I check my phone again. It’s only nine. “We don’t have to stay the whole time, right?”
“Oh, hell no.” Sophie laughs. “I’m putting on the strict one a.m. curfew for all of y’all. Unless you want to walk home.”
“We could do laser tag.” Nathan reads down the list again. “Or skating?”
“I can’t skate,” I say.
“Oh, then we definitely have to go skating.” Nathan chuckles. “I need to see that.”
“No way in hell,” Meleika says, winking at me. “I can’t skate either.”
“Fine.” Nathan groans. “Putt-Putt?”
“I’m game,” I say.
Meleika kicks ass at Putt-Putt, but the course is outside, and it’s getting pretty chilly, so after a few holes we just head back inside. There’s this whole room near the arcade rented out for dancing. Nathan and Meleika run right in, but Sophie and I hang back, just sort of standing there, staring at the entryway.
“Come on.” Sophie hooks an arm through mine, and we head toward the arcade. I’ve been waiting all night for her and Meleika to say something about the art show. But they haven’t. They didn’t even say anything at school yet, but maybe they were waiting to get me alone.
Or maybe they aren’t planning on saying anything at all? Maybe they’re just trying to be as normal as humanly possible with me because they think that’s what I need right now? I hope it’s the last one. Because I don’t want to talk about it anymore.
I want to forget that night ever happened.
“What do you want to play?” Sophie asks.
I look around, and nothing seems all that interesting, and ever fewer games are two-player, so we end up in front of the claw machine game. And Sophie’s pretty amazing at it. Like, ridiculously amazing.
“My dad taught me a few tricks.” Sophie aims the crane just right, so she picks up this cat from an anime I’ve never seen. Her tenth win in under half an hour. “Here.” She hands the cat to me.
“You sure?”
“Yeah, I’ve already got one of him.” Then she starts to wrestle with the bundle of plushies on the floor. “Mind helping me?”
I take most of them, trying to balance them all in my arms. It really should not be this difficult to carry around a bunch of stuffed animals.
“So, this is where you two ran off.” Nathan’s laugh makes me jump. “Aw, cute.” He taps the nose of the pink Yoshi at the top of the pile.
“Shut up.” I almost throw one of the plushies at him, but I think I’ll drop them all if I do.
“Mel wants to do laser tag next. Y’all game?”
“Yeah.” Sophie wrangles her keys out of her purse. “Here, you want to go put those in the car?”
“Come on.” Nathan grabs the keys. “We’ll meet you two over there.”
“Just don’t take my car on a joyride.” Sophie winks and walks off in the direction of the arena.
We brush past our classmates, Nathan waving to people every now and then. I try to tell myself they’re staring at Nathan, or the bundle of stuffed animals in my arms. Because that’s what they’re doing. No one cares about the art show; no one cares about what happened there. I just have to keep telling myself that.
“Having fun?” Nathan nudges me.
“Yeah,” I say. “Why?”
“Just wondering.” He huffs. “I was worried about you there. After everything happened. You weren’t really answering my texts, and you seemed so distant at school.”
“Oh,” I say. “Sorry.”
“Don’t apologize. I can’t even imagine what you’re dealing with.” I feel him get closer, like he wants to take my hand or something. Maybe dropping all these plushies wouldn’t be such a bad thing?
“It’s been …” I start to say, but I don’t even know how to finish that statement.
“Rough?” he finishes.
“That’s probably the nicest word you could use.” I see Principal Smith across the room. I don’t think she was at the art show. No doubt she heard all about it though. She gives me a half smile and a short wave when she catches me looking.
I try to wave back.
It’s weird to think this really all happened because of her. She could’ve said no to me, denied me a spot in North Wake. I never would’ve met Mrs. Liu, or gotten to paint as much as I have, or met Meleika or Sophie. Or Nathan.
“Well, if you ever need me for anything just tell me, okay?” Nathan says.
“Okay,” I say.
“Anything,” he repeats. “I mean it, Ben.”
I stare ahead and try not to think too hard about what “anything” implies. “Thank you.”
I actually don’t sleep well that night, which isn’t good because Sophie drops me off at home around one thirty. Laser tag ran a little long.
But it has more to do with the fact that in less than twelve hours, I’ll be meeting Mariam. At least I hope it’s because of that. I’ve still got time to kill when I do finally decide to get out of bed. Mariam’s got a tour of State’s campus scheduled, and some kind of special lunch, but after that we’re totally free to do whatever we want.
“You want to use my car?” Hannah asks.
“Is that okay?”
“Here.” Hannah reaches over the counter and snatches her keys. “Don’t be too late, okay? I’ll see you at dinner.”
“Okay.”
“Just don’t run over any hydrants, please?” Hannah pleads.
I look at her, and smile. “I mean, I can’t exactly promise anything.”
“Ha.” She takes the keys back. “Funny, kid. Now promise.”
“I’ll be careful, I swear.”
Except when the GPS tries to lead me down a one-way street, I nearly run into someone. And then I nearly run over a fire hydrant while I try to get into a parking lot to turn around. This is why I let Hannah drive me everywhere. Eventually I make it to the coffee shop, but when I look around I don’t see Mariam, or anyone who could maybe be Mariam from behind.
Oh God, what if I’m so late they left? It’s only been ten minutes, but maybe they think I stood them up. I have to double-check my phone to make sure it’s even the right day. Definitely Saturday, definitely the time we agreed on. So where are they?
There’s a tap on my shoulder. “Ben?”
“Oh my God!” My first instinct is to wrap Mariam in a hug, because they’re here, they’re actually, really here. But then I don’t remember if that’s haram for them, so I keep my arms to my side and just sort of awkwardly shuffle my feet. Better safe than sorry.
“Oh, please.” Mariam throws out their arms. “I’m sorry I’m late. You’d think I’d be used to traffic.”
“It’s okay.” Their arms wrap around me. “I was worried I’d missed you or something.” We hug for what feels like forever, because they’re here. They’re really here.
“Sorry,” I say, finally letting go. “Guess I got a little excited.” I almost want to cry.
“It’s cool.”