The Cure for Second Lead Syndrome by Amanda Abram

CHAPTER 17

“Is everything okay, sweetie?” Mom asked me the next morning during breakfast.

“Yeah,” I replied. “Why?”

“You’ve barely touched your food.” She pointed to the stack of chocolate chip pancakes in front of me that I hadn’t even cut into yet.

“I’m fine,” I said. “I’m still waking up.”

“Did you and Natalie have fun last night?” she asked.

“Yeah,” I lied. “We had a great time.”

“Good, I’m glad. It’s so nice to see you doing something other than watching TV for a change,” Mom said with a smile.

“I told you I’d find plenty of things to do once Natalie came home.”

“And you’ve been hanging out a lot with Caleb, too,” she added with a small smile, and my breath hitched in my throat.

“I thought Caleb was Braden’s friend,” Dad said, confused. He glanced between me and Braden. “Did you two finally start sharing friends?”

“No,” Braden and I said simultaneously, and then I continued. “Caleb and I aren’t friends. I’ve been…helping him with something.”

But not anymore.

With that thought, I pushed my chair back. “Thanks for the pancakes, Mom, but I’m not that hungry. May I be excused?”

Concern flickered across Mom’s face as she nodded. “Of course. Are you sure you’re okay?”

I forced a smile. “I’m sure.”

I made my way upstairs, took a quick shower, and then proceeded to my bedroom. My phone was still sitting—completely silenced—on my nightstand. I had no idea if Caleb had tried to contact me again, and I didn’t care to know. But I had to turn the phone back on at some point. I was sure at least Natalie had tried calling or texting, and if she didn’t hear back from me in a reasonable amount of time, she’d start to worry.

Turning it back on, I held my breath and waited. At first, there was nothing. Nothing from Caleb. Nothing from Natalie. But after a few seconds, the notifications started popping up on the screen. Missed calls. Missed texts. None of them from Natalie.

All of them from Caleb.

He really wanted to talk to me, apparently.

I quickly scrolled through the texts, most of which were asking if I was awake yet, and then checked the voicemails.

There were two of them. I listened to the first one, which had come through at eight o’clock this morning: “Hey, Bria. It’s Caleb. Not sure if you’re awake yet, but I need to talk to you, so please call me back as soon as you get this.” He sounded chipper. Excited. Like a boy who’d made out with the love of his life the night before.

Taking a deep breath, I started playing the other voicemail—this one from only a few minutes ago. This time, his voice wasn’t as cheery. He almost sounded annoyed. Probably because between voicemails, he’d texted me four times with no response.

“Hey, it’s Caleb again,” he said. “I’m starting to think something’s wrong with your phone. Anyway, I really, really need to talk to you, so I’m on my way over to your house right now—”

My heart leapt into my throat. He was on his way over to my house? Right now? In a panic, I rushed to my closet and grabbed my Converse. It would only take Caleb ten minutes at the most to get to my house. If he left right after leaving that voicemail, he could arrive any minute.

I needed to make sure I wasn’t there when he did.

“Mom!” I yelled out as I flew down the stairs. “I’m going to Natalie’s house for a little bit! I’ll be back later!”

“Okay!” she yelled back from the living room. “Have fun!”

I grabbed the car keys and threw open the front door to make my quick escape. But it wasn’t quick enough, because as soon as the door opened, it revealed Caleb standing on the other side of it, hand raised as if he’d been about to knock.

“Bria,” he said, blinking in surprise.

“Caleb,” I wheezed, trying hard to catch my breath.

“Did you just get back from running a marathon or something?” he asked with a smirk.

Nope. Just out of breath because I was rushing to leave to avoid having to see you.

“Something like that.” I stepped onto the porch with him and shut the door behind me. Steadying my breathing, I feigned ignorance and asked, “Are you here to see Braden?”

“Um, no.” Caleb’s brow furrowed slightly as he studied me. “I’m here to see you. Did you get any of my texts? My voicemails?”

“Huh?” I pulled my phone out of my pocket and glanced down at it. “Oh, I’ve had my phone turned off since last night. Sorry.”

“It’s okay,” Caleb said, smiling. “I was surprised, that’s all. I figured you would have tried calling me this morning to see how things went last night.”

I would have, had I not already seen with my own two eyes how things went. But now, I wouldn’t even have to ask. He was going to tell me.

Unless I could somehow change the subject before he had a chance to.

“Yeah, well, I’ve been a bit preoccupied since yesterday,” I said, having no idea what I was going to say next. “I…” Think, Bria. Tell him something. Tell him anything. It doesn’t matter. Make up any excuse.

“I met someone,” I said finally. The words weren’t premeditated; they popped right out of my mouth before I had a chance to stop them. “I met a boy. On the beach. Yesterday.”

Wait—what?

Caleb’s smile faltered slightly. “You did?”

After internally berating myself for saying something so stupid, I decided to go with the lie. Too late to turn back now. Besides, it was a great explanation for why I didn’t rush to find out how things went with Paige. So, it was either keep the lie going, or tell him the truth: that Natalie and I dressed up in disguises and followed him to The End Zone to spy on him.

“Yeah,” I said casually. “He and his friends were, uh, throwing a football around and it landed right between me and Natalie. When he came over to get it, he apologized, and we started talking. We hit it off and he, uh, asked me out for tonight.” It was the least believable thing I’d ever said in my life, but somehow Caleb seemed to be buying it.

