He Loves Me Not

by Caroline B. Cooney

  “I was not mooning over him. And I don’t think anything happened to Ted. I’ve just never run into him again.” I tried to be very offhand about Ted.

  “Why don’t you call him up?” said Daddy. “Ask him out. This is a new world, you know. Equality between the sexes and so forth.”

  The mere thought of asking a boy out made me queasy. Fortunately, I had a very logical answer for Daddy. I didn’t know Ted’s name and consequently could not look up his phone number.

  Daddy picked up the photograph of Mother. “She’s beautiful,” he said. “You look just like her.”

  I stared at the face, frozen there for all these years, the only face I knew for her. I didn’t know my mother angry or laughing or tired or proud. I only knew her calm and waiting for the photographer to snap the picture. I wondered if she had been well organized. If she could have fit school and a music career into one life. I was organized down to the last tube of toothpaste, and I was still missing out on half of what was out there.

  The male half, among other halves.

  I decided to go over to the Devaneys and say good-bye to Kathleen decently, not just shout it at her during changing periods at school.

  “Alison!” cried Mrs. Devaney. She hugged me fiercely. “It’s been so long. Come in, darling. Kathleen tells us all the time about your music. We’re all so proud of you.”

  Now there was a welcome!

  I followed her into the den, and sitting around on couches, in chairs, and on the floor, were the three Devaney girls and their three boyfriends. I don’t think I have ever in my life felt so lonely as I did at that moment, being introduced to three hugging couples. I’d played jump rope and horses and Spud with the Devaneys, Bridget had taught Kathleen and me how to put on mascara, and Annie was the first kid I ever baby-sat for.

  And now they all sat with their hands entwined with boys I’d never met. I was the only person in the room without a partner.

  Mr. Devaney started things off wonderfully by asking why I hadn’t brought my boyfriend along.

  I managed to laugh. “I don’t have one to bring,” I said.

  “Ah,” said Mr. Devaney. “Between men, huh? Beautiful girl like you.” He shook his head sadly and began describing the social lives of his three daughters. Bridget, Kathleen, and even thirteen-year-old Annie had obviously dedicated themselves to the pursuit of men. It sounded like fun.

  Kathleen said, “Dad, Alison doesn’t want to hear all that now. You hush for a moment and let us talk.”

  “Tell her about the wedding,” said Mr. Devaney.

  “The wedding!” I gasped. I stared at Kathleen and at Billy. Getting married at sixteen? Surely she wasn’t really going to do that! It would be crazy!

  The Devaneys shrieked with laughter. “Bridget,” they told me. “As soon as she graduates from college this June.”

  “Oh.” I felt totally stupid. The entire evening was just the same. I didn’t know the Devaneys anymore; I couldn’t share their jokes; I didn’t feel like a part of their family.

  I felt terribly, totally lonely.

  Kathleen kissed me good-bye on the cheek; her boyfriend shook hands with me. We agreed that it had been nice, and I went on home.

  Annie, I thought. Even little Annie can rack up boyfriends.

  I walked heavily in the door. The phone was ringing. I didn’t feel like answering it. It would only be Ralph.

  On the sixth ring I gave up and answered. It was Ralph. I sighed.

  “That kid Ted who drove you to get my electric piano,” said Ralph.

  “Yes? What about him?” My heart leaped about seven stories up from the cellar where it had been at the Devaneys.

  “You remember him?”

  “Yes,” I said distinctly. “I remember Ted.”

  “He called me.”

  “He called you?” I said. It seemed to me if Ted were going to make a phone call, he should at least make it to me.

  “Yeah. He wanted your phone number. I gave it to him and he gave me his to give to you in case he doesn’t reach you so you can call him. That make sense?”

  I didn’t think it made a whole lot of sense, no, but it certainly made me happy. “What’s his last name, anyhow?” I said. “Did he tell you his last name yet?”

  “I didn’t ask and he didn’t say.”

  Terrific. If we did have a date I would have to pick his pockets, sneak a look in his wallet, read his driver’s license, and then I’d know Ted’s last name.

