Class Favorite

by Taylor Morris

  “Excuse you, children,” said Mrs. Franklin, the librarian. “But please keep it down. And no screaming?” She said it like a question, her hefty figure perched permanently on a high chair behind the desk as if she hadn’t stopped stamping due dates since Tom Hanks last made a comedy.

  “Sorry,” I whispered to her.

  Jason laughed again and said, “Come on, Sara,” and I followed him to a back table, near the U.S. and world history section and by the window that looked out on the courtyard he had crossed earlier in the day.

  When we sat down, Jason immediately began rubbing his leg just above where the cast ended. “This thing is killing me,” he said. “It throbs like crazy.”

  I shuffled in my bag for my algebra book and notebook. As I opened my notebook, a loose piece of paper went fluttering out—my Class Favorite qualities list. I sucked in my breath, and tried to snatch it before it hit the floor. If Jason saw it, it’d be over forever. I was so spazzed to get the list just before it landed that, as I bent to catch it, I slammed my head on the edge of the table. I didn’t feel the pain until the paper was safely in my hands—facedown—and was jammed into my bag that I realized Jason was laughing. “Stop laughing,” I said, rubbing my forehead.

  “Never a dull moment, Sara. Not one.” He gave a final chuckle and shook his head, looking down at his book. “Well, I guess we should start. I’ve got all night.”

  “Actually,” I said, rubbing my forehead, “my mom wants me home for dinner.”

  “Yeah? That’s cool. I didn’t think families actually had dinner together anymore.” He rubbed the spot just above his boot again, his eyes focused down on his unopened book.

  “It’s my mom’s idea. She thinks it’s, like, important or something for us to eat together since she and my dad split. I don’t know what good it does.”

  Jason stopped rubbing and stared over at my open book. “Hmm . . . yeah, I know what you mean,” he said, then thoughtfully added, “Which do you think is the worst: the fighting or the silence?”

  “Me? I don’t know. I guess if it’s quiet, at least my sister isn’t saying something stupid to me or my mom isn’t mad at me for something I did.” I didn’t realize his parents were divorced, and was glad that we had something in common.

  “True,” Jason said, tapping his pencil on his notebook. “But don’t you hate that kind of silence when no one is saying anything but it’s like everyone knows what everyone else is thinking? And you’re all trying to avoid looking at one another but you can’t help making glances around, anyway? And then, if you ask someone to pass the iced tea, everyone jumps up at once like they’ve been waiting there to serve you the whole time? You know what I mean?”

  I thought about it for a moment; I could see what he meant, although I never really saw my parents fight—they just ignored each other.

  “Did your parents fight a lot or something?” I asked.

  He sighed. “Constantly fighting, either by yelling or ignoring each other. When they’re doing the silent thing, I think they think they’re doing me and my sister a huge favor by not screaming at each other. But it’s just as bad.”

  I stared down at the table and said, “Before my parents split, they used to tell me and my sister to go outside to play when they were about to break into a big fight. My sister would dare me to stand underneath their bedroom window and listen to what they were fighting about. And then, when they called us back inside and my dad huffed and Mom sighed more than usual, it was so obvious what had been going on. If they were actors, they’d totally win a Razzie for best worst performance.”

  “A what?” he asked, a smile forming on his lips.

  “Oh,” I said, having forgotten myself. “The Golden Raspberry. It’s this award thing for the worst movies and actors. It’s kind of funny. Arlene and I used to rent really bad movies and watch them just to laugh at how awful they are. Anyway.” I immediately realized that I had spoken of Arlene in the past tense, like she was this friend I once had but never would again. Even though we hadn’t spoken in so long, I had never fully believed that we would never be friends again. It was something I wasn’t sure I’d ever be able to accept. But I couldn’t think about her then, though. I’d start crying for sure. “Is it better in your house with just your mom?”

  Jason rubbed his hand across his forehead, and I noticed that his nails were cut properly, not all bitten down to the skin like most boys’. “I don’t know. Since Dad moved out, Mom tries to be real nice to all of us. It’s like she’s trying too hard sometimes. I think that’s why she’s letting me have the party.”

