My Best Friend, Maybe Read online

  “Imagine it was Mark somewhere with some other girl. Imagine having to see him flirt and cuddle and kiss other girls right in front of you.”

  The thought makes my heart clench in my rib cage.

  “She did that to you?”

  Sadie nods. “Worse,” she says.

  I sigh.

  “Will you think about it, Coley?” Sadie pleads. She sounds like she’s a kid again, begging me to loan her my best shirt for school, to lend her my five dollars on the boardwalk, to ask my parents if we can stay up a little later at a sleepover. “I’ll be your best friend.”

  That last part’s a joke. I know it. She says it with the inside-joke smile. But it still melts me.

  “I’ll think about it,” I say.

  Relief comes in the form of sleep and by the grace of God or the universe or whatever is out there after all, my dreams drift away from Sadie and my parents and Rose and the volcano. But I am in the sea.

  I do a perfect freestyle away from the cliffs of Santorini, though I can feel their beautiful presence behind me. The salty waves slide along my skin, tickling my arms, my sides, my butt, my legs. I feel the sun baking the top half of my body as my feet kick and I move forward and my face is surrounded by cobalt blue.

  Still, I hear the rustling of waves behind me and then I feel strong, warm hands slide up my calves. I know it’s Sam, but I don’t turn right away. I float suspended and enjoy his palms as they make their way up the back of my legs, and despite the sun, goose bumps form on my spine.

  When his fingertips reach my butt I realize that I’m naked in the water and, embarrassed, I turn to see him.

  He treads water, smiling at me like he expected me to be unclothed, like it’s natural. His own naked shoulders and chest are suspended above the blue and I reach out to touch his wet skin.

  And then I’m awake.

  There’s a banging on my door.

  I sit up, rubbing the sleep out of my eyes. The sun is streaming through my open windows at such a harsh angle that I can tell it’s so early there’s no way I should be awake yet.

  And because at the moment I’m too tired to try to figure anything out and I’m too lonely to have any sort of conversation I yell, “Go away, Sadie.”

  I crash back into my pillow and meditate on Sam’s smile, his skin, eyes, muscles, trying to use him to chase away all the other thoughts that are taking my brain by force.

  I know I can’t do anything about Sam. It wouldn’t be fair to Mark. As confused as I am about my mom and even my dad right now, there are some things that are just wrong, like cheating. Plus, Sam is Sadie’s brother and his mother hates me.

  But I’m too tired to stop myself from thinking about him. He’s the only good thing about this trip.

  And for some reason the typical guilty feelings don’t follow this naked dream.

  Why did Sadie have to come back? Thirty seconds ago I was in the sea, about to have a guilt-free moment with Sam. Instead, here I am, lonely and confused in my cave.

  I hear a click and I sit up in bed. Sadie is standing against the inside of my blue door. She freezes wide-eyed. “Sorry,” she says. “The door was open.”

  Why did I do that again?

  I lie back down.

  She comes over and sits on the side of my bed. I curl away from her.

  “I have to tell you something else,” she says.

  I pause. I want to tell her to leave so I can go back to sleep. But I’m also thinking about what Sam said last night—that Sadie needed me, specifically me, for a reason. I still don’t know everything that happened.

  “What?” I say, but I make my voice all bratty.

  “I missed you.”

  I roll onto my back to look up at her.

  “I still miss you. I hate it,” she says. And she crumples, speaking through sobs. “I hated leaving you on that bench when I knew you just wanted a milk shake. I hated when we got to school freshman year and you waved at me in the hallway without saying anything. I hated being so mad at you when I saw you in the bathroom that time.” I kept waiting for you to come to me and tell me it was okay that I’m gay, that you accept me, but you never did. I thought you knew and I thought you hated me for it.”

  “How would I know? You didn’t tell me.”

  She shakes her head. She’s crying harder now.

  “I always thought you knew. I thought I wasn’t good enough for you. I realized—just a minute ago when I was lying next to my mom, staring at my ceiling trying to make sense of everything—I realized that if you didn’t know, it makes me the bad guy.”

  I sit up and put my hand on her shoulder. “I didn’t know,” I say.

