Between the Notes Read online

  “I’m sure he’s a perfectly nice boy.” She disappeared upstairs to check on Brady.

  I took the phone to my room and dialed Reesa’s number.

  She answered on the first ring. “You got a phone?”

  “Landline,” I said flatly. “Same number as before. Didn’t you recognize it?” We must’ve dialed each other’s home phone numbers a million times when we were kids, before we got our own.

  “Oh, yeah.” She recited the numbers, superfast. “Sorry about not calling. I didn’t think they’d let you have the same number over there.”

  I know she didn’t mean it as an insult, but it felt that way. “What, like there’s a special number for poor people?”

  “No, I . . . never mind. That was stupid.”

  An awkward silence fell between us. This phone call was not taking my mind off my situation as I’d hoped. “So, what are you doing now?”

  “Deciding what color to paint my nails.”

  “Choices?”

  “Sassy Librarian’s new colors are out. I couldn’t decide so I got them all.”

  We had discovered this teen boutique and bookstore in Belleview last summer that made its own nail polish, with literary-inspired names. There was “Shatter Me Silver” and “Lovely, Dark, and Deep Purple,” and “Every Day Red.” We loved them more for the names and the fun of figuring out which book they referred to. And if you bought the polish and the book, you got a 20 percent discount.

  “How many?” I asked.

  “Six,” she said. “And books, too. Mom said we’d call it a back-to-school present.”

  I started calculating in my head what six polishes and matching books would cost, but stopped myself before I reached an exact figure. One polish was out of my budget now. “That’s great,” I said weakly.

  “Wait till you hear the names.”

  I sighed. “I should probably do homework.”

  “Oh, okay. Fine.” She sighed. “I’ll show them to you this weekend. We’re still going to Little Invisibles concert, aren’t we?”

  “Oh, crap,” I said. “I can’t.”

  “Ivyyy,” she whined. “You told me we’d go next time they played at the King.”

  “That was before I became a person with an allowance of zero,” I said.

  “It’s only twenty dollars!”

  “It might as well be a hundred,” I mumbled.

  She paused. “I guess New York’s out, too?”

  I’d forgotten all about the trip we’d been planning—to take the train into the city to shop, maybe see a show. Even if I didn’t actually buy anything and we stood in the discount ticket line at Times Square and walked everywhere instead of taking a cab, it would still be a four-hundred-dollar day. “I don’t think so, Rees.”

  “I’ll loan you the money. You can pay me back when things clear up.”

  “Things aren’t just going to clear up, Rees. And I’m not going to be your charity case,” I said. “I’ll get a job or something.”

  “A job?” She was wrinkling her nose, I could just tell. “Then you won’t have time to do anything. You’ll always be working.”

  “Yeah, well . . .”

  “I have two words for you,” she said. “Rich. Boyfriend.”

  I sighed. “Because destitution is so attractive. I’m sure they’ll be lining up outside my crappy apartment.”

  There was a rustle and clunk on the other end, like Reesa had dropped the phone. “Hold on,” she said, then I was on speaker. She always put me on speaker when she was painting her nails. “Maybe James has a friend.”

  “Uh, James . . . who?”

  “My future boyfriend. James Westerton. Wickering. Whatever his name is. The new guy who sat next to me in English. He of the golden, wavy hair.”

  I wanted to tell her his last name was Wickerton, not Westerton or Wickering, and his hair, while definitely worthy of running one’s fingers through, was not his finest feature. But I was too busy feeling slightly nauseated at the thought of James and Reesa becoming an item. I didn’t begrudge her a hottie boyfriend, but the guy had seen me with bugs smashed to my face. The last thing I needed was to hang out with him and Reesa all the time.

  “Wonder what kind of car he drives,” she mused.

  I should’ve said something then, that I’d seen him in the parking lot. That he drove a nice car, a black one. Mercedes, or maybe a BMW. But I kept it a secret. Maybe because secrets were all I had left. Or maybe it was inertia . . . an object in motion stays in motion? Once you start keeping secrets, it’s kind of hard to stop.

