The next year was one of the worst for me socially, though it didn’t start out that way. At the beginning of the year, Macie, Audrey, Callie, Phoebe, and I really bonded as a group. That was the year we started traditions like our monthly scary movie sleepover. We all hated scary movies, but Audrey had the idea to start watching them. She told us that when boys took girls out on dates, they always took them to scary movies, so we needed to be able to sit through them. On the first Saturday of every month, we would all go over to Audrey’s house and watch a horror film in the basement with all the lights off.
The first time we did this, Callie hated it so much that she left the room and sat upstairs while the rest of us watched the movie. Halfway through, Macie decided that it wasn’t right that four of us should be in the basement watching the movie if Callie wasn’t with us. She marched upstairs and talked to Callie for twenty minutes. The rest of us waited. Audrey and Phoebe were looking at pictures on Audrey’s laptop while I sat awkwardly waiting for Macie to come back. I never admitted this to anyone, but when Macie wasn’t with there, I didn’t really feel like I was part of the group. It’s not that Audrey, Callie, or Phoebe wanted to make me feel left out, it just happened that way.
About twenty minutes after Macie had left the room, she came back down the basement stairs, her arm linked with Callie’s. I don’t know how she did it, but Macie had put a huge grin on Callie’s face. She was able to sit and watch the rest movie with us.
By November, Callie became the one who wanted to pick the scary movie for us to watch. To this day I still don’t know what Macie said that changed Callie’s mind. Whatever it was, we all knew how much Callie appreciated it.
Callie started hanging around with Macie more often after that. At school, she’d sit next to her at the lunch table and start up a conversation that only the two of them were involved in. In history class they’d pass notes, which would keep me from being able to connect with Macie. The worst of this happened in December.
At the beginning of the month, our history teacher announced that there would be a partner project due the day before we all left for Winter Break. We were allowed to choose our own partners, which made everyone really happy to hear.
“We have an even number of students in this class so there will be no groups of three!” The teacher proclaimed. People giggled at that, although I didn’t really see what was funny.
Immediately, I looked for Macie. That’s when I saw Callie sitting with her. The two of them were laughing about something. Macie caught me watching and motioned me to come over. I did walk over, only to hear Callie remind me, “We’re only allowed groups of two. Sorry.”
Macie didn’t seem to register the fact that that meant I had no partner. She smiled somewhat sympathetically and went back to laughing with Callie.
Macie and Callie grew really close that month. They started hanging out almost everyday. When Audrey or Phoebe would invite all of us over to one of their houses, Callie would remind Macie that they had to work on their history project. And if Macie wasn’t coming, none of us were. In fact, I can’t think of one time that Audrey, Callie, Phoebe, and I were together without Macie. She tied us together. So when Callie “stole” her from the rest of us, it was almost like we didn’t have friends. Callie had achieved what we all secretly wanted to do. The truth of the matter is that each of us, Audrey, Callie, Phoebe, and I, wanted Macie to ourselves.
I ended up being paired with Max, a quiet boy in our class who always seemed happy; despite the fact that I don’t think he had many friends.
We weren’t the best pair, Max and I. If one of us had been more open, it might have been easier. But since we were both passive and quiet, not much got done at first. We worked it out, of course, but it wasn’t exactly fun. We decided to use the few free periods we had to work on the project together. Since we both wanted to avoid the awkwardness of going over to each other’s houses, we often stayed after school and worked in the library.
Max was nice, but we just didn’t work well together. We had opposite ideas for our project and neither of us knew how to communicate them to each other. Our project was to take an event in American history and make something creative to teach the event to the class. Since I have always lacked creativity, I didn’t know what to suggest for our project. We were assigned the signing of the Declaration of Independence as our event.
The project that Max and I made ended up being a recreation of the Declaration of Independence. It didn’t look great, but the teacher gave us an A- on it, so I didn’t complain. After we got our grade back, Max told me he wanted “to talk at lunch.”
“Oh my gosh! He’s totally going to ask you out!” Macie exclaimed when I told her during gym.
“What? No, wait-” I tried to process what Macie had said.
“Nash, this is great! You’re going to have a boyfriend! Good for you!”
“Macie, stop!” I realized a little too late where this was going. “I don’t like him like that.”
“Why not? He’s cute and he’s totally into you!” Macie elbowed me in the stomach playfully.
“Seriously, Macie. What do I say? I don’t want to hurt his feelings.”
Macie frowned. “You’re really not going to say yes?” I shook my head. “Fine,” she continued, “I’ll help you.”
I sighed in relief. “Thank you.” At this point in our friendship, I was used to the idea that I was always risking Audrey, Callie, and Phoebe finding out whenever Macie knew a secret. However, I didn’t really mind with this one. I mean, I was flattered that Max wanted to ask me out, but also worried about how to say no.
At lunch, I realized that Macie was wrong. It turned out Max didn’t want to ask me out at all. He wanted to return my pencil case that I had left in the library where we had worked on our project.
It was embarrassing. I had to walk back to our lunch table holding nothing but my pencil case.
“Oh my god, Nash! Tell us everything!” Audrey squealed when I sat down.
I looked down at my shoes. “He gave me back my pencil case. I, uh, left it in the library.”
There was an awkward silence. It lasted for only a few seconds, but it felt like it was a lot longer.
Then Callie let out a laugh. “Are you serious?” Audrey and Phoebe started giggling too as Callie continued, “Wait, so he didn’t even ask you out?”
Audrey added between giggles, “Why didn’t he just give you the pencil case before?
Still looking at my feet, I replied, “I don’t know.” At that moment, I could have sworn I even heard Macie let out a giggle, but when I looked up she had a concerned look on her face.
“I thought it was because he wanted to talk to you again,” Phoebe offered.
