Food Freak

by Alex van Tol

  “Different how?” I snap. I’m kind of good at being mean.

  “I don’t know. You don’t travel in a pack with other girls. You think about stuff. And”—he points to the book—“you read cookbooks for fun.”

  I feel a blush creeping up my neck, and I rearrange my scarf. We’re fifteen minutes from my house. I am praying we get to his stop quickly so he can get off and go home.

  Come to think of it, I have never seen him on this bus before.

  “So then,” he says, “if you don’t like making cupcakes, what do you like to make?”

  I sigh theatrically.

  He waits.

  I roll my eyes. “Pasta,” I say shortly.

  “Really? Are you Italian?”

  I nod, once.

  “What’s your last name?”

  “Müller.”

  “Myooler?” He repeats it slowly. “That doesn’t sound very Italian.”

  “It’s German. My dad’s last name,” I say.

  “Is he very German?”

  “What do you mean, is he very German?”

  “Like, was he born in Germany?”

  “Oh. Yeah. He grew up near the Black Forest, but he moved here to go to university. My mother’s last name was Rizzuto.” You would think an Italian and a German would make an odd pairing, but it’s kind of perfect. They are both loud talkers with heavy accents who love to argue and interrupt each other.

  At least, they used to.

  Gregor’s eyes light up. “Really? Rizzuto? That’s a last name too?”

  “Um, yeah. What do you mean, too?” This guy is confusing to talk to.

  “I love rizzuto!” he exclaims. “It’s really good. My grandmother always makes it for Thanksgiving. Hers has a lot of parmesan in it. And wild mushrooms.”

  “That’s risotto,” I say. Oh my god. I have to bite the insides of my lips to keep from laughing. He’s hopeless.

  “Oh.” He looks puzzled for a moment and then a flash of embarrassment crosses his face. When he smiles again, my whole energy field lights up.

  I look back at my book.

  “Risotto,” he repeats. “I have been saying it wrong for a very long time.”

  I pretend to read.

  “So you like pasta,” he says after a moment. “I like lasagna. What’s your favorite kind?”

  He is not going to leave me alone. “Spaghetti carbonara,” I say briskly. I don’t take my eyes off the page.

  “What’s in that?”

  Why didn’t I just pick mac and cheese?

  I sigh. “Cream. Garlic. Cheese. Pepper. Egg. Pancetta. Except I leave that out.”

  “What is pancetta, and why do you leave that out?”

  “It’s an Italian-style bacon.”

  “And why do you leave it out?” he repeats.

  I sigh and look up. “Haven’t you heard? Bacon isn’t very good for you.”

  Gregor covers his ears, a look of mock horror on his face. “Speak no evil about bacon! I won’t hear it.”

  I fight a smile,which probably makes me look like I just swallowed vinegar.

  Gregor uncovers his ears and grins. “Did you know they had a bacon festival last year downtown?”

  I give up trying to be cold to him. I want to know more about this bacon festival. We end up talking about all the things that can be made with bacon. We decide there should be a national bacon museum. With a store that sells bacon, of course, and little things made from bacon.

  “Like pen holders and clocks,” Gregor says. “And knit caps.”

  My stomach hurts from laughing so much. We’re about five minutes away from my house now. “So where’s your stop anyway?” I ask once I’ve got a handle on my giggling.

  Gregor shrugs. “I don’t live anywhere near here.”

  “Then how come you’re on this bus?”

  He shrugs again. “Because you are.”

  My face goes all hot again. He caught my bus because he wanted to hang out with me? What about his nerdbot friends? Every time I pass him in the hallway, he’s talking a mile a minute to someone. This morning it was Mr. Adams, our principal. He was nodding as Gregor talked, and as they turned into the Foods room, Gregor’s hands started flapping around, and Mr. Adams laughed.

  Mr. Adams doesn’t laugh often.

  Gregor is a shapeshifter like that though. People of all stripes seem to like him.

  I look out the window. We’re just passing Spruce Cliff Village. I don’t see Papa outside the Origins. That means he could be loose in the neighborhood. I wish Gregor hadn’t taken this bus. What if he sees Papa?

