For Keeps

by Natasha Friend

  I notice that Mr. Catenzaro, who is the only teacher I know who wears jeans to school, seems to have gone one denim shade darker and two sizes tighter since last year. Liv thinks Mr. C is hot. She says he looks just like John Travolta in Saturday Night Fever—the same olive skin; dark, feathered hair; chin dimple. She imagines him tossing off his blazer after school, unbuttoning his shirt, and doing the hustle on his desk. I’m not sure how she comes up with these things, but she does.

  It’s not just Mr. C, either. Liv thinks a lot of the male teachers are hot. Even Mr. Arble, the assistant principal, with his cheesy goatee, makes it onto her crush list. Forget high-school boys, Liv is always telling me. Too immature. The last guy she dated, Avi, a counselor at her drama camp, was twenty-one: a real man.

  The truth is, twenty-one sounds old to me—skeevy. I like boys. I like that Matt Rigby was a bit unsure of himself that night on my porch, fumbling with the hook on my bra, embarrassed when our noses bumped. If he was twenty-one instead of seventeen, he might not have been so—

  “Josephine? . . . Josephine Gardner?”

  Mr. Catenzaro must have been calling my name for a while, because now everyone is looking at me. I can feel my cheeks heat up.

  “Here,” I say.

  Mr. C grins. “Are you sure about that?” His teeth are big and square and white. “Sure you’re not still on the beach somewhere?”

  Porch swing, actually.

  I bob my head like an idiot, telling myself: No—the whole class did not just watch a slow-motion reenactment of Matt Rigby de-bra-ing you on New Year’s Eve.

  Mr. C finishes attendance and moves on to announcements. My cheeks return to room temperature. After a million years, the bell rings.

  By some scheduling fluke, the entire Makeup Mafia ends up in fourth-period gym with me and Liv.

  “So their coach talked to Coach, and I think it’s happening tomorrow.” Jamie Mann is all smiles and hair flips.

  I sit on the bleachers, lacing up my sneakers and listening to Jamie, Kara, Lindsey, and Schuyler chattering away.

  “It is such an awesome idea,” Kara says.

  “I know, right?” Lindsey says.

  “Isn’t it an awesome idea?”

  “Don’t you guys think?”

  Apparently, they’re asking me and Liv.

  “About what?” Liv says.

  “Coed scrimmage. With the boys’ team.” Jamie’s face is all aglow with excitement.

  “Whose idea was it?” I ask.

  “Theirs,” Schuyler says. “Can you believe it?”

  No, actually. I can’t.

  “Their strength is aggression at the net,” Jamie explains. “And we’re better at the passing game, so it, like, makes sense to learn from each other.”

  “Plus if we’re trying to impress each other, we’ll probably play better. I know I will,” Schuyler says. Schuyler is not exactly the queen of motivation during practice. She’s probably most excited about scrimmaging the guys so she can show off her butt in Spandex.

  Liv shrugs. “Sounds good to me.” Meanwhile, her elbow is digging into my ribs. “Hester?”

  I shoot Liv the fish-eye.

  She smiles innocently.

  The girls are confused. “Who’s Hester?”

  “No one,” I say. “Scrimmage sounds fun.”

  Seventh period, on my way to English, I’m walking through the senior corridor (not because I’m hoping to run into anyone, but because it’s the shortest route to Room 310), and I see him. Matt Rigby, alone at his locker, fiddling with the padlock. His polo shirt is bright green, new-looking. Blond hair curls over his collar. Jeans. Black Converse low tops. I can feel my breath quicken, the plunge of my stomach into my knees. He couldn’t look better if he tried.

  What if I walked up to him right now? What if I walked right up and tapped him on the shoulder—smiled and tossed my hair around like Jamie Mann. Hey, Riggsy. What’s up?

  But I would never do that.

  It’s stupid to pretend that I don’t see him, but that’s what I do. I hold my books to my chest and steer my gaze to the end of the hall: the trophy case under the Elmherst Hurricanes banner.

  Out of the corner of my eye I see a redhead in a tube top—Tessa something, a senior—sidle up next to him. “Heyyy, Riggsy!” she says in that perky cheerleader way, draping one arm around his waist like she’s done it a million times before.

