The Meet-Cute Project

by Rhiannon Richardson

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  My parents give me permission to meet Harold at his job on Tuesday after swim practice, to review my lap times before the meet tomorrow. He’s been working longer hours setting up an exhibit at the Art Institute of Chicago and hasn’t been getting up early to swim. He leads me through the construction site that is the south hall gallery. It’s the first time we’ve gotten together in a while without Gladys. I find myself missing her a little, wondering what she might be up to. Harold’s oversize dark gray sweater makes him look more like a grandpa who sits in a leather armchair and reads books than an athletic old grump. Excuse me—grump with a girlfriend.

  One day, I figured out that he worked at the Art Institute when we ran into each other on our way out of the locker rooms and I saw an Art Institute employee badge clipped to the front pocket of his button-down shirt. Beyond that, he never talked about it much. Then again, he doesn’t talk about himself in general.

  He gestures to the observation bench in a room that’s been partially set up for the exhibit he’s managing. When I sit, he hands me a pudding cup and sets down his own pudding cup and notebook before reaching up and stretching his back. We are facing a Buddhist tapestry depicting the seven realms of heaven and the seven realms of hell. There’s a circle at the center of the Buddha, resembling the earth realm.

  “I don’t know why it’s taken me so long to come here,” I admit, peeling back the lid on my pudding.

  Harold sits down next to me and pulls his plastic spoon from behind his ear. “I appreciate you driving out here. It’s just, with this being our most highly anticipated exhibit of the season, they want all hands on deck.”

  I glance around the room. The tapestry is one of the few things that have been set up already. There are workers on the other side of the gallery still unpacking paintings and sketches and moving sculptures in.

  “Well, thank you for taking the time,” I tell him. “And for the pudding.”

  “Of course,” he says, smiling down at his own pudding. “This is the best part of the day.”

  We fall silent, slipping our spoons into the smooth chocolate pockets. It reminds me of middle school. Chocolate pudding was something my mom used to pack in my lunch every day. Then one day my doctor told her that there were healthier sweets that she could be packing, stuff that wasn’t so “artificial.” Suddenly the pudding was just on Fridays, and then when I started swimming for school, I stopped eating it all together.

  Harold takes his notebook from the bench and holds it in his lap, keeping it open with his pudding cup. He uses his finger to go from line to line, looking for the latest recordings. His spoon hangs out of his mouth. We go over my best and worst times since my last meet. Then he reviews the times for this past week and my averages. He prefers to base his assumptions for upcoming meets on my averages.

  I don’t notice when he’s finished going over the numbers until he says, “I would say that the adrenaline of the meet should help you improve on these times, but you seem a little deflated.”

  He’s right that my mind isn’t completely in my usual competitive space. Even though thoughts about swimming, practices, drills, and times are floating around in my head, none of them are the thought that’s holding.

  “How did it, like, happen for you and Gladys?”

  Harold raises his eyebrows, more amused than surprised. From the smile in his eyes, I can tell that I’m touching on his favorite topic, but simultaneously he might have known this was coming.

  He looks away from me to the tapestry before us, thinking.

  “Well, as young as I like to think I am, the truth is, I’m alone and—well—old. I used to go to the pool in the evenings, after I got off work, but then they moved me to a later shift and it made more sense to go in the mornings, and it was like fate put me into a position.

  “I used to think I didn’t want to be bothered. Before Gladys, you were the only person at the pool that I talked to. When I noticed you always at the pool, always on time, always in the water swimming, I also noticed that you didn’t talk to anyone. You ignored everything around you, and I guess I was afraid you’d end up like me. In a way, it made me realize that I did feel like something was missing.”

  When he doesn’t continue, I ask, “So, what does that have to do with Gladys?”

  Harold turns his notebook over in his hands for a moment before looking at me. “How could I hope for you to take a chance, branch out, and socialize if I didn’t want that for myself?” The question comes out sounding like it’s more for him than for me.

  I remember when Harold started showing up in the mornings. He would swim in the outer lane and splash all around, and one time I heard some of the other morning swimmers talking about him. They called him an old man, said he was wasting space in the pool. I wanted to tell those guys, at least Harold was in the pool, while they were sitting on a bench eternally adjusting their swim caps, putting their goggles off and on. But now that I’m thinking about it, Harold approached me. I thought I was doing him the service, but what really happened is, he saw me, he leaned on the lane divider one day when I happened to be taking a short break in between laps, and he asked if I swam for a team.

  “Gladys was me allowing myself to see more than what I thought I needed to see. I had my job, my art, my house, and my swimming. I paid my bills, put food on the table… And for a while I thought that was enough, but it didn’t feel like enough.”

  “Like, something was missing?” I ask, recognizing a familiar feeling within myself.

  Ever since middle school, I’ve worked so hard to convince myself that I never needed to date. I needed good grades, good friends, good lap times, and good club involvement. But maybe I’ve been trying to busy myself so that I wouldn’t even have time to try for more.

  “Is there trouble in paradise?” Harold asks, scraping the inside of his pudding cup.

  “No,” I say, even though it feels like there is, in more ways than one.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  On Wednesday morning before school, Abby and I knock on the south entrance doors and wait for our teammates to let us in. It’s tradition that for the last home meet of the season, the boys’ team decorates the girls’ lockers and then someone from the boys’ team will lead us from the south entrance once they’ve finished setting up—that way we don’t get any sneak peeks. Then, at the end of the boys’ season, we decorate theirs. Everyone spends the morning speculating about who might be in charge of the decorations and what they might do. Some guys go all out and make locker-size posters with our names on them and photos from the season. Victor always picks Abby, and he does her locker in a Christmas theme, since it’s her favorite holiday, and brings her one of every flavor of Dunkin’ Donuts Munchkins available. Depending on when the last meet falls, there’s usually pumpkin, blueberry, and maybe a Christmas one already.

  Even though we have our man on the inside, Victor never gives us hints as to who my decorator is. Last year it was Braylon Myers. I was a sophomore; he was a senior. How we got paired is beyond me, but I felt very lucky. He decorated my locker to look like a swimming pool and did a cutout of me in a swimsuit made from striped scrapbook paper, and the lanes next to the one I was in said YOU WILL DO GREAT. He made it like a poster so I was able to just peel it off my locker at the end of the day, and I kept it hung up in my room for a few months.

  But Braylon graduated and I haven’t spent much time thinking about who I would even want it to be this year. The reason it’s a big deal is because some of the guys do request to decorate for specific girls, and when that happens, they usually make it known, to see if the girl likes them back. In a perfect world I would ask Ben to decorate my locker. Last night we stayed up texting, going over the list of things he’s going to need for college. I scrolled through the Bed Bath & Beyond website on my phone, looking for links to a bedspread that wasn’t too simple but not trying too hard. I could barely keep my eyes open, I was so bored. I did find some that I liked, but I figu
re there’s a good chance there will be new prints out when it’s my turn to choose.

  “Ladies, ladies, ladies,” Chris Stone sings as he comes around the hallway corner to where we’ve been waiting. “Please follow me, and feel free to split off from the group as we pass your respective hallways, and hopefully you are satisfied with this year’s decorations.”

  We start following him. Some of the freshman girls cluster together and start giggling. I can’t make out exactly what they’re saying, but it sounds like one of them is hoping Chris did her locker.

  “Also,” he says, turning around and running his hands through his bowl-shaped haircut. “I bet you guys will do amazing. You’ve worked hard, and I hope you have a great last home meet.”

  We all say “Thank you,” nearly in unison, and as we do, I notice a teacher jump at his desk in one of the classrooms. The freshman hallway comes first, then the senior, then the sophomore, and finally—all the way at the other end of the school, because it’s not enough that junior year is the hardest year of high school, so the administration needed to make things harder for us—the junior hallway.

