by Laura Ellen
Monday morning, he didn’t pick me up. I called him every three minutes until finally, out of time, I had to wake Mom up to drive me and then I beelined to Life Skills. I flew past Tricia spinning in the hallway and ran into the classroom.
Tricia followed. “Can’t say hi?”
“Leave me alone.” I surveyed the classroom. He wasn’t there yet. I threw my books down next to my desk and trotted back into the hallway.
Tricia trailed behind. “You know your name spelled backwards is Llew-sor?”
Clever. I made a mental scan of her name backwards, but got nothing. “You spend all weekend coming up with that?” The first bell rang. No Jonathan. I moved to the end of the hall, searching in both directions.
“Trouble in paradise?” Tricia said.
“No!” I snapped. “He’s just late.”
“Or off playing with his new toy.”
“Shouldn’t you be shooting whipped cream somewhere right now?”
“And miss this? Not a chance.”
“There is no this. I’m just waiting for my boyfriend.”
“Girls.” Mr. Dellian motioned into the room with his head.
Tricia leaned forward after he’d gone back inside. “Boyfriend? I saw him at Ethan’s Saturday, all wrapped up with his new doll—he’s done playing with you.” Tricia smiled her wicked smile and turned away.
I yanked her backwards by the hood of her cloak. “What are you talking about?”
“Watch it!” She examined her hood for a second, and then gave me an exaggerated look of sympathy. “Oh, you thought he really liked you? You were the payoff in my drug deal. Nothing more.”
“You’re sick.”
“Am I? I had no money, remember? He took you as collateral. But I’ve got my own payment plan now. Your services are no longer required.”
I hated her. “You self-absorbed witch. This has nothing to do with you.”
“I thought there was no ‘this’?”
“He asked me out.” I seethed. “We were dating. Are dating.” My voice got louder, angrier. “He’s mad because I couldn’t go out Saturday. Would he have got mad if I was just your—your—”
“Crack whore?” Tricia offered.
“Screw you,” I said, and left Tricia laughing in the hallway.
I couldn’t concentrate on anything, not even the chocolate éclairs Ruth had brought. I was too consumed by anger. And panic. What if he really had hooked up with someone else at Ethan’s party?
I tried to find him after class.
Again before third and fourth.
Left messages. Texts.
At lunch, I ran outside to the seniors’ parking lot. I got there just in time to see a brown blur getting into a shiny red blob a few yards away. The loud engine and boom of the base as it sped out of the school lot sent jealous waves through me. Tricia? What the hell was he doing with Tricia? I ripped out my phone as I came back inside.
“Hi,” Greg said, walking up. “I’m still working on your notes. Tomorrow okay?”
“Fine,” I mumbled. I called Jonathan. He wouldn’t answer. Why wouldn’t he answer? Where were they going? I turned back to the door and stared out the window.
“You waiting for someone?” Greg asked.
“No, just—” I turned around and headed to the cafeteria. I needed to talk to Heather. Maybe she’d seen something at Ethan’s party. Heard something.
Heather wasn’t there yet. I sat down at our table to wait.
“I wrote my paper for Dellian.” Greg sat next to me. “The extra-credit one? Could you look it over?” He held it out to me. “Hope the font is large enough for you.”
He had nothing to do with my foul mood. But I was angry and frustrated and he was there, annoying me with petty things like notes and extra-credit papers—and the large-font comment put me over the top. I ripped a red pen from my purse and raged through his paper, slashing words at random, then threw it back at him.
“What is this?” Greg cried. “Why did you mark all over my paper?”
“Because it’s wrong!”
He rubbed at the red markings with his eraser, but couldn’t remove them. I don’t use erasable ink. “You didn’t even read it! How do you know it’s wrong?”
“Because you’re wrong!” Tears sprang to my eyes.
Greg stared at me. “About what?”
I turned away from him.
He leaned forward. “Look at me,” he whispered. When I wouldn’t, he stretched his body across the table until his face was directly in front of mine. “What’s wrong, Roz? Why are you upset with me?”
