Barnard - Fragile Like Us

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This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and events are products of the authors imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or places or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

SIMON PULSE

An imprint of Simon & Schuster Childrens Publishing Division

1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, New York 10020

www.SimonandSchuster.com

First Simon Pulse hardcover edition July 2017

Text copyright 2015 by Sara Barnard

Originally published in Great Britain in 2015 by Macmillan Childrens Books
as Beautiful Broken Things .

Jacket illustration and photographs 2017 by Getty Images

All rights reserved, including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form.

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Jacket designed by Jessica Handelman

Interior designed by Mike Rosamilia

The text of this book was set in Adobe Garamond Pro.

Library of Congress Control Number 2016939293

ISBN 978-1-4814-8610-1 (hc)

ISBN 978-1-4814-8612-5 (eBook)

For Lora, my very best

If I could tell you only one thing,

My message would be this,

The world would be a lonely place,

If you did not exist.

Erin Hanson

I THOUGHT IT WAS THE start to a love story.

Finally.

The boy, who looked to be around my age or slightly older, had skidded to a stop in front of me. He gave me a quick, obvious once-over and then switched on a wide, flirtatious grin. His friend, better looking but very much not grinning flirtatiously at me, rolled his eyes.

Heeeey, the boy said, just like that. Heeeey.

Hi, I said, sending up a quick prayer that my bus wouldnt arrive before the conversation ended. I tried to flick my hair casuallydifficult to do when its a touch on the bushy sideand lifted my chin, like my sister once showed me when she was trying to teach me how to act confident.

What flavor have you got?

What?

He gestured to the cup in my hand. Oh, I said, stupidly. Toblerone. Id only had a few sips of the milk shake. I liked to let it melt a little before I started drinking it properly, and the cup was heavy in my hand.

Nice. The boy carried on grinning at me. Ive never tried that one. Can I have a sip?

Here is what I was thinking as I handed it over: He likes milk shakes! I like milk shakes! This is a MOMENT . This is the START .

And then his back was to me and he and his friend were running away, their laughter lingering after them. When they were a few feet away, the boy turned, waving my cup triumphantly at me.

Thanks, love! he bellowed, either not realizing or not caring that he was not old enoughnot to mention suave enoughto pull off love.

I just stood there with my hand holding nothing but air. The other people at the bus stop were all staring at me, some hiding smirks, others clearly pained with secondhand embarrassment. I adjusted my bag strap as nonchalantly as I could, avoiding anyones gaze, seriously considering stepping in front of a passing bus.

Three days ago I had turned sixteenthe first of my friends to hit this particular milestone, thanks to my end-of-August birthdayand my parents had rented out a hall for my birthday party. You can invite boys! my mother had told me, looking more excited by this prospect than anyone. The problem wasnt that I didnt want boys (definitely not), the problem was that I went to a girls school, and I could count the number of boys I knew well enough to speak to on one hand. Despite the efforts of my best friend, Rosie, who went to the coed high school and had plenty of boy/friends, the gender mix at the party was hopelessly unbalanced. I spent most of the night eating cake and talking with my friends rather than flirting wildly and dancing with what Rosie called potentials, like sixteen-year-olds are supposed to do. It wasnt a bad way to see in a new age, but it wasnt exactly spectacular either.

I mention this so my okay-have-my-milk-shake-stranger idiocy has some context. I was sixteen, and I honestly believed that I was due a love story. Nothing epic (Im not greedy), but something worth talking about. Someone to hold hands with (et cetera). The milk-shake meet-cute should have led to that. But instead I was just me, standing empty-handed, and the boy was just a boy.

When the bus pulled up just a couple of minutes later and I retreated to the anonymity of the top deck, I made a mental list of milestones I would have reached by the time my next birthday rolled around.

1) I would get a boyfriend. A real one.

2) I would lose my virginity.

3) I would experience a Significant Life Event.

In the year that followed I achieved just one of these goals. And it wasnt the one I expected.

So he just took your milk shake? Rosies voice was skeptical. It was nearly nine p.m., and shed called me for our traditional last-night-before-school-starts chat.

Yeah. Right out of my hand.

He just snatched it?

Um. Yes?

There was a pause, followed by the sound of Rosies laughter tickling down the line. Aside from my grandparents, Rosie was the only person I spoke to using the landline. Oh my God, Caddy, did you give it to him?

Not deliberately, I said, already wishing I hadnt brought up the milk shake story. But it was always hard to stop myself telling Rosie everything. It was just second nature.

I wish Id been there.

Me tooyou could have chased after him for me.

Rosie and I had spent the day together, another before-school-starts tradition, and had actually each bought a milk shake before going our separate ways. She would definitely have chased after him, had she been there. When we were four, not long after wed first met at a ballet class we both hated, an older boy had snatched my bow (I was the kind of kid who wore bows in her hair), and Rosie had sprinted after him, taken back the bow, and stamped on his foot. Our friendship had followed a similar pattern ever since.

Why didnt you chase him?

I was surprised!

Youd think after all this time in separate schools youd have learned to chase your own bullies, Rosie said, her voice light and teasing.