500 Words or Less Read online

  I turned around and screamed

  “What the fuck, Jordan?

  Why did you make me do it?”

  “I didn’t fucking make you do

  anything.”

  Jordan sat up.

  He rifled around under the covers.

  He threw a bra, underwear, a T-shirt

  that wasn’t even mine

  at me.

  He slid out of bed and picked up a pair of boxers

  off the floor,

  then walked,

  disheveled,

  into the adjacent bathroom.

  He shut the door.

  The lock clicked in place.

  I fished around the floor,

  for the rest of my clothes,

  and haphazardly tugged on

  a T-shirt and jeans

  and jammed my feet

  into a pair of laced-up sneakers.

  I opened Jordan’s bedroom door

  and left it wide open.

  Downstairs,

  in the kitchen,

  half-empty Solo cups

  of whiskey and Coke

  littered the countertops.

  On the table,

  lay an unfinished game

  of beer pong.

  Outside,

  stragglers smoked

  cigarettes and weed.

  I slipped out the front door

  unnoticed.

  My ride

  I dialed Kitty’s number.

  I knew she’d be home.

  She had parents who were

  responsible—

  who cared where she was

  at one in the morning.

  My dad, stepmother, and stepbrother

  were in China for two weeks,

  and my mom—

  who knows?

  There was no one holding me accountable

  for my actions

  at this hour.

  She answered on the fourth ring.

  “Nic?”

  “Can you pick me up?”

  Kitty could have told me

  to walk the three miles home

  like we’ve done before.

  “Uh, sure,” she said groggily.

  “I’ve got to put on some clothes.

  Find my car keys.

  Tell my parents.”

  The air was warm and sticky.

  It felt better

  than being tangled under the sheets

  with Jordan.

  “Your parents?”

  “I can’t just drive off with the car

  in the middle of the night.

  They’ll understand.

  We want you to be safe.”

  They all cared,

  and it almost felt

  like too much.

  “Is everything okay?” Kitty asked.

  I wanted to say no.

  “My ride left,” I said.

  Left.

  “Ben?”

  I didn’t answer.

  “Tell me where you are.”

  I looked at the street sign.

  I’m on the corner of forever,

  I didn’t say.

  I said something else,

  then hung up.

  The sky began to rumble.

  It lit up, briefly,

  before going black again.

  In Meydenbauer

  thunderstorms were rare.

  I couldn’t remember that last time I’d seen one.

  I was probably too young

  or too scared.

  I sat on someone’s manicured front lawn,

  waiting for Kitty,

  waiting for the summer storm to roll through.

  I knew that Ben knew.

  It didn’t really matter how.

  He just did,

  and he drove away,

  tires screeching around a corner.

  The next afternoon

  I found myself

  back upstairs

  in his room.

  I found Jordan shirtless

  in his bed, holding

  a controller for his Xbox, shooting

  at humans, orcs, and elves.

  “Are we supposed to be together?”

  Jordan barely glanced over from the screen,

  but when he did,

  I caught a glimpse in his eyes.

  Something flickered like a faulty bulb,

  and then it was gone.

  In its place

  a vacant expression.

  “I doubt it,”

  Jordan said.

  Last night, here in his room,

  strings of sadness had knotted us together.

  We didn’t solve anything.

  We didn’t untangle

  our tangled parts,

  but the closeness,

  the knots tied together

  felt like

  something.

  “Why are you here?”

  Jordan asked.

  Whatever it was in the haze of last night—

  a heart poured over with alcohol,

  emotions that betrayed me—

  was nowhere to be found.

  “You’re his best friend.”

  “You’re his girlfriend.”

  “That’s not how best friends

  are supposed to act.”

  Jordan snorted and shook his head.

  He said nothing for a moment.

  “Nothing is ever supposed to happen.

  Things just happen,”

  he said.

  “Was that all it was to you?”

  “You tell me.”

  “You’re infuriating.”

  “You’re a bitch.”

  I wasn’t going to be

  the one who stood there

  being shot at

  like I was an orc on the screen.

  “Good luck with your game!”

  I shouted.

  “And same to you,”

  Jordan replied.

  High school love

  Was not supposed to end

  the way mine did.

  It was supposed to end

  with the looming prospect of

  college—

  when separate schools,

  quite possibly on separate coasts,

  and the element of

  time

  could not possibly keep

  two high school lovers

  together.

