Or Not

by Brian Mandabach

  DJ got all riled up, and he wanted me to tell somebody and get people in trouble. I convinced him that I was doing the right thing by letting it blow over. It pretty much has.

  The conversation came around to its predicted end, with DJ asking me if I, like, wanted to go out with him. I resisted my immediate impulse to mock his incessant use of the mindless “like” and tell him that I couldn’t possibly go out with anyone who used that word in, like, every other sentence.

  I did tell him that I wasn’t sure what “going out” meant—did he want me to go out somewhere with him, or to enter into a formal relationship with him? That set him stammering and liking, and I realized that I might have been a little too harsh, so I told him that I liked him and wanted to see more of him, and wasn’t that enough? He indicated that it was.

  I think the whole point of “going out” is that it’s black and white. Kids want something definite. Just as the Bible-thumpers have Him and a set of rules that are supposed to come from Him—rules they don’t question, aren’t allowed to question—DJ wants our relationship to be beyond doubt. Once I’d thought it out, I was glad that I hadn’t given that to him. How could I?

  I do like him and want to hang out with him, but as Gandalf says, “even the wise cannot see all ends.”

  3 October

  Griffin really liked the first part of my story. He was gushing, all excited about the whale at the end and wondering what it signifies when you find your spirit animal, and it’s dead.

  Everybody else liked it too, though the seventh graders didn’t think Ally should be smoking pot, and one didn’t think the end was realistic.

  Here’s something strange, Di: After I read, and we talked about my story, I was warm and flushed, so I pulled off my usual baggy hoodie. Then I got almost as much attention for my little Indian halter as I did for my story. Isn’t that stupid? Kel was totally staring. DJ blushed. Mr. Griffin gave me this sort of look that seemed to say that he knew I knew I was supposed to be a little more covered up, but he wasn’t going to be the one to tell me.

  Mr. Math wasn’t either, when I got to his class. He took one horrified look at me and left the room. In a minute, he came back followed by another math teacher, Ms. Jennings, who motioned me out into the hall.

  “We try to keep our school a business-like setting—Cassie, is it?”

  “Yeah.”

  “And I can’t think of any business where that top would be appropriate.”

  “Really?”

  “So, Cassie, do you have something to put on over it, because if you don’t, we have a couple of Tabor sweatshirts—”

  “Oh, I’ve got a hoodie, I was just a little warm.” I acted innocent, but I was tempted to ask her if basketball uniforms and sweatshirts were really all that business-like.

  “Maybe in the future you should wear something cooler, but that, uh, covers you up a little more. Is your hoodie in your locker?”

  “No, it’s in the room.”

  “Well, put it on. And keep it on.”

  Can you believe it, Di? I’ve seen that sort of thing so often, I couldn’t believe it was me this time. But I got sort of a charge out of it. I think Mr. Math was actually scared of me.

  Liz invited me over tonight to watch a movie, and Dad said it was okay as long as my homework is finished. Mom’s back on symphony rehearsal schedule, so she wasn’t around. As far as the homework goes, I’m afraid I am a couple of chapters behind in history, but I’ll get caught up this weekend.

  Hi, Di. Kind of an exciting night—I’d better start from the beginning.

  Liz hadn’t warned me, but when I got to her house, DJ was there—along with Quill and Kelly.

  Though they had seen it a few times already, Quill and DJ were set on me finally seeing The Fellowship of the Ring. I reminded them that Mr. Griffin hadn’t liked it the first time, and I was pretty sure that I wouldn’t like it ever. They said I had to see it, or I couldn’t be against it.

  So we settled on the couch down in the basement, where Liz has a giant TV and speakers all over the place.

  In the first moments of the movie, as soon as I saw Elrond’s begrimed and scowling face, I knew they had gotten it wrong. Even if they hadn’t left out half of the most important things and changed half of the rest, you just can’t find an actor to portray the wisest and most fair of all remaining Elves. And when they tried to jam almost a hundred pages of background into a couple of minutes, I could hardly stand it. But I tried.

