10
MORGAN
Ruby Thompson is avoiding me.
At first, I thought I was reading too much into it. But after nearly a week of her skipping out on eye contact and me trying not to get caught staring at her in class with puppy-dog eyes, there is no mistaking it. It’s deliberate.
God, why do I always go for girls like this?
I should have learned my lesson at my old school. I did learn my lesson at my old school. But here I am anyway, sneaking glances at the bleachers as I run laps around the track with Lydia, hoping she shows up again. Which she hasn’t, not once all week, even though her friends have been here and that guy Tyler is always practicing in the center of the field.
Real talk, Ruby could be straight. I mean, I know logically that’s a possibility. A strong possibility. The strongest of possibilities ever, if we account for the captain of the lacrosse team. Maybe I’m reading too much into everything that happened. Maybe she just felt guilty for almost running me over and was trying to be polite . . . but then again, maybe I’m reading things exactly right, and that’s the problem. Maybe she’s scared.
I glance at the Ruby-less bleachers again, just as Lydia laughs and pulls ahead at the last second. We both cross the line and bend over, hands on our hips as we try to catch our breath.
“You’re eleven seconds late, Matthews,” Coach barks as she walks over. I rub my hip without thinking about it, and she raises her eyebrows. “You still sore?”
“No, Coach,” I lie, straightening up. “I’m good.”
She scribbles something down on the pages of her clipboard. “I want you to rest it. Take the weekend off.”
“I don’t need to.”
“I’m not asking; I’m telling.” Coach looks me in the eye before turning her attention to Lydia. “Good work today, Ramírez.”
“Ugh,” Lydia groans after Coach walks away. “Running without you this weekend is going to be so boring. Allie can never keep up.”
“At least you get to go.” I sigh. Missing even our unofficial runs makes me want to crawl out of my skin.
“Hey, a day or two off from running isn’t the end of the world. We all see how hard you’re trying not to limp in front of us.”
“Am not.”
Lydia arches an eyebrow. “I’m still not buying that whole ‘stepped off a curb weird’ excuse you gave Coach.”
I shrug because this is like the fifth time she’s tried and failed to sniff out the truth. “Guess I just bruise easy?” I say as I sneak another glance at the bleachers.
“Who are you looking for?” Allie asks, trotting over to join us. “Is your brother coming?” She flashes a hopeful smile. She’s been semi-crushing on Dylan since coming over after practice a few days ago to hang out. It would probably be disturbing if Dylan actually noticed. Fortunately, he’s completely oblivious. And I’m pretty sure he’s super into this woman who brings her three-year-old into his shop for haircuts—even if he won’t admit it yet.
“Sorry to disappoint, but he’s working until seven today.”
“Then who?” she asks, a puzzled expression on her face as she follows my line of sight.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. I was just zoning out.” Crap. I didn’t think I was being that obvious.
“Maybe she’s looking for the reason she gained eleven seconds on the eight hundred today,” Lydia says.
“No, she’s definitely looking for someone.” Allie taps her chin. “If it’s not your dashing big brother . . . Ohh! Is it someone from Pride Club?” She studies my face. “Oh my god, you did meet somebody, didn’t you? Were they supposed to come watch today?”
“I didn’t.” I shake my head. “Well, technically, I did, but not the way you mean. Trust me, I’m not seeing anybody. And nobody came here to see me.”
“Well, obviously, or I wouldn’t have epically beaten you,” Lydia says. “I’ve seen you show off before, and that wasn’t it.”
“I was holding back! It was just a training run.”
“Wait, you seriously beat Morgan?” Allie’s full-on transitioned to sprinter now, which means she practices on the other side of the track. Guess she missed Lydia’s just barely passed me as we crossed the line at the same time, supposedly “epic” win.
“I did and it was awesome,” Lydia says.
I throw up my hands. “I was holding back!”
“Uh-huh. Fine, keep your secrets for now, but I’ll find out. I know, like, every out girl in the school. Oooh, but what if she’s not out?” Allie whispers to Lydia conspiratorially, “What if she’s like you? Most people don’t even know about you.”
Lydia rolls her eyes. “Just because I’m not out out, doesn’t mean I’m not not out.”
Allie and I just blink at her.
“You know what I mean.” Lydia groans.
“I’m just saying, maybe Morgan’s mystery girl is ‘not out out’ but ‘not not out’ too.”
“There’s no mystery girl,” I insist, my cheeks getting hot, because not only is Ruby Thompson not out out, by all accounts and indications she may not even have anything to come out about. But the way her hand slipped against my skin . . .
“Uh-huh.” Allie laughs.
“Look, just drop it, okay?”
