Tell Me Again How a Crush Should Feel

by Sara Farizan

  Lisa blinks a few times. Ugh, she’s so exasperating! She turns to Tess. “So the fourth one isn’t so great, huh?” Tess just shakes her head and looks perplexed. I groan.

  Lisa turns back to me. “I’m sorry I wasn’t brave enough to be your friend back then. But I’d like to be honest with you again. When you’re ready. And when we aren’t surrounded by so many spectators.” I deflate and droop in my seat. She’s right. It’s not the place to have this conversation.

  “The Zombie Killers Part V trailer is amazing,” I mutter. I look over at Greg because he would know what I’m talking about, but he’s hanging on to Saskia’s every word, just like all the other guys at their table. She’s probably telling them the best ways to poison someone.

  “Hi-ho, losers.” Taryn saunters up to our table, Christina and Simone in tow. Taryn quirks an eyebrow when she sees Lisa sitting with us. “Well, I’ll give you credit. You do honor your dares.”

  “Nice to see you, too, Taryn,” Lisa says.

  “You guys working on the play this term?” I ask.

  “Yes. The Importance of Being Earnest doesn’t really inspire me, but I’m looking forward to finding period costumes,” Simone says. “Do you think you’ll work on the play with us?” I can’t imagine having to watch people in petticoats over and over again.

  “I’d like to do theater again, but I want to try something other than stage-managing,” I say.

  “I’m designing the set for the middle school play. We need student directors if you’re interested,” Christina says. Direct? Me? Molding the future actors of tomorrow? Kids adore me!

  “Yeah! I’d love that,” I blurt before I have time to overthink it.

  “Cool. I’ll let Kessler know you’re interested. Tomas wouldn’t be able to handle them all by himself,” Christina says. Tomas! He’s going to take over everything!

  The tech girls wave and walk out of the cafeteria. “Well, no sports again for me,” I say cheerily. Lisa just shakes her head and Tess laughs.

  “So now I can run for real during squash practice?” Tess asks with a smirk.

  “I will not stand in the way of your varsity dreams now that you’re buddies with the all-star here,” I say with a nod to Lisa.

  Lisa finishes, chewing an orange slice before she answers. “I don’t know that I’m going to play this year.” Tess gasps a little because she knows how good Lisa is. She’s better at squash than she is at soccer, if that’s possible.

  I feel myself getting angry. “You loved it, though. Plus, you’re really good. You’re good at basically everything.” Lisa sets her jaw and looks at me. I match her gaze and see her eyes have gone dull with refusal. Not even a glimmer of a shine.

  “Why, Leila, I didn’t know you cared,” Lisa says. Tess just looks back and forth between us like a fight is about to start.

  “If you don’t try out, I’ll have my mom tell your mom,” I say in the most threatening tone I can muster. It must not be very effective; Lisa just chuckles.

  “Oh no. Not that. How will I survive?”

  “If you don’t try out, I’ll . . . I’ll . . .” I can’t think of anything to hold over her. She holds up her hands to stop me.

  “I will try out if you agree to hang out once in a while.” She’s serious. She wants to be friends again. Or something more? The something freaks me out . . . but maybe in a good way.

  “Okay,” I whisper. Lisa and I study each other for a moment. Like we are the cowboys sizing each other up in Zombie Killers Part III, just about to detonate the water tower and drown the town. A little bit of a spark has returned to her eyes, which are really pretty with those bangs off her face.

  “You guys are weird,” Tess says, and takes a bite of her grilled cheese sandwich. Tess really has no gaydar. But apparently neither do I.

  “What’s up with you? Why are you avoiding me again?” Greg asks when he corners me by my locker at the end of the day. I keep my attention on the locker’s contents for as long as possible, stalling for a way to explain myself. There’s a picture on the door of Greg and me posing like we’re hard thugs, both of us wearing black Dickies skullcaps, standing back-to-back. I can’t believe a girl is coming between us.

  “You’re going to be late for wrestling tryouts,” I say, and he touches my shoulder so I’ll face him. I fold my arms and refuse to meet his glance.

