Hot Dog Girl

by Jennifer Dugan

  Seeley turns her head to look at me, smiling a little before she catches herself. “Thanks.” I glance around the room again. She’s watching Doctor Who, an episode with Ten and Rose—the one she only watches when she’s really upset. I can tell from the smudges on her hands she’s been sketching it too.

  I frown. “What are you doing?”

  Seeley rubs her eyes, dropping her arm across her face so I can’t see her anymore. “I was wondering how long you were going to stand outside my window and freak out, but now I’m only wondering what you’re doing here.”

  “You knew I was out there?”

  “Grace and dexterity aren’t exactly your strong points, Elouise. I could hear you coming before you were even halfway up the tree.”

  I push her arm gently, sitting up beside her. “If you knew I was out there, why’d you make me wait?”

  “I wanted to see how long it would take you,” she says, like that even makes sense, like playing games is something we do instead of something we complain about.

  I tug at one of the strings on her hoodie, making them uneven. It’s always so cold in here. “I was going to leave.”

  She draws her knees up to her chest, watching me. “Why would you leave?”

  “I don’t know.” I bite at the rough edges on my thumbnail. “I didn’t want to know how mad you were, like if you locked the window or something.”

  “I would never lock the window.”

  “You sent me to voicemail.”

  “I was in the bathroom.”

  “Oh. Well, still,” I say. “But seriously, come on, what’s the big deal?”

  Her eyebrows shoot toward the ceiling. “Are you kidding, Lou? What you’re asking is off-the-wall for so many reasons.”

  “Look, if they’re so happy, then why did they keep breaking up and getting back together?”

  “Who knows? Maybe ’cause her mom is super strict. Remember last summer she made Jessa leave the staff barbecue because her shorts were supposedly too short?”

  “Yeah, and they were like practically capris,” I snort.

  “Exactly.” Seeley nods. “What if her mom demanded she break up with Nick, but true love or whatever, so they keep finding ways to be together?”

  Then why does he keep flirting with me, I want to add, but I know she’ll never believe me. I don’t even know if I completely believe me.

  Seeley sighs. “I feel like—morals aside—there’s a really good chance this is going to all blow up in your face. And then what?”

  “I’ll be fine. I’m always fine.”

  “Lou, you’re not thinking straight. You’ve already built this summer up in your head so much that there’s less than a five percent chance it could ever meet your expectations. You need to take a step back. You’re making really bad decisions, even for you.”

  “Even for me?”

  She frowns, straightening out the strings of her hoodie. “That came out wrong. I just mean that you’ve had some random ideas over the years, and I’ve always stood by you, always. God, I even helped you figure out how to get into that stupid French class so you could try to get with Malia, and look how well that worked out! But come on, this one is way out there. Let’s say Nick was actually jealous for some reason. What happens after tonight when he thinks you’re super gay and has no idea that you’re really just a creeptacular stalker?”

  “Okay, a) I’m not creepy, and b) even though the whole thing with Malia didn’t exactly work out, I learned a lot of French, and c) the whole bisexual thing isn’t exactly news to anyone!”

  “Oh really? Not anyone?” she asks, and I know what she’s getting at.

  “Okay, can we not do this right now?”

  Because she’s talking about my dad not knowing. Again. It comes up a lot. She can’t stand that I’m not out to him. But it’s not like that. I mean, I don’t hide anything, I just haven’t said the words. Not because he’d care, just because it’s super icky to talk to my dad about things like sex and dating and whatnot. Like, he’s a guy, you know? He doesn’t always get it.

  Sometimes I imagine what it would be like to have a mom to go to for this type of stuff. Seeley swears it’s just as bad, but I guarantee you she didn’t have to sit there while her dad read the instructions on the tampon box when she got her period for the first time. Like, I’m sure her mom has that kind of thing down, you know?

