The Secret Recipe for Moving On

by Karen Bischer

  It’s only then that I notice Paul’s chair at the table next to ours is still empty. I’m relieved that I won’t have to be dealing with him, but what does that have to do with us?

  “And since your group has five people, and our assignments will call for groups of four, I was hoping one of you would volunteer to join Paul’s family to replace him.”

  I feel my face grow hot as I scan my table. There’s Steve and Hannah, both Hunter and Brynn’s friends. And then there’s Brynn, Hunter’s new lady love. And the man of the hour himself. All of them are staring at me.

  They expect me to volunteer to go.

  You have got to be kidding me.

  I mean, these people may be my new sworn enemies, but I’m not trading them for a group of delinquents and the opportunity to relive my middle school angst for the next nine months. No way, no how.

  When none of us says anything, Mrs. Sanchez laughs. “I guess you’re all really tight. But you’ll still be in the same class. Surely one of you can join another group.”

  Nope. Not me. Luke is staring at me, probably relishing the idea of teasing and laughing at me on a daily basis.

  “I’m afraid if one of you doesn’t volunteer, I’ll have to pick someone,” Mrs. Sanchez says, annoyance rising in her voice. Good, let her pick. I’m not being pushed out of this group as if I’ve done something wrong.

  “We don’t bite, yo,” A.J. says, tipping his chair back and lacing his hands behind his head.

  Brynn leans toward Hunter and whispers, “I can’t believe her.”

  “Can’t believe what, Brynn?” It comes out of my mouth before I can stop myself.

  Brynn’s mouth hangs agape as she struggles for something to say. I feel kind of vindicated.

  Until Luke speaks up. “Hey, Mrs. Sanchez. What if we pick someone? Will that make it easier?”

  Mrs. Sanchez sighs. “Seeing as how this group is too stubborn to do anything, I think that’s a wonderful idea, Mr. Burke.”

  Luke smiles and I just know what’s coming next. “I think there’s a little too much testosterone in our family, right, guys?” he says, nodding at his group-mates. I close my eyes, preparing for my utter humiliation.

  “Okay,” I hear Luke say, and I suck in my breath. “We’d like Brynn.”

  Huh? I open my eyes and exhale. Brynn is completely slack-jawed. “Me?” she squeaks.

  “Ms. Potts, gather your things and join their group,” Mrs. Sanchez says. “I think this is a more than sensible solution since none of you are volunteering.”

  “B-but,” she sputters, looking helplessly at Hunter, who is shaking his head in dismay.

  “Now, Ms. Potts!” Mrs. Sanchez snaps, clearly at the end of her patience.

  And that’s when Brynn starts to cry. Like, her nose gets red and tears spill over. Her hands are shaking and she lets out a little sob as she pushes in her chair. Hunter makes a grab for her free hand. Hannah tries to pat her on the back. It’s like Brynn’s being shipped off to a war zone or something. And it makes me realize I’m now going to be viewed as the monster of the group for daring to stick to my guns.

  “Oh, for the love of god,” I grouch, standing up and grabbing my backpack. “I’ll go.”

  Brynn is totally stunned into silence as I huff over to the next table and sit down in Paul’s vacant seat with a heavy plunk. I don’t look at any of the guys and will my hands to stop shaking. I stare straight ahead at Mrs. Sanchez, who shakes her head, perplexed. I’m kind of confused myself, though I’m not really thinking rationally right now. All I know is there’s no way I’d let Brynn play the martyr, as if her anguish was somehow worse than the pain she and Hunter inflicted on me.

  It’s only then I notice the guys in the group are all gaping at me.

  “Hey,” A.J. mouths, wiggling his eyebrows at me. I quickly turn my attention back to Mrs. Sanchez.

  What have I done? Oh god, what have I done?

  Mrs. Sanchez is oblivious to my horror as she walks around the room, placing unmarked manila envelopes on each table. “Inside these are different income brackets for your family. We have everything from ‘Grad Students on a Budget’ to ‘Dual Income Investment Bankers.’ You will also find your monthly expenses and you’ll have to figure out a realistic budget for your family based on this.”

  The classroom is suddenly buzzing as everyone opens their envelopes to find out their status. A.J. is momentarily distracted from harassing me and grabs the envelope off our table.

