The Starter Boyfriend

by Tina Ferraro

  “Well, no, but Saffron,” I said, turning to her, “didn’t you go with your ex and his crowd last year?”

  “I did my duty, yeah. But that’s pretty much player/cheerleader stuff.”

  “You also get the student body types, too, so you might know some people,” Flea added, patting my arm. “And of course, you’ll be with Randy.”

  I felt my back teeth grind together.

  We trailed with the foot traffic down to the back exit, where I’d promised to meet Randy. There, the girls did a see you tomorrow at the group mani/pedi appointment thing, and took off. Practically linking arms. Leaving me feeling about as vital as a runner left on base. And shaking my head at the irony that I was basically doing all this to strengthen my relationship with my friends.

  Soon Randy lumbered toward me in a grass-stained uniform, cleats, and charcoal smudged beneath his eyes.

  “Good, you’re here,” he said, his mouth quivering into something that could reasonably be taken for a smile. “I gotta change and everything, so come hang out with the others.”

  We moved into the darkened hallway behind the bleachers. People passed in small groups, talking and clowning around, but there remained an intimacy about the cramped walkway that felt slightly embarrassing to me since we were, technically, on a date. Or at least, a pre-date.

  When he picked up his pace toward the bright lights, I ran-walked a couple steps to catch up. “This must be weird for you,” I blurted out, deciding to clear the air. “Being with me instead of Jacy. How long were you guys together?”

  Randy slowed to look me full in the eyes. It was a struggle not to study the smudges beneath them, especially since one was broader and deeper than the other.

  “A year next month.”

  “You didn’t see the break-up coming?”

  “We had problems, sure. I thought we’d make to prom, at least.” His footsteps slowed, but sounded harder. “Oh, well, it is what it is.”

  We shot out across the Astroturf in the direction of a group hanging outside the guys’ locker room.

  “Hey, everybody,” Randy called out. “You all know Courtney.”

  I forced a smile and scanned the fifteen or so faces. Mostly girls. Some new, some familiar, only two totally recognizable. Science and Jacy.

  Definitely drop knee.

  Chapter 13

  Time flies when you’re having fun. Or so people said.

  Standing with Randy’s friends outside the players’ locker room, shifting my weight and checking my phone every three seconds for the arrival of a phantom text message I was not expecting, I wondered if there was a saying for the opposite. More than just time standing still, maybe like an elephant-sized weight bearing down on your soul?

  When the moon completed a lunar orbit around our planet and Randy and the other players finally shuffled out of the locker room, I felt my muscles, limbs and over-active imagination begin to chill. At least now I’d have someone who’d acknowledge me.

  In fact, my face was probably birthday candle bright as Randy crossed the packed dirt path toward us. So much so that he shuffled right on into my body space and dropped an arm across my shoulder, my smile dropped like a pop fly into a softball glove.

  “Sorry to keep you waiting, babe.”

  Babe?

  When I could hear again over the rush of blood in my ears, I was pretty sure I’d registered a gasp. I thought we’d been crystal clear on the boundaries of this date. Besides, if he’d wanted to grope me, he would have started back in that darkened hallway.

  So what changed? His mother wasn’t around to impress, and the only other obvious reaction he’d be gunning for was Jacy’s. He’d told me he no longer cared about her. Her flyer told me she didn’t care about him. And in fact, I’d let her know I didn’t care about either one of them.

  Since we were enough steps away from his crowd to have relative privacy—and because I didn’t want to get another moment into this night without clearing the air—I squinted my eyes at him. “What,” I spoke sharply, “was that?”

  “What was what?”

  “Babe.” I did a Jacy-worthy tongue click, loud and slow, figuring it my best chance at reaching him and breaking him.

  Lo and behold, his forehead waved into a grimace, making his eyes look all squinty and sorry. “Look...the guys think you’re hot.”

  Huh? I am pretty sure my eyelashes flew all the way back to my eyebrows. Although maybe that explained the nonsense with Science.

  “They’ve been giving me back slaps for trading up.”

