whereas Pothan just assumed I was with him. The thing is, you can’t just “be yourself,” if whenever people look at you they see something entirely different.
“It’s like a war, Avani,” I said. And she was right on the verge of laughing and saying something cutting, something about how I was taking this way too seriously, when I smiled and pulled back. “And of course it’s not a big deal. In two years, none of us will care about this. But right now, at this moment, this is important. Like, don’t pretend you’re not sitting here feeling lonely because Carrie won’t watch Drag Race with you anymore. Well, you can keep hiding, or you can do something about it.”
That got her. She jolted upright with one middle toe still only half painted. “People grow up,” she said.
“That’s Carrie talking,” I said. “That’s not you. Breaking things and vomiting on the beach isn’t grown. This”—I waved my arm—“this is grown.”
“A basement full of vintage pinball machines?”
“No, I’m talking about this, us, being real, being—”
She let out a large breath. “Nandan, I don’t know.” The corner of her mouth turned down. “I keep thinking maybe I shouldn’t go out anymore. But even Jessie gets bored sometimes. And so do I! Sometimes I think maybe I should’ve made better friends.”
“No, Avani,” I said. “I’ve been on the beach with you, and I’ve seen what happens there. It’s not fun. We can do better.”
Her chest rose slowly. “All right. How?”
“Ummmmmmmmmm . . .” I drew out the word, happy to be here, in this basement, dancing on the edge of success. “You . . . could help me set up Dave with this girl.”
Her lower eyelids had red smudges from too little sleep. “Why would I do that?”
“I don’t know. It’ll be fun. It’s—it’s—it’s a caper. Come on. There’s nobody else who’d be good for this. It’ll be a story. Aaaaaaand it’ll show Carrie that you can have fun too.”
I explained it all to her, a little haltingly, trying to emphasize how little time it’d take and how nothing else was happening tonight.
“Mmmm.” She tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. “Okay.”
“Really?”
“Sure, yeah, what’s the plan?”
“They’re going to a movie. We’ll invite ourselves along and nudge them in the right direction.”
“Going to the movies together. I love it. Which theater? Let’s go to the Century 20 at Redwood City and then to Tartine. It’ll be like being thirteen again.”
She got mixed up about Dave and thought he was a sophomore. When I said he was our year, I barely stopped myself from adding, Oh yeah, and by the way, I hooked up with him last night.
Avani scanned through her phone, looking for a third person. “You know who’d be really good for this? Hen.”
“Come on,” I said. “Can’t we just invite Carrie?”
I said that I hardly knew Henry—his number wasn’t even in my phone!—and after some wrangling, Avani agreed to text Carrie instead; I texted Dave to get him on board too.
While we were waiting for their responses, I watched Avani put together her face. This was a new experience; at the beach or at parties she always showed up fully formed. But now, as she used a variety of pens and brushes, her eyes blossomed, her skin turned smooth, and every feature got bigger and sharper.
“This is nice,” I said. “I wish there was something I could do too. Like a . . . a . . . a preparatory thing. So we could get ready together. You know, like your guys’, umm, homecoming tea party.”
“You remember that?” she said.
Last year before homecoming Avani had invited Carrie and Jessie over for a long afternoon of drinking tea and doing their nails and hair. Strictly a sober occasion, since they wouldn’t let you into the dance if you were drunk. That meant, too, that her and their parents could be involved, and apparently all the families had a really nice time together.
Of course afterward we changed plans at the last minute and went to Lyle Brashear’s party instead of actually going to homecoming. But I still remembered when the three of them had come to pick us up in the limo Avani’s dad had rented. They had seemed so happy and proud and beautiful, and I’d envied them for being a unit, a group, a conjoined six-legged monster that always walked the earth together, no matter what.
“I really, really wanted to be there.”
“You wouldn’t have liked it.”
“I don’t know, Avani. I like a