  “May I do the honors?” he asks.

  The guys nod, and A.J. unhooks the gold clasp on the envelope. He reaches in and pulls out a stack of papers bound together with a binder clip, and reads something on top of the pile. His smirk fades away.

  “You’ve got to be kidding,” he says. He sits back in his seat, disgusted, as he tosses the papers on the table. Clipped to the top of the stack is an index card, with “Single Mother, Two Kids” written on it in thick black marker.

  “Maybe it won’t be that bad. Maybe the mom’s some big-shot executive,” Luke says, picking up the stack. He peeks under the index card at the first sheet of paper and his face falls. “Oh. She’s a bus driver.”

  A.J. and Isaiah are shaking their heads at the stack of papers, as if it somehow has the capability to know it’s disappointed them. Luke, however, is studying me. I decide now is as good a time as any to let him know he can’t intimidate me, so I shoot what I hope is a defiant look back at him. But instead of mocking me or making some creepy gesture, his eyes quickly shift away, the tips of his ears turning slightly pink.

  I’m momentarily confused, but then I notice Steve and Hannah high-fiving, Hunter pumping his fist, and Brynn, having done a complete emotional 180, dancing in her seat. Hannah is holding their papers, and I squint to read their index card: “Husband and Wife Investment Bankers, Two Kids.”

  Of course.

  “Now,” Mrs. Sanchez is saying, “every month you will be responsible for paying the bills in your pile. You’ll find a current budget for the family attached, but you will be making changes to it based on your income. The goal is to have some money left over each week to go into savings.”

  Isaiah is skimming through the pile. “Well, it looks as if we’re making thirty-eight thousand dollars a year.”

  “In this area? With two kids?” A.J. says. “There’s no way this is going to work.”

  I’m kind of surprised he’s even aware of how far thirty-eight thousand dollars goes. A year ago, I had no idea how much money a family would need to get by. Now I’m all too familiar with it. I didn’t suspect other kids in an area as middle-class as Ringvale Heights would have to worry about such a thing.

  I’ve noticed Luke has stayed pretty silent on the subject, but he’s reading one of the pages.

  “The mom is in the process of paying off hospital bills for her recently deceased husband,” he says quietly, and I’m surprised at his sober tone.

  Everyone at the table is silent as this registers. Well, everyone but A.J.

  “Hey! How are we going to be able to make this budget work?” he says accusingly at Mrs. Sanchez. “We’ve got bills coming out of our ass and barely any money coming in.”

  “Please refrain from swearing, Mr. Johnson,” Mrs. Sanchez says, but she smiles. “I know your income is pretty low, but with a little smarts and teamwork, you’ll make it. I promise. Now, let’s move on to picking out names for your families. Maybe think of something that invokes the lessons of this class or teamwork!”

  Teamwork. I survey the group at my table: A gambling addict in training, a loudmouth, and a tattooed goliath who may or may not be crushing on Brynn. “Making it” is somehow going to be impossible.

  Out of the corner of my eye, I see Hunter tickle Brynn, which makes her squeal. It doesn’t help that Hannah is giggling at their tickly shenanigans because they’re just so adorable together.

  “What about Breasts, Legs, and Thighs for a group name?” A.J. says. “It falls under the food thing becau
se it refers to a chicken!”

  “I don’t think Mrs. Sanchez will dig that too much,” Luke says with a laugh. He cocks his head at me, as if he’s waiting for me to weigh in on the situation. Probably so he can make fun of me. I just keep my mouth shut.

  “Okay, how about the Home Economics Homeboys?” A.J. suggests.

  “I’m not exactly a boy now, am I?” I say, annoyed.

  “No, we were all under the impression that the long hair and pierced ears were a big attempt at a disguise,” Luke says, rolling his eyes, and I feel my face grow hot with annoyance.

  A.J. snickers, but Isaiah doesn’t say anything.

  “Well, what if we take the letters from each of our first names and make it an antonym,” A.J. says.

  I’m about to sigh over his word misuse when Luke surprises me and says, “I think you mean acronym, bro, but that sounds like it could work.”

  “Cool, so we get an A and J for me since my real first name is Andrew-James,” A.J. says.

  “It’s just an L for me,” Luke says.

