Chapter 3: Moxie

M A D D O X

Goodbye world. I'm screwed.

I half-run, half-walk in my girlfriend's wake, but she isn't slowing down. I can tell by her stride—the way her wavy hair flounces with each step—that she's getting ready to rip me a new asshole. What exactly did I do this time? Honestly, I'm not sure I care. This whole routine is getting old.

I've gone through these motions too many times. It always plays out the same way. Our whole relationship is like some glitchy piece of code, stuck in an infinite loop, spitting the same output over and over and over.

You know what, though? Sometimes there's only one way out of a broken loop...  CTRL-ALT-DELETE. Force quit.

"Eleanor!" I call after her again.

She's headed for the library, about to disappear inside the glass revolving door. Enough's enough. I need her to turn around. I don't want to have the coming conversation inside there, under the scrutiny of the campus surveillance cameras. "Eleanor, cut the crap! Hold up!"

She spins around to face me in a swirl of whipping hair. Her icy glare demands silence. I know that look too well. It's designed to freeze me in place, like I'm some well-trained puppy dog commanded by its owner to stay.

I push the thought away. Eleanor Winthrop doesn't own me. Neither does her family – not even with their name emblazoned on this school's wrought-iron gates. 

I didn't plan on having it out with her today, but I don't see any way around it. I can't spend the next year going through the same motions. The thought of making nice with Eleanor for the seventeen-thousandth time makes me want to gouge my own eyes out. I know what I need to do, and I'm prepared to live with the consequences. Even if it means spending my Senior year in a public high school.

"What do you want, Moxie?"

Eleanor and her nicknames... She's been calling me by that one since we were little kids, playing together in the sandbox at Riverside Park. I used to like it when she called me that. Who am I kidding? I used to love it. But hearing it now sets my teeth on edge.

Maybe because it's been a while since I showed an ounce of moxie in real life.

"We need to talk," I tell her.

"I'm really not in the mood."

She turns and pushes her way through the door, but I follow her. I grab her elbow and tug her toward the first study room we pass.

I click the glass door closed behind us. There's a camera mounted in the corner of the room, but I can't do anything about it now. At least it only records video. No sound. That's the closest we're going to come to privacy in this place.

Eleanor faces me, hands on her hips. My VR glasses dangle from the cord around my neck, and she points at them. "Shouldn't you be wearing those?"

"Eleanor—"

"I mean, since your InstaLove score is the only thing you care about anymore."

"That isn't true."

She snorts. "No? So, are you flirting with other girls in front of my face because you actually like them?"

I grit my teeth. Is that why she stormed off? For real? Because of that girl I was talking to just now? I'm used to Eleanor's possessive streak, but she's got a hell of a lot of moxie herself, giving me crap for talking to other people.

I know what's supposed to come next. I'm supposed to grovel. Cajole. Wheedle my way back into her good graces, until she finally breaks down and rewards me with some grudging morsel of affection. Well, it's not going down like that. Time to break the loop. CTRL-ALT-DELETE.

"Eleanor, this isn't going to work."

Her face freezes—the slightest narrowing of her eyes, the only sign that she understood. I wait for her reaction. It feels like an hour ticks by before she speaks. "What are you talking about?"

But she knows what I mean. I can see the comprehension on her face, as I point toward her and back to myself again. "This. You and me. It's not working. It hasn't been working for a while."

"Wait," she answers slowly. "Are breaking up with me?"

She actually looks hurt. I soften my tone and take a step toward her. "I still want to be friends. Always. I just can't—"

"No," she cuts me off, shaking her head and pointing toward my glasses yet again. "If you're InstaFriending me, then no. I don't accept. Request denied."

"This isn't a game, Eleanor."

"Why are you doing this? Over that little—that little nothing? That little nobody?" She waves her hand in the direction of Fenmore Hall.

See, this is the problem with dating a girl you've known since you were both in diapers. She knows me inside and out. She can read me way too well. And the fact is, there was something interesting about that other girl... that other Eleanor—or Ellie, as she called herself.

Ellie's IL Score is 0.

Zero. Brand new profile. A baby, freshly hatched. I can't remember the last time I encountered one of those... Maybe I would've looked right past her under normal circumstances, but the name stopped me in my tracks. Ellie. I used to call Eleanor that at some point in the distant past, before my babyish mouth had the wherewithal to pronounce the full name correctly.

But this new Ellie couldn't have been more different from the Eleanor I know.

She just seemed so... real. Nothing fake about her. Nothing calculated. No fancy clothes. No filters. Every passing emotion written clearly on her face. She seemed jumpy at first--a frightened bunny rabbit--but then her eyes landed on my InSight Visor, and she lit up like a little kid at her birthday party. Those green eyes of hers got so big and round, I thought they might swallow us both up.

The memory makes me grin, but I wipe it off my face. I don't know why, but somehow in the 30 seconds I spent walking with that girl, I came to a decision. I'd intended to stick it out with Eleanor for one last school year together, but I changed my mind. I needed to be my own person. I needed to show some moxie, for once in my life.

I swallow hard and square my shoulders. "I'm sorry. We can still be friends. We can still work together for Maker Fair. But I don't want more than that. And honestly, Eleanor, I'm pretty sure you don't want more than that either."

I expect her to pout. Maybe even shed a tear or two. Instead, she throws back her head and laughs up at the study room's white tiled ceiling. Any trace of guilt evaporates at the sound of her amusement.

This is all part of the routine too, of course.

Eleanor Winthrop has been laughing at me for as long as I can remember—from the day the Winthrops first hired my grandma to be little Eleanor's nanny, and let me tag along to serve as playmate for their adorable only child.

And damn if she wasn't adorable...

I used to like making her laugh. Hell, I used to live for it. I assumed that tinkling laughter masked some undercurrent of affection. It definitely did at one point. Only recently have I realized how toxic our relationship has grown.

Things have been weird between Eleanor and me since we came back from spring break. My grandmother wasn't feeling well, so I went home to the city to take care of her. Eleanor took Reese in my place to stay at her family's five-bedroom "cabin" in Lake Tahoe.

I expected to miss Eleanor during the week apart, but I barely thought of her at all. I spent the week sleeping late, blasting music, and sneaking into the bachata clubs with my fake ID. I upped my IL score through the roof, flirting all night with girls who laughed at my preppy clothes and utter lack of dance moves.

And I know for a fact that Eleanor barely missed me either. She hardly bothered to text me. Our endless Private InstaLove chat stayed idle the whole time. But I saw the way her own IL score jumped sky high while she was in Tahoe. She was talking to someone out there... and I didn't even care enough to wonder who.

Nah, I came to a decision that week. I've spent my whole life as nothing more than Eleanor Winthrop's plaything. The time has come for me to branch out.

Eleanor's still laughing, but I'm done. I turn to leave the room. Her voice rings out after me, and I stop short. "Where do you think you're going?"

"I said what I had to say." My hand is on the doorknob, but I hesitate. "It's over," I tell her softly. "And you're laughing, Eleanor. Admit it. You're not even sad." I have my back to her, but I can see her face reflected in the glass door. I detect a tiny quiver at the corners of her crimson lips, but she keeps that bemused grin firmly planted.

"You know it's not that simple."

I drop my hand and leave the doorknob unturned. Instead of walking out, I bend my head forward and let it rest against the doorframe. No, I think. It's never that simple. Not with Eleanor. Not with the Winthrops.

"You can walk away from me if you want, Moxie," she says in that mocking tone I know so well. "But I've got some terms and conditions."

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