Kate in Waiting Becky Albertalli (best way to read books TXT) 📖

But Mom can be kind of a bulldozer when she wants you to do something. And I guess she got it in her head that I should do Ella.

Okay, that’s not entirely it.

She wanted me to, yeah. And at first I said no. But then I kept picturing Eric Graves in the audience, staring up at me, entranced. He’d be in the front row. He’d think, how have I never noticed Kate Garfield before?

It was pure cliché nonsense.

I guess I let myself be bulldozed.

My hair was so long back then, it took me an hour to dry and straighten it. I dressed like Ella, too—at least the second-rate mall version of Ella: white peasant top, blue maxi skirt, thick belt. The variety show was just one night, always a Friday. But we did our dress rehearsal as an assembly during the day for the school. I was so wrecked with nerves, Mom had to play the opening notes twice. My voice trembled at first, but I shut my eyes and kept going.

And then the song did what songs do. It took over. It pushed me out of the driver’s seat. I was Freddie Mercury and I was Ella and even Rachel from Glee, and I’d never felt so beautiful, ever. I opened my eyes after the first chorus, and there was Eric. Front row, center. The house lights were down, and I couldn’t quite make out his expression. But he wasn’t sleeping or whispering or even texting, like Mira Reynolds was doing beside him. He was paying attention. And when I finished, he clapped and whistled.

I just about bubbled over with joy.

For the rest of the day, I floated through the halls, feeling quietly triumphant. I didn’t breathe a word to the squad. But I could just picture Eric on the walk back to homeroom, trying to explain it to his friends. Her voice. I think I’m falling for her.

I kept thinking he’d text me. Not that we were on texting terms. But maybe he knew someone who knew someone who knew someone who had my number. Maybe he’d look me up. Maybe he’d follow my Instagram. It’s funny—I remember almost nothing about the variety show itself. I just remember being backstage, checking my phone over and over.

Nothing, nothing, nothing.

But as soon as we got home, my brother followed me straight to my room. That’s how I knew something was up. He passed me his phone, already open to Mira’s finsta page.

There I was.

Thirteen-year-old me, my peasant shirt coming untucked, and a crease I hadn’t noticed on the side of my hair. It was the shittiest possible angle—tilted up from below, making me look like a front-facing camera meme in motion. And my painstakingly modulated Ella voice sounded as high as a six-year-old, with round choir-girl vowels and overly enunciated consonants.

There were already thirty-two comments.

yikes lol

saw it live, that was some good shit wow

I’M SCREAMING

Is that Ryan garfield’s sister??

What is her face doing at the 32 sec mark? haha

this is so embarrassing, I literally can’t watch

“Don’t read those,” Ryan had said, snatching the phone away.

I could hardly form words. “Mira filmed me?”

Ryan showed me the caption.

Shoutout to e-dawg @sirEricGeneric for this cinematic masterpiece

Everything froze.

E-dawg. Eric Graves.

“Don’t sweat it, okay?” Ryan shifted awkwardly beside me. “It only has a hundred and three views.”

“A hundred and three people have seen this?”

I remember I could barely breathe. I remember wondering if you could puke your own heart out.

“It’s not actually that bad,” Ryan said.

I didn’t reply.

“I mean, at least you sound—”

“Oh my God, just stop.”

Ryan stopped.

I flopped backward on my bed, arms crossed over my chest like a corpse.

The next day, someone started a new account on Instagram called Kate Garfield Singing. It consisted entirely of ugly screenshots of me from Eric’s video. Square after square of my jaw hanging open, lips curled, eyes half closed. The bio said simply: I die a little. I cried, texting the link to the squad.

FUCK THIS, Raina wrote. I WILL DESTROY THEM. HOLY SHIT

This is garbage, sweetie, I’m so sorry, Brandie wrote.

Anderson never wrote back to the text, because he was already at my door.

“That fucking monster,” he said. He didn’t even pause to say hello.

I wiped my eyes with the heel of my hand. “Which one?”

“Eric. Mira. Both of them. Every single fucking fuckboy who followed the page.”

By then, there were seventy-eight. I couldn’t stop checking. Some were faces I recognized from the f-force, but some were strangers.

Ryan was on the living room couch, but I plopped down anyway, peering up at Anderson. “I’m never singing again. Ever.”

Ryan didn’t even look up from his phone.

But I woke up Sunday to find Mom’s old guitar propped outside my door.

Ryan was in bed still, but awake, thumbing through a textbook. He didn’t exactly look surprised to see me.

I gripped the door frame. “You know I don’t play guitar, right?”

“I’ll text you a tutorial.” He stretched his arm sideways, expertly plucking his phone from its charger. A moment later, my phone buzzed.

I glanced down at it and then back up at him, glaring.

“‘Somebody to Love?’” I asked. “Yeah, that’s not—”

“It’s a good song. Don’t let a bunch of assholes ruin it for you.”

I pressed play, and the video was pretty basic—just some guy running through the chords and finger positions on an acoustic guitar. But there was something about how the threads of sound came together.

My eyes were glued to the screen. “Who would I even play for?”

“What do you mean, who would you play for?” Ryan said, shrugging. “Just play for yourself.”

Scene 11

I think Mom’s self-destructing. Cause of death: Shabbat dinner. She’s got no fewer than eight printed recipes fanned out on the table, and she’s making everything from scratch. I don’t know if she realizes we have one oven. And she’s one person.

Needless to say, we Garfields aren’t exactly Shabbat-dinner-level Jews.

“Katy, stick the mini soufflés in the toaster oven. Can we do that? They’ll cook, right?”

I survey the kitchen: