I broke Dr. Parish’s rule and retreated to my bedroom to hide. There were several knocks on my door that night but when I didn’t answer them, people took the hint and left me alone. Cinder was apparently denser than my stepfamily. He called, and when I didn’t answer, he called again. And then again. Then he got online and made my computer start beeping at me with instant messages while my phone continued to ring.
EllaTheRealHero: Sorry, Cinder. I’m not in the mood to read tonight.
Cinder458: We don’t have to read. We can just talk. Call me?
EllaTheRealHero: I can’t. Not tonight.
Cinder458: Is this because of earlier?
I stared at the screen with my fingers poised over the keys to type a response, but I had no idea what to say. I was in no place to deal with Cinder at the moment. This day had completely wrecked me. I’d taken a huge step in trying to be part of my dad’s family tonight. I’d offered up a piece of myself to them, and in turn it opened the lid on all the memories I’d been suppressing for years.
For a while, it had worked. For a few minutes I had my dad back—the dad I remembered from my past. Anastasia’s question had taken him away again. She’d opened up those old wounds while I was in the middle of reliving the happy memories, so it hurt like a fresh cut. Normally I would let Cinder cheer me up, but I didn’t even have him tonight. He’d rejected me this afternoon too, just like my dad had all those years ago.
Cinder458: Ella?
Cinder458: I’m so sorry.
Cinder458: Ella, please talk to me. Let me explain.
EllaTheRealHero: You don’t need to explain yourself. I’m the one who should apologize. I’m sorry Vivian put you on the spot like that. I only met her a couple of days ago. We hadn’t had the “Cinder” conversation yet. She didn’t know what she was doing when she asked you to come Friday. If I’d known she was going to do it, I would have stopped her. I’m sorry.
Cinder458: You have nothing to be sorry for. It’s me, Ella, not you. I know how that sounds, but it’s true. You know how much I care about you, right? You have no idea how much I wanted to accept your friend’s invite. I just…
My phone rang again, but I didn’t pick it up. I didn’t want him to hear me cry.
Cinder458: Can we please not do this over the Internet?
EllaTheRealHero: Do what?
Cinder458: Have this talk.
EllaTheRealHero: We don’t have to talk about anything. I understand. It’s okay.
He called me again, and I ignored it again.
Cinder458: No, you don’t understand. It’s not that I don’t want to meet you; I just can’t. My life is really complicated. I don’t want you to get hurt because of it.
EllaTheRealHero: Are you saying that because you have a “sort of” girlfriend who you hate, but can’t dump?
Cinder458: That’s a big part of it.
EllaTheRealHero: But Cinder, I don’t care about that. Well, I mean of course I care, and I want you to break up with her because she makes you miserable and you deserve better, and I want you to be happy. But I don’t mind that you have a girlfriend. That wouldn’t hurt me. I’m not asking to date you. I just think it might be nice to finally meet my best friend.
Cinder458: But that’s just it. You’re my best friend too, and if we met everything would change. It could ruin our relationship. I’m not ready to take that chance. My life is too crazy right now, and I need you too much. I need our friendship. You’re the most important thing to me right now. The one thing that keeps me grounded. I can’t lose you.
EllaTheRealHero: You’re not going to lose me. Things would change between us a little, I’m sure, but it would only make us better friends. There’s no way it could ruin our friendship. Nothing could do that.
Cinder458: I know you think that, but you don’t understand. You’re so sweet, Ella. You’re still so young and naïve, and my lifestyle is so different from yours. You couldn’t handle it.
Right then was a really bad time to have this conversation. I was already emotional thanks to Anastasia, and Cinder could be so infuriating. I lost my temper and dialed his number. He picked up almost instantly and sounded relieved. “Hey!”
“You’re kidding me with this, right? You know how arrogant that makes you sound, don’t you? You’re what, twenty? Twenty-one?”
Okay, he’d sounded relieved until he realized I only called to yell at him. “It’s not arrogance. It’s just reality. And I’m twenty-two, FYI.”
