Two-Way Street Read Online Free

of the room. “This party is so lame.” She glances at me out of the corner of her eye, and I know that’s my signal.
    “You want to get out of here?” I ask. “I have my truck.”
    She shrugs, like she doesn’t care. “I guess. Just let me go tell my friends.”
    Madison walks away, and I try to find some way to distract myself. I can’t be waiting for her when she comes back. I have to make her work for it a little. I know it sounds mean and fucked up, but it really isn’t. It’s just how things work. I look around for some situation that has to be taken care of, or some girl I know that I can later claim came up to me, not vice versa. And that’s when I see B. J. attached to Courtney McSweeney’s leg.

courtney before
    125 Days Before the Trip, 9:43 p.m.
    Tonight I’m going to tell my friend Lloyd that I’m in love with him. Important things about Lloyd:
He’s been my best friend since the seventh grade, when we got seated near each other in every single class because of our last names. It seemed like every teacher was doing it alphabetically, so since I’m McSweeney and he’s McPeak, we were always together. When we got to high school and ended up being able to choose our own seats, we still sat together. It was like a rule.
Ever since the first day of seventh grade, I’ve been in love with him. My friend Jocelyn says that you can’t be in love with someone if:
they don’t know it
they don’t feel the same way
you’ve never kissed them, held hands with them, or done anything more than be friends with them.
    But that makes no sense to me whatsoever, because, hello, it’s called unrequited love. Look at people in movies. They’re always saying “I’m in love with you” when they haven’t done anything physical with the other person. Physical is just physical, it doesn’t mean anything.
    Besides, I am going to tell Lloyd how I feel. The reason I haven’t up until this point is because I don’t want to ruin the friendship (i.e., I’m deathly afraid of rejection). But lately, there have been signs. Lloyd has been calling me every single night—definitely more than usual—and talking on the phone with me for hours. And he helps me with my math homework, even when I get totally confused and it takes us twenty minutes to do one problem. He never gets impatient with me.
    I have to make my move soon, though, because Lloyd is going to school in North Carolina and I’m going to school in Boston, so we’re going to need to be dating for a few months before we leave for college. That way we’ll be all set up for a long-distance relationship. Which is why I plan on telling him. Tonight. After the party. That I want to be more than friends.
    I’m even wearing my “I’m going to tell Lloyd I want him” outfit, which consists of a very short jean skirt and a tight white shirt. Which is not the kind of thing I usually wear. But I need to get Lloyd to stop thinking of me as a friend and start thinking of me as someone he wants to date.
    So far, the night is not going as planned. First, Lloyd said he would be at this party, and so far, I have not seen him. Second, my friend Jocelyn (who I drove here with), is off talking to this junior guy she has a crush on and has left me standing here by myself. This is not her fault, because I told her I would be fine, since I thought Lloyd would be here soon, and I would be so busy seducing him that I wouldn’t need Jocelyn to hang out with me anyway. Third, and definitely the most upsetting, is that right at this moment, there is a guy dressed like a leprechaun with his arms wrapped around my legs. I’m scandalized by this, but I’m trying to be nice, because I think he’s drunk.
    “Oh, um, hi,” I say, trying to push him away gently. “You’re, um, a leprechaun.” This is why I don’t go to parties. Because stuff like this always happens to me. I’m always the one standing in some corner, by myself, with a guy dressed like a leprechaun drooling on my