Dramatically Ever After

by Isabel Bandeira

  She scrunched her nose, peering at me through thick lenses that made her blue eyes look huge. “Okay, I see that. But, really, if you guys didn’t already know each other, I’d be a little worried that you were paying attention to something like that.”

  “It’s impossible not to. Kris is a little like a bug bite— you can forget it’s there, but the second anything touches it, you’re itching like crazy.”

  She pressed her lips together, but the corners of her mouth still turned up slightly. “So, go scratch that itch.” After saying that, her grin escaped and she waggled her eyebrows suggestively.

  “Ew. No. My interest in Kris is purely competitive. I’ve seen too much of his seedy political underbelly. I’ll let you and everyone else swoon over him.”

  She gave me a wary look. “Okay.”

  “Trust me, you’ll see what I mean when he really gets going.”

  The rest of the morning, though, Kris just kept acting like he was on the campaign path instead of at a conference-competition. In a weird show of regional magnetism, all of the Midatlantic states seemed to clump together and we ended up in the same tour group along with Ann and the girl from Alaska. He’d charmed them all, flashing smiles and doing his whole “look people straight in the eye and pretend you care” act whenever anyone talked about anything. I knew his game was charm, throw the person off guard, and destroy, but I didn’t think he’d try that with over a hundred people. Apparently, I was wrong. By the time we reached Faneuil Hall, I was about ready to shake some snot into him. It was either that or arrange my own personal Boston Massacre right at the site of the original.

  Every ounce of annoyance flew out of me in a whoosh as we entered the Great Hall. Our tour guide barely had a chance to give a quick history lesson before we broke free and fanned out all over the room. We were speechwriters, political nerds, or history geeks and this place had enough history to suck in all groups. I made a beeline for the front of the room.

  “Susan B. Anthony and Frederick Douglass spoke here,” I said, sotto voce, as I made my way onto the stage and stared out at the other students milling about the hall. I closed my eyes and imagined the room like it had to have been over the centuries, packed with crowds waiting to hear fiery speeches from people trying to change the course of the country or argue for civil rights. I took a deep breath and tried to absorb some of the greatness that had to have soaked into the walls and floors of the building.

  My eyes shot open when the wooden floor of the stage vibrated as someone else came near.

  “And Samuel Adams. Speeches that changed our country’s history were made in this room.” Kris added as he stood right next to me. There was enough awe in his voice—as much as I knew had to be in mine—that, for once, I didn’t even mind the intrusion. “You know they’re going to have the awards ceremony here, right? Imagine how awesome it would be to get to read your speech on this stage.”

  “I am a vital component in the fight to ‘make the world better.’” My voice carried through the hall thanks to years of practice in theatre, but the one sentence got lost in the din of a room full dozens of conversations. Kris’ eyebrows drew together and he tilted his head, making me laugh. “That’s the first line of my speech. I’m surprised you didn’t read them all yet to scope out the competition.”

  His brows drew together for a second. “I don’t need to scope out anyone because I know my speech is awesome.” And the Kris I knew and despised was back, down to trying—and failing—to slick back his hair with one hand. “I know this isn’t your thing, but here’s a tip—these competitions are all about confidence, I’m confident I’m going to be up there again later this week. If you’re not confident with your speech, might as well drop out right now, because everyone else will run with that and crush you.” While I stood there trying to think up a retort, he tapped me on the arm with his rolled up tour brochure and jumped off the stage. “Later, Em.” With a wave of the brochure, he walked off to join some of the guys checking out a painting back by the entrance. Within a minute, a comment he made had the whole group breaking into laughter. Probably something about my speech.

  “Jerk.” I reined in the impulse to stomp off the stage in a Scarlett O’Hara-esque huff and instead channeled Grace Kelly, gliding over to another group checking out something on the completely opposite side of the hall. No use in letting him know how much he bugged me.