  She wants to know if he’s going to study hall. He is? Great! They can go together!

  Great.

  “Are you going to the game Friday night?” I hear her ask.

  And he says, “I don’t know. I have to check with my secretary.” Now she giggles.

  I walk as fast as a person can walk without looking like a moron.

  Sometimes the feeling is like a wrecking ball to your gut. Not that I have any right to be jealous. I mean, just because Matt Rigby disrobed me on a porch swing once, it’s not like I own the guy. He’s probably been disrobing girls all summer long, ever since he and Missy broke up. And who cares if he has? Matt Rigby can do whatever he wants, as far as I’m concerned. It’s a free country.

  “Awww,” my mom says. “Best daughter in the world.” She peels back the lid of the milk shake I’ve brought her and tastes it. “Hmm. White chocolate peanut butter?” She likes to be surprised, so Bob always changes it for her. “No, wait”—she frowns into the cup—“what is that? Almond? Cashew?”

  “Macadamia nut,” I say. “White chocolate macadamia nut.”

  “Aha!”

  “Bob says hi, by the way.”

  “Well, tell him hi back.”

  “If I do that, he’ll think you like him.”

  She smiles. “Bob’s sweet.”

  “Please.” I roll my eyes. “I have ten minutes before I have to go back and bleach something.”

  “And I have no customers. Let’s sit.” She steps down from the ladder she’s been using to shelve books. We’re in the travel section. I used to love the travel section. When I was little I would pull down the National Geographic coffee-table books with the photos of Africa, and I’d pretend I was going on safari. Now I’m more into self-help. That section is hilarious. Whatever problem you’re having, there’s a book with the solution. Fear of snakes? Check out the Phobia and Anxiety Workbook. Trouble with your hoo-hoo? You too can Overcome Painful Vaginal Symptoms and Enjoy an Active Lifestyle. Then there’s my personal favorite—the first place everyone should turn when they’re feeling sorry for themselves: Shut Up, Stop Whining, and Get a Life.

  We plop onto the blue velvet couch by the window. Everything in Twilight Books comes in shades of blue. Blue curtains, blue chairs, blue shag rugs. This color scheme can be either extremely soothing or extremely depressing, depending on your mood.

  “So,” my mom says, “how was the first day?”

  I shrug. “OK.”

  “OK?” Both eyebrows shoot up.

  Here is the thing: You can’t just say “OK” to my mother. You can’t just say “fine.” You have to get specific. There is no such thing as the fuzzy middle.

  “Teacher stuff, girl stuff, or boy stuff ?” she asks.

  I shake my head.

  “It’s one of the three.”

  “How do you know?”

  “I know.”

  “How?”

  She laughs. “Believe it or not, I used to be a sixteen-year-old girl.”

  “Gee, really?” I say, adding a little squirt of sarcasm. “I had no idea.”

  She takes a sip of milk shake. Stirs it with her finger. Licks the finger. Takes another sip. Waits.

  “If you must know,” I say, “it’s boy stuff.”

  “The boy?”

  I nod. My mom knows about New Year’s Eve—the PG version anyway.

  She leans in.

  I sigh, reach for the milk shake, take a swallow. “This is disgusting.”

  “You’re changing the subject,” she says.

  “No, I’m not.”

  “So
. . . did you talk yet?”

  “I told you, we don’t talk. We stare. And we say nothing. That’s what we do.”

  My mom raises her eyebrows again.

  “Just . . . never mind. It’s not a big deal.”

  Silence for a moment. Then she pats my arm. “Well, you’ll talk to him when you’re ready.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “When you’re ready to put yourself out there, to take the risk, you’ll do it.”

  “Oh, OK, Pot.”

  “What?”

  “Calling the kettle black much? When was the last time you put yourself out there?”

  “We weren’t talking about me,” she says.

  I smile. “We are now.”

  She gives me a look that’s halfway between annoyed and amused. Anused? Ammoyed?

  “When was the last time you went on a date? Huh? 1994?”

