The Fill-In Boyfriend Read online

  “He used to live here before I knew him. Before he went away to school. He must’ve known her from then.”

  “Who is she anyway?” Claire asked this time. “We should find her and talk to her. Tell her to stay away from Bradley.”

  “I didn’t recognize her. Maybe she doesn’t even go to school here. Maybe she went to prom with a friend.” My anxiety was building, my heart racing. I didn’t like lying. Lucky for me, Daniel Carlson sidestepped into our group, draping his arm around my shoulder. I was happy for the interruption, knowing he’d change the subject to student council stuff that we had been working on for the last few weeks. Or at least that’s why I figured he was here. It’s all we ever talked about anymore.

  “So, now that you’re single . . .”

  Or maybe he wouldn’t change the subject. “I don’t do repeats, Daniel.”

  He laughed. “Too bad for you.”

  “Yes, it tears me up inside.”

  “So,” he said. “Rally emergency. The sound system for the gym is down. Mr. Green doesn’t know if it will be fixed by Friday.”

  “Okay, we’ll discuss it at the meeting today.”

  “As vice president, I felt it important to report this immediately as I am just a servant to your authority.”

  I hip-checked him. “Whatever. I’ll see you after school.”

  “I’m dismissed, boss?”

  I smiled. “Go away.”

  He ran off, joining another group of girls ahead of us. Claire and Laney had fallen a few steps behind, talking about calculus homework, but Jules was still at my side.

  “I thought he said he didn’t know our town very well. He asked if we had an arcade,” Jules said.

  I blinked, confused. “What?”

  “Bradley. You said he lived here before, but he said he didn’t know our town very well.”

  Something in me snapped. I wasn’t going to put up with this anymore. I’d been trying to play nice for months now, thinking if I didn’t they might choose her over me. But right now, I had to take the risk because I was tired of feeling like I had to defend myself every time I hung out with my best friends. So in a voice as low and stern as I could manage I said, “I’m done with this. You met Bradley. He’s obviously real. If you continue to play whatever game it is that you’re playing, I will take my friends and you will be gone.”

  My hands shook and I shoved them into my pockets so she couldn’t see how upset it had made me to say that. I was assuming what I had told fill-in Bradley the other night was true—that she thought I was the leader of this group. If she thought that, this power play would work.

  She narrowed her eyes and her head clicked one notch to the side, like a lioness assessing her next meal. “I’m not sure what you’re talking about,” her mouth said even though her look said, “Game on.”

  “Good. It was just my imagination, then.” I took the steps to the C building quickly, outpacing the group. “See you guys at lunch.”

  A group good-bye echoed from the three of them and I ducked into the building while they continued on to the next one. I pressed my back against the wall, counted ten deep breaths until the shakiness was gone, then continued on to class.

  I sank into my seat and the girl in front of me, a girl who normally sat on the other side of the room, turned around to pass me the quiz Mrs. Rios was already handing out.

  “Thanks,” I said, annoyed Mrs. Rios had chosen to give us a pop quiz on the Monday after prom. I pulled out my phone and quickly sent off a tweet: PSA: Pop Quiz in Government. That should win me a few points with my followers. It made me feel better to do something nice after what I’d just said to Jules. I sighed and tucked my phone away.

  “Bad day?” the girl in front of me asked.

  I met her eyes lined in thick black, like they always were, and gasped. It was fill-in Bradley’s sister.

  CHAPTER 7

  “Bec?” I asked.

  She just smirked at me then turned back around, retrieving a pencil from her backpack.

  “That is so not fair,” I said. “You looked nothing like this at prom.” I gestured toward her outfit, which was black layered with more black, then to her face, which was covered in almost as much makeup as my makeup-hoarding grandma wore on bingo night.

  “It was a social experiment. You failed.” Bec paused. “Or succeeded in proving us right. Either way.”

  “So you’re mad at me for not recognizing you when you purposefully made it impossible.”

