The Opposite of Geek

by Ria Voros

  “So what’s the prize for the winner?” I ask.

  “Other than bragging rights?” Dean says. “Maybe a kiss from the lady. Isn’t that how it used to be done?”

  “Aw, man, don’t do that.” James groans. “Are you introducing sexual tension into our group just when it was getting great? That licks.”

  I must look stunned because Dean drops his jaw and winks at me. “You’re cute,” he murmurs. “No, I’m not sabotaging the group, James. It’s the group above all else, right?”

  James says nothing. I am paralyzed, brain frozen. Awkward silence.

  “But hypothetically, Gretchen —”

  “Stop talking, stop talking, la la la!” James yells from the back seat.

  “Okay, fine. We’re here anyway. But let me know what you think — you know — when you’ve thought about it,” Dean says to me, leaning in as he unclips his seat belt.

  “Sure,” I manage to say, but I’m still stuck on the kiss part. Dean wants me to kiss him.

  Why does that make the world stop?

  And Now What?

  After the shock wears off, I start to think about what this means. Does Dean actually want to date me, or is he just teasing me in that pull-your-pigtails kind of way we are always told guys do? And what do I want? Sure, a high school grad for a boyfriend is up there on my list of Coolness I Will Never Hope to Achieve, but do I want to date Dean? What about the friendship we have — and James? We were just getting such a cool vibe, the three of us. I can’t afford to mess that up, what with my recent friend track record.

  But Dean

  decides it all for me. Tuesday afternoon he picks me and James up from the corner outside school. He looks the same as always but my stomach is churning, so exactly nothing is the same. I hate that.

  I’m thinking about what to say that will simultaneously let him down easy and not be awkward, when he says, “Hey, Gretchen, about the kiss thing the other day.”

  I only stare, trying to look unflustered.

  “I was totally kidding, okay? It’s not like that with us and I respect that. We’re buddies. Let’s keep it that way.”

  He glances quickly into the rear-view and I know he’s looking at James.

  “I wasn’t weirded out,” I say. “It’s no problem,” relief and disappointment flooding through me.

  “Okay, I need a serious dose of caffeine, people,” James says from behind me. “Beeline it for Starbucks, driver.”

  52 Percent

  Upside to this latest chemistry quiz: I actually passed.

  Downside: It won’t be good enough for The Board.

  Does it count if it’s good enough for me?

  Mum’s Thoughts on Life

  resemble fairy tales on acid. She thinks I should send Nemiah a letter and all will magically be well. Since she only knows we had a fight and not that I am Ostracized Girl at school, I can’t really protest. I peel potatoes into the sink as my duty to dinner while she regales me with her opinion.

  “Maybe I should phone her mother,” she says.

  “Don’t you dare!” I wave a naked potato to make my point stronger. “You can’t help.”

  Layla waltzes in, peering at us hopefully. “What’re you talking about?”

  “Nothing,” Mum says. “Get to your homework.”

  Layla looks insulted but takes off.

  I finish the spuds and make my escape.

  “Wait, Gretchen.”

  I freeze in hopes Mum can’t see me. Works for rabbits.

  She unstacks plates. “I miss our chats,” she murmurs. “We used to be so close.”

  Yeah, I think, when you still changed my diapers. And before you decided my future for me.

  “Let’s have dinner, just us. Maybe next week,” she says.

  I say I’ll think about it, knowing she expects a yes. Knowing the conversation would be awkward and I’ll end up angry but unable to say anything.

  Knowing I’ve cut her somehow.

  Approaching my village:

  Don’t know about the people,

  but all the scarecrows

  are crooked.

  – Issa

  At Times Like This

  I forget I once lusted after Luke Bremmerman at all. I swear he’s not as cute as I thought — what’s with the almost-mullet? Ashlyn, who still clings to my cooking skills (“You’re better than everyone combined!”), can have him. Her roots are growing out dark, but she has been pretty nice to me since I became a loser. She says hi to me in the hall as others look on in pity or malice. I have noted that when Luke visits her in the Foods room, he only comes when he can snarf some baking. Yes, Luke and Ashlyn sitting in a tree, I swear to god that’s fine with me.

  Nemiah Leaves a Message

  Heart in throat —

  can she be ready

  to say sorry, will I

  wake up in her room

  after a sleepover

  and it’s all a bad dream —

  everything’s okay?

  I turn up the volume

  on the phone

  to make sure

  I don’t miss anything.

  “Hey, Mrs. Meyers,

  it’s Nemiah, I just

  wanted to ask if

  my yellow jacket is

  at your place. I think

  I might have left it there

  before Christmas.

  If so, could you

  leave it on the porch?

  I’ll grab it

  tomorrow. Tha—”

  I erase the message

  halfway through

  her thanks.

  Five seconds later

  I wonder if she

  said anything about me

  in the part I erased.

  Damn.

  I throw the phone

  on the floor,

  but I’m too wimpy

  to break it.

