CHAPTER ONE
Like usual, I sat in the very back row of the classroom. Leaning over my desk, I closed my eyes and dropped my head, coving my ears with my hands. It was always so loud in the morning and I wasn’t a morning person…at all.
I felt a tap on my shoulder and opened just my right eye.
“Hey.”
“Hey.” It was Jordan, my best friend and next door neighbor, and my life would totally suck without him. He was one of the few that ‘got me’. We were so much alike, artistic, and smart with a wicked twisted sense of humor. As loners we unsurprisingly gravitated to each other for companionship and for defense, since we were natural targets for all the bullies and cliques in school. Trouble was I hadn’t seen him since the last day of tenth grade. Now, it was comforting to see him on the first day of our senior year.
I sat back in my seat and turned toward him.
“How was your year in Europe?”
“It was great. I have lots more pictures to show you. I only sent you about 10% of what I actually took. My dad just received news of his new posting. He got Saudi Arabia. It’s an unaccompanied tour. Since we can’t go with him this time, maybe I’ll be here all year, but who knows with my family. How about you? You didn’t write me much.”
“Well I…”
Miss Weaver pounded her ruler on the desk like a gavel. “Okay, calm down. Your reading list is on the board. Your first assignment is to memorize and act out a scene for the class. I’ve randomly drawn a partner for each you and you can get together after class to decide how and when you want to meet and work on the assignment.”
There was a collective groan in the room and everyone looked around. Mostly I thought it was to see who they didn’t want to get stuck with. Jordan and I had to be on the top of everyone’s list. It was like sports all over again, although I was a pretty good athlete and coordinated, I was so shy nobody knew it. I always held back, hating to be the center of attention in any way. I knew I had to get over it; it just wasn’t as easy as it sounded.
I glanced to Jordan and I could tell now that there was something very different about him. His curly mop of brown hair for instance. Instead of overpowering him, it seemed to fit him now. He turned and smiled and I realized something else. His braces were gone and so were his glasses. Dang, my Jordan was cute! Really cute!
Names were being called and I had my fingers crossed. Please let it be Jordan.
“Jordan, you’re with Allison.”
My heart sank. Allison was a petite blonde. Cute, no, more like gorgeous, if you like that cheerleader type. She turned and peered at him. Jordan smiled. Allison promptly rolled her eyes and turned back around. He glanced to me and shrugged. We were both pretty used to that reaction.
Finally I heard my name. “Elizabeth, you will be working with…”
I swear things started to move in slow motion, my heartbeat pounded through my temples and all I could think of was how Charlie Brown’s teacher sounded…’waw, waw, waw…’ When I came back to my limited senses everyone seemed to be staring at me. I felt my face warming and knew it was probably beet red.
“Did you hear me Elizabeth? You’re working with Liam.”
All I could do was nod and force a lame smile. Liam happened to live in the house on the other side of my house. He also was the captain of the football team and the president of the student council. His dad was a doctor, but he’d opted out of his family about a year ago and moved to Indianapolis with his nurse and new wife.
It seemed no one I knew except Jordan had an intact family and still his dad was always off working in some crazy part of the world.
Mine? Well, my dad left us too, although I barely remember him, I was only three when he walked out. My mom remarried. She works as a waitress at the Denny’s next to the interstate. My step-dad is a drunken idiot who I hate. He drives truck and luckily is only home one week a month.
I stood and gathered my books. When I turned Jordan was gawking at me.
“What’s wrong with you?”
“You’ve changed Lizzie. What are you a foot taller and, what happened?”
He was looking me up and down, and I felt my face heat again. I’d forgotten he hadn’t seen me in a year either.
“I, uh, grew, and lost weight and well, you know…blossomed.”
He was focused on my chest now, so I pulled my books up to my chin and started to walk away, my bottom lip firmly pinched between my teeth.
“You sure did.”
I didn’t look at him when he caught up to me. “You can put your tongue back in your mouth now and shut up.”
When we walked out the door, Liam was waiting. He held his books at his side, his left hand swiped a drift of dark brown hair from his forehead and corner of his mouth turned up causing his right cheek to show a dimple. If I’d known how to swoon, I would have. Of course we kept walking. It wasn’t possible he was waiting for me; he obviously wanted to talk to Miss Weaver or something.
“Elizabeth?”
Wait, did he say my name? The planets must be aligned or something. I looked around to see if I’d dropped something, or imagined I’d heard him. Good, at least there was no toilet paper stuck to the bottom of my shoe.
“Elizabeth, I thought we could set up a time to go over the assignment. I have practice, but I could come over right after?”
“That would be great. I have piano anyway. Is six okay?”
“Sure. See you then.” He raised his fist. “Good seeing you back in town, Jordan.” Jordan seemed as stunned as I was, but managed to handle the fist bump.
“Thanks, good to be back.”
Jordan and I watched him walk away before turning to each other.
“What the heck is going on? It’s like a parallel universe.”
I shook my head and started walking. “Don’t ask me. I have no idea. I was gone most of the summer too. I’ve only been home a week, and you just got in last night, maybe they’ve all been taken over by aliens.”
“Like ‘Pod People’ in the old black and white movies?”
“Yeah. Maybe we shouldn’t go to sleep tonight.”
Jordan chuckled and left me at second period calculus with Mr. Anderson while he headed off to shop.
In third period I was lucky to be seated at a table with three girls I knew from band and I relaxed into my day.
