Paper Hearts

03

I looked in the mirror and smiled at myself.

Not out of pettiness, or vanity―I just wanted to see if I still had the ability to smile genuinely, as if nothing was wrong.

As if my estranged mother wasn't going to get married in four weeks. As if my dad wasn't slipping into depression. As if I didn't have to find someone to be my boyfriend for the wedding.

As if everything was okay.

Which it wasn't.

Straightening my blouse and wiping my hands on my jeans a few times, I made sure my hair was in place―what had once been a mess of blonde tangles was now brushed and pinned back neatly. I applied a layer of foundation, eyeliner, mascara. Nothing too out of the ordinary. Simple. Put-together. Me.

Blowing out a breath, I prepared myself for the day ahead.

You are Victoria Hemmings. Everything is fine. You are doing fine.

And I was.

For now, at least.

________

"So you have four weeks." Rachael echoed quietly, with a low whistle. "Wow."

"I know," I muttered. "It's ridiculous. I mean, she doesn't call for years, and suddenly, she's getting married! It's insane!"

"It's your mom," Rachael pointed out, brushing her red hair behind her ears, her deep brown eyes scanning the hallway as we walked. "Of course it's insane."

Rachael Whims knew me better than I knew myself. She'd been my best friend since kindergarten, and she knew everything there was to know about my family and our constant problems. After all, she'd been there since the beginning. Rachael was always at my house; she was there when the fighting began. And when the fighting ended. And when Mom left. She might as well have been my sister―she had experienced everything just as vividly as I had.

The only difference between Rachael and I was the fact that my life was mine, and not hers. She still had a nice, stable home to go back to. I, however, had the nightmare that was my own.

And it hadn't been bad as of late. It had actually been nice. Dad and I didn't talk about Mom, Mom didn't bother to call us up, and we were happy. We were getting along; I was finally prepared to put everything behind me.

Until yesterday.

"Look, Vick," Rachael said, snapping me back into the present, back into reality. "I don't know what possessed you to claim that you have a boyfriend when you obviously don't―"

I opened my mouth to object, but she talked over me,

"But," she said, pointing a finger at me. "I am willing to help you try to figure this out."

I gave a dry laugh. "Gosh, Rachael, how generous of you."

"I'm serious here," she said, adjusting her backpack on one shoulder as we turned the corner, passing the water fountains. "I mean, all you have to do is make a deal with someone."

At this, I couldn't help but laugh. "If you think I'm low enough to―"

"Not that kind of deal," she interrupted, rolling her eyes. "God, no. Just―find a guy to tutor, or something. Get his grades up. And, once he's happy with the results, ask him if he can do you a favor. It's that simple."

"It's so not that simple."

"It is if you put your mind to it," she said, with a hint of a smile. "You just have to focus."

"Easy for you to say."

"Trust me on this one," she countered. "Just find a guy who, eventually, would be willing to take a trip with you to Florida, be your boyfriend until your mom gets married, and then dump him."

"Rachael," I said, my tone firm. "This is not a romantic comedy. This is my life, and it's already ruined enough. The last thing I need to do is drag someone else into it."

"Fine." She said, shrugging. "Go by yourself and watch your mom burst into tears on her wedding day."

I grit my teeth. Rachael was right, as always. If I did come clean and show up alone, I knew that my mother would be either furious or completely heartbroken―or both.

"I'll figure something out." I said, only halfway speaking to Rachael.

"Keep telling yourself that, Vicki." She said, with a laugh. "The clock's ticking."

________

As I waited in the parking lot of Grayson High, kicking around some gravel, I blew out a long breath.

How on earth was I supposed to pull this off? It wasn't like some cute guy going to fall from the sky, or ask me to be his tutor. It wasn't like a fairy godmother was going to show up and send me off to the ball. I wasn't going from rags to riches―I was going from rags to, well, even more rags.

I was a liar. An impulsive liar who hated it when her mother was angry.

I was a pushover, a coward, a mess. I was someone who got dumped by her boyfriend and then lied about having a different one. Someone who wasn't over a love that no longer existed, someone who tried to regain her pride by lying.

For some reason, that was the one thing my mind kept going back to. The fact that I lied.

I tried to justify this. I was stressed, I told myself. I wasn't thinking straight. Mom was mad. I couldn't think of anything else to say.

But the truth was the truth. Solid. A fact. I had lied, and I wasn't proud of it.

And now I had to face the consequences.

Needy. Insecure. Selfish. Prideful. Unable to move on.

All of which were good ways to describe me at the moment.

Victoria Hemmings, the human disaster. The girl who couldn't be fixed.

The girl who couldn't escape.

________

About an hour later, I was still in the parking lot. I was beginning to think Dad forgot me.

Sighing, I hitched my backpack further up my shoulders, beginning to trek across the asphalt, keeping a hand over my face as the blinding sun began to sink lower and lower into the horizon. I kept my head down, the cool Kentucky breeze caressing my face, my eyes shutting for a split second, and then―

CLANG. The sound of metal against pavement rang throughout the lot, resonating so loudly that I felt my teeth clamp together. Turning around, I caught sight of a large, beat-up truck making its way around the school, emerging from the alleyway. Its headlights were dimming; the engine made a loud, obnoxious noise―my eyes flew to the front tire, where the hubcap was supposed to be. When I found that it was missing, I spotted it, just lying there, a few feet back, in the middle of the alley. That must have been the source of the noise.

As the truck came nearer, I squinted, peering at the person in the driver's seat. It was a guy. Brown hair and tan skin. That's about all I could register before the horn blasted, loud and blaring, right in my face.

Clamping my hands over my ears, I shouted over the noise.

"Cut it out!"

With a quirky half-smile, he did. I let my hands drop.

The boy rolled down his window using a hand-crank, popping his head out and shooting me a smile.

"Need a ride?"