Second Helpings_ A Jessica Darling Novel - Megan McCafferty [119]
“Bridget, you’re missing the point!”
“What’s your point?”
What was my point? Was I feeling sinful because I made out with anyone at my grandmother’s wake? Or was I feeling dirty because I made out with Marcus, of all people, at my grandmother’s wake? Or was I feeling hypocritical because I had just spent a bizillion hours on the phone trying to explain to Hope why he was an evil genius, and it would be extremely messed up for me to have this intense kissing episode with someone I considered to be an evil genius? Or was I feeling idiotic for putting off such an amazing total-body blissful kissing episode for so long? Or was I feeling guilty BECAUSE I GOT CAUGHT?
When I told Bethany that Marcus and I had been talking, that I wanted some privacy, so he could help me cope with my grief, she simply said, despite all the evidence to the contrary (the razor burn, the pork-chop lip gloss, the hickey), “Whatever you say,” and left it at that. I can only attribute her coolness to a nine-months-pregnant hormonal cocktail. However, it didn’t make the situation any less mortifying. The only thing that makes me even remotely okay about this whole thing is knowing that my making out with Marcus would’ve made Gladdie extremely proud. It’s exactly what she always wanted to happen.
My thoughts were interrupted by the whoosh of the front door downstairs.
“Your mom?” I asked.
Bridget barely shook her head. Two sneakers pounded up the stairs and showed up as crimson footprints all over Bridget’s neck.
“Good morning, mon amie!”
In this context—specifically, Bridget’s house at nine A.M. on a Saturday morning, I couldn’t quite place the voice. Even when I saw Pepe in the doorway, I still had trouble piecing things together.
Bridget’s face was redder than a thermometer in a heat wave. They shot each other nervous looks before Pepe finally said, “Look who it is. My two favorite Anglican Princesses!”
The ease with which Pepe had entered the bedroom made it clear that he had been here many, many times before. Then it hit me. This wasn’t a hapless crush. This was real.
“Holy shit! You two are going out!”
Pepe and Bridget exchanged sheepish smiles.
“BRIDGET! YOU LIED!”
She bashfully held up her palms in resignation.
I still couldn’t get over this. Not so much that they were a couple, but that Bridget had lied about it. About anything. Bridget NEVER lies.
“YOU LIED!”
Pepe sat down next to her on the bed and held her hand.
“She did,” he said.
“You lied,” I said again, quieter.
“We both did.”
“How long has this been going on?”
“Since the play,” she said. “October.”
“Holy shit! You’ve kept this quiet since October?”
“Trying to,” Pepe said. “But Pinevile Low isn’t making it easy.”
“But why? Is it, uh, because of the interracial thing?”
They both laughed.
“Why, my Caucasian friend, I never pegged you as a Klansman,” Pepe said, smiling.
“Not me, I don’t care, but you know, Pineville at large . . .”
“We didn’t do it because of the black/white thing,” Bridget said.
“We did it to keep it real,” Pepe said.
“So no one would, like, get in our business.”
“So no one would spread rumors.”
“So Skankier wouldn’t jump his bones.”
“That girl is busted. I’d never leave you for her,” Pepe said while tenderly stroking the inside of her wrist.
“A girl has got to be on guard, though, because it’s, like, only a matter of time before she gets tired of Len,” Bridget said.
I sat there for a moment, still taking all of this in.
“Why don’t I ever see anything coming?” I asked, almost to myself.
“What?” they asked.
“I mean, I consider myself to be a pretty observant person. I see too much going on, which is why I can’t sleep at night. But why am I always shocked by people, even when their behavior seems so obvious after the fact?”
It was a rhetorical question, really. I hadn’t expected Bridget or Pepe to have an answer, which just proves my point.
“Maybe it’s because you’re, like, too busy thinking about yourself,” Bridget offered.
I must say that I was taken aback by this attack on my character.
“Excuuuuuuse me?”
Bridget