Push Girl: A Novel Read online

  Text 2: Jack Matthews, my ex-boyfriend. Jack and I were together from eighth grade to the summer after sophomore year. We’d always liked each other, and there was no big dramatic scene when we broke up. It was totally mutual; I thought we should break up and he agreed. I had my dance stuff, after all, and he got elected to Student Government, so it was a perfect time to pull the “moving in different directions” card. I’d say that Amanda should take a lesson from him in accepting change and moving on, which would have been convenient because the two of them were next-door neighbors and practically besties, but the thing is, recently Jack had started texting me pretty regularly. There was no real point to his texts—they were mainly fun facts or super-cheesy inspiring quotations. (Yesterday I got YOU MISS 100% OF THE SHOTS YOU DON’T TAKE—WAYNE GRETZKY) But still. I kept telling myself that Jack and I were doing the whole exes-as-friends things really well, and that his silly texts were totally innocent. But, at the same time, I wasn’t telling Curt about them, either.

  Today, I decided to ignore Jack. Sometimes I replied with a fun fact or quotation of my own or asked how Student Government was going, but I wasn’t lying to Mom about wanting to take a nap before I headed out for the night. Rehearsal wore me out today.

  Ignoring Amanda wasn’t an option, though. I didn’t want to have a full-on convo, so I replied with GOING TO A PARTY WITH CURT. After a few seconds of consideration, I added a:-) to the end and hit Send.

  I plugged my phone into the charger and flopped down on my bed. Logan jumped up next to me and snuggled up into my armpit. “I’m going to have the best night ever, Little Lo,” I said, stroking his fur. “Now, what should I wear?” I tried to start planning my outfit, but I slipped off into my nap before I even had a shirt picked out.

  CHAPTER 2

  I’d like to say it was the smell of pizza that gently lulled me from my nap, but that would be a lie. It was the yelling, and it’s more like it shoved me out of bed with cold hands.

  “I already told you, go out and get a job if you’re so miserable!”

  “I never said I was miserable. Stop putting words in my mouth. I just said I don’t know what I’m supposed to do. I haven’t worked for seventeen years.”

  “Volunteer. Work part-time. Do something. Anything!”

  “Well, Kara doesn’t need—”

  “Don’t do something for Kara. Do something for yourself. I swear, you have no life of your own. You have no identity anymore. I don’t even recognize my wife. What happened to your personality?”

  This was bad. I pulled the pillow over my head to drown them out, but it didn’t matter. It’s like they were in my room, yelling at each other on the edge of my bed. Logan gave a whimper and burrowed his fuzzy butt under my covers.

  “I don’t know if you noticed, but she hasn’t needed you in a long time. She can even drive herself to dance and school now.”

  “So, you just think I’m completely useless, don’t you? It doesn’t matter that I keep the house clean and make meals and—”

  “Of course I don’t think that! You’re not even listening—”

  Since the pillow wasn’t working—nothing could drown out the deluge of swearwords that were flying back and forth like daggers now—I decided to give it up. It was time to get ready for the party, anyway. I blasted my music as loud as I could without making it obvious I was trying to tune them out, and I did my best to ignore it all as I put on my makeup. It was no easy feat, because this had to be the worst fight I’d ever heard my parents have. They usually went out of their way to keep from fighting where I could hear them so clearly; I wondered what had happened to make them just not even give a single eff anymore.

  I stared at myself in the mirror, zoning out as I tried to plan my escape from the house. It was going to take some James Bond–level sneaking to grab a piece of pizza from the kitchen and creep out the front door without drawing any attention to myself. I was daydreaming up an elaborate plan that involved using Logan as a distraction when the sound of the front door slamming made me jump. I hurried over to my window right in time to catch sight of my dad’s SUV backing out of the driveway and peeling off down the street.

  Was he leaving? Or was he leaving leaving?

  I grabbed my phone and my purse and hurried down the stairs, where I found Mom, her tiny body crumpled up on the couch like a little kid. She wasn’t crying, but I could tell that tears were around the corner. Like she was in that place where one wrong word or look would set her off, and it wouldn’t be pretty.