At lunch things were totally back to normal. The tables were segregated into the usual cliques and I decided I’d rather go practice piano now instead of after school. I really wasn’t that hungry anyway. I pulled music from my cubical and sat down at the piano in the cool, deserted choir room. Pressing the music binding open, I started to play the accompaniment and hum my soprano part. On the second time through I sang the words, gradually increasing the volume and feeling in my clear non-vibrato voice and when I finished was startled by clapping. I turned to see Allison and her side-kick Mandy standing just behind me at the door.
Allison started to circle like the predator she was. She smiled as she walked, not looking over yet.
“That was amazing; you should join the drama team. We could use a voice like yours for our musical. We haven’t cast any leads, but you have a great voice. I’m sure if nothing else the backup singers could really use…well…backup.”
She smiled again. It was the same fake smile she always had on her face when she wanted something from someone. Mandy almost crashed into her when she stopped, immediately copying Mandy’s stance and mannerism as Allison planted her hand on her cocked hip and stared at me.
“Thanks, but I’ don’t really think drama is for me. You’re the one with the great voice anyway, Allison. Everybody knows that.” I only said it because that’s what everyone had been told for as long as we could remember.
Her eyes narrowed and I knew she was trying to figure out what to do about me. Why she cared at all I didn’t know, but I was sure I was about to find out.
“You’re so different than you used to be, Elizabeth.”
“No,
I’m the same.”
“I mean you look different. Almost...pretty.”
“Yeah, almost,” Mandy repeated.
“Thanks?”
“You’re working with Liam, everyone knows we belong together.”
Ah there it was. This was about Liam. She was right, everyone knew they belonged together; everyone it seemed, except Liam.
“I had nothing to do with our being paired up for that assignment. If you want to work with him instead of Jordan just ask Miss Weaver.”
“I already did. She won’t let anyone change.”
I stood and gathered my things. “Well sorry, I don’t know what you expect me to do.” The bell rang, but as I started for the doors, Mandy stepped in front of me.
“I want you to keep your hands off Liam.”
She was kidding right? She had to be kidding. I started to laugh, but neither of them did. “You can’t be serious. Liam is not interested in me, and I never thought he would be. I have to get to the gym, see you.” I went around Mandy, pushed through the door and strode down the hall. The gym was just across the from the music department so it only took a few minutes to wind through the crowd and get to the locker room. Gee, another chance today to make a fool of myself. I took a deep breath as I shoved everything into my assigned locker and changed into the navy shorts and grey t-shirt provided. Everyone was streaming in now and I had to make a decision. I could cower in the background like I usually did, or take my power back and be the person I was really meant to be. After all I was the one in charge of my destiny wasn’t I? I was going to a great college, and getting out of this small minded town. Was I going to do it on my terms, or theirs?
I pulled my waist length light brown hair back in a pony-tail and sat on a bench to put on my shoes.
“Ready to run the gauntlet?” I heard and glanced up to see Haley, who sat next to me in science and played clarinet, while I played flute and piccolo.
“Do we have a choice?”
“Not really. If I didn’t need this last credit, I wouldn’t be here. I’ve been putting it off for four years.”
“Yeah, I did the same thing. Come on, we’ll get through this together. You have brothers, and I had Jordan to play basketball, go bowling, stuff like that, we can do this.” We slapped hands and walked from the locker room into the gym, feeling like gladiators. I remembered the movie and under my breath I repeated the gladiator mantra. “Those who are about to die salute you.” Okay, maybe Allison was right, I should join drama.
Basketball teams were chosen by captains Coach Branson picked. Surprisingly, I wasn’t last. It must have been because I’m much taller this year. Actually, they had no idea if I could play basketball or not, but certainly assumed I couldn’t. I smiled to myself. I’d been playing driveway basketball since I was old enough to pass a ball and grew up loving college basketball, watching it every time there was a televised game. So I knew everything about the game, the major teams, coaches, players, all their stats, offensive plays, defensive plays, you name it.
I listened to Coach Branson talk about the rules and then pull out a couple of girls which she designated as referees. Our captain, Karen, played guard on our Panther girls’ varsity basketball team and was really good. Coach went over a few simple plays and defenses and then we separated with our captains.
“Liz, you try center, the rest of you have played before, help her out. Coach wants us to play zone. Liz, do you know what that is?”
“Yah, I know.” I was actually more excited than scared, and darn it, for the first time I wanted to be good at it. We clapped and felt like a real team, even if it was just phys-ed. The other team also had several girls that played on our school team; this wasn’t going to be easy. Jordan and I played one on one all the time, so I was used to being pushed around and shooting from everywhere. I knew I had some stamina from my 3-5 mile running regimen and had developed some quickness from the sprints I ran twice a week. I’d been running and lifting light weights since last summer, so I was in pretty good shape. It was how I lost what mom called, ‘my baby fat’.
I was just about as tall as Jen, the center of the other team. I didn’t get the tip, but Karen stole the ball right away and passed it to me, I drove the lane and made the first basket. Karen smiled and high fives were exchanged. After that everything pretty much fell into place.
The final whistle blew and we’d won. “Great job everyone, go shower, see you tomorrow,” Coach said.
Karen patted me on the back. “You really should try out this year, Liz. You were great out there.”
“Thanks, Karen, I just might.”
I rushed through a shower and dressed quickly. I checked myself in the full mirror on the way out, twisting side to side. Not bad, I thought, viewing my body. I still needed some work, but not bad at all.
Haley came up behind me, so I moved to the side so she could see herself. “We’ve almost made it through the first day, just band left, and that’s fun. You really played great. I had no idea you were a closet jock.”
I had a chance to look at my friend Haley. Like me, she’d been a wallflower her entire life, but she was really pretty.
“Hey, do you want to go to the Cross Town mall after school?”
She frowned and then smiled. “Yeah, that’d be great.”
My Life Would Suck Without You Page 9