“Oh, twenty-two, excuse me. You’re so old and wise. Those three-and-a-half years or whatever you have on me must be vital ones if I’m still so young and naïve compared to you.”
“I didn’t mean that as an insult,” he said with a tired sigh. “You’re not immature—hell, you’re way more mature than I am by far—but you’re so innocent in some ways. You’d be like a goldfish in a shark tank in my world. You’d get eaten alive. People like my own damn girlfriend would rip you to shreds. I can barely handle the bitch, and I’m a master at the game.”
“Screw you, Cinder! I’m not some kind of baby. I’ve been through more than you can possibly imagine and I’ve survived so far.”
I was up now, barefoot and pacing my bedroom. It was making my toes hurt, so I braved the risk of earthquakes and stepped out onto my deck. I leaned against the railing, taking the majority of the weight off my feet, hoping the view and crisp air would calm me down.
The line was silent for a long time and then Cinder quietly said, “That’s different, Ella. I know you’ve been through a lot. And you’re right, I have no idea what that must have been like for you. I’m sure you’re tougher than most people in some ways, but trust me, if I sucked you into my bullshit, it would crush you. And if we met in person, you would get sucked in. It would be unavoidable.”
“Thanks for the faith, jerk.”
Cinder sighed again. “I’m sorry. I know you’re frustrated. I know I sound like an asshole, but I swear to you if there were any way I could make it work, I would. My life is too insane and I don’t really have any control over it. You would get hurt, and you would end up hating me for it. Will you please just trust me on this? Can’t you let what we have right now be enough? Please?”
Ugh. He sounded genuinely desperate. There was no way I’d be able to say no to him, but I couldn’t just give in and let him have his way, either. “Fine. Whatever. I have to go.”
I hung up on him.
He called me back.
I turned off my phone.
By the time I went back inside and climbed into bed, Cinder had gone back to instant messaging me.
Cinder458: Come on, Ella. Don’t be like that.
Cinder458: I’m not trying to be a jerk.
Cinder458: Hello???
Cinder458: Ella!
Cinder458: Stop ignoring me, woman!!!
I should have signed off and put my laptop away. Instead, I responded.
EllaTheRealHero: I’m sorry, but I am just so pissed at you right now.
Cinder458: I know, and I’m sorry. I understand if you need some time. Just don’t stay mad forever, okay? I’ll miss you too much. I need you, Ellamara. I need this friendship.
I read his message and pulled my pillow over my face so I could scream into it.
EllaTheRealHero: Ugh! I hate how you do that!
Cinder458: Do what?
EllaTheRealHero: Make me love you even when I’m so mad at you!!!!!
Cinder458: I love you too, Ella. More than anyone in the whole world. I’m sorry you’re mad at me.
EllaTheRealHero: I’m sure I’ll get over it. Eventually.
Cinder458: I know. That’s why I’m not worried. Go have your girly freak-out and call me when you love me again.
EllaTheRealHero: I hate you.
Cinder458: No, you don’t. Goodnight, Ella.
EllaTheRealHero: Goodnight, Cinder.
. . . . .
I was devastated that Cinder didn’t want to meet, but in a way I was also relieved after our talk. For one thing, I no longer had to stress about the What Ifs. It was nice to understand what he was thinking, why he’d never asked to meet.
His reasoning was stupid, but at least he wasn’t rejecting me. Not really. He was afraid of losing me. Which, if you thought about it, was really sweet. It also happened to be exactly why I was scared of meeting him all this time. For me to not understand his hesitation would make me the biggest hypocrite in the world.
The other thing my conversation with Cinder did was free me from that small hope I’d had that someday we would have a happily ever after. I told myself all the time that Cinder and I would never be anything more than friends. I reminded myself every time I spoke to him that he dated other girls all the time. But of course, like any normal girl in my position would do, I hoped that he secretly loved me and held my breath waiting for the day he would finally admit it. Now I could stop waiting and start trying to get over him. At least, that’s what I told myself I would do when I finally met Rob Loxley after school the next day.