  Bake Sale Brownies

  Ashlyn announces we will make her favourite food in the entire world, ever, on Wednesday, as the cooking club gathers around her like kids to the kindergarten teacher. She revels.

  Garth, a puny kid in grade nine who, it’s rumoured, eats, sleeps and breathes Dungeons and Dragons, takes the chair next to me. (The rumour goes he wants to change his name to Thor.) At least he’s okay in the kitchen. These days my criteria for suitable acquaintances has gone out the window. Garth/Thor makes a joke about what’s really in the brownies. A couple of innocents stare blankly.

  “We’re practising these white chocolate–cherry brownies because I have a surprise for you.” Ashlyn giggles. Garth/Thor and I groan in unison and instantly feel a bond. “We’re going to have a stall at the Spring Fair!”

  I look around at all the empty expressions and Ashlyn maniacally grinning. “What the hell’s that?” I ask. There are grunts of agreement around the room; I feel the power.

  Ashlyn looks shocked. “The Spring Fair? Fundraising for the senior class trip? Games, rides, food, fun for all ages? Ring any bells?”

  Garth/Thor pipes up. “Why should we slave for them?” More grunts, a few table-slaps. Ashlyn’s kindergarten class has officially rebelled.

  “We give them a cut of the profits, they’re buying the ingredients,” Ashlyn explains. We’re not buying her logic. “It’s a partnership. We can use the money to get new equipment — or go on a field trip!”

  I put my hand up. “Well, at least we get in free, right?” I step forward. “I’ll sell stuff if we get to take turns on the rides and games.” I look around and realize I could take over as leader of the pack (who knew?). “We deserve a reward for our brownies.” The cheers around me feel like warm honey — well, not really, but they feel good.

  For the Record

  Popularity (at school): nil

  Popularity (outside school): minimal but respectable

  Boyfriend status: nil, but nobody’s perfect

  Chemistry grade status: la la la, I can’t hear you

  Hope for the future: faint but
growing

  Me and My Boys

  We are solid, easy, fresh air in a stuffy room, and hilarious — no one makes us laugh like we do.

  Dean makes me a playlist that spells out words by the first letter of the song’s titles:

  Come On with Me, The Crones

  Rich Enough, Betty and George

  Allison, The Games

  Shut Up, The Cosmic Turkeys

  How Are You?, Tender Flesh

  Not Now, Not Ever, Call Me Crazy

  Beautiful, Rock Paper Scissors

  Underneath It All, Flavour

  Reach Me, Stanley Shepard

  Noodles, Not The One You Want

  I try not to read into it.

  Hint of Spring

  The rain lets up for a day and we get the most beautiful, almost-warm morning, on which I walk to school feeling like maybe things will be okay. Maybe I don’t need Nemiah.

  I consider asking Ashlyn if she wants to go for coffee sometime. She’s been looking low lately — it’s going around that she and Luke are having issues.

  A squirrel runs across the road toward me and stops, chewing a nut.

  I pick up an acorn and throw it to him. He scampers off, but a minute later, when I look back, he grabs the one I threw and zips up a tree.

  Layla’s Agony

  She’s been dumped. I won’t say I expected marriage or anything, but at least it could have lasted a month. I guess grade seven doesn’t work like that. She got 3.2 weeks and four sort-of-dates, but one doesn’t count because it was a walk home from school.

  She sits at the breakfast table and moans about heartache and loss. I want to shake her and say, “You don’t know squat about those things — try losing your best friend!” but I don’t; Mum’s at the sink trying not to offer advice.

  Layla slumps off to school and, on the order of our mother, I catch her up in the driveway and try for something cheery: “I’ll watch that music show with you tonight.”

  She looks ready to cry. “That was Wes’s favourite show!” Gag-fest. She sniffs. “Can you paint my toenails for me?” I wonder what would happen if I answer literally. (Technically? Yes. Do I want to? No.).

  “Yeah, all right,” I say, and she looks at me gratefully.

  I am Super Sister.

  Haiku for James

  (because he deserves one)

  Lanky wrong jeans boy

  Exhales smarts like fog on glass

  Has the coolest laugh

  Run-in with the Tooth Fairy

  She finds me in the hall when I least expect it — think fast. Hard to do at 8:14.

  “How are you doing with James?” she asks, all smiles. I try to smile back as I tell her that I think I’m getting it.

  She nods, murmuring about Mr. Marchand knowing his star chemistry student can tutor anyone out of a black hole. Then she asks excitedly, “Did you read the poems?”

  I dive into the security of poesy and feel much safer. “I’m really jealous of her sexy line breaks,” I say. “And there was this one image —”

  “The frog in the pond?” Her face lights up.

  “Yes!”

  “Wasn’t that gorgeous? I almost cried. And the way it connected back to her mother …” She looks like she’s going to swoon.

  “Are you okay?” I ask.

  She straightens up. “I’m okay. Oh, and she’s going to be at a poetry slam next month, if you want to check her out.”

  “Poetry what?” I’ve never heard of this before, but just the sound of it makes me think I’ll love it and be embarrassed by it at the same time.

