by M. F. Lorson
“Promise me, Ginger. Promise me.” He squeezed her tighter, and Sloane started to ease into the hug, her eyes never leaving me.
I saw the disappointment in her expression when I didn’t say a word. Instead, she looked away, up at my brother when she answered him. “Promise.”
Sloane
It was a big time no-no to cancel on Reagan and Harper, but I didn’t really have a choice. Gabe and I had to start filming for our segment and that meant we were at the mercy of the interviewees. Today we were interviewing Cassandra Moyer, better known as, Washington State Spelling Bee Champion, two years running. She was essential to the video because Grover didn’t win much of anything. We weren’t consistently good at sports, an occasional winning season maybe, but never any consecutive state championships. Cassandra was our star, and yet, neither Gabe nor I had ever really talked to her.
“Let me get this straight,” said Harper. “You’re blowing off our Friday plans to interview the school’s best speller?”
“The state’s best speller,” I corrected.
Harper folded her arms over her chest in the school parking lot. “Are you sure you’re not just making up an excuse so you can spend another epic night posing for Becca’s instagram.”
I could feel my cheeks heating with a blush. It wasn’t like I had asked Becca to post the picture. She did it on her own free will, and to be quite honest, we both looked pretty good, no filter required.
“Come on, Harper. You know how much this project means to me.”
“The project or Gabe?”
I didn’t look her in the eye. The project was important to me, but I was beginning to realize that I looked forward to spending time with Gabe as much as I did working on the film itself.
“That’s what I thought,” said Harper. “Try not to forget who your real friends are while you're riding the popularity train, okay? It feels fun now, but you don’t know these people.”
I wanted to defend them, but I was afraid if I started saying Gabe and Becca—and even Landon were not what they seemed, I would just make Harper even more skeptical. Part of it had to be jealousy. I felt bad even thinking that. Harper and Reagan were my best, most loyal friends, but if it were either of them suddenly hanging out with Becca Landry and blowing me off to do it, it wouldn’t matter what the reason was, I would be jealous. Maybe if they got to know them though, then it wouldn’t be me choosing one over the other. I really hadn’t intended to invite Reagan and Harper to the post HoCo party, but now that it served a purpose I was fully taking Landon up on his offer.
“I know you want to protect me, but I think you’re worrying for no reason. In fact, I think you need to meet them.”
Harper laughed, “You act like we haven’t attended the same school for our entire academic career.”
“That doesn’t mean we all know each other. I’m interviewing someone today that I have literally never talked to before. And we’ve had classes together!”
Harper sighed, “And how do you propose we get to know each other? I’m not sharing a HydroFlask full of vodka on a football field if that’s what you have in mind.”
“Baseball and no. I’ve got something better. Come to Gabe’s Homecoming Party with me. His brother practically begged me to invite you.”
Harper’s face twisted up in disgust. “You mean the dude that called you a ginger for all of sixth grade? The very reason I met you crying in stall number four of the Grover Middle School ladies room?”
I had forgotten Landon was the reason Harper and I became friends. “I probably should have let you punch him that day like you wanted,” I said with a laugh.
“There’s still time,” said Harper, her smile tinged with just a touch of evil.
“So you’ll go then?” I asked, hopeful that my new friends and old friends merging would prevent me from having to give up either.
“I’ll think about it,” said Harper. “But don’t think I’m not aware that this is just a pity invite.”
“I want you guys there,” I argued. “No pitying involved.”
“Yeah, yeah,” groaned Harper. “Your boyfriend with a girlfriend is on his way over here. Call me later,” she demanded, slinging her bag over one shoulder as she backed away. “I gotta know what Cassandra Moyer has to say when you tell her she’ll be representing the Grover High School Champions demographic.”
“I feel bad that you had to cancel on your friends,” said Gabe, reaching for my car door just as Harper was disappearing into the park at the edge of the school property. We would be taking the Gremlin to Cassandra’s on account of the fact that Gabe was still riding to school with Landon to avoid anyone seeing his not-so-new car.
“They get it,” I lied then fastened my seatbelt and turned the keys in the ignition.
Gabe
Sloane leaned over her bullet journal, her array of multi-colored pens arranged in a neat line next to her on Cassandra Moyer’s dining room table. She was scribbling down everything the girl said, regardless that my phone was already recording the interview on a handy tripod.
I could have reminded her that this was a video interview and that we would be using video footage, not writing an article, but Sloane was so invested in the creative process, I didn’t want to mess with it. Besides, I was too captivated by her, color-coding interview questions and flipping back to actual notes she had on Cassandra’s bio.
“Did you ever choose studying for the bee over anything else?”
“You mean like going to parties?” Cassandra replied. Cassandra didn’t look like your everyday spelling bee champion. She didn’t have perfect posture or speak so eloquently like you would have expected. She had frizzy black hair and wore a Ramones T-shirt that was about three sizes too small.
“Yeah. Like did you feel like you had to choose an academic life over a social one?”
