color of beige that Maya had ever seen). “But if you ever want to go clothes shopping, I can help you. I helped Lauren. Changed her life.”
“You need to stop talking.”
“I’m just saying—”
“In. The. Trunk.”
Maya held up her hands. “Okay, okay. I’ll just sit here. Quietly. Not talking. At all. Maybe I’ll even learn something from NPR. Oh, wait—”
“Five minutes!” Grace cried. “That’s all I ask!”
“But—”
“Maya, I swear to God—”
Maya pointed out the window. “That’s our exit.”
“What? Oh, shit!” Grace immediately pulled the car across four lanes of traffic, swerving past two cars and exactly zero cops. Maya just grabbed onto the handle over the passenger door, hanging on as they zoomed onto the off-ramp, but when she saw herself in the side mirror, she had a wild grin on her face.
“That’s more like it!” she cried. “Those were some straight-up Fast and Furious moves!”