  “I know,” said Ralph brightly. “You’ve got his phone number. Go through the entire phone book, number by number, until you—”

  I hung up on Ralph.

  8

  FIRST I WAITED THREE minutes to see if the phone would ring and it would be Ted. Then I panicked. I would have to call him.

  He loves me, I thought, mentally stripping a daisy of its petals. He loves me not. He needs a pianist for his birthday party to which he will ask some other girl. He wants to ask me to a party. He needs to know the name of a Baroque composer for a history exam and figures I’ll know. He wants my company. He cracked a rib falling down and wants to sue me.

  Eight-six-nine, six-one-seven-eight.

  It was a pretty catchy number. I might set it to music. Setting it to music would definitely be less traumatic than dialing it.

  I eyed the telephone. Previously it had been a small white object with a gentle bell. Now it was The Enemy.

  The more I thought about telephoning Ted, the more I thought it was a miracle that anybody ever got asked out on any dates at all—considering the courage it takes to dial a number and ask a question.

  I remembered the shape of Ted’s nose and the way he had fed me petit fours. Love, I told myself. He wants to get to know me better. I picked up the receiver and dialed eight-six-nine, six-one…

  Ralph, I thought. Mean, sinister, untrustworthy Ralph. I bet this is a practical joke of his. Ted didn’t call him at all. When I phone that number it’s going to be a pizza house or one of Ralph’s extra drummers.

  I picked up the phone book this time. Ours is about two inches thick, excluding yellow pages. I did not really want to work my way through it one number at a time to locate and verify the number.

  Strength, I told myself. Backbone. Character. This is where we separate the sheep from the goats.

  Eight-six-nine, six-one…

  I put the phone back down. If Ted planned to ask me out, I needed my datebook right there so I could see when I was free. I got the engagement calendar out of my purse and studied it. I was pretty heavily booked up but, frankly, there wasn’t one commitment in there I wasn’t willing to sacrifice. Ralph probably wouldn’t feel that way, but I wasn’t his slave. He could find another keyboard man.

  I waited another fifteen minutes for Ted to call me, but the phone didn’t ring.

  Then I spent fifteen minutes planning what I would say if all Ted wanted was a pianist and not a date.

  By that time it was too late for anybody to telephone anybody and I had to go to bed. I lay there meditating on two things. One, was Ralph really sufficiently cruel to play a joke like this? Two, what color were Ted’s eyes?

  Around one o’clock in the morning I remembered that I really should be thinking about an English Lit essay test, but somehow Ted’s eyes were more interesting.

  By morning I knew I was being very childish and silly about the whole thing. The only way to resolve this was simply to dial the number and see who answered. I waited until my father was in the shower so he couldn’t listen in.

  Eight-six-nine, six-one-seven-eight.

  There was no answer. I was very sure because I let it ring seventeen times. Afterwards, I wondered what I would have done if someone had picked it up on the seventeenth ring and demanded to know what kind of worthless, interfering person would let a phone ring seventeen times when other people were trying to sleep late.

  I went off to school to take my English Lit essay test, and all through the test I was sort of humming to myself
: eight-six-nine, six-one-seven-eight.

  “I knew you were peculiar,” said Frannie at lunch, “but singing happily through that terrible Lit test? Honestly, Alison, if I’d had a china plate I’d have broken it over your head.”

  “I’m sorry,” I said humbly. “I didn’t know I was doing it out loud.”

  “What was the song, anyway?” said Lisa. “I didn’t recognize it.”

  I blushed scarlet. “Can’t remember,” I mumbled, and cleared my place quickly and left early for my next class. I had to go through the main hall to get there. There’s a pay phone in the hall. It attracted me enormously. Silly dope, I told myself, Ted’s in school right now, too.

  I wafted through the rest of the day. I had convinced myself that Ted also had a crush on me, that it really was his number, and that we were destined for a long and loving relationship.

