You Look Different in Real Life

friendship.”
    “Yes,” I say. I’m not sure where she’s going with this, but I keep the shot framed on her, her face so close and unfiltered.
    “How do you know I wouldn’t have gotten sick of you at some point?” She asks this scientifically, with no accusation. I can tell Felix and Nate are listening intently but neither of them turns around.
    “Maybe you would have,” I say. “Maybe you would have dumped me .”
    “That wouldn’t have happened. You were my only friend. I was a difficult person to be with and still, you stayed around.”
    I realize she’s just trying to understand the situation. Looking at all sides in order to see it as a whole.
    “We’re just talking hypothetically here,” I urge. “Just pretend, like this is a story in a book or something.”
    Rory considers that. “If I had been the one to dump you, would you have wanted me to apologize?” she asks.
    “If I missed you as a friend, yes.”
    “And you would have forgiven me, if I’d done that?”
    “Yes . . . but, Rory, this is really about you. If you think we’re done and we should go back to ignoring each other, then I’m okay with doing that.”
    “But you’d rather not.”
    “No,” I say. “I’d rather not.”
    Now Rory bites her lip. “Me neither.”
    She leans in and hugs me, sideways and quickly, and on camera it looks weird because her face just gets closer closer closer, then disappears, then reappears. But actually, it’s perfect.
    I turn the camera off.
    “Did you get it all?” she asks.
    “Yeah.”
    “Good. Because that’s why I didn’t say it last night. I wanted to do it when you could shoot it. Because I know that’s better. Right?”
    “Yes.”
    Rory folds her hands into her lap and bows her head.
    “You know that email I sent you?” she suddenly asks, looking at the gross car floor mat. “When I heard you weren’t going to do the film?”
    “That was you ?”
    She raises her head to look at me again, even more surprised than I am. “Yeah. I thought you’d figure that out right away.”
    “No, I assumed it was Felix.”
    “Oh. Well. It was me.”
    “You said we were part of a whole.”
    “We are. And I can’t stand missing puzzle pieces. Remember?”
    Now we look at each other and smile at the same time. One thing has closed and another has opened, and I’m not sure which is which, but it doesn’t matter.
    “I remember, Rory. I so totally remember.”
    It’s almost ten o’clock by the time we see signs for the Mountain Ridge exit. I can’t believe it’s still Sunday morning. The rest of the day may as well be the rest of my life, the hours unfurling with possibilities and uncertainty.
    The first stop is Keira’s. Nobody discussed this. It just seemed the obvious choice. When we pull up to the house, Mr. Jones steps out the front door wearing running pants, a sweatshirt, and sneakers, as if he’s not waiting for us at all but just on his way to work out. He takes a few steps forward, then stops at the last stone of the front walk.
    “Good luck,” says Nate to Keira.
    “I won’t need it,” Keira says with determination.
    She opens the car door and turns to glance directly at me, giving the slightest of smiles, before she climbs out. I don’t know what will happen the next time I see her. Willshe say hi to me? Hug me? Ignore me completely? Any of these things seems possible. I guess I’ll just have to stay tuned.
    Keira walks slowly to her dad. Nate doesn’t back up right away. It’s only when Mr. Jones reaches out for her, not hugging but putting a firm and protective hand on her shoulder, maybe making sure she’s really there, and Keira nods, that Nate feels okay to leave.
    “Who’s next?”
    “May as well get this over with,” says Felix. “Although if anyone else is interested in a last-minute trip to, say, Canada, for about a month, I might be up for that.”
    I pat the top of Felix’s head as Nate drives deeper into town. We both know that, unfortunately, Felix is only half-kidding. The iPod has dialed up some melancholy one-hit-wonder from a few years back, so unoriginal it’s catchy.
    “I’m not sure why this is on here,” says Nate.
    “Uh, because you’re a tween girl at heart?” asks Felix, and they both laugh. I don’t think I’ve heard them laughing at the same time in years. It’s like pure glee, uncorked. At least, to me.
    But Felix gets quiet quickly as we pull onto his street, and he sighs.
    “One thing at a time,” says