Unfriended (11 page)

The next day at work passed in a haze. I was pretty sure that people ordered smoothies and I made them, but mostly I existed in a happy world in my own head. My friends would text me and I would respond, but I was
only half aware of what I was doing. My thoughts were on Nate, and counting down the minutes until he would be back and I could tell him that I loved him, too.

Luckily, it was a gray, overcast day, threatening rain, so there were far fewer customers than usual. But my nonparticipation at work meant that Kavya actually had to make a smoothie or two, which she claimed stressed her out so much that she needed to leave early to get a pedicure. And Daryl and John left midafternoon to head to their valet job—and to try and score some sweet Jack Johnson tickets—so I was closing up alone. Which was fine with me, as this gave me uninterrupted time to sit on the counter and stare into space, reliving the events of the night before.

Five minutes before I was due to close up, I was startled out of my reverie when my phone beeped with a text.

INBOX 1 of 32
From: Justin
Date: 6/22, 5:55
P.M.

Hey, Mad—I see on Constellation that you’re at work. Can I swing by and get my wallet from you?—Justin

I let out a breath. It had been bothering me that I still had Justin’s wallet, and even though it meant that I would have to stay at work a little later, I was happy to get it off my hands. And plus, it wasn’t like Nate was around and I had anything important to do that night, anyway. I texted back right away.

OUTBOX 1 of 37
To: Justin
Date: 6/22, 5:57
P.M.

Sure! Come on by. I’m just closing up.

A response from him came almost immediately.

INBOX 1 of 33
From: Justin
Date: 6/22, 5:58
P.M.

Great! Are you by yourself?—Justin

I frowned down at my phone, thinking that was a bizarre question, when it beeped again.

INBOX 1 of 34
From: Justin
Date: 6/22, 5:58
P.M.

I mean, is your coworker there too?—Justin

I
knew
Justin had been interested in Kavya, and this proved it. I felt myself smiling as I responded, adding my name as a joke I was pretty sure he wouldn’t get.

OUTBOX 1 of 38
To: Justin
Date: 6/22, 6:00
P.M.

Sorry—just me. See you soon!—Madison

By the time I’d locked the freezer, rinsed out the blenders, and cleaned the wheatgrass machine, the bell over the door chimed. I looked up and saw Justin standing in the doorway.

“Hey,” I said, smiling at him. Justin walked over to the counter, and I pulled his wallet out from my back pocket.

“Is that it?” he asked as he reached me. I nodded and he smiled. “I can’t believe I forgot it. Thanks for coming through for me, Mad.”

“Sure,” I said. I held out the wallet to him, but he made no movement to take it from me.

“So here we are again,” he said. I looked around, not exactly sure what he was talking about. The last time he’d come in? When he’d forgotten his wallet? Maybe seeing my blank expression, he prompted, “Remember, we came here on one of our first dates?”

I did, in fact. Lisa hadn’t approved at all, saying that early dates should not involve Styrofoam or straws. Or drinks with names like Mango-Go. “Yes,” I said, wondering where he was going with this. “Of course I do.” I smiled and extended my wallet-holding arm farther out, trying to ignore the fact that it was actually beginning to ache a little.

“I really liked you back then, you know,” Justin said. He had a small, half-fixed smile on his face that didn’t seem to have any connection to the words that he was saying. “I thought it was so cute that you came
to my rugby games. I could tell you liked me, too.”

I blinked at him and finally lowered my arm, which had begun to shake, making me realize it might be time to start doing dips, or push-ups, or something. “Yeah,” I said slowly, gathering my thoughts, “I liked you, too. You know, back then. That’s why we went out.” I nodded with what I hoped was finality and held out his wallet to him once again. But Justin didn’t even glance down at it and continued to look straight at me.

“You know, I don’t think I ever told you how embarrassing it was for me when you dumped me over Friendverse during spring break.”

I stared at him. This was ancient history. This had all happened
months
ago, and we had all moved on. Hadn’t we? I had absolutely no clue why it was resurfacing now. “Wait,” I said, giving my arm another rest, “you know I wasn’t the one who did that. You know that my Friendverse got hacked.”

“But I still got dumped, didn’t I? Publicly?” he asked.

“Well,” I said, feeling my forehead crease, “yes. But …” I tried to gauge from his expression what this was about. His face looked blank, which wasn’t out of the ordinary for Justin. But there was something about it—maybe the fixed expression—that made me think that it was carefully blank, and masking something else. But I had no idea what. “Why are we talking about this now?” I finally asked, getting exasperated.

“We should have talked about it then,” he said.

“I did try,” I pointed out, even though the last thing I wanted to do was to belabor this conversation I wasn’t
even sure why we were having in the first place. “But you were going out with Kittson then, and didn’t seem to really want to discuss it.”

“Kittson,” he said slowly. He took his hands out of his pockets, which gave me hope that we were getting closer to the moment when he’d actually take his wallet back. I was a few minutes away from just dropping it on the counter. He gave a short, bitter laugh, a kind I’d never heard from him before. “Yeah. What a disaster that was. After you dump me,
she
dumps me and starts dating that total burnout. And then when I say I want to get back together with you, you totally shoot me down.”

“Justin,” I said slowly, wondering why he was steering us forcibly down memory lane. “Where is this coming from?”

He shrugged and looked over at the happy smoothie couple pictures before glancing back at me. “I just think you treated me like crap last semester,” he said bluntly, surprising me. “And then you totally used me at the prom.”

“I didn’t,” I said quickly, feeling that this, at least, could be cleared up. “I’m sorry I couldn’t explain it better at the time, but I really didn’t mean it like that—”

“Whatever,” Justin said, interrupting me. “I just wanted to make sure you knew where I was coming from with this.”

“Okay,” I said. “But listen, Justin. I really wasn’t using you, I swear. I had thought that you were doing me a favor. As a friend. That’s all.” Justin stared at me, his small smile gone, and it seemed like he was hearing
me for the first time in this bizarre—and for him, quite extended and multisyllabic—conversation. I held up his wallet for him, hoping that he could finally take it off my hands and I could go home. “Just like this is me doing you a favor,” I said. I held it out once again, and Justin looked down at it, then shook his head.

“Actually,” he said, and his voice was quieter now, and colder. “This wasn’t you doing a favor for me. This was me doing a favor for someone else.” He reached into his pocket, pulled out his phone, and started typing a quick text.

I stared at him, totally confused. “And who’s that?” I asked.

“Oh,” Justin said, giving me another small smile as he pocketed his phone, “I think you’ve met.” As he said this, the bell above the front door jangled again. I looked up to the entrance and felt my heart stop for just a moment.

The figure there was wearing a gauzy tank top, fitted skirt, stacked pumps, blunt, dark brown bangs, and a satisfied smile.

I stared for just a moment, trying to make sense of what I was seeing.