  Isaiah pulls out a piece of paper and writes out an A, J, L, and I. Then he points his pen at me. “Do you go by Mary Ellen or Mary?”

  “Now, now,” Luke says. “Don’t assume. Maybe people call her ‘Agresti.’”

  “Uh, no one calls me that,” I say, staring straight ahead, waiting for him to drop another insult on me.

  “Well, then, that’s a shame. It rolls right off the tongue,” Luke says. I can’t tell if he’s being serious or sarcastic.

  Then I turn back to Isaiah. “You can call me Ellie.”

  He adds an E to his list and we study the letters.

  “What about IJEAL,” I say. “It sounds like ‘ideal.’”

  “It sounds like something nasty,” A.J. says with a wrinkled nose. “Like it’s what happens when a guy—”

  “Uh, hold it right there,” Luke says with a laugh. He lifts up his hand, revealing a tattoo of a bike tire mark on the underside of his arm. “Let’s remember there’s a lady present.”

  “Wait!” A.J. says, his pale skin suddenly flushing with excitement. “What about this?” In big block letters he spells out: JAILE.

  “Jaile?” Isaiah’s face is incredulous.

  “As in ‘this class is a prison I can’t escape’?” I say. I can’t help myself.

  “As in the most badass name this class will have,” A.J. says, tapping the paper with his pen. “Think about it. We’re competing against the other groups for points, right? So we can intimidate them right off the bat with our name.”

  Before anyone else can say anything, a brown-nosey voice I know all too well calls out, “Mrs. Sanchez! We have a name!”

  “Well, tell us then, Ms. Potts,” Mrs. Sanchez says, smiling at Brynn’s National Honor Society level of enthusiasm.

  “We’re calling ourselves Synergy!” Brynn says, as Hunter beams at her. Of course he would. She comes up with SAT words—even though I don’t think it makes that much sense for a home economics class—for their group name, and I come up with “ijeal.”

  “What exactly does synergy have to do with a home economics class?” Jared Curtis wonders from the literary/hipster kid table.

  “We’re going to be working as a group toward our cause,” Brynn sniffs haughtily. “And what’s your name going to be? The Hipster Posers?”

  Jared informs her that his family is going to be called the Bukowskis, after Charles Bukowski, whom the whole group apparently admires. The table of football players and ohmygawd girls will be Jersey Strong, and the stoners go completely unironic and call themselves the Bakers.

  Mrs. Sanchez peers at them over her glasses, as if to say, “Seriously?” but she doesn’t fight them on it. Then she turns to my table. “And what about this group over here?” she says. “Have you picked a name?”

  I clear my throat. “Not ye—”

  “We’re the JAILE family, bitches,” A.J. says, pumping his fist at the rest of the class.

  I close my eyes and inhale deeply as the whole class howls with laughter, and to make matters a billion times worse, I can hear Brynn snorting among them. When I open my eyes, I see that Mrs. Sanchez’s head is tilted with curiosity. “And how did you arrive at that name?”

  “Because they’re bound for juvie,” I hear Anthony snicker from the Jersey Strong table.

  “Why don’t you shoot some more steroids into your brain, douchebag,” A.J. snaps, and Anthony sneers at him.

  “Mr. Johnson, that’s enough of that,” Mrs. Sanchez says. Then she looks at us expectantly. She still wants an answer to her question.

  “We just mixed up all the letters of our first names and came up with it,” Luke says.

  Mrs. Sanchez smiles. “That’s very creative and a very good representation of what your families are supposed to be about…”

  Convicts? Felons? Chain gangs? That’s what you’re supposed to think of in a home economics class?

  “… Individuals coming together as a unit to learn and get tasks done. And believe me, you will need every member of your family to get points in your weekly rankings. Nice job, JAILE family.”

  I peek out of the corner of my eye to see the Synergy family shaking their heads, annoyed. That’s when Hunter rests both his hands on Brynn’s shoulders and gives her a massage, as if to ease her disappointment at not being the “smartest” in the class.

  Fighting the urge to simultaneously burst into tears and puke, I force myself to turn my attention back to my table.

  Luke grins at me wickedly. “Excited to spend the next nine months in ‘a prison you can’t escape,’ Agresti?”

  Seriously. What have I done?