I couldn’t take my eyes off Sloane. I knew our interviewee was the girl across the table, but she was just so in her element that I couldn’t not look. I wouldn’t have even thought to ask a question like that, but it was excellent. It was a piece about student life after all, so how brilliant of her to get Cassandra’s—the most unconventional of students’ input on the matter. It really put things in perspective.
“Of course, I did,” Cassandra answered, grabbing a blueberry muffin from the plate that Sloane was so clever to bring. “People think high school is for partying, but now I have a choice of full-ride scholarships because of my championships: multiple championships.
Geez, this girl was smug.
Sloane didn’t miss a beat. “Will you make the same choice in college?”
“Of course,” she answered. “But maybe there I’ll have some actual competition.” She took a bite of the muffin, crumbs falling all over her lap. Sloane set down her pens and regarded the girl for a moment. She was sizing her up, deciding her next move, where her questioning would go next.
I liked to imagine she was plotting a course of destruction for this cocky speller, a line of questioning that would have her eating her words instead of that muffin.
As for me, I was already planning how I would edit the footage of her basically being a slob and bad mouthing Grover as a warning sign for any incoming students: don’t be like this girl.
“Have you ever seen The Breakfast Club?” Sloane asked.
Cassandra screwed up her nose and stared at the red-head next to me. “I don’t have time for movies.”
“Oh, it’s a classic,” Sloane answered eagerly, pulling a muffin from the stack and peeling back the paper, careful not to get even one crumb on her perfectly color-coded journal. “My friend Reagan and I have seen it at least a thousand times, and we used to watch it because she had the hots for Emilio Esteves, so on all our thousands of sleepovers she demanded we watch it.”
I was bewitched, watching Sloane, so elicit in her movement and her words.
She continued. “Well since you’ve never seen it, I’ll tell you it has all of these super cliche high school ch
aracters and one of them is the nerd—”
“What’s your point?” Cassandra interrupted her.
“The point is that they learn they’re all the same. They have the same struggles and no one is better than the other. Not even the nerd who can’t make a lamp and walks away a virgin.”
“Who said I—”
“I think we got it,” I said, grabbing my phone and trying desperately to wipe the grin off my face.
Sloane packed up her pens carefully into her Saved by the Bell themed pencil pouch. The girl on the other side of the table still had a look of confusion on her face, like she still couldn’t tell if Sloane had insulted her or not.
“You know,” I said, filling the silence. “Life moves pretty fast.”
Sloane let out a hiccuping laugh, muffin crumbs landing on the table.
With her mouth full, she added, “If you don’t stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.”
We left Cassandra’s house almost in tears, laughing at what she thought were inside jokes, because she clearly thought we were nuts. She spent the last hour bragging about her accomplishments while also basically insulting the rest of us who didn’t have full-rides, but active social lives.
“What a brat!” Sloane said as we pulled shut the squeaking doors of her car.
“You were perfect,” I threw in, feeling a little awkward as soon as the words were out of my mouth.
“She totally thought she was better than us!” She shrieked, and I laughed along, but I couldn’t answer. For what felt like impossibly long moments, I sat there struck by how she looked in the driver’s seat next to me. The setting sun hit her hair just right, practically illuminating every strand in various shades of red.
Rich scarlet. Radiant cherry. Honeyed auburn.
I wanted to reach out and brush the curls out of her face, but a moment later, she reached into her purse and pulled out her black RayBans, placing them on her face and distracting me from my dazed gawking.
Sloane and I were just friends. I was not supposed to be thinking about running my fingers through her hair if she was my friend.
Not to mention, I had a girlfriend.
That was fair to neither Sloane nor Becca.
“Oh my gosh, I’m so excited to interview our next person!” Her energy radiated in the car, and I knew that I was just as excited for our next interview, but if she could read my mind, she’d know it wasn’t for the interview at all.
I was excited everytime Sloane and I worked together. I couldn’t wait until I could hear her laugh again. I looked forward to the banter of our conversations, building up those inside jokes we shared until everything we said to each other was our own private conversation of movie quotes and '80s trivia no one else would understand.
Then it hit me. As we traveled down the turnpike toward my house, I realized how badly I wanted to be Sloane’s boyfriend. Even sitting in Cassandra’s house, I had the distinct feeling of pride knowing we were sitting on the same side of the table. I wanted to be on Sloane’s team. When we walked through the halls of school, I wanted people to know I was with her, to hear her claim me as hers, to be the Gabe and Sloane of Grover High instead of the Gabe and Becca.
A sudden panic swept through me as she pulled up to my house. I couldn’t want this as badly as I did. Did it make me a royal jerk for breaking up with Becca because I wanted to date Sloane? Whether or not it did, I sure felt like one.
Either way, it was time to come clean with Becca. If the two of us didn’t have a future, it wasn’t fair for me to string her along and prevent her from finding someone who would be a much better boyfriend than me.
Sloane
The interview went well. Too well. Cassandra Moyer could have been an inanimate object for all I cared. I was taking notes on the way Gabe’s biceps looked when he leaned over and pressed his elbows to the table. He was adjusting the tripod, and also, little parts of my heart. This was bad. It was beginning to become obvious to me that I didn’t like working with him because he loved '80s movies. I liked working with him because I liked him.
