Rotten Apple Read Free Page A

was being very kind. She was just not herself today. She was in what her Crazy Aunt Hazel always annoyingly called her “Rotten Apple” mood.
    “Oh,” Apple said. “I’m sorry. Thank you for helping me.” She watched the cute guy stand up. He was at least a head taller than her.
    “No, seriously,” the cute guy continued. “Come on! Is that really all I get from you?”
    “What do you mean?” she asked.
    “Apple! It’s me! Aren’t you even going to ask how the last six months of my life was?” the cute guy asked. “Have you lost your mind along with your cell phone and everything else in that deep and endless pit of a bag of yours? You should really think about cleaning that thing out. Apple, it’s me! Me!” he insisted. “Come on! You really don’t recognize me?”
    Apple turned her eyes up and took a proper look at the cute guy’s face, finally forcing herself to even look in his eyes.
    “Oh … my … God,” she said, blinking her eyes. How had she not noticed? But he looked so completely different. It couldn’t be. Could it?
    “Zen?” Apple asked, hesitantly.
    “Um, hello? Yes, it’s me, Zen,” he said with a laugh. “We’ve only been going to school together for ten years now. I know I was gone for half a year, but still …”
    Apple suddenly found herself feeling light-headed and slightly dizzy. All the shiny cars trying to find parking in the mall, and the people walking around them on the sidewalk eating ice cream cones suddenly seemed to go into slow motion. It was the same feeling she had always had when she walked by Zen in the hallways at school, or when she knew he was sitting near her on the spiral staircase before classes started.
    All she could think was, please, dear God, do not let me faint.
    “It’s only been six months,” protested Zen. “Am I that unforgettable? Do I really look that different?”
    How could I ever forget you? Apple thought. I’ve only thought about you every day for two years. I just spent months wondering if I was ever going to see you again. She cleared her throat and fanned her face. She suddenly felt very hot, as if she had just gone for a long jog.
    “I can’t believe it,” Apple said. “You look … well… you look so different. What happened to your glasses? And your hair! It looks so much longer and blonder. You look … you look … you look … you look so muchtaller,” she gushed. And she thought—this time
only
in her head—and you look like you’ve been working out! Where did those shoulders come from? Where did those washboard abs come from?
    Apple hated herself for stuttering. She hated herself for gushing. She was a stuttering, gushing moron.
    Breathe, Apple, just breathe.
    “‘Different’ meaning good? Or ‘different’ meaning bad?” Zen asked, smiling his dimpled smile.
    “‘Different’ meaning amazing!” Apple heard herself gush again. She knew the words coming out of her mouth made her sound idiotic. She had to tone it down a notch—or five hundred notches. “I mean, you know, you look healthy. Very healthy. That’s all I meant. You look really, really healthy. You look very different and really healthy.”
    I did not just use the word “healthy” four times in one sentence, Apple moaned inwardly. Please tell me I did not.
    “I decided to get contact lenses,” Zen said, “so maybe that’s the ‘different.’ You can’t exactly surf with glasses. And my hair, I know it’s a little long, but six months’ surfing in the Australia sun does make it lighter, and I guess grow faster or something.” He touched his hair. “I guess hanging out with all those surfers got to me or something, because I kind of like it like this.”
    “Well, you look incredible,” Apple told him. What was wrong with her? “I mean, you look incredibly healthy.”
    “Well, I’ll take ‘healthy’ as a compliment. So how are yow?” Zen asked. “How was your semester?”
    “Fine. Uneventful. Boring. The usual,” Apple