Troy High

by Shana Norris

  “WELL, IF IT ISN’T GREG THE SILENT.” I SLID INTO the booth Greg occupied at TJ’s.

  He looked startled to see me. “What are you doing here?”

  “I went by your house and your mom said you would be here.” I picked up the menu and scanned over the items I knew by memory. “I’m hungry anyway. I could use a cheeseburger.”

  “Actually,” Greg said, “I was just leaving.”

  I raised an eyebrow at him. “But you haven’t eaten yet. Have you ordered already?”

  “I’m not hungry,” Greg said. “I just came in here to get a glass of water. I’m headed to the library now. I have a really big project to research.”

  Yeah, I didn’t believe that for one minute. Why come all the way to TJ’s, which was three blocks farther from his house than the library, just for a glass of water?

  Something else was going on, and I wanted to know what it was.

  Greg stood and started putting on his jacket. I looked up at him and asked, “Are you trying to get rid of me?”

  Greg tried to look innocent. “Why would I be doing that?”

  “Why don’t you tell me?” I asked. “Since you’re the one trying to get rid of me.”

  “I’m not. I really have to go to the library. I have a huge history paper due next week.”

  I rolled my eyes. “Fine, whatever. Just stop freaking out.” I slid out of the booth and stood up next to him, so close that I could smell mints on his breath.

  “I’m not freaking out.”

  “You’re certainly acting really weird,” I said. “What’s gotten into—”

  “Hey, Greg,” said a voice behind us.

  I turned around and looked into the big green eyes of a tall, pretty brunette. Was this why Greg wanted me gone? Was he on a date?

  But then I noticed two other girls and a guy behind her.

  “Hey, guys,” Greg greeted them.

  “Are we early?” one of the other girls asked, pushing past me to slide into the booth. She carried a laptop that she set on the table and opened.

  Greg shook his head. “No, you’re right on time.”

  The first girl who had spoken, the brunette, stared hard at me. “Don’t I know you from somewhere?” she asked.

  I shook my head. “I don’t think so—”

  “She’s a Trojan,” the girl with the laptop said, her gaze still on the screen. “Cassie Prince, younger sister of Hunter and Perry Prince.” She looked at me, smiling at my look of surprise. “I make it my business to get to know all the key players on the enemy side.”

  They all glared at me, then at Greg.

  “Hanging out with the enemy?” the guy said.

  “Lay off it, Kevin,” Greg told him. “Cassie and I have been friends for years. She’s not part of this rivalry.”

  “Her brothers are the ones leading the attacks against us,” Kevin snapped. “She’s as much a part of it as any of us. And I have to say, Greg, it doesn’t look very good to have our class president being seen in public with a Trojan.”

  Greg stood straighter, holding his shoulders back as he stared Kevin down. “Are you going to do something about it? You’re class vice president, not president, remember?”

  Even though I worried a little that Kevin might do something, I had to admit that Greg looked really hot when he was defending my honor.

  “Come on, guys,” said laptop girl from her seat in the booth. “We have a lot of work to go over and I have to be home in an hour. Have your macho showdown some other time.”

  The guys stared at each other a moment longer, then Kevin slid into the booth with the other two girls sliding in next to him.

  “Tell Elena Argos that Spartans don’t forget people who betray them,” the brunette girl told me, her face twisted into a sneer.

  Greg grabbed my arm and steered me toward the door. “I’ll talk to you later, Cassie,” he told me.

  “Okay” was all I managed to say before he led me out the door and then returned to his student council friends.

  “We have to get them back,” Kelsey said, three days later, thumping her fist on Elena’s desk.

  We had gathered in Elena’s room after school. I laid on Elena’s white ruffled comforter, staring up at the ceiling where she’d stuck glow-in-the-dark stars.

  “It really bothers me that we haven’t done anything ourselves yet,” Kelsey went on. “Specifically targeting the cheerleaders, I mean.”

  “You’re right,” Mallory said. “We can’t let the guys fight our battle. And we can’t let the Spartan cheerleaders think they’re getting away with what they did.”

