The Boy on the Bridge

“Wait, Valerie Johnson?” I nod my head. “I’m friends with her. What’d she do?”

“She ostracized my friend Sara. She has these slumber parties…”

He nods when I trail off. “Yeah, I know the slumber parties,” he says with a smirk.

Ugh. I roll my eyes. “Of course you do.”

“She barely invites anyone to those, though. If Sara doesn’t make the cut, I’m sure it’s not personal. Mostly only our friends go to her parties.”

“I know that’s what it’s like now. This was in first grade.”

Hunter’s eyes widen. “First grade? When we were little kids?”

I nod my head. “The social stigma somehow lingered. Like I said, it’s stupid.”

“That’s incredibly stupid,” he agrees. “So, let’s fix it. I was gonna invite you to come hang out with us this weekend. Why don’t you bring your friend, too?”

“Hang out?” I question.

He nods.

“With your friends?”

“A few of us are gonna go to the mall—shop a little, get some food, just hang out, you know?”

Right. I know, because these are… normal things that normal teenagers do. “Yeah. Right. Totally. I do that all the time.”

He stares over at me. “You don’t even go to the mall, do you? God, Bishop, what do you do?”

“I go to the mall if I have to,” I say defensively. “But Sara and I aren’t really—we don’t go to the mall all the time, that’s all.”

“Jeez,” he says, shaking his head. “You’re not just 80 levels below me on the food chain, you’re extinct.”

“Hey!” I object.

“It’s okay,” he assures me, reaching over and patting my thigh reassuringly. “I’m gonna put you back on the map.”

I narrow my eyes at him. “I don’t need you to put me anywhere. I’m just fine where I’m at.”

“You’re really not,” he disagrees, now assessing the outfit I’m wearing. “We need to get you a couple new outfits, too. You dress like an alien who just arrived and found a box of clothes nobody wanted on the side of the road.”

“All right, now, you listen to me—”

He holds up a hand to silence me. “Don’t worry about it. My mom gives me her credit card when I go to the mall, I’ll have someone with more style sense help you out and I’ll buy you some stuff.”

“I don’t need you to buy me things,” I inform him, wide-eyed. “I’m not your project, I’m just fine the way I am.” I look down at the Old Navy top that is admittedly an ugly, vegetable-like shade of green. And okay, yes, the graphic is a bit faded and it has seen better days, but it’s not like there are holes in the fabric. It’s still perfectly fine clothing. “I know I’m not the most stylish girl in the world, but why does that matter?”

“Doesn’t matter to me,” Hunter says. “But it matters to my friends. They’re into that stuff. If you want them to accept you, you’ve gotta look the part.”

“I don’t need your friends to accept me,” I tell him, frowning.

“It would make my life easier if they did,” he tells me. “Just let me do this for you, okay?”

“I didn’t even agree to go with you. And why would your friends accepting me make your life easier?” I ask, still scowling at him.

He doesn’t say anything for a minute. He waits for me to give up, looking down the hall, scratching at the knee of his jeans. When he looks back at me and I lift my eyebrows expectantly, he finally says, “Because I like you, okay? I enjoy hanging out with you, but my friends… they think you’re a little weird. And I know you’re a little weird, but I think it’s cute. I think it’s part of your charm, but they don’t know you yet. I’ve had the chance to look past the surface layer and think you’re pretty cool underneath, but they haven’t. I know it’s shallow, but stupid shit like wearing the wrong thing…” He shakes his head, looking mildly irritated. “It’s enough to make them dismiss you. If you can just fit in with them long enough for them to get to know you, I’m sure they’ll like you, too.”

Swallowing, I look down at the dingy linoleum floor. “I don’t think I should have to change in order for people to like me.”

“You don’t,” he says. “You don’t have to change, just wear a new outfit. Is that such a big deal?”

“I guess not,” I murmur, but I can’t imagine having a good time with people who demand I dress a certain way just to be seen with them.

“If you don’t like it, then okay, but it can’t hurt to at least try, right?” he says, trying to put a more positive spin on things. “You never know, you might like the new clothes.”

“I don’t know.”

“I didn’t want to read this book, and I did it for you, right? And I’m enjoying it.”