  Breaking up with Ben was supposed to occur

  the summer before college, not

  the summer before senior year.

  Yet five months later, I still felt him

  so rawly.

  Ben’s arms wrapped around my waist

  like they belonged there,

  like they hung there,

  like the way sleeves belonged on a jacket.

  Why I write #2

  If I was to be branded,

  as the girl who cheated

  on her charismatic and lovable

  boyfriend

  with his best friend,

  then I had to

  become the person who

  could at least make everyone pause

  and for a moment

  be someone

  other than

  that girl.

  She cheated on her boyfriend,

  but she’s really fucking smart.

  She cheated on her boyfriend,

  but she got into Princeton.

  She cheated on her boyfriend,

  but she wrote my college essay

  and now I’m going to

  Duke.

  We were all unbreakable

  Audrey Pugh leaned against her locker,

  angular hips protruding

  like corners on a coffee table.

  “I miss Ben,” she said, pouting,

  to Jilly, who snapped her gum

  and wore her cheer skirt

  in the off-season.

  I missed him too,

  so damn much.

  �
��Ben was like the nicest guy

  in our class. The nicest, Jilly.”

  Jilly’s head bobbled.

  I didn’t know whether

  to slow down or speed up.

  To act totally oblivious,

  or confrontational.

  But then the choice was made for me.

  “Nic,” Audrey called out,

  “I need your help.”

  I didn’t understand why on earth

  Audrey Pugh

  would utter the word “help”

  and my name

  in the same sentence.

  It was like she totally forgot

  that time freshman year

  when she told my mom

  I was bulimic.

  I wasn’t. I’m not.

  “I’m not a doctor yet, Audrey.

  So it would be unethical of me

  to diagnose

  that rash on your ass.”

  Jilly’s jaw dropped. Her gum nearly fell out.

  Audrey’s mouth tightened for a millisecond,

  then relaxed like I had said

  nothing at all.

  Audrey was like this perfectly

  unbreakable

  twig,

  the rubbery kind

  that bows and bends

  but never snaps.

  Pavlov’s dog

  “I need you to write my college essay,”

  Audrey said.

  She thrust a wad of cash

  in my face.

  “I hear you do that sort of thing.”

  I could have said no.

  I wasn’t sure

  I could write anything nice

  or meaningful about Audrey Pugh.

  Yet I snatched the cash

  from her fingers

  like I was conditioned to,

  like Pavlov’s dog,

  and began counting the bills.

  Audrey’s mouth formed a small,

  knowing smile.

  “Oh, Nic.

  It’s just a wad of twenties.

  Your family has money, right?

  Or did your mother

  take all of it

  before she left?”

  She laughed before shutting her locker

  and trotting away

  with Jilly.

  There was nothing Audrey

  could say

  about my mother

  that I haven’t

  heard before.

  Rumors grew

  lackluster

  over time,

  but they still

  gnawed on

  parts inside me.

  Yet, in spite of all the terrible things

  Audrey and I

  have mutually said

  to and about

  each other,

  I still wanted

  to write

  her essay.

  Maybe it was

  the way she existed

  as a unit.

  The way none of us

  were ever quite sure

  if either twin

  were truly

  different

  from the other.

  The way she shielded

  her innermost feelings

  and thoughts,

  her own identity

  so none of us

  could see.

  If I could write an essay

  for Audrey,

  then maybe

  there was something

  worth writing

  about all of us.

  There were papers

  Papers covered

  every inch of my room.

  They insulated me

  from thinking,

  from feeling

  too much.

  Vignettes of Marco

  and Miranda

  and Laurel

  and Austin,

  lives that demanded

  attention.

  I was exhausted by

  their words.

  But of course,

  I couldn’t stop.

  By December

  The days felt fleeting.

  Everything that you wanted to last longer—

  lunch periods,

  weekends,

  the amount of time we were given on an exam—

  passed quickly.

  Everything you wanted to fly by—

  homework,

  lectures,

  winter itself—

  only dragged slower.

  Jordan tore a page

  Out of his notebook

  and flicked the crumpled paper

  at me as we sat

  across from each other

  at a table in the crowded library,

  cramming for upcoming exams.

  I flicked the paper back.