  That’s sorta why Seeley and I ended up coming out to each other so quickly when we were younger. I definitely didn’t want to ask my dad about it, so I asked her instead. I still remember her face when I asked, “Do you ever think about kissing girls?” I was so nervous that she was going to freak out, but then her eyes got so big and she was just like, “Uh, that’s actually all I think about kissing.”

  It was pretty much the most perfect conversation ever—so easy, so simple—and after that, there was no more hiding, really. If anybody at school had a problem with it, screw them. Because who cared what other people thought, when Seeley had my back and I had hers.

  That’s how it’s always been with us . . . until now, maybe.

  Seeley crosses her arms. “I need you to admit that pretending to be with me to go on a double date with someone else is basically the definition of creeptacular. Like, you have to see that that’s messed up.”

  “Okay,” I snap, but I swear I don’t mean to. “Can I think for a second?”

  “Fine, think away.” She sighs. She waves her hand like I’m dismissed, and goes back to watching Doctor Who and sketching Rose and Ten burning up a sun to say goodbye. It’s literally the saddest part of the saddest episode, which, you know, isn’t really the tone I wanted to set for tonight, but whatever.

  I bet Nick would burn up a sun to say goodbye too. He seems like that kind of guy. I mean he’s already the kind of guy who goes out of his way to save someone from drowning even when he’s on the opposite side of the pool. Burning up a sun for someone he loves isn’t too much of a stretch, probably. All the more reason to win him over.

  “All right,” I say.

  Seeley pries her eyes away from the screen. “That was quick.”

  I sit up a little straighter. “How about this: We go on a date or two and hang out with Nick. It lets me get to know him better without Jessa being sketched out. Then I can figure out for sure if he has any feelings for me and what’s up with his relationship with Jessa, and we’ll go from there.”

  Seeley throws her hands up. “Why do you think you have the right to meddle in their relationship?”

  “If I can break them up, then obviously their relationship isn’t that great. I’d practically be doing them a favor.”

  Seeley sets down her pencil. “You. Are. Bonkers.”

  I cross my arms. “It could be good for you too.”

  She rolls her eyes. “How?”

  “You’d be off the market as far as anyone knows. That would solve the Angie situation.”

  “I see, this is for my benefit, then?” Seeley laughs and then takes a deep breath, staring down at her sketch. “Yeah, okay, you get me out of a second date with Angie, but now she’ll think I was leading her on the whole time. What about that?”

  “I’ll talk to her.”

  “You’ll talk to her?” And I can tell by the way she drops her chin and looks at me that she thinks that’s a terrible idea.

  “I don’t know, okay? We’ll figure that out tomorrow. But, please, we’re gonna be late tonight.”

  Seeley looks up at me, tilting her head. “Hypothetically, if I was going to agree to do this, what would the plan be?”

  “I don’t know. I was thinking like once Nick and I got closer, you and I could fake problems so he becomes my shoulder to cry on or whatever. Then we break up, and boom, Nick comes running and you and I are back to being platonic best buddies.”

  “Just like that?” I can
tell by her tone she doesn’t quite believe me.

  “Just like that.” I beam, hoping I can force out enough confidence for the both of us. “I’ll seriously owe you for this. I’ll do whatever you want, I swear, but I need your help. Please. I can’t do it without you.”

  “This seems like a terrible idea.”

  “Just come tonight, please. We’ll figure it out, I promise.” I check the time on my phone. “They’re probably already waiting for us.”

  “I don’t know,” she says, but then I realize that she’s packed up all her art supplies while we were talking.

  I grab a pillow and throw it at her head, missing horribly. “You were gonna come this whole time?”

  She cackles, feigning innocence. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  “Come on, then.” I grab her hand and drag her to the window. “We’re gonna be late.”

  “Stairs, Elouise.” She groans, but follows me anyway.

  “Nah.” I step to the edge of the roof and grin. “Not this summer, Seeley. This summer it’s windows only.” And I can tell when my foot hits the first step that everything is coming together. This summer is going to be awesome, perfect; everything I dreamed of and more. Unfortunately, I can also tell when my foot hits the second step that it’s totally rotted. The step, I mean, not the summer.