  After school I decided against using the pay phone because the lobby was crammed with people, all of whom lean against the pay phone and make wisecracks whenever it’s being used. I went on home and there was my father, having a snack—a large one—that would take him half an hour to eat, what with the paper there for him to read…right next to the phone.

  Ted didn’t call me. My father didn’t leave his post. We went out for supper and Daddy dropped me off at Rob’s junior high, where he teaches band and where our combo has its rehearsals. I walked in warily waiting for Ralph to make some snide remark, but the only snide remark Ralph made was about how I didn’t modulate very well from E flat to G and what kind of musician was I anyway?

  It didn’t bother me at all. If Ralph didn’t hassle me over Ted, then it really was Ted’s number he’d given me and not some joke. I went straight home after rehearsal and it was only eight forty-five, so I dialed the number.

  “Ted?” said a tired, irritated voice. I couldn’t even tell if it was a male or female talking to me.

  “Yes, please,” I said.

  “Ted left half an hour ago. He won’t be back until late.”

  “Oh,” I said.

  “You want to leave a message?”

  I tried to think of an intelligent, noncommittal message to leave.

  “You from the paper?” said the voice.

  “No. My name is Alison Holland and Ted asked me to call him.”

  The voice coughed a few times, cleared its throat, yawned, and finally said in a much more pleasant, female tone, “Okay, I wrote that down. And who are you, please? Did he interview you?”

  “No, ma’am. I’m a musician he met a few weeks ago.”

  The voice climbed an octave, getting edgy and suspicious. “Musician?” said the woman. Obviously, to her musicians were drug-popping, orgy, organizing fiends. I tried to sound very innocent and ordinary. “Could you just tell Ted I returned his call? My number is—”

  “I’ll tell him,” she said, and hung up.

  At least it gave me something new to worry about all night. It was probably Ted’s mother. She would probably not give him the message because she didn’t like musicians, and in the meantime Ted would have met some super girl and forgotten me.

  Several things happened over the rest of the week. We had two important gigs, I earned a lot of money, Daddy changed jobs, I aced the Lit test and got D-plus on a surprise Latin quiz, war broke out all over Central America, and new cancer-causing agents were discovered.

  I, however, was concerned solely with a little white telephone that did not ring when I watched it.

  On Wednesday my father said, “Oh, I forgot to tell you that some boy called.”

  I froze. He did not elaborate. “And?” I said.

  “And I said you weren’t home.”

  Now I knew what teachers meant when they said that getting answers was like pulling elephants’ teeth. “And what did he say?”

  “He said he’d try again.”

  “Who was it?”

  “He didn’t say.”

  I revved up my courage and dialed eight-six-nine, six-one-seven-eight again.

  “Yes, Alison,” said Ted’s mother, “he tried to call you back, too. I’m afraid he isn’t here right now. The newspaper called and he’s covering a United Fund Drive meeting.”

  That sounded just about as interesting as our gig for the Annual Club Women’s Combined Award Dinner, or whatever it had been. At least I hadn’t had to write about that. I wondered how Ted could stand all that stuff. He’d actually have to pay attention to what was being said.

  Once I got into the swing of dialing that number, it got easier and easier. I almost forgot why I was calling Ted; it was just a habit I got into. I finally reached him before breakfast, an hour his mother suggested when she grew tired of exchanging remarks with me twice a day.

  “Oh, hi,” said Ted, yawning hugely into his end of the phone. I visualized him half-awake. Half-dressed.

  “Hi,” I said. “I got your message to call you.”

  And then I felt stupid. Stupid right down to the smallest capillary and the least significant cell. I had made no fewer than eleven phone calls to try to reach this kid. Talk about excessive eagerness. His whole family was probably joking about it right now. “Hey, Ted,” they’d say, laughing hysterically between bites of toast, “it’s that crazy girl again.”

  “Lemme wake up,” said Ted groggily. “Sorry, but I’m not at my best at six-thirty.” There was a slurping noise and Ted said, “There. Okay.”

  “What was that?”

  “My mother just gave me a cup of coffee. Now that my tongue is burned we can talk.”