  Gregor is talking about bacon again, but my mind is skipping around in a near panic. I can’t risk Gregor finding out about Papa. I let the bus go three stops past my usual one before I pull the cord.

  “This is me,” I say, standing. “I’ll see you at school tomorrow.”

  He looks confused by my rapid conversational dismount. “Oh. Okay. See you tomorrow then.”

  “Yeah.” I give him a quick smile, then hurry off the bus.

  The cold wind sweeps through my tights when I hit the sidewalk. It makes me shiver. I walk in the opposite direction of home in case Gregor is watching from the window.

  I scold myself all the way home. What am I thinking, making friends with someone from school? If Gregor finds out my dad is the Food Freak—and if other people catch on—my life at Central is over.

  Chapter Eight

  Of course Mr. Wilson assigns us a major project later that week. And of course we have to work with a group.

  “Can’t we work alone?” Kennedy asks.

  Mr. Wilson shakes his head. “All through life you’re going to have to work with other people,” he says. “Besides, research shows that when you work with others, you develop more ideas.”

  Kennedy groans. I do too, inside. The last thing I want is to work with a bunch of other people. Then I’ll have to actually talk to them.

  “Well then, can’t we just work with one other person?” Kennedy whines.

  Mr. Wilson considers this. “Yes,” he says finally. “I would prefer a group of at least three, but if you insist on working with only a partner, I won’t stop you.”

  So, of course, because fate is not on my side, Gregor asks me to be his partner. I guess it’s better him than anyone else. I don’t want to have to get to know any more people than necessary.

  “Sure,” I say.

  “So,” he says after everyone has broken out into their groups. “Imperial China? The Renaissance? Or the Reformation?”

  I shrug. “Each of them is going to be interesting to learn about. Do you have a preference?”

  “Are you serious? It all sounds ultra boring to me,” he says. He pushes his glasses higher on his nose and studies the handout. “Hmm. There’s nothing here about how bacon shaped civilization. Now that I could get into.”

  I snort. A couple of people across the room look in our direction. I make my face blank. “Why don’t you like history?” I ask when everybody has gone back to their own conversations.

  Gregor sighs and looks at the ceiling. “It all happened a long time ago. And all of the people involved are dead now anyways. How is any of that important to my life?”

  This is what Papa says about why people don’t like history. “But our world now was totally shaped by everything people did before,” I say to Gregor. I love learning how people used to live. “Totally. Without Apple, we wouldn’t have the iPad, right? But if the Industrial Revolution hadn’t happened, we never would have invented computers two hundred years later. If the Middle East hadn’t always been a zone of unrest, Steve Jobs’s dad would never have immigrated to the United States.”

  Gregor looks at me. “You really like this stuff.”

  I shrug. “My dad’s a history professor.” It slips out before I can think about it. Arrgh. Okay, that’s all I’m going to say about him.

  “Must be nice,” he says. “My dad’s a loser.” There’s a bitter edge to his voice.
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  “Oh,” I say. “Does that pay well?”

  He shoots me a look that’s halfway between irritation and laughter.

  “Sorry,” I say. “My dad’s not perfect either.”

  “Yeah,” he says. “Parents suck most of the time.”

  I think of Mamma. And I think of Papa before she died. They didn’t suck.

  “What’s wrong with your dad?” I ask.

  He shrugs. It’s the first time I’ve seen him anything close to angry. “Oh, you know. He cracked up and started doing weird stuff in the operating room.”

  “He’s a surgeon?”

  “Was.”

  “He’s not anymore?”

  “He’s not allowed to practice right now.”

  “How come?” As soon as I say the question out loud, I wish I hadn’t. It’s too nosy.

  Gregor shrugs. “Oh, nothing major or anything. Just showing up for surgery drunk as a skunk. Swearing and yelling when he doesn’t get his way. Refusing to take off his sunglasses.”

  “During a surgery?”

  “Yeah. They’re talking about taking his license away.”

  I sit there staring at Gregor. He has just blown this big, fragile bubble of truth in my direction, and I am terrified of catching it the wrong way and making it pop.