  “You’re wrong.” It wasn’t even day two of the conference and Kris and I were already at each other’s throats. The conference room was silent as a-hundred-plus sets of eyes focused smack-dab on the New Jersey section, all because Kris had jumped at the chance to tear me down the second I had opened my mouth about the latest presentation. “There are a ton of problems with voluntourism.” Kris shot my way, turning his chair to face me so he didn’t have to keep looking to the side.

  I didn’t let his stare unnerve me. “Stop calling it that,” I said, trying my best to keep my tone calm. “Everything has problems. But there are a lot of positives to volunteering in other countries, too.”

  “Students—” Ms. Shawnee looked like she was about to jump in and break us apart, but the presenter, who had just given us a presentation on international volunteer opportunities, was watching us with a smile on her face. When Kris and I both looked her way, she waved at us to continue.

  “Sorry, my mistake, I thought you wanted to help people,” he said, his tone bordering on sarcastic. “You’re talking about positives like sweeping in for a few weeks or a month to swing a hammer or play with kids and have great photos to post on Photogram while locals and full-time people from the organization waste time instructing each batch of volunteers how not to build a substandard building, right?”

  Now, I was fired up. I’d scooted my chair back so far that I was literally on the edge of my seat, practically on the verge of standing. “No, like being more aware of the problems in the world around us, empowering us to make change in the world, and building connections with people in other places.”

  “All while taking away jobs that would normally be paid? Instead of having some rich kid on spring break help build a school or something, the organizations can pay local workers. People’s lives aren’t your tickets to personal growth.” Kris’ eyes met mine and there was the littlest bit of amusement playing in them as he lobbied that last sentence my way.

  “Oh, please, not like you like the organizations, anyway, based on what you said when we talked about NGOs.”

  The presenter cleared her throat and said, “Remember, this is a place to share ideas, but they don’t have to be concrete. There are no perfect answers and we want to respect everyone’s point of view.”

  Kris nodded as if he had heard her, but never broke eye contact with me. “At least even those are more efficient when they’re staffed with locals. I’d rather fund them and, by supporting local labor and buying local goods, stimulate their economy while building or doing whatever they’d have volunteers doing, rather than fund someone’s feel-good self-discovery trip.”

  I curled my fingers under my chair to keep from getting up as heat wove its way up my neck. “And while you’re trying to find those goods and labor and organizing things, we’ll be delivering all the things we collected to people who really need them. Because, you know, you saw how well things went here in the US with organizations and government after Sandy and Katrina and the Baton Rouge floods, and I can keep going on. Even here, you need volunteers and donations if you want to help people right away when they actually need it.”

  “I never said volunteers weren’t important, but voluntourists are another breed.” He waved his hand dismissively. “Don’t even get me started on drives to collect stuff for disaster zones. We end up spending a fortune shipping crap that might not even be what people actually need, instead of buying from somewhere local. But, you know, filling drive boxes at school with old t-shirts and sneakers makes everyone feel better than intensive fundraising.”

  “But at least we’re
doing something instead of sitting on our asses and talking crap about helping others.”

  Ms. Shawnee stood up and cleared her throat. “And, I think we need to take a break. Em, Kris, remember, we want to keep the language a little more…G-rated in our debates, okay?”

  Kris smirked at me and I gave him one last glare before loosening my white-knuckled grip from my chair. At least I’d had the last word.

  “Alabama. I almost passed out when he said hi to me this morning. A face like that combined with that accent should be illegal,” the girl from Washington, Adrienne, said, fanning her face with her binder. Since the inn was made up of a row of historic homes tied together through knocked down walls, us girls had our own buildings, totally separate from the boys. We had gathered in the sitting room of our part of the inn, spread out all over the floor and antique furniture. One of the other girls had gotten a platter of cookies from the kitchen and it was already half-empty. While some of the other girls were comparing state facts and others were pulling a Phoebe and reading, the group of us closest to the fire had moved from rehashing the day to a debate on accents. And guys with accents.

