My Awesome/Awful Popularity Plan

by Seth Rudetsky

  She went on. “It’s like I thought. Practice went on longer and now he wants to hit the treadmill and then stretch. I’m going to see him tomorrow morning in geometry.”

  Excellent. I left Spencer’s so I could eat a side of greens and stare at a plateful of food that made me gag.

  Becky put her phone into her bag. “Let’s talk about the spring show.”

  And be forced to have a conversation I would do anything to avoid.

  What an amazing first date with Chuck.

  THAT ALL HAPPENED TWO WEEKS ago.

  I’m now in my Monday study hall. Usually I spend the period quietly sitting and studying, which usually deteriorates into me fantasizing about starring opposite Kristin Chenoweth in a Broadway musical that’s filmed for TV and then gets released as a major motion picture. Instead, I’ve spent the whole period today passing notes. And not like I used to, which was like this:

  1. One of the cool kids would write a note.

  2. They’d slip it to me while whispering to whom to pass it.

  3. They’d then tell me NOT to open it.

  4. I’d pass it to a cool kid and risk getting in trouble.

  5. Repeat from opposite direction.

  This time they didn’t want me to pass it to anyone; instead it was being passed to me! The notes were mostly making fun of E.R.’s (Ms. Horvath’s) neck brace. She apparently fell off the treadmill she has to walk on, according to doctor’s orders, “every day for twenty full minutes.” She had been complaining about her regimen for weeks: “It’s supposed to be physical therapy, but it’s physical agony.” She informed us that last week she hadn’t been able to take the “torture” anymore, so she’d pushed the STOP button. Apparently the treadmill didn’t slow gradually; it just stopped and the abruptness of it made her neck snap “all the way forward and all the way back.” She told anyone who walked by that she now had “fifth-degree whiplash.”

  First of all, I didn’t know whiplash came in degrees, and secondly, when things are registered in degrees, don’t they only go up to third? Also, is fifth degree the worst level or is it at the low end of the spectrum? No one dares ask her for fear of the personal medical history we’ll have to endure. Regardless, her injury has been the subject of most of the notes today, featuring pictures of her with arrows pointing to various body parts. Next to the arrows were written things like “seventh-degree halitosis” and “twelfth-degree hemorrhoid” (that was mine).

  Usually when I looked around a classroom, my view would be mainly kids I wasn’t allowed to talk to (too cool) and kids I was too scared to talk to (too tough). But now, thanks to Becky, I can talk to any of the cool kids. Yes, it’s still for limited amounts of time (aka until someone cooler comes along and I get dropped), but it’s more words than I’ve spoken to them in fifteen years! AND now the tough kids don’t call me fag, etc., anymore because my girlfriend is so “hot.”

  Even Doug Gool stopped actively bothering me. Oddly enough, though, he’s stepped up his harassment of Mary Ann Cortale. It seems that ever since he put chocolate on her butt, he’s taken all the hatred he had toward me and directed it toward her. Whenever I’m at my locker, he’s in front of hers in the middle of writing skank or gluing her lock or taping up rolls of toilet paper. I feel bad that she’s bearing the brunt of him, but I can’t really do anything about it; plus I have too much other stuff to deal with.

  My main issue is trying to get all my homework done and piano/violin practicing in while still having time every day for a Chuck-and-Becky rendezvous. I’ve started to wake up extra early so I can get my practicing done in the morning, because after school I have to be on call. So far I haven’t been able to work a whole lot on getting Chuck interested in me because we haven’t spent much time together. Normally what happens is I’ll get a last-minute phone call to meet at a location where I’ll show up early and meet Becky. We chat until Chuck shows up (at least twenty minutes late, sometimes up to an hour); then they’ll go off somewhere and make out while I keep a lookout. Also, in the last week alone, he’s canceled three times because of practice/the gym/the coach/the team. It’s not exactly what I’d envisioned, but at least it’s gotten me one item I can cross off my goals-for-the-year list: school-wide popularity. Well, not exactly popularity, but no one’s being mean to my face.