  “You didn’t call or text all break. Didn’t even wish me a happy New Year. That’s messed up.” I stare at my shoes. What can I say to him? I’m angry with him but it’s not his fault. I’m angry with him and I can’t begin to tell him why.

  “Yeah, well, you’ve made some new friends lately,” I mutter in a voice barely audible to the human ear. “I didn’t want to get in the way.”

  He’s heard me just fine. “Is that what this is about? My seeing Saskia?” He chuckles, but it’s mean sounding. “Why do you care who I date, Leila?”

  I stare him right in his stupid eyes. “I don’t care who you date!” It isn’t true, though. I care that he’s dating her. I’m glad people are off to their afternoon activities and not in the hallway to watch Greg and me argue.

  Greg grunts in frustration. “I don’t get you! You told me you weren’t interested in dating me. So I can’t date anyone else?” He’s so dense, always making this about him. This isn’t fair. I want to tell my friend what’s wrong, what’s happening.

  “I just don’t think she’s right for you,” I say, and I really mean that. He doesn’t know what she’s capable of or that she broke my heart in giant, jagged pieces. Greg is trying to read me, but I won’t let him. I’m working hard to keep any emotion off my face.

  “Hi, guys!” Saskia calls, bounding down the hall to us. So much for not showing emotion. I wince a little as she gives Greg a peck on the lips. She puts her arm around his waist like he’s going to run away if she doesn’t hold him as tightly as possible. “Hi, sweetie!” she says to me. Is she seriously calling me sweetie? I want to scream but can’t let Greg know something is wrong.

  “Hey.” That’s all she’s getting out of me.

  “Did you have a nice break?” she asks with a saccharine smile. Like nothing has happened. Like she didn’t inspect my mouth with her tongue whenever it was convenient.

  “Yeah. Pretty quiet,” I say trying not to get intoxicated by her scent again. She smells like expensive perfume and waxy lipstick. “You were busy, I bet.”

  Greg just rolls his eyes and stares off to the side. “I better get to wrestling. I’ll see you later?” he asks Saskia. She kisses his cheek before he saunters off, not even looking in my direction. I watch him stride down the hallway and out the door. I want to yell at him but I can’t. I hate this.

  “He has such a nice bum,” Saskia says. “But he’s so boring. What did you two even talk about?” I twist to glare at her. She seems to genuinely be waiting for my answer.

  “There’s something wrong with you,” I say, slamming my locker shut. She doesn’t even blink.

  “I’m just trying to be polite,” she says. “Look, I know you’re probably not over me, but I thought we could at least be friends. You’re the only person that makes me laugh in this place.” I’m tired of being her source of entertainment. I walk away, but she follows me. “If you’re upset about my being with Greg, I can break up with him.” I stop walking. The hall, the whole school is spinning around me. I’m dizzy with rage.

  “Why would you do that to him?” I ask through clenched teeth. I don’t want Greg to be hurt just because I have been. Saskia grabs my hand and turns me around to face her.

  “Because we’re friends, aren’t we? Isn’t that what friends do for each other?” No. That’s not what friends do for each other. I’m wondering exactly how many friends Saskia has had in her lifetime. She grasps my hand a little tighter now.

  “Don’t you like him?” I ask, incredulous.

  Saskia just bites her lower lip. “He has his merits.” She says it like she’s talking about a restaurant. “But I’d ra
ther hang out with you.” She inches a little closer and as much as I’m upset with her . . . Wow, have her eyes always been that green?

  I blink to break the spell, and try to make her understand. “Greg’s my friend, so I want him to be happy, and I don’t want to see him hurt. You should date someone you really like. But you can’t just play with people. ” Saskia gives me a blank look. “You know, toy with their emotions and toss them when you’re bored?” It still doesn’t register. I try again. “Poison their brownies?”

  Saskia pulls me in a little closer. My hand brushes her breast and I blush. “I promise. I’ll be more conscientious of others.” I want to believe her. I really do. People make mistakes, right? Even gorgeous girls who are really good at kissing, but bad—BAD—for hurting people. She pulls me in by my arm and embraces me, nestling her head in the crook of my neck. I hate that part of me is creeped out and part of me is tingly. Emotions are so stupid. Zombies have it easy.