  I pray she doesn’t ask me what I would have done if I did know. I pray she won’t ask me if I would have followed my church’s rules and turned away from Sadie if I had found out before this island pried my mind open. Because I don’t know.

  “I can’t help who I love, Coley,” she says. And it makes sense, so I nod.

  “Sadie,” I say.

  She twists her neck so she can look at me.

  “I’m really tired.”

  She laughs. I roll over and she lies down next to me on the bed. “Me, too,” she says.

  My mom would hate this. My mom would call this bad company, the web of sin, me curled up under the covers and Sadie spread out on top of them two feet away from me. My mom would call this against God, just because of who Sadie is.

  My mom would be wrong.

  And with that thought, I fall back to sleep.

  Ω

  The next day, Sadie had a magenta streak zigzagging through her hair.

  I was just out of the outdoor shower, dressing for dinner in the back bedroom. Sadie burst in the door, smelling like soap with her head wrapped in a towel.

  “Coley!” she said. “Ta-da!”

  She whipped the towel away and shook out her dry hair. Sure enough, the very back of her head was streaked magenta.

  “My mom did that?” I asked. “My mom?”

  Sadie nodded and I watched the streak bounce up and down. “Doesn’t it rock?”

  I shrugged. It didn’t rock. It looked like she’d colored in her hair with a highlighter. The line was in the exact middle of her head, dividing the hemispheres of her brain. And it zigzagged back and forth like the stripe on Charlie Brown’s T-shirt.

  But I didn’t say any of that because you don’t say anything if you don’t have anything nice to say.

  Sadie walked toward the wall and twisted around, trying to study herself in the little mirror that hung on it.

  “It is so cool. I can’t believe how amazing I look,” she said. “Your mom is awesome, Coley.”

  My mom was a lot of things. She was righteous and knowledgeable and occasionally fun. She was a good mom, I thought, because we never went hungry and we always went to the beach. But she wasn’t awesome-mom. In my opinion, awesome-mom was Edie, who always seemed more concerned with hugs than rules.

  Sadie collapsed on the bottom bunk and watched me comb my own long wet hair.

  “I want to be like your mom when I grow up,” Sadie said.

  It was the opposite of what she’d told me the day before.

  “I thought you wanted to walk the red carpet.”

  Sadie flipped over and propped herself on her elbows. “Oh, I do!” she said. “But I mean at home. At home, I want to be like your mom. I’ll have dinner on the table for my kids at the same time every night. And if they’re shouting at each other, I won’t let it keep going. I’ll make sure they stop and say ‘I’m sorry.’ ”

  I turned around and looked at my friend sprawled out on the bed, fantasies running through her brain.

  When I grew up, I would probably be like my mom, too, because it was the right way to be. But I’d want to be like Edie—I’d want to still have my own friends and be more concerned with what my kids were saying when they argued than with making them stop.

  “That’s what makes my mom awesome?”

 
“No,” Sadie said, snapping out of what ever daydream was forming in her eyes. “That’s what makes her a good mom. What makes her awesome is that she does my makeup and dyes my hair.” She gave me that smile and said, “You’ll probably be just like her, too, right? So you can totally be the best person to watch my kids while I’m on the red carpet.”

  And we laughed.

  Later that evening, after dinner and the boardwalk, after the boys were put to bed and while Dad was outside shaking sand out of the towels and Sadie was in the bathroom, I found my mom in the kitchen and asked her the question that had been bugging me all day. The one that was code for everything that had been bothering me for days and weeks and months.

  “Why did you dye Sadie’s hair?”

  She laughed. “I don’t know. I was feeling spontaneous. Don’t tell me you want yours dyed, too?”

  I shook my head. Like she’d ever even consider it.

  “Good. It’s a bit vain, I think. Dyeing your hair like that.”

  “Sadie said you dye your hair,” I said.

  My mom leaned toward me and pressed her finger to her lips. “Shh!” she whispered. “That’s a girl-secret.” She winked at me and it made me feel good. At least she told me, too.

  “Why did you tell Sadie your secret?” I asked.

  Mom laughed. “Don’t be jealous now, Colette. Jealousy doesn’t suit anyone.”