  North Carolina made a face. “I don’t know what it is with everyone falling all over themselves when they hear a southern accent. I mean, yeah, of course I think it’s nice, but it’s not like we’re all southern belles and gentlemen or something.” As she spoke, I couldn’t help but try to tune my ear to the little details in the words that just sounded so gorgeously smooth. I could use that information in the future.

  “It beats all the other boring accents. Imagine someone who looks like him talking with a Shore Boyz accent?” Wisconsin chimed in, then looked over at me. “Sorry, Jersey.”

  “Apology accepted, cheesehead,” I said around a mouthful of cookie. I couldn’t resist a jab at her, though. “Dontcha know?”

  “Speaking of Jersey, what’s up with you and him? You two nearly tore each other’s heads off in the conference today. I thought Ms. Shawnee was going to explode when you got into the NGO debate.”

  I looked up from my spot on the hearth to see who asked the question and Colorado waved her cookie at me. I let out a puff of air and tried not to roll my eyes. “He’s a jerk and was trying to piss me off. It’s what Kris does best. Just ignore him.”

  “I don’t know,” Colorado continued, taking a bite of her cookie and saying with a verbal shrug, “he seems nice enough to me.”

  “Definitely nice. Super polite, too. And, ohmigosh, those eyes. He could just look at me and I’d be happy,” New York said from her spot on one of the footrests. The other girls were starting to sound like Phoebe back when she crushed on him, like they were totally blind to his many, many faults.

  Hawaii nodded. “He was at my table for dinner and I thought he was actually really sweet. He even switched places with Lee so she could see the speaker better.”

  “Does he have a girlfriend?” New York plopped down right next to me, holding out a cookie like it was some sort of bribe. “C’mon, spill. We don’t have inside info on any of the other guys here.”

  “This is supposed to be a competition and conference, not a dating service, but, no. Kris only loves Kris.” I may have taken the cookie anyway, but I wasn’t going to play Twenty Questions about the thorn in my side. “Can we please stop talking about him and maybe move on to Louisiana? Now, that’s some Southern goodness right there.” North Carolina let out an exasperated groan.

  “Seriously, Feebs, he’s doing this to mess with my mind.” I paced the tiny inn bathroom, phone held out so I could see my best friend’s reaction on its screen. Out in our room, Ann ran through scales at a demonic pace. “Like a speech competition freak-out mind trick or something.”

  Phoebe shook her head and let out a laugh. “I think you’re overreacting. I’m pretty sure Kris isn’t doing some diabolical evil-villain thing.”

  “Don’t laugh. I’m serious. He’s not acting like himself. It’s really weird.” Like this was his good twin or something. “And then, just when I think that maybe he’s too busy to bug me, he’ll just say something perfectly calculated to piss me off.”

  “Maybe you don’t know him as well as you think you do.”

  “Right. We’ve only been going to the same schools since first grade. No, really. I know he’s doing this all to trip me up so I lose this competition.” I glanced up at my reflection and twisted my nose at the Pebbles Flintstone-y way my little ponytail stuck up on top of my head. “But I have a plan.”

  The screen flipped around crazily and then settled on a blue-green bedspread and a pile of yarn before focusing again on Phoebe. “The last time you had a plan, it involved dressing me up and shoving me at guys.”

  “And now you’re dating Dev, so I was right, wasn’t I?” Without waiting for her to answer because I was right, I perched on the edge of the bathtub and twirled an invisible mustache. “So, I’m going to give him a taste of his own medicine.”

  “Em, really, I think you’re overreacting…” she began in her “I live in a world of fairytales where magical teapots and candlesticks talk to me and think everyone is nice” voice, but I cut her off.

  “I’m not going to do anything to hurt him or, like, kiss the judges’ asses until they like me and hate him. Actually, I’m going to be really, really nice to him.”

  Phoebe’s brows knit together in the same expression she got when we talked about things like music or pop culture. “And how is that…?” She trailed off then tried again after taking a deep breath. “Maybe I’m missing something, but that doesn’t make any sense.”

