by Nessa Morgan
“How are you, Joey?” That throws me for a loop and I nearly choke on my mushy chunk of apple. His eyes are set to mine, staring into them as if he’s trying to discover some deep secret to seek access to the temple.
Fat chance, buddy.
I know this is random, but I really want him to be chased by a giant boulder. Downhill. And the boulder crosses the finish line first. With a little Ryder imprint. My macabre thoughts and interest in Indiana Jones makes me smile.
“Amazed,” I grumble with a full mouth, better to try and gross him out as I ask him, “and yourself?” I stare at him, hoping he caught my comment. His blue eyes are blank and show no understanding. Just great.
Why is sarcasm lost upon the weak minded?
He’s fine, he tells me, and that lands us in familiar territory: the awkward silence. That lull in the conversation that seems to take five hours to overcome rather than the realistic thirty seconds. I just want to walk away—because it would be rude and interesting—but I fight the overwhelming urge. The thought brings a small smile to my lips, imagining leaving him with Kennie and Harley; Kennie smiling like a mad woman because she’s so happy that Ryder is talking to me and Harley glaring as if she was staring at something both amazing and disgusting, mostly agreeing with the latter.
However, I don’t. I, for some unknown reason, stick it out five awkward, silent minutes, while my friends continue to stare at the wreck that he’s creating at the moment by being here.
“So, Joey, I was thinking—” Ryder begins. I open my mouth to cut him off with, Good for you, I didn’t know that brains worked beneath that shiny, blonde head of yours, but someone with impeccable timing beats me to it.
“Joey, let’s talk.” Zephyr slides onto the bench next to me. He’s so close that I can smell his cologne—I think he wears cologne. Whatever it is, it’s familiar and it makes me smile, briefly. I stop myself when I realize how close he is and that he’d know I was happy to see him. Don’t want him thinking that, now. His chocolate eyes glance toward Ryder, his eyes silently asking for a challenge, and I think I see something else in his stare… jealousy? But it’s gone before I can correctly identify it.
I roll my eyes dramatically. Looking across the table. Kennie is watching the three of us with wide eyes and… fear? I think fear. Why the girl is scared, I couldn’t answer. Harley’s smirking, waiting for someone to throw a punch. I need to tell her that it might be me; I might start swinging—any second, now.
Annoyed with the two boys surrounding me, I start with, “What do you want, Zephyr?” Asking through clenched teeth—a sure sign of my growing anger. Soon, I’ll pass angry and hit infuriated going full speed.
“To talk to you,” he whispers, close enough that I can finally decide that yes, he is wearing cologne. Very delicious cologne that makes my mouth water, I might add.
Damn! Where the hell did that come from?
Brain, focus.
The thought to tell him that he’s had plenty of opportunities to talk to me throughout the morning, plenty of moments when he could have grabbed my arm, pulled me aside, and gotten my attention, but he passed them all by. I don’t. I ignore it and stare out the window through the tiny space between my two friends’ heads. I don’t want to see the looks on their faces; I can’t even begin to fathom what they must be thinking.
Actually, I can.
Harley, being as great as she is, probably wants to injure both Zephyr and Ryder—just like me—while Kennie, who’s still a sweetheart with a thriving library, the typical hopeless romantic, might think this is straight from a romance novel.
There is no romance here and this is my life, not a Jane Austen novel.
Instead, I stand up, dragging my backpack with me, ignoring everyone’s loud protests, and I flee to my only safe haven within the constricting walls of the school. It’s easy to find me but no one does, no one searches for me, no one chases after me, and I’m happy about that. The librarian smiles at me as I run into the book-filled room seeking solace between the stacks, she’s so used to seeing me at random times during the day. I heard toward a few well-worn recliner chairs sitting against the wall behind the classics section. I quickly plop into my usual seat and wait for the bell ending lunch as I pass the time by trying to decipher the words of Beowulf.
Lunch ends too quickly, leaving me with a half finished homework assignment, and I go through the rest of my day in a hazy fog. A thick fog that no one can penetrate because I’m just so angry about lunch; angry with Ryder for thinking that just because he is who he is, that I would instantly fall into his arms, and angry with Zephyr for being a dickhead.
