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i.
Candace tries to stay away. Really, she does. Because her raging she-devil of a mother would absolutely have her ass if she knew Candace is crushing on another girl. It would be scorched earth after that. No survivors.
Unfortunately for her, when she turns to get away from her mom hovering at the edge of the soccer field, she spots Lilly up in the bleachers, a camera in her hands. And Candace is…drawn. That’s the only way to describe it. Constantly pulled in Lilly’s direction even as she tries her damndest not to give in. Even though she forces distance between them by being as much of an asshole as possible.
But that distance she needs so badly never grows all that big because Lilly never pushes her away, no matter how much she should. No matter how much it would save herself. So, now, even though Candace is definitely interrupting her phone conversation with her better half, Lilly doesn’t show an iota of annoyance.
Because she’s Lilly. Open, trusting, easy to talk to. Beautiful. No wonder Candace’s walls crumble when Lilly so much as smiles in her direction. No wonder Candace opens up about her mom, the unbearable tension at home. No wonder that, for a second—for just a fleeting, ephemeral heartbeat—Candace considers what it would be like if all that’s wrong in the world were right. If she didn’t have an apathetic boyfriend waiting for her, if she didn’t care about what everyone else at school thought, if she could just be brave and ask the girl she likes to the dance.
But this isn’t that life and she’s not brave. So, when Lilly walks away, all Candace does is watch her go.
ii.
Standing outside the church with Lilly, it’s almost like old times. Candace remembers being eight years old and the best of friends in the way that only kids can be. They spent all summer together, running around in back yards, climbing trees, sleeping under the stars, eating too much sugar. Those were the days. When she was happy.
Being here—making Lilly laugh with a stupid joke and watching her eyes light up—that almost makes her happy too. At the very least, it lifts Candace’s heart, tugs it up on little strings like a puppet, and Candace can’t help the smile on her face.
If their friendship hadn’t ended—no, that wasn’t right. If her mom hadn’t stomped on their friendship like it was a landmine and if the shrapnel hadn’t embedded itself into her skin…would they be together now? Like, together together? Candace for sure wouldn’t be such a massive bitch. With Lilly’s calming energy around, she’d be pacified.
And she would want to go to the stupid soccer formal because she wouldn’t need to rage at the world and because a night spent with her arms around her best friend would sound like heaven.
That bubble pops once Astrid bursts out of the church’s front doors and Lilly’s attention is drawn away. Candace’s heart pinches with hurt, all too familiar, but she squeezes until it turns to anger. Until her walls go up so high even she can’t see over them.
When Astrid is around, all Candace can ever be is an afterthought. When Astrid’s around, Candace is “the enemy.” Just hearing the words fall from Astrid’s lips brings the bitchiness out of Candace. Is she proud of the insult she hurls in their direction like acid? No, but it’s so much easier to combat this emptiness with anger rather than with sadness.
iii.
Lilly’s lost in thought in yearbook club. She doesn’t even notice Candace come into the room, doesn’t notice when she sits a few seats away. Not close enough that anyone would remark on it, but close enough that Candace can sneak a peek at Lilly’s sketchpad.
She stifles a gasp. The piece is far from finished. Only a pair of eyes, but it’s enough for her to recognize herself.
Lilly really is an incredible artist. She’s good at drawing and at photography. Which does she like more? Does she dabble in other media?
Lilly still hasn’t registered her arrival, and Candace takes the opportunity to study her. She has her pretty blonde hair half pulled up with small braids, and she’s wearing that black and purple striped sweater she likes so much. The sun throws the scar under her left eye into sharp relief. Candace doesn’t remember it from when they were kids. Did she overlook it back then, or did it happen in the years since they hadn’t spoken? Either way, she’d like to know the story behind it.
“H-hey, Lilly,” she says softly.
Lilly looks up. Immediately, a smile appears on her face. “Oh, hey. What’s up?”
Shit, she was supposed to have a follow-up. “Nothing.”
“Oh, okay.” Lilly returns to her drawing, not even angling it away from Candace in embarrassment.
Candace blinks. All this time, she’d thought Tate was the one Lilly was studying, but…could it have been her? Her heart flutters in her chest and gives her a surge of courage.
“Are you—are you going to the dance?” she asks.
Lilly’s pencil pauses. “Oh, uh, maybe? I’ve been kind of…busy lately.”
“Too busy to go to a dance?” Candace asks with a small chuckle.
Lilly only shrugs. “I guess you’re going with Tate?”
Candace looks down at her hands. Right. Her boyfriend. But who said she had to go to a dance with her boyfriend? There’s no rule that she can’t go with a…with a friend.
“If I do go,” Lilly says absently, back to sketching, “I’ll just go with Astrid.”
Astrid. Yeah. Lilly’s other half who can’t so much as look at Candace without a sneer or an insult. Candace bites her lip. No, even if she had the guts to ask Lilly, she wouldn’t. She’d only be a third wheel all night, and Candace Powell refuses to be the odd one out.
iv.
