Page 122

“Happy birthday,” she whispers. Then, at full volume, “HAPPY BIRTHDAY.”

It’s seven-forty on a Saturday. Her hair is in a claw clip. She’s wearing Nash’s hoodie and no pants.

“Thank you,” I say into my pillow.

“You have to blow it out.”

“It isn’t lit.”

“You have to pretend.”

So I sit up and pretend. I blow on a candle that isn’t lit, and Kylie claps like I’ve done something incredible and makes me eat it. I’ve never woken up to cake before, so I laugh and enjoy my cupcake.

I’ve never really cared about my birthday. Some years it fell on a school day and nobody knew. Some years my grandma made a box cake, and we ate it standing up in the kitchen. One year my mom took me to the mall and let me pick out earrings, and then the next year she didn’t remember until the fourteenth. But all in all, it was always just another day.

Grandma: Happy birthday my Tess. Love you to the moon.

My heart stills. I know she loves me. I love her too. Sometimes love isn’t enough.

There are four voice notes from Elsie, the longest one is six minutes, which I listen to while Kylie does her makeup. Most of it is Elsie singing, badly, and Payton telling her to stop, and Elsie singing louder.

Elliot: Happy birthday sunk costs girl!! Hope it’s a good one.

I look at Kylie. He must have gotten it from her.

There’s nothing from my mom.

I put the phone down.

“Okay,” Kylie says, turning around from the mirror with one eye done. “Dinner. Tonight. All of us. The diner, or somewhere nicer, I don’t care, you pick. And then something after.”

“I have packages.”

“You have packages every day. Today you have a birthday.” She points the eyeliner at me. “I already told Paige. Paige already told Kenzie. Bianca’s bringing a cake. You can’t say no to a cake, Tess.”

I look at her. She looks back at me with one eye done and one eye bare, which makes her look like two different people.

“Okay,” I say.

She screams. It’s seven fifty-two.

Somebody above us stomps on the floor, and we laugh.

I spend the morning the way I spend every Saturday morning. Shower. Coffee. The packages.

There are eleven of them, which is a lot for a Saturday, but it’s December and people are buying presents for each other. Some of those presents are a wool scarf, a pair of boots, and a little ceramic dish with a bird painted in the middle of it that a woman in Pennsylvania wants for her sister. I wrap each one in tissue. I fold the mailers. And then I fight with my tape gun.

The tape gun is my worst enemy. The teeth are completely gone now. Every time I pull, the tape folds over on itself and sticks to the dispenser and then to my fingers and then to my sleeve. I end up tearing every strip off with my teeth, which takes forever and tastes like glue.

It’s not a big deal. It’s a two-dollar tape gun. I’ll buy another one after Christmas, when I’ve got the bus money set aside and can spare it.

At some point, I pick up my phone. I look at the screen. Nothing new.

I put it down.

I pick it up again twenty minutes later.

And I know what I’m doing, and I hate it.