  “If that were your worst offense, I’d consider myself lucky.”

  I’d done something else to her? Something worse?

  Mrs. Rios cleared her throat. “Girls, no talking. It’s time for the quiz.”

  This morning had not started off well. Fill-in Bradley could’ve told me that his sister normally dressed like a heavy metal band member. I might’ve remembered her then. She’d only been here a few months—mid-year transfer. As far as I remembered, I hadn’t said more than two words to her, so I wasn’t sure what my other offenses might have been.

  I was distracted for the entire quiz, my mind barely registering the questions let alone being able to answer them in an intelligent manner. I tried my best then stared at the back of Bec’s head the rest of class waiting for my opportunity to talk to her. When the bell rang, I grabbed my backpack as quickly as she grabbed hers and matched her step for step out the door.

  “What?” she barked when we were in the hall.

  I wanted to ask what her brother’s name was, but I couldn’t admit that he hadn’t told me. “I need your brother’s phone number.”

  “Why?”

  “I just wanted to send him a thank-you text.” Right. A thank-you text. It would go something like Dear fill-in Bradley, Thank you for lying for me and tricking my friends by pretending to be my boyfriend. Now, can you tell me why you decided to come into prom with me? Why you wanted to help me? Why you gave me a super-intense look while we danced like you could see something in me that I had no idea existed? That way I can get you out of my head. Thank you.

  “If he wanted you to have his number, he would’ve given it to you.” She seemed to take pleasure in saying this to me.

  “He would’ve but he had to leave abruptly with the whole fake fight thing.”

  She groaned as if she had just remembered how I had used him again.

  “If I give you my number, will you give it to him?”

  “If I throw myself down these stairs, will you leave me alone?”

  We had exited the building and were standing at the top of the cement stairs. A guy as equally punked-out as her stood at the bottom staring up at us. She didn’t wait for my answer, which technically could’ve been yes or no, just walked down to join him.

  “Hey, Gia,” he said when I caught up with them both at the bottom.

  I did a double take and realized he was the guy who had been Bec’s date to the prom. “Hi. I’m sorry. I don’t know your name.”

  He shrugged. “I’ve only been in four of your classes over the last three years. Why would you?”

  My cheeks reddened. Had he really? I looked at him again, closer. He honestly didn’t look at all familiar to me, except from prom the other night. We did go to public school—class sizes were big.

  “Watch out,” Bec said, “your popular friends might see you walking with us.”

  I looked up to see Claire and Laney making a beeline for me. They probably wouldn’t recognize her, but Bec was right, if they saw her and realized she was the same girl from prom, it would ruin everything. I changed my direction, leaving Bec and her boyfriend behind.

  “Coward,” Bec said when I was ten steps away. I tripped a little but didn’t stop.

  “Do you know them?” Laney asked when I met up with her and Claire.

  “She’s in my government class. We had a pop quiz. Who gives a pop quiz the Monday after prom? Our teacher is Satan, I’ve decided.”

  They didn’t seem to notice that I’d completely glazed over thei
r question, changing the subject. “Yeah, I saw your tweet. People were retweeting it all over the place.”

  “Gia!” a guy called out while walking by. “Thank you for the PSA. You’re my hero.”

  Laney laughed.

  Claire tugged on my arm, bringing my attention back to her. “Are you and Jules fighting again?”

  Another question I wanted to glaze over. “She’s been on my case about Bradley for two months and she still won’t let it go.”

  “But we all met him. What could she possibly have to say now?”

  My tongue felt two sizes too big for my mouth. Now was the time when I should come clean, tell them what she could dig up and how stupid I was for lying. That way she’d have nothing on me.

  Laney grabbed my hand. “Just try to be nice to her. She’s been through a lot.”

  “Right, it’s just—” My phone chimed and I instinctively glanced at the screen.

  Claire must’ve been looking over my shoulder because she said, “Don’t you dare call him.”

