Please Don't Tell - Laura Tims Page 0,19
peeling now. There’s more gum wadded to the underside of the table. When we were little, Joy would steal the cherry on Dad’s sundae and hold it out to me, but I’d shake my head. I could always tell when she wanted something for herself. Sometimes they’d give us free ice cream for never ever fighting.
Joy bites into her ice cream with her front teeth. “Remember that time we were spitting sprinkles and nailed that bald dude’s head?”
“That was just something you were doing.”
She doesn’t hear me. “And he wanted Dad’s phone number to get us in trouble, and I gave him the number for that sex hotline? This place is the best.”
My ice cream’s melting. Dripping on my thumb. I tear open a pack of sanitary wipes from my bag. When I told her I needed to talk, she insisted we come here.
“Remember when they had that sundae-eating contest, like if you could eat the whole thing, you wouldn’t have to pay for it? And Mom and Dad were freaking out because they thought we wouldn’t finish, but then I did?”
She’s the hero of our childhood. The best part of every story. The knight in every game we played. I was the princess, and the point of me was to be afraid of dragons. But what does the princess do while the knight is having adventures? Nobody sees her.
“Do you know how many calories are in that?” I ask.
She shrugs, her ice cream half-gone already. “What did you want to tell me?”
Soon I’ll have to eat mine or throw it away.
“I have a thing for this guy,” I mumble.
“Oh my God, Grace! What guy?”
I brace myself. “Adam Gordon.”
“Him? That guy is such a dick.”
I shrivel up. “Please don’t tell anyone.”
“Duh.” She tosses back her hair. Curly and wild. I flat-iron mine straight every morning. Forty-five minutes.
“You’re not always so good at secrets.”
“I am too! Well, no, I’m not. But you’re the only person I’d get better for.” She crunches cone. “Can we go back to him being a dick, though? Nov hates him.”
“So?”
“I trust her taste in people.”
My stomach is a hard rock. “November hates everybody.”
“She doesn’t hate me,” she says a little smugly.
“You’re so special.”
“Why are you so weird about her?”
“She’s the weird one.” I don’t like what I’m saying, but I say it anyway. “She was out of school for her whole sophomore year and nobody knows why. Supposedly she was into drugs.”
“So?”
“It’s just—November, and Preston, they’re both . . . kind of . . . What was wrong with our old friends? Lily and Cat? And Brodie?” I ask.
“Those were your old friends.”
“You liked them in middle school.”
“They stopped talking to me when I didn’t get into your honors classes. And then I noticed, surprise, I didn’t even have any of my own friends, because I always hung around with yours. So don’t be weird about Nov and Pres.”
How did I not know any of this?
“You wanna know how I met Pres?” she asks. “He hates gore, right? And one day I see Adam waving some gross picture of guts from a bio textbook in his face. So I yelled at Adam. Like, what the fuck?”
“You hold on to things,” I say, but what do I really know about Adam? Just stupid fantasies. Nothing real, other than that five-minute conversation.
“I don’t forgive people for fucking with my friends. So that’s why it’s a big deal that I’m gonna give Adam another chance.”
My stomach uncoils. “Really?”
“You’re my sister. If you like him, I like him.” She smiles at me. “Or I’ll try, anyway. That’ll be important for when we make him like you. I guess it’s kind of perfect! Adam and Cassius. We’ll have that whole twins-dating-best-friends thing.”
Could I trust her with more than just this? I’m trying to find the right way to start when her eyes widen. I turn and look over my shoulder. The warmth disappears. November Roseby has just walked into the Ice Cream Palace.
“Quick,” she hisses. “Do I have stuff on my face?”
“You’re acting like you have a crush.”
She shushes me and jumps up, waving and hurrying over to November. Apparently we’re not talking about Adam anymore. I get up and throw my ice cream away while she’s not looking.
November moseys over like she’s too cool to move any faster.
“You got my text,” Joy’s crowing.
She invited her? I told her I needed to talk, and she invited November?
“I got your text.” November casually steals a lick from the bottom of Joy’s cone.