  “What do you want,

  Jordan?”

  He leaned back in his chair.

  “That’s the million-dollar

  question.

  Thanks for asking.

  “My dad bought me a new Rover,”

  he said.

  “Good for you.”

  I went back to studying.

  “Is that supposed to mean

  love?”

  Jordan mused.

  His elbows leaned

  on the table, his chin

  resting in his hand.

  “I don’t know,”

  I muttered.

  Jordan continued to ramble

  like I wasn’t even there.

  “Do you notice that no one ever asks

  what you want?

  Like I didn’t ask for this Rover.

  “Maybe I wanted an Audi.

  Or maybe I just want

  my dad to, like,

  ask me about something

  other than my GPA

  and whether or not I finished

  that Princeton application.

  “Would have saved him $80K.”

  I stopped writing and put down my pen.

  Our friendship may have ended

  at his party last summer,

  but there were invisible threads

  of something

  that I could still feel

  tangling us

  together.

  “Maybe I would like to know

  if my dad knows anything about me

  other than my class rank,”

  Jordan grumbled, opening up his textbook.

  I returned to working

  on the practice test

  for AP Bio,

  when Jordan said,

  “When someone doesn’t have an interest

  in you,

  you stop having an interest

  in yourself.”

  I looked up at him.

  “I get it.”

  “I know you do, Nic,”

  Jordan whispered.

  “Also, your answer to question seven

  is wrong.”

  Early decision

  We checked our phones obsessively.

  Not for a text,

  or a like,

  or a friend request,

  or a photo,

  but for an e-mail,

  with a .edu address,

  preferably from an Ivy.

  Suitors

  A week before Christmas,

  I found five guys

  gathered around my desk

  at the start of AP Bio.

  They leaned over Jordan’s shoulder,

  saying things like,

  “Shit, man” and

  “That’s so sick.”

  “Oh my.

  Five strapping young suitors

  have come a-calling,”

  I said.

  “What will I tell my mother?”

  They glanced over at me,

  then back at Jordan,

  and then back at me.

  “That’s not why

  you’re here?”

  I feigned a dramatic sigh

  and stepped overr />
  their backpacks.

  “Move,” I said,

  and the five of them

  scurried away.

  Jordan swiveled around in his seat,

  facing me.

  His left arm was wrapped

  in a hard cast

  up to the elbow.

  He swung it around in the air

  like a giant mallet.

  “Nicky, did you include

  ‘Killer of fun’

  and ‘Where the party goes to die’

  in your list of extracurricular activities

  on your college application?

  Because you sure excel at them.”

  I smirked back.

  “What the hell did you do to your arm, Jordan?”

  “Nicky, that is an excellent question.

  I thought you’d never ask.”

  He whipped out his phone and

  cued up a video.

  I mostly saw Ben,

  or at least the outline of Ben,

  on the screen from the vantage point

  of a helmet-mounted camera.

  They were in the mountains,

  in the snow.

  Ben, bundled up in a North Face jacket

  zipped up to his nose.

  Goggles and a helmet

  covered the rest of his face.

  But I could tell it was him.

  I knew that nose.

  The nose that

  snuggled against mine.

  The nose that

  I would kiss ever so lightly

  when saying good-bye.

  My heart paused for a moment,

  and then I felt a stab of anger.

  Jordan was still friends

  with Ben.

  Still close enough

  that Ben could drive into the mountains

  and spend a whole day

  with someone who slept

  with his girlfriend.

  There were girls

  who I was never even friends with

  who won’t talk to me

  because I cheated on Ben.

  Yet Jordan

  still gets to

  live his normal life

  as if nothing ever happened?

  The double standard

  was infuriating.

  Jordan was

  infuriating.

  Roadkill

  In the video, Ben took off first,

  on his skis,

  down what looked to be

  a steep mountainside.

  Jordan pointed the camera downhill.

  You could see Ben

  flying off a man-made jump

  vaulted into the air,

  crossing what now appeared to be

  a mountain highway.

  Ben sailed across it and landed

  miraculously

  on the other side of the road,

  in the snow.

  I turned to Jordan. “Are you guys idiots?”

  Jordan nodded his head vigorously,

  grinning.

  You could hear Ben hollering

  and Jordan saying something like,

  “All right, watch this.”