by Piper Banks
“Let’s put it this way—she made it clear she was interested, and I made it equally clear I was not,” Dex said. “But that’s as much detail as I’m going to give you.”
Which, of course, made me insanely curious to know all of the details. Had Avery thrown herself at Dex? Asked him out? But then another thought occurred to me.
“So why’d you come over today?” I asked. “I had the impression it was a couples thing in there.”
“Yeah, well, I didn’t know that before I got here. Geoff and Roy are friends of mine, and I came along with them,” Dex said.
“Those guys are your friends?” I asked.
I assumed that Geoff and Roy were the two mouth-breathers that the twins had been draped over. If so, they looked like they had the combined intelligence of a sneaker, and probably enjoyed crumpling soda cans against their rocklike skulls in their free time. But why was I surprised? Dex was a jock, and they were clearly jocks, and it was common knowledge that jocks hung out together.
But on the other hand…Dex didn’t strike me as the typical jock. I didn’t know him very well, of course, but he just seemed…sharper than that. Like there was more to him than just muscles and testosterone.
“Yeah, we’re friends. Why?” Dex asked.
“I don’t know. They just seemed…” I stopped, searching for an adjective that wouldn’t offend him, but also wouldn’t make it sound like I was lusting after him. “…not like you,” I finished.
“Maybe not. But then, you don’t know me very well, do you?” Dex said, his lips curving up into a half smile. He leaned over to pick up a small pink shell off the sand, and threw it overhand into the surf.
“I guess not,” I said.
“So what do you want to know?” he asked, winging another shell.
“About you?” I asked. I wasn’t sure where we were going with this.
“About anything,” Dex said. “Go ahead…ask me anything.”
I tried to think of something interesting and witty, but I couldn’t think of anything.
“What’s your last name?” I finally asked.
Dex chuckled, and I flushed. Okay, it wasn’t the most original question I could have asked him, but at least it was better than something really stupid, like, If you were an animal what would you be? (For the record, I’d be an elephant. They’re really smart, and beautiful in a pachyderm sort of way, and they trample anyone who screws with them, which is a definite bonus.)
“McConnell,” he said.
“Is that Irish?” I asked.
“Can’t you tell?” he asked, pointing to his red hair.
“Hey, L’Oréal has some pretty convincing shades,” I said. Willow stopped to examine a piece of seaweed, sniffing it from all sides, and I had to give her leash a gentle tug to get her moving again as we continued our walk down the beach.
“You think I’m the kind of guy who dyes his hair?” Dex asked with mock horror.
I shrugged. “Hard to say. As you yourself pointed out, I don’t really know you,” I said, shooting him a sideways smile.
Dex laughed. “You’re right; I did.”
“Besides, you’re wrong. I know all about you,” I continued.
“Oh, really?”
“Yup. You’re the star lacrosse player at Orange Cove High. You like to take chances, hence the parasurfing. You’re friends with jocks. And you have pretty girls throwing themselves at you. Doesn’t that say it all?” I said lightly.
Dex stopped suddenly. I came to a halt, too, and turned to look at him. He had a curious expression on his face.
“Is that what you think? That I can be summed up by those four things?” he asked.
And suddenly I had the feeling that I’d offended him. For the first time since I’d met Dex, his expression was serious. Grave, even. All traces of the mocking light had disappeared from his light blue eyes.
“I’m sorry. I was just kidding,” I said quickly.
“Were you?” he asked.
“Well…sort of,” I said. I had to look away from the intensity of his gaze. “But is it so wrong to draw conclusions about someone based on their hobbies and friends? They say a lot about who we are,” I pointed out.
“Do they?” he said softly. I looked back at him, then, and as our eyes met I felt a jolt that seemed to start in my heart before zipping out to the tips of my fingers and toes. It was a super-zing, a zing on steroids.
“I’d better get back,” Dex suddenly said. “That Emmett guy said he’d give me a ride home. See you later, Miranda.”