“Well he’s stupid for not asking you out.” Macie walked over to give me one of her famous Macie hugs. “Clearly he’s the one missing out. You can do better.”
Audrey, Callie, and Phoebe followed Macie’s lead and started acting a bit more sympathetic. Not that I felt like I needed sympathy. They all seemed to forget the important detail that I didn’t actually want to go out with Max.
“Yeah, who needs him anyway?” Callie added. Then, changing the subject, she continued, “Hey, Macie, are we still on for Friday?”
Macie turned back to face Callie. “Oh my god, yes! I’m so excited!” She seemed to forget all about me in that moment. In fact, she seemed to forget about everyone except Callie. The two of them spent the rest of lunch discussing their plans for the weekend.
I didn’t see much of Macie, or any of the girls for that matter, over winter break. As far as I know, Macie spent most of the break with Callie. I never called her because I was afraid of being told she was busy with Callie. I don’t handle rejection well—I never did—so it would have been too upsetting for me to hear that Macie didn’t have time for me. I decided that it would be better to not risk finding out.
It wasn’t a good time for me. My family rarely went on vacations because we couldn’t afford them, so we were stuck in the small town over break. I spent all my time at home. Where could I go? I didn’t have anyone to see. Audrey’s family was on vacation in the Caribbean, Phoebe always spent the holidays with her extended family a few towns over, and I assumed Macie and Callie were together for most of the week and a half that we had off from school. Even if any of them had been home, though, I doubt it would’ve changed anything. I surely wouldn’t have asked them to hang out, and I can’t imagine that Audrey or Phoebe would invite any of us over without Macie being there.
I did see Macie once during that time period, however. My parents had dragged me to a movie at the drive-in movie theater in the town next to us. Not many people from my school went to that theater because it was farther away from our town than the mall, which had its own movie theater. That was the main reason I agreed to going with my parents to the movie; I didn’t expect to see anyone there that I knew.
But I did. My mom and I got out of the car before the movie started to use the port-a-potties, supplied by the theater. That’s when I recognized a familiar head of brown hair. “Macie?” I asked.
She turned around. The expression on her face showed me that she was surprised. At first, I thought I had made a mistake because she didn’t say anything in reply. “Oh, Nash! Hey.” Her confused look turned into a smile and she walked over to give me a hello hug. “How’s your break going?”
“It’s good,” I replied with a shy smile. “What about you?”
Just then my mom walked out of a port-a-potty. She walked over to us and, noticing who I was talking to, said, “Macie! Great to see you!” My parents aren’t like me in their personalities. I mean, we all get along really well, but they’re both so much more social than I am.
Macie knew this already so it didn’t catch her off guard at all. “You too!”
“Are your parents here? I’d love to say hello.”
“No, sorry, they’re not.” Macie replied.
“Oh.” My mom was definitely surprised to hear that. “So, you’re here with friends, then?”
Macie smiled to try to show that it was totally fine by her that she was there without adults. “Don’t worry, they’re family friends. Practically cousins! And they’re very responsible.”
My mom did not seem convinced, but she put on a smile to hide the fact. “Okay, well I’m going to go back to our car. Nash, just join us when you’re ready. Enjoy the movie, Macie.”
“Thanks!” Macie replied with her cheerful friendly voice that everyone was so used to.
I didn’t stay long to talk to Macie. It was hard to make conversation when I couldn’t help but feeling like her mind was somewhere else.
“So, have you see any of the other girls over break?” she asked me.
“Um, no. I’ve been relaxing mostly.” I smiled and tucked a piece of hair behind my ear.
“That’s good. I wish I had! I’ve been so tired.” She groaned, jokingly. “Things have been really busy for me. Callie wants to see me as much as possible before-”
“Hey, Macie! The movie’s about to start!” Someone yelled out the passenger seat window of a nearby car. The voice didn’t sound like an adult’s, but I couldn’t really tell.
“Sorry, I should probably go.”
“Oh, okay. Well, see you later.”
We hugged goodbye, and Macie started to walk away. “I’ll call you soon, okay?”
I smiled. “Sure.” But she never did. Macie didn’t try to contact me at all until school started up again. I wanted to know who she was with that night at the drive-in, and why she was there, but I never got the chance to ask her. By the time we were back in school, some other news made me forget all about seeing Macie over winter break.
That January, another secret came out. Macie let us all know that Callie’s father had gotten a new job—in California. That meant Callie was leaving our school in the middle of the year. She seemed a little disappointed at first, but I don’t think she was very upset by the move. After all, she was moving from Small Town, USA to California, “a state filled with beaches and palm trees,” she explained to us all at lunch one day.
Macie had the idea to organize a goodbye party for Callie. We had the party at Audrey’s house because it was the biggest. It was a sleepover party for just the five of us. We watched a scary movie of Callie’s choice, eat junk food, and played truth or dare. It was a fun night, but it didn’t seem special or different compared to our other sleepovers.
Callie was joined to Macie at the hip that night, but I didn’t mind. It’s hard to admit, but I was glad that Callie was leaving, and I’m pretty sure the Audrey and Phoebe felt the same way. It would give the rest of us more time to be with Macie. Callie didn’t seem to be aware of this, but part of me thought that Macie knew it. And not only did I think that she knew it, but I think she liked it.
The second half of the year was much better. While Macie and I grew closer, I’m pretty sure that Audrey and Phoebe did too. Before, Audrey used to be annoyed by Phoebe and her endless energy, but she seemed not to mind it as much after the first half of 7th grade. I did wonder if Callie’s leaving had anything to do with that. As much as I liked Callie, things seemed simpler after she left. Of course, I had no idea at the time just how complicated things would get. But how could I? I was an innocent 7th grader who was just happy to have a best friend—Macie.