  Abby and I are practically holding on to each other when we turn the corner, both of us curious to see who my decorator is. Needless to say, I’m floored when I see Ritchie standing next to my locker, a few lockers in front of Victor. Both of them are holding Dunkin’ Donuts bags, which probably means Ritchie asked Victor for help.

  “Hey,” he says, casual, as he hands me the pink-and-orange bag.

  I take it and stare at my garden-themed locker.

  “What is this?” I ask, my eyes trailing the rose petal border of a green piece of poster board. In the middle is a printed-out picture of a greenhouse that Ritchie cut out and glued down. Next to it is a stick-figure drawing of me in a skirt and sweater holding a single stick-figure flower. In my other hand is a shovel that’s taller than stick-figure me. I’m guessing the flower was a gift from stick-figure Ritchie, who is intruding on my peaceful garden and my peace of mind. Stick-figure Ritchie is telling me to swim like a shark, and stick-figure me is just smiling like the Joker.

  “Victor told me you like to garden, and then he told me how he gets Abby doughnuts, and I thought, Great idea because you need fuel for the day,” he explains.

  I want to ask if he would eat sugary carb-loaded doughnuts on the day of one of the most critical meets of the season, but I stop myself. Over Ritchie’s shoulder I see Abby with her back to me pointing her finger in the face of a very confused and defensive Victor. Of all the secrets for Victor to keep, after what happened at the team dinner, this was not one of them.

  “Mia,” Ritchie says, snapping his fingers in front of my face.

  “What are the chances that we would just randomly get paired together?” I say as the thought comes to mind.

  “I wanted to apologize,” Ritchie begins.

  “You already apologized.”

  “Yeah, but Sloane got in the way—”

  “Like, how your girlfriend got in the way?”

  “Mia,” he says, pleading.

  “Don’t ‘Mia’ me, Ritchie. That was humilia—”

  “Mia, would you let me talk, please?” Ritchie raises his voice. A vein pops out on his forehead, and I freeze. I feel exposed and embarrassed and not sure what to do. “You don’t think that was embarrassing for me, too?” he continues. “You don’t think it was hard for me, having an ex-girlfriend, making it impossible for me to move forward, when I just transferred schools in the middle of a semester? Having someone trying to ruin every attempt I’m making at my new life, at making friends? And she succeeded in ruining whatever it was I originally saw in you. And now I barely remember what that was. You’ve been so wrapped up in your assumptions about that night that you haven’t been able to see that someone likes you, Mia! I liked you.” He sucks in a deep breath, then laughs cynically like he’s finally found his voice.

  I can tell he’s stopping himself from saying more. For a moment we just stare at each other. His eyes staring into mine, not like they’re searching but like they’re confirming something. He balls his fists at his sides and then lets his fingers uncurl. I feel trapped inside a moment that’s repeating itself, only I want to change the outcome. I remember that nervous feeling I had, sitting on the garage steps next to Ritchie that night. But now I don’t feel nervous about us getting closer. I feel scared that I’ve pushed him away. I remember him telling me about his family, about the separation he felt, and I remember how genuine he was. How vulnerable he was. After Amanda showed up, I stopped letting myself see who he was.

  “I’m sorry,” I say quietly.

  “I’m sorry too,” he says.

  * * *

  By the time classes end for the day, my mind is grinding with focus on the meet. This morning feels like a blurry but still tangible memory suspended in a parallel universe. It’s like the memory is hanging by my bed, and once I’m done with the competition, I can go home and pick all my feelings back up. But right now, with Abby standing over me braiding my hair, I know what’s important.

  “Are you excited?” she asks.

  “About what?” I ask, thinking that “stressed” or “pumped” would be more accurate descriptions for today’s meet.

  “Ben? Coming to the meet? Are you really that out of it?” she asks, holding the end of my braid and bending over to see my face.

  “No,” I say, trying to turn away from her so she won’t see the redness in my cheeks. When I feel her still bent over, barely breathing, I clarify, “I mean, yes, I’m excited. No, I’m not that out of it.”