  “Sounds exactly like my mom. I mean, hello? The roses?” I couldn’t believe I had just willingly brought up one of my most embarrassing moments to Jason. “Talk about trying too hard.”

  He laughed and said, “Point taken. You definitely win on that front.”

  We sat for a moment, and then, to kill the silence, I said, “So. Do you want to try to do these problems at the end of the chapter?”

  He gave a little groan and flipped open his algebra book. “Yeah, sure. Equations, equations, equations . . . ,” he muttered as he thumbed through his textbook. “Let’s do the substitutions first since you have to leave.”

  I took a deep breath. “Okay, but don’t make fun of how little I know. I mean, aren’t these things impossible to do unless you’re a total genius?”

  “Nah. You just have to make sure you do each step of the formula, and you’re set.”

  “Er . . . there’s a formula to these things?”

  He nudged me with his good foot. “Sara, you crack me up.”

  As we sat together in the library going over our algebra—Jason was right: It was easy once you got the formula down—I realized that I wasn’t so nervous around him anymore. He was a guy just like anyone else. Except he had chosen me, Nobody Sara Thurman, to do homework with while confessing dark family secrets.

  Which made me wonder: Is it possible that I’m not as bad as I thought?

  16

  Be Honest: Do You Love, Like, or Hate Gossip?

  You have just been told that your economics teacher, Mr. Russo, has been performing in a play downtown. What do you do?

  a) You e-mail the entire school directory with the news, including the when/where/cost of the play, and try to rally everyone to go see him—it’ll be a huge laugh!

  b) You tell your closest friends, giggle about it, but wonder if it’s true.

  c) You shrug off the information—there’s nothing to back up its truth, and besides, even if it is true, he’s still an awesome teacher.

  Over the next few days, I bounded into school with renewed energy. Suddenly I didn’t feel so lethargic. Thanks to the sort-of date I’d had with Jason and the fact that he had invited me to his party, I realized he wasn’t as untouchable as I had thought. He was just a boy. Who happened to be maddeningly gorgeous, but still.

  Later that day I spotted Rosemary and Kayla standing by the vending machine outside the cafeteria just as I was going in to meet Kirstie. I thought of No. 8 on my Class Favorite list: friends. I was beginning to think of ways Arlene and I could reconcile (and I knew it would have to begin with me), but in the meantime, hanging with two of the most popular girls—even if one of them wasn’t exactly my number-one fan—would help propel me even closer to my goal. We could hang out together at Jason’s party, and by Monday after the party, surely we’d all be passing notes in algebra. Looking at them, I thought, Rosemary Vickers is not so much better than me, right? Besides, if Adam Sandler could bounce back in movies after Little Nicky—one of the last Golden Raspberries Arlene and I had watched—then I could come back from my own momentous disasters. If I were actually a Class Favorite nominee instead of just channeling their traits, then I would embrace No. 7 on my list—confidence—and walk right up to these girls and get in the conversation. So that’s what I did.

  “Hi, Rosemary. What’s up, Kayla?” I said confidently as I approached them, telling myself I had every righ
t to talk to them. Maybe they should have intimidated me—they were it, after all—but for some reason, they didn’t. At least, I didn’t let them. I’d always felt that Rosemary had this very open, real quality about her. Kind of like Haden Prescott: how, even if you’d never spoken to her, you could tell she was just as sweet in real life as she was in interviews and movies.

  Rosemary stopped talking, and Kayla cut her eyes at me.

  “Hey,” I said again, with a push of determination.

  “What’s up, Sally?” Kayla said, eyeing me.

  “Sara,” I breezily corrected. “Not much. Just about to head into the barfeteria. Meat loaf today?”

  “Not sure,” Rosemary said as Kayla flipped her thick hair back and shifted in her strappy sandals. “I never buy.” She held up a gingham cloth bag cinched closed with a pink satin ribbon.