  The hobbits were good. Gandalf was great. Aragorn was good too, and Arwen was beautiful—though they magnified her role to make up for the fact that there aren’t any major female characters. And again, how can a twenty-five-year-old human actress play an immortal that is hundreds, even thousands of years old, and is supposed to be the image of the most beautiful maiden of all time?

  I’ll admit that there was a majesty to it, and certain moments were breathtaking. Maybe, like Griffin, I’ll have to see it a couple more times to be able to appreciate it for what it is and not just be missing my own true vision of the book.

  When we stopped for a potty break, I asked Liz why she hadn’t told me DJ would be there.

  “Why, would you have worn something sexier?” She looked at my top.

  “What’s with everybody and my clothes?” I said, as we climbed the stairs.

  “Nothing—whatever. So Gimli called you last night. Are you guys going out? I thought you were going to shoot him down.”

  “That’s not what I said, I just—”

  “I have got to pee,” she said. “You use this one,” she pointed to a door. “I’m going up to my bathroom. Mom-meee! I want an elevator! This sucks, I hate exercise!”

  Back in the basement, I sat on the couch a little closer to DJ.

  I wanted to ask him what he told Liz, but they started the movie right away, and Quill was shushing anybody who so much as whispered. I had a hard time concentrating on the rest of it, because DJ kept inching himself—millimetering really—closer to me, until he finally reached and put his arm around me. I slid way down, since I’m so much taller than he is, put my head on his shoulder, and leaned into him.

  It was getting cold in the basement, and it felt nice and warm to be close to him. He was stroking my bare shoulder and arm, and I took his other hand and held it. What you are supposed to do when you hold hands, I’m not sure. He grabbed mine tightly at first, then he relaxed, and I was touching his hand lightly with my fingers. Eventually, he started rubbing my side with the hand that was around me, slowly moving it toward the front. He pulled away from me, embarrassed, when I stopped its progress toward my right breast, but I snuggled back against him and whispered that it was okay, just take it slow.

  As the movie was ending, with the fellowship broken and Sam and Frodo heading off to Mordor on their own, Ms. Pine yelled down that DJ’s mom was there. I looked up at him and said, “See you tomorrow,” and he kissed me.

  Then he jumped up and headed for the stairs, “See you, guys. Bye, Cassie, see you tomorrow!”

  “Fare thee well, son of Glóin!” Quill called after him. And he was gone.

  The kiss was nice, quick, with no smacking or dreaded tongue. I think I kissed back, but it was over so fast, and I was so startled, who knows? I don’t think Quill or Liz saw it—they didn’t say anything, except that Liz said it looked like the two of us were “getting closer.”

  I called DJ when I got home, but his mom wouldn’t let me talk to him. She said he had already been out too late and it was past his bedtime.

  So here I am, Di. I have my first boyfriend—no sense in denying it now—and I just had my first kiss. I’m happy and miserable at the same time. I feel like such a silly, typical teenager with my silly, typical teenage drama, the moral of which is always that everything will work out for the best because everything happens
for a reason.

  4 October

  Uneventful day at school. Could it be that they have forgotten about me? No flat tires, no “Osamas,” and Matt didn’t jam his locker door over so that I couldn’t open mine.

  At lunch, Quill wanted to know what I thought of the movie. I told him a couple of my complaints.

  He thought that the part when Lady Galadriel talked about taking the ring was cool, whereas I didn’t see why they had to trip it out with a bunch of computer effects. The moment should not have been so obvious.

  DJ was shaking his head in agreement. “I don’t know why Peter Jackson has to do that,” he said. “It’s like when Gandalf made Bilbo leave the ring. It didn’t happen that way.”

  “And what about,” Quill said, “when Gimli asks for a lock of Cassie’s, I mean Galadriel’s, hair?”