  The run-in with the Lacede student council still occupied my mind. How could people I’d never met before have so much animosity toward me? I hadn’t even had a chance to say something inadvertently insulting or rude to them. Just because I went to Troy, they automatically hated me?

  And why did Greg just push me out of the restaurant like that? Was he choosing them over me?

  A pillow landed on my face, startling me.

  “Stop zoning out and start offering some advice,” Elena said. “Any suggestions about what we can do to get the Spartan cheerleaders back?”

  I sighed loudly. “I have no idea. Freeze their bras?”

  “We’re not in sixth grade,” Mallory told me. “And how would we get access to their bras?”

  “Fine,” I snapped. “Don’t ask me for help if you don’t want to listen to me.”

  “What’s wrong with you?” Kelsey asked, shooting an annoyed look in my direction.

  “Nothing,” I said.

  Elena bounced onto the bed next to me, shaking me around. “Aw, come on, Cassie. You can tell us. We know something’s bothering you.”

  “Did you get a bad grade on that algebra quiz?” Kelsey asked, patting my knee. “That’s okay. I heard Ms. Jenkins always throws out the lowest quiz scores at the end of the semester.”

  “It’s not algebra,” I said. “It’s boys. Or one boy in particular.”

  A squeal multiplied by three nearly shattered my eardrums.

  “Tell us all about him,” Mallory said. “Do we know him?”

  “Well, um …” I wasn’t too eager to tell Mallory and Kelsey that my boy problem was about a Spartan.

  “You don’t know him; it’s a guy Cassie met a few summers ago,” Elena said quickly, jumping to my rescue. She must have guessed who the boy was. “What’s the problem?”

  I rolled over and buried my face in the comforter. “What isn’t the problem? I kissed him a month ago and he just hasn’t said anything about it. He’s been acting weird ever since then. I’ve pretty much taken the hint that he doesn’t want to be anything more than friends, but couldn’t he have the common courtesy to just be honest?” I sat up, punching one of Elena’s teddy bears. “He makes me so mad. He’s treating me like I’m nothing, like I don’t deserve respect.”

  “Okay, first of all, stop punching my bears.” Elena snatched the teddy bear away from me. “Second, if he’s acting like that, he’s not worth your time.”

  Mallory and Kelsey nodded.

  “She’s right,” Mallory said. “There are tons of other guys out there, and if this one doesn’t know how to treat you right, find someone who does.”

  I let out a long sigh. “But what if I don’t want someone else?”

  “Then you have to decide how much this heartache is worth to you,” Elena said. “If you don’t like the way he’s treating you, you have to stand up for yourself. Make him see you as someone who deserves respect and honesty. And then let him know exactly how you feel. Tell him that you’re not happy being just friends and if he doesn’t want more than that, you can’t be his friend anymore.”

  “I’m afraid to lose him,” I said softly. The thought of not having Greg around, not being able to tell him anything or spend hours playing video games with him, hurt deep inside. Yeah, I had a huge crush on him and wanted to kiss him, but most of all I wanted to keep our friendship.

  “
You have to take a chance sometimes for the person you love,” Elena said. “Sometimes you just know that a huge risk is worth it.”

  Was that how she saw Perry? Was he the person who she felt was worth the risk, worth all the trouble that she had caused, just to be with him?

  For the first time, I saw Elena and Perry’s relationship not as something that was done just to spite Lucas or to start a war between our schools, but as a connection between two people who truly wanted to be together. I almost felt, well, as if I respected Elena for taking the chance despite everything.

  I smiled at her. “Thanks,” I said.

  She smiled back. “No problem. That’s what friends are for.”

  Elena sat back, looking at the three of us. “Now,” she said, “what are we going to do about those cheerleaders?”

  “ARE YOU SURE YOU REALLY WANT ME HERE?” I stood on Greg’s front porch, my arms crossed over my chest as if to keep Greg at a distance from me.

  “Of course I want you here,” Greg said, giving me a confused look. “Why would I have called and invited you over if I didn’t want you here?”