  “Wow, that’s a lot,” I finally say.

  He nods again. “Yeah, there’s more. He ditched me and my mom and my brother. Just took off.”

  “Wow.” I drop my voice to a whisper. “Do you still see him?”

  “Nope. And he won’t tell my mom where he is.”

  “Is she okay?”

  He shrugs again. It’s bitter this time. “She’ll never be okay. She’s mortified. People feel sorry for her. It drives her crazy.”

  “That must be really frustrating.”

  He nods, then shakes his head quickly, like he’s clearing it. “Anyway. Whatever. It could always be worse. We’re healthy, and we have a roof over our heads. At least, that’s what my mom always says.” He grins. “And I get to partner on this project with someone who reads cookbooks for fun. Dirty cookbooks,” he adds in a stage whisper, peeking around.

  It cracks me up, but I am careful not to laugh out loud. “It wasn’t dirty!” I exclaim. “I got it from the library.”

  “Yeah, from the dirty section,” he whispers.

  I laugh.

  “What about you?” he asks.

  “What about me?”

  “What about your family?”

  I wish I hadn’t asked about his dad. Because what did I think, that he wouldn’t ask me about mine?

  “It’s boring,” I say, with what I hope is an easy wave. “You know. The usual family stuff. Let’s get going on this so we don’t have too much to do outside class.” I slide the assignment sheet out from under his pen and read from it. “So here it looks like we need to describe gender roles, daily life and family structures.”

  Gregor leans forward on his elbows, so he’s less than a foot from my face. “Nothing bores me. I could sit in a padded cell for eighteen years and never run out of things to think about.”

  Why am I not surprised? This guy could probably rewrite the entire Hunger Games trilogy in binary code.

  “But history bores you,” I say, indicating the assignment sheet.

  He pauses, then grins. “Touché.”

  “Indeed.” I make a show of rummaging in my bag for my favorite black pen.

  “But I still want to know about your boring family.”

  “Nothing to report,” I say.

  “Oh, come on,” he says. “I told you about mine.”

  This is true. He told me a whole lot about his family. He opened up and took a chance. In a normal friendship, this is where you reciprocate. Share something of similar value. But I just can’t.

  Besides, I never asked him to tell me all that personal information about his dad. He went ahead and did it. I don’t want to be responsible for that.

  He’s waiting for me to say something. I’m feeling a little desperate. I flip the paper over to the blank side and start making notes. “I think we should do the Renaissance. The Reformation is heavy on religion. The Renaissance is more interesting. And besides,” I say, looking up with a smile I hope he thinks is easygoing, “it started in Italy.”

  “Ah, Italy,” Gregor says. He leans back in his chair and kisses his fingers in a Mafioso-like way. It’s kind of funny, because he is so not a godfather type. “Were you born there?”

  “Nope,” I say. “Just my mom. Okay, let’s focus. We can get our outline done in class today if we get going.”

  “Okay, okay,” Gregor says. “I will-a work as you say, Dani-bella.” He’s talking now in an exaggerated Italian accent. “But your mamma. Tell-a me about your mamma. Is-a she-a beautiful like-a you?”

  His compliment confuses my response. I want to shut this conversation down, but hearing him say I’m beautiful is like tasting a chocolate truffle for the first time.

  “Thanks,” I manage. Then I take a deep breath and fix him with a look that says I refuse to be distracted. “Okay. So what aspects of daily life should we look at?” I sit with my pen poised over the paper.

  “Why-a you-a so secretive, Dani-beautiful?” he says. He leans back in his chair and studies me in a lazy way, eyes half closed. “You-a gotta something to hide?”

  I cap my pen and slap it down on the desk. “My mother is dead,” I say tightly. “And my father is locked in a permanent state of grief. And I don’t want to talk about it. Happy now?”

  Gregor freezes, his hand halfway through stroking an invisible mustache. “Oh,” he says, sitting forward in his chair. “I am really sorry. I had no idea.”

