Chapter Fifteen
In homeroom the next morning, everything else disappears behind the immediate crisis of my report card: three C’s, one D, and two B’s means a total GPA of Absolute Flop. Even though I can smile about the B in 20th Cen., I know that Dad won’t be smiling about any of it. I’m not the greatest student ever, but usually I only have two C’s, not three, and I swore I would never get another D after the Algebra II incident last year. Dad is going to flip.
I’m so distracted, I almost don’t see Trip walking toward me in the hall between homeroom and first period. Though our homerooms are just a few doors away from each other, our paths don’t cross around here anymore. It’s almost like he came this direction today on purpose. And, seeing him, my whole body feels how badly I could use one of his hugs right now. But probably he’s only taking a faster route to meet Lily, or Chris. I’m not going to even make eye contact with him, but then at the last second I can’t help it. And it’s like he’s waiting for me to. He lifts his own report card, and his eyebrows—just barely—go up in sympathy. I almost stop. I almost do. But then we both keep walking and the moment is over.
I obsess about it through first and second periods, thinking of all the things I’d say to him if I had the notebook right now. But there are other things I probably wouldn’t be telling him about—namely Benji and our date tonight. Though he’ll probably hear the rumors anyway.
This makes me more nervous to see Benji than I want to be, so I walk slow to 20th Cen., barely making it in before the bell. As I pass his desk to get to mine, Benji holds his fist up for me to bump.
For once I’m glad when Dr. Campbell lurches up to the overhead to start class.
Afterward, Benji and I walk out together, and I talk just loud enough so that the kids going past us can hear.
“Where should we meet tonight?”
“I’ll pick you up,” he says, fast and a little defensive. Which is odd.
“Do you need directions?”
“Have you moved?”
“No.”
This should be a joke or something, but we’ve both turned strangely formal.
“What time?” I ask.
“Seven?”
“Seven is good.” I smile, because tonight could be really fun. And also because it’s kind of funny how serious he’s being.
“Okay, then. Text me if, you know, you need more time or something.”
I want to tease him for that, as well. But I don’t. Instead I tell him I’m looking forward to it. He says that he is too.
Lish must still be pretty much choked with shock about me and Benji, though, because she hardly says anything at lunch while the other girls tell wilder and wilder stories they’ve heard about things Benji’s done to and with different girls. They talk on top of each other, and I try to ignore the overwhelming hot feeling I get, wondering what Benji might want to do to and with me tonight. And what—wave of warmth—I might want to do back. I try to focus instead on how, after this weekend, the whole meand-Oliver thing will surely be very old news. Maybe one date is all it’s going to take.
When Gretchen, Darby, and I roll out of the lot at the end of the day, headed for the weekend, we drive past Lily’s car. Trip’s opening the door, about to get in the front seat. He looks up, straight at me. And this time he acts like I’m not even there.
I don’t want to think about Trip, though, so I fully submerge myself in Darby’s pre-date routine: bubble bath, painted nails, hair blowout, sparkly lip gloss, short dress with leggings, boots. As Darby works, she chatters all around me, but I’m hardly listening.
When Lish calls, though, I have to answer.
“We’re having dinner, but I don’t know where,” I tell her when she asks. “A movie. Regular date things.”
“Well, it was a shock.” She tries to say it in a British accent.
I’m not sure which part is a shock: me going out with Benji or me going out with anyone. Either way it’s irritating.
“Benji’s cool when you get to know him. He’s smart. And hilarious.”
“I think Eli’s pretty cool,” Lish says.
I can’t help snorting. “Eli just gets weirder the more you know him, believe me. And if you think Benji has a rep with girls, you should hear how Eli talks about them.”
“Except you, of course.”
“Except me.” I chuckle. But then I realize she wasn’t trying to be funny.
She sighs. “Well, let me know if you want to hang out tomorrow night.”
“Can’t,” I say quick. “Sorry. I’ve got plans with a guy in the band.”
“Oliver?” She perks up.
“No. God.” I want to hit her. “You can come with us if you want.”
Wait. What did I just say? I don’t want Lish hanging out with me and Fabian. And Taryn is sure to blab to Lish about our new band, which means Oliver—and the whole school—will know about it in ten seconds. Too late now, though.
“Where are you going?” Lish wants to know.
“The Masquerade.”
“Isn’t that, like, a bar?”
“Most of their shows are all ages.”
“Huh. Well, Miss Cool and Popular.”
It’s stupid that she says this, and especially stupid how jealous she sounds.
“People suddenly recognizing me in the hall, after years of near invisibility, does not make me popular.”
“You were never invisible before,” she says. “Only now you’re more visible to more important people.”
This whole conversation has been awful, but now it’s especially so.
“Look, I gotta go.”
Which is true, because Darby is glaring at me, powder brush in hand.
“Okay, well. Have fun tonight,” she sings. “Text me later, ’kay?”
“Okay.”
But I know, without a doubt, I won’t.
Dad gets home twenty minutes before Benji’s supposed to arrive, and immediately wants to see our report cards.
