by Jody Gehrman
“I guess Mr. Sands dictates your reading list now?”
“It’s not that good.” I decided to sidestep the topic of Mr. Sands. “I don’t quite get why it’s such a classic.”
Ben nodded. He opened his mouth to say something, but stopped.
“What?” I laughed. “Say it.”
“No, I just . . .” He hesitated again, then plowed ahead. “What do you think of Mr. Sands, anyway?”
I glanced over at Amber quickly, but she was lost in the Land of iPod. I didn’t really know how to answer Ben. I could hardly say I found our English teacher unspeakably hot, could I? On the other hand, should I out-and-out lie just to save his feelings? I decided to take the path of least resistance: understatement.
“He’s cool.”
Ben flashed me a disturbingly knowing grin.
“What?” I demanded.
“Nothing. It’s just that sometimes, when you say so little, your face says so much.”
I sat up, pushing the book aside. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Don’t be mad! Just don’t ever go into politics or poker.”
“Ha-ha,” I said dryly.
PJ tore himself away from the sight of George chewing something majorly repulsive—an earthworm, I think. “You two having a little tiff?”
We both answered simultaneously—I said no and Ben said yes. He was still grinning, though.
“What’s the matter, Ben? She reverting to her man-hating ways?”
I snorted. “I’m not a man-hater, okay? I never was.”
“No, you’re no hater,” Ben teased. “I think Mr. Sands has transformed you.”
Amber yanked her earbuds out and popped up onto her elbows. “What are you guys talking about?”
“Mr. Sands,” PJ grumbled. “Man, that guy’s making it hard on the rest of us.”
Ben was still looking at me in that I-know-all-your-secrets way. It made me incredibly nervous. Why can’t I be like Sophie De Luca—artful and mysterious—instead of walking around exposed all the time, like a great big plucked chicken?
“Mr. Sands,” Amber said, “will soon be off the market, so don’t even stress.”
“Don’t tell Geena that.” Ben’s eyes twinkled. “You’ll break her heart.”
Amber flopped back down on her makeshift pillow. “Yeah, right. As if G ever looks at anyone besides you.”
Ben leaned over and kissed me then—gently, teasingly. As usual, it stirred in me a powerful mixture of self-consciousness and white-hot lust.
“Okay, okay,” PJ complained. “Get a room.”
Ben’s lips murmured against my jaw, “Don’t ditch me for Dr. Hipster.”
That made me laugh. I pushed him away and shoved Kerouac into my bag. “Don’t worry. The only thing I want from ‘Dr. Hipster’ is an A.”
Inside, though, I couldn’t help but wonder if Ben already knew more than he should.
Saturday, January 17
11:45 P.M.
This afternoon was the grand opening for Floating World Tattoo. Amber’s got a job there a couple afternoons a week, which luckily won’t eclipse her other calling, slinging coffee with me at TSB. Her plans for world domination involve branding the youth of America with manga-inspired nymphs, gargoyles, fairies, and other fantastic confections of the mind. I don’t really get it, but she’s wanted to be a tattoo artist since she was eight or something, so it’s good she can apprentice there. At least she knows what she wants—that’s way more than I can say.
When we were getting ready, she took one look at my Dickies, T-shirt, and hoodie, then rolled her eyes.
“G, are you wearing that?”
I looked down at my outfit. “Yeah, why?”
Without answering, she started flipping through my closet until she found a low-cut, long-sleeved deep red shirt Jen got me for my birthday. I’d never even put it on.
“Try this!” she ordered.
I did, but reluctantly.
“That looks better. You need a different bra, though.” She frowned at the way my tatty old sports bra peeked out from beneath the U-shaped neckline. Digging through her bag, she produced a black lace push-up bra, lightly padded. So convenient, sharing the same bra size with your best friend. Obediently, I took everything off, strapped the Uniboob into this much sexier holster, and pulled the shirt back over my head. She studied the new me with an appraising eye.
“Uh-huh . . .” she muttered, before whipping out a tube of berry red lip gloss and smearing it across my lips.
“Am I acceptable now?” I grumbled sarcastically.
“Much improved. You’ve got a rival in town. You better start working it.”
