Page 87 of I Kissed Shara Wheeler
“Chloe,” Smith says finally, holding up a hand. There’s a speck of glitter on his thumbnail, like he painted it and then scraped it off. “It’s fine. Did she tell you why she left?”
“She said she did all this because she lied about getting in to Harvard, and because she wanted to distract me so she could win valedictorian,” Chloe rattles off. “And to force you and Rory to talk to each other, because she thinks you’re only dating her because of him.”
Smith doubles over, forehead to knees, and Chloe thinks he’s taking the news hard until she hears him laugh out, “Oh, thank you, Jesus.”
“What?”
Smith straightens up again, still laughing. He swipes a hand across his forehead. “I thought I was gonna have to tell her myself. Whew.”
There’s no way. She saw Smith’s call log after Shara disappeared. He couldn’t have faked caring that much. “You—what are you saying? She was right?”
“It’s,” Smith says, sobering with a wince, “complicated.”
“I defended you!”
“Look, it only started that way!” he insists. “It was… okay, so, freshman year, I went to a party at Dixon’s house and found out Rory had moved in next door to Shara. And he didn’t want to talk to me at school, but I realized I could still stay close to him, and I wanted to know he was okay. I was worried about him. The last few months we were friends, we talked a lot about how he was afraid his dad would have to move, and how his brother wouldn’t be able to drive us around introducing us to music anymore because he was going to college. I knew it had to be rough for him. So I—I asked Shara to homecoming, so I could go over to her house and see him.”
“You spent twenty dollars on carnations for that?”
“I wasn’t sure she’d say yes,” Smith says. “It was only supposed to be homecoming, I swear, but then I liked her. Like, as a person. She was cool, and I could be myself around her. And everyone liked us together, and it worked for both of us, and I felt so guilty about how it started, but it was too late to tell her the truth. And every time I said I loved her, I meant it, just, you know. Not like that. And I tried to forget about the Rory thing and be a good boyfriend, but he was—he was always there, and I couldn’t think about her because I was thinking about him—”
“Oh my God,” Chloe gasps, “you are in love with him.”
Smith’s eyes go wide. “Is that what Shara said? Am I—Does he—?”
“Uh-uh.” Chloe holds both hands up to ward him off. “I am not getting involved with that side of this love quadrilateral. Go back to the story.”
“Right,” Smith says, shaking his head. Chloe is definitely not attending Smith and Rory’s emotionally fraught MarioKart session tonight. “Anyway, next thing I knew, it’d been like, two and half years and Shara was my best friend other than Ace, and I realized she deserved to know before we decided what to do after graduation. So I told myself I was gonna come clean after prom, but then she dipped. And the worst part is, I was relieved, because it meant I could put the conversation off a little longer. That’s why I didn’t say anything after the note from Dixon’s house.”
Chloe tries to catch up. “What about the note from Dixon’s house?”
“She told me where she was in that note,” Smith says, rubbing the back of his neck. “The G in ‘Graduation’ was capitalized.”
It takes a second for the memory to snap into focus: the name on the back of Wheeler’s sailboat. Graduation.
Chloe, who’s still processing the revelation that Smith and Shara have been in the Willowgrove version of a lavender marriage since sophomore homecoming, tries not to scream when she says, “You’ve known where she was since Dixon’s party?”
“I know! I know! I’m an asshole!” Smith says. “You think I don’t feel like shit? I feel like shit! But the longer it went on, the longer I didn’t have to talk to her.”
“But…” Chloe presses her fingers to her temples. “But she knew you’d figure that out. Why would she tell you so early?”
“I think,” Smith says, “she wanted to give me the option to end the whole thing, but she trusted I’d let her do what she had to do first. We’ve always kind of gotten each other like that. Like, even with all of the stuff I’ve found out about her since she left, I still think that part was always true.”
“So, you… you let me and Rory run around like idiots for weeks. We went in the air ducts, Smith. The air ducts.”
“I told you, I’m not proud of it. Of any of it. But… I don’t know, Chloe. I kinda did want to let her do her thing,” Smith tells her. “And not just because I didn’t want to have the conversation, or because I felt guilty, or because I was starting to wonder who she even was. And not because it meant Rory was talking to me again for the first time since we were fourteen, though that was… definitely part of it.”
Chloe shakes her head. “What other possible reason is there?”
Smith considers the question, folding his hand under his chin.
“The other day, after the theater party and the lake,” Smith says, “I came home when everyone was asleep and pulled flowers out of my dad’s garden. And I sat in front of my mirror and put them in my hair. Just to see how it would look. And it looked dope. So I thought about what Ash said, and some stuff I talked to Summer about, and what I’m supposed to look like and act like to play football, and what actually feels like me, and the way Shara used to look at me sometimes… I mean, yeah. Shara’s done shitty things. That sucks. But at the same time, if you’re not what Willowgrove wants you to be, and if your family believes certain stuff, it can make you kind of crazy. You know what I mean?”
The words “not what Willowgrove wants you to be” send Chloe’s brain tumbling noisily away like Georgia’s water bottle when she dropped it down the C Building stairs. Her ears start ringing.
Why does everyone keep bringing that up?
“I, uh. Okay. I actually have to go.” She turns for the door, then pauses. “Um. Not because of you. You’re doing great, with all the, um. Identity stuff. Also, pronouns?”