They seem to sense my shift in mood, and Allie immediately goes back to complaining about how it must somehow be a violation of her constitutional rights for Coach to force sprinters to do weekly distance runs. She’s five minutes into rambling about the difference in stride lengths when my phone goes off.
It’s a text from Aaron telling me that he and a few other kids are meeting up at the diner later and offering to pick me up if I want to come. I text back that I totally do, but I’d rather just ride my bike there. It’s not like this town is that big, and as crappy as it probably is to say, I want an out if things get awkward. Other than a few random texts this week, I’ve barely talked to him, and if there’s one thing I learned after the St. Mary’s debacle, it is to always have an exit plan. Better to bring a bike and wish I hadn’t than to sit through two awkward car rides with a stranger.
Lydia leans over my shoulder, reading my texts. “Oh, fun, I love that diner. And Aaron is really nice. I think you’ll get along for sure.”
I glance up at her. “You and Allie want to come with? I mean, I know it’s just kids from Pride Club, but I don’t think they’d care. And it’s not like you wouldn’t fit right in.”
Her face falls. “No, I can’t tonight. But thanks?”
“Okay,” I say, more than a little disappointed. “I guess I’ll just see you tomorrow, then.”
“No, you won’t,” Lydia teases. “Because you’re banned from running, and I expect you to spend the entire weekend on the couch resting.”
“Don’t remind me.”
• • •
Aaron and Anika beat me to the diner, along with two other kids I recognize from Pride Club but haven’t really gotten a chance to talk to. Anika is in one of my classes, but I deleted all my socials when I moved, and we’ve yet to exchange numbers. The others I’ve really only seen in the halls.
They scoot over to make room for me as Aaron gestures toward us with his french fry, like a conductor leading a band. “Morgan, you remember Brennan and Drew, right?”
“Yeah, hey, guys,” I say, and I’m met with warm smiles and half waves as I slide into my seat.
“How’s life?” Aaron asks.
“Fine, I guess,” I say as the waitress brings out plates of chicken fingers and quesadillas to go with our apparently bottomless fries. I spin around to ask her for ketchup, which is when I notice Ruby sitting with a few of her friends at the counter. We make eye contact and I smile, but she just slowly turns her stool away.
“We usually split apps,” Drew says, saving me from spending any more time staring at the side of Ruby’s head. “But if that freaks you out, feel free to order or skip.”
I grab a chicken tender and tear a piece off, calculating what my share of the bill will be and praying I brought enough cash. Mom and Dad have been sending money to Dylan for taking care of me, and he’s been giving some to me, but I feel bad spending it knowing how much they’re paying the lawyers. I feel like I should be paying them, honestly.
Aaron is still looking at me, though, and I realize belatedly he probably wants more than a “Fine, I guess” answer to his “How’s life?” question.
“I miss my old friends and school and life.” I sigh. “But I really like the track team here, Allie and Lydia especially. I tried to get them to come here tonight, but . . .” I don’t miss the look shared between Aaron and Anika. “What?”
“Nothing.”
“No, really. What did I miss?” Everyone at the table suddenly becomes extremely interested in their food and phones.
“Nothing important,” Anika says.
I shift in my seat, clearly uncomfortable.
Anika looks at Brennan, who just shrugs. “It’s just you were right at the meeting. School athletes don’t really hang out with us. So I wouldn’t take it personally that they don’t come. You’re more the exception than the rule.”
I roll my eyes. “They’re not like that. Allie and Lydia are, like, the furthest thing from being stuck-up I’ve ever seen, and I dealt with that a lot at my old school.”
“Wait, who said anything about being stuck-up?” Aaron asks, scrunching his face up.
My ears get hot because I just assumed . . . “I thought you meant they wouldn’t come because of some snotty sports popularity thing?”
Brennan puts his hand on my arm. “I don’t know what the social hierarchy was like at your old school, but the teams aren’t necessarily at the top of the food chain here.”
“Oh, okay. Sorry,” I mumble into my glass of water.
“You are half-right, though,” Drew says.
“I don’t—”
“They’re not like that. But they’re also not like you,” he continues. “Allie’s sweet, but this is so not her scene. And Lydia, well, she’s the queen of I can neither confirm nor deny—so don’t expect her to be hitting up Pride Club meetings and hanging out after school wearing a pin that says ANGRY LESBIAN.”
I reach for the lapel of my denim jacket, touching my pin with a laugh. “Yeah, I guess I’m not super subtle.” Not anymore, at least. In fact, this pin graduated from desk drawer to favorite jacket right after my parents left last weekend.
“You came here already out too,” Drew says. “Of course they’re going to give you more latitude or whatever. But just because most of the student population is cool with a new student being out doesn’t mean they’re going to be cool with it when it’s someone they’ve been sharing crayons with since kindergarten. Trust me, I know.”
