Catch a Falling Star (35 page)

Deflated, Adam looked up at the night sky, the stars dull

tonight and shrouded in cloud cover. Finally, he said, “I’ll have Mik

take you home.”

278

twenty-two

it was late when Mik dropped me off in front of my house after our

silent ride home from Tahoe. As he drove away, I could see the shadow

figures of Chloe and Alien Drake sitting on the roof of Drake’s house.

My stomach seized, realizing I was supposed to be there with them

tonight. I hadn’t even texted them to tell them I was in Tahoe.

Climbing the ladder, I called up to them. “You have room for

one more up there?”

Chloe’s head appeared over the side. “We’re mad at you.”

I stopped my ascent. “I know, I’m sorry.”

She offered me her hand, her face softening as she helped me

up onto the roof. “You look terrible. Cute dress, though. Nice

parrots.”

“You can have it.”

Her eyes widened. “Seriously? Thanks!”

Alien Drake frowned at me from where he sat, eating peanuts.

“Chlo’s right. What happened to you? Why does your face look so

blotchy?”

I had cried most of the way home, Mik stealthily handing me

tissues, as I stared out into the dark at the passing trees. “Adam and

I just broke up.”

279

“You broke up?” Chloe’s face paled in the moonlight. “How is

that possible?! You’re in
People
this week! Look at you two! You’re

adorable.” She held up a magazine, a shot of Adam and I sitting

outside Little Eats eating a grilled cheese sandwich on its cover.

The caption read:

CITY MOUSE,

COUNTRY MOUSE

Adam Jakes dines

with small-town love.

Seeing Chloe’s face, my body flooded with guilt. What a hypo-

crite I was. An hour ago, I’d stood there outside the Tahoe house

and called Adam a liar when, throughout all of this, I’d constructed

my own spectacular prism of lies.

Alien Drake stood and moved to take down the telescope. “I

think it’s for the best.”

Chloe sat down, tossing the magazine onto the quilt beside

her. “Of course you do.”

“You did the right thing, Carter,” he assured me.

Chloe groaned. “You’re just saying that because you’re sick of

her picking him over us. But it’s Adam Jakes. And he picked Carter.

He picked
her
.”

I couldn’t do it anymore. Collapsing onto the quilt, the sky

heavy with stars above me, I knew I couldn’t lie to them anymore.

“He didn’t pick me at all; his manager did.”

Chloe’s head tilted in confusion. “What do you mean?”

I pul ed my legs into my chest. “It wasn’t real. None of it was real.”

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Alien Drake zipped a pocket closed on the telescope bag, then

took a seat next to me. “Wait, what are you talking about?”

They listened intently while I told them, Chloe holding my

hand, Alien Drake asking questions. I told them everything, send-

ing my story out into the night, the crickets and stars providing a

sort of force field around us. I was scared of how angry they’d be.

That maybe they’d never speak to me again. My heart broke all over

again seeing their faces darken as I talked. But then their looks soft-

ened as they heard me out. “The dumb thing,” I said, not crying

anymore, feeling numb, the moment dreamlike, “is that I really

started to think we could have something real. How stupid is that?”

I waited for them to yell at me, to tell me that I was a horrible

person, that I’d betrayed them, knowing I deserved whatever they

tossed my way.

Instead, Chloe squeezed my hand, her eyes glossy. “The whole

thing sounds awful, Carter. I can’t believe you tried to do this

without us.”

Her understanding washed over me. “I’m so sorry. But I

promised them I wouldn’t tell anyone.”

“And you were trying to help John, as always,” Alien Drake

said softly.

Chloe’s eyes lit up. “Maybe Adam feels as bad as you do. Maybe

you should try talking to him.”

Alien Drake rolled his eyes. “Geez, Chloe, did you not just

hear what she said? The guy’s a total fraud.”

Chloe’s face crumbled. “I can’t believe this whole thing wasn’t

real. I mean, Adam Jakes picking you, it just made it seem like,

well, he could have picked any of us.”