And then, without waiting for me to respond, Dex turned and walked back up the beach toward the house. As I watched him stride away, his shoulders squared and his gait relaxed and unhurried, an uncomfortable knot twisted in my stomach. Had I hurt his feelings? And if so, how? Surely, a good-looking, popular jock was used to people seeing him as a good-looking, popular jock, right?
But clearly I had offended him. And suddenly I had the distinct impression that perhaps I was guilty of judging Dex in much the same way that people judged me when they heard where I went to school and how I was gifted in math, and immediately concluded I was a geek.
I’d better go apologize, I thought. For real, this time.
I turned decisively and hurried back, Willow beside me, following Dex’s footprints in the sand. But by the time I got to the beach house and went around the front to the driveway, Emmett’s Jeep—along with Emmett and Dex—was gone.
Chapter 18
Mrs. Boxer was at her desk when I arrived at Headmaster Hughes’s office for our scheduled meeting.
“Is he in?” I asked.
Mrs. Boxer was stuffing and licking a stack of envelopes emblazoned with the Geek High emblem on the upper left-hand corner. I was secretly hoping that Headmaster Hughes had forgotten all about our appointment, that he had, in fact, forgotten about assigning me to head up the Snowflake altogether…but I knew this was unlikely. It would solve everything, though. I’d be off the hook, and Felicity could take over—as I knew she was itching to do—and everyone would be happy.
“Yes, indeedy!” Mrs. Boxer chirped in her girlie voice. “He said to send you right in the instant you got here.”
“Great,” I said without enthusiasm.
“Would you like a cupcake?” Mrs. Boxer asked. She twirled around on her task chair and whipped a shirt box off of her credenza. She turned back, popped the lid off the box, and offered it up to me. I peered inside. There were three rows of five cupcakes lined up inside, each topped with a mound of pink frosting.
“Oh, thanks, but I’m not hungry,” I demurred.
“Go ahead…take one!” she insisted.
So I reached in the box and took a cupcake. It was wrapped in a silver-foil cupcake liner, which I peeled off before taking a bite. It tasted terrible, probably the worst cupcake I’d ever had in my life. I don’t know anything about baking, but I suspected that Mrs. Boxer had added about four times the amount of sugar the recipe called for.
I forced myself to swallow the bite I’d taken, and then said, “Thanks. It’s really good.”
My mouth was so puckered up from sugar shock, it was hard to get the words out.
Mrs. Boxer beamed. “Baking is a hobby of mine,” she confided. “People are always telling me I should write a cookbook.”
“Oh, yeah, you totally should,” I lied. What would she call her cookbook? Baking Your Way to Diabetes?
“Maybe someday,” Mrs. Boxer trilled happily. “You’d better hurry along. The headmaster is waiting for you.”
I smiled at her, and, still clutching the rest of my cupcake (I’d have to hold on to it until I could find somewhere to throw it out), I pulled open the door to Headmaster Hughes’s office and walked in.
Headmaster Hughes was again sitting behind his enormous desk, the telephone tucked under one ear. I hesitated at the door, not wanting to interrupt, but he gestured for me to come in and sit down.
“Yes, that’s right…. No, I quite agree…. Yes�
�No…No…Yes…I see…How about that,” he was saying into the phone. “Thank you for bringing this to my attention. I’ll definitely look into it. Although I don’t know if a campus-wide ban on pencils would necessarily be the best course of action to take. Perhaps we could first try incorporating classroom instruction on how best to use—or not use—the pencil sharpener.” He paused and held up a finger, signaling to me that he’d be off in one minute. “Thank you for calling, Mrs. Brown…Yes…You have a good day too. And I hope Aidan’s finger heals soon…Yes…No…Yes…All right…Good-bye.”
Headmaster Hughes hung up the phone, looking remarkably unflustered. Apparently he was used to dealing with ridiculous requests from parents. If I were headmaster of a school—a school for gifted children, no less—and a parent called me up insisting that the school ban all pencils because her son had self-inflicted an injury while goofing around with the pencil sharpener, I’d probably get a little snippy. But not Headmaster Hughes. He looked utterly calm as he gazed unblinkingly at me.