  “Well, now you do.” I pack up my books, even though class won’t be over for another half hour. I hike my bag onto my shoulder and tell Mr. Wilson I need to go to the infirmary.

  I snatch the assignment sheet from Gregor’s desk as I leave.

  Chapter Nine

  Gregor catches up with me on the bus. “Hey.” He sits down beside me.

  Half of me wants to scream, and the other half doesn’t know what to do. I am surprised to feel a sort of excitement. I know he got onto my bus just to talk to me. But I can’t be excited. I want to stay mad.

  I turn to look out the window as I try to figure out which feelings I should show him.

  “I’m really, super sorry,” he says.

  “It’s okay,” I say without looking at him.

  “No, it’s not. You tried to tell me to back off, and I didn’t listen.”

  The sincerity in his voice melts the frost off my indignation. I flash a look at him. “It’s okay.”

  “You sure?”

  I nod. I could make it harder, but he is so earnest. And he didn’t mean to hurt me. Why should I hurt him? “I was a little rude too,” I admit.

  He waves it off. “I deserved it. You should have punched me in the nose.”

  I smile at the image.

  “Or maybe dished me a roundhouse kick.” He does an awkward seated demonstration. I laugh.

  He nods at the book I’m holding. “What do you have there? Another steamy cookbook?”

  I roll my eyes. “Would you stop?” Although I’m really glad he isn’t asking about my mother. That’s usually the way the conversation slides once people find out she’s dead.

  He grins as the bus pulls away from the curb.

  “It’s Watership Down,” I say. “Nothing remotely steamy.”

  He looks disappointed. “Oh. Well, that’s too bad. No nudity?”

  “They’re all nude.”

  “Really?” He looks at the book again.

  I shrug. “They’re rabbits.”

  “Oh. Ew,” he says as the inevitable thought occurs to him.

  I laugh.

  “Oh, hey,” he says, reaching into his bag. “You left your pen on my desk.” He hands it to me in a weird way. Is he holding it like that so I can’t avoid touching his fingers when I take it?
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  “Thanks.” An electrical impulse jumps between our fingers, and I jerk my hand back. I hurry to think of something else to say. “I guess we should figure out when to work on our project…Did Mr. Wilson say anything about whether we have more class time for it?”

  “I wouldn’t count on it,” Gregor says. “We’ll definitely need to work on it outside class.”

  I nod. “Okay.” Oh jeez. More time with him. This doesn’t work with my plan.

  “Saturday?” he says.

  “Sure. Okay, yeah.”

  His eyes light up. “Awesome. How about your place?”

  My palms start to sweat. “Uh, no, my place is no good.” What do I tell him? My brain zings along like a car radio scanning for a station. Looking for a reasonable excuse. “My dad’s really grumpy and mean,” I finally stammer. “It’s better not to get in his way. What about your place?”

  “I don’t care if your dad is grumpy.”

  “Well, but he’s really, really grumpy. He doesn’t like other people. At all.”

  Gregor smiles. “I’ll soften him up. How can he not like me?” He does a Mafia godfather thing again, spreading his arms confidently, like he’s the king of the world. “I’m a nice guy.”

  “He won’t like you,” I lie. “I swear. It’s not even worth trying. What about your place?” I ask again.

  Gregor lowers his arms, and his face closes up. “Nah,” he says. “Charlie will bug us the whole time.”

  “Charlie? Is that your dog?”

  He laughs. “No, Charlie is my little brother.”

  “Oh. How old is he?”

  “He’s nine. And he’s a brat.”

  “Maybe he can help us with our project.”

  “No,” Gregor says flatly. “Let’s go somewhere else.”

  “Okay.” I’m a little disappointed. I would have liked to see where Gregor lives. I’d say Fernwood, the hippie-dippie neighborhood with flowered telephone poles and community gardens. It’s funky and welcoming. I wonder what his house looks like. I bet there’s a wicker chair in the living room and soft blankets thrown on the sofa. I’d like to see his room. Look at his bookshelves. See what old stuffed animals he still keeps. Maybe he has a train set.

  “Where else can we go?” he asks. “Hey, I know. What about the rec center?”