The Astonishing Adventures of Fanboy and Goth Girl

by Barry Lyga

  Right. Lacrosse playoffs. Who cares? I remind myself: Cal does, for some reason. "I guess you guys lost?"

  "Not exactly."

  "I don't get it."

  "Neither do I."

  It turns out that a few of the guys on the lacrosse team were—big surprise—not exactly academic geniuses. No shock there, but apparently they were failing a couple of classes each. Normally, this would disqualify them from the team. It's automatic—when the grades go into the computer, it spits out a report of who's eligible and who isn't.

  But someone—probably not the flunkers in question, who would lack the smarts—changed the grades in the computer. This was discovered late Friday night, probably as I was helping to clean up the chili dishes. Dr. Goethe, the principal, happened to be talking to a teacher who had flunked one of the players. The teacher didn't realize that the student had failed another class, too, but Dr. Goethe seemed to remember another teacher complaining about the same student. So he went back to the paper records and found some F's, and then he compared them to the computer and saw D's, and then he got really ambitious and checked the whole team, staying up late in the night, alone in the darkness of his office, painstakingly double-checking the grades of every player on the team. (OK, I added the details about late in the night and all that—it sounds better that way.)

  The next morning, he reported his results to the people who run these things (like I know) and the rest is history.

  "The whole team's on probation," Cal says, his depression like a liquid, moving thing that can crawl through the phone line. "They revoked every single win we had back to the beginning of the season and we had to forfeit today's game and every game through the end of the year."

  I try to care, but it's tough. A bunch of Jock Jerks finally sowed what they'd reaped (or reaped what they'd sown, whichever). I have difficulty summoning pity. I feel something like glee instead. Behold the awesome power of The List!

  But Cal cares. It's tough to be too gleeful at the downfall of the South Brook High Lacrosse Team when it means Cal's miserable.

  "I'm sorry," I tell him, and I do my best to mean it.

  "Yeah. It sucks."

  Silence. We just sit on the phone, breathing together. I feel warm and whole. I had forgotten how much our friendship meant to me. With all the craziness of getting ready for the convention and dealing with Kyra, I hadn't had a chance to miss Cal. And now it's like all that missing has been dammed up somewhere, and the dam's broken loose, and I'm feeling the effects even though he's back.

  "Hey, Cal?"

  "Yeah?"

  "Look, I know it's been a little weird lately, and..." I don't know how to fix this, how to talk about it without actually saying it.

  "I know."

  "You do?" Oh, God. He "knows" I'm gay. "Yeah, and it's cool."

  It is? Oh my God! What if Cal is gay? No way! "Are you sure? Because—"

  "This is stupid," he says. "We're talking around this and we shouldn't have to. We're better than this. I know all about this graphic novel you're working on."

  He what? "Um, what did you say?"

  "At first I thought that you were overreacting to the lacrosse thing. I mean, you didn't talk to me for the rest of the day and it was like I just didn't exist to you anymore." He knows about Schemata? Huh?

  "But I kept thinking about it and thinking about it and it just didn't make any sense. I couldn't see you staying that way for so long. Not even if you were really, really pissed at me."

  "I wasn't pissed at you."

  "Yes, you were."

  "Cal..."

  "Do you think I'm stupid?"

  I wait. He asks again, and I realize it's not a rhetorical question.

  "No, Cal."

  "Good. I know you hate all of those guys. I know that. I know you wanted us to hang at the comic book convention. And I wanted to go, too."

  "Then why didn't you?"

  "Because we had a game, " he says, like I'm a slow learner. "Dude, I made a commitment to my team, OK? That means something to me."

  What about your commitment to me? I want to ask.

  "And you'd been so distant for a while. I mean, I'd see you hanging out with that goth chick in the halls and stuff. I figured you wouldn't get all bent out of shape about the convention."

  He saw me with Kyra? He saw? The idea that Cal—super-stud, star athlete, ladies' man—would even be looking for me in the halls is like cold fusion: impossible, but exciting. I had no idea.

  "And then she came up to me the other day and she told me that you were stressing hard-core on this graphic novel that you wanted to show to Brian Michael Bendis. I couldn't believe it! I told her she was nuts because you would have told me about that."

