by Nina Beck
“Oh yeah?” Samantha says, pulling her socks on.
“Yeah,” Jenny says, her back against the lockers. “I was asking Tilly who it was. I mean, I didn’t think it could be your boyfriend. Or is it? I mean, he’s really hot.”
Samantha starts looking uncomfortable. “He’s not my boyfriend.”
“I didn’t think so, but who is he?” Jenny says.
Ugh. I’m going to cut in here. I’m going to regret it, especially since Samantha didn’t stick up for me earlier, but it’s like watching a goldfish swimming in the shark tank.
“Hey, Sam,” I say. “Maybe you could set up Jenny. I mean, she sounds pretty desperate for a new boyfriend.”
Two gasps and a head swivel. A little sharper of a turn and I think Tilly’s head might’ve screwed right off. Sweet.
“Riley…” Samantha says, but I just look at Jenny and Tilly. Jenny stares me down for a couple of seconds and then tsks her tongue.
“We were only making conversation.”
“Me too.” I smile. Bitches.
“You know, you are who you hang out with, Samantha,” Jenny says, grabbing a bag off the bench before walking away, Tilly in her wake. There is a long pause while we wait for them to make it outside the locker room and before our aisle clears up. I’m waiting around…for what? For a thank-you? Somehow I don’t think it’s going to happen.
“I didn’t need you to jump in.”
You cannot be serious.
“I was just trying to help,” I tell Samantha, stuffing my crap in my bag. Seriously, you try to help someone and it’s not like I expected a thank-you—although that would’ve been nice—but I certainly didn’t expect a lecture.
“No, I understand what you were trying to do—but you’re leaving here in a couple of weeks and I’ll be here for another two years.”
Eh. I didn’t think of that. And suddenly I wonder if I just made things worse, because Jenny wouldn’t turn around and say anything to me. A shark knows better than to go after another shark. Sharks prey on the fish without the big teeth. People like Samantha, who probably don’t deserve it except through virtue of not being a shark.
“Look, I’m sorry. I didn’t…I’m just sorry.”
“Forget it,” she says, smiling. “It was a good line, though.”
“Yeah, it kinda was.”
She laughs and for a second I am reminded why I liked her so much that morning.
“So, you have a picture of a hot guy in our room? And I didn’t see it? I thought I had radar for that sort of thing.”
“I have a picture of my stepbrother, not a hot guy.”
“Stepbrother? Honey, if there is no blood in common, there is nothing to—”
“Ew,” she says, “you have got to stop.”
“Fine, fine. Let’s get out of here. I have a free period for the next—” I look down at my cell—“forty-three minutes. They do keep you buzzing around here.”
“Yeah and if you’re late more than three times for any activity, it’s a quarter demerit.”
I stop in my tracks and turn to face her. “What exactly is the deal with these demerits?”
“Three demerits and you get sent home until the start of the next program.”
“And this is bad?”
“I dunno, I guess,” she says, walking around me and out of the locker room.
CAN YOU FALL FOR SOMEONE OVER VOICE MAIL?
I walk with Samantha back to the Victoria Dorm because she wants to check her e-mail. Once in our room, I make my bed, which only takes thirteen tries and Samantha to show me how. The rest of the room is pretty bare on my side, but it is obvious that Samantha lives here year-round. Her wall is covered with posters, snapshots, letters from friends, quotes, and one big movie poster of Batman. I’m not sure which one.
While Sam checks her e-mail (and after I get a quick look at the pic of the boy on Sam’s desk—yes, he is hot), I lie on my bed and check my voice messages. Which are as follows:
D: Hey, Rye—What’s up in upstate NY? You haven’t called so I’m just checking in. M says you’re going to be going on the trip. What changed? But I’m glad you’re going to be there. I think we need to talk about what happened. I’m feeling kind of weird about it.