  My cheeks burned and I shook my head.

  “Anyway, you’re my little girl, but I’ve been having fun with your friend, you know? It’s been nice to have a little woman around who wants to learn about all of the womanly things. You were always such a tomboy.”

  I swallowed. Was I a tomboy?

  “It’s just some harmless fun, okay, baby?” Mom tweaked my chin. “And you know what our church always says: if you want to catch a fish, you have to go up the right stream. I know it might look weird for me to bond with Sadie over trivial things like hair and makeup. But that’s just a starting point.”

  My face was twisted as I tried to work out what she was saying.

  “And Sadie . . . she needs it.”

  “What do you mean?”

  Mom paused and thought before she answered that part. “You know, Colette, I’m trying to do the right thing. Sadie is so . . . sweet and . . . feminine and . . . she lives in that house. That crazy family . . .”

  Mom didn’t see my eyes getting wider with each word she said.

  “It’s not natural. Sadie needs some good mothering.” Now she looked at me, but she still didn’t see how shocked I was that my own mother couldn’t tell how wonderful and sparkly and warm Edie was. “Don’t get jealous, Colette, okay? You have a good mom. You were lucky enough to get that by birth, but not everyone is.”

  And even though deep down in my heart I knew Edie was a great mother, I nodded. Because my mother always knew all the rules and so she always did the right thing.

  Ω

  When I wake up a few hours later, I’m smiling. The Santorini sun is now streaming in my window and my ex-now-new–best friend is snoring lightly by my side. I smile at the ceiling, thinking about our old sleepovers, the ones at my house, when we always shared my queen-size bed. Away from the beach, I was always awake first and I would lie next to Sadie hoping she would wake up soon so we could start our day of imaginary play and games and laughter and swimming in the pool.

  But now we’re here, across the world in a cave on Santorini where the sun is so strong it almost has a smell and the stairs carved into the sides of cliffs allow you to see everything at once and yet have a million surprises a day.

  I’m also thinking about something Sadie said this morning. Something that made sense. “I can’t help who I love.”

  I don’t think I love Mark anymore. And even if it feels wrong to break his heart, I can’t help who I love. Of course I love him for being a good person, for being kind to me for so many years, for being my first boyfriend, but I don’t think I love him like that anymore. And if I don’t love him, we have to break up. We did break up.

  I don’t have to accept him as a boyfriend again just because he said so.

  And that’s what makes me smile the most. Because . . . Sam.

  Sadie is suddenly upright next to me.

  “Sorry!” she says, too loudly.

  I sit up and turn to her. “For what?”

  “I didn’t mean to fall asleep here,” she says. “I was so tired and we were talking and—”

  “Uh-oh,” I say. “Will your mom be mad?”

  “I don’t think so.” She’s talking fast. “But I thought you—”

  “No,” I say firmly, smiling. “I don’t care.” You’re my best friend.

  “You don’t?” she says. The pleading in her blue eyes is almost electric. “About anything?”

  I laugh. “I care about some things. But I’m on vacation.”

  “I mean . . . you forgive me?” She closes her eyes like she’s afraid of the answer.

  “I forgive you. Mostly,” I say. “Let’s go get breakfast before it’s too late.”

  I disappear into the bathroom, and when I come out Sadie wraps her arms around me in a bear hug. And then we’re hugging and laughing. Relief dances around our heads in almost visible music notes. We never meant to be ex-besties. It was all a mistake.

  Forgiveness makes me feel light, like I’m swimming. We walk out of the cave, arms around each other, laughing.

  “Sadie?”

  We both turn. Rose stands in a red bathing suit on the balcony next door, a Greek coffee in one hand, a bottle of sunblock in the other. Her brown eyes are wide as saucers and her strong face looks broken open.

  I watch Sadie stare at her.

  “Seriously, Sadie?” she says.

  Sadie looks at her feet. I can almost feel her heart beat through my arm, which is still draped over her shoulders.

  Rose shakes her head, looking right at me. “I really thought this was fake,” she says. And I know she means me—a fake date, a fake lesbian.

  I wait for Sadie to say it.