  “Mom,” I said gently, kneeling in front of her. “What happened?”

  “Oh, sweetie.” She grabbed my hands and pulled me close to her. She tried to hug me, but with me crouching on the floor, she couldn’t really get her arms around my shoulders, so I crawled up next to her on the couch. “I’m sorry you had to hear that.”

  “What happened?” It was impossible to keep the hint of panic out of my voice.

  “Your father went to Uncle Kevin’s house.” She let out a sigh, and her voice was so small. It sounded like she was giving up on everything.

  “Is he…?” I wanted to ask if he was coming back. Or when. Or what was going on between the two of them, what the reason was for the constant fighting. But I didn’t even know how to form the words. Sure, my parents had been at each other’s throats a lot recently, but everyone’s parents fought, right? People fight. It’s human nature. But is it human nature to scream the way they did tonight? And to storm out?

  “Kara. Sweetie.” Mom’s small voice wavered now. “I know you’ve heard me and your father fighting a lot recently. We’ve been having a lot of problems. We thought we could work them out, but we’ve had these issues in our marriage for a long time now, and—”

  I shook my head and grabbed her hand. “Well, it doesn’t sound like it’s all that big of a deal. Just—”

  “Kara, honey, it’s way more than just that.” She pulled me in close and hugged me as tightly as she could. She took a deep breath and let it out slowly, and I could feel her arms shaking as they tightened around me. “Sweetie, I think your father and I are going to get a divorce.”

  My stomach dropped to the floor, and I instantly felt a puking sensation. I pulled away quickly, almost launching both of us off the couch with the force of my recoil. “What? A divorce? No.”

  Mom shook her head. “I’m sorry, sweetie. It’s not like we—”

  “No. You can’t do this.” I stood up and backed away from her, as if I could distance myself from what she was telling me. “I can’t believe this. Why can’t you just work things out? You guys have been together forever. You can’t just get a divorce. That’s not how it works.” I knew I was rambling, but I couldn’t keep the words from tumbling from my mouth. Like, if I kept talking, it would change the reality of what she told me.

  “Kara, I know you’re upset. Sit down and we’ll talk about—”

  “No.” I said. The pukey feeling hadn’t gone away, and it had been joined by a pounding in my head. “I don’t want to talk about this, because it’s not happening. I don’t know what you said to Dad, but just call him and tell him you’re sorry. Just apologize and get back to normal and move on.”

  “It’s not that easy, sweetie. People don’t get divorced over one fight. We’ve had issues that have been going on for years now, and—”

  “Well, fix them, then!” I didn’t mean to scream, it just came out, rough and raw. “You’re adults. Adults fix their problems; they don’t just give up on them. You don’t just quit, Mom. Try harder. That’s what you tell me. Try. Harder.”

  “We would never quit without considering all of our options, sweetie. But there are some things we can’t just work through. We have to accept that and move on.” Mom stood up and reached out to me, but I swatted her arms away.

  “I can’t believe you,” I said. “You tell me to never give up on things that I want. That I can do anything I set my mind to. But look at you. You’re just giving up. You can’t even follow the a
dvice you give me. Way to be a role model.”

  And with that, I grabbed my keys from the basket in the entryway and stomped to the door. “I’m going to the movies,” I snapped. “Maybe by the time I get back, you two will have figured out how to deal with your problems like the adults you pretend to be.” And I slammed the door on her, exactly like Dad had only ten minutes before.

  As I buckled myself into my car, I was suddenly even more thankful that I’d agreed to meet Curt at the party instead of having him pick me up. Ever since I got my license the year before, driving had been my Zen. There was something about being on the road with the windows down that helped me sort through my thoughts and clear my head in a way that nothing besides dance had been able to do.

  I backed out of my driveway and took the long way to Rob Chang’s house. I needed some time to myself to make sense of this world-shaking news.

  My parents. Getting a divorce.

  This was the absolute worst thing that could happen to me.