On the other side of the room I heard Missy laughing with her cronies. Her cackle made me realize Greg was not the enemy. “It’s not you.” I swiped at a tear before it could escape my eyelid. “Sorry about your paper.” I focused my eyes on the renegade curl that had fallen across his left eye. “Jonathan won’t talk to me.”
“Oh.” Greg recoiled, his eyes falling on the ink-riddled paper.
“I saw him leaving, with Tricia of all people. Why would he be with her? And she said he was with someone at Ethan’s. I thought she was just trying to get at me like she always does, but she was with him just now! I saw them!”
Greg stood up. “Maybe you should let sleeping dogs lie.” He picked up his essay and untouched lunch. “I have to go.”
“Whatever!” I muttered as he walked away. I snatched up my own untouched lunch and retreated to my locker.
Minutes later, while I slammed books around on the shelf, Jonathan slipped his arms around my waist. “Hey, Beautiful.”
“Jonathan!” I turned and hugged him hard. “Where’ve you been?”
“Around.” He nuzzled my neck. “You still mad at me?”
“I never was! You were mad at me because I went to the museum.”
“Yeah, I heard you went with some loser. What’s up with that?”
“You mean Greg?” I inhaled his musky smell. Relished the warmth of his arms around me. “I didn’t go with him. We were both there, so we hung out. Seriously, Greg’s just a . . .” What? A friend? Friends don’t ditch each other the way he had just ditched me in the cafeteria. “A classmate.”
Jonathan pulled me close. “Bet he wants to be more.” He kissed my chin.
I pushed away slightly. “Were you with Tricia at lunch?”
“Tricia? Nah.” He kissed my ear. “I just got here.”
“I saw her get into your car, Jonathan. I saw you two leaving.” I tried to stay focused, to stand my ground. My body was melting into his touch, though, losing the battle.
“You sure it was my car, Beautiful? You know you don’t see that well.”
“I thought it was your car,” I mumbled as his lips caressed my neck again. But I was already starting to doubt myself. I hadn’t actually seen his car, had I? Just a red car.
“Nah, wasn’t me.” He pulled me in tighter. “You know I’m up for King.” His lips brushed mine. “Be my homecoming date?”
My body surged as he kissed me again. “Yes!” I breathed.
He gently pulled away and slipped his hand in mine. “Come on, let’s get out of here.”
Hours later, while we were snuggling on my living room couch (I was too embarrassed by my UFO pictures to bring Jonathan into my room) and I was listening to Jonathan complain about Dellian’s attempts to get him off the hockey team, the doorbell rang.
“Shit,” he said. We scrambled to untangle our bodies. “Is that your mom?” He’d parked at his house and walked over in case she came home early, but still, we hadn’t really thought she would.
I shoved his jacket at him and flew over to the living room curtains. Greg’s purple hovercraft sat in the driveway. “Why’s he here?”
Jonathan looked over my shoulder. “What the hell kind of car is that? Is that that loser?” He flew downstairs and ripped the door open. “What do you want?”
I could hear Greg’s awkward surprise. “I . . . need to talk to Roz.”
“Well, she
doesn’t want to talk to you,” Jonathan said.
I felt embarrassed for Greg standing there, all uncomfortable. But I was annoyed at him for spouting that ridiculous quote and ditching me in the cafeteria. I stepped up to the door and looped my arm in Jonathan’s. “I’m busy, Greg.” I focused my dots on his face to fake eye contact so he’d know I meant it.
“That means get lost,” Jonathan added.
Greg shoved a stack of papers at me. “If you don’t show for class, the deal’s off.”
“What deal?” Jonathan asked, slamming the door shut.
“Class notes.” I flipped through the notes as we walked back upstairs. Every single day was in there. Dated, categorized by topic. Typed. Large font. Bold.
This had taken time, effort. All for me. And I was a total bitch to him.
Suddenly I didn’t want Jonathan there anymore.
I just wanted to be alone.