  NINE

  Tuesday. Lakeside, day four. I contemplated carving hash marks on the wall of my room, but didn’t want to make the place feel any more like a prison sentence than it already did. I left the apartment five minutes earlier so James wouldn’t see me bug-faced and shrub-hiding again, so Lennie wouldn’t walk in with me, so the Witches wouldn’t pounce. So, so, so many reasons. My hair was tied back. No looking like a possessed sea anemone today.

  I went into our backyard to get my bike but stopped short when I saw a white plastic bag in the basket. If my parents had noticed the bike, they hadn’t said anything. Maybe they assumed it was Carla’s. But somebody had found it.

  I poked at the roundish shape, then lifted it far enough to see the blue-and-green Ike’s Bikes logo. My dad had taken us to get our custom bicycles there. It was a nice shop. Expensive. I reached in and pulled out a bicycle helmet. Had my parents . . . ? No. They definitely would’ve said something.

  A light went on over at Lazarski’s house. I saw a shadow pass in front of the window. Then a light in another room. My eyes went back to the helmet in my hands. I started to get that nervous feeling like when you think someone’s following you on a dark street.

  You should really wear a helmet, you know, Lennie had said.

  I dropped it into the basket as if it was scalding hot. Why would he buy me this? What did he want from me? I couldn’t wear it. Absolutely not.

  But the cars did whiz by really fast.

  I picked the helmet up again and turned it over in my hands. It was gorgeous, and that is not a word that usually appears in the same sentence as “bike helmet.” The surface was smooth and cream colored, with pale gray-and-white flowers screen-printed on the side.

  I hated that he’d paid for this . . . if he’d paid for this. I’d be indebted to him. Maybe I could wear the helmet until I had a chance to buy one of my own. Then I’d give it back to him. I wouldn’t owe him a thing. I flipped the helmet onto my head and snapped the buckle under my chin.

  It fit perfectly.

  When I got to my locker, relatively nonsweaty in the fresh shirt I had packed, Reesa was waiting. She waved a sheet of paper in my face. “This is the answer to your problem. Right here.”

  “Which problem?” I said, pushing it aside to get to my locker. “I have several, you know.”

  “Your cash flow problem.”

  I took the flyer. The country club her parents belonged to was looking for someone to play piano and sing in their hoity-toity bar and restaurant, and to perform “light background music” at dinners and receptions. I pushed the sheet back into Reesa’s hands. “I don’t think so.”

  “What? It pays fifty dollars an hour. Plus tips.”

  “A, everyone we know goes to that country club; and B, I can’t sing.” I turned back to my locker.

  “Yeah, and Adele totally sucks, too.” Reesa was the one person, outside my family, who had ever heard me sing. And only because she was sneaky and had a key to our house.

  “I can sing at home. That’s it.” And I couldn’t even manage to do that anymore.

  Reesa slapped the flyer on top of the books I had pulled from my locker. “Come on. People will start noticing if you never have spending money. And this isn’t like a job job. You could totally do this.”

  A graceful arm swept over her shoulder and snatched the flyer. “Do what?”

  I tried to grab it back, but Willow held it
out of my reach as she read. “You sing?”

  “No,” I said, but Reesa drowned me out with a loud, “Yes! She sings.”

  Willow looked at us like we were crazy, which we probably were. “Like, in the shower?”

  “Yeah. Something like that.” I grabbed the flyer and shoved it into my backpack while giving Reesa a don’t-say-another-word-under-penalty-of-death stare.

  “God, Ivy. It’s been six years,” Reesa muttered. “Get over it.”

  Air hissed out between my teeth. She might as well have stuck a knife in my chest. I knew how ridiculous it must seem that I hadn’t gotten over my stage fright from that stupid talent show yet. It should’ve been ancient history by now, but the further away I got from that day, the darker and more frightening its shadow became.

  “Thanks.” I stared daggers at Reesa. “Thanks a lot.”

  Willow tilted her head to the side and tapped her dangly earring. “Wait,” she said. “Are you talking about . . . Oh, my God. I forgot all about that!”

