“Yeah, but I’m going for scholarships.” She turns to Ritchie as if to have a private conversation. “She’s not trying to get a scholarship, and she’s been swimming her whole life! And is one of the best on the team!”
“Wait, why not?” Ritchie asks as Victor slows the car to a stop.
I look out the window and see Maria’s house. A few people are closing the front door behind them as they duck inside.
“Oh, look,” I say, thankful for an excuse to avoid the ever-looming topic of my future and my continuing education. I feel my stomach grumble and throw open my door, practically cheering, “It’s time for dinner.”
I stumble away from the truck, forgetting how far off the ground it is. I’m thankful Abby didn’t say anything about me wearing Vans. Being able to firmly plant my feet on the ground saves me from falling into the woodchips lining the walkway up to Maria’s front door. I turn around to wait for Victor to lock the car and catch up with us. I watch Ritchie check the bottom of his shoe, and I wonder what he would do if I fell into the woodchips. I wonder if he would risk getting a scratch on the sole of his New Balances to hold out his hand, or if chivalry isn’t his thing.
I’ve always liked Maria’s house because there’s something warm about it. The outside is painted a dark blue that nearly blends in with the night sky and complements the pine trees lining the sides of her yard. The windows are outlined in white paint, and the front door is a deep almost red-looking wood with a gold knocker. There’s a porch swing that creaks when it sways, and the red lantern on the floor next to it makes it seem like when you walk up to her house, you’re walking up to a cabin in the woods. Especially since it’s smaller than most of the houses in her neighborhood.
Immediately inside the front door, a few of our teammates sit at the bottom of the steps, bowls in hand. To the left of the stairwell is a small hallway leading to the dining room and then the kitchen. That’s where the fragrant and intoxicating smells are coming from. To the right of the stairs is the living room, where a few of the guys have set up camp. Some have already placed their bowls down to spear some marshmallows by the fire.
I breathe in the spicy scents of garlic, ginger, tomato, samosas, and mint yogurt sauce.
“Indian theme,” Abby and I say at the same time as we kick off our shoes next to the mound building by the door.
There are already a few people sitting down at the dining room table. Abby says hello as we squeeze by to the kitchen, and I can’t help but notice as a few of the girls do a double take when they notice me wearing a dress. When I hear some of the boys in the kitchen, I quickly button up the sweater Sam loaned me.
“Hello, girls, and Victor,” Maria’s mom greets us, lifting her wooden spoon out of the huge pot on the stove. “And who is this unfamiliar face?”
“I’m Ritchie,” he says, holding out his hand. Mrs. Gurdip swats it away and leans in for a hug.
“Hello, Mrs. Gurdip,” I say, accepting my own hug before stepping over to look down at the orange sauce bubbling. “Gosh, this smells amazing.”
“It’s my famous chicken tikka masala,” she says, grabbing a paper bowl and ladling some into it. “Tell me what you think.”
I take a plastic spoon from a bag on the counter and gently blow over an orange chunk of chicken before taking a bite. I watch as Abby and Victor hand their bowls to Mrs. Gurdip, and then my eyes meet Ritchie’s. Now that we’re under the fluorescent kitchen lights, I can see a beauty mark just above his lip. And as his smile widens while I chew on a piece of chicken, I spot a slight, but adorable, snaggletooth.
“This is fantastic,” I say, still chewing. “Can I have some more?”
I wait as she adds some to my bowl and points over to a tray full of samosas. I take a couple and pour myself a cup of Pepsi before going into the dining room.
“This is her best dinner yet,” one of the boys is saying.
Everyone nods in agreement, silently chewing.
I catch movement out of the corner of my eye and find Shannon trying to get my attention. She waves me over to her side of the table, and I take a seat next to her. I don’t realize how tired I am from practice until I lean back into the cushion and feel my entire body relax.
“What’s with the dress?” she asks quietly, blowing over her bowl.
“It was Abby’s idea,” I say. “She wanted to dress up for Victor, but she didn’t want to be the only one who changed after practice.”