  Twenty-four

  Mr. Kessler has given Tomas and me the reins to choose and direct the middle school play since he’s going to be so busy with The Importance of Being Earnest. Tomas suggested doing Glengarry Glen Ross. Mr. Kessler went pale and suggested we think along the lines of a one-act fairy tale. I suggest “Cinderella,” thinking of Lisa.

  “‘Cinderella’? That’s so tired,” says Libby, a seventh grader with a lisp. The six other kids who signed up for the play, five girls and one boy, chime their agreement.

  “Let’s do a play version of Goodfellas!” That Thurston Smith kid sure has a lot of energy. He gets the rest of the cast to cheer and Tomas tries to settle them down. I don’t know that we are cut out for this. Tomas blows a whistle and they finally shut up. I think my eardrum is busted.

  “Goodfellas is an incredibly violent movie,” Tomas says. “And rated R, which leads me to question your parents’ child-rearing skills.” I look at the cast in front of us. The kids are awkward and fidgety, and they listen to Tomas like he’s the coolest person on the planet. Oh, what a few years will do.

  “My older brother showed it to me, and it was awesome!” Thurston exclaims, pretending to fire a machine gun.

  “What if we rewrite ‘Cinderella’? Make it . . . less tired?” I’m surprised by my initiative. Apparently so is Tomas.

  “Why, Leila! You’re actually onto something,” he says, clapping his hands together. “And I thought I was going to have to carry the load of this production myself. What do you think, guys?”

  “Can we have gangsters in it? Like Cinderella has a glass gun instead of slipper?” Thurston asks. The rest of the cast cheers his suggestion. Tomas blows the whistle again. I have a feeling I know how the rest of the play rehearsals are going to go.

  After some improvisation games, like the human knot and freeze, which help us get to know the kids and figure out a little more about them, Tomas and I end rehearsal early so we can brainstorm our new version of “Cinderella.”

  We walk from the middle school down the hill to the upper school. “What if Cinderella is in a corporate setting, and instead of being concerned with her glass slipper, she’s concerned with the glass ceiling?” I suggest. Tomas looks at me like I am the biggest dork in the universe.

  “Leila, they’re kids. But I like the different, contemporary setting. What if we make Cinderella gender nonconforming?” Tomas asks.

  “I’m not so sure about that.” I don’t know how that would go over in middle school. And I don’t want to be associated with more out-of-the-box stuff than I have to be right now. Tomas gives me side eye that would make a person of weaker character cry.

  “The administration is always going on about how they love and support diversity, so they’d be hypocrites to disapprove,” he says. “We’ll write a tasteful story that gets people to think about their hateful, ignorant, stupid reactions to things they do not understand.”

  “I just think we might be over our heads already, and to make a fairy tale controversial, well . . .”

  “Leila! We have a chance to tell a story that can get people thinking. Aren’t you sick of being a wallflower? I know you are, because you’re not stage-managing again.”

  “Okay. We’ll write the play. So long as we don’t call it Cinderfella. That would just scream amateur.”

  Twenty-five

  Ms. Taylor is making us read aloud from the essays she assigned before break. To get any of us to read aloud is like pulling teeth. Usually I help her out and volunteer because I feel bad, but this time someone beats me to the punch. Ms. Taylor is shocked when Lisa raises her hand.

  “Is it okay if it’s creative nonfiction?” Lisa asks.

  “Oh! Lisa! That would be wonderful. Please, go right ahead,” Ms. Taylor says. Lisa pulls out some tattered pages and walks to the front of the classroom. Ashley looks confused. Robert stops sipping from his Gatorade bottle. Tess, sitting beside me, whispers, “I didn’t think she even did schoolwork anymore.”

  Lisa stands in the front of the class, staring down at her pages. Her hand trembles only slightly. She takes a deep breath and begins to read.

