THE NEXT MORNING BEFORE SCHOOL, we’re packing up the car so Daddy can take Margot to the airport, and I keep looking up at Josh’s bedroom window, wondering if he’ll come down and say good-bye. It’s the least he can do. But his lights are off, so he must still be asleep.
Ms. Rothschild comes out with her dog while Margot’s saying her good-byes to Jamie Fox-Pickle. As soon as he sees her, he leaps out of Margot’s arms and makes a run for it across the street. Daddy chases after him. Jamie is barking and jumping all over Ms. Rothschild’s poor old dog Simone, who ignores him. Jamie is so excited he pees on Ms. Rothschild’s green Hunter boots, and Daddy’s apologizing, but she’s laughing. “It’ll wash right off,” I hear her say. She looks pretty, her brown hair is in a high ponytail, and she’s in yoga pants and a puffy bomber jacket that I think Genevieve has.
“Hurry, Daddy!” Margot calls out. “I need to be at the airport three hours early.”
“Three’s a bit much,” I say. “Two hours is plenty.” We watch as Daddy tries to scoop up Jamie and Jamie tries to wriggle away. Ms. Rothschild snatches him up with one arm and plants a kiss on his head.
“With international flights you’re supposed to be at the airport three hours early. I have bags to check, Lara Jean.”
Kitty doesn’t say anything; she’s just gazing across the street at all the dog drama.
When Daddy returns with a squirming Jamie in his arms, he says, “We’d better get out of here before Jamie causes any more trouble.” We three hug each other fiercely, and Margot whispers to me to be strong, and I nod, and then she and Daddy are gone for the airport.
It’s still early, earlier than we would’ve woken up on a school morning, so I make Kitty and me banana pancakes. She’s still lost in thought. Twice I have to ask her if she wants one pancake or two. I make a few extra and wrap them in aluminum foil to share with Peter on the way to school. I do the dishes; I even send Janette over at Belleview a feeler email, and she writes back right away. Margot’s replacement quit a month ago, so it’s perfect timing, she says. Come in on Saturday and we’ll talk about your responsibilities.
I feel like finally, I’ve gotten it together: I’ve hit my stride. I can do this.
So when I walk into school that cold January morning, holding Peter’s hand, full on banana pancakes, with a new job and wearing Margot’s Fair Isle sweater she left behind, I am feeling good. Great, even.
Peter wants to stop in the computer lab to print out his English paper, so that’s our first stop. He logs in, and I gasp out loud when I see the wallpaper.
Someone has taken a still of the hot tub video, of me in Peter’s lap in my red flannel nightgown, skirt hitched up around my thighs, and across the top it reads HOT HOT TUB SEX. And on the bottom—YOU’RE DOING IT WRONG.
“What the hell?” Peter mutters, looking around the computer lab. Nobody looks up. He goes to the next computer—same picture, different caption. SHE DOESN’T KNOW ABOUT SHRINKAGE on top. HE’S HAPPY WITH WHAT HE CAN GET across the bottom.
We are a meme.
Over the next couple of days, the picture shows up all over the place. On other people’s Instagrams, on their Facebook walls.
There’s one with a dancing shark photoshopped in. Another one where our heads have been replaced by cat heads.
And then one that just says AMISH BIKINI.
Peter’s lacrosse friends think it’s hilarious, but they swear they don’t have anything to do with it. At the lunch table Gabe protests, “I don’t even know how to use Photoshop!”
Peter stuffs half his sandwich into his mouth. “Fine, then who’s doing it? Jeff Bardugo? Carter?”
“Dude, I don’t know,” Darrell says. “It’s a meme. A lot of people could be throwing their hat in the ring.”
“You have to admit, the cat-head one was pretty funny,” Gabe says. Then he turns to me and says, “My bad, Large.”
I stay quiet. The cat heads were kind of funny. But overall it is not. Peter tried to laugh the first one off, but now we are a few days in and I can tell it’s bothering him. He isn’t used to being the butt of the joke. I suppose I’m not either, but only because I’m not used to people paying this much attention to anything I’m doing. But ever since I’ve been with Peter, people are, and I wish they weren’t.