The three of us stand with him in the kitchen, waiting for his response, while he looks at them. Gretchen and Darby both get quick approval, but I have to shift uncomfortably while he stares at mine for a full minute. When his eyes come back up at me— and my perfumey sparkle gloss—they aren’t happy.
“You going out?” he wants to know.
I nod.
“All right,” he says, quiet. “We’ll talk in the morning.”
And that’s all. But it’s enough. It’s more than enough.
And then the doorbell rings and Benji’s there.
He stands in our living room, shakes hands with Dad, and tells me that I look nice. The expression on his face makes me believe I really do. And I have to admit, he looks pretty good himself.
“So, how’s it going with the lesband?” he asks once we’re together in the car.
A surprised guffaw comes out of me. “How’d you know Taryn and Sylvia are gay?”
He sideways glances at me. “Um, I have a pulse?”
You flirted with them plenty last weekend, I want to sass. But that doesn’t seem like Benji-and-Charlotte-sitting-in-a-tree behavior.
“It’s definitely different,” I say. “I’m not used to singing with them yet, but it could be good.”
“I bet they’re glad to have you.”
His sincerity catches me off guard and makes me blush. “So, what’s this dinner place again?” I say to cover it up.
“You’ll see,” he says. “But it’s not far.”
I notice there’s some kind of bossa nova jazz coming out of his stereo, instead of the usual sound track.
“A little mood music?” I snark before I think.
His right shoulder raises in this shy way. “You know.”
Which is when I remember that Benji’s actually on a date too. The understanding renders me mostly silent for the rest of the ride. Because, until this minute, I didn’t honestly think of Benji as actual boyfriend material. And now it’s the only thing I can think.
>
But Benji doesn’t seem to notice. We find a parking place behind a small Decatur restaurant, and on the way up to the door he puts his arm around me—loose, like he’s testing it out. His hand is a white-hot thing against my shoulder.
Inside, the restaurant is warm plank tables and a big chalkboard menu. The lighting is dim but cozy. Benji grabs a paper menu from a wire basket. We squint over it together. I can barely read a thing, but it’s clear all they’ve got here is hamburgers.
“You’re not vegetarian, are you?” he murmurs.
The urge to joke with him takes over. “Um, actually . . .” I bite my lip, feign disappointment.
He jumps. “We can totally go somewhere else.” He’s pulling me toward the door, uncool and awkward in a way I’ve never seen. “I mean, I couldn’t remember and I’m really sorry.”
Which makes me feel awful, but also surprised he couldn’t tell I was joking.
“I’m kidding. It’s okay, really.” I hook my arm around his, squeeze myself closer—to reassure him, but also because now I’m curious what being Girlfriend Girl with him might feel like.
We step up to order our burgers and some fries to share. There are too many toppings on this menu, so I stick to the basics: onions, tomato, lettuce, and cheese. And then, at the last second, I remember no onions. Because probably we are going to kiss.
As we take our seats, Benji’s eyebrows toggle up and down. “Big slice of meat, eh?”
Which makes me laugh, for real.
While we wait for our food, and then after it arrives, we talk nonstop. About music, our families, people at school. I find out that he, like me, has a sister who’s in college, though his is older than Jilly. He tells me about the book he’s reading. I tell him about writing songs. We keep talking on the way to the movie, the jokes and the back-and-forth continue, and as we walk up to the theater, I link my arm through his again. A group of people from school are coming out of an earlier showing, and when we see them we wave. All of it is perfect, in every way.
Until we step up for our tickets, and I reach for my wallet. Benji puts a hand out to stop me.
“You paid for dinner,” I protest.
“I got this.” He frowns, like I’ve insulted him.
I want to tell him he’s being stubborn and stupid, but instead I say, “Thank you,” both of us awkward again.
We decide to skip snacks. Taking our seats, Lish’s squealy voice careens through my head, but I squash it. While I’m kind of excited, the brief formality of getting our tickets makes me realize there’s no going back to being just friends after this. Even if Benji’s the type who can be friends with his exes, there will never not have been this between us. I will never be able to see him and not think, I kissed that mouth. He put his hands— But at the same time, I’m not totally sure I don’t want to find out what kissing him is like, whether it kills the Oliver rumor or not.
As the movie starts, I push my hesitation aside and execute proper I Like You behavior: leaving my arm conveniently on the armrest between us, my hand dangling down so that it’s almost touching his knee. When the movie gets intense, I let my fingers clutch at his sleeve. Eventually his hand is entwined in mine, and then our palms are pressed together—warm and close.
But we don’t kiss. After what I heard at lunch today, I’m pretty surprised, actually. I don’t know if it’s because we both get into the movie, or because Benji’s nervous too, or because he doesn’t want to kiss me, or what, but it doesn’t happen.
“So . . . it was funny, right?” he asks in the car back to my house.
I look at him. “You mean the part where he realized his best friend killed his dad? Or the part where his girlfriend drowned?”
He frowns. “Well, not those parts. But . . . you know . . .”
I don’t.
“It wasn’t anything like the comic,” he tries again.
“I didn’t know it was a comic,” I admit.
So he dissects the differences between the two for me. While he talks, I nod as though he’s right, even though I don’t really read comics.
“I thought the fight scene at the end was cool,” I say when he’s done.
