Normal

by Francine Pascal

  “Sorry,” Laura whispered earnestly, melting back into the crowd. Gaia couldn’t help but smile a little at his total control over the bitchiest of girls and his utter disregard for one of the prettiest of the idiot crew. His priorities were clear. The game first. Doting ninnies later.

  “Hey.”

  And finally, there he was—right in front of her. Jake Montone had stepped in front of her view of the chess game, big as life, complete with his gleaming white teeth and smooth olive skin. Gaia looked up at him gratefully as he dropped his book bag and collapsed into the chair opposite her.

  “Hey,” Gaia said, smiling at him. It was clearly time for her to make a smart-ass comment about him being late. But that was so “old Gaia.”

  “What—no clever put-down?” Jake said, as if he’d read her mind. He leaned forward and swatted at the book in her hands. “All this Russian literature’s messing with your head.”

  And then they were staring at each other again. Gaia’s other new favorite pastime. This was happening all the time now—every time they met, it seemed. A few moments of awkwardly intense staring that continued to leave Gaia with an inexplicable rush of blood to the center of her chest. She always tried to pass it off as more of a staring contest, but she had a feeling that Jake could see past her competitive veneer.

  “How freakin’ weird is this?” he said with a subversive little smile.

  “How weird is what?” Gaia asked, feeling an unexpected tinge of insecurity. Was he talking about them? Weird that they’d been making goo-goo eyes at each other? Weird that they were even hanging out like this at all? It was weird, wasn’t it? It was so out of nowhere. But Gaia had thought it was good weird. Didn’t Jake think it was good weird?

  “This,” Jake said, shrugging. “Us. Here. Like this. Weird.”

  “What’s weird about it?” Gaia said, far too defensively. She felt her spine stiffen. “I don’t see anything weird about it—we’re just . . . I mean, whatever. You’re weird. . . . ”

  “Whoa.” Jake laughed, squeezing Gaia’s hand. “I meant good weird.”

  “Oh.” She started to relax again. Maybe she had been burned by this boy-girl thing one too many times. Maybe—

  That thought was cut short by the sudden pang of complex emotions jabbing at her heart and pricking her spine. That was always the feeling she got upon spotting Ed Fargo.

  Ed and Kai were sitting across from each other at one of the smaller tables in the back of Starbucks, and Gaia’s eyes had just met Ed’s by accident. It was the kind of moment she and Ed both worked very hard to avoid in school.

  That was the standard now between Gaia and Ed. Distance. Distance and avoidance. Gaia still felt like such an extraterrestrial whenever she let herself think about it for too long. How could two people who had been so utterly and completely in love now be going out of their way to avoid anything more than a second’s worth of eye contact? She did her best to dump the little pangs of jealousy she was feeling about Ed and Kai, because it was such a ridiculously unfair double standard. Here she was, rushing to Starbucks for another rendezvous with Jake, so what right did she have to be even the least bit resentful of Ed and Kai? None. She had no right whatsoever. Because this was the deal now. This was how things worked. Ed and Kai over there and Gaia and Jake over here . . .

  Gaia and Jake . . . She ran the phrase through her head again. Gaia and Jake . . . Is it “Gaia and Jake” now? Is that what we call it?

  Gaia turned back to Jake and began to stare at him again, the rest of the world drifting off into space.

  “What?” Jake asked defensively, looking at her again. “What’s the problem?”

  “No,” Gaia assured him. “No, nothing. I wasn’t—”

  “What was that look?”

  “I was just . . . ” Gaia found her hands reaching behind her head and fiddling with her hair. She readjusted her ponytail, but it only made the hair fall farther into her face. “Nothing, just . . . It’s not a bad look,” she explained. “I was . . . This is me happy, okay?” she announced. She practically slapped Jake in the face with the words, but at least she’d managed to get them out of her mouth. “I mean, this is what I look like when I’m . . . happy.”

  A grin began to spread across Jake’s face. A wide, pearly white, excessively hot, excessively confident grin.

  “Stop it,” Gaia warned, trying to suppress the embarrassed smile that was about to pop up on her own face. This giddy lovesick child thing was going to give her a goddamn ulcer.