  "I'm sorry," I tell him.

  "Man, don't worry about it. It just caught me by surprise is all. She told me to stay away for a little while, not to bug you, because you needed to focus. And I'm cool with that. So I left you alone."

  I can't believe it. Kyra was helping me. Just like she said all along. "Man, Cal, I don't know what ... I'm just really sorry, man. I'm really sorry this happened."

  He laughs. "Don't worry about it. Jeez, it's not the end of the world. Really. It's nothing. It's—It was just a fluke. We weren't on the same page is all. And you have such a chip on your shoulder about anyone who even goes near a sports team—"

  "Hey!" I have a chip on my shoulder? I'm the victim here, not them.

  "You do. I'm being honest with you. I think I get it, but you just reek of attitude, man."

  "It's mutual. They hate me."

  "Not really. Maybe once. But I defend you to those guys." He says it like it makes him a hero, like I've been waiting my whole life for SuperCal to step in and save me from the big, bad Jock Jerks.

  "That's not what I want."

  "What do you want?"

  I want you not to be their friends at all, I think but don't say. This is starting to sound like the teary scene in a bad romance movie.

  I sigh and stretch out my legs. My feet, still in my dress shoes, feel like they've been pounded with a meat tenderizer. "Look, this doesn't ... It doesn't matter, man. It's all over, OK? But why..." I drift off. Don 't ruin it. Don't.

  "Why what?"

  "Nothing."

  "Come on."

  "Nothing ."

  "Come on. "

  "Why did you call me about this?"

  "What do you mean?"

  "This lacrosse thing. You know I don't like those guys. Why did you call me?"

  He pauses, and there are infinities in the pause before he says:

  "Because you're my friend. "

  "Cal, can you hang on a second?"

  "Sure."

  I put the phone down and walk to the other side of the room, where I indulge myself in some quiet tears.

  Chapter Forty-Eight

  HERE'S THE THING: The rest of the lacrosse team is pissed that the guy who hacked the computer or faked the records got caught, forcing them to forfeit. But Cal is pissed that it happened at all. He doesn't understand why his teammates aren't angry about it, that no one acknowledges that it's wrong. It's a pretty cool scenario to use for Schemata, actually. As long as I change the names and the sport to keep from getting beat up.

  "It's like a criminal saying he should go free because no one should have caught him in the first place," Cal says. "It's just wrong. You get that."

  "Uh-huh."

  "So, tell me about the convention."

  No. Not yet. Just not yet. In person, maybe.

  "Nah. Nothing happened."

  "Something had to happen."

  Yeah, Kyra flashed Bendis. Much to my surprise, I giggle at this.

  "See? Something happened."

  "Well, this guy was selling Giant-Size X-Men #1."

  "Yeah?" He sounds excited. "How much?"

  "Too much. But I got to hold it. That was cool."

  "You know, they've reprinted that all over the place—"

  "I know. But I want t
he original of this one. I guess..."

  "Because it's the one that your dad doesn't have."

  I think about that for a minute. "Yeah, maybe."

  "So, we both had bad days."

  He doesn't know the half of it. Not yet. "Yep."

  "I have an idea to make it better."

  "Yeah?"

  "Yeah. It means you'll have to do something you've never done before."

  That doesn't necessarily narrow it down. There are entire encyclopedias of things I've never done. "Like what?"

  "Do you trust me?"

  "Yeah."

  "Good. Tell your mom you're staying at my house tonight."

  Chapter Forty-Nine

  MY BEST INSTINCTS TO THE CONTRARY, I'm going to a party tonight. How do I get into these things?

  Forty-five minutes after I hang up the phone with Cal, I'm changing into jeans and a golf shirt and—thank God —a pair of sneaks. I ask Mom if I can spend the night at Cal's and she's all good with that. Her phobia about people visiting our house doesn't make her at all sensitive about me staying elsewhere, and she thinks Cal is a good influence on me, which is a joke considering he's smoked (hated it), drunk (got sick), and had sex (lucky bastard), while I'm as pure as the driven snow.