We are both polite, considerate of each other’s points of view. We are both afraid to make the other think we might be laugh-ing—in the wrong way—at anything the other one says. It’s a completely different dynamic, and it makes me realize that kissing him is probably not worth it if it turns us into this.
By the time we make it back to my house, I feel like this was a bad idea. But leaping out of the car at this point probably wouldn’t improve anything.
I touch the top of his sleeve. “Thank you for everything.”
“You going to the Masquerade tomorrow night?” he wants to know.
I nod. But then I remember Dad. “Unless I’m grounded for the rest of my life.”
“Report card?”
“Yeah,” I admit. “Though you saved my Twentieth Cen. grade, that’s for sure. I don’t know what I would have done without you.”
And I do mean it. Mean it so much that when he says, soft brown eyes focused directly on my lips, “You’re welcome,” I’m suddenly not afraid of what will happen.
He moves close enough for me to lean in too. Our mouths meet. And it doesn’t feel at all awkward or fake. His lips are half parted, and mine don’t land quite squarely on his at first, but it’s sweet. There’s some pecking, a poke or two of tongue. Nice.
“I’ll text you,” I say, pulling back and trying to sound normal, “about Masquerade. It’d be great if we could go.”
There’s an expression on his face that I can’t read. “Sure.”
“I’m glad we did this,” I tell him.
“My pleasure,” he says softly.
And because I don’t know what else to do, I get out of the car.
Though my date with Benji was confusing, there’s nothing unclear about Dad’s disappointment down in the kitchen the next morning.
“So,” he says, lowering the screen of his laptop.
I pour a bowl of Corn Pops at the counter. I’m not hungry, but I want to keep my back to him. I know my grades are bad. I don’t need his disapproval on top of it.
“Just say what it is you have to say, Dad,” I grumble.
“Well, obviously I’m not pleased with the report card you brought home yesterday.”
I lean against the counter, facing him, decide I’ll eat my Corn Pops standing up.
“And I think it’s plain that you’re not spending enough time or energy on your studies,” he goes on.
“I’ve had practice. You never got on to Jilly about that kind of thing.”
“That’s because Jilly never let her after-school activities interfere with her grades.” He frowns at the table. “I’ve tried to be supportive. But obviously you’ve let things slip.”
The calm, slow way he handles everything is maddening.
“It’s not like I decided to, Dad. I just lost track. I’ve had a lot going on.”
“I understand that you have. Hannah and I can hardly keep up with all the fellows lately. Which is why you obviously need us to step in now and reduce the number of things you’re involved in.”
The tiny amount of sarcasm he uses when he says “fellows” like that just sends me over the edge. I see my life the way he and Hannah must: three afternoons a week at Oliver’s house, plus long phone calls with Trip, and then Fabian showing up with rides home and what they could only interpret as Saturday-night dates. And now this business with Benji. That Dad thinks, like everyone else, I’m dating all these boys—that not even my own father understands it isn’t like that—well, it makes me furious.
But because screaming is Jilly’s jurisdiction, I try to start out as calm as him.
“Maybe I am distracted, Dad.” I breathe through my nose. “But it isn’t like you think. The rehearsal I have this afternoon? That I’m going to no matter what you say? It’s with girls. Girls who think I’m cool. And did you even kn
ow that I’m singing with Sad Jackal now?”
His face is surprised, but I don’t pause.
“No, you didn’t. Because you were too busy counting how many guys were coming in and out of here to pay attention to your own daughter. Well, I am. I’m singing. Me. So yeah, I’m a little distracted—I’m distracted doing something I love, something I want to do more of.”
“And we support that. Just not at the demise of your other—”
“I’m never going to be good in school!” I shout. “It’s not my friends that are the problem; it’s that I’m just not Jilly.”
“That’s a silly card to try to play right now, don’t you think?”
His being right makes my anger even more uncontrollable.
“This is something I’m good at,” I holler, on the verge of tears. “And I’m not going to let you keep me from doing it. I’m not going to let you hold me back, the way you held back Mom.”
It’s like somebody turns all the sound off in the room. I can’t hear the coffee machine, the hum of the refrigerator—nothing. My eyes can’t make themselves blink.
But then Dad clears his throat and the ability to move returns to us. He looks down at his hands, now both flat on the table. “I wasn’t aware that was how you felt.”
I wasn’t aware that was how I felt, either, until it was out. And now that I’ve said it like that, I’m not exactly sure it is how I feel. But this isn’t a piece of paper I can crumple up and throw away. They aren’t words I can cross out to start over. Now they’re out, and I know they’ll hang here, between us, maybe forever.
“Taryn and Sylvia want me to come over at two,” I say. “They can come get me if I can’t have the car. And if, you know, I can still go.”
“Have you checked with Gretchen?” he asks, still looking at his hands.
“No, but I can.”
“If you two can work something out, it’s fine.”
“Dad—”
He lifts the edges of his fingertips, just barely, to stop me. “I think we should be done talking to each other for right now.”
Which is worse than the yelling. Worse than getting privileges taken away. Worse than anything. If he would just let me say I’m sorry . . .
Being Friends with Boys Page 18
