Part 35: Victoria

“He doesn’t even play an instrument,” Hannah said out of nowhere.

“Xander? I thought he played guitar and piano?” Victoria replied, confused. Hadn’t they watched him play both last night?

“No, James.”

“Oh.” So she was still thinking about James. All her work at the restaurant, all her sitting there watching Hannah play video games - it was all for nothing. Even The Letter hadn’t gotten the reaction it should have. Hannah had barely even looked at it before saying, ‘Oh, cool, I’ll read it later,’ and going back to pressing buttons. But now she was bored with that, too. The start-up screen of the game was still displayed on the screen and its stupid theme music was still playing in the background, way louder than it needed to be.

“He says he writes songs and he’s in a band, but he doesn’t even play an instrument. Such a fucking poser, am I right?

Victoria was afraid to agree: what if they made up and Hannah told him she had called him a poser? Maybe that was why he hated her. “Can he sing?”

“Lmao, I doubt it.” Hannah pronounced all the letters in lmao, which gave Victoria an answer to something she had been wondering about for a while. (In her head, it had been la-MOW.) “He just thinks calling himself a musician makes him sound cool. But it doesn’t.” She kept glancing at the computer as she talked. She wanted to go online. “It’s like, kid, stop trying so hard, you know?”

“Yeah, I know.”

Victoria shivered. The air conditioner, blasting for hours, had made the room frigid.

“I think I want to go home,” Hannah announced suddenly.

“Really?”

“I miss Benji.” Sometimes that meant she missed Benji; sometimes it was just her way of saying she was unhappy. But either way, it meant she was going home.

“I think my mom might be sleeping,” Victoria replied hesitantly. She was certain of it, having heard her snoring when she went to the bathroom. “Can you call your mom or . . .?"

“Or what?” Hannah snapped.

“You know. . . “

“No, Victoria, I don’t know. Why don’t you tell me?” She was angry again, ready for a fight, and it didn’t seem to matter if it was with James or with her. Victoria wondered what she had done wrong. Should she have offered Hannah the computer? Said something mean about James? Run to wake up her mom? Or begged Hannah to stay? It was so hard to know the right answer.

“No, it’s okay, I’ll go wake her up.”

“No. Don’t. Let her sleep. She deserves to sleep. I’ll call my mom and make her drive all the way over here and then all the way back, even though she’s probably been drinking, and even though we went, like, right by my house earlier. It’s fine. Don’t even worry about it.”

Victoria froze in the computer chair. She wasn’t really there; she wasn’t really anywhere.

Hannah took her phone out of her pocket and pressed the buttons furiously, just as hard as she pressed the buttons on the XBox controller. She put it up to her ear and turned away from Victoria, towards the door, as if that made her closer to leaving. “Mom, I need you to come pick me up. Victoria’s mom is taking a nap and we can’t wake her up, I guess.” A pause. “Like right now. Yeah. ‘Cause I’ve been here all weekend and they’re probably sick of me? ‘Cause it’s rude to just assume I can stay as long as I want? No, I’ll wait outside. Yeah. Bye.” She turned back to Victoria, who was still numb. “I’ve got to wait outside ‘cause she doesn’t want to get out of the car. Talk to you later obviously.

“Oh, okay,” Victoria heard herself say. “Bye.”

“Yeah, bye.” Hannah lived twenty minutes away, but she was clearly determined to wait outside alone, without Victoria. She left the door open, the air conditioner on, the XBox on. In a daze, Victoria put everything back the way it was supposed to be, logged back on to Myssenger, and waited for Hannah to get home and log on. Maybe there Hannah would explain herself; maybe there they could really talk.