  Therefore, the next step is figuring out a way to amp up my popularity. Yes, kids don’t actively ignore/hate me, and they chat with me before and after class, but where are the invitations to parties? Where are the late-night, two-hour phone calls? Where are the bare-your-soul conversations while you walk through the park? In other words, where’s all the stuff I get from Spencer? I won’t feel truly popular until one of the cool kids calls me and we spend an hour watching a reality show together while on the phone. I’m trying to figure out what I need to do to make that happen since it seems that dating Becky and being funny aren’t enough to get to that next level. And while I’m figuring that out, I have to work on the other two items on my sophomore-year list: dating Chuck and getting my first kiss!

  The unexpected thing I’m having to deal with as well is Becky and Rock and Roll High School. When we were at the mall eating Japanese food (aka a side salad for me), she asked me if she could come to my house in a few weeks so I could work with her on her audition. Unfortunately, the day we decided to meet is today. Oh yeah, since I play the piano, I sometimes help people get their audition songs into shape. Normally I’d be super-excited to help Becky because I think she’s really talented and I love telling someone how to sing a song … I mean, suggesting to someone how to sing a song. The problem is her father. If I help her audition, I won’t get those tickets to the Lincoln Center show. For the past two weeks, I’ve been trying to think of a great excuse to keep her from coming over, like “My mom has a migraine,” “My piano broke,” and, I’m ashamed to admit, “I have fifth-degree whiplash.” Finally, this morning I was going to pull the old stomach flu routine, but before I could, she told me she was sick of Chuck being late or sometimes not even showing up, so she told him he had to come this afternoon. How could I pass up a chance to have Chuck in my house?! Maybe they’ll come over and we’ll all wind up chatting for so long that we never get around to working on her audition and I’ll still be able to snag those Lincoln Center tickets. Or maybe her dad will call her on her cell and she’ll have to leave earlier than Chuck and he’ll wind up staying for dinner. Or a snack. Or a severe make-out session.

  Oops. I have to pass a note!

  OK, so this afternoon around four, Chuck and Becky arrived within minutes of each other. I wanted a good hour to gaze at Chuck so I could memorize what his blond stunningness looks like in my house and replay it over and over again in my mind for years to come. Instead, Becky immediately took out her audition song and put it on my piano. I was about to feign arthritis in my hands, but Chuck suddenly looked over and said, “Hey, Justin. I didn’t know you played.” ARGH! That’s what drives me crazy about this school. I’ve played and sung in every chorus concert and all the musicals, and I know the cool kids would be impressed if they heard me in action, but the only people who come to those performances are the parents of the kids performing. Or a handful of kids who aren’t performing but love the arts and are therefore in a low social echelon. I wish that attendance at the plays and chorus concerts was mandatory for every kid in school. Hearing me sing a solo with an entire chorus behind me or belt out a big song and dance number in a musical would be just the thing to get me to the real popularity level I want to be at.

  Chuck sat right next to me. “C’mon, Justin, play something.”

  Mmm … He’d obviously just been chewing gum because I was enveloped in a cloud of Doublemint. My vision began to blur and I started to play the only thing I could think of: the music in front of me. Becky took that as a cue that her coaching session with me had started and began singing. Hmph. So much for me not helping her. The cheerleader in Rock and Roll High School has a big song in the second act that she
sings to the freshman character. The theme is “I’ve been where you are and this is what I’ve learned. Don’t make the same mistakes I did.” Since the song has an old-school R & B/pop feel to it, Becky decided to sing a 1980s Whitney Houston classic. “The Greatest Love of All” was Whitney’s first big hit and has a similar theme to the cheerleader’s song in the show. It also has some super-high notes that are impossible for most people to sing. Becky sang the whole song without any of her onstage issues: no flat/sharpness, memory loss, inappropriate softness, or cracking. After she finished her final “lo-o-o-o-o-o-ve!” I was speechless. She belted all the high notes and even added some sassy riffs she made up. Plus her acting choices were amazing. It’s like she stopped being Becky and had this inner glow that conveyed power and wisdom yet some kind of past hardship she didn’t want anyone else to go through, just like the character. Chuck started clapping. I was waiting for Becky to acknowledge him, but I turned and saw he was clapping toward me!