  I shrugged. “I don’t know, but you couldn’t seem to get rid of me fast enough last weekend at TJ’s. You know, when all of your other friends showed up.”

  Okay, so I still felt mad about him choosing the Spartans over me. I realized it was silly and that Greg had every right to hang out with people other than me, but still it hurt to be rejected and pushed aside like that. So what if Greg already had an arranged meeting with those Spartans? He could have told them to get lost and spent the day with me.

  Well, if he even wanted to spend the day with me.

  “It was a student council meeting,” Greg told me, running a hand through his dark hair. A big clump of hair stayed sticking up from the right side of his head. I had to fight hard to keep myself from reaching out and smoothing it down. “We had to discuss fund-raising ideas for this year. I wasn’t trying to kick you out.”

  “Yes, you were,” I said.

  Greg sighed. “Fine. Yes, I wanted to kick you out before they got there. But only because I didn’t want things to be uncomfortable for you. You know, one Trojan faced with a bunch of Spartans? I thought it would be better if they didn’t see you so that they wouldn’t have a chance to make any mean comments.”

  Why did he have to go and make it hard for me to be mad at him? Things would be so much simpler if I could just go on venting my anger and not feel ridiculous for getting upset over a stupid incident.

  “Well,” I said, raising my chin and trying to look as if I were doing Greg a favor by being in his presence, “I suppose I can forgive you then. Just this once.”

  “Thanks so much for the honor,” Greg said, giving me a lopsided grin. “Now, are you coming in or not? I’ve got the game all set up. And there’s pizza.”

  “You should have said the word ‘pizza’ five minutes ago,” I said, pushing past Greg as I stepped into the house. I followed the delicious cheese-and-tomato smell to the den, where the Martial Battle 2 Select a Character screen filled the TV screen and a large pizza with everything sat steaming on the coffee table.

  “Extra mushrooms just for you,” Greg said, handing me a plate as we sat down.

  “You hate mushrooms,” I reminded him.

  Greg shrugged and took a big bite of his slice. “I’ll deal with it.”

  For a long time, we ate pizza and played the game like we always did, laughing and taunting each other. It felt like everything that had happened in the last few weeks was just a dream. That I had never kissed Greg and messed things up. That our brothers weren’t engaged in battle against each other. It was just Greg and me, like it had always been.

  “You are dead meat,” Greg said as his fighter lunged at mine on the screen.

  “I don’t think so,” I told him, laughing as my fighter teleported out of reach.

  We played four matches in a row and were tied when Lucas wandered into the room.

  “I thought I smelled something in here,” Lucas said, sneering at me.

  Greg’s expression grew stony. “Lucas, don’t even start.”

  “Relax, little brother. I meant the pizza.” But he sneered at me again before reaching over and stealing a slice.

  “Ugh,” Lucas said, settling down into the armchair and propping his feet up on the coffee table next to my can of soda. “Who put all these mushrooms on here?”

  “Cassie likes them,” Greg said.

  “Oh, of course. I forgot. Anything Cassie wants. You know what I call that, little brother? Whipped. This Trojan has you wrapped around her little finger.”

  I glared at Lucas, but he ignored me as he stuffed half of the pizza slice in his mouth.

  “If you’re going to talk like that, you can go back to your room,” Greg said. “No one invited you in here.”

  “Fine,” Lucas said, rolling his eyes. “I’ll keep my mouth shut so that I don’t offend your Trojan girlfriend.” Every time he said “Trojan,” he emphasized the word like it was an insult.

  I would never understand how Greg and Lucas could actually be brothers and share the same genes. But then, I didn’t understand how I could possibly have the same genes as Perry and Hunter.

  Lucas kept his word and stayed silent while Greg and I continued to play. Greg’s focus didn’t seem to be entirely on the game anymore now that Lucas was in the room and so I easily beat him three times in a row.

  At the end of the last match, when the game declared me the winner again, Greg stood up. “I need another soda,” he said. “Cassie, you need anything?”

