Real Live Boyfriends by E. Lockhart Page A

the nether regions—and I was wondering how a guy could want to make out with me so much—he was all over me, really—and still not call me the way he used to, or send me e-mails, or even really talk to me when I was trying to have a serious conversation. I didn’t really touch him back, the way I usually did, because my brain was going: Why do you say nothing’s wrong when there’s obviously something wrong?
    And if you don’t like me that much anymore, why do you like grabbing my boob?
    In fact, I think you like grabbing my boob more now than you did before you left.
    And oh, actually, that feels amazing.
    And oh, I think I love you.
    I do love you, Noel.
    At least, I love the you who used to be here.
    But now, that you is somewhere else.
    Like maybe New York City.
    Or maybe just closed off to me.
    And was it something I did?
    Or something I said?
    And oh, that neck-kissing thing is—
    No one ever did exactly that before.
    I do love you.
    But hello, I don’t really feel like kissing when everything’s so weird with us.
    And I don’t know if you get to touch my boobs and kiss my neck that way when you wait so long to call me back and you never seem to hear what I am trying to tell you.
    It was really quite a complicated situation to be in, and not anywhere near as fun as getting horizontal had been, back when everything was cheerful and simple between us. Eventually when his hand roamed up my dress toward my butt, I pulled away and said,
    “Something’s wrong with me , then, Noel, if nothing’s wrong with you.”
    He crinkled his forehead. “What?” It was like he’d He crinkled his forehead. “What?” It was like he’d forgotten the whole conversation we’d just been having.
    I didn’t want to repeat myself. “I have to go,” I said.
    “Ruby, wait!” he called as I got out of the car. “Are you mad?”
    “No,” I turned. “I just have to go. We have school tomorrow.”
    Noel didn’t get out of the car. He didn’t chase after me. Just like at Snappy Dragon, he didn’t chase after me.
    1 Lobotomies: For real, they used to do this to people from the 1930s to the ’50s. Just chopped out a bit of the brain to see if it solved a person’s mental health problems, including anxiety disorders and just inconvenient behavior like moodiness or defiance. The procedures involved either drilling holes in the scalp or going in through the eye with an ice pick. And get this: the doctor didn’t need to get the patient’s informed consent, so you could completely just go to bed in the mental hospital and wake up with a section of your brain having been removed .
    Needless to say, it’s good I wasn’t born back then, or I’d have had an ice pick through the eyeball ages ago .

    An Agonizing Public Scene! With
    Violence!
    a video clip: Meghan, leaning against the front of her Jeep, which is parked in front of the Olivers’ dock.
    She’s holding her usual thermos full of vanil a cappuccino and wearing a golf team T-shirt, a jean skirt and Birkenstocks.
    Roo: (behind the camera) It’s the first day of school, so I want to ask you about popularity .
    Meghan: I used to think I was popular, and then later I realized I wasn’t .
    Roo: What do you mean?
    Meghan: Back when I was going out with Bick. He was a senior, and he had all these friends, and we went to lots of parties. I hung around with all these senior girls. I thought I was popular .
    Roo: Then what?
    Meghan: You didn’t invite me to your Spring Fling party, remember?
    Roo: I’m so sorry .
    Meghan: Well, I was upset at first, but then I realized. I had been to all these other parties, all year, but no one had ever invited me. I just went. Because Bick was invited. In fact, not one of those people I ate lunch with every day ever called me. Or e-mailed me. Or put a note in my mail cubby.
    I never saw them if Bick wasn’t around .
    Roo: Ag .
    Meghan: I know. Then you and Nora started actually calling me, and we were like, friends for real and went