Abby, Victor, and Ritchie join us, Ritchie sitting between Abby and me. Ritchie tries to make conversation, but we keep falling into silences because while he’s talking, I’m chewing, and when I finally finish and ask him a question, he’s started chewing. Slowly but surely I find out that he loves Indian food, and there’s a restaurant downtown that he and his brothers go to for their birthdays where they make the best samosas he’s ever had. In addition to swimming, he does archery and soccer, which I didn’t see on his Instagram. He also has a cat named Tac, who I don’t remember seeing on his Instagram. I try to imagine him cuddling up to Tac, a chubby three-legged Siamese, and it makes me smile.
“You have a nice smile,” he tells me.
“You do too,” I say, which makes him smile even harder.
“Do you want my last samosa?” he asks, taking my empty orange-stained bowl out of the way. “And I can get rid of these?”
“Sounds good to me,” I say, gladly taking the samosa and dipping it into my mint sauce. “The trash can is in the kitchen.”
“He gave you his last samosa,” Abby says after he walks away, swooning and leaning across his empty seat. “I think this is going well.”
“I mean, we’re just getting to know each other,” I say, pushing her back toward her seat when she starts making a kissy face at me.
“I think at the rate this is going, we’ll be sipping Starbucks during first period in no time,” Abby whispers, winking at me.
When Ritchie gets back from the kitchen, the two of us drift into the living room and find a couple of pillows to sit on in front of the couch. I spear a couple of marshmallows and hold them over the fire in the fireplace, glancing at Seinfeld on the TV.
“Even when my parents were together, my house was never like this,” Ritchie says, quiet enough that only I hear.
“What was it like?”
He scooches his pillow closer to mine before saying, “Empty. Even with my brothers and me, the house always felt underused. We would always go to our friends’ houses so that we wouldn’t get embarrassed by our parents’ fighting. And when we were home, we usually ate in our rooms, did homework in our rooms… I would watch TV on my Mac more than I would downstairs.”
“It sounds like you guys were all separate,” I say, watching him stare into the flames. The way the yellow light flickers on his face, giving him a sheen of moisture, softens his features. I can make out the peach fuzz on his chin. And in the shadows from the ceiling lights, I can make out his eyelashes and a fleck of dry skin on his nose.
“My brothers and I were still close, but until we moved in with my dad, I guess I didn’t realize how much time we were spending apart even though we were in the same place.”
“I know this is nothing like parents getting divorced, but my sister moved in with her fiancé, and now whenever she stops by the house, it’s like the ghost of our childhood settles over us. Sometimes it feels like she moved back in. She’ll stay over late, planning her wedding, and end up sleeping in her room. More and more, she comes back to the house after work and ends up staying for a few days, and then when she leaves again, it just feels cold and empty… but I don’t notice it until she’s gone.
“It was actually kind of funny, because the first time it happened, we ended up going to the November Always diner for Sunday brunch, which we hadn’t done since Sam was still in high school.”
“I feel that,” Ritchie admits.
But—in a way—I feel it for the first time as the words leave my mouth. Whenever Sam is home, Dad is downstair
s more, and Mom doesn’t hole up in their room for her evening reading. She’ll hang out in the den, which is where she, Sam, and I used to have our late-night talks. I really miss it when she’s gone, because my parents and I automatically go back to orbiting in our own little spheres.
Ritchie and I stare at our marshmallows, pulling them out when mine catches fire and he decides not to test his luck with his. I let the flame go for a moment, watching as the white melts and bubbles into black before I blow it out.
“Let’s give our spots to someone who needs them,” he suggests, standing up and holding out his hand to me.
I take it and let him lead me through the house that I know better than he does. I look back once as we head down the back hallway. I see Abby sitting on the couch with her legs crossed, Victor holding two sticks with marshmallows over by the fire. Then I turn back and point at a door at the end of the hall when I feel Ritchie hesitate.