Four days before
The next morning, my Life Skills class headed to the Division of Vocational Rehabilitation, the first step toward Dellian’s job program. Everyone was excited. Ruth even brought croissants for the road. But I was distracted. Yesterday I’d been so quick to skip with Jonathan. The sight of Dellian, however, reminded me that he’d be asking for a pass in sixth hour.
“In the van, Miss Hart,” Dellian said to me, and then to everyone, “Sit with your partners, please.”
“But I always sit in the front,” Jeffrey said. “I have to sit in the front.”
“Not today, Jeffrey. Go sit in the middle bench with JJ.”
“No! I. Sit. In. The. Front.”
I ignored Jeffrey’s outburst—it was pretty much routine anytime something was out of order or not what he expected—and headed to the back, where Tricia sat sprawled across the bench, spraying whipped cream on her croissant and licking it off. I flung her cloak off the corner of the seat and sat down.
Tricia clutched the material to her body. “You rip it, I kill you.”
“Why do you wear that stupid thing anyway?” I said. “You attend a lot of impromptu Star Wars conventions?”
“Star Wars conventions?” Jeffrey said. He dropped his battle with Dellian and climbed into the middle seat. “Where?”
“Go away!” we yelled in unison. He turned back around.
“My mom made this.” Tricia smoothed her cloak. “Before she went to prison.”
“Prison?” I echoed, sure this was yet another lie to get a reaction from me.
Tricia squirted another blob of Insta-Whip from the canister, pushed the cap on, and shoved it in her pocket. “For killing her dealer.”
“Lovely,” I said.
“It was. All that blood on her Tahitian-brown satin sheets.” Tricia’s eyes glossed over. “Spreading out like petals on a flower.”
“You saw it happen?” I still wasn’t buying this. Tricia loved drama.
“Yeah.” She breathed on the window until a little circle of fog formed. Slowly, she traced her finger through it, forming a smiley face. “Wayne was on top of me when she stabbed him.”
“Jesus, Tricia!” My stomach wrenched. “That’s, that’s—”
She whirled around. “That’s what?”
I stared back, at a loss for words. “That’s . . . awful.” There was nothing else to say. Whether true or another one of her lies, it was awful.
“So’s your breath.” She turned back to making smiley faces on the window.
Maybe it was the sickening revelation that drugs weren’t Tricia’s only demons; maybe it was shame over the notes Greg had painstakingly typed out for me; or maybe it was simply selfish fear because I didn’t have an excuse for missing class the day before. Whatever nudged me, I decided right before lunch that it was time to talk to the principal.
“Mr. Dellian has been marking me absent—” I began.
“Yes.” Principal Ratner leaned back in his chair. “Mr. Dellian informed me of this situation. Our tardy policy is clear. If you’re more than fifteen minutes late, you’re marked absent, whether you eventually make it to class or not.”
Wait, what? “No, see, I was never tardy!”
“You’ve never been tardy?”
“No.” I shook my head. “Well, yeah, I was late the first day because I got lost . . .” And I flat out skipped yesterday. “For most of those absences, I was there the whole time. He’s lying.”
“Roswell, when someone won’t even make eye contact with me, it usually means she is lying.”
“But I’m not!” This was not going well. “My eyesight—”
“Mr. Dellian said you’d try to use your disability to get out of this. Let me guess. He’s not accommodating your IEP?”
My mouth dropped open.
“He said you’d say that too.” He gave me a look of pity. “Mr. Dellian knows his students very well, Roswell, including you. He thinks you may be feeling overwhelmed with the AP class but are afraid to admit it. No one will think any less of you if you transfer out, okay? But skipping or arriving unacceptably late, that’s a disruption and not fair to the rest of the class.”
My mouth was still open. Dellian had thought of everything. It was all twisted, distorted. “You don’t understand—”
“I do understand. And if I had my way, you’d be suspended for these absences, but Mr. Dellian requested that nothing be done at this time. He’s given you a second chance, Roswell. Use it wisely.” As I stood up to go, he added, “If you need to get out of that AP class, I can send you to the counselor right now.”