281

Alien Drake let out a snort. “Hello! I’m actually sitting

right here.”

She shook her head, biting her lip. “That’s not what I meant. I

didn’t mean me. I didn’t mean he could have picked me specifi-

cally.” She looked across me, catching Alien Drake’s eye. “And I

wouldn’t want him to, I swear. It’s just that for these few weeks,

our world hasn’t seemed quite so . . . so
little
.” We laughed at her

choice of words. We’d grown up here, laughing at but also loving

our Little-ness. Still, Chloe was right; it was sometimes very

small, and Adam Jakes had brought something bigger here for a

few weeks, had widened our skies.

I glanced between them, each of them at my side like they

always were. “I’m not going to ask you guys not to tell anyone. I

don’t feel right about that. Only I kind of hope you won’t.”

Chloe slapped my bare arm.

“Ouch!” I rubbed at it.

“We would never tell if you didn’t want us to,” she said, her

eyes wide. “We’re your friends.”

“Thank you, guys.” Leaning into them under the stars, I knew

I would rather have a few people love me for who I really was than

millions of people adore me for who they
thought
I was.

Just one of the many ways I was different from Adam Jakes,

one of the many reasons why he and I were never meant to be.

Early the next afternoon, I met with Parker one last time in the gar-

den of The Hotel on Main. Minutes before, we’d stood on the

porch, issuing a statement to the press, my sunglasses dark saucers

282

over my face. I ended things, we explained, because I just couldn’t

find my place in Adam’s world. It wasn’t Adam, I told them. He’d

tried. I just couldn’t find the midpoint in our worlds. There’d been

flashes and questions and then, after a few minutes, Parker had led

me inside, past Bonnie’s sympathetic face, into the garden in back.

Now, Parker handed me a check. The rest of the money. When

I didn’t reach for it, he said, “You earned it.”

So I took it from him and tore it up.

Surprised, he took the torn pieces. “What about your brother?”

“He leaves tomorrow for his program. We’ll figure it out as a

family.” John could finish recovering from his injuries at the in-

patient program down in the Bay Area where Mom would drive

him. We had no idea how to pay for it, but I couldn’t take any more

of Adam’s money. Somehow, the money felt like the biggest lie of

all. And Adam had already made that donation to Sandwich

Saturdays. He’d called Investigator Meadows for help.

“We’re even,” I told Parker.

With sad eyes, Parker shook his head, pocketing the ripped

pieces of check. “Someone else would like a chance to say good-

bye, if you have a moment.” He motioned to where Adam emerged

from the shadow of a tree in the lower part of the garden. “Go easy

on him,” he said, leaving us alone in the cool green of the yard.

I walked down the sloping lawn to meet him. “Hi.”

He had his sunglasses pushed into his hair and his hands in the

pockets of his shorts. “Hi.” He cleared his throat quietly. “So,

you’re pretty mad at me.”

I shrugged, studying the fountain resting near the base of

the tree. It had a frog spitting water into a pool. “Not really, not

283

anymore.” Because I wasn’t. This was something else, a sort of

hurt that burrowed deep and nested there.

He searched my face. “I’m sorry, though. I wish you could

understand.”

I put my hand on his arm, his nearness still affecting me, still

sending those currents moving through me. “I want to, honestly.

It’s just . . .” I searched the leafy trees around us, as if their shade

held answers. “I just don’t think I can. I’m sorry.”

Before he could say anything else, before I could change my

mind, I walked away.

At home, I found my parents reading a note from John at the

kitchen table. Mom held it out for me to read, and I dropped into

the chair across from them, tears welling.

Dad, Mom, & C —

I can’t go to that treatment center. I’ve been

there before and it feels like jail. I know you mean

well trying to send me there, but I just can’t. So I’m

leaving. I need to figure this thing out for myself —

without your help. Please don’t try to find me.