  I am referencing the Paul Tucci era without actually saying the name. I can’t. My mother hasn’t uttered the word “Tucci” since the Shop-Co debacle, which means she is not exactly—

  “Help!” I squeal, because she is pinching my thigh. “Child abuse!”

  That’s when the bells above the front door tinkle and a man walks in. Not too old, not too young. Blue eyes, wavy sand-colored hair. Suede jacket, khakis. Funky green sneakers. He spots us on the couch. “Wait—you are open, right?”

  “Absolutely,” I say, and stand up.

  “Great,” the guy says. Nice baritone voice. “Because I’m looking for a book.”

  “Break’s over,” I say to my mom, and boy do I hightail it out of there. Because sometimes, just when you need to end a conversation, a beautiful moment arrives.

  Four

  THE NEXT MORNING my mom makes pancakes, which is not normal. Most of the time it’s toast or cereal. I sit at the kitchen counter, watching her slide pancakes onto a platter like Martha Stewart.

  “What’s his name again?” I ask.

  “Jonathan.”

  “Jonathan,” I repeat. “Not Jon?”

  “I don’t think so,” my mom says, shaking her head. “No.” She opens her mouth, closes it.

  “What?” I say.

  “Nothing.”

  I can tell she wants to say more, but she doesn’t want to jinx it. She’s probably saying to herself: Come on, Kate. He’s just a guy who came into the store looking for a book. (Except that the book just happened to be The World Is Flat, which my mom just happened to have finished reading last week, and which just happened to jump-start a two-hour conversation.)

  “He’ll be back,” I say.

  “You think?” She pours juice into my cup, which already has juice.

  “Yes.”

  She sits down next to me but doesn’t say anything for a minute. “It’s just . . .”

  “What?”

  “It’s been a long time since I . . .”

  “What?” I say, even though I know. Two words, rhymes with “Saul Crucci.” It’s been a long time since she felt anything even remotely close to the way she felt in high school.

  “I don’t know!” she says. “Just . . . I know it sounds crazy. We just met! But there was something there last night.”

  “What kind of something?”

  “Something . . . I don’t know. . . . I’m being ridiculous.”

  “No, you’re not,” I say.

  She shakes her head.

  “You’re not, Mom.”

  She shrugs, smiles.

  “I get it,” I say. Because I do. I get that she’s giddy and insecure and scared and hopeful and utterly confused. All because of a guy.

  “I guess I’ll go for a run,” she says.

  “Do it,” I say.

  “You’ll take the bus?”

  “Unless you want to give me the car. I’m an excellent driver. . . .”

  “I will give you the car when you get your license.”

  “Fine,” I mock-grumble. “Be that way.”

  But then I hug her and say thanks for the pancakes. “I could get used to this,” I tell her. “What do I get when he asks you out? Eggs Benedict?”

  My mom snorts. I snort back. She snorts again, louder. This is how the Gardner Girls do the levity thing: We impersonate livestock.

  “Close your eyes,” Liv says on the bus.

  “What?”

  “Just do it. I have something for you.”

  “Fine.” I close my eyes. “I don’t know why you have to be such a—”

  “Open!”

  She’s holding up a piece of paper. It’s a photo of a house—a humongo white colonial with a three-car garage and a circular driveway.

  “So?”

  Liv smiles. “So . . . Nico and Christina Tucci. Forty-four Lehigh Street. North Haven, Massachusetts.”

  “What?”

  “I know, right? They closed two weeks ago.”

  “But how did you—?”

  “One of Dodd’s clients at Trillium runs a real-estate agency. . . . Anyway, it’s a matter of public record.”

  All I can do is stare at her.

  “I thought you should have the information,” she says. “You know . . . just in case.”

  “In case what?”

  Liv shrugs. “In case you decide to get in touch.”

  “I won’t.”

  “Well . . .”

  “Like, ever.”

  “Completely your call.” She folds the paper in half, then in quarters. “We’ll just put this away for now.” She unzips the side pocket of my backpack, slides the paper in. “For safe-keeping.”

  “You’re unbelievable. Do you know that?”

  “So I’ve been told.”

