No One Needs to Know (21 page)

What this is, in front of me, is one of the most beautiful things I’ve ever seen in my life. It’s my mom, beaming from ear to ear as if an entire semi-truck has been lifted from her shoulders and she’s throwing her head back, screaming in relief. Until this moment, I don’t think I truly realized just how hard those years of job searching was for her.

And my sister, the black eye all faded away, can sense it too. She’s spinning and laughing, her hair whipping wildly around her shoulders. I want to fall to my knees with relief, but that seems too dramatic, and besides, it’s all I can do to stand there in the entryway, a silent observer as the two of them twist and twirl around the tiny space, never bumping into the cabinets, the fridge, anything, their steps fluid, their bodies graceful.

This is what I’ve wanted, forever and ever. It was never about money or nice things. It was this. This moment of knowing we’d be okay. Of seeing my mom free, relaxed, her head tipped back to the skies even though she’s inside a house with a cramped, low ceiling.
Alive.
Of knowing, once and for all, that Carolyn will make it out of here, will be stronger than ever.

The song finally ends and the spinning slows, and when my mom tips her head back, she’s beaming at me. “Hey. Didn’t hear you come in.”

“Wonder why,” I say, dropping my bag onto the couch. “Something smells good.”

“Me and Carolyn made a pizza,” she says. “It’s Hawaiian if you want some.”

“Sure, maybe in a little bit.”

“Okay.”

“How was your first day?”

When she grins, I think I could count all her teeth. “Amazing. I’m going to be in charge of twelve other maids, and the last supervisor left lots of notes and instructions before she quit to take care of her sick dad. I have my own office!”

“That’s great,” I say.

“It is. And the thing is, this place is different. Everyone in upper management at this hotel … they earned it. They really like to promote people. There’s a future there. I could become more than a supervisor. I could become the hotel manager someday.”

My eyes sting before I can blink. “Oh Mom,” I say. Walking to her, I let her envelop me in a hug. “You deserve this.”

Neither of us speak for a minute, and when I realize Carolyn is standing awkwardly to one side, I grab her and yank her in, and the three of us hug under the ugly bug-catcher light, basking in the glow of the future.

“So where are we going exactly?” I ask, slamming the door of Olivia’s car and following her down the sidewalk.

“You’ll see,” she says, slapping the crosswalk button.

It must have been waiting for us, because it flashes the
walk
symbol almost instantly.

“Can you believe we got a perfect hundred on our assignment?” she asks as we cross the street.

“We worked hard on it.”

“I know, but I never get As. I’m stoked.”

We approach the archways of Tacoma’s Union Station. It’s not even a train station anymore, just an elaborate brick building with iconic archways. Every time I see it I think of some bygone era, when riding trains was glamorous. I picture ladies with big traveling gowns and fancy trunks arriving by carriage, excited for some grand adventure.

I push away the image as Olivia leads me under the arches, the cool night air blowing my hair out of my face. Ahead, a bridge glows, awash with a rainbow of color.

The bridge of glass. Below it is the freeway, a neverending stream of cars. But here, the blown glass vases and flowers and butterflies and twists and turns of glass … each piece of art is incased in its own clear cube. The walls of the bridge must be ten feet high, and the span of the bridge …

I’ve been up here during the day before. I thought it was pretty seeing the elaborate glassworks, which are almost like spun sugar. And I’ve passed by before in a car, drove right underneath and thought it looked nice all lit up.

But at night, up close and backlit, it’s breathtaking.

“This is … ” I say, my voice trailing off as I stop in front of one particularly large vase. It must be four feet tall by itself, but it’s got a dozen blown-glass flowers, too, as if it’s a whole flower arrangement.

“I know,” Olivia says, her breath on my ear.

I turn, my back against the wall of glass displays. “Why are we here?” I ask. She can’t have talked to Liam yet. I just saw him. So why all the secrecy?

She smiles. Pulling a single flower out of her pocket, she dramatically going down on one knee. She holds the flower out, and it looks identical to the one behind me—the blown glass flower in the vase.

“Zoey Thomasson, will you go to the Fall Fling with me?”

I stare, slack-jawed, unable to move.

She giggles. “Don’t freak out. Everyone will think we’re just friends. Girls dance together all the time at these things. In case you didn’t notice, there’s kind of a guy shortage at Annie Wright.”

I swallow. “But it’s in two weeks.”

Olivia furrows her eyebrows. “I know.”

I purse my lips. “Your brother just invited me to his homecoming dance. It’s the same weekend.”

It’s like I stole the breath from her lungs. She goes from a goofy, on-one-knee pose to dropping down to sit on her heels, staring up at me from the ground. “Oh.”

“I’m not going with him,” I say.

“But you’re his girlfriend. You have to go with him.”

I laugh, and it comes out ugly and bitter. “No, Olivia, you were supposed to talk to him today! I don’t want to be with him anymore. If you don’t tell him, I will.”

“But he’s never going to forgive me! Don’t you get that? He’s never liked a girl before, not like he likes you. He deserves to be happy.”

“But it’s not
real
,” I say. “Not like it is with us.”

“He’s going to hate me,” she moans.

“Really, Olivia? You’re chickening out? Are we just supposed to stay like this forever? Am I supposed to just be with both of you? When are you going to call it off? When I’m marching down the aisle with him?”

She finally climbs up off the cement floor so that we’re eye to eye. “That’s not fair.”