“A rival? What does that mean?”
She scoffed, leaning toward the mirror to examine her eyeliner. “Don’t pretend you haven’t noticed.”
“Noticed what?”
“Everyone knows Sophie De Luca’s after Ben.”
I swallowed. When she noticed my silent horror, she spun around and tugged on one of my braids. “Not that he’s tempted. Still, it can’t hurt to—you know—turn on your love light.”
I wondered what that meant. Was my “love light” a padded bra and lip gloss, or was it something more involved—some secret weapon other girls had that I didn’t even know about?
Ben picked us up around noon. His eyes registered something when I climbed into the Volvo—surprise, I guess, to see me sans-hoodie—but he didn’t say anything, and I wasn’t about to fish for compliments.
Walking into Floating World, I felt a twinge of self-consciousness, of not-fitting-in-ness. The space is super cool. It’s got exposed steel girders and brick walls—very urban and chic in that pseudo-industrial, Soho loft sort of way. Since the owner, Alistair Drake, used to be the drummer for Stalin’s Love Child and his tattoo parlors are considered la bombe, the place was packed with twentysomethings who looked like they’d just stepped out of an AFI video. Everyone had greasy hair streaked with tropical colors, exotic piercings, bared midriffs, and heroin addict bodies. They walked around in a state of glamorous decay, insouciant and grimy as French movie stars. Even in my cleavage-bearing shirt, next to these pale, sylph-like creatures I felt like a chubby, pink-cheeked Girl Scout.
There was a band playing on a small wooden platform. A girl with a shaved head sang and a lanky redhead played bass. The drummer had a scruffy Mohawk. The guitar player looked considerably younger than his band mates, and I thought I recognized him from school. While Amber, Ben, and I hovered around the food table chowing down, guitar guy followed Amber everywhere with his eyes, as if there were invisible wires connecting his pupils to her face.
“I think lead guitar likes you,” I teased.
She glanced over her shoulder at him and scoffed. “Jeremy? Yeah, like that’d work.”
“Why? What’s wrong with him?”
“Oh, come on, G, he’s a total emo-kid.”
Ben tilted his head appraisingly. “He’s got a kick-ass Strat.”
Amber rolled her eyes at Ben while I studied the boy in question more carefully. He was pale, with the milky, pure complexion of a British schoolboy. His black hair was streaked with indigo; it cascaded over his forehead and concealed much of his face. When he shook it aside, you could see that his eyes were gorgeous—strikingly blue, sapphire-bright. Though I’d never really noticed him before, he was intriguing, in an art-boy sort of way. In fact, he looked a little like one of Amber’s sketches . . . indie-cool, slightly androgynous, with manga-style eyes that made the rest of his face blur into the background.
“Have you ever talked to him?” I asked Amber.
She blew her hair out of her eyes impatiently. “Yeah. Here and there.”
“And . . . ?”
“And nothing . . . He looks twelve!” Unfortunately, the music stopped just before she spit out this last part, and her voice was loud enough for everyone to hear. A couple trendy girls in tiny T-shirts giggled. Jeremy dropped his eyes to his guitar, looking dejected.
/> The band took a break then, most of them sauntering toward the exit. Jeremy didn’t follow, though. Instead he leaned against the far wall, hands in his pockets, trying hard not to look at Amber, but failing miserably. I felt bad for him. I caught his eye and tried to convey a welcoming, we won’t bite vibe. Finally he pushed away from the wall and walked over to us.
“Hey,” he said, peeking up at Amber through his hair. “How’s it going?”
Amber looked bored. “Just groovy. You?”
“Yeah, fine.”
“I’m Geena,” I said. “This is Ben. Love your band. What are you guys called?”
“The Aqua Nets.”
I grinned. “Cool.”
“We’ve got some good gigs coming up.” His eyes darted to Amber, then over to Ben and back to me. “We’re playing the Raven Theater in a couple weeks.” When Amber didn’t even look at him, he added, “Probably start around eight.”
An awkward pause ensued. Amber glanced from one corner of the room to another, while Jeremy studied his scuffed Doc Martens.