  "There's a party at Ves's," Cal told me over the phone before. "Everyone's getting together to shake off the lacrosse thing and have some fun."

  "You've got to be kidding me! I'm not going to Pete Vesentine's house!"

  "There's gonna be a million people there."

  "Forget it. I'm not going someplace where everyone hates me."

  "Did you not hear the 'million' part? There's going to be people from West Brook and some of the guys from last year's team..."

  "I won't know anyone."

  "Oh, for God's sake!" He was exasperated with me. "Which is it: Everyone there hates you or no one knows you? It can't be both."

  True.

  "I don't know."

  "Look, we won't stay long. We'll go, mingle a little bit, relax, try to forget about our crappy days, then go back to my house and chill out and you can tell me all about the show and this graphic novel, OK?"

  So, I gave in. Packed a bag, talked to Mom, and now I'm standing outside, waiting to be picked up, feeling—oddly—like I should be looking for one of Kyra's cars.

  Instead, a gray sedan pulls up. I hesitate, not sure if I should approach, thinking of scenes in movies where a guy is on stakeout or something and he goes up to a car with mysterious people in it and BANG! He's gunned down before the opening credits start.

  Cal rolls down a window. "Come on!"

  He opens the door for me and I hear him tell someone to "shove the hell over!" I get in. Even though I'm skinny, it's a tight fit as I close the door—how many of us are in the back seat, anyway?

  "Go," says Cal, and we're off.

  As my eyes adjust to the dark, I realize that I'm sitting behind Ronnie Warshaw, who's riding shotgun. Mike Lorenz is driving and Jason Benatovech is sitting on the other side of Cal.

  Oh, God. This is hell. It's like my own personal Rogues Gallery. It's like Batman going into Arkham Asylum alone, unarmed, and needing to pee really bad.

  "What's the bag for?" Warshaw asks, tittering as he twists to look at me from the front seat. I feel like a little old lady with my overnight bag perched on my lap, my shoulder crushed against the door.

  I don't know what to say, so I go into ignore mode, as always. Just ignore him. He'll go away. Only he won't because we're in a car. Kyra would know what to do. She'd zing him. Or light his pants on fire. Something.

  "Shut up, Warshaw," Cal says. "He's staying at my house tonight."

  I wait for a gay joke, something about Cal and me sleeping together, but it doesn't come. Of course not. They wouldn't say that about Cal.

  "He needs a bag for that?" Warshaw sneers, as if an overnight bag is some sort of sign of weakness.

  "Yeah, because he actually changes his underwear, Ronnie."

  Lorenz and Benatovech both howl with laughter. Warshaw shrugs and turns to face front again, mumbling, "Whatever," but now the others won't let it go. Lorenz chimes in with, "Yeah, Ronnie, at least he swaps out his skivvies. How long you been wearing those briefs?"

  "How long?" Benatovech asks, laughing. "They started out as boxers! "

  I can't believe it. I just sit there, silent, as three of my tormentors gang up on a fourth. It's like I'm a diver who's been saved from a shark by other sharks.

  "—smells so bad," Lorenz is saying, "that his zipper has a hazard alarm hooked up to it!"

  More howls. Wow. The pecking order doesn't just peck me. Cool.

  Chapter Fifty

  PETE VESENTINE'S HOUSE IS LIKE something out of an old sitcom, if you imagine the sitcom colliding with a vice raid. Picture-perfect furniture, walls that aren't painted the white that came with the house, wallpaper borders, molding. All the stuff Mom keeps threatening to do but never does.

  If I didn't know better, I'd say every student at South Brook is here, crammed into the living room, mostly. The lights are down so low that you almost have to feel your way around. Maybe that's the point. There's an array of gyrating bodies, moving as if in spasm. This is supposed to be fun?

  I waste a moment scanning the crowd for Kyra. The idea that she would be at a party like this is such a ridiculous notion that I feel like an imbecile for even considering it. Then again, I shouldn't be here, either, so there's precedent.

  But she's not here. Not in the living room, at least.

  I wish I'd brought along a notepad or a sketchbook or a camera. This is great research for Schemata. I can see a whole scene like this, a party, maybe Courteney comes to find one of her students ... I don't know. But this is what kids my age do, apparently, so if nothing else it's good to be exposed to it. It'll add some good details to the story.

