Please Don't Tell - Laura Tims Page 0,15
principal for me.”
“I didn’t lie. I was here early this morning, signing up for classes. I was on the stairs and I did see you. You looked exhausted, but the second that asshole opened his mouth, you were on him. Like sticking up for your friend was more important than whatever else.”
My friend. Preston. I remind myself that Pres will know what to do about the note, once I tell him. The knot in my throat loosens slightly.
Levi’s smiling at me again.
“You can’t tutor me,” I say. “I’m not smart. I don’t understand things, you’d get frustrated. I’m just going to fail no matter what and I’ve accepted that.”
“I’m—”
“Thank you for helping me with Eastman. I know I’m being an asshole, but I can’t be—friends with you. I can’t tell you why. So you and me alone in a room, it wouldn’t work.”
“I get it,” he says. “I’m not gonna tutor you.”
Duh. He was lying and I gave him a speech.
“I’m going to help you cheat. You can copy my homework, and I’ll sit next to you on quiz days so you can look at my answers.”
He says it like I’d be doing him a favor by saying yes.
“What?” He rotates his earring. “What’s the look for?”
“I’m just surprised. You didn’t seem like the type to condone cheating.”
“Seriously? The earring, the hair? The whole point is to look like the type. Girls love the type.”
I start to smile, but the bell for second period rings out in the hall. In seconds, everyone’ll swarm the bathroom.
“Sometimes there’s stuff going on that makes grades impossible. That doesn’t mean you should be screwed,” he says. “I would suck at tutoring anyway. I think your principal’s assuming I’m gonna be this straight-A Asian stereotype. Plus I owe you. I was weird to you at the funeral.”
“You weren’t weird. I was weird.”
“Look, I’m gonna go before I make my big first day impression as the guy who chills in the girl’s bathroom. But, real quick. My first day impression of you is that you’re a badass. You picked up my dad, you punched an asshole. Whatever’s going on, you got this.”
He picks up my backpack, passes it to me. The side pocket’s all unzipped and my heart stops—the photos are half sticking out. For a millisecond, I swear he looks. I grab the bag, hold it close.
But he doesn’t say anything else. Just gives a little wave and leaves.
It’s not until he’s gone that I realize I’m still wearing his sweatshirt. I reach into the front pocket and there’s his old baseball cap, folded in on itself.
Preston’s not at lunch. He has Chem Club meetings every day. And he’s not by his locker when school finishes.
When I get home, there’s mac ’n’ cheese powder on the kitchen counter, a pot and two plates in the sink, cereal flecking a bowl by the toaster. Grace does this sometimes. Hits the kitchen and eats everything in sight and vanishes five minutes later. The beat of the treadmill pulses through the house. She’ll be on it all night.
I reach for chips and know immediately that food’s not going to work out. So I go to my room. Nothing on my windowsill.
I text Preston, praying he’s around and not at another nerdy club meeting.
hey I know this is hypocritical since I was all flakey the other day but I rly need to talk to u. come over?
I lie in bed and stare at the screen until my room darkens, my eyes burning. My mind’s stuck on him: Preston. Preston will fix this.
An hour later, there’s a tap on my window. I bite my tongue so hard I taste blood, but—it’s only him, one leg swung over the oak tree branch, twigs in his hair. He raps on the glass again. I let him in.
“I am not aerodynamic enough for this.” He brushes leaves onto my carpet.
He’s here, he came, he’ll fix it. I turn on the light. “You could have used the front door.”
“I will literally scale oak trees to avoid uncomfortable and undesired familial social interaction. What did you need to talk to me about?”
I reach for the letter and envelope. I hear him sigh through his front teeth.
“Are you mad at me?” I ask, turning around.
“Mildly.” He picks at a chin zit. “I want you to stop hitting people who make fun of me, because then everyone hears about it. It’s like putting a big spotlight on the fact that I’m a freak.”
“You’re not—”
“I don’t like the