His enthusiasm for reconnecting with a lost high school friend stings. It forces me to remember how the split with Dylan and the new conflict with Ethan hurt, a reality I’ve worked to ignore.
When we’re waiting under the overpass on the edge of the city and I’m hearing some new story from Settlers of Catan Club, I’ve had enough. I interrupt Hector harshly. “Don’t you think the fact you fell out of touch might mean you shouldn’t be friends anymore? Maybe there’s a reason you haven’t talked in ten years.”
I press the pedal, continuing through the overpass. There has to be a reason they’re not friends. I need Hector to recognize that and move on, because I need to know that in a decade I’ll have moved on. I can’t be coming up on my own reunion and longing for people in the past. I can’t feel the way I’m feeling now.
Hector falls silent. I can feel him studying me, like he knows I’m not talking about AJ. I’m grateful when he doesn’t call me on the clear undercurrent in my question. “You could be right,” he says carefully. “But I miss him, which I think means something.”
“People get nostalgic for the past. It doesn’t mean you should turn back time,” I say. “Sometimes people just outgrow each other.” The drizzle patters the windshield while I drive.
Hector nods. He folds his hands in his lap. “Sometimes. But sometimes you only think you outgrew someone when really you let them go.”
I don’t say anything. If Hector has a point, it’s not one I’m ready to consider right now. It’s nearly the end of the hour, and I want this conversation to be over. The rain rattles on the roof. I wish it would let up, irrationally resenting the noise of wet rubber on pavement.
“Hold up, you should turn left,” Hector says. “We’re not picking up Ethan today, remember?”
I turn the wheel sharply. Lost in my thoughts, I’d instinctually driven in the direction of Ethan’s house. Of course he doesn’t have a lesson now. I’m frustrated I forgot. Navigating out of Ethan’s neighborhood, I cross the city in the direction of mine. While I steer onto the streets close to my house, Hector says nothing. With memories of Ethan’s overcompetitiveness this week caught on repeat in my mind, I for once wish Hector would pick up his high school stories where he left off.
The rain is relenting when I pull into my driveway. “Tell Ethan hi for me,” Hector says congenially.
I cut him an unamused glance. “I will not.”
Hector laughs lightly. “You’re going to be fine.”
“On my driving test? You think I’ll pass?” It occurs to me I planned this extra hour with Hector intending to fine-tune my driving. Instead, I spent the entire time hearing his yearbook signatures in story form and dwelling on where I’ve left everything with Ethan and Dylan. It makes me freshly nervous for retaking the test.
Hector hums noncommittally, which I interpret as reassurance. “Try not to let thinking about where you’re headed distract from what you’re doing,” he says. “I’ll see you and Ethan at the reunion.”
I nod, unbuckling my belt. Walking up to my front door, I wave goodbye, replaying Hector’s final words of guidance in my head. They’re definitely helpful for driving. I could forget details like signaling and full stops if I’m overly focused on getting my license.
Somehow, though, I don’t think he was talking about the exam.
Fifty-One
OVER SPRING BREAK THE next week, I focus on AP exams, feeling increasingly overwhelmed with the quantity of reviewing hours facing me. I repurpose an entire half of my whiteboard into a color-coded nightmare of a plan for the next two weeks. No minute is wasted. Whenever I’m eating breakfast, I’m reading my Princeton Review guides. When I walk to get coffee, I’m listening to an audiobook for AP English. When I’m home, I rarely leave my room, permitting myself only half-hour dinners with my family, repeating presidential powers and differential equations in my head the entire time.
I make flashcards in the garage while Jamie practices with her band, who have dubbed themselves the Stragglers. They’re not horrible. Jamie’s middle-school orchestra skills have set her up to be fairly capable, if not amazing. I could imagine the band playing open mic nights or something. Their Green Day covers don’t provide the worst studying soundtrack ever, although sometimes their practicing devolves into Jamie helping with Mara’s grad school application essays.
The highlight of my vacation is I manage to pass my driving exam. When I do, Jamie and I celebrate by driving to the Sweet Wieners truck, where we consume horrendous hot dogs covered in chocolate chips and graham cracker crumbs.
I’m worn thin by the time production week begins on the Monday we return to school. My sleep schedule is down to four hours nightly, and I’m hardly keeping on top of homework while following my whiteboard’s AP reviewing plan. I’ve made no progress on the reunion, which is in less than two weeks, except approving the Millard Fillmore kitchen’s hors d’oeuvres menu. Ethan’s equally overwhelmed. I know because he didn’t object when I assigned him another editor and then wasn’t obstinate enough for Julie Wang to complain to me when they were done.
With the sheer number of exams upcoming, I’m surprisingly nervous. Everyone is—even Ethan, who’s let his new vehemence in competition with me fizzle out, suffocated under the strain of six APs. In a way, it’s sad. While I didn’t enjoy the week of increased contention, this harsh withdrawal is sort of worse. I feel our rivalry fading. It’s for the best, I remind myself. I’ll be able to handle myself maturely at Harvard, no longer consumed by our petty games.
Like everything with Ethan, though, reason doesn’t help. I still find myself mourning something I feel receding into the past.
On Wednesday evening, I’m ready to drop from exhaustion. It’s nearly eleven, and we’re only waiting on proofs of a few pages from Ms. Heyward. I’m in my office, rubbing my eyes over the printouts of the opinion pages, when Tori rushes in.
She’s breathless. “Thenewscomputercrashed.”
My exhausted mind can’t quite parse her words. “What?”
“The news computer crashed,” Tori repeats, controlled panic in her voice.
I eye her, not exactly understanding the gravity of the problem. Tori’s generally good under pressure. She’d have to be to handle Ethan in news meetings. If she’s freaking out, something’s really wrong. “It’s a good thing we back up everything to the cloud, isn’t it?” I inquire evenly.
Tori swallows. I raise my eyebrows.
“I have the SATs next weekend,” Tori starts. When I say nothing, she continues, her words falling out in a rush. “Tomorrow I have this precalc test, and I’m just really exhausted. It’s my fault. I uploaded one of the pages, but I guess I forgot the other two. I promise I’ll fix it, even if it takes me the entire night—”