  I careen down the rest of the tree, having just enough time to curse my luck before I land with a thud onto the ground below. I’m scraped and bloody, and oh god my butt hurts so bad, but I’m still laughing. Seeley is on the roof, screaming down, asking if I’m okay, but I can’t stop laughing long enough to catch my breath and answer.

  She disappears into the house and reappears a second later, flying out the front door. I don’t know if it’s the fall or all the tension that’s been coiled up in my belly since Seeley got mad, but I’m still laughing so hard I can’t breathe. It’s not until she wraps her arms around me and tells me I’m okay that I finally stop, that I can finally believe it.

  CHAPTER 13

  “I can’t go like this.” I am sitting on the edge of the toilet in Seeley’s upstairs bathroom, chin tilted up, as she dabs at my face with gauze and antiseptic.

  She leans back to admire her work. “It’s not even that bad, now that all the blood is off.”

  “Great.”

  She smooths my hair a little, tucking some of it behind my ear. “Besides, we’ll be in the dark anyway. It’s not like he’ll even notice.”

  “Perfect, just what I wanted, to not be noticed at all,” I grumble.

  “Fine.” She smirks. “Maybe he’ll notice and be really worried about you. Maybe he’ll dote on you and kiss your boo-boo and whisk you off to urgent care in a panic.”

  “You think?” I tilt my head enough to see her through the corner of my eye.

  “No.” She pulls a face at me, and I know it well. It’s the same face she’s given me every time I’ve said something ridiculous for the past ten years.

  “Thanks for the vote of confidence.” I stand up, wincing at the motion. Apparently, my butt is just as bruised as my ego.

  “It’s not that.” Seeley laughs and pulls a few stray bits of grass out of my hair. “Nick is going to be there with his girlfriend, and you’re supposed to be there with yours. He’s not gonna want to cross a line or anything. Besides, if you were Jessa, would you want your boyfriend fawning over another girl?”

  “I’m in a committed relationship, remember? But as far as I’m concerned, Nick should be able to hang out with as many girls as he wants. Especially those in committed relationships.”

  “You’re a wolf in sheep’s clothing,” Seeley says. “It’s freaking me out.”

  “You said you’d go.”

  Seeley sighs. “I know, but that doesn’t make me feel any less crappy about it.”

  “It’s just for a few dates, promise. Then we’ll break up, like I said, and it’ll be fine.”

  “Oh really? It’ll be fine?” She tosses the bloody gauze into the wastepaper basket with a frown. “What happens after we break up?”

  “We won’t pretend anymore. No more fake dates for us. You’re free to run off with wild abandon, chasing every hot girl that crosses your path,” I say.

  “Right, because that’s me: girl chaser extraordinaire.”

  I drop back against the wall. “You know what I mean. Things will go back to normal.”

  “Right, except the whole park thinks we were together.”

  I raise my arms in frustration. “Half the park already thinks we are.”

  “And now they all get to watch me get dumped again.” Seeley rests her head on her knee. “It was bad enough last time.”

  I scrunch my eyes shut. Shit. I didn’t think about all the dust this might be kicking up in her head about Sara. “I—” I start, but then it hits me. This could actually be good. This could be really good. A smile stretches across my face.

  Seeley furrows her eyebrows. “Do I want to know what’s going through your head right now?”

  “You can dump me.”

  “What?”

  “You can dump me. It’d be like therapeutic or whatever. Dumping me will totally help you work out all the crap from when Sara—”

  “Stop,” Seeley says, and it sounds like she really means it.

  “Okay.” I huff, scowling at my scraped-up chin in the mirror while I fluff out my frizzy hair. “Sorry, forget I said it, then. Bad idea.”

  “I’m not mad,” Seeley says, but then she doesn’t say anything else, so it doesn’t really make me feel any better. “Tell me one thing, though: Why Nick? Why are you wasting all your time on a guy with a girlfriend?”