  “Stop what?” Jake asked, his smile increasing as he tried to regain eye contact, which was difficult given the fact that Gaia’s hand was beginning to involuntarily mask her eyes.

  “Stop it,” she muttered between clenched teeth, “or I swear to God, I will mash your face against this table and that grin will be forever altered.” Gaia collected herself and tried to look back in Jake’s eyes, but his smile had only grown larger.

  “You have no queen,” the blond chess player taunted his opponent across the room. Now even some adults had come over to watch. The crowd around the table had grown. “You have no rooks, you have no queen . . . you have no chance, my friend.”

  Jake leaned toward her. “We need to talk,” he announced. He locked his eyes so tightly and securely with hers that she didn’t even try to avert his glance this time. It was almost like a mild form of hypnosis.

  “About what?” Gaia uttered.

  “Not now,” he said, looking over at the wall clock. “I’ve got to pick something up for my dad. But we’re going to move your stuff over to that boardinghouse later, right?”

  “Right . . . ”

  “So I’ll be done in about a half hour. Then we’ll walk a little bit before we head uptown. And we’ll talk.”

  “About what?” Gaia repeated. But of course some part of her was smarter than that. She could see in his eyes what he wanted to talk about. He wanted to talk about them. He wanted to talk about what was clearly happening between them and what was going to happen between them. He wanted to talk about when talking would not be what they spent most of their time doing. He wanted to talk about everything Gaia had been having a delightful time not talking about But exactly how long was she planning to avoid that talk? Old Gaia would have voted for as long as humanly possible, given how ridiculously burned she’d gotten with all this romantic stuff. But new Gaia . . . ? What would new Gaia do?

  “Not here,” Jake said. “Later. We’ll talk. You and me.”

  Gaia looked deeper in his eyes. “Okay,” she heard herself answer.

  “Okay,” he said. And before he’d even finished that one word, he’d pressed his large hands against the table, leaned his entire torso across, and kissed her. Short, sweet, and deep on the lips. In the middle of Starbucks. With everyone watching.

  It was so unexpected. And yet it was so natural. As if it belonged. As if they’d been together for months. And for that one moment Gaia felt like they had been. She felt like everything was right. She felt undeniably normal. For one perfect moment, with Jake’s lips pressed to hers, she felt like one of those real girls, complete with real girl tingles down the back of her neck and her real girl hands clasped tightly to her seat. And just as quickly Jake pulled away, backing himself out of Starbucks as he smiled at her.

  Then he was out on the street and gone.

  Star-Crossed lovers

  A VOICE ECHOED THROUGH ED’S head. Something about bands that would be playing that night around town. Something else about the movies at the Film Forum. Some part of his brain realized that the voice was Kai’s—that she was talking a mile a minute, with her usual unbridled enthusiasm about their potential plans for the evening. But Ed really couldn’t hear a word. He couldn’t hear Kai, and he couldn’t hear the commotion surrounding the nearby table where two boys were playing chess. He couldn’t hear much of anything at the moment. All that seemed to matter right now was what he could see.

  Gaia and Jake. Kissing. Gaia and Jake kissing across a table in
the middle of Starbucks like the happiest teenage lovers in the worst kind of movie.

  It was like they were one of those couples whose names had become one word at school: Are Jake-and-Gaia coming? Hey, did you guys go to Jake-and-Gaia’s party last night? It was making Ed feel unexpectedly ill.

  But that really wasn’t any of Ed’s business anymore, was it? No, that really had nothing to do with Ed in the least.

  And why the hell do you care? Ed hollered internally as Kai continued to read out options from The Village Voice. You don’t care, Ed. You don’t give a crap. That’s Gaia’s life over there. This is your life over here. You and Kai. Making plans. For Christ’s sake, you’re the one who finally called things off with her, remember?

  Of course he remembered. This was just a freak momentary lapse in sanity, that’s all—little moldy leftovers of the kind of jealousy Ed didn’t even feel anymore. Gaia deserved to be happy, and so did Ed. And clearly there was no way they could be happy with each other. Gaia’s life was just too freaking insane.

  Too freaking dangerous.