  I don’t think I could have been more shocked if I’d heard Lady Gaga was performing live at tomorrow’s dance. Still—

  “You know,” he said, even though I totally did not, “I was showing off a little.” He shook his head. “Look, forget it. That’s over. Let’s just go to the bonfire, okay?”

  “Okay,” I agreed.

  “I’m parked in the teacher’s lot. Player privilege on game nights.”

  “Cool,” I said automatically. Since he’d promised to behave himself, I figured I’d still go. The thing was, I wanted to follow in my own car, just in case. Before I got that out of my mouth, he was introducing me to a couple people.

  “Hank and Therese,” he said.

  The redheaded girl straightened herself and nodded at me, while Hank—who I’d forever think of as Science—gave me a big grin. Filled with big teeth and big tartar, too.

  I shuddered inwardly, then glanced back at the girl, who I realized not only had to deal with the guy’s rampant immaturity, but had to kiss him, too. Some people had it way worse than me.

  “Hi,” I said as pleasantly as I could to them, then threw a look at Randy. “Okay, I guess we’re good to go?”

  I sat beside Randy in his mom’s SUV, in what some people called co-pilot, others as shotgun, and I was trying not to think of as the girlfriend seat. I was glad when he jacked up the KROQ volume on an old Led Zeppelin song and started head-rocking, thinking it would make conversation near impossible.

  Near being the operative word. Because faster than I could blink my eyes, he was shouting something at me.

  “What?” I yelled back.

  He tried again. And again. Finally, I picked up on the word “cheeseburger,” which at least made sense since we were headed in the direction of In-N-Out. Since he and I had had our share of misunderstandings in our week of not-dating, I decided to save us one more and reached for the volume button and turned it down.

  Only to see him recoil like I’d just flung battery acid at him. “What the— That’s Jimmy Page!”

  “I couldn’t hear you.”

  Blowing out a sigh, he cranked the volume back up. Even higher. Telling me he either lived and died by Led Zep, thought music trumped cheeseburgers, or was just basically stupid. A question I did not want or need answered. I rested my cheek against the cool window and readied my taste buds for a double-double, Animal Style. Yeah, it would be way messy, but that’s what napkins were for, right? I didn’t care so much about losing my cool in front of Randy, and my guess was, he wouldn’t hyper-focus on me, anyway.

  “Dude, remember,” Science spoke up when KROQ went to commercial. “There’s food at the bonfire.”

  Randy nodded, then looked my way and shrugged. Whatever his gesture meant was completely lost on me. I was too busy trying to figure out how a guy in the back seat heard what I couldn’t. Wondering if it was some kind of male telepathy, or just further proof that I did not belong with these people. And if that was a nix on In-N-Out.

  We parked in the beach lot, then ambled across the sandy asphalt toward the pink-lit beach pavilion, voices and peals of laughter arcing up around the crash and splash of ocean waves.

  When a voice cried out, “Incoming!” I barely had time to look up before Randy was a foot off the ground, and making a one-handed grab at a football hurling toward us in the wind. Which he caught, then tucked under his arm for a charge at a testosterone-laden huddle out on the sand.


  I followed, watching him engage in knuckle, chest and shoulder bumps, and hearing lots of yeah-uh-huh-dude name-calling. Further down the beach, the bonfire blazed up from the fire pit almost two stories high, its sparks trying to reach the heavens.

  After finally noticing (or maybe remembering) me, Randy asked his teammates if they knew me. All ten or so of them looked my way, their expressions ranging from bored nods to peering straight through me.

  “Well,” Randy said, then did an exaggerated stomach rub. “Starving here. Gotta get some grub. Later, guys.”

  The wind at our backs, he told me about some long pass in some game long ago. I tried to look interested while writing it off as one of those you-had-to-be-there’s.

  Over at the pavilion, picnic tables lined the pavement, covered with assorted bags and bowls of chips, dips, burgers and dogs. While Randy went in for a junk food touchdown, I moved to a far table to eye some sealed bags of marshmallows that I hoped would find their warmed-up, gooey way between chocolate bars and graham crackers to be the highlight of my night.

