“No!”
They both freeze, tacos hovering halfway to their mouths.
“I mean, there’s enough going on, but thanks,” I say, softening my voice.
“Any other parties? When we were in high school there was one practically every night, especially as it got close to graduation.”
“I wouldn't know.”
My mom is undaunted. “There’s a lot of pressure around this time and I’m in no way suggesting dad and I missed out.” She looks at him. “We had a few unforgettable nights.”
“Epic,” my dad chimes.
That word.
“We just want to make sure this is a memorable time for you, too. If there’s anything we can do...” She pats my dad’s hand. “You know, time has wings.”
“And apparently, so do bicycles.” I take a giant, crackling bite of my taco, signaling the end of the chat.
After dinner and a round of Scrabble, in which my parents spell out hump day, much to my chagrin, I wander up to my bedroom. My incomplete homework piles up on my desk.
I thumb through my phone for a few minutes and then lean toward the window, scratching Wigwart’s furry neck. “Glad to see you came up for air,” I say. When it’s as hot as it’s been, Pibbles and Wigwart, our pair of polydactyl cats—the best my parents could do for siblings—usually stay in the basement.
Pibbles jumps onto the windowsill and bats with his mondo paws at a bug on the other side of the screen. Like his chair at the dinner table, Teddy’s window is vacant and dark.
I consider texting H back, but she’s probably busy with Sherman. It is hump day after all.
I try to conjure up something to text to Grady. There’s a good chance, based on his offer to give me a ride and the incline of his head when we sat by the shore earlier, that he might want to get in a kiss before the end of the year.
I sigh.
He's more than a dare; meeting him on the beach Monday afternoon was chance or maybe fate or wishful thinking manifested. After all these years of chasing fantasies of smooshing my lips against his, I’ll admit it would be epic.
Then there’s Joss. Joss. I don’t know who I am or where I belong. In Joss’s orbit, everything she does has purpose, but the super-cool unintentional kind. She lives an epic life; at least in all her dyed blue, poetic badassery, it appears that way. Maybe tonight I could be a little bit Joss.
I pick up my phone and put it back down. I pick it up again and reread Grady’s text. Where’d you go? Sorry I got wrapped up talking to the guys. Do over?
Before I have the chance to talk myself out of it, I text back When do you want to do—? I quickly delete it because do sounds like dog doo. Gross. Also, do as in doing it, as in hump day. I might actually be incapable of being cool, despite Teddy's insistence that there's no such thing.
I’m right here, waiting for the do over… Delete, delete, delete. I might also be epically challenged in the text-writing department. I bite the inside corner of my cheek, thinking, overthinking, epically thinking. A cool breeze blankets my sweltering skin. I let it carry off my thoughts. Enough thinking.
Grady, I’m taking a walk in ten minutes. If you want to meet me, I’ll be by the shore, where you parked earlier.
Straightforward and to the point. Then I want to delete it too, but it’s too late. I slide on a pair of sandals and flip flop downstairs.
“Where ya going?” my mom asks, glancing up from her Stitch and Bitch knitting project.
“Taking a walk.”
“Want company?” she asks, setting down the needles.
“I’ve got my phone.”
“That’s not company.” She gives me a mom look.
“I know, I just meant if…" If Grady texts me back. "I just need to clear my head,” I say instead.
“Cobwebs in there?” She gets to her feet and pulls me in for a hug. I linger in her arms. She smells like essential oils.
“Yeah, it’s pretty messy. Housekeeping hasn’t showed up in weeks.”
She cups my cheek. “To the moon and back.”
“To the moon and back,” I repeat.
I step into the night. It’s just me and the crickets. The Westing's driveway is empty. I quickly scan my phone for evidence of another party, but Heather and Teddy’s feeds are the same as they were a couple of hours ago.
I reach the broad sweeping beach at low tide. I kick off my sandals and step to the water’s edge. I inhale deeply, lifting my arms up toward the sky. A wave trickles in and laps against my toes.
Maybe my glory days already happened, freshman through junior year and this is the real definition of senior slump. I’ve always been unique. My dad says I march to my own drummer and he’d know since he plays the drums.