How can Ryder ‘Pretty Boy’ Harrison just swoop to my section of the cafeteria and pretend that he finally sees me as an acceptable person to be with, spend time with, be around? It doesn’t make sense to me, not when I explain it to myself, not when I just think about it. And I don’t want it to happen, regardless of the outcome.
I’m not his type.
And Zephyr. What the hell is his deal—pardon my French. If he’s truly upset with me, or downright angry, then why try and save me from Ryder? He doesn’t make sense. This entire situation doesn’t make any sense and I just want to go home and hide in my closet next to my old books, beneath my clothes, surrounded with all the stuffed animals I’m too cool to have still.
After the last bell signals the end of the day, I’m walking to my locker, quickly avoiding the glares of the people that still aren’t comfortable being around me. Lucky for me, I don’t hear anyone conspicuously cough freak as I pass—yeah, like I never heard that before. Maybe they’ve outgrown that by now. An unusually large form catches my eye as I near my locker. Ryder is waiting for me, planted against my locker, blocking me. Why the hell is he here? Can’t he just move on to some idiotic bimbo with Daddy issues by now? And, just for clarification, I’m not an idiot bimbo. But I can’t pretend that I didn’t see him and I can’t just turn around and walk away; I need most of my books for homework. He shuffles to the side, fixing his baseball cap—which, ironically, has a football logo on the front—as I twirl and turn my lock to open the metal door. He is patiently waiting for me to acknowledge his presence.
I won’t.
“Hey,” he finally says, understanding that I don’t want to talk to him or be near him. You know, I just don’t want to do anything with him, really. I can feel his eyes slowly glide over my body—like his eyes are undressing me—as if he’s selecting cattle to slaughter.
Um, ew.
“Hello,” I mutter, angrily twisting and turning the dial on my locker. It opens—I’m too aggressive, a byproduct of my anger, so the door slams back emitting a loud metal clang that echoes in the emptying hall—revealing a mountain of books hidden inside. Ryder peeks inside the small metal space, viewing the world I’ve created for myself here: books, a calendar with future tests and school appointments inked inside the boxes, no pictures, no magnets, no mirror. Pretty plain, pretty basic, pretty boring, but still me.
I’m not the type for glitz and glamour, if you couldn’t tell.
Tugging the books from the shelf, his hands shoot out, reaching for the books in my grip. “Let me,” he offers kindly, but obviously showing off his muscles, as he piles the textbooks into his arms, nearly shoving me away from my own locker.
“I can manage,” I snap angrily, reaching to take my textbooks back. I’ve never let anyone do anything for me. The thought of someone thinking that I’m weak and incapable of doing basic tasks infuriates me. I understand the whole chivalry thing, but we’re not dating and he doesn’t need to treat me as if I’m on a pedestal. I can manage on my own just nicely; I’ve been doing it for the past two years just fine, thank you very much.
He still doesn’t relent.
“I know you can.” He angles his body away so I can’t reach him and I can’t take back the books piling in his arms. “But I just want to help you out, okay?” Ryder seems sincere. It could be false. I’m not that trusting of people like
him. I’ve been burned too many times to count. Still, after a few moments of argument inside my head, I let him hold my books just so he can feel what it’s like to take an AP class before I try to cram them into my backpack.
“What do you want, Ryder?” I ask once I zip close my bag, slinging my pack onto my back and slamming my locker shut to lean against it with my shoulder. He shakes his curly blonde locks from his blue eyes in that annoying way that makes the girls swoon, faint, and gasp.
Um, ew… again.
“To get to know you, Jo,” he says matter-of-fact, like I’m an idiot for wondering, for asking why he’s standing in front of me, blocking my exit. His smile lights up his face, illuminating his blue eyes, which I’ll admit, are pretty perfect, but I will never let him know that. Not after what he just called me.
I could slap him for that. In fact, my hand twitches with the urge.
Strike one against him: He called me Jo. Only Zephyr calls me that.
I hold up a finger. Not that finger. “First thing you should know,” I begin, my other hand gripping the strap to my bag. “It’s Joey.” I don’t add the Idiot but I strongly hope that it’s implied.