  “Shut up, man.” He blushed.

  “Yeah, man,” I said, and put an arm around DJ. “He’s, like, sensitive about that.” Then DJ really blushed, scarlet, and I took my arm away quick, feeling a flush myself. What’s getting into me?

  “Well, I think the movie’s cool,” said Liz, “but I haven’t read the book.”

  “Unacceptable,” said Quill.

  “It was boring. I couldn’t get into it.”

  Speaking of boring, I should catch up on my history.

  I didn’t get very far. I tried to call DJ again, but his mom said he was “unavailable.” What’s up with that?

  Then I had to break for dinner. No rehearsal tonight, so Mom cooked, and she had some big news. No cabin this weekend for her, because she is joining a quartet!

  I’m really excited for her because she has waited a long time for this. Back when Sean was born, she quit her chamber group because the double rehearsals were too crazy with little kids. And though she’s tried a couple of others since I started school, she couldn’t find a good fit. In this group the players are awesome, and they have gigs lined up already. She’ll have to switch her lessons all around and probably even drop some students. They start practicing next week.

  Dad and I are going up to the cabin without her, so she can, as Dad put it, devote herself to the muse.

  5 October

  Beautiful Indian summer in the mountains, Di, and nice to be up here, but I can’t settle into anything. Dad did some fishing; I tried to work on the Sisters. I was copying from the first one, and changing it as I go, but it’s not coming together. I think I’m going to type it all into the computer at home, and make cuts and changes as I go. It’s too unmanageable this way.

  Later I wandered along the creek, bringing my field notes from past summers, but I ended up daydreaming, remembering what Sean said, how “wherever you go, there you are.” I was lost in my own head, thinking of DJ and what it would be like if he were with me.

  It turned chilly after sunset, and Dad built a fire. We hung out reading, made some popcorn. I forgot my history book—guess I’ll catch up at home—so I pulled some old books off the shelf, things that I’d already read, and was looking at them. The Nick Adams Stories, Laura Ingalls Wilder, Captain Underpants. I should be reading my lit circle book, but instead I read The BFG again. “Giants is never guzzling other giants.” Now that’s literature.

  6 October

  Now that I’m back home, I’ve got no excuses for avoiding my homework. Except not feeling like doing it. It was cool to have those straight As when I was trying to get up to high school. And even before, I was always driven, who knows why.

  But now? I don’t see the point.

  Thinking of my history test coming up, I’m starting to panic, but I still can’t get motivated. Maybe I can afford to slack a little. I can skim the chapters this week, do my article analysis for science, and finish my “six traits of writing” thing for language. As for math, I got some of it done in class.

  Instead of doing homework, I typed my story.

  And DJ called. He asked me where I was this weekend, so I told him all about the cabin and my tipi and everything. Then I said I’d tried to call him and asked why his mom never lets me talk to him.

  “She’s, like … I don’t know,” he said. “She doesn’t want me to spend a lot of time on the phone.”

  “Are you allowed to get any calls?”

  “Well, sometimes.”

  “Like if some nice girl from church calls, or your youth pastor or something?”

  I felt bad then because I was just goofing on him, but I should have known he’d take it seriously.

  “Cassie, no way, I don’t like any girls at church, I mean, they don’t call. And I don’t like them. But my mom, like … she just … ”

  “What?” I said, gently.

  “She doesn’t want me dating until high school.”

  “Oh.”

  “I know it seems really old fashioned, and, like, stupid and everything, and I shouldn’t have asked you out.”

  “I said no, remember?” I was tempted to tease him some more, telling him that I was saving him from sin, but by now I knew better. “It’s okay.”

  “I guess I shouldn’t be calling you or, like, seeing you.”

  “We should call it that, ‘seeing’ each other, not dating, not ‘going out.’ And I’ll wait for you to call me, okay?”

  “You won’t get mad if I can’t?”