  All day in school I’ve been thinking about the Tuccis. But I’m not going to think about them anymore. I am done. Finito. The only thing I’m going to think about right now is the fact that it rained last night and the fields are soaked for our coed scrimmage.

  The coaches spend ten minutes bitching about the lack of drainage and another ten debating the merits of playing in a swamp versus preserving the grass. Finally they decide we should just use the baseball field because their season doesn’t start until spring, and their grass will grow back by then.

  They split us into teams by position until we’re evenly matched. I’m on the blue team. So is Liv. Matt Rigby is on the gold team, and try as I might not to notice these things, I do: The gold pinny matches his hair.

  How pathetic am I?

  So pathetic.

  I am not, however, pathetic enough to be wearing either “Juicy”-across-the-butt shorts (Schuyler) or blue eye shadow (Jamie) in honor of the occasion. No. I am my usual slobby soccer-playing self, because I didn’t come to this scrimmage to impress anyone. I came here to play soccer.

  It’s a mudfest. There’s no other way to describe it. Here’s what happened: About fifteen minutes into the scrimmage it started to rain, and now, even though we’re all wearing cleats, everyone is slipping all over the place. You would think that the coaches would call the game, for safety reasons, but here’s the thing: The score is 1-1 and we’re playing like this is the World Cup. No joke. I don’t know if it’s the trying-to-impress-each-other thing or the weather drama or what, but this is a serious game. Everyone’s spreading out, passing, following their shots. And it’s not as if the guys are going easy on us either. At one point, Kara was flying up the field toward the goal, and this guy Phil slide-tackled her. From then on it was like the gender seal had been broken. Now, it’s no holds barred.

  I want to score so bad I can taste it.

  The problem is, the gold team is playing amazing defense. Lindsey is sweeper, and in practice she barely moves her feet, but today she’s like an aerobics instructor, lunging and kicking all over the place. Too bad for Lindsey, I know her weakness: She’s a sucker for head fakes. So when Mike Woodmansee sees that I’m open and passes me the ball, there’s only one thing on my mind: Fake left, go right. Fake left, go right.

  I am not thinkin
g about the gold pinny coming up behind me—the one that’s getting closer and closer. I am not thinking about it because I just I faked out Lindsey, and the goal is right there, and I am about to take my—

  Crap.

  I’m flat on my back in the mud, and I don’t even know how I got here. All I know is there’s someone on top of me.

  Who’s on top of me? And why the hell isn’t he getting—

  Oh. A nanosecond.

  My. Is all it takes.

  God. To realize exactly whose limbs are tangled up with mine.

  “Hey,” Matt Rigby says. His breath is soft and warm. There’s mud on his chin. And in his hair. He’s so close I can literally see his pulse, beating through the vein in his neck.

  There are so many things I could say right now.

  Hey.

  ’Sup?

  Fancy meeting you here.

  Get. Off.

  Great game.

  Illegal tackle much?

  Kiss me.

  But when I open my mouth, nothing comes out. Have we been lying here for three seconds or three hours? I don’t know. All I know is I don’t want to get up. Because this is exactly what it felt like that night on my porch, like the whole world had stopped just for us.

  “Nice shot, Jose.” Liv is standing over us, grinning.

  That’s when it hits me. “It went in?”

  She nods. “Lower left corner.”

  “No way.” To Matt Rigby I say, “You’re cutting off my circulation.”

  You’re cutting off my circulation. I swear to God.

  Then, as if that wasn’t mortifying enough, he laughs.

  “There’s something on your face,” Bob says. He’s squinting up at me, suspicious. “Looks like dirt.”

  “It’s mud,” I tell him.

  “Mud?”

  “From soccer practice. Don’t worry.” I hold out my hands for inspection. “I won’t be scooping ice cream with my face.”

  Bob shudders at the thought.

  It’s a moot point anyway because summer is over and we’ve barely had any customers. Mostly what I’ve been doing when I come to work isn’t scooping, it’s scrubbing. And hauling FedEx boxes down to the basement. And helping Bob play out his European decorating fantasy—lots of ferns and throw rugs.