Dad: Hello, Riley, it’s your father speaking. I hope you’re having a fun andproductive trip. If it can only be one, I hope it’s productive (chortle). I’m calling because Emily left a message saying that there has been a large charge on your credit card recently and wanted to know if your cc has been stolen. Please call Emily back and confirm that you didn’t leave your wallet in a cab.
Marley: Hey, sweetheart! I’m just hanging out with D and we wanted to say hi and see how you are enjoying your spa vacay! We called the spa first but they said you hadn’t checked in yet. I hope everything is good. Call us!
D: Hey—you’re not mad at me, are you? Call me.
Dad: Riley, Emily said the charge was for over three grand for a spa in upstate NY. Call me back right away.
D: Did you lose your phone again?
Eric: Um, hello, Riley’s cell phone. This is Eric’s cell phone calling. Eric would like to know if Riley is available to meet tonight after dinner. Perhaps go for a walk so he can further pursue his totally platonic and on-the-level stalking. Please call or text Eric’s cell phone back. You have the digits.
D: Greetings to the taxi driver who has found this phone. Congratulations! You are now the owner of a three-month-old iPhone. These phones retail for around four hundred dollars but you got it for free because the owner, Riley Swain, can’t hold on to a phone to save her life. If you see Riley, tell her to get her ass on the phone—I’m going to start feeling unloved.
Eric: So, you haven’t called yet. Am I being too forward? Because I’ve been told that I can be too forward at times, but I know chicks like guys who are openly aggressive. It all goes back to that primitive “me man, you woman” thing, right?
Delete All Messages?
Yes.
I look through my missed-calls registry and scroll past D’s name to click on Eric, who has kindly put his name, number, and a charming picture of himself smiling smugly into the phone for me to find. Except instead of it saying “Eric,” it says “Mr. Right.”
I laugh loudly so that Samantha turns around and raises her eyebrows. I think of calling D first but just shake my head and hit SEND.
“I knew you couldn’t resist me,” he says when he picks up.
“Wow, Eric,” I say, flipping onto my stomach, “I’ve never been stalked quite like that before.”
“Only the best for my girl.”
“Eric, I’m not your girl.”
“Semantics.”
I am still smiling like an idiot, and by now Samantha is watching me carefully and I just shoo her away and turn to face the wall so I won’t have to watch her making kissy faces at me.
“So…” he says. “Meet me after dinner?”
“I guess. I mean, that’s probably the only way I’m going to get you off my back, right?”
“Probably. I can’t promise, of course, but really, what other choice do you have?”
“Right,” I say, smiling into the phone. “When and where?”
He names a place and a time after dinner but well before lights-out, which I repeat back to him. I’ll need to get Sam’s help figuring out where this place is, but that’s fine. It sounds like she is already listening anyway. I figure I can trust her. I mean, I’m not really trusting her with anything real…I’m just going to meet him and talk. And tell him again that nothing was going to happen.
I hang up and figure I have to deal with Samantha before I can call D back. Plus, I’d actually want some privacy for that conversation.
“OK, nothing is going on,” I say, sitting up in bed and turning around.
Her eyebrows are already in the raised position as she drinks from an open can of Diet Pepsi. “Nothing, huh?”
“No, nothing. He called and left some annoying (charming)
messages, and I’m going to meet him later to tell him to cut it out.”
“I could see the glare from your smile all the way over here.”
“Whatever.”
“You like him,” Samantha sings.
“No, I don’t! I like this guy from home.”
“Uh-huh.”
“Whatever.”
“You keep up that great rebuttal and I’ll totally start believing you.”
I jump off the bed and begin rummaging through my suitcases.
“What are you doing?” Samantha says, glancing over her keyboard at me.
“Looking for something to wear to dinner.”
I don’t even stop when I hear her laughing. I like to dress for dinner. It has nothing to do with Eric whatsoever. I pick something low-cut and run for the bathroom with my makeup bag.
THEBIGUN17: So now there is a new guy?
RILEDUP: I don’t know. I’m not sure I’m over the old guy.
THEBIGUN17: What’s the new one like?