  “Of course not. I’ll see you in school, right?”

  “Yeah, and, like—” He stopped, then he whispered, “Gotta go. Bye.”

  “Bye,” I said, but I don’t think he heard me.

  This going out, or “seeing” each other, is complicated. As if DJ needs all this hyper-protection. He’s so sweet, I can’t imagine him doing anything wrong. But I guess he already is, according to Mommy.

  7 October

  Today was okay. I didn’t have time to finish up the math, so I turned it in halfway done. Mr. Math put a big red line after the ones I had done and said I would get half credit if I finished it. What a privilege! Then I got him mad by reading my lit circle book in class. It’s boring, but I didn’t feel like listening to him droning on and on. After he made me put the book away, I was really irritated. I actually was half-listening, enough to pick up what he was saying, so who cares if I read? I was more bored than ever, too, so I slipped out of my hoodie. Underneath, I had on a low-cut tank with spagetti straps. I just wanted to see if he’d notice. Did he ever. He trurned back from the board, did a nice double take, then said, “Miss Sullivan, would you put your sweatshirt back on, please.”

  “I’m hot,” I said, which drew a good laugh out of the class.

  “Either cover up, or you can go to the office and tell them that you think it’s too warm for teachers to enforce the dress code—is that clear?”

  Poor guy. As soon as he’d tacked the question on the end, I could tell he regretted it. I decided to let it slide, though, and just act like your average slut instead of your average smartass. So I sighed dramatically and made a big show of getting my sweatshirt off the back of my chair, standing up, and stretching my arms way up as I put it on. I know it wasn’t very nice, but he deserves to be messed with.

  Later, DJ met me at my locker and we went to lunch together. I smiled and waved at my old friends, and Sophia waved back.

  Nobody is bugging me anymore. I guess I was right to let everything blow over.

  Mom wasn’t home after school. I’m a latchkey kid now that she has afternoon rehearsal. She is off tonight though, so we had a normal dinner. She loves the new group, said that things came together really well.

  Gotta get caught up in history. Test on Wednesday.

  Still can’t do it. Can’t focus on the Sisters either. I was hoping DJ would call, but he didn’t. I called Liz. She has history tomorrow and was studying for the test. I feel a little better about it because I knew all the questions she
was asking me. But they were all on the early chapters, when I was actually reading them—maybe I shouldn’t feel better after all.

  8 October

  Decent day today. There’s no school on Friday and Monday, so on Friday we’re all going to walk downtown and see a movie. If DJ’s mom will let him. His grades were bad at mid-quarter, and he has to get a grade check showing everything is at least a C or he can’t go anywhere this weekend. After she let him go to Liz’s the other night, his language teacher called. I’m going to meet him at school early tomorrow to help him with his project. I wonder if that would score me any points with his mommy. Doubtful.

  Anyway, I sort of have to finish my own language project. I could put it together now, but I might as well do it tomorrow with him. As far as history goes, I think I know the big stuff from showing up in class and being more or less conscious, and I can skim the chapters for details and dates. I also have to do the questions on the last three chapters, but that should be easy.

  If it’s so easy, then why can’t I do it?

  Simple—I don’t want to. Not that I ever did want to, but I made myself. Last winter I actually got further behind than this. That was when I was deep in the fog, and the only thing that brought me out of it enough to get caught up was seeing my grades. I couldn’t imagine getting Cs or even Bs then. Now I think I can. Well, not Cs, but what’s the big deal with a few Bs?

  Does a grade matter any more than a state test?

  I’m a straight-A student.

  “Cassie is a straight-A student.”

  What does that really say about me?

  In high school, you have to get good grades so you get into a decent college. But what does it matter now? Who have I been trying to impress? Why have I been so motivated, and why am I not now?

  I look at that last question and the answer is obvious. Ooooo! Cassie’s in love! But I’m really not. I like DJ a lot, but don’t be silly.