  “Wow, Justin. You got talent.” He caressed my shoulder. Well, more like he patted me on the back. Well, not really patted, more like he pat me on the back. Hmm. I think he was just using my back for leverage as he got up, but nevertheless, there was touching involved.

  Still, I couldn’t believe he was impressed by that. That’s not even a hard song to play. Wait until he hears me play the Chopin scherzo in F sharp minor, I thought. I then decided I should probably stick to playing Whitney. That kind of music is more impressive to people like Chuck. And anyone under seventy-five.

  I thanked him and was waiting for him to go even crazier for Becky. If he was praising me that much, I knew he was going to go overboard for her because she really sounded amazing!

  Instead, he got up and started dialing his phone. “I gotta call the coach,” he said as he walked out of the room. “If we’re gonna practice outside this winter, the hot chocolate machine better get fixed.”

  Chuck went into the kitchen and I looked at Becky. She had lost all of the glow she had during the song and was now looking down. How could she be depressed after such an amazing performance? I had to tell her how great she was.

  “Becky!” I said, and she looked up. “That was incredible!” She had to know that. I decided to get a little nitpicky. “My only advice about auditioning with that song would be to—”

  “Oh, Justin, what does it matter?” She flopped down on the couch.

  Huh? What was she being such a downer about? “Listen, Becky, I don’t know why Chuck didn’t tell you how gorgeous you sounded, but—”

  She laughed. “Oh, please. Chuck never says anything about the way I sing. Or look. Or … anything. That’s just Chuck.”

  Hmm. That sounds annoying. But I could certainly deal with it just to have one delicious hour wrapped in his muscular—

  “I’ve gotten used to Chuck.” Becky broke me out of my mini-fantasy. “That’s not why I’m upset.”

  “Well, do you think it’s the wrong song choice? I think it’s great, but if you don’t”—I started flipping through papers on my piano—“I have the music here somewhere. Maybe you can learn a song from the show.”

  “Justin. I’ve been listening to the CD all year. I have every song memorized. That’s not the issue.”

  “Then what’s up?” I asked, and walked over to where she was sitting on the couch.

  She sighed. “I was feeling so good about the song and my chances for getting cast—”

  “Exactly!” I interrupted. “You have to get the cheerleader part. No one else in the school can sing like you.”

  “That’s what I was thinking … then I saw this.” She held up a picture of the cast of Cats. Not the Broadway musical, but the one we did at synagogue. There in the front row was me (in a full split) as Old Deuteronomy and right in back (next to the rabbi’s wife, who was a sixty-year-old Jennyanydots) was Becky, working her natural green cat eyes in her Grizabella catsuit.

  She brandished the photo in its frame. “I’m dreading another horrible performance.”

  “Oh, stop it, Becky. You weren’t horrible,” I lied.

  “Yes, I was. My version of ‘Memory’ stank.” Then she breathed a sigh of relief. “I’m just thankful it wasn’t recorded.”

  Note to self: delete bootleg of synagogue Cats performance from iPod.

  “Well, stop worrying. Your voice sounds incredible now.”

  “Justin,” she said with her hands on her hips. “Didn’t I sound incredible in Cats rehearsal?”

  “Yeah …,” I said tentatively.

  “Don’t I sound great at all rehearsals?”

  “Yes, you do,” I said, dreading what was coming.

  “OK. Now name me one performance in which I’ve sounded incredible.”

  Ouch.

  “Um …”

  Must. Fill. Silence.

  “Well, Becky, there was that concert … that time … during the … thing.…” I nodded like I had just completed a coherent sentence.

  “Forget it, Justin. I have ears. I know that every time I get in front of an audience, I suck.”

  She was right. But obviously she had a great voice. If she always panicked during performances and lost all of her vocal talent, there had to be some reason for it.

  “I’m not going to audition,” she said firmly.

  True, there had to be some reason for it, but why find out? Lincoln Center, here I come!

  “Um … are you sure?” I forced myself to ask. I did this mostly to placate Spencer, who I knew was going to go over this exchange with a fine-tooth comb searching for my karma.

  “Yes, I’m sure,” she said, taking the Whitney music off the piano and sending my heart soaring. “I came here today in denial. You can tell Chuck I went home.”