RILEDUP: He’s a bit of a freak. In that overly assertive I LIKE YOU kind of way.
THEBIGUN17: That’s nice, right? A guy who isn’t scared to express his feelings?
RILEDUP: Um, it’s scary. But kinda nice. I mean, I don’t know. I can’t tell.
THEBIGUN17: Sure, whatever. Just give him a chance.
RILEDUP: You’re not even a little jealous?
THEBIGUN17: What do I have to be jealous over?
RILEDUP: Tell me the truth—you want me to be your girlfriend. You want me to stand this guy up and spend all night on IM with you. Right?
THEBIGUN17: You can’t hear me, but I’m laughing really hard.
RILEDUP: Ew.
ROMANCE IS SO MY THING
Dinner passes uneventfully. Meaning without drama (since Jenny and Tilly sat with a group of girls on the other side of the cafeteria and I sat with Sam and Allie) and without taste (since they served grilled chicken breast, overly steamed broccoli, and iced tea without sweetener).
I must’ve done something wrong that I’m being punished this way. This is not fair. Prisoners probably eat better than this.
I do spend at least the majority of dinner talking about the really great food that I’ve eaten in NY, over which Allie seems to salivate and Samantha just rolls her eyes and calls us masochists. Dreamers, not masochists, I retort. Good food is a privilege of a free and open society. To keep us away from it is akin to slavery.
Samantha just rolls her eyes again, but Allie is into it.
After I finish eating, I excuse myself, to which Samantha gives me a highly stylized and overdramatic wink. Ugh. The girl does not know how to keep a secret. Instead I brush off my suede skirt (A-line, dramatic yet flattering), dump my tray, and decide it is time to make my way to the meeting place.
Our meeting place is a boathouse by the lake under this really big tree. I get there about fifteen minutes early. Eric is already there.
“You’re early,” I say.
He stands up from the dock and smiles at me. “You are too. Couldn’t stay away?”
“Who, me or you?”
He just smiles and sits down again, patting the dock next to him. Ugh, I am wearing a skirt and not at all in a position to go dock-sitting, but I kick off my sandals and sit down next to him anyway. Then I dip my toes in the water.
“We’re early,” he says, turning his head toward me.
“Early for what?”
“Well, at dusk, it gets a lot colder and the water is warm, so it gets a little foggy on the water.”
“Oh. Fog,” I say.
“It’s romantic.”
“If you say so.”
I’m looking out over the water and see small bubbles pop up, then look over at him. “Probably just fish or a turtle or something.”
I pull my feet out of the water and slip my sandals back on.
“They won’t bite you, Riley,” he says, smiling at my toes.
“Can you prove that?”
He shakes his head, but then asks, “So what did you want to talk about?”
“Me?” I start. “You were the one who invited me here. And I just couldn’t think of a good enough excuse to stay home.”
“Dead aunt.”
“Hmm?”
“Kill an aunt. It’s always the best excuse for anything that doesn’t have an excuse.”
“You kill your aunt? First, I try not to murder people, and second, I don’t have any aunts. I do have a soon-to-be stepmother I could sacrifice willingly.”
“No, I mean, if you need a good excuse, you say your aunt died. People can’t really question that without sounding like a complete jerk,” he says, reaching down into the water and pulling out a weed. Gross. “Plus, then you can go back to normal the next day because nobody will think badly about you for not overly mourning an aunt. Grandparents get tricky.”
“Wow,” I say, staring. “You’re a sociopath.”
“Not really. It’s all hypothetical.”
“Well, as someone who has lost a parent, at least I could pull it off,” I say, smiling at him. But he’s not smiling back.
“Sorry. Wow. That was really insensitive of me,” he says softly.
“No, I mean, not really. I mean, it’s fine, I was kidding…I guess I was being insensitive,” I say, then I take a deep breath. “I don’t normally talk about…”
“Yeah, I mean, you don’t have to talk about it now,” he says, turning to face me. “I mean, you can if you want to, but if you’d rather not, it’s cool.”