  There was never an ounce of peace in her life, so how could there be an ounce of peace in her relationships? It was impossible. There was always some massive tragedy just around the corner—always some giant horrific detail Gaia was neglecting to mention. A man could not be happy while attached to Gaia Moore. Period.

  So what the hell are she and Jake doing in 7th Heaven over there?

  “ . . . at the Knitting Factory?”

  Ed had missed something. Kai’s inflections suggested she’d asked a question.

  But what the hell was the question?

  “Ed? Hel-lo?”

  Ed whipped his head back toward Kai and hit her with a good strong dose of eye contact. “What? Yes,” he said blankly. “I mean, hell, yes, the Knitting Factory. Definitely.”

  Kai tilted her head and leaned in closer. Her hair was done up in so many pigtails, she looked like a porcupine. “That’s what you want to do?” she asked dubiously.

  Ed wished he had any idea what they were talking about. He could think of nothing else but to widen his smile and agree. “Yeah.” He nodded emphatically. “I love the Knitting Factory.”

  “Huh . . . ,” Kai uttered, maintaining her perma-smile. “I didn’t know you were into Christian heavy metal. . . . ”

  “What?” Ed blurted far too loudly. “Christian heavy—?”

  “Where are you, Ed?” she groaned. Her smile stayed firm, but Ed could locate true frustration in the corners of her mouth. “You’re not listening. Where are you today?”

  “No, I am,” Ed insisted. “I’m totally listening.” His eyes darted one last time toward Gaia and Jake’s table. Jake was backing away toward the plate-glass doors with the most over-the-top star-crossed-lover gleam in his eye. And Gaia was gazing back at him with a look to match. Ed felt his stomach kick, and then he snapped his eyes back toward Kai, wishing very much that he’d resisted the second look. Because she’d caught him looking.

  And Ed could see the hurt just barely registering in Kai’s eyes.

  Say something, Ed. Say something fast. Keep the conversation going.

  “What about Luna Lounge?” he asked, far too brightly. “Who’s playing at Luna tonight?”

  Kai didn’t respond. Her eyes dropped down momentarily to her lap as her glittering eye shadow reflected the fluorescent lights.

  Don’t be mad, Ed begged silently. Please don’t be mad. I didn’t even mean to look over there. I don’t even care what’s going on over there.

  “Kai?” He tried to sound as matter-of-fact as possible. “How about Luna?”

  Kai took a short breath and then took hold of Ed’s hand. It was a most unexpected public display of affection. “You know . . . ,” she began slowly, “I have a better idea for tonight.”

  “Um . . . okay,” Ed replied cautiously. He wasn’t sure what to make of this particular touch of her hand. But he knew something was different. He knew that in that little moment, Kai had just made some kind of decision.

  “How about no music?” Kai seemed to turn on the high beams in her dark brown eyes. “No music, no movie, no X-treme skating event. How about tonight we do something more . . . romantic?”

  Ed felt a slight hitch in his throat. Hadn’t they sort of been through that approach already? They had tried making things more romantic, but Ed just wasn’t quite up to that level yet. Not that Kai wasn’t adorably sexy. Not that he didn’t love spending all this time with her. Not that they wouldn’t probably get extremely romantic sometime very soon, but right now, fooling around with Kai was still kind of awkward.

  So how exactly was he supposed to deal with being put on the spot like this?

  “Well . . . ” Uh-huh. Good start, Fargo. Smooth. “I, uh . . . I mean, I think . . . ” The longer he stammered, the more he could see Kai’s smile beginning to fade ever so slightly.

  Don’t ruin this, Ed. Kai is awesome. She’s hot, she’s funny, she’s different. She can freaking skate, for God’s sake. Do not screw this up. “I think—”

  “Checkmate!”

  Ed looked over at the chess game. It appeared that the blond boy, whoever he was—Ed had never seen him before—had won. The other boy was sullenly knocking over his own queen. Ed could see only a couple of his pieces remaining on the chessboard.

  “Wow—that was so cool!” Tannie Deegan squealed reverently. Ed realized that the Friends of Heather had formed an admiring clump behind this young chess genius—and they were all applauding.