Candace meanders down the caf line, the chatter of her schoolmates behind her. She wishes they would all just shut up. The voting, yearbook, the dance, even the play—none of that shit matters. She’s not sure what does matter anymore.
Lilly’s appearance behind her startles Candace out of her thoughts. She turns and, without thinking, says what’s on her mind. “That whole yearbook thing is so dumb, by the way.”
“Says the girl who’ll get voted best legs,” Lilly says.
Candace freezes. Did that really just come out of Lilly’s mouth? Even while she’s used to it, she hates being objectified, but Lilly’s appreciation is…different. Decidedly so.
“I’m…assuming.” Lilly chuckles nervously. “I mean, it’s not like I think you have good legs. I mean, you know you have good legs, but it’s not like I stare at your legs or anything.” She stammers a bit and then continues. “And I’m not saying I voted. I don’t vote, so…”
“Are you okay?” Candace asks, knowing that Lilly absolutely isn’t okay, and she turns back around so Lilly won’t see the smile on her face.
It’s fun, realizing someone might have—does have?—a crush on you, but more than that, it sparks hope within her. Now that she’s broken up with Tate, that’s one fewer barrier in the way of asking Lilly to this stupid dance. Asking her to the dance wouldn’t be as scary as asking her on an actual date. Less pressure, and they could go from there.
But then they’re walking to find a table and Jordan is calling Lilly a loser and Candace is doing nothing to defend her. Reality slams back in. Because it’s not that easy, upending the social order. It’s not like turning a page. It’s more like ripping out all the pages, pulping them or whatever you do to recycle paper, and writing it all from scratch. Candace doesn’t know how to make a book!
And she isn’t fearless enough to turn her world on its head without thought and calculation and planning. It doesn’t mean she isn’t ashamed, though.
v.
She asks Lilly to sit with her. If she’s honest with herself, which she rarely is, she’d admit she’s been sitting here in Jonas’s room for half an hour hoping for someone to pass by.
Not just anyone. Someone in particular.
So, when that person pops her head in, of course Candace asks her to sit with her.
As soon as Lilly settles onto the chair beside her, the tension goes out of Candace’s shoulders. It’s always like that, like Candace doesn’t realize she’s been holding her breath all day until Lilly’s smile reminds her to breathe. And Lilly’s cute, choked little “It’s so good” when she drinks the spiked lemonade makes Candace laugh.
It’s so far from how Candace feels in the rest of her life that she almost doesn’t recognize herself. This definitely isn’t the version of her everyone expects—her friends, her classmates, her teachers, her mom.
It always comes back to her mom, doesn’t it? Her mom’s the one who destroyed their friendship in the first place. Her mom’s the reason she’s hiding their friendship now. And her mom’s going to be a chaperone at the dance, so even if Candace could work up the courage to ask Lilly, there’d be no way for them to hide.
Not that Lilly deserves to be hidden. Far from. She deserves to be shown off. She deserves someone who can shout their love from the rooftops.
Candace knows how shitty it is to feel invisible, and yet she still can’t give that openness to her.
Maybe one day she’ll be able to.
Until then, they’re alone in a low-lit classroom and Lilly is sitting so close, looking so pretty and so kissable, and Candace just can’t help herself.
+i.
The play goes horribly. Because of course it does. Because that’s what tends to happen when a portal to a monster world has been opened and those monsters seem to have targeted your school.
Everything is a mess. Literally. The set is in shambles, and half the chairs in the audience are overturned. They hadn’t even made it to intermission.
Amid all the confusion, Candace sees Astrid and Lilly slip out of the auditorium. “Screw everyone else” was her advice to Lilly all the way back when Lilly was signing up for set dec. She hasn’t exactly been following that herself.
She does now. Ignoring everyone else, she beelines for the door and out into the hallway.
“Lilly!”
Both Lilly and Astrid turn around. Lilly looks surprised, confused, but Astrid just looks angry.
“Can I…can I talk to you?” Candace asks, not even glancing at Astrid.
Lilly exchanges a look and some silent communication with Astrid, and after a moment, she pushes the golden orb into Astrid’s stomach and jerks her head toward the other end of the hallway. Astrid rolls her eyes, but she takes the orb and walks away without a word.
Lilly crosses her arms. “What do you want?”
Candace swallows. With so much to apologize for, where does she even start?
Maybe with the one thing that’s been on her mind for weeks now.
She licks her lips, ignoring Lilly’s impatient glare. Screw her mom, screw her stupid friends, screw everyone who forces her into a tiny box she has no interest in being in.
She takes a deep breath and smooths down the folds of her skirt. “Lilly,” she says, her voice a bit shakier than she’d like.
“Candace, I—”
“Will you go to the soccer formal with me?”