  CHAPTER 7

  Apparently, there is a right and a wrong way to do dishes, and Mrs. Sanchez is going to make absolutely sure that we don’t ever wash the plates before the forks, so help her god.

  “You waste room in your drying rack that way,” she says, scrubbing some spoons from her kitchen at the front of the room, the next day.

  Every family is standing by the sinks in their assigned kitchen; one side of our double sink is filled with sudsy warm water, and there’s a drying rack on our counter. We’re supposed to follow along with Mrs. Sanchez as she pulls out utensil after utensil, identifying them, then washing them. It’s about as thrilling as you’d expect.

  “In our class, this will be known as a pancake turner, not a spatula,” Mrs. Sanchez says holding up an instrument I’ve called a spatula most of my life. After she washes it, she holds up the thing I use to scrape cake batter off the sides of the bowl. “This is a spatula.”

  I look at my family members. Luke seems to be trying to see how long he can balance on one leg, A.J. is making bubbles with our bottle of dish detergent, and Isaiah? Well, he’s at least drying the dishes that I dunked into the soapy water and rinsed with the tap. But he doesn’t say anything the whole time he’s drying, as if he’s completely riveted by Mrs. Sanchez’s lecture.

  Though I guess my group seems a little more focused than the guys of Jersey Strong, who appear to be using their Dutch oven and cast-iron frying pan as makeshift weights.

  “Okay, kids,” Mrs. Sanchez says, and the tone of her voice gives me hope that something exciting is about to happen. “On to pots and pans.”

  I’m about to sigh heavily, when I hear Hannah giggle from Hunter and Brynn’s group.

  “We have a lot of pots and pans we’ll be using in this class,” Mrs. Sanchez is saying, but now Hunter and Brynn are suppressing smiles as they glance at each other. Why on earth is this so—

  Oh my god.

  Pots and pans. Brynn Potts and Hunter “Panz” Panzic. Potts and Panz. They’ve been going out for less than a week and they already have a supercouple name. Maybe this is why they got together, because when your names are just so sickeningly cute when paired, how can you not be dating? I look at Hunter and Brynn and their shmoopy-woopy expressions and I have a sudden urge to yank the hose from my sink and take aim at them with the water
on full blast.

  It doesn’t help that Mrs. Sanchez keeps uttering the offending term, without seeming to notice the giggles it elicits.

  “Now, when you’re putting away your pots and pans, make sure…”

  Synergy is now all giggly, even Steve. Hannah adds an “Aww,” when she sees one of the adoring gazes Brynn and Hunter keep sharing.

  “Jesus, shut up,” A.J. hisses, momentarily distracted from his bubble making. The group gives him a collective scowl, like, “Who is he to tell us what to do?”, but they do indeed shut up. If Mrs. Sanchez has noticed this quiet outburst, she doesn’t make it known, because she goes on explaining how you store lasagna pans and loaf pans.

  Part of me wants to thank A.J. for stopping the madness, but then, he didn’t do it for me. I mean, it’s not like he’s got ESP or something. Plus, he’s back to making bubbles with the soap, and completely ignoring Mrs. Sanchez as she identifies a ginormous roasting pan. I start getting annoyed when I realize that Isaiah and I are probably going to be the only ones to pass the upcoming cookware quiz, which means we’ll be the only ones to get points for the family this week.

  Mrs. Sanchez finally wipes her hands on a paper towel, a gleaming mountain of dishes next to her on the drying rack. “Okay, now I want you to put the dishes away, and identify them among yourselves as you go.”

  Oh, this should be fun. I take the stopper out of the sink’s drain and glance at the clock. There’s still twenty minutes left of class.

  “Maybe it would be faster if we pair off and put certain things away,” Isaiah says.

  “Works for me,” A.J. says, grabbing a dish. “This is a cake pan,” he says.

  “No, it’s a pie tin,” Isaiah says slowly.

  “I can tell I’m going to learn a lot from you, dude,” A.J. says. “Pie tin,” he repeats to himself as he puts it in a cabinet next to the sink.

  Luke comes up next to me. “So, I guess it’s you and me and the utensils,” he says.

  “Uh, sure,” I say as I grab a handful of silverware and baking tools from the drying rack. Luke opens the utensil drawer and holds a hand out. “Scalpel,” he demands in a monotone voice.