“Miranda,” he said meaningfully.
I had the feeling I was supposed to answer, so I said, “Yes, sir?”
“How are you?” he asked.
“Fine, thanks. Um. And you?” I always feel ridiculous making small talk with grown-ups. It probably stems from a childhood where nearly every grown-up I came into contact with immediately began quizzing me. What’s 57 times 322? What’s 5946 divided by 576? It always made me feel like such a freak, I got used to looking down at my feet, muttering the answer, and then fleeing the scene.
“I’m in excellent health, thank you for asking,” the headmaster said gravely. “What can I do for you today, Miranda?”
A flicker of hope. Had he forgotten about Snowflake?
“You wanted to see me,” I reminded him cautiously.
“So I did. Mr. Gordon has informed me that you’re not participating in Mu Alpha Theta this year,” Headmaster Hughes said.
This threw me for a loop. It was the last thing I’d expected we’d be discussing during our meeting. And wait…why had Mr. Gordon told the headmaster I wasn’t going to be on the Mu Alpha Theta team? First Sadie, now Mr. Gordon…Why was everyone suddenly so keen on talking to Headmaster Hughes about me?
“That’s right,” I said.
He steepled his hands together so that the index fingers pointed straight up and pressed against each other, and continued to stare at me.
“And why,” he asked, “did you make that choice?”
“Not to join Mu Alpha Theta?” I asked. He nodded. “I just wanted to try something different. I’m going to work on the Ampersand instead.”
“I see,” Headmaster Hughes said, sounding like he didn’t see at all. “Well. That puts us in a very difficult position.”
What was he talking about? And why did I suddenly feel like a bug flying too close to a spider’s web?
“A difficult position?” I repeated.
Headmaster Hughes sighed portentously. “The Mu Alpha Theta team doesn’t have what you might call a deep bench. As you know, Barry Sonnegard graduated last year, which has left a hole on the team. But that’s nothing compared to losing you….” He shook his head sadly. “Without you, the team doesn’t have a hope of beating St. Pius at the first matchup in January, much less of winning state.”
“That’s not necessarily true,” I said. “Leila Chang did really well last year. And Sanjiv Gupta could be a strong player, if he gets over his performance anxiety. I think his parents put a lot of pressure on him. He always did better at competitions when his dad wasn’t there.”
“But St. Pius has Austin Strong,” Headmaster Hughes said.
Austin Strong. Just the name set my teeth on edge. Austin’s almost as good at math as I am. Almost. He’s also an egotistical pain in the butt. He’d probably go to Geek High if he didn’t live all the way down in Fort Lauderdale, where he’s by far the smartest kid at his school. It’s totally gone to his head. On his MySpace Web page, he even claims that his nickname is the Human Calculator. Which shouldn’t annoy me—after all, it’s not like I was ever fond of being called that—but for some reason, it rubbed me the wrong way. And if St. Pius was able to actually beat Geek High at a Mu Alpha Theta competition for the first time in history, Austin Strong would be unbearable.
Well. It wasn’t my problem. I was off the team. The Geek High Mu Alpha Theta team would have to go on and do their best without me.
But Headmaster Hughes seemed to be sensing my ambivalence.
“Is there any way I can talk you into rejoining the team?” he asked.
I shook my head. “No. I’d really rather be on the Ampersand staff,” I said. The headmaster looked at me skeptically, so I took in a deep breath and told him the truth. “I made a promise to myself that this year I’d find my passion. Figure out what I love to do. I know it isn’t math…but it’s possible it might be writing. So I want to explore that.”
Headmaster Hughes sighed. “Well, if your mind is made up, I suppose there’s nothing I can do to change it,” he said. He sounded disappointed but resigned.
Which actually sort of startled me. Headmaster Hughes wasn’t the type of guy to give up easily. I’d been bracing myself for at least another ten to fifteen minutes of guilt trips and bullying.