  And with that, she went out the front door.

  And left Chuck.

  Alone.

  In my HOUSE!

  He walked into the living room. Here’s my chance, I thought. I took a deep breath and—

  He looked around. “Did Becky leave?”

  “Well, Chuck, I think she did. Perhaps you and I—”

  “Oh, man,” he interrupted. “She was supposed to pay me back the ten bucks she owed me.”

  I didn’t know what to say. “That’s too bad …,” I offered.

  He looked crestfallen. “That’s exactly how much more money I need to be able to buy those new sneakers. You know, the ones with the double air cushions.”

  I didn’t know anything about sports sneakers, but I did know he looked adorable when he was sad.

  “Justin, would you”—he moved closer—“could you …” He was right in front of my face. I could have reached out with my lips and touched his. He suddenly moved away. “Nah … I couldn’t ask you to lend me money.”

  Yes, he could, if it meant he would come that close again!

  “Chuck, it’s no problem.” I ran to get my wallet.

  One minute later, I handed him a twenty-dollar bill.

  “That’s all I have,” I explained. “Do you—”

  Before I could ask him for change, he yelled, “You’re the best!” and grabbed his coat. “Thanks, Justin. I’m hittin’ the mall!”

  He waved and ran out my front door.

  I stood and thought about his powerful leg muscles propelling him to the mall.

  Well, propelling him to the shuttle bus that stopped at my corner and would take him to the mall.

  I took a deep breath.

  Wow.

  I just experienced Chuck flirting with me.

  Things are moving along as planned.

  And I’m going to the Lincoln Center show.

  Things are even better than I expected!

  Right?

  THE LINCOLN CENTER SHOW WAS A-MA-ZING! I’m about to go to sleep because I had to spend the last hour obsessively reading through the Playbill over and over again and now it’s super-late, but here’s the backstory quickly. When I first knew I was definitely going to the show, I desperately wanted to give Chuck the
other ticket, but I was smart enough not to ask him. Yes, I’m working toward dating/smooching him, but even I know that when we’re dating, there’ll be no afternoons in Manhattan, having brunch and taking in a musical. That’s why I have Spencer. He’s not even into Broadway like I am, but he’s always willing to come along with me whenever I want to see a show, and because he’s so smart, he’ll always have something incredibly insightful to say about it afterward.

  My mom dropped us off at the Long Island Rail Road. “Have fun!” she said as we got out of the car. We started walking up the stairs, and she leaned out the window.

  “Justin! Don’t you have to wait down here for Becky?”

  Ugh! Lately she’s been asking me all the time how things are going with Becky and if she wants to come over to our house for dinner. I know she’s trying to figure out what’s really going on, and it takes so much effort to keep giving vague answers so she and my dad will keep out of it. This time, because we were halfway up the stairs, I had the advantage of distance.

  “Peas and carrots, peas and carrots!” I yelled. We had learned in Mrs. Hall’s theater class that when you’re in a crowd scene and you’re supposed to make general crowd noises, just repeat “Peas and carrots” and it does the trick. And, from a distance, it looks like you’re saying something.

  “What?” she yelled as the car behind her started to honk.

  That was my cue. I gave her a thumbs-up and pulled Spencer up the stairs. I promptly turned off my cell phone so she couldn’t ask any further questions, and Spencer and I stood on the platform, waiting for the train.

  “Your mother still doesn’t know your devious plan?”

  “No,” I replied. Then added, “And it’s not devious.”

  Spencer did his “no response” routine, which I knew was a way to make me examine what I just said. But I took it as a cue to talk about global warming. I knew if I mentioned something he was interested in, he’d get his mind off me and Chuck and Becky.

  Right when he was talking about the long-term effects of the Gulf of Mexico oil spill, the train arrived. As we were getting on, I noticed that he looked adorable. Underneath his overcoat, he was wearing a casual brown blazer that contrasted with his orange hair perfectly. I mentioned how much I loved his coat, and he told me he got it at a Housing Works thrift store, which gives all their profits to help homeless people with AIDS. Leave it to Spencer to figure out a way to look good while saving the world.