Our eyes adjust to the brightness of the garage. I leave the door cracked open behind us and gather the skirt of my dress behind my legs before sitting down next to Ritchie on the steps leading down to Maria’s mom’s SUV.
“Why don’t you want a swim scholarship?” he asks.
I think back to all the times Sam’s made fun of my swimming, or criticized how much effort I put into it. I don’t want to tell Ritchie that I’m afraid swimming won’t be enough. I know that with my times and my individual wins at meets, I should be able to get a pretty good scholarship, but I don’t think swimming is what I really want to do for the next four years—at least, it’s not what I want to focus on. But, I know if I say that, the next question is going to be, What do you want to focus on? And I haven’t even begun to scratch the surface of that question.
Instead I say, “Because swimming isn’t all that I am.” Before he can ask more, I change the subject. “When did you guys move?”
I take a bite out of my marshmallow and savor the smoky flavor as it melts in my mouth.
“The middle of August. We didn’t move very far, but we changed school districts,” Ritchie says.
“Do you like Hayfield so far?” I ask, remembering his pressed khakis and button-down Holloway uniform.
“I do. I mean, I miss my friends, but I like the new people that I’m meeting.”
“That’s good,” I say through a mouthful of marshmallow.
“I especially like you,” he adds, watching me.
“You just met me,” I say, laughing. I try to lick the sticky marshmallow off my lips, but it’s hard to focus with him staring at me.
“And you seem really cool, and I like you so far.”
The butterflies in my stomach make me say, “I like you too.”
I stare back at him, watching his eyes watch mine. I see my own reflection, and for a moment I can’t believe that he likes what he’s seeing. A girl with messy hair, awkwardly clothed in a small dress with a sweater clearly strategically buttoned. And yet he still likes me. So far, that is.
I take a deep breath and look down at the other half of my marshmallow, barely clinging to the spear. I want to say something cool, or at least keep the conversation going, but I’m at a loss for words.
“Don’t do that,” he whispers, reaching for my chin and turning me to face him again. Only, now his face is a lot closer.
“Do what?” I ask, trying not to be obvious about glancing down at his lips. They’re so pink. I lick mine, worried that they’re still sticky or chapped.
“Break the moment,” he says.
“We were having a moment?” I ask jokingly. But he doesn’t laugh. He just leans in a little closer, and I know that with his hand under my chin he can feel my breath catch in my throat.
I try not to breathe too heavy. I try not to think about how I probably have stinky tikka masala breath. I try not to think about how he has stinky tikka masala breath. I try not to think about how us both having the same stinky tikka masala breath would cancel them both out. No, I focus on his face in front of my face. I think back to the movies I’ve watched with my friends over the years. So, this is how it happens. This is the magical moment, My First Kiss.
When he starts moving in closer, I let my eyes drift close and I hand myself over to—
“Mia!”
The garage door bursts open, knocking me in the back and pushing me forward off the stairs. I stumble, but a hand catches me by the wrist and yanks me the rest of the way into the garage.
“What the—”
Abby claps her hand over my mouth and yanks me down behind Mia’s mom’s car. She holds a finger up to her mouth, her eyes wide, and I decide I can kill her later.
“Ritchie Christopher Hutchins!” Someone has thrown the garage door open again, and this time it smacks Maria’s dad’s tool shelf.
“Amanda?”
“Why haven’t you been answering my calls?” Amanda asks.
I lean slightly forward and try to glimpse Ritchie on the steps, but I stop short, knowing that we could be seen.
“Amanda, I told you I was doing school stuff tonight,” Ritchie explains. I can hear defeat in his voice.
“School stuff, my behind,” she snaps. “A house party isn’t ‘school stuff.’ ”
“Amanda, does this seriously look like a house party? And how did you know I was here? What are you even doing here?”
“I tracked your phone, stupid, and saw that you weren’t home doing your ‘school stuff,’ ” she hisses. I hear her kick something, probably the banister. “Crap.”
“Don’t hurt yourself.”