  I groaned.

  “What was that song you were supposed to sing? Something about summer from the perspective of a butterfly?” She giggled and nudged me like I was in on the joke, not the butt of it.

  “Summerfly,” I mumbled.

  “Awww.” She pushed out her bottom lip, then her face brightened. “I won that talent show, remember? I danced Clara’s solo from The Nutcracker.”

  “Yes.” I gave a weak smile. “I remember.” She hadn’t actually witnessed my humiliation, thankfully. She’d been off somewhere “getting into character” or stretching her foot behind her head.

  “Didn’t some kid have to drag you off the stage because you froze up?”

  I nodded, though “drag” was a bit of an exaggeration. There was a boy who gently took my arm and led me off. At least, that’s what my mother told me. All I noticed were the bright lights and the front few rows of faces staring at me.

  Willow pulled me into an awkward hug, my books pressed between us. Then someone down the hall behind me caught her attention. “Ooh, gotta go.” She waved and sashayed off.

  “Well, that was fun,” I said.

  Reesa grimaced. “I’m sorry.”

  I shrugged.

  “I’m really, really sorry. You know I just want the rest of the world to hear your amazing voice. And for you to have spending money so we can have fun.” She pressed her palms together, fingertips to her lips as if in prayer. “Forgive me? Please?”

  I rolled my eyes. “You’re forgiven. Just promise you won’t throw me under the Willow bus again, okay?”

  “I promise,” she said.

  We started down the hall, walking shoulder to shoulder and swerving to miss people without breaking contact. It was something we’d started in middle school as our own secret good-luck charm. If we made it to class without separating, we’d get whatever we were wishing for that day. As we approached the stairway, Willow twirled away from her locker and pushed straight between us with a laugh. We stopped and glared at her back.

  “I hate her,” Reesa growled. “Remind me why we’re friends with her?”

  “Must’ve done something awful in a past life.”

  “We’re such losers,” said Reesa. “It’s sad, really.”

  “Really sad.”

  “Lame.”

  “Pathetic.”

  We went on like that all the way down the hall, belittling ourselves, turning it all into a joke. But as I sat down in homeroom, I wondered why we let her rule over us the way we did. It was just as much our fault as hers, I suppose. We were all complicit in the state of inertia that governed our friendship. It was just easier to keep going along the way it was than to change direction.

  When we got to AP English, James Wickerton had not yet arrived and Reesa took the opportunity to scoot her desk closer to his. She did it casually, like she was just trying to get her things situated and comfy.

  “Seriously?” I shook my head.

  “What?” She smoothed all her hair to one side of her neck and adjusted the collar of her blouse so it displayed her décolletage.

  I slouched a few inches lower in my chair and let my hair fall around my face like blinders. Reesa was an accomplished flirt, but I didn’t like to watch. It made me feel like a third wheel.

  The room got a little quieter when James walked in. Reesa waggled her fingers at him, and his face brightened with recognition as he walked toward the desk she’d saved for him.

  “Good morning, James,” she practically sang.

  “Hey.” He gave a quick smile and sat down.

  “I’m Reesa.”

  James nodded, his eyes darting from her to me.

  “Oh, and this is Ivy.” Reesa leaned back so there was a clear line of sight between him and me.

  “Yes,” he said, “We’ve . . .”

  “Nice to meet you,” I said quickly, before he could reveal that we’d already met. He frowned, confused, but I ignored him and opened my notebook, paging through it like I was in search of some very important notes. I could still see them out the corner of my eye, though.

  Reesa leaned over to rest her hand on James’s arm. “If you need, like, help finding a classroom or the library or something, don’t hesitate,” she said. “You can ask me anything.”

  “Oh, uh. Thanks,” he said.

  We suffered through the remaining recitations of The Canterbury Tales, the words sounding like mush by the time we were done. Mr. Eli made one more attempt to get James to recite, but he politely declined.

