I sigh. “Please, don’t. I’m not discombobulated or anything. My head hurts a little, but that’s all. I just need a Tylenol.”
“If she can correctly use words like discombobulated, she’s probably okay,” says Trish, and I can tell she’s trying to be helpful. “You thirsty, sweetheart?”
She holds the water toward me, but I shake my head. “No. Thanks. I think I’m going to head home, though.” I turn to Ari. “My bike is outside, but…”
“I’ll give you a ride,” she says, without letting me finish. She ducks back into our booth, gathering our things.
“Thanks,” I murmur. I feel like I should say something, do something. Carlos and Trish, Quint and Morgan, are all still standing there, watching me. Well, Quint is throwing the wet napkins in a wastebasket and avoiding meeting my eye, but the rest of them are staring, expectant. Am I supposed to give them hugs or something?
Carlos saves me by dropping a hand onto my shoulder. “Will you call me tomorrow, or drop by after school or something? Let me know you’re all right?”
“Yeah, of course,” I say. “Um … the karaoke thing…” I look past him to Trish. “It’s actually kind of a cool idea. I hope you keep doing it.”
“Every Tuesday at six,” says Trish. “That’s the plan, at least.”
I follow Ari toward the back door. I make a point of keeping my eyes away from Quint, but I sense him there all the same. The twinge in my stomach feels something like guilt. He’d just been trying to help. I probably shouldn’t have snapped at him.
But he had all year to help. Too little, too late.
Ari pushes open the back door, landing us in the gravel parking lot behind Encanto. The sun has just set and there’s a refreshing breeze coming in off the ocean, full of salt and familiarity. I feel instantly revived, despite the dull ache at the back of my skull.
Ari drives a turquoise-blue station wagon from the sixties—a beast of a car that was a gift from her parents on her sixteenth birthday. She tries not to make a big deal out of it, but her family has money. Her mom is one of the most successful realtors in the county and has made a small fortune selling fancy vacation homes to very wealthy people. So when Ari starts swooning over something like a completely impractical vintage car, it’s not a huge surprise that one shows up in their driveway. Which might be enough to make some teenagers act entitled, but her abuela, who lives with them, seems to keep tight reins on that. She’d be the first to knock Ari off her pedestal if she ever started acting spoiled, though with Ari, I don’t think there’s any cause for concern. She’s pretty much the kindest, most generous person I know.
I try to help Ari load my bike into the back of the car, but she urges me to get in and take it easy. The headache has started to get bad again, so I don’t argue. I slump into the passenger seat and lean back against the headrest.
Sometimes I think Ari is intentionally trying to live her life like she’s in a period documentary film. She wears mostly vintage clothes, like the mustard-yellow romper she’s wearing now, drives a vintage car, and even plays a vintage guitar. Though she knows way more about contemporary music than I do, her true passion lies with the singer-songwriter heyday of the 1970s.
With my bike secured, Ari drops into the driver’s seat. I buckle my seat belt while she goes through the carefully orchestrated procedure of checking her mirrors, even though they couldn’t possibly have moved from when she drove it here a few hours ago.
She’s still getting used to driving a stick shift, and she only kills the engine once before pulling out onto the main thoroughfare. It’s a vast improvement from when she first got the car and popped the clutch about fifty times in a row before she could get it to move. “Are you sure you’re okay? I could take you to the hospital? Call your parents? Call Jude?”
“No, I just want to go home.”
She bites her lower lip. “I was so worried, Pru. You actually passed out.”
“Just for a second, right?”
“Yeah, but…”
I put my hand on hers and say, solemnly, “I’m okay. I promise.”
Her face relents before her words do. After a second, she nods. I sigh and stare out the window. We pass by ice cream parlors and boutique shops that are as familiar as my own bedroom. I hadn’t realized how late it was. The sun has just dipped below the horizon, and Main Street is lit up like a movie set, the palm trees wrapped with small white lights, the pastel-painted businesses glowing under the old-fashioned streetlamps. In another week, this town will be full of tourists on vacation, bringing something akin to a nightlife with them. But for now, the street feels almost abandoned.
We turn away from Main Street, into the suburbs. The first couple of blocks are the mansions—mostly second homes for people who can afford almost-but-not-quite beachfront property. But soon it’s just another neighborhood. A hodgepodge of Mission style and French Colonial. Tiled roofs, stucco walls, brightly painted shutters, window boxes overflowing with petunias and geraniums.