“Shut up! You’re unbelievable,” Amanda screams. I hear someone grab the doorknob, and the wind shifts as the door flies. Then someone, probably Ritchie, catches it. Their footsteps pad on the carpet, down the hall and back into the house, leaving Abby and me sitting on the cold concrete floor of the garage.
“What Victor meant by ‘I believe he’s single’ is that there’s a girl in the picture that—clearly—Ritchie would rather none of us know about,” Abby explains, letting out a long-held breath.
“So, he has a girlfriend?” I ask, feeling my heart race. At the same time, a lump rises in my throat.
“Yes, one that clearly knows what she’s doing,” Abby says, laughing to herself.
I try to laugh, to force myself to find this funny instead of humiliating, but I remember how it felt to have his warm hand cup my chin. I remember how just moments ago we were the only two people on the planet, and I can’t stop the stinging in my eyes.
“Mia,” Abby says softly. She snakes her arm around my shoulders and pulls me to her.
“He was going to kiss me,” I whisper, sniffling.
“I’m sorry,” she says. “This isn’t what I originally had planned for your meet-cute. I was gearing up for a nice Notting Hill moment where someone spilled something on you—or maybe you spilled something on them… but after practice, it just seemed like it was happening so naturally between you two—”
“Abby, it’s okay, I don’t blame you,” I interrupt, just wanting her to stop talking about it. “It’s fine.”
“But it’s not fine. He almost cheated on his girlfriend, and he was going to use you to do it.”
I can feel her getting fired up. I know that in an alternate universe she would run outside after them and tell Amanda that Ritchie nearly cheated on her, and maybe she would kick Ritchie in the shins for good measure. But we live in the sad reality where once again I’m the one left alone. For once, I started getting the romance, but I ended up on the wrong side of the comedy part. Don’t get me wrong, Abby saved me from having my first kiss be a lie… but I wish there was a way she could’ve saved me from the lie without me having to miss out on my first kiss. Without the truth, I had a real moment, what could’ve been one of the best moments of my life.
CHAPTER NINE
On Thursday morning, Harold and I meet at Heartwood Coffee, a small café two blocks down from the community center, to review my averages. One of the reasons I appreciate Harold’
s input is because it’s a combination of a personal trainer—without having to pay for one—and a toned-down version of what my dad used to be for Sam at her field hockey games. With Harold there’s no yelling and no overdone critique the entire ride home when I’m half-asleep and starving after a meet.
I pay for my omelet, oats, and matcha latte and carry my small tray over to a table by the front window. On the day of any competition—swimming or math—I try to keep my meals healthy. No stealing pepperoni off Grace’s pizza or sharing candy with Sloane in study hall. This way I’ll have more energy and no sugary food or unhealthy carbs to weigh me down.
I’m sprinkling blueberries over my oats when Harold pulls up in front of the café. I watch through the cursive lettering painted on the front window as he races around the front of his car to get the door for Gladys. Typically I’d be annoyed that he invited her to crash our game-day chat. But when I put swimming aside, I’m kind of rooting for them as an example that meet-cutes can lead to real-life romance, not just the fictional relationships in movies.
“Good morning, Mia,” Harold says when they step through the door. I can’t tell if his smile is because of the swim meet or because he gets to pull out a chair for Gladys.
When he asks what she wants to order, Gladys insists on getting the coffees so that he and I can get straight to business. Harold gives me the rundown of my most recent averages for freestyle, backstroke, and breaststroke. Since my last meet I’ve improved each one, but not as much as usual. It doesn’t follow with the steady progression he projected. He asks why, but is interrupted when Gladys sets his drink down in front of him. “Thank you, honey,” he says, in a way that would usually make me want to gag, but for them it’s cute.
“Remember you wanted to tell Mia something about her butterfly stroke?” she says, and points to something in Harold’s notebook.
“I can hardly read my own handwriting sometimes,” he says, laughing a little as he squints over the top edge of his glasses.
“It says that she swims to the right on butterfly,” Gladys reads, her glasses pushed to the tip of her nose.
The Meet-Cute Project Page 9