“So, why don’t we turn our attention to other matters? How are your plans for the Snowflake Gala progressing?” the headmaster asked. He laced his hands and tapped his two index fingers together.
Rats. He hadn’t forgotten.
“Well. We had our first committee meeting a few weeks ago,” I began. I’d been trying to think of a way to broach our proposal to overhaul the Snowflake, and finally decided that a direct approach would be best. “And I think—the whole committee thinks—that the single most effective thing we could do to increase student body interest in the Snowflake would be to…well, change things a bit.”
I didn’t chicken out. Not exactly. But Headmaster Hughes was looking so stern—in fact, more stern with each passing moment—and I thought he might respond better to a subtler approach.
“Change things,” he repeated slowly. “And what exactly are you proposing to change?”
I drew a deep breath and plunged in. “Well. First of all, the sit-down dinner isn’t very popular. So I thought that maybe we should start by cutting that.”
The headmaster’s brow furrowed. “No dinner? But then when will the speakers address the students?” he asked.
“They wouldn’t,” I said. “I thought—that is, the whole committee thought—that the Snowflake would be a lot more popular if we didn’t have speakers.”
And there it was. Headmaster Hughes stared at me. I seemed to have stunned him into silence, which was…well, it was a bit intimidating. Although I did learn that when his office was that quiet, I could actually hear the rhythmic tick-tick-tick of his gold-domed desk clock.
“No speakers?” he finally asked, carefully enunciating the words, as though to make sure that there was to be no confusion.
“Yes. The thing is, if you really want to make the Snowflake more popular with the students, then you have to make it into the sort of event that they’ll actually want to go to. And what teenager wants to spend a Saturday night listening to some boring speaker drone on and on about integrating programs for the gifted and talented into regular school curricula?” I said.
“Dr. Keith is one of the preeminent authorities on academically gifted teenagers in the country. I would have thought the students would be eager to hear what he had to say on the subject. In fact, I’ve always taken great care to choose speakers of interest to the students,” Headmaster Hughes said, sounding rather stiff.
Gah. I’d offended him, which I really hadn’t wanted to do. Not because what I was saying wasn’t true—Dr. Keith, the speaker last year, had been so boring, kids were actually face-planting right into their plates of chicken parmigiana—but because I was worried that if Headmaster Hughes got defensive, he might be less open to making t
he changes I was proposing.
“They were of interest.” A lie, but it was for a good cause. “It’s just…” I struggled to find the right words. “If your goal is to make the Snowflake more popular”—I emphasized the word, hoping that I could make my point without having to mention that every year, a full third of the student body simultaneously came down with the flu on the night of the Snowflake—“I think cutting the dinner-and-speeches part of the night would really help with that.”
More silence. More clock ticking.
“Did you have any ideas other than cutting the dinner and speeches?” Headmaster Hughes finally asked.
“Actually, yes,” I said brightly. “We thought that we could get a band to play. And decorate the gym in a theme. Like Under the Sea or Enchanted Forest. And everyone would get dressed up in black-tie.”
“So you’re suggesting that we turn the Snowflake into a prom,” Headmaster Hughes said, his voice dripping with scorn.
Apparently the headmaster was not a fan of proms.
I did one of those nod-and-a-shrug moves. “I think it would be fun. And, after all, Geek High doesn’t have a regular prom,” I said.
“Notting Hill Independent School for Gifted Children,” Headmaster Hughes automatically corrected me.
And apparently he wasn’t a fan of the Geek High nickname, either.
He drew in a loud, deep breath, and then took a long time blowing it back out. Then he bridged his hands together again and stared down at them for what felt like a very long time.
“It would seem that we have a dilemma,” he finally said.
“We do?” I asked. I was getting that bug-near-a-web feeling again.
“We both want something that we can’t have unless the other agrees. And in both cases, the other isn’t agreeing,” he said.
“I’m sorry, sir…I don’t think I really understand what you’re saying,” I said.
“First, you want to turn the Snowflake Gala into a prom, while I want the basic format to remain unchanged. And unless I agree, you can’t make your proposed changes,” he said.