  I shook my head. “I’m good.”

  “I’ll take a Coke,” Lucas said.

  Greg scowled at his brother. “Get it yourself,” he said before leaving the room.

  As soon as Greg had disappeared, Lucas jumped up from the chair and lunged toward me. I thought for a moment that I might have to attempt some of the moves my dancing-lady character did in the game to fend him off, but thankfully, Lucas came to a stop in front of me. Then he dropped to his knees so that we were eye level with each other.

  “Cassie,” he said in strange voice, “I need you to help me with Elena.”

  I blinked at him. “Help you do what with Elena?”

  “Win her back,” he said.

  Why did everyone think I was the expert on winning over Elena Argos? And what exactly was it that made both my brother and Lucas Mennon completely lose their minds over her? More important, how could I possibly get my hands on whatever it was that made boys go crazy so that I could use it on Greg?

  “Sorry,” I said, “but I think Elena has moved on.”

  Lucas grabbed my hands in his, moving so quickly I didn’t have time to react. “Cassie, please. I don’t know who else to talk to about this. Elena won’t answer my calls or texts. I can’t stop thinking about her. She means everything to me.”

  I pulled my hands from his grasp. “You probably should have told her that back when she was still with you. You two always fought. I never heard you say one nice word to each other.”

  “We did,” Lucas protested. “You just didn’t see it. Elena and I really loved each other.”

  He had completely gone off the deep end. “Lucas, get a grip,” I said. “Elena has a new boyfriend. Move on.”

  Lucas’s expression changed suddenly and he glared at me. “This whole thing is her fault.” His voice rose and his neck turned red. “If she had just stayed with me instead of running off with some Trojan, our schools wouldn’t be having this war. It’s her fault, Cassie, and your brother’s. And yours, too. I know you helped them get together. Don’t you want this war to end? It’ll all be over if you help me get Elena back—”

  “What’s going on?” Greg asked as he came back into the room. He looked between Lucas and me, raising his eyebrows. “Cassie, you okay?”

  “Of course she is,” Lucas said, standing up and sounding like his usual self. “We were just having a chat.”

  Greg
looked at me. “Cassie?”

  I smiled and nodded. “Everything’s fine. Lucas and I were just talking, like he said. I gave him tips on how to beat you in Martial Battle 2.”

  Greg didn’t look like he believed us, but he didn’t ask any more questions. Lucas let out a loud burp and said, “Well, I’m stuffed. I’m going to bed.”

  I watched Lucas leave the room, still not quite believing what had just happened. That was too weird. Lucas had never asked me to do anything for him before and now he wanted me to help him steal Elena back from my own brother?

  Although … maybe it wouldn’t be such a bad idea. If Elena and Lucas got back together, Lucas would forget this war on Perry and then everything could go back to normal. But would I be the worst sister ever if I even considered helping get Elena back with Lucas?

  “It’s getting dark,” Greg said, glancing out the window at the darkening sky. “I’ll ride to your house with you to make sure you get there okay.”

  “Who’s going to make sure you get back home okay then?” I asked.

  Greg puffed out his chest. “I can take care of myself.”

  “And I can’t?” I asked. “What do you think I am, some defenseless little girl?”

  “Sorry,” Greg said, rolling his eyes. “I didn’t mean to offend you. What I meant to say was, let me ride home with you so that I can protect innocent pedestrians from making the mistake of thinking that they could easily overpower a ninja disguised as a five-foot-tall, one-hundred-pound girl.”

  “Don’t make me remind you that in the race for ultimate Martial Battle 2 champion, I am so kicking your butt,” I said as I followed Greg outside to get our bikes.

  It secretly thrilled me that Greg wanted to spend extra time with me by riding all the way to my house. Guys didn’t do that for girls that they didn’t like, right? And even though I knew Greg liked me only as a friend for now, I still hoped that maybe somewhere deep down inside there might be just a tiny spark of “romantic like” waiting to come out. Hopefully sometime before college, or else I might go completely insane trying to figure this romance thing out.