  CHAPTER 3

  My car was in a ditch.

  That’s how packed Rob Chang’s party was by the time I finally finished my drive and showed up. Every free square inch of curb on Meadowlark Lane was occupied, and so was all the parkable space on the adjacent Nightingale and Hummingbird Lanes. My only choices were to block a fire hydrant or squeeze my newly washed Prius into this small ditch next to the fancy remodel project on the corner. Since lawbreaking wasn’t really one of my after-school activities, it looked like the ditch was my only option for tonight.

  Now I had mud-caked shoes to add to the list of fantastic things that had happened since I woke up from that nap earlier. Tromping through the sludge in these sky-high heels, my shoe of choice since I’d started dating Curt, was really an exercise in balance that would put some of my dance warm-ups to shame. What did I tell myself? Best night ever? Yeah, not so much. But even though my parents and the D-word had ruined the early evening, at least the nine-o’clock hour was still salvageable. I’d been looking forward to this party all week, and I was determined to have fun. Somehow.

  I trudged through the ditch dirt until I made it to actual sidewalk, where I ran my shaking hands down the front of my jeans and took a second to collect myself. You’ll see Curt in just a minute, I thought. He’ll make you feel better. He’ll give you a hug and kiss your forehead and make you forget all about the fact that your parents are getting a divorce.

  Just letting the word pop into my head, even in the context of Curt making me feel better about the awful news, brought me instantly back to the fight and Dad storming out and peeling down the street. I shook my head in an effort to clear it all away, but no amount of shaking could erase their words from my head. The fight played in my mind over and over, like a ringing phone I couldn’t answer, and it twisted my stomach into knots.

  Breathe, I thought. Breathing will calm you down.

  Even without double-checking the address, I found Rob’s house easily, what with the music and the sounds of the crowd that I could hear from halfway down the cul-de-sac. With that and all the cars everywhere, how on earth had no neighbors complained yet? Maybe this was just a really chill neighborhood.

  Any sense of calm I’d managed to grab on to dissolved into thin air the second I let myself in to Rob Chang’s house. A wall of thumping dubstep smacked me in the face as soon as I cracked the door. The door knocked something into the side table when I swung it open, and a party cup of beer with cigarettes floating in it tipped over and sloshed onto my heels.

  So, it really was going to be that kind of night, huh? Well, at least that beer bath washed off the ditch dirt.

  Just find Curt, I told myself. Just find Curt, and everything will be better.

  “Kara!” Two regulars at these parties, Miranda and Kendall, both clad in tiny denim skirts, were squeezed on the couch between two cute sophomores, and it was quite the spectacle to watch them maneuver out of the low seating arrangement without flashing their goodies to the whole room. “You made it!” they squealed in unison, throwing their arms around me in a tangle of limbs and high-pitched excitement. Kara of three hours ago would have returned the enthusiasm and then some, but this Kara could hardly even fake it.

  “Have you guys seen Curt?” Balancing on one foot, I used someone’s discarded hoodie to wipe off my shoe as I scanned the front room for signs of my boyfriend.

  Miranda pointed through the arched doorway at the other end of the room. “He’s playing flip cup through there with the water polo boys. Enter at your own risk. It’s quite the battle zone.”

  “They put down the tarp.” Kendall gave me a knowing look, and I managed a smile in return. “Come sit with us after you find him, ’kay?” And then the two of them shoehorned themselves back between their sophomores on the couch.

  Crossing the front room, I waved to my friends and the people I knew from school, some of whom were orchestrating a little dance-off, but I moved on quickly before they started conversation. I didn’t want to be rude, but I also only wanted to talk to Curt. Once I had a big hug from him, once I talked to him about what was going on, then I could try to act like a normal person again.

  “There’s my girl!” Curt spotted me the second I walked through the doorway, and hearing his voice calmed me immediately. I hadn’t realized how much stress was coursing through my veins until his presence brought my anxiety down to a manageable level. I crunched my way across the tarp covering the carpet and wrapped my arms tightly around his waist.

