The Museum of Heartbreak - Meg Leder Page 0,55

onto a napkin and flipped to page one, reading more carefully this time.

The narrator had an older brother who taught him to smoke pot when he was thirteen.

His mother complained frequently of ghosts.

But most damningly of all, even though his father wanted him to work at Goldman Sachs, the narrator wanted to be a writer.

Just like Kerouac.

I flushed, like I had been caught red-handed at something, but Oscar was staring out the window and no one else was there.

My stomach gurgled guiltily, but how was I supposed to know? It wasn’t like his name was on the story.

I hated the story.

I wanted to burn it to the ground.

But at the same time I also felt this weird sense of protectiveness for Keats’s vulnerability, sitting there all plain and raw on the page.

The first bell rang, and I checked the “not sure” verdict on the reader report and hastily handed it to Oscar, and instead of recycling the submission, per our guidelines, I shoved it in my bag.

“Talk to you later,” I said at the door, my hands tingling with, what? The theft? Borrowing? Not recycling?

“Later,” he said quietly.

I practically ran out of the room.

The right thing to do would have been to throw the stupid story in the nearest recycling bin and not give it a second thought.

Instead I read it furtively under my binder in World History. It didn’t get better with repeat reads.

• • •

After the final bell, Keats was waiting for me at my locker, smelling like cinnamon. I snuck a glance at his socks.

I tried hard to banish thoughts of moths flying into flames and shallow-girl eye shadow.

“Scout,” he murmured, pulling me into a kiss.

I had a fleeting moment when I wondered if Audrey or Cherisse or Eph was walking by. What would they think if they saw us?

He pulled away, reluctantly, and gave me a sleepy smile—what I was learning was his post-make-out smile. “How are you, babe?”

Babe. Keats called me babe. Forget the stupid story, Penelope.

“To be honest, kind of crappy. Two of my friends got in a really ugly fight. Have I told you about Miles and Grace? I’m worried about them. So I’m mega looking forward to taking my mind off things. I mean, looking at books.” I rubbed his arm, gave him what I thought was a super-cute, flirty smile.

“Ahh, that’s the thing. My parents want me home early tonight—Beckett’s in town for fall break and we’re having some fancy family dinner with Cherisse’s family.”

Cherisse’s family?

I waited for him to ask me to join them.

He didn’t.

“Oh,” I said finally, trying not to sound too disappointed, wishing I could shove Cherisse in a lake.

“You’re totally mad, aren’t you?” He ran his hand through his curls, searched my face.

“No, it’s okay, you should spend time with your family,” I said, even though I wanted him to console me about Grace and Miles, wanted him to at least confirm he knew who they were.

“You sure?” His expression relaxed.

“Yeah,” I lied.

“Thanks, babe,” he said, giving me a quick kiss on the cheek and jogging backward down the hall. “I promise I’ll make it up to you,” he called.

Gloomily, I headed toward the door. Once I was outside, I decided to take Columbus instead of Central Park West. The walk wasn’t as pretty as passing by the park, but after the day’s events, I wasn’t in the mood for fall’s show-offy colors.

I wondered if Cherisse and Keats were heading to his brownstone together.

I wished he hadn’t bailed. I wanted to be with him, wanted to make out until my lips hurt. I wanted to talk with him about Grace and Miles.

Or, at the very least, I wanted him to be a little more upset about canceling our plans.

But to be fair, he hadn’t seen the fight, probably didn’t know how horrible it was to witness, didn’t know it made me sad in a way that reminded me of Audrey. And he was going to make it up to me. He wanted to be with me.

And, I reminded myself, Keats wanting to be with me was surely better than no Keats at all. This was what relationships were: give and take, ebb and flow. We couldn’t hang out every second, right?

I chewed on my lip, walking by the greasy diner Audrey insisted made you smell like fried food if you were even on the same side street, when I did a double take.

Miles was sitting inside, slumped in a booth.

I didn’t particularly want to go in, but