How to Speak Boy

by Tiana Smith

  He swallowed. “Not exactly.” Something in his expression made me wary, and I drew back.

  “What aren’t you telling me?”

  He didn’t say anything for a moment; then he inhaled and spoke in a rush. “We’re missing the finals round. It started on time. Carter lied.”

  I didn’t respond. I couldn’t. Of course, I recognized why he hadn’t told me this at the beginning of our conversation. Because it wouldn’t have made a difference. If you were late to a round, you didn’t get to compete. Sure, some tournaments were a little loose with the rules, but this was the state championships. There was no way they’d let us into that round, so I could see why Grayson hadn’t brought me there right away. It wouldn’t have changed anything.

  How was it possible to feel so happy and so sad, all at the same time? There wasn’t room in my body for this many emotions at once, so I sat there dumbfounded. Then my brain caught up to everything Grayson had said.

  “Carter lied, and you knew?”

  I pulled my hand away, but he grabbed it back.

  “No! Well, yes. But I came here as soon as I found out.”

  My eyebrows furrowed, but I didn’t remove my hand. Yet. I wasn’t sure I could handle this yo-yoing of emotions, though. Everything was bundled up so tightly I felt like I’d burst into a thousand pieces with a single push. “Explain.”

  “I went early to the finals round, but you weren’t there.” He was talking quickly, perhaps sensing my dwindling patience. “I already had the scarf because I’d grabbed it from my bag as soon as you left the speech room. I waited in the finals room until the other competitors started showing up. That waiting was agony, by the way. I didn’t know why you weren’t there.” His smile was rueful, and I gave his hand a squeeze. I knew that feeling all too well.

  “When Carter showed up, I asked him if he knew where you were because I was supposed to meet you. I told him you had something you wanted to tell me, and he said…” Grayson swallowed. “He said you’d told him you’d changed your mind and that you didn’t want to talk to me. Ever again.”

  “What?” I was too shocked to say anything else. Grayson nodded.

  “That was hard to hear.” He gave a weak laugh, and I brought his hand up to kiss it. He touched my lips with his thumb, and I momentarily forgot what we were talking about. I even forgot to be sad, because Grayson made everything better.

  “So then Carter sat in the seat in front of me and made some kind of joke about how we could be our own little ‘rejected by Quinn’ group. The first person gave their speech, and that was when you texted Carter. The judges were still writing their critiques of the first speech, so we were all just waiting there.” Grayson brought his other hand to mine. “I could see it clearly over his shoulder, and when your name flashed on the screen, I, well, I read your message. I couldn’t help it.” He shook his head. “That was when you asked him if you had the right room, and I watched as he responded and told you that the round was postponed, and I got so mad, I got up and left. I came right here to find you.” He smiled wistfully. “I’m sorry I didn’t have the guts to text you earlier and ask where you were.”

  I let his story sink in, and all the ramifications of it.

  I should have seen it earlier. Anyone could adjust a photo to put a different number on top. Carter had told me there was a delay because some judges had been late in turning in their ballots, but the more I thought about it, they couldn’t have posted the lists for the final rounds if any of the judges had been late. I’d been too caught up in my own drama to think things through.

  Not that it mattered now.

  We were out of the running, and Carter had succeeded. All along, I’d been worried that Grayson would ruin my chances, but it was Carter who had put the knife in my back.

  I still didn’t know why Carter would do this to me. Even with me out of the competition, Carter wouldn’t have won. Grayson would have. Well, if he’d stayed.

  “You left the round for me?” I asked. “But you could have won.”

  Grayson shook his head. “You’re the one who deserved to win, Quinn, and you know it.”

  I looked at his intent face, and felt an outpouring of emotion. He’d left the finals round of the state tournament—for me. It didn’t really change my position in the standings, but it changed things between us. Because I knew he had my back. And I had to have his.

  I wasn’t about to let that go without doing something about it.

  I dug through my bag until I found my compact, then handed the small mirror to Grayson. He held it uncertainly.

  “What’s this for?”

  “For you to wipe my lipstick off,” I said. He smiled.

  “I kind of like it there.” He leaned over and kissed me again, and I got so caught up I almost forgot my plan. My fingers found their way into his hair again without my knowledge, and I was almost tempted to crawl from my desk onto his lap. But I gently pushed him away instead.

  “Don’t distract me. I’m on a mission.” I was confident and sure. I’d been right all along that knowing was better than not knowing. Hopefully my coach would agree. That was another reason why I had to make this work. Because if I rolled over and accepted defeat now, she’d blame it on Grayson, and I wasn’t about to let that happen. Who would have thought I’d be defending Grayson’s chances to compete?

  Grayson laughed, and opened the mirror to make sure he was good. I took it back and used it to reapply the shade of red that had just been on Grayson’s lips. Then I stood. He did so too, uncertainly.

  I picked up the scarf that had fallen to the ground and wrapped it behind Grayson’s neck, my fingers lingering there for a moment. It was so freeing to be able to actually touch him now, like I’d been wanting to do for so long.

  Then I used the scarf to pull him out of the room after me.

