Free Love You Hate You Miss You by Elizabeth Scott

driveway like he was stuck there but still, it was embarrassing.
    “Sorry,” we both muttered at the same time, and then I forgot all those questions I was asking myself. Why? Because Patrick’s hand brushed against mine and something inside me twitched, shook itself awake. I stared at him and he stared at me, and suddenly my heart was pounding and my skin felt hot and flushed. I didn’t like it at all.
    “The front seat’s kinda crowded,” Mel said, and I swear, his voice actually startled me. For a second I’d forgotten he was there. I’d sort of—well, I’d sort of forgotten everything. Patrick looked pretty startled too, and we both looked away from each other. He stared at the ground. I looked at Mel’s car. The front seat had a huge box sitting on the passenger side.
    “Yeah, the box,” Mel said. “My mom told me to drop it off for some charity thing she’s doing, but I sort of forgot to. Would you mind sitting in the back with Pat—” He broke off and cleared his throat. I looked at him. Hewas looking at Patrick. They seemed to be having some sort of discussion without talking. It made me think of Julia, and that reminder of how they talked like she and I did, so easily in their own silent language, made my eyes prickle.
    “I’ll just sit in the back, and you can put the box next to me,” I said because I knew what Mel was going to say and there was no way I was going to sit next to Patrick all the way to wherever we were dropping him off.
    So we all got in the car, and there I was, in the backseat with a box. Granted, I have very little dating experience (as in none) but this just didn’t seem like normal date stuff. At all.
    And then, as soon as we left my house, Mel started talking. First he asked how I was doing.
    “Fine,” I said.
    “Good,” Mel said, and cleared his throat again. Patrick looked out the window.
    “What about you, Patrick?” Mel said, and Patrick muttered something too softly for me to hear.
    “Well, man, then maybe I will make you pay me gas money,” Mel said, and then sighed.
    I knew then there was no way I was going to make it through whatever this was supposed to be, and startedthinking about faking a stomachache as soon as we dropped Patrick off.
    Except we didn’t drop Patrick off.
    Instead, we all went to the movies. As in me and Mel. And Patrick. So it definitely wasn’t a date.
    And then things got worse because when we got there, everyone in my freaking honors classes was there too. Someone called Mel’s name and waved us over after we all got out of the car.
    It was torture. Mel went and got tickets with most of the people, Patrick wandered off to stare at upcoming movie posters like they were the most interesting things he’d ever seen, and I got to stand there with Beth and her followers, including Corn Syrup.
    Beth looked at me, said something about “social retards” just loud enough for me to hear, and then added, “Mel’s just too nice, really.”
    I pretended I was deaf—I wished I was then, that’s for sure—and then Beth dragged everyone into a discussion of whose butt was the biggest. (“Oh, mine is, totally.” “No, mine is!” “No way, mine totally is!”)
    Mel came back with tickets, finally, and said, “Hey, you owe me ten for yours, okay?” as we got in line to get into the theater.
    I dug around in my pockets, feeling for money that I knew wasn’t there and vowing to never agree to anything Mel asked again, while Patrick stood next to Mel on his other side, hands jammed in his pockets and staring at the floor. Beth, who was right behind me, snorted and muttered something to Corn Syrup. I didn’t think Mel heard her, but he must have because he muttered something to Patrick and then told me, “Never mind the money, I got it.”
    When we finally got into the theater Mel and I didn’t even sit next to each other. I ended up in the seat next to the aisle one, Corn Syrup on one side of me and Patrick on the other. Patrick and