Emmy & Oliver - Robin Benway Page 0,82

I know that’s not fair and I’m sorry it sounds bad, but that’s how I feel.”

Oliver nodded slowly, taking it in. “I feel like I should apologize or something,” he said, and we all giggled nervously. I looped my arm around his, holding him close. “Wanting someone isn’t the same as loving them, though,” he said. “You know? It doesn’t mean the same thing.”

“No, I know, I know,” Drew said, wiping at his face again. “Sorry, that sounds so awful. I hate that I think that.”

“It’s okay,” Oliver said. “I get it. I do.” He put his hand on Drew’s shoulder, anchoring him.

“I just don’t want Kevin to think that, like, I’m ashamed to be seen with him or something,” Drew sighed. “Or that I don’t want him around my family. Well, actually, now I kind of don’t want him around them, but—”

“Drew?”

A dark figure was walking toward us in the parking lot, a little unsure. It was Kevin.

“I texted him,” Caro said. “I thought you might want to see him.”

Kevin looked at the four of us. I guess we were a little formidable, gathered around Drew like a small army. “Hi,” he said. “Um, Caro texted me? She said you were out here.”

“Hi,” Drew said. “God, I’m a disaster right now. Sorry.”

“Hey.” Kevin’s face grew concerned and he seemed to close the distance between them into two steps. “What’s wrong?”

Drew took a long, shaky breath, then hugged Kevin. They were talking, their voices muffled against each other’s shoulders, and I was about to gesture to Caro and Oliver that we should probably leave when I heard my mother’s voice cut across the parking lot.

“Emily!”

My head jerked up. My parents rarely, if ever, used my actual first name. No one else ever used it. The only time I really heard the name Emily was on the first day of school when teachers took roll for the first time. Then I’d say, “I actually prefer being called Emmy,” and that’d be it until the following year.

My parents were standing near the school entrance, across the parking lot from us. Even from that distance, I could see that they were furious. My mom looked like she could send herself into the air and fly over to us like she was Iron Man, that’s how angry she was.

Even Caro noticed. “Whoa,” she said softly.

“Yeah,” I said. “Whoa.” My knees started to feel wobbly and I glanced over at Drew and Kevin, who were still hugging but both looking in my parents’ direction.

“I think I have to go,” I said.

“Emmy, now!” I heard my mom yell again.

“Uh, yeah, you do,” Drew said. “Are they going to lock you in a tower or something? What’d you do?”

“Nothing that they should know about,” I said, and then I realized with a sobering rush that I had done a lot of things my parents shouldn’t know about, and maybe that wasn’t the case anymore.

“I’ll go with you,” Oliver said, untangling my arm from his so he could hold my hand instead. “You might need a witness.”

“Are you going to be okay?” I asked Drew, who just nodded and then buried his face back into Kevin’s shoulder. Kevin, for his part, just closed his eyes and hugged him back, and I knew that they’d be fine. Kevin wasn’t going to break up with Drew. They’d be okay.

It was suddenly me that I was worried about.

Oliver and I hustled across the parking lot toward my parents. My mom’s arms were crossed now and my dad had the deep wrinkle between his eyes that he always gets whenever he frowns a lot. “What’s wrong?” I asked as soon as we were close enough. I thought it was a good idea to sound like we were all on the same side, like I wasn’t the person who may or may not be responsible for all of the fury that seemed to be coming off them in waves.

“Oliver, your mom’s inside,” my dad said. “Go inside and find her, okay? We need to talk to Emmy.”

“Oh. Um, okay. Yeah, I just—” Oliver let go of my hand reluctantly and I felt our fingertips slip apart. “You’re okay?”

“She’s fine,” my mom said, and the way she said it didn’t leave me feeling exactly reassured. It sounded like I was about to be the opposite of fine, like I would be one of those bodies that always seem to turn up in the first five minutes of those Law & Order episodes that Caro