  And talk Ted did. About his paper. The Register. The wonderful, interesting, meaningful Register. About how on Sundays they had a section of the paper devoted to people in the community who were of special interest to the readership. About how the editor of that section had agreed that a successful teenage girl band musician would be a very interesting article.

  “Crush” is a funny word. My crush on Ted vanished within moments. It was replaced by humiliation and depression and disappointment, and I want to tell you that that was just as crushing. Worse, maybe. Even my tongue felt weighted down. I hoisted it up and said politely that I would think about it.

  “How about today?” said Ted. He sounded very eager and anxious. I tried to feel flattered but that hurt even more. What he was anxious about wasn’t me—it was the article he planned to write and the photographs he planned to take.

  “I don’t think so,” I told him. “I have a rehearsal after school with a wedding soloist and—”

  “That would be perfect!” Ted cried. “I could photograph you in action. Let me come to the rehearsal, please?”

  That didn’t exactly thrill me. Here I had been up nights planning all these lovely dates of dancing, movies, skating, walking, kissing, hugging—and I was going to end up on a piano bench again with a flash bulb going off in my face. “It’s okay, I guess,” I said. “But the soloist might object.”

  “I won’t photograph her. It won’t bother her at all. What time is the rehearsal and where?”

  As I told him, I pictured his engagement calendar. It would be just like mine. Fat and scribbled on. He’d have a pencil in his hand. He’d be the sort whose pencils were always sharp and whose pens were never out of ink.

  I said good-bye.

  All day in school I caught myself fantasizing that at this meeting Ted would get to know the real Alison and be so taken with her that he would ask her on a real date. I tried to stop myself. I was never going to have a real date, because the only date anybody ever wanted Alison Holland for was a paying club date.

  9

  I WALKED INTO THE church, Ted carrying my music and my organ shoes, as if he really were my boyfriend and was coming along for the pleasure of my company. It felt sort of comfortable to have him walking along next to me. I had the sensation that he and I had done this many times and would do it many more. It was a warm feeling, but when I looked over at him to see if he shared it, Ted was staring at the stained glass windows and wondered how old
they were. “Centuries,” I said grumpily and stalked up to the organ.

  Whoever had told the soloist she could sing should be imprisoned. The rehearsal was awful. It made my stomach twist to think of her actually singing out loud at a wedding. The only good thing was that she demanded to know who Ted was and he told her! “I’m Ted Mollison, ma’am,” he said. He had a deep, nice voice. I decided to overlook his interest in the stained glass windows and enjoy our interview. Or at least enjoy his voice during it, even if he behaved like a turkey by being completely professional and not at all interested in me personally.

  Mollison, I thought throughout the rehearsal. He’s Molly’s son. I wondered if that stern-sounding woman on the phone could really have a name as warm and friendly as Molly. No. She probably had a name like Prudence or Hildegarde.

  Ted Mollison. It had a nice sound.

  Nicer by far than the sounds the soloist was making.

  “Whew!” said Ted, when the soloist had finally given up and left us. “They pay her to sing?”

  I laughed, glad to know that Ted could at least distinguish between a horrible voice and a decent one. “I doubt it. She’s probably somebody’s favorite aunt.”

  “She won’t be such a favorite after the wedding, I bet,” said Ted. He turned off the church lights before I was ready and I fumbled in the dark, trying to gather my music together. “I’ll help,” said Ted, but he didn’t help by turning on the lights—he helped by bending over to pick up my music with me.

  We crashed skulls.

  Other girls, I am confident, would manage to touch fingertips. I, Alison had to crash into him with my rock-hard cranium.

  The church was filled with gentle groans as Ted and I simultaneously dropped whatever music we had picked up and clutched our heads. I staggered past him and found the light switches again. We eyed each other rather bleakly. He’s going to figure I’m so dangerous he can’t be around me, I thought. If I’m not plotting how to break his ribs, I’m trying to give him a concussion. I’m worse than being on the football team.

  “I’m sorry,” I said.