Even though I buck against the backing track of how different my parents are from the Westings, the Hitchcock-Hennesseys, and pretty much every other pair of custodians of the under eighteen set, maybe I’m just me. Weird, confused, lonely me.
Some people need constant companionship with the clutch of arms and listening ears. There are others who desire names: a rotating cast of admirers. Then there are those who just need the sky.
I lift my eyes from the horizon to the fathomless starscape. Maybe it’ll just be me, the crashing waves, and the moon from here on out. Maybe that’s the extent of my epic life.
Chapter Eight
☼
Thursday
While I dig through my drawer for a clean pair of shorts for PE, there’s a low growl in the driveway. I glance out the window at the idling, polished Mustang. It’s like the ocean on a crystalline summer day. Grady taps out a beat on the driver’s side door. I wonder what kind of music he likes. I hardly have time to register the fact that this is what it feels like to have a boy waiting for me.
When I get downstairs, my father eyes the car. “I take it those aren't Teddy’s new set of wheels.”
I check my phone. Sorry I missed you last night. Homework. I’ll be at your house in ten. I must have been in the shower when Grady messaged.
“No, that’s Grady O’Rourke,” I say. Apparently, my attempt at a do-over earned me a ride to school. I don’t hide my grin.
“Grady O’Testosterone,” my dad mutters.
My mom stifles laughter. “Oh honey, don’t get a complex. Just look, we have a retro driveway. Classic and modern. Flashback to vintage, flash-forward to the coolest pink Bug on the block. I know how you feel about gender roles; don’t be dismayed, pink Bugs are the new blue sports cars.” She pats my dad’s shoulder and then nudges me toward the door. “I don’t suppose this Mr. O’Rourke would like a smoothie.”
“I wouldn’t want to get anything on the upholstery.” I take mine anyway. “I better go,” I say, unable to fathom what happened between last night when I sent the text and now, which is exactly nothing, but Grady’s out there waiting for me.
I step into the sun pierced morning. In the shadow of Teddy's house and a low cloud, his stickered car sits humbly and slightly pathetically in the driveway opposite.
“Morning,” Grady says. “Ride?”
I get the idea that I might have inherited Uncle Guzzi’s attraction to polished chrome. I swallow. Sparkling in the sunshine, it's an impressive sight to behold. But that might have something to do with the driver, too.
“Yeah. Sure. Teddy won’t miss me,” I say in the direction of the Westing's yellow house and wishing it weren't true.
I slide into the passenger seat. Grady sips a coffee. I slurp my smoothie.
“Here we go, almost at the finish line.” He taps my reusable, insulated tumbler with his coffee cup.
“Cheers.” I catch the edge of a smile as he politely backs out and then kicks up dust as he punches the accelerator once we’re on the street.
If my dad were an emoji, right now he’d have squiggly lips and wide eyes. Poor guy.
“So, you didn’t want to break the rules last night?” I say, trying a taste of flirtatiousness.
“Huh?”
; “I just meant about not doing homework. I haven’t been doing mine. Breaking the rules and all,” I clarify, referencing his comment the other day and the homework text this morning, landing me right back in dorkville.
“Ugh. That. My parents were all over me for being gone so much last week. I had to earn another night out. Party tonight at the Parker’s. You should come.” The simple words I’ve wanted Teddy to say lately—and forever before that from any boy, but specifically Grady—paint exclamation points in the air.
“Cool.” I’m the opposite of a cucumber. I just made the jump to hyperspace in the Millennium Falcon.
Unfortunately, Grady rumbles into the parking lot at Puckett far too soon. We don’t follow a leisurely pace, acclimating to the coming day like Teddy and I do, or rather did.
I feel like I stand on the edge of time, as if I've arrived at the end of an era. I didn’t expect it to be so intense. I thought it’d be more like a transition, like Teddy and I in the morning. Not one day we’re off, the next day we’re on, one night I’m in Teddy’s bed, the next we’re not talking, and the space between us peppered with too many feelings for too many people. Then I wind up in Grady's car. Talk about warp speed.