“There’s not much to talk about, really. I don’t remember that much of it.”
“How old were you?” he asks.
“Four,” I say.
“That’s really young,” he says. “I don’t know. My mom’s a pain in the ass, but I don’t know what I would’ve done without her. Especially after Dad left. She was great. She moved us here and managed everything. I just, I don’t know, you’re really strong.”
“No I’m not,” I say, and I wonder about his mom and his relationship with her. He seems to like her a lot. I wonder whether I would like my mom. I need to change the subject.
“You OK, Riley?”
“Yeah,” I say. “What’s the story with Jenny?”
He looks startled for a minute, but if he thinks I’m crazy he doesn’t say anything. Instead he crosses his arms in front of him over his knees and groans.
“Did you love her?”
“Yes.”
Death knell. He’s not supposed to say yes…at the very least, he wasn’t supposed to say it so fast and so real.
“Why?” I ask, mainly because I’m a masochist at some level and I want to know what she has that I don’t. I want to see where I am lacking. I mean, maybe I can be more amazing than I already am. Maybe I can fix this.
“We’ve always been…I just know her. She knows me,” he says. He’s got this winsome smile on his face (vomit) and I want to make him hurt so I can see that smile go away, but I bite my lip. I bite it so hard that I actually tear up. I turn away so he doesn’t see the tear and think it’s him and these words of love.
“Well,” I say. “I’m not sure if that’s amazingly beautiful or the most tragic thing I’ve ever heard.”
“Thanks.” He sighs. The moment is over. The winsome smile is gone. I didn’t tear it from his face but I definitely removed it. She put the smile there. I take it away. This is not how I want it to be.
“And now that you’re not seeing her? Do you miss her?” I ask, preparing myself for the answer.
“No, I don’t miss her.”
I let out a breath I didn’t even know I was holding and look over at him. He puts his hand out, entwines the tips of his fingers between mine, pulling my hand closer. Then loosens them and entwines them more, tighter.
We sit there, not talking, staring at the water…and slowly as it begins to get darker, and the temperature drops, I wish I wasn’t wearing a sleeveless shirt. A slow mist starts to rise off the water. When the
moon comes out, it’s almost iridescent, and beautiful.
“This nature stuff is pretty,” I tell him. I expect him to say something kitschy, but he just nods and keeps looking out at the water. There are croaking sounds in the background, and I feel like I’m on a movie set for the perfect outdoor date. I turn and look at him. He’s looking at me. I smile and he smiles back.
I’m not thinking straight, I know I’m not, because I’m thinking about how great it would be if he kissed me right now.
I’m thinking about whether or not my palm is sweaty. His isn’t and I like that about him. I’m thinking that my fingers are fat and I hate that. I’m thinking that I want him to kiss me and wondering why he hasn’t and if it would be rude of me to ask. I’m wondering what will happen if I do ask him, will it make him think that…well, I don’t know what I think right now. All I know is that I didn’t call D back yet, and I’m only feeling a little bit guilty about that.
But I don’t know what D has to say to me, and if I’m going to be completely honest with myself, I’m not sure I want to know. I mean, he has been hanging out with Marley a lot, so maybe he’s calling just to tell me that he doesn’t want anything to do with me, and for the first time in months I don’t feel like that would be the worst thing that could happen to me. It won’t wreck me.
I’m thinking of a lot of things.
“If you were interested, you would’ve kissed me by now, right?” I ask softly. Eric laughs, but doesn’t say anything.
“Oh God,” I say, falling backward onto the dock—so I’m dangling off at the knee, but otherwise, lying down under the dusky sky. “Did I just sexually assault you?”
“It was more like peer pressure.”
Ugh! I pull my hand away and roll over. “This is embarrassing,” I say.
“No, no,” he says. “Come over here.”
“No, I can’t,” I tell him, still face in dock. Ew. I’m going to get a splinter. I’m still thinking except now half of my thoughts have been hijacked by embarrassment.