Page 47 of The Underachiever’s Guide to Love and Saving the World

COURTNEY

Try, try, try. The never-ending mantra echoed through my head like a short but petrifying two-second clip of a horror movie commercial. My inner voice shook her fist, saying, See? One kiss and he already needs more from you. And not more in a fun sexual way. More as in more effort .

Still, Amy’s life was on the line, so I had to let it slide for now.

“I don’t have a tragic tale of love and loss,” I began. “It’s not that deep.”

“Then make something up.”

I couldn’t. Not when he didn’t. I had to hope the truth was enough. Had to hope I was enough even though I hadn’t been enough for anyone in six months.

I rubbed my forehead. The rain fell harder, splattering dirt onto my dress.

“When you’re a kid, you play house and pretend to be an adult.

No one tells you that, when you grow up, we’re all still pretending, and we’ve gotten tired of the game.

Last Thanksgiving, I had a career and a boyfriend, who had a ring and plans to pop the question after the pumpkin pie. ”

I took a deep breath and quickly told Bryce how I used to want to be special, how exhausting it was, how I thought it was the only way for people to admire me.

I told him how my fear was proven the day I lost my job, decided I was better off without it, and Will broke up with me.

Bryce leaned against the wall on the other side of the alley, full attention on me.

Absently, I pet Amy’s arm, partly to urge him to stay alive, partly because I didn’t know what to do with my hands.

“After I made my choice, no one asked if I was okay or tried to understand. They went into fix-it mode. I was the happiest I’d ever been, and they wanted to fix it because it wasn’t good enough for them .

My boyfriend went from wanting to propose to me one day to dumping me the next.

My grandmother practically disowned me. Even strangers write me off.

” My eyes stung, my throat growing tight and achy.

“I’d been wearing masks, pretending to be someone I wasn’t so people would love me.

” I lifted my eyes to Bryce’s. “When you showed up, I discovered how much more honest it is to hate people than it is to love them. I never wanted to stop hating you because I couldn’t lose you.

So that’s me. Nobody’s hero. Everyone’s villain. ”

One by one, the muscles in Bryce’s face softened. In my chest, a tiny, warm something fluttered. It was unfamiliar and nostalgic all at once. A feeling of contentment and quiet joy and acceptance. It felt like that evening, baking in the village, surrounded by love and comfort.

My breath caught with surprise as a faint glow rose from my hand. I pressed my palm to Amy’s chest, hoping it would be enough to help him hang on. He was barely breathing now. A few moments went by. His breathing didn’t worsen, but it also didn’t improve.

“More,” said Bryce, crouching on the other side of Amy. “Tell me more.”

The rain had picked up and I looked at the water pooling around my knees where they pressed into the mud. “That’s it. There’s nothing more to tell.”

“You told me about a thing that happened to you,” said Bryce. “That’s not you . I know you.” A smile flirted with the corners of his mouth. “You forget to wash your feet nine out of ten times. You don’t own a bed frame. For some reason, you think Ross Geller is a good romantic partner.”

“Ross was persistent,” I said defensively.

My face felt strange, strained and tight in unfamiliar places.

Keeping one hand on Amy, I reached up and touched my face.

I hit teeth. I was smiling. And for once, I was not wearing a cape.

Not the cape that made me more, and not the cape that made me less.

“You don’t believe in unconditional love,” Bryce finished softly, gazing into my soul in a way that said he was not disgusted by what he found there, and for the first time, I began to doubt my doubts about unconditional love.

We sat there, the ground growing into slippery mush from the rain, Amy barely breathing between us. None of us moved, Bryce and I because we were rolling over everything in our heads, and Amy because he was preoccupied with not dying.

“Courtney…” Bryce swallowed hard. “Tell me who you are, the pieces I don’t know.”

The light glimmering off my fingers was feeble at best. “What if who I am isn’t lovable?” I asked meekly, because I truly didn’t know.

That was the half of me I was too scared to explore.

Too scared the truth would crush me the way it did when I learned superheroes didn’t exist, or when I decided true love wasn’t real.

I didn’t want to bring those soft, vulnerable parts of myself to light.

When the whole world continued to prove itself to be darker than I supposed, why not blend into the darkness so the monsters passed me by?

“Court.” Bryce said my name in a voice so tender and broken, it felt like a tragedy.

“You remember people’s birthdays, even if you only acknowledge them with unsigned cards.

If you forget to wash your feet in the shower, it’s because you only shower for five minutes to save water.

” He held up his hand. “I hear your timer through my wall every night, so don’t try to deny it.

You’ve been protecting my front door from spiders for months.

You hide your kindness, only displaying it when you think no one’s watching, but I’ve been watching. Even if I tried not to.”

Unexpected tears pricked at my vision.

“Now, your turn,” he said.

I rubbed my eyes. I couldn’t do this. Couldn’t.

