The Code for Love and Heartbreak - Jillian Cantor Page 0,78
about walking through the parking lot with George, in the snow. We turn and walk toward the side entrance of the school, to the gym, heading around the north side of the parking lot. The flakes start to fall harder, swirling in front of our eyes.
“Here.” George takes his hat out of his pocket and puts it on my head. “It’s my fault you’re still out in this. The least I can do is keep you warm.”
He tugs the hat down a little too far, so it covers my ears but then it almost covers my eyes, too, and between that and the swirl of snow, everything around me is obscure, light and ethereal and unreal. So when I first see them there together, back up against the brick wall by the gym, I blink, sure I’m seeing things wrong.
And then the second thing I think is, Hindsight is 20/20.
“Hey...is that Sam and Jane?” George says, catching sight of them through the blur of snowflakes about ten seconds after I do.
I don’t answer him, because I’m already running toward them, my feet slipping through the slush, sliding. Neither Jane nor Sam notices me coming, because their faces are too close together, their eyes only on each other. Their lips are connected in a long drawn-out kiss.
“What are you doing?” I say to them when I’m close enough. I’m breathless, and a little numb with shock. They’d walked out of coding club together. Jane was going to drive Sam home, but why are they here—kissing? What are they doing? Sam is dating Laura and Jane hates love. I half expect them to both burst out laughing and explain their joke to me. Because it must be a joke. Nothing else makes sense.
Neither of them say anything for a minute—they’re weirdly frozen there, holding on to each other. But neither one of them is laughing, either. Jane pulls away first, looks at Sam, horrified. Then turns to me. “Emma...it’s not what it looks like.”
Sam looks at her, shakes his head, takes her hand and then looks at me. “I’m sorry, E. It is exactly what it looks like.”
“What does it look like?” I’m still confused.
George has caught up by now, and waves. “Hey, guys...” He sounds out of breath.
“I like her,” Sam says to me, ignoring George.
She takes his hand. “And I like him,” Jane says, biting her lip a little, refusing to meet my eyes, so it suddenly feels like she lied to me about everything.
“E...” Sam says gently.
“Don’t call me E,” I spit at him. “You’re cheating on Laura. And you...” I turn to Jane. “You’re ruining everything we worked so hard for with our app. And what about all those things you said about not wanting a match, not having time for a boyfriend. Love is the worst.”
“E,” Sam says again. I glare at him. “I mean...Emma. Look, I tried the second chance match, and I still don’t match Janie. We have nothing in common other than our hair color and we took that out of the algorithm months ago. We’re never going to match in our app. But that doesn’t change the way I feel about her.” He looks at her, smiles at her. She turns and smiles back at him.
States is next week and they’re ruining everything we’ve worked for. If they don’t believe in our app, in the code we wrote for love, then who will?
But worse is the feeling of betrayal. It washes over me, thick and blinding, and then settles as a wave of nausea pushes up my stomach to my throat. Sam, who didn’t want to kiss me last fall, because he said he matched with Laura in the app. But I guess the truth really was, he just never liked me. And Jane. Jane. She slept over at my house multiple times, and I thought she was actually my friend. She told me she didn’t want a match. She was lying to me, too. I feel bile rushing up my throat, and it’s hard to breathe.
“Emma.” Jane steps forward and reaches for my arm. I pull back roughly and her lab coat slips up. For a second I catch a glimpse of her scars, and I remember how she showed me once, who she really was. How she protects herself. Now her face falls, like I’ve wounded her. “Come on,” Jane says. “I know you want our app to win, but what about how we feel? What about our friendship?”