“So, don’t be mad,” Ari says, and I immediately bristle with the expectation of being mad, “but I thought Quint seemed okay.”
I relax, realizing that for some reason I’d been bracing for an insult. But Ari is too sweet to criticize anyone. Even, evidently, Quint Erickson. I snort. “Everyone thinks Quint seems okay, until they have to work with him.” I pause, considering. “It’s not that I think he’s a bad guy. He’s not a jerk or a bully or anything like that. But he’s just so … so…” I flex my fingers, grasping for the right word.
“Cute?”
I cast her an icy stare. “You can do better.”
She laughs. “I’m not interested.”
There’s something in the way she says it, like she’s leaving something unsaid. She’s not interested, but …
The words linger in the air between us. Is she implying that I am?
Gross.
I fold my arms tightly over my chest. “I was going to say inept. And selfish. He’s late for class all the time, like whatever he’s doing is so much more important than what we’re doing. Like his time is more valuable, and it’s okay for him to stroll in ten minutes into the lecture, disrupting Mr. Chavez, making us all pause while he gets settled, and he cracks some stupid joke about it like…” I drop my voice in imitation. “Aw, man, that Fortuna traffic, right? When we all know that there is no Fortuna traffic.”
“So he’s not punctual. There are worse things.”
I sigh. “You don’t get it. Nobody does. Having him as a lab partner has been downright painful.”
Ari gasps suddenly. The car swerves. I grip my seat belt and turn my head as headlights blaze through the rear window. I don’t know when the sports car showed up behind us, but they’re riding the bumper, dangerously close. I lean forward to look in the side mirror.
“There was a stop sign back there!” Ari yells.
The sports car starts swerving back and forth, its engine revving.
“What does he want?” Ari cries, already on the verge of hysteria. Though she has her license, her confidence behind the wheel still has a way to go. But something tells me having an erratic car on your tail would freak out even most experienced drivers.
“I think he wants to pass us?”
“We’re not on a freeway!”
We’re on a narrow residential street, made narrower by rows of vehicles parallel parked on both sides. The speed limit is only twenty-five, which I’m sure Ari had been following precisely. Now, in her anxiety, her speed has dropped to twenty. I suspect this is only further irritating the driver behind us.
They lay on the horn—extra rude.
“What’s their problem?” I shout.
“I’m pulling over,” says Ari. “Maybe … maybe there’s a woman giving birth in the passenger seat or something?”
I look at her in disbelief. Leave it to Ari to excuse this inexcusable behavior. “The hospital’s that way,” I say, jerking my thumb in the other direction.
Ari eases toward the side of the road. She finds a spot between two parked cars and does her best to angle her way in—no easy task with how long the station wagon is. Still, it leaves enough room for the other car to pass.
The engine revs again and the sports car shoots past. I catch a glimpse of a woman hanging out the passenger window with a lit cigarette. She flips Ari the bird as they speed by.
Fury washes over me.
My fists clench, nails digging into my palms. I imagine karmic justice striking them. A blown tire that would send them spinning off the road, crashing into a telephone pole, and—
BANG!
Ari and I both yelp. For a second I think it was a gunshot. But then we see the car, nearly a block ahead, spinning out of control.
It blew a tire.
I press a hand to my mouth. It feels like watching a video in slow motion. The car turns a hundred eighty degrees, miraculously missing the other vehicles parked on the side of the road. It wheels onto the sidewalk, stopping only when the front bumper smashes into—not a telephone pole—a giant palm tree. The hood crumples like an aluminum can.
For a moment, Ari and I are frozen, gaping at the wreck. Then Ari is scrambling to unbuckle her seat belt and kick open her door. She’s running toward the wreck before I can think to move, and once I finally do, it’s only to unclench my fists.
My fingers are tingling, on the verge of numbness. I look down at them, my skin tinted orange from the streetlamp.
Coincidence.
Just some freaky coincidence.
I somehow find the wherewithal to dig out my phone and call the police, and by the time I’ve given the operator the information, my hand has stopped shaking and Ari is making her way toward me. “Everyone’s okay,” she says, breathless. “The airbags went off.”
“I called the police. They’ll be here soon.”
She nods.