“It’s Emily. Leave a message.”
For a second, I considered leaving a message. I’d apologize and proceed to tell her that her life wasn’t as dull and simpleminded as I had implied. But then again, that may have been exactly what I was saying. Luckily, Em and I never left messages for each other, since we’d just call the other back. Only now there was little chance that Emily was going to call back.
I hung up and looked at Rachel. She was now awake and looking at me.
“Hi,” she said weakly.
“Hey. Are you feeling okay?” I walked over to the side of her bed and sat on the edge. She was a little sweaty and very red. I wondered if she was running a fever. I felt her forehead and arms. She was very warm.
“Ugh. I don’t feel so good. I feel nauseous and tired.” She tried to get up. “Oh…and dizzy.” She fell back on her pillow.
I’d seen these signs before, and it made sense in Rachel’s case, given her strenuous activities in the heat today. “Rach, I think you’ve got heat exhaustion.”
I got her a couple of icepacks from the freezer and ran some cold water over a paper towel. “You should lie back down.” I suggested.
She stubbornly sat back up in her bed. “No, no. I’ve been asleep for a while. That’s not good for heat exhaustion; you just get hotter when you sleep. I need to drink water and cool off. She placed the cool paper towel over her head. She kept her head up, facing the ceiling to keep the towel in place. “So, Peter told me about Jeff’s party today. Are you going?”
“I think so,” I started casually. “Rick said he would pick me up around eight.”
Rachel dropped her head, letting the paper towel fall to her lap. “Rick?”
I explained the quick exchange that Rick and I had earlier. I wanted to be sure I didn’t miss anything in case this evening was just “as friends.”
“Amy, that’s not Rick being considerate or polite. He’s asking you out.”
I playfully waved her off. “It’s barely that. He didn’t say anything about hanging out with me once we got there.”
“Well, he’s not taking Haley,” she pointed out.
“Yeah, um…I sort of asked him about that.”
Rachel’s eyes widened and her smile stretched. “That’s the last thing I would have expected you to do.”
“Well, I had to. It was…bothering me.”
By ten to eight, I was slipping into my light-blue cotton dress where the back fell a little shorter than the front, the front being just above my knees. Since the party was on the beach, I decided to wear my bathing suit under the dress and white flip-flops. It also helped dress down the outfit to appropriate beachwear. I looked over at Rachel, who was nowhere near getting ready. She was lying in bed, flat on her back with no pillow, staring at the ceiling.
“Rach?” I called, quietly.
She groaned.
That did it. I threw off my flip-flops and settled down next to her. “I’m going to stay with you.”
She jumped up into a sitting position. “Not a chance in hell,” she barked.
I shifted back, stunned at her sudden burst of energy, then raised an eyebrow at her. “Good thing I wasn’t giving you a choice.”
“Wow. You’re a terrible friend.”
I swallowed the hurtful words. They only hurt because of my recent fight with my best friend. I said nothing in response and just stared at her.
“Fine. Stay here with me. But all you’re going to do is make me hate myself for getting sick when you had your big date. I’ll just go on feeling like I let you down when I’m supposed to be cheering you on. So in the end, Amy, no one wins.”
My mouth dropped, and she held her challenging stare. There was a knock on our door.
“Wow. Sheesh, okay. I’ll go.” I stood warily and practically stumbled to the door.
CHAPTER 18
