Charmed Thirds_ A Jessica Darling Novel - Megan McCafferty [102]
“Oh, none taken,” I said, thick with sarcasm.
“Omigod! I heard that some guy killed himself over you,” she whispered with pretend concern. “You must be totally devastated. But kind of flattered, too.”
“He didn't kill himself,” I said. “He had an undetected congenital heart defect. And I'm not devastated. Or flattered.”
She girlishly pointed her toes inward, no easy feat as she was wearing a pair of those furry mukluks responsible for making fashion victims look like Muppets from the knees down.
“I heard that when they looked on his laptop, they found all these love letters to you that he never sent . . .”
This was true, but not something I liked to think about then, or write about now. I'd never read them myself, but they were posted on the facebook. They were all about loving and longing for a liberal girl, even though everything she believed in was wrong. And though she went unnamed, I knew. I knew. And somehow Sara knew, too. But I was too tired of this conversation to find out how.
“He didn't kill himself,” I repeated, but softer. “There was a hole in his heart.”
As soon as I said it, I could hear Dexy's voice filling in the rest of the sentence with that early nineties song:
There's a hole in my heart that can only be filled by you . . .
It was almost as if Sara heard it, too.
“Omigod! He died of a broken heart!” she screeched. “A BROKEN HEART!”
I'd had enough of this conversation. As I said, Mini Dub is not someone I like to think about. This is why he often shows up in my dreams. Research has proven that the more you try not to think about a particular person, the more likely that person will show up in your dreams. (Don't try to outsmart your subconscious by intentionally thinking about that person before you go to sleep because it doesn't work. He'll show up anyway. At least that's how it is with me. Perhaps you're not as mind-fucked as I am.) This explains why William and Marcus often show up together. They're like characters in one of those bad buddy cop movies. You know, total opposites who have nothing in common and are forced to partner up to fight for a common cause. In this case, to torment me in my sleep.
The dreams themselves are not at all interesting. It's all textbook Psych 101 dream symbolism: flying, teeth falling out, bathtub water turning into grape jelly. Mini Dub always offers unsolicited, obvious advice like:
“You should leave that to the birds.”
Or:
“You should have flossed.”
Or:
“You should get some peanut butter.”
In all of them, William does the talking and Marcus just stands there not saying anything, just shaking his head with an expression on his face that I can't quite figure out. I was thinking about all this when Sara's braying brought me back to the waking world.
“I heard that he had all these pictures of you . . .”
“Well, I heard you flunked out of school.”
Sara's neck jerked into her chest. “That's just a vicious rumor,” she huffed with the indignation of someone who only likes to be on the giving end of said viciousness. “I'm taking a voluntary leave of absence to explore quote business opportunities unquote.”
“I heard you're managing one of your dad's shops.”
“It's my shop,” she sniffed. “He gave it to me.” Then she glanced at the tank watch glinting on her wrist. “Omigod! I have to go!”
“So soon?” I asked sweetly.
“You can totally come to the party if you want to. Scotty will probably be there because he's so hard-core. Maybe Len and Manda, if they can stop not bang-a-langin' long enough to grace us with their presence, you know . . .”
And as Sara blathered on, giving me directions and cell phone numbers and whatnot, I thought about how many times I've had this exact same conversation with her, only with different details. Because that's the thing about Sara. No matter how much we clearly dislike each other, she will always dig for and dish out gossip about our Pineville High classmates. Sara is who she is. She's annoying, but at least she's true to her annoyingness. I can always count on it, which is a strange sort