“One tiny thing,” Bryce urged.

“I almost stepped on a worm last week,” I mumbled, “but I moved him off the sidewalk.” Inside me, something flickered, encouraging more words.

“I volunteer at an animal shelter on my days off.” Sensing Bryce’s fond, half smile directed my way, I squirmed.

“It’s not, like, A Thing. I’m only there to hang out with dogs because our landlord won’t let us have pets. ”

“Sure, sure,” he said, that smile not budging.

I sighed. “Okay. I’m the world’s best puppy pusher.

Everyone at the shelter says they’ve never seen anyone able to find as many puppies homes as I have.

” I thought for a second. “When people with hazel eyes claim their eye color changes depending on their mood, I refrain from telling them it’s just lighting. ”

“That’s big of you.”

“I’m also hilarious. My jokes are way funnier than yours.”

“Whoa, whoa.” Bryce held up his hands, fully grinning now. “Let’s not get cocky.”

“I think you’re so attractive—ridiculously attractive,” I blurted out.

It was as though Bryce had rifled through an old chest in my soul where I kept every positive thought, every nice attribute, every compliment, and now that he’d started taking things out, more kept tumbling forth, never to fit back inside correctly again.

“You’re funny, even if you’re not as funny as me, and so damn sweet I want to hide you from everyone else, like you’re the best candy in a shitty communal Halloween candy bowl. ”

His smile widened, but that joy wouldn’t last. Bryce had unleashed my nice, and it was going to hurt us both more than our “hate” ever did.

Gathering his hands in mine, I leaned over Amy as though Bryce and I were making eyes at each other over a candlelit dinner instead of a thousand-year-old wizard dude.

“You want more, but I want less. I want Nothing, and that’s the thing, Bryce, that makes us so difficult.

” Releasing his hands, I twisted my fingers together, clenching them until they hurt.

“I have no future, so neither can we. I’m good for nothing and bad for you.

I’m irresponsible, which is why I have to be responsible enough to never tell you if I happen to adore you. ”

As Bryce’s expression broke into one of wonder and confusion, the spark in my chest ignited, flaring into a warm glow of affection.

It was schoolyard whispers tickling down necks and crisscross applesauce traced on backs.

Cool breeze, tight squeeze, shiverees. It was summer night carnivals, the smell of funnel cakes and mosquito spray.

It was the giddy anticipation of counting down the days to your sixth birthday.

It was how you imagined touching a cloud must feel like before anyone told you the disappointing water-vapor truth.

More warmth trickled into my chest. Faster until I could hardly stand it, until my heart raced, and I could barely breathe.

Until I couldn’t stand it, and pale orange light exploded from my body so bright it forced me to squint.

It streamed from my palms, a wavering mix of transparent and opaque.

Without thinking, I laid my hands over Amy’s bony chest, pushing all the best-parts-of-living feelings inside of him.

Amy’s eyes drifted shut. A heart-wrenching beat passed where I thought he was gone.

Slowly, his breathing smoothed, air flowing unrestrained in and out of his lungs. The light faded from my hands, and I sat back. Amy’s skin was still puffy and blotchy, and his eyes remained closed, but he breathed deep and steady.

“So,” said Bryce.

“So,” I said. “What do we do now?”

Rain rolled off the end of Bryce’s nose. “We’ll get him to the doctor. He can look after him and alert us when he wakes up. After that, we’ll have to somehow convince him we didn’t mean to make all the mistakes we did.”

That hadn’t been what I was talking about, and I had a feeling Bryce knew it. I’d been talking about us . What we would do now.

Together, we helped Amy back on the horse.

After dropping Amy off at the doctor’s house, the ride back to the castle was long, wet, and miserable.

And silent. So, so silent. Thoughts raced through my head—what Bryce said about being scared to love because everyone he loved left, and my own problems—how I always fell just short of being enough.

When we got back to the castle, instead of our usual ritual where we climbed into bed together, we stood in the hall between our two doors, dripping water onto the woven carpet.

“We had a moment in the rain,” I said, feeling him out, needing to know where we stood after I practically threw my feelings in his face.

“Sure did.”

My heart was scared to beat. “Isn’t this the point in your books where the hero declares his love?”

Bryce looked down at me, a sort of pain in his eyes. His wet hair curled over his devastating sapphire eyes. “Court, darling, sweetheart, beloved, I confess I have frequent urges to prepare you romantic candlelit dinners, using all your dearest, most treasured possessions as the candles.”

It was a half-hearted attempt at our old fire, but it fizzled out and died in the cold gray between us. There was no going back, and there was also no going forward.

I realized what he must have too; it was better never discussed. It was like a dream you hold close, knowing telling others would destroy the magic. As you sleep again and again, the memory slips away, growing faint and distant until you can’t remember if it actually happened or not.

We turned away from each other, and a moment later, our separate doors clicked shut.