“Excuse me.” A man’s voice reverberates through an intercom. “Can I have your attention?”
I glance sidelong at Box Boy. “Is this—”
There’s a sudden squeal of feedback and a rising piano intro.
And then a literal fucking marching band walks in.
A marching band.
People flood into the post office, carrying giant drums and flutes and tubas, blasting a somewhat off-key rendition of that Bruno Mars song “Marry You.” And now dozens of people—old people, people I thought were in line to buy stamps—have launched into a choreographed dance number, with high kicks and hip thrusts and shimmying arms. Basically everyone who’s not dancing is filming this, but I’m too stunned to even grab my phone. I mean, I don’t want to read too much into things, but wow: I meet a cute boy, and five seconds later, I’m in the middle of a flash mob marriage proposal? Could this message from the universe be any clearer?
The crowd parts, and a tattooed guy rolls in on a skateboard, skidding to a stop in front of the service desk. He’s holding a jewelry box, but instead of taking a knee, he plants his elbows on the counter and beams up at Lip Ring. “Kelsey. Babe. Will you marry me?”
Kelsey’s black mascara tracks all the way down to her lip ring. “Yes!” She grabs his face for a tear-soaked kiss, and the crowd erupts into cheers.
It hits me deep in my chest. It’s that New York feeling, like they talk about in musicals—that wide-open, top-volume, Technicolor joy. Here I’ve spent the whole summer moping around and missing Georgia, but it’s like someone just flipped a light switch inside of me.
I wonder if Box Boy feels it, too. I turn toward him, already smiling, and my hand’s pressed to my heart—
But he’s gone.
My hand falls limply. The boy is nowhere. His box is nowhere. I peer around, scanning every single face in the post office. Maybe he got pushed aside by the flash mob. Maybe he was part of the flash mob. Maybe he had some kind of urgent appointment—so urgent he couldn’t stop to get my number. He couldn’t even say goodbye.
I can’t believe he didn’t say goodbye.
I thought—I don’t know, it’s stupid, but I thought we had some kind of moment. I mean, the universe basically scooped us up and delivered us to each other. That’s what just happened, right? I don’t even know how else you could interpret it.
Except he vanished. He’s Cinderella at midnight. It’s like he never even existed. And now I’ll never know his name, or how my name sounds when he says it. I’ll never get to show him that the universe isn’t an asshole.
Gone. Totally gone. And the disappointment hits me so hard, I almost double over.
Until my eyes fall on the trash can.
Okay. I’m not saying I’m going to dig through the trash. Obviously not. I’m a mess, but I’m not that messy.
But maybe Box Boy is right. Maybe the universe is calling for plan B.
Here’s my question: If a piece of trash never makes it into a trash can, can you even call it trash? Because let’s just imagine—and this is totally hypothetical—let’s say there’s a crumpled shipping label on the floor. Is that trash?
What if it’s a glass slipper?
Chapter Two
Ben
I’m back at the start.
I had one job. Mail the breakup box. Not run out of the post office with the breakup box. In my defense, there was a lot going on. There was that cool and cute Arthur guy, who clearly hasn’t been burned by the universe before, because he actually thought we were supposed to meet. On the day I was trying to mail Hudson’s things back to him. I’m sure Arthur is changing his tune about the universe after that marching band broke us apart.
I hop on the train and head back to Alphabet City to meet up with my best friend, Dylan. I live on Avenue B, Dylan lives on Avenue D. Our origin story comes down to our last names, Alejo and Boggs. He sat behind me in third grade and was nonstop tapping my shoulder to borrow everything, like pencils and loose-leaf. Same deal as we got older when he’d need my two-versions-behind-everyone-else iPhone to text his Crush of the Week after his own battery died. The only time I ever quote-unquote borrow something is when I need him to spot me some lunch money. And I say quote-unquote because it’s super rare that I can pay him back, and he doesn’t care. Dylan’s a good dude. He doesn’t care that I like guys and I don’t care that he likes girls. Shout-out to my main man the alphabet for this bromance.
When I get off the train, I stop at several trash cans, holding the breakup box over them, but I never catch that courage to actually dump the damn thing.
I guess I didn’t expect the breakup to suck if I did the breaking up. But since Hudson’s the one who kissed somebody else, it still feels like he really ended things. Things hadn’t been right between us since his parents got divorced, but I was patient with him. Like when I let him plan my birthday and he took me to a concert of his favorite band. But I let it go because it was my first-ever concert and the Killers are awesome. Then he didn’t show up to my parents’ big anniversary lunch. I let it go again because celebrating my parents’ marriage after everything with his parents was maybe too much for him. And when we went to the movies to see a rom-com about two teen boys and he just went off about how love, even our own, could never be Hollywood-worthy, I stormed off and thought he would chase me and apologize or call my name or literally anything a boyfriend should do.
Nothing for three days. Not until I called to ask him if we were ever going to talk again. Then he surprised me at my apartment and told me he thought we were broken up, so he kissed some random guy at a party. He desperately wanted another chance, but nope. I broke up with him. For real. Even if he thought things were over between us, he couldn’t even wait a week before moving on? Pretty hard not to feel worthless after that.
I reach Dylan’s building and press his apartment number, and he buzzes me up immediately, which is great because I’m not about that waiting life today. I’m carrying around a box of my ex-boyfriend’s things. I’m wearing a backpack with summer homework. Today sucks.
I yawn in the elevator. I had to get up at seven because of summer school. Yay life. The universe keeps on swinging—brass knuckles to the heart and ego.
I step out of the elevator and let myself into Dylan’s apartment because we’re that tight. But I’m smart enough to knock on his bedroom door ever since a few months ago when I walked in and he was really going at it with himself.
“Hand out of your pants?” I ask.
“Unfortunately,” Dylan responds from the other side.
I open the door. Dylan is sitting on his bed, texting away. He’s cut his hair since I saw him last night for dinner. He’s the only dude my age I know who’s rocking a beard. For the longest time I swore I was behind on the puberty game since I haven’t even grown a mustache, but Dylan’s actually the freak show here—handsome freak show.
“Big Ben,” Dylan sings, putting down his phone. “Light of my life. He Who Is Stuck in School.” Summer school double-sucks because Dylan has been cracking jokes ever since that day I came out of the guidance counselor’s office with the bad news. He’s just lucky that no one he ever dated persuaded him to skip studying and to trust that the right grades would fall into place.
“Hey,” I say. Cute nicknames aren’t really my thing.
Dylan points at my chest. “That shirt is a thing of beauty, isn’t she?”
His wardrobe consists primarily of T-shirts from indie coffee shops around the city, and he gave me this Dream & Bean shirt last night when he came over for dinner. Dylan hooks me up when his dresser gets too crowded. He doesn’t usually let go of his favorites, like Dream & Bean, but I’m not complaining.
“I didn’t have anything clean to wear,” I say. “It’s not, like, a cool shirt.”
“That’s hurtful, but I’m guessing you’re in a mood because you’re carrying a breakup box you were going to hand over to Hudson. What happened?”
“He didn’t come to school today.” I put down the box.
“Skipping day one of summer school seems like a bad start,” Dylan says.