With his hand on the door handle, Grady turns to me, smirks, and with a slick toss of his key fob, says, “Meet me here, after school.” I think it’s a question and if so, I already have my answer.
I gather up the parts of myself that pools like lava on the floor next to my backpack and get out. Just before I cross the threshold to begin the school day, I pause, but there’s still no sign of Teddy.
After homeroom, we file into the auditorium for an assembly. The student body buzzes electric. I elbow my way to Heather, standing with a few girls who aren’t Joss. I imagine she and Teddy loom in the back, commiserating and looking for the entire world like best friends. Maybe the newly named Theo impeached me for having boring hair.
“What, no report from yesterday afternoon? I’m crushed,” Heather says, with one eyebrow lifted. “I expected details about your ride home with Grady.”
I don’t wear rouge, but I must look like I do. Rosa and Annie Lemon lean in expectantly.
“We, actually—” There really wasn’t and isn’t a we, at least not yet. “I ended up walking home from the beach. No big thing.” I shrug.
H wags a finger at me. “You don’t have to pretend this isn’t something you've wanted for four years.”
I try to send her a telepathic message to shut it. My cheeks are red enough. “There’s really nothing else to say.”
“Except he gave you a ride to school this morning,” Annie interjects.
“Nina would kill to get a ride in that Mustang.”
“When did we start caring about cars?” I ask, lumping myself in with Grady’s ex, Nina.
“You got this, Willa. Only two weeks left. Seal the deal,” Heather says, wearing newfound confidence since she and Sherman got together.
“It’s ten days, actually, and that expression is hideous. Seal the deal?”
“Whatevs,” she says, brushing me off with a bob of her head and a scandalous grin.
"Did you and Sherman…?" I start to ask.
Just then, Principal Whitaker takes the podium. I brace myself for a lecture about respectful citizenship after the steady stream of pranks so far this week. After three tries and much tapping on the microphone to silence the rambunctious crowd, the best he gets is whispering and shifting in the creaky seats. He breezes through a reprimand. Here come the consequences. But maybe I want to break a few rules, namely my own, penalties can line up to be addressed in ten days.
“The administration considered cancelling the final school dance this evening, but your wonderful student government asked us nicely to proceed. So you're all invited, upper and lowerclassmen, to join us in a farewell celebration. It’ll be in the gym from seven to nine.” Whitaker's bland voice suggests he'd rather clean the locker room toilets. He glances down at his notes and introduces the student body president.
Nina Boggs, Grady’s former girlfriend for two years—they broke up last summer—adjusts her lavender blazer. I can’t picture her in the Mustang. She’s classically pretty, but not Mustang material, whatever that is. In place of edges, she has frills. Whereas I have worn-in cotton with the occasional sequin, she has a blow out and a fully painted face. She taps the mic and graces us all with her perfect smile. I have a gap between my two front teeth and freckles that make me appear to be an overgrown ten-year old.
“I want you all to know that it has been a privilege and an honor to serve as your leader this past year. I can only imagine how proud your parents and families will be as they watch you cross the stage and take your diplomas.” She packs a lot of sarcasm into a couple of sentences. In addition to bossing the student body around, she's the least sincere person I've ever met and that's not me being jealous either.
There’s rowdy hooting and cheering. With manicured nails, Nina claws at her patience for us to quiet so she can go on. She isn't used to failing. I didn’t vote for her. I wrote in Teddy. As if someone holds up a card cuing us to stomp and clap, everyone takes up the invisible directive and pounds on the floor alternating with clapping. I join in and watch, in slow motion, the smiling and gleeful faces of Heather, Annie, and Rosa. Down the row, Berlin and Hansel flank Sherman, their heads tipped upward and their eyes squeezed shut. This is what being young and free looks like. Fuzzies fill my heart. My palms are pink by the time the clamor dies down. God I’ll miss this place.
“Thank you for your support,” Nina says primly as the microphone crackles and the creak of the seats is once again audible. “Moving on, we want to express our appreciation for everyone’s outstanding contribution to this community.” Just then, thunder claps outside and lightning strikes. Instead of sobering the mood, chatter fills the auditorium. Nina clenches her jaw and then taps the microphone again. It screeches. I cover my ears. Smoke might start coming out of hers.
