What Happens Now?

Chapter 13

Going to rehearsals

Nini and EJ are going down the stairs to the bomb shelter. Everyone is gathered outside the room.

"Hey Nini," EJ calls after her. "Where were you at lunch?"

"I had a costume fitting."

"But why weren't you answering my texts?"

"Can we please not do this right now?"

"Are you mad at me?... You're mad at me. There was no costume fitting at lunch."

"Fine. You want to know where I was? I was at the computer lab bribing some hacker to recover a message you deleted when you stole it."

"Wait why do you think that-"

"Oh please! Gina's not the wonderstudy I need to worry about is she?"

"Nini, look. I was spiraling. I told you I loved you but you couldn't say it back. But you said it to Ricky. Now I see the way he looks at you. And I know you guys have a lot more history but-"

"Yeah, Ricky would never steal my phone."

"Yeah, I know. He just leaves sad-face messages to see if you had a moment over a song."

"Don't make this about Ricky!"

"This is what this is about! I was just trying to hold on to what we had over the summer!"

"Yeah, I was too. But you know what? Summer's over."

Ricky's house

"Hey, aren't you late for rehearsal? What are you looking for?" Ricky's dad asks him."

"Scene 7," Ricky says. "I took it out to memorize but now I think that Big Red used it as a napkin... is that a hot wing?"

"I uh... I started to clean up but then your mom said that she wanted to meet at the restaurant."

"Straight from the airport? Why isn't she coming home first?"

"I guess she thought she'd be hungry."

"Nevermind, I'll just borrow a script." Ricky gets ready to leave.

"You'll be done by 7, right? Make sure you give yourself enough time to get to the restaurant."

"The restaurant is like ten minutes from school. I'll be there." Ricky turns to see his mom, Lynn, coming through the door. "Mom!"

"Come here I missed you!" She goes to hug Ricky. "Is that a hot wing?"

"I thought we were going to meet at the restaurant."

"Well, I caught an earlier flight."

"But we agreed to do this at the restaurant."

"Do what?" Ricky asks confused, looking between his parents. His parents look at each other.

"Ricky... we're legally separating," Lynn says after a while.