Listen to Your Heart

The car behind us honked. I stayed where I was.

“Fine, thank you.”

I laughed and applied the gas. “Now was that so hard?”

“Yes.”

“It’ll get easier.” I sighed. “Everything will get easier.” It had to. People would forgive me. We’d move forward. And we’d all be okay.

Max shifted in his seat and there was a sound of crinkling paper. He was stepping on something on the floor of the passenger seat. I glanced over to see the magazine Diego had given me. “Will you throw that on the back seat?” I asked. I didn’t want it to get damaged.

Max reached down, picked it up, and Frisbeed it onto the back seat.

“That day out at the marina when all the WaveRunners got scattered …” Max started but trailed off.

“Yeah.”

“I think it was those guys.”

I opened then shut my mouth. I had accused Frank. “What makes you think that?”

“One of them … the guy I punched … Damon, he had come to the marina the weekend before, Labor Day weekend, with his family. He saw me. His family had rented a powerboat. The whole time Dad was going over rules with his parents, Damon was walking up and down the dock, looking at everything.”

That punk kid not only picked on my brother at school but had to go and mess with our family’s business as well. I gritted my teeth. “You’re going to have to tell Dad.”

Max nodded, but his eyes went down to his hands, which were resting in his lap.

“It’s not your fault,” I said. “That’s on that Damon kid, Max.”

“Maybe if I had reacted differently that very first time …”

I pulled off the road and parked against a curb. I shifted the car into park and faced my brother. “You can’t think like that. He is the one who should be analyzing his mistakes, not you. Nothing justifies what he’s been doing.”

“Thanks.” He looked out the windshield. “We’re going to be late to school.”

“This is more important to me.” I squeezed his forearm. “You do know that, right?”

His eyes flashed to mine.

“Love you, Maxie.”

“Okay, can we go to school now?” he asked, rolling his eyes.

I laughed and put the car in drive. After a few miles, he said, “Love you, too.”

“Ms. Lyon?” I said, stepping inside the empty classroom.

“Yes?”

It was early, before first period, and Ms. Lyon sat at her desk with a laptop open in front of her. She was probably prepping for the other class she taught—computer programming.

“I have some editing requests from the live show on Friday.” I placed a piece of paper down in front of her. I had made a list of everything I hoped could be cut from my less than stellar performance.

She read over the list. “This is a bit of overkill. I think taking out the word cousin would do the trick nicely. The exchange was very entertaining and will be good for the show and for you. It was some of your best work.”

“Please.” I didn’t care about that. I cared about my cousin and how it made her feel.

Ms. Lyon nodded. “Okay.”

“Thank you.” I stood there, unable to move. Maybe now was the time to ask her about switching jobs again. Someone else would probably love the chance to host. If we kept Victoria the same, listeners probably wouldn’t even notice.

“Did you need something else?” she asked.

“No.” I left before I changed my mind.

It took Alana giving me the silent treatment through all of History for me to come to a realization. No matter what had happened over the weekend, we needed to talk about it.

So, at lunchtime, I found Alana at her locker and marched over to her. “Max needs us right now to walk with him from Spanish to the library.”

She turned around. “Okay.”

It shouldn’t have surprised me that she would readily agree. It was Alana, and it was for my brother, but I was a little surprised. We walked down the hall together.

“Are you done giving me the silent treatment, then?” she asked.

“What? You’re giving me the silent treatment. You didn’t even answer my text yesterday.”

“You didn’t text me yesterday,” she said.

Hadn’t I? I brought out my phone. I’d texted Liza; I was almost certain I had texted Alana, too. But when I clicked on her name, there was my written-out text waiting to be sent. I handed her the phone.

“Aw,” she said, reading it. “That’s sweet.”

I smiled, my spirits lifting a little.

Max was waiting outside his Spanish classroom and when he saw us, he looked relieved.

Alana hooked her arm through his, and we headed for the library. “You just need to walk around with me on your arm a few times, Max, and everyone will think you’re cool.”

“I don’t care if people think I’m cool. My only goal is not to get punched.”

“This will help with that goal as well,” Alana assured him.

“You don’t have to go to the library,” I said. “Why don’t you eat lunch with us?”

“I’m good in the library.”

“Okay.”

We dropped him off, then stood outside together.

The campus at lunch wasn’t exactly the most private place for confessions. “Can we go sit in my car?” I asked Alana.

“That sounds ominous.”

“It kind of is.”

That shocked her silent and she took hold of my hand and we walked to the car together. We got inside; me in the driver’s seat and Alana beside me in the passenger side. For once, Alana waited in silence while I tried to figure out what I needed to say. Finally I spoke.

“You kissed Frank, Alana.”

“I knew you were still mad at me for that.”

“Of course I’m mad at you. Diego is … Well, he’s Diego. Why would you do that to him?”

She opened and shut my glove compartment. “I told you, Frank kissed me first.”

“And it meant nothing to you?”

She squeezed her eyes shut. “I don’t know! I like Diego … I think.”

She was confused. Maybe if I told her how I felt, she’d be less confused. “What Liza said the other night at the podcast … it’s true. I like Diego, too.”

Alana took a deep breath and slid the A charm she had on her necklace back and forth along its chain a few times. “I don’t think he likes either of us right now because of the whole Looking for Love thing.”

“Yeah.”

“I tried to talk to him this morning and he’s not over it,” Alana said. “You know Diego, he’s really nice and polite. But all he gave me was a single hello and kept walking.”

I ran my finger over the Toyota logo on my steering wheel. I hadn’t seen Diego this morning, even though I’d looked for him as Max and I walked to class. “Why didn’t you ever tell him you liked him, Alana?”

She bit her lip. “I’ve never had to tell a guy I liked him before. I flirt and they do the confessing. This was different and it made me question everything.”

“It also made you like him more?” I asked.

She lifted one side of her mouth into a half smile. “Yes.”

“And what about Frank?”

“Frank is a risk. He’s not boyfriend material. He’s the kind of guy you have a fling with, not a relationship.”