“Listen people, this was supposed to be an uplifting speech about how after four years here I’ve learned to appreciate everyone’s uniqueness, how we all, in our own ways, both big and small, have contributed to the wonderful Puckett High community.”
Someone yells, "Fork you."
Whatever else she says devolves into something that sounds like blah, blah, blah. My eyes land on Grady, sitting a few rows over. His hands rest lightly on his knees, but he gazes toward the window, distracted. Do guys really have a one track mind like, while Nina's talking, he’s picturing her naked, imagining the countless things they’ve no doubt done behind closed doors. H thinks so. It’s curious to me that with the finish line in sight and Grady, possibly interested, I suddenly lose pace and shrink back, falling into stinkin' thinkin' as my mom says. I question how I stack up next to gorgeous Nina. Now that what I wanted for so long is within reach, I find myself struggling to follow through or as Heather said seal the deal. Maybe all along I was just crushing on the idea of him.
I scan the room but still don’t find Joss or Teddy. Maybe they're off on some felonious caper or she’s come up with a plan to help him get to RISD. I should be a better friend. The room is suddenly too hot. I fan myself, but can’t blow away the onslaught of emotions.
Nina finishes, “Anyway, I wish you all the best, wherever the future takes you.”
The room erupts once more, and I dash toward the door before the stampede. I rush toward my locker, not eager to go to class, especially since I don’t have the paper that’s due, but also overheated and overwhelmed. I wait by the water fountain in an anemic patch of light. With his back to me, Teddy unloads his bag three lockers down.
I can’t just ignore him. “Hey,” I say. Never in my life did I expect the wad of awkwardness that sticks between us.
He turns slowly. “I saw your grand entrance this morning.”
I’ve now confirmed that jealousy isn’t green; it’s blue and has four wheels. Teddy just looks purple and red; he recolored his hair to match h
is car's namesake. His cheeks flare.
“Yeah, Grady, uh, showed up at my house this morning.”
“I saw you stargazing during the assembly,” Teddy says.
The bell rings.
I wonder if he means the minutes I spent staring at Grady or the moments when I was thinking about Joss, tempting me away from reason and everything I thought I knew about myself. “Your hair is purple,” I say, pointing out the obvious.
“No shit, Sherl—” Just then, Mrs. Sherlock flashes a stern expression and we shuffle in a direction opposite from our next class.
He’s quiet for thirty-two-seconds. “That dare, I didn’t expect you to actually…,” he says.
I stop. The clusters of students are thin now that classes have resumed. “What didn’t you expect?” The possibility that Teddy calls me out on my history of stagnation tumbles toward me like an avalanche of uncomfortable truth.
“I didn’t think you’d actually do anything,” he says.
Despite the commonly held belief that the venomous Portuguese man-of-war is a single jellyfish, it’s actually a colony of multiple organisms and right now, Teddy’s words are like the long tendrils that can reach up to one-hundred-sixty-feet long. They whip and rasp me.
“Why would you say that? I thought we were good. I—” But I don’t know what I think or feel. I rush down the hall. The reason he asked is because I rarely do anything. I hold the world title for treading water. My theme song is static. And in the yearbook, under my name it says most likely never to change. Except that I am.
Then he calls after me, “I hope you know what you’re doing.”
I stop short. My chest heaves. This, I take up as a challenge.
Sitting in front of a computer in the library, during my free period, I recount as many of my recent interactions with Teddy as possible, trying to pinpoint exactly when we contracted this virus in our friendship. Maybe we’re growing apart or he’s preparing himself for when we’re both in different places like my dad said. I have no doubt he’ll end up at RISD. My destination is less clear. I’m not going to MIT or BU or Brown. Rhode Island definitely isn’t in my future. I have no plans to go to UMass or UNH. I will not be joining a sorority. But not knowing any of that doesn’t make me a loser, which is exactly what Teddy implied.
Chasing Days Page 8