“Sorry,” he says quietly, correcting himself. “Joey.” His lips wrap around my name, his tongue almost tasting the word as it leaves his mouth smoothly, even seductively. The look on his face, the glint of his eyes, would make me think that he loved the taste and would want, and do anything for, seconds. Holy balls, that is never going to happen, dude. He smiles against, maybe thinking that his smile has some dreamy effect on me like it does on all the other girls in the school. It doesn’t. I’m not a mindless drone wandering around hoping that one day I’ll attract the attention of the hottest guy in school. In this case, Ryder. God, someone gag me with a spoon. “I was thinking that I could take you out, get to know you over dinner, maybe?” His hand reaches out to play with the buckle on my backpack strap and I back up, moving out of his reach.
“Nope.” That is my final answer, dude. With that said, I start walking, heading toward the music hall to grab my violin from the storage room before making my way to the parking lot, leaving Ryder to watch me walk away. Just like lunch.
Only, he didn’t watch me leave this time. Damn. He decides to get in on the action and chase me down like they do in the stupid movies. Those stupid movies that I never like to watch.
“Joey, wait!” He calls after me, his voice getting closer with every syllable. Ryder must be running to catch up with me.
Damn it. I don’t like that, like, I’m not a fan of that in the slightest. I know that a lot of girls might like the thought of a guy chasing after them; I am not one of them.
I don’t. Wait, that is. I don’t wait for him, in fact, my speed increases.
Thankfully, the crowd of students in the front of courtyard is thick enough that I can dodge him easily. I slide into the passenger seat of Jamie’s car, spotting Zephyr lounging in the backseat, and beg her to speed out of the parking lot. Her tires squeal on the asphalt as she literally stomps on the gas. Zephyr still doesn’t speak to me and I’m stuck listening to Jamie ramble on about Marcus and their plans for later tonight. I love her, but there are other things on this planet to discuss other than Marcus Heatherton. The following morning, Zephyr doesn’t even stop by my house like normal. Jamie tells me that he’s in the shower.
“He had a late start this morning,” Jamie says as she drops two slices of bread into the toaster, her head practically in the clouds as she talks to me. Jamie doesn’t even notice when I roll my eyes. “He said that he’ll be ready by the time we leave.”
Of course, he will.
Zephyr is still avoiding me. Well, as best he can when his sister drives us both to school. Late start, my ass. He needs to work on his ability to lie. Even if I can’t see him.
As she said, he’s sitting in the car—the back seat again—when we leave for school. Zephyr doesn’t say much in the car, but he does smile at me when I look back at him. A little relieved, because it’s more than I received from him since two nights ago, I return it, but that’s it. In class, we both take notes studiously, only focusing on the teacher’s discussion on the focus of the start of World War I and what he writes on the board rather than each other.
However, I think that he’ll actually talk to me today.
I’m tempted to test this theory of mine, but don’t want to start whispering to him, so I debate my next option: Hangman. Zephyr and I used to love playing hangman when we were kids–I still do—when it was raining outside—which was a lot back then—and his parents wouldn’t let us play in the collecting puddles for fear that we’d track mud in the house or catch pneumonia. So we’d just sit and think up random words and phrases, starting games of hangman that would go for hours because his hangmen were elaborately drawn, even as a kid, and my words were too long, but correctly spelled.
I always won but his drawing of the hanging man were always too realistic, his parents made us stop playing after a while when they saw how descriptive the hangmen got. He got red markers in various shades, that is how detailed he got—the blood oozed.
Apparently, he has the same idea or he can read my mind. He might even be remembering the same moment, because he slides over a sheet of paper with a pristinely drawn one-person gallows—with far too much detail, I’m talking about the grain of the wood—and six groups of lines. As I start every game, I guess A followed by the remaining vowels, and that includes Y for me to cover all bases. He draws a head, E is wrong. My next guesses are R and S, he fills in six blanks and after a few minutes of speculation, I fill in the rest.
SORRY I AM SUCH AN ASS stares at me from the page.