  “My therapist has told me to be more honest with my feelings, which I think is a crock of shit—” Ms. Taylor opens her mouth to say something but reconsiders and apparently decides to let the swear slide, maybe because Lisa is actually participating—“because no one is ever really honest. We talk to one another but never really say anything. We hide from things that are uncomfortable, things like death.” I can’t believe this is happening right now. The whole classroom is so silent you can hear everyone breathe.

  “So he’s dead now. Has been dead for a while and I get it. I understand that he’s buried in the ground, I understand that grieving is a process, I understand that my mother is emotionally starved for his attention and no longer has it, so she’s forcing me into her life. I understand all of that.” Lisa takes another deep breath and blinks for a few moments. It feels like hours. “What I don’t understand is that I should be over it by now. No one’s ever over it, but I should concentrate on wanting to feel better. Distract myself. Get back into sports. Go shopping with the girls. And the only thing I’ve been distracting myself with are thoughts of you.”

  Ashley looks at the clock and sighs. Robert looks like he’s tearing up a little as he takes a long sip from his bottle.

  “I think of you and how I spent so much time trying not to think of you. How I pushed away traces of you, memories we shared as kids, all the things I never knew I cherished because I was scared. Scared of what being around you meant and what you could take away. What you have taken away.” I have a feeling she’s not talking about her brother, Steve, anymore.

  “And if I’m supposed to be honest, if I’m supposed to feel things even when they are uncomfortable, I’d like to do that with you. I’m ready to be honest, because his dying taught me I don’t want to waste any more time.” Lisa pauses for a minute and her bottom lip quivers a little. She exhales and composes herself. “If you’re ready to be honest, so am I.” Holy crap, it is about me! I stare at the floor to avoid making eye contact with anyone—including Lisa. What she just did was bold and fearless. But she could have warned me. She may be ready, but I don’t know if I am. I don’t know if I can be that brave.

  No one is breathing now. Only the sound of Lisa folding her paper, finished, breaks the silence.

  “Thank you, Lisa, that was—” Before Ms. Taylor can even try to say what that was, Lisa has walked right out of the classroom, leaving her backpack behind.

  I skip history class to go find her. Lisa is sitting at the top of the bleachers, coatless, but seemingly unaffected by the cold and snow. I’m shivering, but not because of the temperature. I climb up the bleachers and stop a few risers in front of her. She looks out at the empty tennis courts, refusing to meet my eye.

  “I don’t understand you,” I say. Lisa doesn’t say anything so I go on, awkwardly. I have had a few make-out sessions, but it dawns on me that I’ve never had a conversation like this
one. “Just to confirm, I am not reading anything into that public reading that you didn’t intend—”

  “It was about you,” Lisa says and now fixes her eyes to mine. It makes me blush, but I can’t look away.

  “Lisa, are you . . . I mean, what are you?” She just smiles. How can someone be so unflinchingly blunt and remain so elusive? She’s not gay. She couldn’t be. It would be too easy to fall for her if she were. I don’t think I could handle that.

  “I’m sad mostly,” Lisa says. “I didn’t like certain feelings I had for you in sixth grade. It was just . . . weird. You were one of my best friends. When I came to Armstead, I figured that would be the end of it. Of my feelings for you, and of feeling that way.”

  My mind is blown. “Sixth grade! Seriously?” Lisa chuckles a little at my surprise. She pats the seat beside her. I’m hesitant to climb up, but her gaze doesn’t waver, and I make my way up the risers, as if I’m hypnotized. I sit next to her but far enough away that we can’t touch. This feels too real, and it freaks me out a little. Lisa takes a cigarette from her pants pocket. She fumbles with a matchbook, her hands shaking so that she can’t even strike a match. I take the matchbook from her hands.

  “I don’t condone this habit, just so you know,” I say while striking a match for her. She leans closer to light her cigarette. She pulls away and takes a long drag.

  “Anyway, I liked some boys okay enough and figured those feelings for you were a fluke.” She slowly exhales a long wisp of smoke, sighing softly at the same time. “Then you showed up at my school. And it turned out I still liked you, which was really, really annoying. So I avoided you. Which wasn’t so hard given the sandals with socks thing.”