  I take a deep breath and turn to face her. “I feel like he sees me, really sees me. Most people don’t.”

  “I see you.”

  “Besides you, I mean,” I say, smoothing down my hair as best as I can without a mirror. “To everybody else, I’m just background noise, like a water fountain or a slamming locker or something.”

  Seeley frowns. “That’s not true.”

  “It is. The only time people notice me is when I mess up or do something weird or say the wrong thing. But then Nick transferred in, and even though he’s a year older and popular, he always sought me out and said hi. Even if it was just two-second conversations here and there as we rushed to the next classroom, it felt good.”

  “Lou—”

  “Are we going?” I ask. “Because if we are, we gotta leave now. The movie starts in a half an hour.”

  “It’s five minutes down the road.”

  “I know, but I want popcorn and good seats and stuff.”

  “And time with Nick before the lights go down?”

  I grab my bag off the floor. “Maybe a little bit of something like that.”

  “Come on, then.” Seeley slips her feet back into her flats. “Let’s go.”

  CHAPTER 14

  My nerves get the best of me during the walk to the car, so I’m grateful when Seeley offers to drive. She keeps the radio off the whole ride over, and her slow, steady breaths keep me grounded no matter how many times my head starts to spin out.

  Current status: excited, nervous, nauseous, hungry, happy, and scared.

  Basically, I’m a little bit of everything that I possibly can be, and things I never thought of too, a bundle of nerves so twisted up I can barely think. I love it. Or maybe I hate it. I can’t even tell the difference anymore. Is there a difference, really?

  “It’s only a movie,” Seeley says, her voice soft and delicate.

  “I know.” I cross my arms tighter over my chest. I’ve never felt like such a fraud, such an invisible fraud, as I do sitting next to my best friend in the whole world, pretending to pout when really I want to cry. She’s making this impossible. I mean, yeah, maybe she’s right, maybe this will all blow
up in my face but, still . . .

  It’s not supposed to be like this.

  This is supposed to be fun, something we’ll giggle about when we’re old and boring. The first of the never-gonna-die, live-forever moments to kick off our impossible summer.

  Seeley looks over at the next red light, her lips a flat line to match the irritation in her voice. “Don’t do this.”

  I sigh and go back to looking out the window. “You said you would. We’re almost there.”

  She pulls into an empty parking space and turns off the car. “It’s your funeral.”

  I take a deep breath and stare up at the looming theater in front of us. The Grand Marquis is the only movie place we have here. I love it, even if it is kind of a dump. The big nice theater with the new movies is almost an hour down the highway, a trek reserved for only the most special of shows. Here we only get second- and third-run stuff, months after they’ve left other theaters. But hey, when you live in the mountains, you take what you can get.

  I pop open my door and slam my feet onto the pavement. Seeley’s parked nearly on the line, a huge pet peeve of mine. I can’t help but wonder if she’s done this on purpose. She slams her own door and turns toward me, waiting. I can see it in her eyes. Nothing to wonder about, then; definitely intentional.

  I open my mouth but snap it shut, smiling instead and refusing to take the bait. “Ready, darling?”

  “Absolutely, sugar,” she says, but the word rolls off her tongue like venom.

  Seeley trails behind me as we make our way around the front of the building, mumbling something I can’t make out. It’s probably better that way.

  I yank open the front door, the air-conditioning a welcome reprieve as I make my way to the concession stand. The popcorn here is always stale. God knows how long it’s been sitting under the warming lights, waiting for someone desperate enough to come in and start snacking. I order it anyway, like I do every time, along with a Sprite, because I’m too cool to ask for Diet Coke even though that’s what I want. Diet Coke is for parents or librarians or senior citizens. It’s not something a cool kid drinks on a fake double date with her long-suffering best friend and the pirate of her dreams. Except, on second thought, maybe I should double check with Seeley to be sure.