“I had people change their lockers in gym after I came out because they thought they were, like, god’s gift to queer girls or something and I wouldn’t be able to resist staring at them.” Anika huffs. “And that’s just losers from gym class. It’s probably twenty times worse when it’s a teammate.”
“But your school—our school,” I correct myself, “has an active Pride Club! It’s even openly advertised! There’s so much more support here than at St. Mary’s. I thought it was different here.”
Drew nods, swirling his quesadilla through a dollop of sour cream. “Well, it is, probably, for you at least. But the reality is that this place is kind of a dead zone when it comes to liberal ideals. Like the town puts on a good show, but it’s still pretty conservative underneath the rainbow flag stickers they slapped on some of the businesses. A lot of the adults here are still stuck in the stone age, and that kind of trickles down to their kids. If your parents are shitheads, you’re going to feel a lot freer to be a shithead yourself. And if your parents are shitheads and you happen to be gay, I promise you’re going to be a hell of a lot less loud about it.”
“Well, that’s garbage,” I say, maybe a little too loud as I shred my chicken finger to bits. I did not come out at my old school just to be shoved back in the closet at this one. “Is it really so radical to think people should be able to date who they want without having to hide or transfer or sue somebody?”
“Hey, hey, you’re preaching to the choir here,” Anika says.
I sneak a peek behind me just to see if maybe Ruby heard me and was going to, I don’t know, jump out of her chair agreeing. I look away quickly when I’m met with a glare.
“You should come down to the center,” Aaron says.
“The center?”
“Yeah, there’s an LGBTQ+ resource center outside of town, near the college. One of the things we do there is peer counseling, and there are a couple athletes who would probably really benefit from your story. You should talk to Ms. Ming—she’s the one that coordinates volunteers. It counts for Honor Society hours too, if you need them.”
“See, the town isn’t all garbage,” Anika pipes up, slurping the last of her soda through a straw. “It’s just mostly garbage.”
“The center sounds cool,” I say. “I’d love to feel like I’m doing something to help. Right now, it’s like my parents and their lawyers are doing everything and I’m just along for the ride.”
“Awesome,” Aaron says. “I think you’d be a super-good fit. I’m going to be there Sunday if you want to come.”
“Yeah, sounds great.” I smile and grab another fry, letting the conversation drift on to other things. I’m just scraping the last bit of ketchup up when Ruby walks by, heading toward the bathroom.
I get up to follow her without thinking. I mean, I should wash my hands after touching all that greasy food, right? Right.
“Are you stalking me now?” Ruby asks, narrowing her eyes in the mirror when I step inside the ladies’ room. She’s fixing her makeup, sliding an inky black line across her eyelid with near-surgical precision.
“No.” Kind of.
“Right.” She doesn’t look convinced.
I rush into one of the stalls and bolt the door behind me. I really didn’t think past coming in here. I guess I just wanted to see if she would look at me the way she did at my house the other day—as if I was someone she kind of liked instead of someone she couldn’t stand.
Except she didn’t look at me like that at all, and now we’re surrounded by automatic flushing toilets and the scent of wet paper towels and bad air freshener. This is not how I imagined it going. Maybe the fact that I imagined it going anywhere at all was a major error on my part.
“You know I can see your shoes by the door, right?” she asks. “I know you’re just standing there. If you came in here to say something, just say it. Otherwise quit being creepy.”
“Oh,” I say, because that’s not embarrassing at all. Why is this so hard?
Maybe because when I finally put my heart on the line for Sonia Delecourte—after our third date, mind you—she told me kissing me was just an experiment, just to see if she liked it, which she didn’t.
And then the next day she ran and told the headmaster that I came on to her.
And then I was called up for a conduct meeting.
It’s been a long, painful series of “and thens” ever since, which somehow led me to this moment, standing in a toilet stall, possibly making the same mistake all over again.
“Look, if you’re gearing up to sue me or whatever for hitting you, just tell me. I don’t have time to stress over this anymore.” I hear her zip up her purse. “I have the Miss Tulip event tomorrow, and missing that last pageant seriously screwed stuff up. I have to focus on that, and not Why is Matthews lurking in a bathroom stall?”
Wait, does she seriously still think I might sue her? Is that why she’s avoiding me? Not because she’s weirded out but because she’s worried? Hope surges up into my throat as I slam the lock back and practically fall out of the stall.
“I’m not going to sue you. I just want to—”
But I’ve missed my chance. The door clicks shut behind her as the smile slips off my face.
Then I see it: her eyeliner pen, forgotten beside the sink. And a blooming, wild sense of hope surges, because tomorrow’s a new day, a day I have off . . . a day that I know right where she’ll be.
And I have some eyeliner to return.