  And when class was over, I darted. I didn’t want James to mention the bike, the bushes, or the bugs in front of Reesa. She wouldn’t understand why I was keeping secrets from her. I didn’t understand it myself, except it was all so embarrassing.

  As soon as I reached my locker, I realized I’d forgotten my hoodie. I quickly swapped my English book for chemistry and hurried back, hoping Mr. Eli hadn’t left for his free period yet.

  I was relieved to find the door ajar. But someone was in there with him, so I hesitated before waltzing in.

  “. . . smale foweles maken melodye, that slepen al the nyght with open ye . . .”

  It was a deep, rich voice that managed to put feeling into the words that had lost all meaning coming out of the rest of our mouths. I listened as if transported to fourteenth-century England, where my now-favorite poet was whispering the melodious verses into my ear.

  “. . . The hooly blisful martir for to seke, that hem hath holpen whan that they were seeke.”

  When the poem ended, a shiver shot down my spine, jarring me back to the present. I peeked through the narrow slit but could see only Mr. Eli, tilting back in his desk chair.

  “Excellent,” he said, looking more than a little astonished. “I wonder why you didn’t want to do it for the class.”

  James?

  “I don’t know. Nervous, I guess. I’m not very good at public speaking.”

  “Our Shakespeare section should help with that. We’ll be reading from various plays,” said Mr. Eli. “If you want full credit, I’ll expect you to participate.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  The warning bell for second period rang and I didn’t want to be late. But I didn’t want James to think I was stalking him, either. My hand was poised over the door handle when he pulled it inward. He caught me in an awkward, about-to-steal-a-cookie pose.

  “Oh, hi,” I squeaked, sounding like a helium addict. I withdrew my fingers from the handle and we did a little you-first, no-you-first dance in the doorway.

  He laughed and stepped aside. “After you.”

  “I, uh, forgot my jacket.” I pointed to where it was draped over the back of my chair.

  He took three long strides back to my desk and snatched it up, and then held it out by the shoulders to help me put it on.

  Mr. Eli cleared his throat. “Don’t you have somewhere to be? I know I do.”

  The bell rang for second period. “Can I get a pass?” I asked Mr. Eli.

&
nbsp; He nodded and I went to his desk. When I looked back at the door, James was gone. Mr. Eli scribbled out a pass for me and I hurried off. The hall was empty, except for a lone figure approaching the far end, messenger bag slung over his shoulder and a huge book under the other arm. I watched as he opened a door near the stairs and slipped inside.

  Though chemistry was in the opposite direction, I followed the path James had taken to see which class he was in. But when I arrived at the door I was certain he’d entered, it wasn’t a classroom. It was the same unmarked door that led to my secret room. I put my hand on the knob and turned.

  It was locked.

  TEN

  When I returned to the supply room at the end of the day to wait out the after-school rush, the door was unlocked. It hadn’t occurred to me to lock it before, but James had done it, so I pressed the button to make sure nobody walked in on me. Then I quickly found my way to the secret room and switched on the lamp.

  Everything was just as I’d left it, but my tattered copy of The Great Gatsby was no longer the only item on the shelf. It was now dwarfed by a three-inch-thick hardbound book. I pulled it down to read the cover: The Complete Works of William Shakespeare.

  Not my first choice of reading material. But James was proving to be not-your-average cute boy. I sat and thumbed through the book. Almost every page had something highlighted, with notes scribbled in the margin. Words defined, explanations of what was really going on. I flipped to the front cover to see if James had signed his named, but found only the initials J.A.R.

  I closed it tenderly and returned it to the shelf, gathering my stuff to go. But something called me back. I don’t know if it was the secret feeling of the room or my new life of secrets, but I wanted to know more about the owner of that book. I took out a pencil and scrawled a note under the initials.

  And what do you read for fun?

  I smiled as I closed the book again and left. I avoided the stairwell where I’d seen Lennie yesterday, got my bike, and pedaled home as close to happy as I’d been all week.

  Mom was sitting on the living room floor with papers spread out around her and all over the coffee table. She looked up as if she hadn’t been expecting me and quickly scooped everything into a pile.