“Maybe we’ll go!” I blurted. What was wrong with Amber? Why couldn’t she give the kid a break?
“That’d be cool.”
I stepped subtly on Amber’s toe. “Wouldn’t that be fun? I’ve never been to the Raven.”
She just mumbled a noncommittal “Maybe.”
Then all at once Amber’s face lit up. Her cheeks flushed, she licked her lips, and her eyes abandoned their dull glaze for a sparkly, expectant glow.
I looked over my shoulder and spotted Mr. Sands squinting in through the plate-glass windows. He had a slight case of bed-head, and his usual five o’clock shadow had thickened to something a shade darker. He was wearing a threadbare T-shirt that might have been yellow years ago, but had long since faded to dishwater-gray. His ancient Levi’s hung low on his hips, revealing just the waistband of his boxer shorts.
“Oh my God,” Amber breathed. “He’s here.”
Jeremy looked perplexed. “Mr. Sands? You have him for English?”
Ben rolled his eyes. “Great. Doctor Hipster to the rescue.”
“Catch you guys later.” Amber walked away from us abruptly, and I thought for a second she’d go talk to him. Even Amber didn’t have enough nerve to approach Mr. Sands directly, though. Instead she hovered at the edge of the window, peeking out with besotted puppy dog eyes until the object of her affection wandered off down the street. Only then did she dare go outside to the sidewalk and stare after him wistfully.
Jeremy didn’t look well. His already pale complexion had turned skim-milk white. I’d never talked to him before today, but seeing his cheeks drained of color like that, my heart went out to the poor kid.
“She’s got a little crush, but I don’t see it going anywhere.”
He snapped to attention. “She’s into Mr. Sands?”
“Yeah. But come on, he’s a teacher! It’s just a fantasy—she’ll definitely get over it.”
Ben flashed Jeremy a sympathetic grin. “Get used to it, man. They’re all into him.”
Jeremy’s eyes wandered back to Amber, looking forlorn.
“Listen,” I said, “we work at Triple Shot Betty’s. You know where that is?”
He nodded, and some of the color returned to his face. “Yeah.”
“You should come by. Maybe give her a CD or something. She likes . . . um . . . manga, and tattoos, of course, and . . .”
“Mr. Sands, apparently,” he finished.
“Yeah, well, like I said, it’s temporary. Believe me, if you can distract her, you’ll be doing everyone a huge favor.”
Jeremy turned to me, his expression grim. “Look, I appreciate what you’re trying to do, but I think she’s out of my league.”
“Don’t give up so easily!” Ben chided.
Jeremy managed a halfhearted grin.
“Seriously,” I told him. “Come by Triple Shot Betty’s. Amber whips up a killer mocha.”
Jeremy shrugged. “Sure. Why not? What’s a little more humiliation at this point?”
“That’s the spirit!” I told him.
Sunday, January 18
9:20 P.M.
After we worked the morning shift at TSB, Amber and I came back to my house. I had to pound out a research paper for history—rough draft due tomorrow, so no more putting it off. Amber flipped through magazines and texted people while I worked. By four o’clock I’d read so many articles on the civil rights movement I thought my head would explode. I decided to take a quick MySpace break. Ha! Like most quick MySpace breaks, it turned into a four-hour detour.
My first mistake: I decided—just out of idle curiosity, mind you—to search for Mr. Sands. Suddenly, there he was, his default picture perfectly recognizable.
“Oh my God!” I yelped. “Mr. Sands is on MySpace!”
Amber pulled her chair so close she was practically in my lap. In a few seconds his profile loaded and there he was, staring up at us from the screen, his moody gray eyes boring into our souls.
“I love him,” Amber whimpered. She leaned all the way forward and planted a kiss on the monitor.
“Down, girl,” I said, but I have to admit his lips did look disturbingly kissable.
We pored over his profile, searching for pertinent details. He’s 24, born October 30, a Scorpio (hot!). He went to high school in Carmel, did his undergraduate work at Stanford, his graduate work at UC Berkeley (impressive). His favorite movies are Rear Window, Citizen Kane, and The Maltese Falcon (classic). His musical taste ranges from Coltrane to Rogue Wave (eclectic).