I turn my gaze to him, ignoring the lecture at the front of the room, and shrug my shoulders, my way of telling him it’s okay, even though it wasn’t at the time, before I go back to my notes. We still need to talk about it. I really want to know why he was being such an ass to me.
Class ends, the bell ringing loudly overhead, but Zephyr takes his time today, slowly placing everything in his backpack, unlike yesterday when he just carried everything to his next class to speed his escape.
“Wanna study for the quiz together tonight?” Zephyr asks. It’s the first quiz of the class tomorrow, and I know that Zephyr’ll need help. From a random glance or two, I can tell that his notes aren’t as specific as mine.
Wait a minute, he isn’t just making up with me so he won’t fail the quiz tomorrow, is he? Hmmm…
Nope, I squash the idea before it can take root; Zephyr isn’t that big of an ass.
“Sure,” I tell him, remembering my appointment after school today. “I have something to do after school but I’ll text you when I get home,” I promise him. Then we’re off to our next classes.
Calculus goes by without incident, like normal, only I ace the random pop quiz about last night’s homework. I’m smart enough to actually do the homework. In gym, we play dodgeball, my team wins by collecting the entirety of the opposing team. Lucky me, I was on the same side as Zephyr and the rest of the football players. In AP Chemistry, someone set their tabletop on fire. By lunch, the entire school knows who did it and will not stop pointing and laughing at Gerard Matthews when he passes in the hall. They mostly do it because his face turns an odd bright pink akin to a sunset in the summer.
Harley slides into the seat across from me—my seat yesterday—and rolls an apple my way. I thank her before taking a large bite, feeling the juice run down my chin. That’s when Kennie shows up, taking the seat next to me. She smells like lavender, floral and heavenly, with a flip of her hair, the scent is drowned out by strawberry and vanilla, her shampoo. I’m still sniffing the air as I use the sleeve of my sweatshirt to wipe up the juice running down my chin.
She leans close to me, asking, “Is it true that Gerard Matthews set his table on fire in your chem class?” She’s trying to soak up every bit of juicy gossip she can. Anything that she can share at cheer practice later in the afternoon will work ju
st fine, whether it’s arson or some person accidentally ripping their pants while at their locker. It’s all the same to her.
I nod, my mouth too full of apple to speak. I was raised not to speak with my mouth full.
“How funny was it?” Her thrice-pierced ears are eager for information and her mind is eager for a descriptive visual.
I think of the fire—the flames licking higher and higher toward the ceiling, the sight of Gerard Matthews and his chemistry partner, Lacey Gallagher, screaming and bolting for the door, Gerard shoving her to the side so he can seek the safety of the empty hall. We, as a class, watched the fire instantly devour their paperwork before someone, who paid attention to the safety demonstration not even two weeks ago, calmly grabbed the fire extinguisher from the back of the room, and put out the fire. They lost all their data from the past week and a half but gained a hilarious reputation, especially Gerard.
I still answer truthfully because honesty is the best policy.
“Hilarious.” No one was hurt, that’s the good thing, the fire was quickly extinguished, the school is still standing, we’re all still alive, but watching Gerard run, scream, and manhandle his way through the door was a sight I’ll never forget. I wonder if anyone got that on video, and if so, will they upload it to YouTube? I make a mental note to check that later.
We spend the rest of lunch laughing, actual gut-clutching laughter, laughing so hard that we cry, like we used to do. Kennie relayed a story about last night’s cheer practice when the entire squad, not steady on their hands, collapsed on top of Alexia Cavanaugh. Someone, as in Kennie, took a video showing Alexia’s dyed-blonde head bouncing up and down as she screamed and demanded for someone to help her up. That kept us laughing long after the bell rang, leaving all three of us late for our respective classes. Before long, classes were over and I was home digging the keys from the bowl and driving to Dr. Jett’s office for our session.
***
Dr. Jett, in her stone gray designer pantsuit—that isn’t all that flattering on unusually tiny her, is waiting for me when I enter the lobby. That’s new, I think to myself, biting my tongue so the words don’t escape my closed lips. She walks with me, more like following behind me, to her beige office at the end of the hall and we take our usual seats once she flips the In Session tag and closes the door.