  “It’s a performance poetry contest on Commercial Drive. Every Monday.” She looks at me from under her thick bangs. “You’d love it, Gretchen. Maybe you could go with James.”

  “James isn’t into poetry — and we’re not together.” I don’t know why I have to say this — we are friends and I could totally ask him and Dean to go with me. “I just don’t know if performing poetry is my thing.”

  “You don’t have to perform anything,” she says. “Just go and watch. It’s poetry that will blow your mind.” She unperches herself and turns to go. “And keep up the chemistry work, right?

  When I’m Hanging Out

  with James/Dean I get to be myself.

  Not the me who orders and cooks and cleans messes

  in the Foods room. Not the me who

  doesn’t upset the apple cart at home.

  The fun me who howls with the boys

  driving down the boulevard,

  watching people watch us go by,

  wondering how much they want to be us.

  I was on the outside once too.

  Funny Dean

  If I could bronze a moment

  like my mum

  bronzed my baby shoes,

  it would be this:

  Dean accidentally walking

  through a tai chi session

  in the park

  on the way

  to find ice cream.

  Dean purposefully

  joining in,

  striking a praying mantis

  pose beside

  an old man whose eyes

  were closed.

  James and I hiding

  behind a bush, stuffing

  our hands

  in our mouths

  to keep from laughing.

  The old man

  opening his eyes,

  seeing Dean in

  Tortured Locust position

  with his eyes closed,

  and shouting so loud

  Dean falls over.

  I have never

  laughed and run

  so hard in my life.

  An Almost-Glance

  I walk down the hall on the way to social studies and it happens: Nemiah looks up from reading something at her locker, and maybe she forgets for a second that we are not talking. She catches my eye and smiles. But then the light goes on: She’s supposed to be a bitch to me. She reverses the smile and looks away. It’s like I can hear the commentary her brain is making to her face muscles: “Cheeks up, smiling — wait! Abort! Target is not worthy of this reaction! Cheeks down, down! Avert eyes, commence Ignore Mode!”

  I Suggest a Slam

  We’re sitting in the library — one of the rare times these days when we actually act like tutor and tutee — and I’m looking for yet another way to avoid looking at chemical reaction formulas. James is wearing a t-shirt that says Geeks Rule the World, and has pictures of Stephen Hawking, Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg.

  “So, there’s this thing next Monday over on the Drive. I kind of want to go and I thought you and Dean might …” I don’t know how to end. Like it? Save me from myself?

  “Define ‘thing,’” James says, his finger still on the formula for ammonium sulfide, “because Commercial Drive has a lot of them.”

  “It’s a poetry slam,” I whisper.

  “What? Speak up. The oppressive silence of the library is drowning you out.” His eyes crinkle in the corners. “Did I hear poetry?”

  “Slam, yes. It’s this performance thing. Like spoken word, but there’s judges and winners.”

  He slaps the table. The sound reverberates around the library like a gunshot. “You, Gretchen Meyers, are a poetry geek. Congrats on the arcane terminology. I have no idea what you just said. It’s awesome.”

  I’m mortified, but I manage to ask if he’ll come.

  He taps my shoulder lightly. “Hey, don’t take it personally. Embrace it. It’s your thing. Dean works that night, but I would like to be confounded and confused by a bunch of hopped-up poets on Monday. Count me in.”

  Unfortunately

  Things don’t start off well for my first poetry slam. James doesn’t show at school on Monday, calls me at lunch to say he’s got the flu — so sorry not to witness me in my geek element.

  Having made the stupid mistake of telling my parents about the poetry slam (I’m going with a friend — a real one — you’ll be so proud)
, I explain that I won’t be going anymore. Mum then decides it’s her job to fill the James-shaped hole in the evening, likely because I still haven’t agreed to go for dinner with her. I can’t think of the right thing to say to turn her down. It’s actually nice of her to take an interest, considering it’s not doctor-related.

  But as we pull up to the place, all I want to do is go home. I’m here with my mother. She won’t understand what’s going on — on several levels. She is wearing a sweater from the year I was born. What was I thinking?

  The Scene

  We get a small table at the back of the café. Mum orders us hot chocolates and I try not to bolt for the door. Everyone is older than me, cooler than me, and completely without a parent.

  “This should be interesting,” Mum says as she slides into her chair. “I’m so glad you invited me.”

  I didn’t. You invited yourself.

  My heart is racing for some inexplicable reason. The lights dim slightly and the emcee gets up on the little stage.

  One Hour and Five Minutes

  later, after poets have stood up and read their stuff and the audience has sent the best ones to the final round, a guy with long hair and a goatee wins the slam and the crowd cheers. He deserved it. They all did. I want them all to go again — I want to live this hour again.

  I’m not one for competition. Sports are not my thing, but poetry sports — now there’s something worthwhile.

  I could be an elite poetry athlete.

  The Point

  I’m buzzed with the energy of the slam as we leave the café — the rhythms and voices and goosebump-inducing lines. It feels like home. This is where I want to be. I want to live here and make all these people my friends.