  “I was getting worried about you,” he said, nuzzling his face into my hair as he hugged me. “I was starting to wonder if you had ditched me for bigger and better plans.”

  “Never.” I pulled my head away from his chest and scanned the room, which was filled with water polo guys and swimmers, all crammed around a dining table littered with red party cups. “Tonight was the worst. Can we talk somewhere for a minute? Alone?”

  During my drive, I’d thought over and over again about what Curt said in the car on the way home from rehearsal—that he could handle the tough stuff, that was what he was there for. I’d been avoiding the topic of my parents with him because I didn’t want to be annoying. But I really needed to talk to someone about this, and Curt was my go-to when it came to talking. It would be uncomfortable, but I knew I needed to take this opportunity and really open up to Curt about what was going on with my parents. I had to trust him to listen, help me feel better, and help me get through this.

  “I’m sorry.” He kissed my forehead, and I couldn’t help but smile at the soft pressure of his lips on my skin. “Can you give me like five minutes? We’re about to finish up this round, and then Carlos’ll be back from the store. He can cover for me, and I can give you my undivided attention.”

  I caught the disappointment before it hit me too hard, and I took one of my deep, cleansing breaths to keep it away. He just needed five minutes and then he would be all mine. I could handle five minutes.

  “Promise? I really need to—”

  “Here, take this, okay?” He waved his hand at one of the beer-filled cups from the table. “Go grab one of the lounge chairs outside and I’ll be right there. I promise.”

  “I’ll see you outside.” Standing up on my tiptoes, I kissed him quickly on the nose. I turned and walked toward the kitchen, but as I did, my shoe slipped in a river of beer on the tarp, throwing me off balance.

  “Whoa,” Curt said, grabbing me before I could fall and steadying me by my elbows. “Careful there, babe. You’re going to hurt yourself in those shoes.”

  “I’m fine, I’m fine.” Luckily all the water polo boys were too caught up in setting up the next round of flip cup, so they didn’t even notice me almost eat it on the beer-soaked tarp. I straightened myself up again and ran my fingers through my hair.

  “I can’t let the dancing queen hurt those graceful ankles of hers,” Curt said, slapping me on the butt. “Oh, and Kara,” he said as I turned to walk away. “Don’t forget your beer.”

&nb
sp; “Oh, yeah. Thanks.” I took a cup from him and walked toward the kitchen, pushing my way through the people blocking the way out.

  Once I was safely in the kitchen, which was considerably less crowded than the flip cup room, I lifted the red cup of beer to my mouth to take a sip. But one big whiff of the sour, foamy beer made me gag like I’d never gagged before. I couldn’t help it. With everything on my mind, the beer smell actually made my anxiety worse, if that was possible. I ditched the cup on the kitchen counter and stuck the edge of my thumb in my mouth instead, chewing on what was left of my thumbnail as I scanned the kitchen for some water or soda.

  “Aww, sucking your thumb, little baby?”

  I hadn’t even realized that I wandered right into Jenny Roy’s airspace, but there she was, poking around in Rob’s fridge, emitting her usual negativity like the stench of a skunk. She was that girl with the perfectly tanned skin, long, black hair in immaculately tousled beachy waves, and the tiniest shorts this side of the toddler section at Nordstrom. She was also the one girl at school who had randomly decided to hate me once I started dating Curt.

  “Shut up, Jenny,” I mumbled. I was never in the mood for her antics, but today, of all days, it was more likely she would push buttons I usually kept tightly covered. The last thing I wanted to do was let her see me react. Keep it together, Kara, I thought. Ignore her and get outside.

  “What are you even doing here? Besides being in my way?”

  I pushed past Jenny, not even trusting myself to respond to her, and I reached into the fridge to grab a bottle of water. She moved out of my way, thank God, but now she blocked the sliding glass door to the backyard. How could someone smaller than me, which wasn’t an easy feat in the first place, take up so much room? I knew it would still be a few minutes before Curt made it outside, so I opted for a detour to the bathroom rather than a patio door showdown.