  “Where are we going?” He took a couple long strides to reach me, then took my hand in his when we were walking side by side. My fingers wove between his and I smiled.

  “We’re going to the tab room to see if there are any coaches or judges in there. Then we’re going to tell them everything and hope they let us compete anyway. This isn’t just a case of being late. This was sabotage, and hopefully they’ll see it that way too.”

  After all Grayson had done for me, it was the least I could do.

  I hoped it worked.

  Chapter Thirty

  The look on Carter’s face when we went back to the room, two coaches in tow, was so stricken it was almost worth all the trouble he’d caused.

  Not really, but it was still vindicating.

  It’d taken us some time to explain everything to the coaches, and then they’d all deliberated over what to do. But we were here now and they were letting us compete. That was the important thing.

  One of the coaches we’d brought with us addressed the room. “Sorry to interrupt,” he said. “Judges, could we see you in the hall for a moment?” They all shuffled outside while Grayson and I took our seats in the back of the room. Far away from Carter. Carter, who turned in his chair and tried to catch my eye. I refused to even look in his direction.

  “Quinn,” he started.

  I held up my hand to stop him. “I don’t want to hear it.”

  This didn’t deter him. He got out of his seat and came to stand in front of me.

  “Quinn.” He put his hands in his pockets. “I—”

  “Carter, I need to focus now,” I interrupted. I took a shaky breath. It wasn’t that I didn’t want to talk to Carter right now—it was that I didn’t want to talk to him ever again. “Because of you, I nearly lost my chance to compete. I refuse to let you take away my concentration now.”

  “That’s not what—”

  “Carter, she asked you to stop.” Grayson interjected. His eyes were fire and ice at the same time. I wasn’t quite sure how Carter was still standing, to be honest.

  Carter swallowed, and looked around the room at all the students watching him. No one bothered to
hide their interest. Everyone had to be wondering what was happening, but I didn’t feel like explaining.

  The door to the room opened again and the judges filed back inside. The coaches who’d accompanied us here stayed by the door.

  “Contestant 10720, please come with us. I’m afraid you’ve been disqualified.”

  Carter was still standing, but he didn’t move.

  The coach wasn’t having it. “Now.” He held the door open. “You’ve already caused enough of a delay, and your coach is waiting for you in the tab room.”

  Our coach hadn’t been there when Grayson and I had gone, but I was glad to hear she knew about the situation now.

  Carter looked back at me one last time before grabbing his things and following the coaches out the door. I expected to feel some relief, but fire still coursed through my veins. There wasn’t room for me to feel anything else. The coaches and Carter closed the door behind them, and everyone in the room seemed to hold their breath in the silence.

  “Okay.” One of the judges turned in her seat. “Sorry for all the drama. It looks like we missed two of the speeches, so we’re going to tag them onto the end of the lineup. Since we’ve heard the others in this room, that means”—she looked down at her paper—“Contestant 91698, you’re up next.”

  I stood up and walked to the front of the room.

  This wasn’t any different than the other countless times I’d performed this speech.

  Except it was.

  Everything felt different. I was different. So much had changed in just the last hour that I couldn’t begin to process it all.

  I looked out at my audience and felt their curious glances like a second skin. My gaze skimmed over the people in the room, passing over the contestants and landing on the judges. They were focused, their pens poised over their papers, waiting for me to make all this worth their time. My eyes kept traveling until my gaze stopped on the one person who grounded me.

  Grayson smiled reassuringly. Everything I needed to know was right there in his expression. He knew I could do this. He believed in me, probably as much as I believed in myself.

  I took a deep breath and began.

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Now that I’d had a chance to compete and everything was entirely out of my hands, I couldn’t help but let the demons in. The high was over, and all that was left was worry, negativity, and buckets of self-doubt.

  I had good reason. After interrupting the finals round like that, there was zero hope the judges would treat me fairly in their results. I looked like the entitled diva that demanded everything go her way. They’d penalize me for that reason alone.

  More than anything, I was still experiencing aftershocks of Carter’s betrayal. When today started, he’d been one of my friends. He’d been the one I turned to when I needed a boost, or the person who’d had my back if someone said something that cut too deep. Then he’d done the unthinkable, and I was still processing the fact that our friendship was officially over. He made the deep cut himself this time, and the shock was slowly being replaced with hurt. It was like I couldn’t take a full breath. My mind was cloudy with the weight of it all, still trying to make sense of everything.

  I sat on the floor with Grayson, our backs against the wall in the speech and debate room. There was still an hour before the awards ceremony, and our coach was away in the tab room, probably hiding from all my drama. I didn’t even blame her.

  Grayson held my hand, obviously unsure of how to make me feel better. He knew that Carter had been one of my only friends. But it wasn’t a secret that they didn’t get along. At the same time, he wasn’t likely to speak badly of Carter knowing that we’d been friends either.

  Competition, though, that he knew something about. It was obvious he felt comfortable on that subject, because he kept reassuring me. “You know you did great,” Grayson said again. His thumb made circles on my hand, and if it weren’t for my impending doom, I might have been distracted by it.