  That’s when I felt the prickly-warm arrival of someone moving in close behind me. I turned to see a male physique inside a gray hoodie, a few loose, blond curls hanging free.

  “A—Adam,” I sputtered. “What are you doing here?”

  A muscle jerked in his jaw. “Well, it is the beach.”

  Okay, he had me there. “Yeah,” I said and laughed. Which felt remarkably good, like I was letting fizz out of a capped-up soda bottle. “I mean, here. At the homecoming bonfire. A school-sanctioned event. I didn’t think it would be your thing.”

  “It’s not.” He flicked his head toward a distant sand dune. “I saw the fire from over there with my bros, remembered about Homecoming, and figured there’d be food. Since it’s my school, I get to eat, too.”

  His lips curved, which was when I saw a crumb on his cheek—practically calling for me to reach up and wipe it off. That would definitely break our laws of unattraction. I laced my fingers together in front of me to resist my ridiculous temptation.

  “What’s your excuse, Courtney? I didn’t figure you for a member of the pom-pom set.”

  “Oh, I’m here with Randy.”

  “Randy? That’s on?”

  “Just Homecoming,” I said matter-of-factly. The fact boomeranged back at me that I had probably never told him about this date. I hadn’t seen Adam in awhile. When we had talked, it had been Saffron, right? “I’m with him. At the dance, and at this thing right now.”

  He rammed his hands inside the pockets of his sweatshirt, which strained the material across his shoulders. If it wasn’t for the gleam in his eye, I might have thought him upset or angry or something.

  Like Adam would care if I went on a friend-date with Randy. Or a real one. With anyone.

  “Excellent,” he said, mugging a grin. “We should coordinate our spy watches and assign times and places tomorrow night to meet up for misery-loves-company rendezvous.”

  I laughed again, although this one didn’t give me that same sense of relief. Especially when a plastic plate of grilled hot dogs and mounds of potato salad and potato chips was rudely forced between Adam and me.

  “Hey,” Randy said, accompanying the plate.

  I felt my body stiffen, wondering how much he’d heard, and if trying to cover up the misery-loves-company crack would make things better or worse. Instead I asked if the guys knew each other.

  They both nodded. My intention for those nods to blossom into actual words and then some sort of conversation died a quick death. Randy chewed, Adam stared, I shifted from foot to foot.

  After a week or more had passed, Adam made this back-of-this-throat noise, then said he was heading out. “Back to my bros. You have a good night, okay?”

  “You, too,” I said, and I was pretty sure Randy’s grunt meant the same.

  Adam’s evenly spaced eyes stayed on me. “Call me if you need anything.”

  I blew out a laugh. He was kidding, right? Needed him? When had I ever needed or relied on him? Tonight, of all nights—when I actually had a date-that-was-a-date—would fall at the very end of that spectrum.

  But my laugh simply hung in the air between us, until he shrugged and turned, crossing the sand into the darkness.

  Beside me, Randy gave me a matter-of-fact, “Let’s go,” but it was hard to tear my eyes or my confused thoughts from Adam’s retreating body. Not unlike how I usually felt when I turned off the lights and locked the door at night on Tux.

  How weird was that?

  Chapter 14

  Randy and I slugged through the sand, drawn toward the glow of the bonfire. My mind was spinning with the slow realization that Adam and I had somehow crossed a line to being legitimate friends when Randy’s voice cut in.

  “How do you know that slacker surfer, anyway?”

  I tensed, preparing to defend Adam’s honor. Until I realized that I pretty much couldn’t. He definitely put that vibe out there, even though he was a fairly cool slacker surfer, who got decent grades and at least talked about going to college. “Oh,” I said instead, “our dads have a dental practice together.”

  “That’s it?”

  What else did he want to hear? That I’d once had an epic crush on Adam that he’d either not sensed or not wanted to act on? I just shook my head.

  “Good.”