  “Oh, cool. Good choice,” I blabbed. Conversation wasn’t exactly flowing, but I wasn’t leaving until it was dead in the water.

  “Actually,” Kayla began, “we were talking about you earlier.”

  “Oh. Really?” My mind zipped. Was it already around school that Jason Andersen and Sara Thurman recently had had a library date? Or that he had personally invited me to his party and we were now practically a couple? Maybe they were talking about putting me on the Class Favorite ballot because I was so worthy. . . .

  “Was it really you who blew up The Ball?” Kayla asked.

  Kerplunk went my heart.

  “Uh . . . well, yeah.” Maintain calm, maintain calm. I told myself that any publicity was good publicity.

  “Oh, my God,” Kayla shrieked. “That night was so insane. I can’t believe it! And it was you?”

  I meekly shrugged my shoulders.

  “Geez, Kay.” Rosemary looked at me and rolled her eyes. “Calm down.”

  Kayla’s wide eyes were filled with excitement. “That was only the single greatest event of the entire year. It was,” she concluded, “beyond hilarious.”

  “Oh . . . really?”

  “We were just saying how embarrassed we would have been if it were us,” Rosemary said. “But you seem to, I don’t know, sort of take it all in stride. You don’t let much bother you, do you?”

  “Uh . . . I don’t know,” I said.

  “It’s just that, you’re always getting yourself into these crazy situations, but you never seem to lose it. You laughed off Mrs. Everly’s matching outfit, you were in total control during the whole locker thing”—I cringed—“and now The Ball. I mean, if it were me, I would have transferred schools a long time ago.”

  “I would have left the school district,” Kayla added.

  Then they both started laughing. But you know what? It wasn’t one of those laughing-at-you laughs; it was a laughing-with-you laugh. Even though I wasn’t laughing, yet.

  I said, “Yeah, so how about that announcement from Mr. Moran?”

  “I couldn’t believe it,” Kayla said. “That was the longest three minutes of my life.”

  “Of your life?” I asked. “How do you think it was for me? At one point, I actually thought time wasn’t moving at all.”

  “Oh, you poor thing!” Rosemary said. “We all felt so sorry for you after that stupid thing. I mean, could Mr. Moran have been any more over the top?”

  “With the way things have been going for me,” I said, “I think three minutes is right on par. Lately it’s like I’ve been a complete glutton for punishment.”

  Rosemary laughed. “More like addicted to it,” she said.

  I’d had a library date with Jason, he’d invited me to his party, he talked to me in the halls, and now I stood with Rosemary and Kayla, talking and laughing. I was so close to my goal that I knew Jason’s party would be the final performance I needed to get these people to nominate me.

  Our school loves to keep the classrooms so ice cold that I always think I’m one degree away from hypothermia. I used to think they kept rooms like this because Texas is so hot, but Elisabeth once told me they do it to keep us from falling asleep in class. Which didn’t make much sense when you consider that sometimes people freeze to death because they fall asleep in the snow, but whatever.

  I sat in algebra shivering, goose bumps covering my entire body. I kept my arms folded safely across the front of my thin T-shirt.

  “Thurman!” Shiner whispered from across the aisle. Since the night of the exploding Ball, we’d picked up the habit of giving shy hellos and smiles to each other in the halls. I had realized that Shiner had never done anything to me—just like Ellen had said, back on Valentine’s Day. And since he’d been so nice to me at the game and after I blew up The Ball, I made sure to always give him the benefit of the doubt.

  “What?”

  “How’d you do on the exam?”

  I shrugged. “Don’t know yet.”

  Mrs. Everly was passing back the exam she had given us a couple of days earlier. That normally would have been cause to freak out in a huge way, but I had actually felt pretty good about it, thanks to Jason’s help and the extra studying I did (academics, No. 6).

  “What’d you get?” I asked Shiner.

  “Seventy-six.”

  A true miracle for Shiner Camry. Last semester I would have assumed he had cheated, but that day, I was really proud of him. “Way to go,” I said.