Vivian had come home with me because she’d never had a friend who’d lived up in the hills before, and she wanted to see the house. She flipped when I showed her the remote control windows.
“Ridiculous, right? The view is pretty amazing, though.”
“Whoa!” Vivian barged out onto my patio and spun around. “Is this for real?”
I laughed at her reaction. I couldn’t blame her. My private balcony was big and had a view all the way to the ocean. It wasn’t as large as the deck off the family room where the fire pit and the hot tub sat on the side of the cliff, but there was room for a round patio table with four chairs and a hammock.
“This is awesome! I’d live out here all the time.”
“I don’t go out there much,” I admitted, laughing. “With my luck, we’d have an earthquake and I’d plummet down the cliff and live through it.”
Vivian frowned at me as she plopped her bag down on the small patio table. “Criminal.”
She lifted her face to the sun and sucked in a deep breath. The sight made me smile. If there was one thing I loved about Southern California, it was the weather. It may have been November, but it was still seventy degrees outside. It would be strange to have Christmas without snow, but I had no doubt I’d get used to it quickly and without complaint.
“Get your butt out here, Ella.”
I sat down in the seat across from her, but I left the French doors hanging wide open so that I could dive for safety at the first sign of any trembling. We’d just pulled our homework out when Juliette barged into my room and threw herself down onto the hammock. “What’s up?” she snapped, glaring with all her might into the house toward my open bedroom door.
Vivian and I followed her gaze. We couldn’t see anything, but we could hear the laughs of several different people in the kitchen. As was quite common, a handful of the twins’ groupies had followed them home today. Anastasia’s grating voice stood out above the others. I couldn’t understand what she was saying, but the anger in her tone was unmistakable.
“Did you just get us involved in some kind of sibling war that will no doubt eat us alive as collateral damage?” Vivian asked Juliette.
Juliette huffed. “I don’t care. I am not hanging out with her while she’s being such a jerk. She’s pissed at me because she got chewed out after what happened at dinner last night. As if any of that was my fault!”
“Well,” I said, turning back to my trig homework, “you are welcome to stay, so long as we don’t have to listen to any of the drama.”
Juliette glanced at me, surprised, and I managed a smile. “Vivian and I were just discussing the possibility of a Brian Oliver marathon this Friday night at her place. That new comedy came out on DVD last week, and the V is for Virgin movie is on Netflix now. I haven’t seen it, but it’s supposed to be fun.”
“I’m in,” Juliette said without hesitation just as Dylan Traxler, Juliette’s latest fling, became our next surprise visitor.
Dylan was gorgeous and popular, but he didn’t bat a single eyelash at whom Juliette had chosen to hang out with. He saw the empty space on the hammock next to her and landed like a fly on sticky paper. “What are we in for?” he asked as he laid back and pulled Juliette with him.
“Movie night at Vivian’s this Friday.” She glanced at Vivian for approval. “Or is this a girls-only thing?”
“Co-ed is fine,” Vivian answered, doing a decent job of masking her shock. “But small. My place is tiny.”
“Cool,” Dylan said. I took that to mean he was “in” too.
Other than a shared glance, Vivian and I managed to act as if we had chill parties involving popular people all the time. Before either of us had to figure out what to say next, Dylan’s friend Luke moseyed into my room.
“Switchin’ it up, huh, Jules?” he asked, joining us on the patio. “Personally I was hoping for a Coleman twins catfight, but I’ll settle for a little love from the elusive stepsister.”
He pulled out the chair to my right and straddled it. Grinning, he nodded at me in an extremely bro-dog kind of way. “Sup, Ella? Word on the street is you’re secretly a pretty cool chick. What’s up with the loner status?”
I decided to forget the fact that Luke used to tease me about my limp when I first got to school. “Well, you know, having a fan club is kind of a hassle so…”
Luke laughed, and then his eyes caught sight of something in the house behind me and he lifted his hand. “Yo, Rob! Party’s out here today, bro.”