  The stereo is cranked up so loud that you don't hear the music so much as feel it through the soles of your feet, an endless repeating bass line. Vesentine himself cruises the house, jerking his head like a turkey, allegedly in time with the music, but as near as I can tell he's not keeping any kind of rhythm.

  "White man's dance," Cal says, smirking, and I feel like an honorary black kid for a minute.

  The place reeks of beer—it's like ten thousand Tonys decided to crack open brewskis all at once. Someone shoves a bottle into my hand and I stare at it in revulsion. I had beer once, a few years ago, on New Year's. My dad let me try some. I puked.

  But I figure if I hold the beer bottle, I'll look like I fit in and no one will pressure me about drinking.

  Cal's got a bottle, too, and I feel a flare of disappointment until I see that the liquid level in his hasn't budged either. He leans over to me. "If you really want to fool people, spill a little into the ficus over there every now and then."

  A horrifying thought occurs to me. "Is Frampton here?"

  Cal gives me the look he usually saves for when I try to do my bad 50 Cent impersonation. "Who?"

  "Mitchell Frampton?"

  "Oh, that burnout? Big blond doofus?"

  "Yeah."

  "No way, are you kidding? Ves can't stand him. No one can stand him. He's a total loser."

  No argument there.

  Someone shouts out, and then the music dips low, almost to silence, becoming a backbeat. Vesentine jumps up onto a table, pinwheels for balance, and then raises his beer bottle to hoots and hollers from the crowd. He launches into a long, slurred, invective-filled rant against the school system, the county, the head of the lacrosse program, and pretty much the rest of the planet. One word figures into his monologue repeatedly, used as noun, verb, adjective, and adverb, often in the same sentence.

  The crowd receives him like he's Caesar. Let me clarify: like he's Caesar at the beginning of the play.

  I look around for Cal to see his reaction to all this, but he's nowhere to be found. I'm alone in a sea of faces, some familiar, some unknown. Even the familiar ones are strange to me, remem
bered from hallway glimpses and not much else. There's almost no one from the sophomore class who isn't on the lacrosse team, but there's entire packs of juniors and seniors, roaming like confident soldiers, safe in numbers and age.

  No Kyra. I don't even realize that I'm looking for her again until the depression that she's not around hits me. I don't understand what happened at the convention. I don't understand why she even showed or why she did what she did. Was that supposed to help? Jeez, every time she shows off her breasts, bad things happen to me.

  "Yo!" A hand claps my shoulder and I almost collapse. "Need a beer?"

  I turn to the face of a stranger. He's grinning widely, his eyes slightly unfocused, his breath a tidal wave of alcohol.

  "Dude!" he says. "Dude, do you need a beer?"

  I have no idea who this guy is. I raise my beer bottle and he goggles at it as if discovering Troy. "Ex cellent!" He hugs me and staggers off. I am officially weirded out.

  Definitely using this in Schemata.

  I push through the crowd a little bit, finding the going tough in the dim light. Vesentine's monologue is over, having ended in a flourish of profanities linked by the occasional preposition, then a defiant roar from the crowd. The music comes back up and the walls start to vibrate. I try to figure out how to get through the crowd without rubbing against anyone the wrong way. In the end, I think it's probably impossible.

  I don't want to drink. I don't want to be here. I don't do stuff like this, stuff that's wrong. It's illegal to drink at my age. I shouldn't even be holding this beer. It's like I told Kyra: There's right and there's wrong. That's it.

  I manage to make my way through to a hallway, which is just as crowded as the living room. Girls are clustered with guys in couples up and down the corridor, kissing, grinding against each other. Like a porno with clothes on. I creep through. I just want some fresh air.

  I make it to Vesentine's kitchen, which is a riot of ice cubes, beer bottles, smashed bags of chips, and something greenish gray smeared down a cabinet. I don't want to know.

  I open the back door and go out onto a deck, into the cool night and blessed fresh air. At last! I breathe in deep, sigh in satisfaction, then lean against the railing and—after checking below—let my beer start to trickle out down to the ground.