“Oh,” he said, eyebrows raised in what looked like surprise. “Wow. That’s…” He rubbed the back of his neck. “Who is it?”

“You don’t know him,” I said with a shrug. “He’s visiting from New York with his family for the summer.”

“I see.”

“I was actually heading out to go shopping with Natalie,” I continued. “You know, to get a new outfit. For tonight. For my date.”

The more I talked, the easier the lie became.

“Oh, okay,” Caleb said, backing up toward the porch stairs. “Well, then, I won’t keep you.”

“No, wait,” I said quickly, stopping him. Drawing in a deep breath, I held it for a moment before slowly letting it back out. I couldn’t let him leave without asking him the question. “How did it go last night?”

He stared at me blankly. “Last night?”

I gave him a curious look. How could he not know what I was talking about? “Yeah. You know—with Paige. How did it go?”

“Oh, right. Of course.” He chuckled slightly, running a hand through his hair. “Yeah, uh, it went well.”

He stopped talking and I waited. Waited for him to say more. To elaborate. To give me all the dirty details I didn’t want to hear. But he didn’t.

“I can tell you all about it some other time,” he added with a dismissive wave. “When you’re not busy.”

I couldn’t help but feel bad. He had rushed over here to tell me all about last night, and I was completely brushing him off. And with a stupid lie, no less.

That wasn’t fair.

“You can tell me now,” I insisted, motioning to the front door.

“No, no. You have way more important things to do right now. I’ll catch you later.” He gave me a smile and a small wave before turning to leave.

“Caleb, wait,” I said, starting after him.

He stopped when he got to the bottom of the steps and turned back around. “Have fun on your date tonight.”

I said nothing as he made his way down the driveway to his car. There was something in his voice—a hint of disappointment, maybe—that suddenly made me feel like a jerk. He was probably so excited to tell me about everything that happened. Why wouldn’t he have been? I’d made such a big deal out of his love for Paige. I’d put so much effort into trying to get her to fall for him. At times, it even felt like I was more invested in his love life than he was. So, of course he wanted to share the good news with me right away. But I ignored him last night. And now I’d made up some dumb story about a fake date and he thought I cared more about that than I did about him.

Way to go, Bria.

After Caleb drove away, I called Natalie. As soon as she answered, I blurted, “I did something stupid.”

She didn’t even ask for details. “You wanna come over and talk about it?”

“Sure,” I said with a sigh. “Either that, or we can go clothes shopping for my fake date with a guy that doesn’t exist.”

“Huh?”

“Never mind,” I mumbled. “I’ll be right over.”

***

“Wait—you told him what?”Natalie asked, cringing.

I leaned forward and buried my face in my hands. “I told him I have a date tonight. With some rando I met at the beach yesterday.”

“Omigosh, Bria, why would you tell him that?”

“I don’t know,” I moaned. “I wasn’t thinking straight.”

Natalie snorted. “Obviously not.”

Falling back on her bed, I stared at the ceiling and sighed. “What am I going to do? I don’t really have a date tonight. I don’t even have anyone I could pretend to have a date with tonight.”

“So? Caleb doesn’t have to know that.”

I sat up. “Wait. You’re right. How would Caleb know if I actually went on the date or not?”

“He wouldn’t.”

“And when he asks about it the next time I talk to him, I can tell him the guy was a jerk, and I won’t be going out with him again. Easy peasy.”

Natalie grinned and nodded. “See? Not a big deal.”

“And then maybe he won’t go into as many gory details about his date last night,” I added. “He’ll feel so bad for me having a terrible time on my date that he won’t want to rub it in that he had a wonderful time with Paige.”

“You’re probably right.” Natalie paused for a second. “And hey, the whole date thing doesn’t have to be a total lie. You can be my date tonight. We can go to the carnival!”

“I dunno,” I muttered. “I’m not in a carnival kind of mood.”

“Well, you need to get in the mood because it’s only going to be here for the weekend, and I really want to go.”

She was referring to the Midnight Carnival, which set up for one weekend every summer in a parking lot near the beach. It was our summer tradition; we’d been going since we were little kids. I’d been so preoccupied that I’d forgotten this was the weekend it was in town.

“You need this,” Natalie continued. “What else are you going to do tonight? Mope around your bedroom, brokenhearted? I’m not going to let you do that.”

“I was looking forward to moping around my bedroom,” I said with a pout.

“What if Caleb decides to stop by to see Braden, and you’re home when you’re supposed to be out on your date?” Natalie asked. “Do you want to get caught in your lie?”

“Well, no, but—”

“No buts!” Natalie hopped off the bed and planted her hands on her hips. “We either go to the carnival or we go somewhere else. I don’t care—we’re doing something tonight.”

Sighing, I threw my hands up in defeat. “Okay. Fine. We can go to the carnival.”

“Yes!” Natalie triumphantly pumped her fist in the air.

“But I’m going to start moping again first thing tomorrow morning,” I informed her.

Her excitement faded as she sat back down next to me and slid an arm around my shoulders. “And I’ll bring a box of tissues and ice cream. But for tonight, let’s have fun. Let’s forget all about Caleb Nichols, okay?”

I said nothing, just forced a half-hearted smile and nodded.

Forget about Caleb? Yeah, right.

That was going to be a lot easier said than done.