  I looked at Jason, sitting across the room, talking quietly with Richie Adams. We’d played it casual since the library sorta-date. Sometimes he walked with me out of English before he made his way across the courtyard. Aside from that, we hadn’t talked much, and I worried that I was taking a backward step in my goal. I needed him to notice me—I needed them all to notice me. Jason sat with Richie, Rosemary, and the others at lunch, and I still sat with Kirstie, who kept threatening to invite Jason over to our table, saying I’d never get nominated if I didn’t make a bold move, and soon.

  “And I don’t mean by exploding things,” she had said. “Just remind yourself that you’re a perfect match for a guy like Jason, and he’d be lucky to get a girl like you.”

  “A perfect match? How do you figure?”

  “Please!” she huffed. “He used to be just like you are now, and so he can probably empathize with your current situation.”

  “You mean feel sorry for me?”

  “And,” she continued, “you’re very pretty and you never, ever give up.”

  “That last one I’ll agree with.” For better or worse, I silently added.

  I snapped back to attention when I realized that Richie saw me looking at Jason. I quickly darted my eyes away. Right then, Mrs. Everly placed my quiz facedown on my desk, which could only mean one thing: a failing grade.

  “Sara! Wait up!”

  Jason limped as fast as his walking cast would let him through the doors of algebra. I stopped in the middle of the crowded hall to wait for him, happy little butterflies zipping around my stomach—he hadn’t forgotten about me after all.

  “Hey,” I said.

  “So, how’d you do?”

  “You first. What’d you get?”

  “Ninety-six.”

  “Dang! Really?” I asked, happy he did so well.

  “Okay, now you.”

  I pulled my crinkled quiz out of my bag and held it up for his inspection.

  “Ninety-two? Hey, nice job, Thurman.”

  “Only the best I’ve done all semester,” I said proudly as we headed down the hallway together past kids slamming their blue lockers shut.

  “We make a pretty good team,” he said, nudging me with his shoulder. I smiled and tucked my chin to my chest. “I go this way,” he said, nodding in the opposite direction. “Will you be at basketball practice today?”

  “Yeah. The guys are running court sprints,” I said. “I gotta write the times.”

  “I’ll be there, sitting on the bench. Maybe I can help you with the times.”

  I smiled at the image of Jason and me working together on stats. Between algebra, stats, and the upcoming party, we might be
nominated Best Twosome in addition to Class Favorites.

  “Cool,” I said before watching him walk away.

  After school I sat on a bench outside the gym to change into my tennis shoes. As I stuffed my Mary Janes into my messenger bag, I saw Arlene and Ellen Spitz coming toward me, chatting away like best buds. Arlene wore dark blue jeans and a top I knew she got in San Antonio two summers ago. It was white with embroidered flowers around the neckline. It was her favorite spring blouse even though it was girlie. I watched, feeling a new level of guilt and sadness at the way things had turned out for us.

  I quickly jammed my books and folders into my bag. “Hey, Arlene,” I called. I knew this would be hard, but I had to do it. I started to think that if I’d just spoken to her right when I’d felt that something wasn’t right, then none of this would have happened. “Can I talk to you?”

  Arlene told Ellen that she’d see her later, and Ellen gave me a look before she walked off that was a little like one of those given by publicists you see on red carpet events, ferociously protecting their star. I didn’t like it.

  “What?” Her curtness shouldn’t have surprised me, but it did. I knew clearing the air with Arlene would be one of the hardest things I’d ever done, but I also knew that continuing to do nothing at all was even worse. Still, it was hard to know where to start.

  Of course, being me, I said the absolute worst thing.

  “Why do you hang with Ellen Spitz? She’s kind of a hick.”

  Arlene’s mouth dropped a little. “I hang out with her because she’s nice.”

  I shook my head, angry at myself for saying that. The truth was, I was still jealous of Ellen—jealous that she was Arlene’s best friend and I wasn’t. Even though I had Kirstie as a friend, I guess I just felt territorial of Arlene “Look, Arlene, I didn’t mean—”