“What is fair? Dating him forever so you don’t have to take me away from him? So you can stay the perfect sister in the hopes you’ll always remain best friends? News flash, Olivia—he’s sick of your neediness. He told me he wants you to get your shit together.”

I’ve gone too far. I know it instantly by the expression on her face. It’s like she shuts down, recoils all at once, reels every last feeling, every confession, inside her iron walls. And when she looks into my eyes again, she’s the old Olivia, the one who ruled our school with an iron fist, whose perfection gleams from every photo.

“You know what?” she says, her voice cracking. “Take the light rail or walk home or something. I’m so done with this.”

I rush after her. “Stop!” I say, yanking her arm back.

She stops but doesn’t turn around, not right away. She stares at the ground in front of us, struggling to pull herself together.

“This isn’t what I wanted, you know,” she says a moment later. “This isn’t who I thought I was.”

“And it’s who I planned to be?”

“I don’t know, but you’re sure handling it better than me.”

“You can still be perfect, and be … ” My voice trails off. “This, too,” I say, motioning between us. “Because
I
think you’re perfect.”

The ragged, strangled breath she takes catches me off guard. Flawless, composed Olivia is barely holding it together.

“I’ve lost so much over the last couple years. The house I grew up in. My parents. Ava. And now you want me to go home and tell my brother I’m taking you away. Liam never cares about girls, and he cares about you. And if I take that from him, he’s going to hate me. I’m going to lose him like I’ve lost everything else.”

“I never had any of those things to begin with,” I say, smiling sadly through my tears.

“Sorry,” she whispers.

I reach out to touch Olivia’s arm, but then she’s backing away, her eyes still trained on me. She stares for a long, lingering moment, as if to memorize what I look like, out here beside the blown glass artwork.

And then she spins on her heel and runs off, leaving me standing on that bridge, the freeway traffic rushing by below.

OLIVIA

The next day, I’m sitting on the little window seat in my room, staring out at the water and wondering how it is I screwed things up so badly.

I ran away from Zoey the second she pushed. She wanted to end things with Liam, and I knew it was the right thing to do, but I freaked.

I exhale, and my breath fogs the glass. Then I pick up my phone and call her. Again.

It rings twice, then goes to voicemail, so I know she’s screening my calls. If her phone was off, it wouldn’t have rung at all.

She wasn’t even at school today. I only went to school to see her, and she wasn’t there.

“Hi, you’ve reached Zoey. Leave a message.”

The beep comes, and for a long second I don’t speak. The lump in my throat makes it seem impossible. I swallow it down. “Hey, Zoey,” I say. “Look, I don’t know what I’m doing any more, okay?”

My lip trembles and I realize how much I can’t afford to lose her. How much I need her.

How much I care about her. I couldn’t sleep last night, I just kept replaying the same thing over and over—that moment she said,
I choose you
, followed by the way her face crumpled when I left her there.

“I’ve never felt like this about anyone. It’s terrifying. But I can’t lose you. Give me another chance, please. Just don’t give up on me yet. I’ll talk to him, okay? Just tell me you’ll still be there once I do.”

I end the call and drop my phone into my lap, still staring out at the driveway. I wipe away the one tear that trails down my cheek.

A knock comes then and I jump, bumping my forehead against the glass before I turn to see my brother standing in the open doorway.

As our eyes lock, I know.

He knows.

He overheard the call.

His eyes search mine, boring into me. He steps into my room, then walks closer and sits at the edge of the bed, all without looking away. It’s like he expects the answers to be written in my eyes.

“Just say it,” I say.

He rubs his hair with one hand, then drops his hand back to his side. “Are you and Zoey more than friends?”

“We were,” I say, sniffling. “And I know that makes me a really shitty sister because you liked her first.”

“Have you dated other girls?” he asks.

I finally break our eye contact and look at the lines left in the carpet from the vacuum cleaner. I dig my toes into the deep pile. “No.”

“Hey,” he says. “Look at me.”

I glance up again.

“I don’t care, that you’re … you know.”

I can’t speak.

“But, I mean, it would have been cool if it wasn’t a girl
I
was dating … ”

I can’t help it. I laugh, and then it makes me want to cry.

“Are you in love with her?” Liam asks.

“Are you?” I counter.

He breathes deeply, leaning back on his hands on my bed. “I like her. I really do. But if she was pissed at
me
, I don’t think I’d be moping in my room like … ” He swirls his finger around my room. “Like this.”

I nod.

“Has
she
dated girls before?” he asks.

I shake my head.

“So you two just kind of … ’

“Fell into it.”

“Huh,” he says, as if struggling to wrap his head around it.

“I know, it’s weird.”

He shrugs. “Nah. Just … unexpected.”

I nod. “Yes. Definitely unexpected.”

“Has it been going on the whole time I was dating her?”

I shake my head. “Not really. Just since the lake.”

He nods slowly, staring at where my toes disappear into the carpeting. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

I lean back, feeling the cool pane of glass on my back. “Because I thought you’d be pissed. I’ve been sneaking around with her, and she was
your
girlfriend first. And then you come home and tell me how amazing she is, and how am I supposed to tell you?”

Liam leans back too, resting his palms against my bed. “You use words, Olivia. Like the ones you’re spouting right now.”

I stand up and walk past him to my dresser. My hands slide down the strand of pearls draped around the corner of my mirror. “I’m not like you, Liam.”

“I don’t know about that. Sounds like we’re both into girls.”

I laugh again, not because the joke is all that funny, but because the relief at the way he’s taking all of this is almost more than I can handle.

“I thought you’d be mad.”