You Look Different in Real Life

have after you BROKE MY HEART FOR NO APPARENT REASON? I’m sorry if it’s not everything you imagined it to be.
    But here’s all I can mutter before my throat clenches up: “Me too.”
    “It feels like you’ve been avoiding me lately. Are things just overly weird?”
    Yes, I’ve been avoiding him, which means fighting every impulse I’ve got. It’s worth it though. If I’m not around him, the camera isn’t around him, and there are no humiliating questions about who he is and what happened.
    “Things are weird, yes,” I say, trying to pull out the strands of truth, the ones that won’t make me feel like a total fake liar girl. “I just have a lot going on right now.”
    “Well, if you feel like you need some fun, let me know. The trails up on the mountain are clear and we could go for a hike.”
    When we were JustIan, I put up with the hikes. I put up with the blisters in my Converse high-tops (“You’re not supposed to wear shoes like that,” he’d said) and the constant, panicky breathless-but-not-in-a-good-way feeling of trying to keep up with him.
    “It might be something cool for, you know, the camera crew to film.”
    He must notice my expression. Actually, if he didn’t, he’d be a moron because I’m looking at him like someone just slapped me with a wet rag.
    “I mean, it’s so beautiful this time of year,” Ian quickly adds, and by his face I can tell he wishes he could just back up, up, up from that thing he just said.
    Is this what he wants? Does he want to be in the movie ?
    My stomach tightens again.
    “Justine?” a voice calls from around a corner. Leslie.
    “Gotta go,” I squeak, not caring what Ian thinks, all flight response. I’m prey and the crew is my predator. I dart back toward the door and fling it open, letting it bang shut behind me as I rush inside.
    The hallway is darker now but I move farther down, into the shadows. At the end of the hall there’s one classroom door open, a trapezoid of light projected onto the floor. I walk toward it because I’m a fugitive from my own absurd life and have nowhere else to go.
    Closer to the classroom now, I hear happy voices—I can tell from the musical upturn at the end of each comment. Someone laughs. I reach the doorway and peer into the room.
    There’s one girl cleaning the whiteboard at the front of the room. Another is moving desks around.
    The first girl is Rory. I’d know by her clothes even if I couldn’t see her face: Rory always wears button-down blouses and track pants with white stripes down the side. The second is a girl named Aimee who I’ve often seen talking to Rory.
    My afternoon is about to get even more bizarre.
    “Justine?” asks Rory, seeing me.
    I step all the way into the room. “Hi,” I say.
    Silence. Ugh ugh ugh.
    “What are you guys doing?” I ask casually, like it’snormal for me to just appear at this moment.
    “Setting up for a History Club meeting,” says Aimee.
    Rory’s eyes are on me, then off me.
    “What are you doing?” asks Aimee.
    “I was just . . . looking for someone.” Got it! I can say Ian. Ian was probably just here checking the wastebasket and voilà, plausibility.
    Rory puts down the paper towel and Windex she’s been using to clean the whiteboard, then steps a little closer, all without making eye contact.
    “Me?” she asks.
    “You?” I echo, stupidly.
    “Were you looking for me ?” Now here comes the eye contact. One, two, three. I meet her there, in this small space where we are staring at each other, and all the things we ever shared, all the adventures and secrets and daily ins-and-outs of friendship, are jammed in tight.
    There are footsteps in the hallway.
    “Justine!” calls Leslie, because she can see me, and I am stuck.
    I turn and hold up my hand in a wave. “Sorry,” I mutter.
    Leslie looks pissed. I can’t see Lance’s face because he’s focused on the camera, which is pointed at me and most definitely on.
    “Justine, you can’t . . .” Now they’ve reached the doorway, and Leslie glances into the classroom. “Rory!”
    Rory doesn’t react. She’s been staring at the top of the doorframe above my head, but now she glances at me again.
    “Were you?” she repeats. “Looking for me?”
    A strange question for anyone but Rory to ask in this situation, but she makes it sound like it’s so obvious, it would be strange if she didn’t ask it. It feels like if I tell her, “No, I was looking for Ian,” or even if I tell the