I didn’t answer—my body was caught between crying and screaming, and I really wasn’t sure what would’ve come out of my mouth if I had answered. I left, feeling powerless and trapped, and desperate to talk to Greg. He was the only person who seemed to understand. Maybe he’d have an idea of what to do next.
If he’d talk to me.
I hurried toward Heather and Greg at our usual lunch table. “Greg—”
“Hey, Roz!” Fritz said as my face began to burn. I’d mistaken him and Ricky for Greg and Heather. It would have been comical if it hadn’t been so embarrassing. “Heather sick again?”
I frowned, disoriented by my mistake. “Not sure,” I said, searching now for Greg. “Is she at Grease tryouts?”
Fritz shook his head. “Those aren’t until Thursday.”
“Oh.” I hadn’t spoken to her since Friday. Was she sick? Or was skipping two days in a row normal for her? “Have you seen Greg Martin anywhere?”
Fritz pointed to the far corner of the cafeteria. “Tell Heather I said hey.”
“Thanks. I will.” I made my way to where Greg sat studying. “I talked to Ratner just now,” I said, sitting down. “Dellian sold him some story about my being supertardy every day because I can’t hack an AP class.”
“That’s too bad,” Greg mumbled without looking up.
Not the response I’d hoped for. “Thanks for the notes. They’re very thorough and neat and . . . thanks.”
Greg gave a half nod, still not looking at me.
“I won’t miss class again,” I continued. “Jonathan and I—”
“I don’t want to hear about him.”
“’Kay.” I shrugged. “I won’t talk about him.”
“Good.” He pretended to read his notebook.
I stared at his ear. “I know you’re not reading,” I said. “I’m the queen of fake reading. The trick is to move your head a teensy bit from left to right to look legit. And turn the page in a timely fashion. That’s a must.”
“I’m studying. I don’t need to turn the page.”
“Oh. Are you studying the same word over and over? ’Cause you’re not moving your eyes that I can see. That could be because I can’t see . . . ” I was making a fool of myself. I just wanted to apologize. I ripped the notebook from under his nose, ignoring his outcry, flipped to a clean page, scribbled “I’m sorry,” and shoved it back at him.
He shrugged and gave me a blank stare.
I rolled my eyes. Of cou
rse he wasn’t going to make this easy. “I was a bitch yesterday. Forgive me?” I wrote.
He took the pen from me: “Yes. I’m sorry too for being a jerk.”
“You weren’t a jerk. I was,” I said.
“We both were.” He smiled. “It would’ve been difficult ignoring you during our presentation.”
“What presentation?”
“That’s what I wanted to tell you last night. Dellian said we have to present what we learned at the exhibit to the class today if we want our extra credit.”
“Why does he want me to fail so badly?” I said, my voice catching.
Greg shook his head. “He tried to get me to present yesterday. I’m sure because you weren’t there. I lied and said you had all our notes.” He tapped his notebook. “I made us bullet points.”
I imagined him in class freaking out, stressing, lying. Meanwhile, where was I? At home with Jonathan’s tongue down my throat? “Sorry you had to lie.” I sighed, feeling defeated and deflated. Everything had spun so out of control. “Maybe I should just sit in that back seat, huh?”
Greg sighed too. “It might be the only way to stay above water at this point.”
“I guess he wins.”
“No,” Greg said softly, “he hasn’t, Roz. We’ll find another way to win.”
I hated taking that seat, and the way Dellian gloated over my sudden compliance made me sick. He noted my presence with a loud “Hart, present!,” gave Greg and me an enthusiastic “Well done!” after our presentation, and remained uncharacteristically upbeat throughout his lecture.
“Miss Hart?” he said after class ended. “Now that you are sitting where you belong, are there any accommodations I can provide you? Prewritten notes perhaps?”
“Whatever.” I started to leave.
“One more thing.” He picked up his attendance book. “With the number of absences, yesterday’s puts you at risk of suspension. Do you have a note excusing you?”