Here is the thing though; it felt like I couldn’t stop liking him, even if I tried. So what was the point in trying? I kept my eyes on the road ahead of us as we drove to Gabe’s house. He didn’t say much on the drive which was okay by me. Our afternoon had been one golden moment after another. I didn’t want to ruin it by saying something stupid on the car ride home, but the second he was out of my vehicle, I pulled out of the drive and headed toward the cemetary. Mom wasn’t going to be able to offer any sage advice, but she was a damn good listener.
I didn’t have flowers like I had promised, but I grabbed the last remaining blueberry muffin off the plate in the backseat and placed it on top of her headstone.
“I did not bake these muffins,” I admitted. “They are store bought. Just like you taught me.” I laughed at my own joke. Mom was a terrible baker, always shoving a store pie into a glass dish and calling it good. I wished I could picture her laughing with me, but I wasn’t sure what that sounded like anymore.
It was harder and harder to remember things like that, the sound of her laugh, whether her smile started small and stretched wide or began bold, all of her teeth gleaming. Pictures do no justice for the dead, but memories fade, or maybe we just store them somewhere too far off to access.
I forced myself to stop thinking about her being gone and focus on what I had come for. To vent, or gush, I wasn’t sure which. I did my best to get her up to speed. I talked about class, about Becca, about Gabe and I laughing in the dugout, our inside jokes, even his european fashion faux pas. By the time I had finished spewing the details of my life pining after Real Live Jake Ryan, I was exhausted.
Everything was so much more complicated in life than in the movies. If I were Samantha, it would all work out. Becca would start as competition and end as a minor character, easy to discard, no feelings involved. Viewers would cheer for Gabe and I to end up together.
As it was, people were more likely to throw stones than offer applause. Becca was not a minor character, Becca was a human, with a heart and layers. Rooting for them to break up was mean-spirited and selfish.
“Tell me I’m not selfish,” I pleaded. If a massive gust of wind swept through the cemetery and stole my blueberry muffin from its perch, it would be a sign. I would know my crush was okay and not mean girl behavior. Instead, the ground was silent, not a single leaf danced across Mom’s grave.
I looked across the lawn to where Gabe’s mom was buried. The little vase cemented to the base of her statue was full of fresh alstroemeria. Someone visited her regularly, today even. I wondered if it was Landon or Mr. Maxwell, neither seemed the type, but the last couple of weeks had taught me people are rarely what you think they are.
Cassandra, for example. I thought we would be interviewing a shy little smarty pants, grateful to be in the presence of the Gabe Maxwell. Instead, we were met with a snarky, too-busy-and-important-for the-likes-of-you type.
“I’ll let you know what happens,” I said, then I stood up and brushed the little bits of freshly trimmed grass from the back of my jeans.
Telling my story to Mom made me realize that Gabe was deeply flawed. He didn’t have the guts to break up with a girl he had nothing in common with. He couldn’t tell his family he wasn’t who they thought he was, and he put more energy into getting fired as anchor than he did doing the job he really liked. But it also made me realize he wasn’t that person when it was just the two of us. So either Gabe was putting on an act for them or he was putting one on with me. I didn’t trust myself to know the difference. Not when feelings were creeping in on my judgement.
I needed a sleepover with Reagan and Harper, movie theatre popcorn with the good flavoring sprinkled on top, and Molly Ringwald, shy and beautiful, getting the guy. Just for the weekend, real life could wait.
Gabe
My anchor performance today was especially awkward. I kept doing a weird dance to music that wasn’t pla
ying, and I spoke over Becca more often than not.
I wasn’t trying to be a jerk, but I could feel a change in the air, and I had a solid plan.
I would get rightfully fired as anchor.
I would break up with Becca.
I would talk to my dad and Landon and cancel the HoCo party.
In that order.
But after my terrible job today, no one said anything, and I started to realize just how untouchable the Maxwells were at Grover High. I could get away with literally anything, and no one would hold me accountable for it. It was infuriating.
Sloane was mysteriously absent today, and after I blamed her for Ferris Buellering without me, she insisted she was actually sick. I still wasn’t buying it.
A part of me worried that I was too weird after the interview with Cassandra Moyer on Friday. Did Sloane notice that I was thinking a little too much about kissing her when I should have been thinking about interviewing our next student at Grover? Is that why she couldn’t bear to be around me today? I totally freaked her out.
After we taped the show, Becca pulled me aside as we were gearing up to work on our projects. I hadn’t been able to look her in the eye all day. I was mentally prepared to pull the plug, but I had no clue how to start it. Part of me was waiting for a fight or a natural break to insert the split, but none of that happened. In fact, nothing ever happened. If I didn’t end it, I had a feeling things would just go on like this forever, and that was a pretty sad thought.
“Gabe, what is going on?” she asked, and there was a sort of sincerity to her tone that made me pause. Becca was usually light-hearted and flippant. She took things seriously, but not much and not often. So hearing her get serious with me was new.
“What do you mean?”