  But Sadie shakes her head. “Sorry, Rose,” she says, like she’s trying to sound mean.

  Rose’s face hardens. “Your mom is going to kill you when she finds out you snuck out last night,” she says calmly with a slow, phony smile.

  Sadie walks away and I follow her down to the breakfast level, a disturbing smile spreading on my own face. Why do I want to beat Rose? Why do I like it that Sadie chose me?

  “I always thought that would feel better,” Sadie says, leaning into me once we’re sitting.

  “What happened with her?” I ask.

  She shakes her head, stuffs a bite of eggs into her mouth. We eat quietly, but in solidarity.

  Then Sadie starts talking. “It was so hard. She didn’t . . . she hated that I wouldn’t tell anyone. She kept threatening to break up with me if I didn’t come out at school.”

  I chew my eggs and listen. She’s talking about another girl. She was in love with another girl. Why doesn’t this seem weirder?

  “She hated that I’d, like, flirt and stuff . . . with guys . . . you know, so no one suspected.”

  I nod.

  “She didn’t get it. She goes to high school in New York, the city. People are more open-minded there. There are other, like, out-and-gay kids in her school. There’s even a gay-straight alliance and a lesbian volleyball club at the community center. She didn’t get how strange the way I am would make me at our school.”

  I try to imagine Sadie being an out-and-gay kid at our high school. I can’t.

  “She cheated on me finally. She texted me a picture of her half-naked with some gorgeous girl from her school.”

  My eyes go wide. Two naked girls . . . it’s so confusing.

  “You’re coming to the wedding now, right?” Sadie asks quietly. Her broken heart is clearly reflected in her eyes.

  “Yes,” I say. Please don’t get more specific. Please let me come as your friend.

  “You’ll
come . . . as my date?” she asks.

  At this moment I feel closer to Sadie than I have in three years, or maybe ever. It’s like our blood is running through the same veins. Her frown is piercing my own heart, her hurt is weighing on my own limbs and she is mine. All I want is to protect her. But what she’s asking makes me feel off - kilter. There’s something weirdly familiar about it.

  “Do I have to do anything differently than I’ve done all week?” I ask.

  She shakes her head no.

  I glance up toward Rose’s balcony. I imagine her telling Sadie she loved her one minute, then cheating on her the next. It makes me want to punch her.

  I take a deep breath.

  “I’m in,” I say.

  Standing naked in the shower, my fingertips rubbing the shampoo suds through my hair, I think for the first time about what it means that Sadie is gay. She fell in love with another girl and a girl broke her heart. When she has fantasies and sex dreams (if she does) they look a lot different from mine.

  I can’t keep the images Sadie has planted in my brain over the past few hours from running through my mind in a constant stream. Sadie kissing Rose. Rose and some other girl half-naked on a cell-phone screen. Rose’s eyes, jealous over me.

  The girl I was closest to throughout my entire childhood, who I played with every day, who I sat next to every chance I got, who I loved. She’s gay. I’m not.

  I know I’m not a lesbian. I think Sadie’s beautiful, but I have the chest-crushing fantasies, the sex dreams, the jelly-legs with her brother, not her. But I’ll pretend to be gay for one night for her. The thought is so terrifying it’s exciting.

  All my life the whole gay thing was about a bunch of anonymous sinners. I never thought of it in relation to anyone I knew, to myself.

  I’m curious.

  And I know what I’m about to do is wrong. I know it’s wrong for any version of Colette—Fun Colette or Perfect Colette, Responsible Colette or Spontaneous Colette, even the Colette I Want to Be. It’s wrong to hurt someone purposefully, even if she almost destroyed your best friend. But given the way the layers of anger and curiosity are building up in the steam, I’m going to do it anyway.

  Ω

  An hour or so later, I stand next to Sadie in my skintight, bright-red strapless dress and watch as Andrea and Ivan say the words that will change their lives forever. I’m Sadie’s date, I keep reminding myself, an internal mantra. I’m a lesbian for the next twelve hours. In the small crowd of spectators, I stand so close to Sadie the backs of our hands brush against each other. Pinpricks of excitement light up my skin.