  My eyes were still wide with shock. It was a message from Bradley: I’ve been thinking about prom night . . . call me when you get home.

  I was home, staring at my phone, not calling Bradley. What I had told Daniel was true—I didn’t do repeats. But Claire was right too—I’d always been the one to break it off with a guy. The breakup with Bradley was sudden and I hadn’t been prepared. Maybe it was premature. My mind tried to remind me that he had left me in the middle of the prom parking lot. I didn’t want him back. But it wouldn’t hurt to call him back, get better closure. Maybe if I told him how it felt to be left in the parking lot at prom, by myself, I’d feel better. Maybe it would help me get over this faster because I still got a stupid lump in my throat every time I thought of him.

  I needed to touch Call. All the numbers were on the screen waiting for that simple act. What was stopping me? Nothing.

  I touched the Call icon. My heart raced as the phone rang. I was going to do this. End it for good. Then why was I relieved when the call went to voice mail? “Heeey,” his prerecorded message said. “You missed me. But I have your name and number on caller ID so unless I don’t want to talk to you, I’ll call you back.” I laughed a little. Bradley was fun. It felt like I hadn’t heard his voice in ages even though it had only been a couple of days. I pushed End without leaving a message then threw my phone on my bed and left it there while I spent the next few hours on homework.

  When I went back to my room, my phone showed several missed texts from Claire and a missed call from Bradley. I responded to the texts but I had made an important decision about Bradley. I had to wait to talk to him, give myself some time to calm down. I didn’t want my emotions to tell a different story than my mind. In the meantime, I needed to see fill-in Bradley one more time. He needed to answer one simple question—why had he done it? He’d answer that question away from prom night, under normal circumstances. He’d be in his nerd T-shirt with his shaggy hair. Then I could be done with both the Bradleys and move on with my life.

  This was my plan and I was determined to make it work. I started by opening my closet and retrieving my yearbooks from the top shelf.

  CHAPTER 8

  My friends and I normally went off campus for lunch so it wasn’t hard to stay behind claiming make-up testing. It also wasn’t hard to find where Bec and her boyfriend hung out with a few other friends by the empty portables that were technically off limits during lunch.

  I clutched the note with my phone number in my hand. I didn’t want to admit how many times I had written my number so it looked the perfect amount casual, the perfect amount deliberate. I had never done that for a guy before. It added to my frustration over this whole situation. I just needed to talk to him, figure out his prom motivations, get him out of my head, and then it would be over.

  Bec and another girl were playing tic-tac-toe in the dirt using sticks.

  “Hi, Bec. Hi, Nate,” I said when I approached. It had taken me two yearbooks and an hour and a half to figure out Nate’s name but I did. He didn’t seem impressed with my efforts. He just waved a half-eaten apple at me in greeting. Bec didn’t even look up from her game.

  I held up the note. “I was hoping you’d give this to . . .” I paused, praying that either Bec or Nate would provide me with a name.

  Bec just looked up and said, “My brother?”

  “Right. Will you give this to him for me?”

  She filled in an X on the board in the dirt. “No.”

  “Please.”

  “Oh, well, since you asked nicely . . . no.”

  Her friend laughed. “Oh, look, it’s Gia Montgomery. You told our friend his band sucked and that he should take up a new hobby.”

  I gasped. “I did not.”

  “Oh, that’s right. Your friend Jules did and you laughed. Same difference.”

  I remembered that. It was the end of a very long day of bands trying out to play for prom. They were the fifth horrible band in a row and my head had been pounding. Jules, who’d volunteered herself as one of the judges and had done a pretty good job of being nice, couldn’t hold her comment in any longer. I did laugh. We all laughed. I shouldn’t have. This was probably the “bigger offense” I’d committed that Bec had referred to the day before.

  “Yeah . . . sorry about that. I had a headache.”

  “Don’t apologize to me. It wasn’t my dream you were crushing.” She looked at Nate as if waiting for him to say something. Maybe she wanted him to get mad at me as well. He didn’t.