I had just enough time to share another look with Vivian, who seemed every bit as bewildered by our hijacked study time as I was, before Rob Loxley walked out onto my patio, one hand in his pocket and the other holding an energy drink.
I didn’t quite know what to make of Rob. He was no earth-shattering hottie like the guys Juliette and Anastasia dated, but he was decent-looking. He was a little short for a guy, only a couple inches taller than my five six. But since I’d never wear high heels again, I didn’t see his height as a problem. He had really short brown hair, green eyes, and a clear complexion. He was still in his school uniform, but he’d loosened his tie and untucked his shirt. It looked good. He wore casual as if he’d invented the concept.
I’d heard him described as both quiet and nice, but there was something about him that suggested those two things didn’t equate to shy. Maybe it was the nose that sat a little crooked on his face as if he’d broken it once, or the arms so lean his veins stuck out. The guy was little, but I bet he was ripped beneath his shirt. Scrappy seemed an accurate description. He also had an air of confidence that couldn’t be faked. He was comfortable with himself. Quiet and nice, he might be, but he was very intimidating at the same time.
Rob sat down next to me and then went to work sipping on his energy drink. He let his eyes drift over the balcony railing to the city below us, clearly enjoying the view. He didn’t speak, and it left me flustered. I had no idea what to do or say. When I looked to Vivian for help, Luke laughed. “My homeboy Rob is a man of few words, but the dude is seriously awesome. He’s a superstar soccer player. Captain of our school’s team, and he’s being recruited by a ton of colleges.”
Rob rolled his eyes at Luke’s bragging, but the corners of his lips twitched as he fought back a smile. He was modest but still loved the attention. I liked that.
“So, what’s up, Ella?” Luke continued when neither Rob nor I said anything. “Are you dating anyone? Jules said she thought there might be a guy.”
I couldn’t be sure, because I was too busy blushing, but I think Rob kicked Luke under the table.
“There’s no guy.” I didn’t know if I was more embarrassed by the question, the answer to it, or the fact that my face was on fire and everyone could see it.
“What about Cinder?” Juliette asked suddenly.
I hadn’t thought she was paying any attention to our conversation, but her eyes were on me now, along with everyone else’s. Thank you so much, Juliette. If it had been Ana that asked, I’d have known she brought Cinder up to torture me, but Juliette looked honestly confused.
“Cinder’s just a friend,” I mumbled. “We’ve never even met in person. He’s just someone who knows me from my blog.”
Vivian, like an awesome friend, tried to get the attention off of me. “We’re having a movie night at my place Friday night, Luke.” I met her sympathetic smile with a grateful look. She winked at me and then smiled at Luke. “Nothing special, just a handful of people, some snacks, and the latest Brian Oliver movie. But if you and Rob want to come…?”
Now it was my turn to kick my friend under the table. I tried to take back my grateful look by glaring at her, and she winked again. I risked a glance at Rob, horrified that he might have seen her wink and think I’d asked her to say something. He met my gaze and slid me a wry grin. “Is it just me, or are we being set up?”
I wasn’t sure if he’d asked to be set up, or if his friends had just picked up on his interest, but either way he was waiting for me to answer him. “It would seem so,” I mumbled, feeling my face reach new levels of red.
Rob’s eyes never left my face as he took another sip of his drink. After a moment, he said, “I’m okay with that.”
Again, I had no idea how to respond…unless my eyes doubling in size counted as a response.
“Is it cool if I come to your party on Friday?”
I blushed again. “It’s not really a party. Just a couple of us hanging out and watching movies.”
“Those are my favorite kind of parties.”
He wasn’t going to let me off the hook. I took a deep breath, willing myself to keep it together. I tried to appear a lot more relaxed than I felt as I shrugged. “Then I guess you’d better come.”
He smiled and it lit up his face, making me realize that he was cuter than I’d given him credit for. “Good. It’s a date.”