  And he realized something else as his gaze flicked uncontrollably over to Gaia (and Kai caught him doing it again). Gaia was interested. She was watching.

  “Who’s next?” The blond boy had started restoring the pieces on the chessboard. “Come on—who’s next? Is there anyone here who can play chess?”

  “I’ll play! I’ll play!” Laura yelled. She was bouncing on her toes with excitement.

  The blond chess wizard shook his head condescendingly. “I meant, can anyone here actually play chess?”

  “Ed?” Kai was asking. She was moving her head around, trying to regain eye contact with him. “What were you saying?”

  Gaia was standing up. Ed didn’t want to look—he didn’t want Kai to see him do it. But it was like he’d lost conscious control of his eye-balls. Gaia was hefting her book bag—and walking over to join the chess players.

  “You think what?” Kai was asking. “Ed?”

  “Hmmm?” Ed could read Kai’s annoyance. “Sorry. I was just—they’re playing chess over there,” he explained lamely.

  “Do you want to go watch?”

  “No, I—”

  Kai’s eyes darted up to meet Ed’s. This time she didn’t even bother hiding the hurt in her eyes.

  “I have to go,” Kai said suddenly. She rose out of her chair.

  “Wait a minute,” Ed complained. He shot up from the table and tried to get some solid eye contact back from Kai. Make it better, Ed. Make it better fast. “Wait, I want to talk about tonight,” he sort of lied. “I want to make a plan.”

  “Sure, yeah, anything,” Kai said far too bouncily. “I mean, I’m really up for whatever.”

  Ed knew she was lying. And he wasn’t particularly proud of himself for pretending to believe her. “Okay,” he said. “How about bowling?” He smiled. “Tonight? Bowlmor?”

  Bowling. Very romantic, Ed.

  “Bowling, sure,” Kai agreed, staring down at the floor. “I love bowling.”

  Kai rammed the double doors open with her butt and disappeared without a good-bye or another glance in Ed’s direction.

  Follow her, asshole, Ed told himself. Now’s the part where you’re supposed to follow her.

  Ed sank back into his wooden chair. He picked up his forgotten grande mocha, which was now room temperature.

  He should have just gone after Kai and set things straight.

  He really should have.

  Queen of Toothpaste

  “I CAN PLAY,” G
AIA SAID.

  She was standing in front of the wooden table where the blond boy had just soundly defeated the other chess player. The loser had already sullenly shaken hands and left—Gaia saw him over to one side, throwing out his empty paper coffee cup.

  The new boy looked up at her. Tannie and Laura and the others stood behind him, glaring at Gaia as if she’d barged into their private room at a country club.

  I do believe I’m socializing, Gaia thought dazedly. Will wonders never cease?

  Standing up, walking over, Gaia had realized that she was behaving strangely. But it felt good; there was no denying it. Jake’s kiss was still tingling on her lips as she crossed the room, wondering what possible force of nature could have actually propelled her toward the Friends of Heather and their new boy toy. But strange or not, here she was.

  Old Gaia would have buried her nose in her book and fiercely ignored the invitation to play chess. She had come very close to doing just that—it was only a sudden impulse that had made her answer the challenge.

  “Can you play a real game?” the blond kid demanded. He was frowning sternly at her, as if he was done wasting his time with amateurs.

  “Yeah,” Gaia said.

  Without a word, the blond boy held out his two closed fists.

  Gaia pointed at his left hand. He opened it up—it contained a black pawn.

  “Look at that,” he remarked bemusedly. “Already losing.”

  “Do you want to talk,” Gaia asked pleasantly, “or do you want to play?”

  The boy smiled and made a courteous gesture toward the empty chair facing him.

  “The lesson begins,” the boy said, advancing the pawn in his king’s file. The chess piece clicked against the board, a tiny warrior challenging its enemies.

  Gaia didn’t bother to speak. She advanced her queen’s pawn two ranks.

  “Can she do that?” Laura yelled out. “Wait, that’s two squares.”

  “Can’t you all go to a shoe store or something?” Gaia asked the Friends of Heather. One move into this game, she was realizing how long it had been since she’d played. She honestly wasn’t sure how she would do. “We’re concentrating.”