  “Right,” I said. The hand, still clutching my ignored note, dropped to my side.

  Bec drew a new empty board on the dirt, ignoring more than just my note. Nate took another bite of his apple and smiled at me but then shrugged as if to say, “You’re out of luck.”

  “I’ll see you tomorrow in class, then.” I tucked the note into my jeans and left to the sounds of more laughter. I guessed it was okay when they were the ones doing the mocking.

  “Can I take the car to school tomorrow?”

  My mom’s hand paused where it was reaching for a glass in the cupboard. “Why?” She grabbed the glass and turned to face me.

  “I need to do something after school.” That may include following someone home like a creepy stalker. “I don’t want to make Claire drive me.”

  She considered while she filled her glass with water from the door in the fridge. She was a real estate agent and if she had tons of appointments set up tomorrow it wouldn’t work. But she usually wasn’t too busy on weekdays. The weekends were when people needed to look at the twelfth house they wouldn’t buy or the one they’d already looked at twelve times. “That should be fine. I can borrow Dad’s car if I need it, but this isn’t going to be the norm, right? You and Claire aren’t fighting or anything? Dad told me about Bradley.”

  Her thought progression made no sense to me. Was she saying that because I’d fought with Bradley, I must be fighting with everyone I knew? “No, we’re fine. We’re . . . the same as we’ve always been.” Everything in my life was the same as it had always been. I may have felt off, but everything around me was exactly the same.

  “Good. You’d hate to start college fighting with your roommate.”

  “Uh . . . thanks, Mom.”

  She laughed. “You know what I mean.”

  I knew what she meant and she was right, I didn’t want that to happen. Why had I lied to Claire? “Yes, you’re right. But we’re not fighting.” At least not yet. I watched her drink her water and thought about asking her what she thought the result of lying to my friends would be. Maybe she’d have some insights. But I didn’t ask.

  “Thanks for letting me use the car,” I said, then left the kitchen.

  I dialed Claire’s number as I walked the hall to my room. I fell back on my bed. “Hi, Claire,” I said when she answered.

  “Hey.”

  “So I don’t need a ride tomorrow to school. I’m using my mom’s car.”

  “Why?�
�� It was a fair question. We’d been riding to school together since we got our licenses and my parents had made the executive decision that I didn’t need my own car. I blamed my brother for the three accidents he had gotten into before he turned eighteen. The only time I didn’t ride with Claire was when one of us was sick.

  “I have to run some errands for my mom.” The lies were endless at this point and it sucked. I sucked.

  “Are you mad at me?”

  “Of course not.”

  “It’s just, you’ve been acting weird since prom.”

  I’d felt weird since prom, like maybe for the first time I was really evaluating my life and discovering I came up lacking. Starting with the fact that Bec was right—I was a coward. I was scared to tell my friends the truth. What if Claire didn’t want to room with me at college? What if she hated me? “I know, I’m sorry.”

  “It’s okay.” She gave a little sigh.

  I steered the conversation back to a safer topic. “Do you believe we’re about to graduate?”

  “I know, high school seemed to take forever and now it’s speeding by.”

  I twisted the corner of my sheet around my finger over and over and listened to her talk about how fun college was going to be. Yes, finding fill-in Bradley was key. He had done this to me and I needed it undone.

  It had all gone as planned so far. I’d been able to discreetly find Bec after school where she got into the passenger seat of a car that did not belong to her brother. Well, it could’ve, but he wasn’t driving it. We’d made two right turns and passed three stoplights. He’d said he lived only six blocks from the school, so I imagined we were coming close to their house. My palms started to sweat, so I wiped them on my jeans, keeping my eyes on the taillights in front of me. I couldn’t lose them. Their car’s blinker went on and so did mine. Then they turned into the parking lot of a 7-Eleven. I hesitated, not wanting to lose them, but it was a small parking lot. Bec would surely see me.