— J

“I’m sorry,” I whispered, as much to myself as to them. It was

my turn to feel like a black hole, too much density in too small a

space, too much debris sucked inside me with no chance of escape.

Mom reached across the table for my hand as Dad stood and

284

put his arms around me. The afternoon light played on the kitchen

wall, shifting as the tree outside moved in the wind. The refrigera-

tor clicked and hummed.

Dad sighed into my hair. “Me too.”

The Ghost of Christmas Future scene would be filmed back in

L.A., so the last scene Adam Jakes would shoot in Little, in a

narrow Victorian near downtown, was the famous Tiny Tim “God

bless us, every one!” moment. In this retelling, Scott would visit a

weak Cheryl at her home, and she would wake just in time to say,

“God bless us, Scott, every one!” in front of a roaring fire and

sparkling Christmas tree.

Late that night, while my parents talked quietly downstairs

about John’s flight, I slipped out of the house, the moon a slim

wedge in the sky. I started in the direction of Alien Drake’s, but I

paused on the sidewalk, realizing that the one person I really

wanted to see, the person I felt pulled to like a magnet, was shoot-

ing his last scene in Little in a house two streets away. I turned and

headed down the hill.

When I got to the house, I knocked lightly and one of the crew

guys opened the back door for me. A slender hallway spilled into a

living room where I found Adam sitting on a red velvet sofa, study-

ing a script as the crew hurried around him, the room a cozy

Christmas scene.

When Adam saw me, he stood in surprise. “Carter?”

Seeing his face light, I crumbled, and he whisked me into a

room they weren’t using, the kitchen. Moonlight streamed through

285

the wide window over the sink, glazing everything silver. Adam

looked worried. “What happened?”

I showed him John’s note.

“Oh no,” he mumbled as he read. “I’m sorry.”

“He’s not going.” I brushed at the tears on my cheeks, feeling

ridiculous for being here.

Adam put a hand on my shoulder. “Where do you think he

went?” He handed the note back.

“No idea.” I slipped it into my bag. “We don’t know where

he is.”

“Is there anything I can do?” he asked, his eyes concerned.

I shook my head. “There really isn’t.” I let out an awkward

laugh. “Sorry, I know I shouldn’t be here. It’s just, it’s so stu-

pid of me.”

Adam frowned. “What is?”

“I thought he’d get help, you know? I thought he’d get better.”

I took a deep breath. “I thought he’d finally figure it out.”

“Relapse is part of recovery.” Adam held up his hands against

my sharp look. “I might not have been in real rehab, but I’ve spent

plenty of time in therapy.”

I leaned against the silvered counter. “I was just hoping he’d

have his Scrooge moment, you know? Like Scott, like you do in the

movie. Realize he’d been wrong, that he could change, and then

fix it.”

“He’s an addict. It’s not that easy.”

“So was Scrooge. Addicted to selfishness, addicted to money.”

I motioned toward the other room, where the sounds of the scene

echoed, spilled Christmas into the night kitchen. “But he fixes it.

286

He realizes he’s wrong in two quick hours.” I sighed. “Do you

ever get tired of telling lies to people with all these Hollywood

endings?”

Adam’s expression softened. “Not lies. Possibilities. Isn’t that

what you and Alien Drake are always talking about with your star-

gazing? We have to keep telling these stories, just like we have to

keep looking up at the stars at night, because we’re human. We

need steady reminders. We need to hope.”

My heart tugged. Why couldn’t he just be a boy who went to

Little High, who took me to the movies instead of starring in

them? Why did our lives have to be so different?

But he was right. We needed our ghosts to remind us.

“I think I’m going to start dancing again,” I told him. “With

Nicky. At Stagelights. I’m going to go see him tomorrow.”

“That’s great!”

“Nothing big,” I hurried to explain. “Just for fun. And I’m

going to look into some dance therapy programs. You know, for

after graduation. For college.”