  Okay, full disclosure, I was still pretty distracted by it.

  But everything I’d worked so hard for, for an entire year, was slipping from my grasp all because of something someone else did. Now that things had finally, finally, worked out with Grayson, I could allow all my headspace to focus on this final tournament, and my stress was taking advantage of it by obsessing nonstop. Plus, the fact that Carter had been the one to do this to me wasn’t exactly making it easier to swallow.

  Carter was my friend. Well, he had been. If it had been another competitor, I’d have an easier time processing things. I still wouldn’t have liked it, but at least I would have understood. This was not something I could understand.

  My mom always said it was the people closest to us that could hurt us the most. It sucked that I had to learn this firsthand. Carter was my personal Peter Pettigrew, betraying me to Voldemort for his own gain.

  Of course he’d been disqualified. But his real punishment would have to wait until we went back to school on Monday. That’s when Coach said Carter had a meeting with the principal to discuss an in-school suspension for how he’d represented our school at an event. He was currently sitting in the far opposite corner, headphones in and hood up. We hadn’t talked yet, and I wasn’t sure what to say to him if we had. How do you say, “Gee, thanks for stabbing me in the back, please get out of my life,” to someone who once knew all your darkest secrets?

  He’d kept his head down when we returned to the room, and I was just fine with that.

  I’d been so optimistic then, when the round had just gotten over. I’d still been all vindicated and full of justice. But then the judges left the room, and none of them even looked my direction.

  “It wasn’t enough,” I said to Grayson, remembering the way they’d so easily dismissed me. Earlier I’d wondered how it was possible to be so happy and sad at once, and I kept waiting for that feeling to go away.

  But it didn’t, and I was left with feeling like I was pulled in too many directions at once. Grayson kissed the back of my hand and my pendulum swung the other way. My heart was suddenly so full I could burst.

  A single tear escaped and I brushed it aside.

  What a great way to start a relationship.

  “Why on earth are you crying?” My coach walked in the room, and all eyes swung first to her, then to me. Great. There were only a few team members hanging out in this room, but even a one-person audience was one too many. Carter pulled out his earbuds and placed them on the desk in front of him. I tried to ignore him altogether.

  “You know why,” I mumbled. “You were right about me getting distracted. You can tell me ‘I told you so’ already.” If I spoke softly enough, eventually my teammates would look away and busy themselves with something else. They did, but only after Coach surveyed the room and gave them all a withering stare that would make any parent proud. Then she came and settled next to us on the ground.

  I didn’t bother to hide my shock. She was not a “sit on the floor” kind of person. She was a “don’t you dare get my suit dirty or I will crush you into oblivion” type of person.

  “I can admit when I was wrong. This is one of those times. You have no reason to cry.” She crossed her legs out in front of her, like that settled the deal.

  I wasn’t about to unload all my hurt about Carter to my coach, so I was glad when she didn’t mention it. It was better to stick to the competition for now. One thing at a time.

  “You know that’s not true,” I said. “I interrupted a round, and those judges are going to take it out on me.” There was way too much water in my eyes. I blinked furiously, trying to keep it all from spilling over.

  Coach sighed. “You know I just came back from the tab room. Would I really be telling you not to worry if I hadn’t seen your results?”

  “You’re my coach. You’re supposed to say stuff to make me feel better.”

  Grayson still hadn’t said anything, but he stayed by my side, holding my hand. That alone made me like him that muc
h more, if it was possible.

  Coach Bates shifted and took my face in her hands.

  “My dear, you have nothing to worry about.”

  “You know I—” I tried to say, but Coach cut in.

  “Quinn, you won.”

  I stopped breathing. She’d said it so softly, I could have misheard her. I could have heard the things I wanted so desperately for her to say. But the way Grayson squeezed my hand told me I wasn’t dreaming right now.

  “Really?” I breathed.

  Coach nodded. “If anything, I think that little stunt of Carter’s might have given you some leverage, because the judges knew you were the one to beat.” She released my face and brushed some hair out of her eyes. “Now you have to pretend to be surprised and you can’t tell anyone I told you. But enough with the waterworks already, okay?”

  I threw my arms around her neck. She stiffened in surprise before lightly patting my back until I drew away.

  She stood up, wiped dust off her pants that wasn’t visible to the human eye, and then gave me a nod as she walked out of the room. Grayson attacked me in a hug and kissed my cheek.

  I turned so he could have my lips instead.

  Who cared if everyone was watching us? They’d already been eyeing the way we held hands, so they had to know something had changed between us. Besides, I wanted the whole world to know that Grayson was taken. By me.

  I smiled as I kissed him, letting myself get lost in the moment. Truthfully, he could have been upset. If I got first place, that meant he didn’t. But Grayson brought his hand up to play with the stray piece of hair that had fallen from my French twist, and I knew we weren’t competitors anymore. We were on the same side. When I won, he won.

  Someone cleared their throat and we broke off the kiss.

  I looked up to find Carter standing a few feet away. His hands were in his pockets and he was very carefully looking at the wall above our heads.