Amber grabbed the mouse, logged herself in, and jerked the curser to his “add to friends” button.
“No, wait!” I protested.
“What?” Amber had that feverish look again. “Can’t I friend him at least?”
“Let’s think about this a second.”
“What’s there to think about?”
I leaned back in my chair. “Look, I’m not saying any of this is a good idea . . . but if you really want him, you’ve got to have a strategy.”
She let go of the mouse. “What kind of strategy?”
“Here, let’s look at your profile.”
We went to Amber’s page. Her pictures showed her in a variety of bad-girl poses. In her default pic she wore a skimpy little leopard-print bustier, her red hair streaming out wildly in all directions. Her smile looked crazed and demonic, while her fingers pointed at the camera in rocker-girl devil horns. It screamed Underage freak looking for trouble. Mr. Sands would take one look at it and hit “deny” to her friend request faster than you can say “ jailbait.”
“Don’t take this the wrong way.” I weighed my words carefully. “Your profile’s cool and everything. I just don’t think this is precisely the persona you should be projecting.”
She leaned back and crossed her arms. “What do you mean?”
“You know how you asked me to, like . . . study him?”
She nodded.
“Well, I’ve been reading the books he’s into and . . . you know, watching him carefully.” I decided not to mention the rather involved fantasies I frequently indulge in while he’s writing on the chalkboard—the ones where he and I end up in some smoky San Francisco jazz club.
“And . . . ?” she asked, impatient.
“He’s like . . . an intellectual.”
“So?”
“Well, right now your profile shrieks, ‘I’m hot, reckless, and underage.’”
“Yeah?” Her tone said, And your point is . . .?
“Look,” I said, pointing at the monitor. “You’ve listed your interests as tattoos, fast cars, and death metal.”
She shrugged. “Just being honest.”
“Which is great. The thing is, with Mr. Sands, everything is based on a lie; you told him you’re in college. If you want to get anywhere with him, you’ve got to build on that lie and add to it. I’m not endorsing it, I’m just saying if you want him, we’ve got to create an all-new you.”
&nb
sp; She squinted at me, mulling this over. “Okay, fair enough. So what should I change?”
I took another look at her tattoo slideshow and her Betty Page background. “Um, let’s just start over, okay?”
An hour later, Amber had a brand-new profile. We kept her old one and just created a new, alternative Amber, one that’s way more Mr. Sands-friendly. In this parallel universe she’s a twenty-one-year-old lit major and philosophy minor at Brown taking a year off to care for her sick mother in Sonoma. Her interests include Jack Kerouac, Zen Buddhism, Gary Snyder, and “the schism between self and society.”
“What the hell does that mean?” she wanted to know.
I wasn’t totally sure, but it was the sort of thing Mr. Sands was always going on about in class.
When we were almost done with her “About me” section, I had another thought. Maybe he’d get suspicious if we made her too much like him. She shouldn’t be just a female version of Mr. Sands, after all—there had to be something else there, some opposites-attract ingredient. I decided to call on my own interests, since that’s what I know most about. I added Wuthering Heights and Jane Eyre to her book list, and the sentence: “I’m partial to spooky, gothic literature and I gobble up the classics every chance I get.”
Having completed the written portion of Project Pygmalion, we moved on to the eye candy. I didn’t really know what a female beat was supposed to look like, so I just went for a generic intellectual motif and hoped it would do the trick. We raided Mom’s closet and dressed Amber up in cashmere twinsets, tweed blazers, black turtlenecks, and plaid pleated skirts. We even put her in a black beret and showed her reading On the Road, her brow furrowed. She wore reading glasses and matte lipstick in serious shades like rose crepe and spiced raisin. By the time we’d loaded the photos onto her page, even I half believed in this fictional Amber who read Dharma Buns by candlelight and knew all about Zen Buddhism.
“Okay,” I said, checking it over one last time for annoying grammatical errors. “Now you can friend him.”
She brought up his page, chewing her bottom lip in agitated concentration. She locked eyes with his photo as if engaging him in a staring contest. Then she swept the curser across the screen dramatically and clicked on his “Add to friends” button.