  Glancing over, I saw his face backlit by the vast, dark sky, and swirls of light from the three-quarter moon. In movies, this was basically the stuff romances were made of. But not for me—not here, not now. Not with him. “Good?”

  “Good that you two didn’t date. The guys would have eaten me alive for that, being with his ex.”

  Everything inside me tightened. Nothing about my life, past or present, was his or his friends’ business. Not to mention, if he would just open his eyes, he’d see those guys didn’t give a flying fig about me. (Well, except for Science, who’d made his thick-toothed desires abundantly clear.)

  And then there was the fact that Adam was a heck of a lot more fun to be around than Randy or any of his group, anyway.

  This whole thing was getting old. I yanked my hood up for protection against the wind—and to put another layer of defense between him and me.

  People were scattered in small groups around the bonfire. Standing on a beach chair, reading a speech or declaration of some sort, was a long-necked guy I was pretty sure was our Student Body President.

  Science stood from a splintered log and raised a hand at us, sending Randy veering in that direction. I let him settle next to his friend—I was nothing if not considerate—and then plopped my own blue-jeaned butt on the far end, half of which ended up hugging thin air. Not optimum, but it beat the alternative of crushing against my date.

  I’d barely taken in a moment of fire-generated warmth when Jacy appeared and pushed her rear down between the guys. I did a quick phone check for one of those important and distracting texts that I kept praying someone would send, and when I looked back up, she’d leaned forward and across Randy to fake a smile at me.

  “You doing okay down there, Courtney?”

  I arched a brow, figuring she could see my face just fine in the flickers of orange-yellow light. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

  “I don’t know, babycakes. You tell me.”

  Babycakes? That was so wrong from her mouth.

  I frowned, only to see her “meet” my frown and “ante up” an eye dragger.

  Randy must have sensed the static because his big old arm shot out and around me. Probably in a comforting way, but give me a break. I slid off the end of the log, my intent being a purposeful and graceful exit. The reality was more like a hard thump on my hip, and then toppling all the way over on my right side to take a nice bite of sand.

  Laughs sounded from somewhere around me.

  Okay, Olympic gymnast, I was not. Still, I wasn’t usually a total klutz, either. If I didn’t know better, I’d think Jacy was descended from a long line of witches and some ser
ious nose-wiggling had been involved in my calamity.

  Standing to brush myself off, I was totally done with her head games. “Come on, Jacy, let’s take a walk.”

  She did an exaggerated head wiggle, then stood to her feet and followed me.

  I felt numerous sets of eyes on us as if we were about to have some kind of serious “Jersey Shore” hair-pulling war.

  When I figured we were out of general earshot, I stopped and nailed her with a glare. “Look, like I told you the other day, he means nothing to me. You’re wasting your time harassing me.”

  “Harassing you? I’m just defending myself.”

  “Defending your territory, you mean. Like telling your friends that there would be murder if one of them went to Homecoming with Randy.”

  She screwed her face into a What the—? “That’s the second time you’ve...where’d you hear that?”

  “Does it matter?”

  “Well, considering I never said that? Yeah, it pretty much does.”

  I studied her (surely lying) eyes, my thoughts floating back. It had been in front of my locker with Flea, Madison and Saffron the morning of the “Lost Dog” flyer. Saffron had shaken a finger at me—like I was her bestie, rather than someone she’d tried to keep from knowing about her big party—assuring me I’d be a great match for him, and reminding me that I’d be safe from Jacy’s wrath since I wasn’t part of that crowd.

  Still, no way I was ratting out my teammate to this girl. Especially when Randy himself had told me the same thing, like it had been common knowledge. Feeling no reason to protect him, I lifted a hand to point at his back.

  “Randy?” she asked. After I nodded, she said his name louder. And louder again. Until he turned his head, then got his butt off the log and wandered toward us.

  “You told Courtney,” Jacy blasted, “that I threatened my friends to keep them from going to Homecoming with you?”

  Emotions blew across his face before settling on what looked like confusion. “Well, didn’t you?”