  “If Kris thinks pretending to be this nice guy will throw me off my game, let’s see what happens when I do the same to him and he’s exposed to the full power of my flirt. He’ll be so confused, he won’t know what to think. And then I’ll kick his ass in the competition.” I pretended to buff my nails on my shirt and looked at her triumphantly.

  “I don’t think that’s a good idea,” she said slowly.

  “Please. You know I’m an awesome actor. And it’s not like he’s not trying to do that to me. He said as much right outside MacKenzie’s office.”

  “Em—”

  “Fee,” I said, imitating her.

  She rolled her eyes at me and shook her head. “You shouldn’t mess around with other people’s emotions.”

  “Trust me, this will be fun.”

  “Trust me, you just have this weird perception of Kris as evil incarnate. He’s actually really nice with a little bit of an ego, that’s all.” She pursed her lips for a second, “Not like you’re any better on the ego end. ‘Awesome’ actor?”

  “It’s true, don’t deny it.” I pulled my hair out of the ponytail, fluffed it like those actresses in the forties, and smiled. “Plus, you’re so wrong about him. You still think of him like the book version of Liam, which he’s not.”

  “I do not.” She then giggled. “Liam’s taller and has a tattoo. I don’t know if Kris has one, but it would only make him hotter if he did.”

  She was kind of right, but I wasn’t going to let her know that. “Eww. I bet Dev wouldn’t be too happy to hear you say so.”

  “Whatever. Dev doesn’t have anything to worry about. But, speaking of boyfriends, I bet Wil isn’t too happy with your plan.” As much as I loved Phoebe, sometimes talking to her was like talking to my mom. The guilt part, not the hot guy part, because that would just be wrong on so many levels.

  “I haven’t been able to talk to him yet.”

  “You guys did make up already, right? From the way you were talking…”

  “Technically, no, but haven’t you been paying attention to his posts? He wants me to see how much he misses me.”

  Phoebe’s eyes narrowed in confusion. “He’s only posting in German, except when he’s tagging Alec in something.”

  I waved away her worries. “That’s what Translator is for. Trust me, we’re good.”

  “But you haven’t talked to him?”

  At her frown, I a
dded, before she could jump to any conclusions, “It’s really hard with the time difference.” The lie tasted bitter on my tongue, but I pushed it back with the guilt monster that had just jumped on my back. It wasn’t my fault he wouldn’t answer my calls. “I’m sure he’ll support me bringing Kris’ ego down a few pegs.”

  “Just…be careful,” Phoebe said softly. “You might be good at acting, but you’re too good a person to manipulate anyone.”

  “Thanks, Jiminy.”

  “Whatever, Pinocchio.”

  “Okay, let me get this straight: Your mom’s an ancient history professor so you like ancient history, you love US history, and you love classic movies?” Ann was cross-legged on her bed and had a pen and notebook out like she was ready to take notes. “That’s a millennia’s worth of things right there.” We’d changed into our pajamas and she still managed to look like she’d stepped out of Rivendell in her light-green tunic top and leggings.

  “No one said I had to confine the stuff I like to one specific century.” I fluffed my hair. “I simply have broad interests, dah-ling.” Compared to Ann’s perfect posture, I was sprawled on my stomach on top of my bed and had propped myself up on my elbows. My own pajamas were decidedly non-elvish plaid pants and an old long-sleeved Tee I’d stolen from Alec. “Your turn. What do you do when you’re not playing the flute or saving the world with all your volunteer work?”

  “You make it sound like the only thing I do is volunteer.”

  “And play flute,” I added, pointing at her flute and music stand with a grin.

  “I’m a black belt in aikido,” she said, smiling at my expression. “It’s in my bio, if you ever bother reading the binder they gave us.” I scrunched my nose at her, and she added, “Between that and orchestra and Scouting and Noelle’s Song and school, I don’t have a lot of free time.”