Until It Hurts to Stop by Jennifer R. Hubbard Page B

worse, mine? Would he rat me out, get me expelled from school for threatening other students? “I wouldn’t really poison anyone.”
“Yeah, I know that,” he said.
My skin was damp with nervousness by then, my gut churning. Raleigh and Adriana told me a thousand times a day that they wanted me to die. They threatened to break my arms, burn me, and scar my skin. They told me I should kill myself. And yet when I fantasized about poisoning them, I felt guilty.
The worst thing Raleigh and the other girls did was to plant that lump of coal inside me, the shame of believing I was the wrong one, wrong in every way. After all, there must be something wrong with me or why else would they be picking on me?
But Nick never told anyone what I’d said. I didn’t know why he understood how I felt. I only knew that Nick did understand, and from then on he was not just the guy whose house I had to stay at while my mother worked. From then on, we were friends.
    So I don’t know how he can say that Raleigh isn’t a real threat to me. I open my mouth to argue with him, when his phone goes off. Beethoven’s Seventh rings out like a bad omen, a warning.
    Nick groans. “Will you get that? Tell him I’m driving.” He shoves the phone at me.
“Why don’t you let it go to voice mail?”
“He hates voice mail.”
Only Nick’s father could try to deny a fact of life as ingrained as voice mail, but I answer the phone. “Hello?”
“Who’s this?” Nick’s father booms.
“It’s Maggie, Dr. Cleary. Nick’s driving right now.”
“He couldn’t pull over? Never mind. Tell him I can’t take him to dinner tonight after all. My idiot post-doc screwed up a month’s worth of data, and I’m going to be working all night.”
“Okay.”
“But tell him to text me about how he’s doing in history. I want to know what’s going on there.”
“I will.”
“Good. Thank you, Margaret.” Dr. Cleary hangs up before I can say good-bye. Or anything else.
I pass on the message to Nick, who says, “That breaks my heart, that I can’t spend the whole night getting grilled about my history grade.”
“Aw, don’t worry, Nick. I can grill you about your history grade if you want.”
“Sounds like a fun night.”
“Seriously, though—if you want help, I could work with you. I got an A in Connard’s class last year.”
“Okay. Thanks.”
That night, when we’re going over the causes of the Great Depression at his kitchen table, I lean over to point out a date on the time line in his book. When he looks up from the page, we’re eye to eye, our faces close enough to kiss. He draws back, and as soon as he does, I do, too, so I’m not left leaning in toward him as if I expect something. We can barely look at each other for another half hour or so.
And it’s like a slap, because before last weekend, that awkwardness was never there. As much as I wish he would’ve leaned in toward me just now, I would settle for his not springing away from me as if I’ve scalded him.
He gets up to hunt for something to eat, and trips over some books he piled behind his chair, knocking them across the floor. He says, “For my next trick, I’ll use my athletic skill to scale Crystal Mountain.”
We laugh, and I help him pick up the books, and we ease back into our old selves. Yet I wonder how many times we’re going to stumble over moments like these, how long it’s going to take to get all the way back to normal—if normal is even possible.

fourteen
    Nick and I are on our way to Vanessa’s party. My nerves tighten when he turns onto Ridgway, the curving road leading to her house. I can tell that he has just showered—the dampness of his hair, the scent of soap—and it seems strange for the two of us to be out after dark, as clean as if it’s morning. I’m chewing a cinnamon candy because someone once told me it was better for your breath than mint, and my shoulders are cold. I shouldn’t have worn a shirt this thin, but I saw the same shirt on a