  “Okay, cool. Because I was about to say…”

  When Abby finishes braiding my hair, I check my phone one more time. As she crams the rest of her stuff into her locker, I lay my phone on top of my backpack and ignore the twisty feeling in my gut. Ben hasn’t responded since I texted him over an hour ago, asking whether or not he’s still coming to the meet. I was hoping he’d say yes and maybe I could talk to him about what happened this morning with Ritchie, see if maybe he’d at least listen.

  Abby and I follow our teammates out of the locker room. The humidity around the pool soothes away some of the goose bumps on my skin. I feel both calm and excited again when I see Sloane, Grace, and Grace’s kinda-maybe-it’s-complicated girlfriend in the bleachers. They met over the weekend at the end of Thanksgiving break when Grace’s family went downtown to ice-skate. Grace slipped while racing her dad and knocked Amy over. When Grace told me, I said that sounded like a meet-cute, and she couldn’t stop blushing! I smile at them and let my eyes trace over the rest of the stands. I find Ben toward the top. He doesn’t notice me because he’s showing his friend something on his phone. As they laugh, I feel happy that he’s here.

  Coach quickly tells us the lineup. Abby and I are paired for the relays at the end of the competition, which is a relief.

  With all the noises bouncing around the room, I’m thankful when it’s my turn to get into the water. I submerge myself and focus on envisioning each lap, how to maximize each stroke, as my competitors tread. I focus on how the water feels on the surface of my skin, the quick and quiet beat of my heart. I trust in the simplicity of swimming there and back, from one end of the pool to the other. It’s just me in the water, competing with myself.

  My first three races go well. In the last one I place second, but my time was still one of my personal best. Whenever I get out of the water, my eyes are pulled like magnets back to the stands. Out of the corner of my eye, I see Sloane and Grace waving, though I’m more focused on Ben. I’m curious if he’s paying attention, and if not, I wonder what he’s doing, what he’s talking about, what he’s looking at on his phone or his friends’ phones. When I finish my laps, I look up to see if he’s watching, to see if he’s seeing me at my best the way I see him in math club.

  Sometimes he is watching, and when I catch his eye on my way out of the pool and he smiles, I think about whether or not we are finally connecting. As I hold
my head up high and stride across the slick tile to the diving block, I feel like I’m floating, and there are points when my adrenaline is rushing so much that I almost swear I can float up the bleachers and right into his arms.

  I get a short break before the relays, and Abby suggests I invite Ben to come out with us after the meet. We’re all going to November Always so that Grace can formally introduce us to Amy. Abby jokes that since it’s where things started for Ben and me, maybe that’s good luck for Grace and Amy. I wish I had my phone so I could text him and ask him right now. I wish I felt more certain that he would want to hang out with me after the meet, even if he does have other plans.

  Abby and I line up for our relay. When I glance up at Ben, I catch him watching me. He’s leaning back against the bench behind him. He sees me returning his gaze and flashes me a smile that makes me feel like I can win this whole thing. Like, I have to win.

  I’m glad that Abby goes first because she can give us a strong start, and I can push us over the top with a strong finish. While she’s making her way up the lane, I notice the pool doors open, and a familiar figure stumbles and drops a book on the floor in the doorway. When she stands up, I recognize Michelle Zhang from math club. I watch her walk over to the bleachers and scan the rows until she finds whomever she’s looking for. I watch curiously, wondering if I completely missed any of the other math club members who decided to come and show support.

  As she climbs higher, closer to Ben, I wonder what the chances are… but I don’t have to wonder for long because when Michelle reaches Ben and his friends, Ben makes one move down so that there’s room for her to sit next to him.

  Maybe he’s being nice. It’s not like I know his friends, so if I were her, I would want him to let me sit next to him. I’d also want him to tilt his head toward me so that I could hear him over the loud noises of people thrashing through water. I get lost a little, staring at Ben and Michelle. Instead of wondering about Ben, I wonder about them. What are they talking about? What is Michelle doing here?