Antisocial

by Jillian Blake

  Rad scoffs, hisses in my ear, “I’m sorry, did he say we need to be more responsible? He’s the one who didn’t know Big Brother was recording us!”

  I bump fists with her and tune out the rest of Nichols’s speech.

  All I want is to go home and crawl into bed, close my eyes, and keep them closed for fifteen hours or so.

  —

  Finally, chapel is over, and we’re up and filing out along with everyone else when I feel someone’s hand on my arm. “Hey,” Jethro says, tugging lightly. “Got a minute?”

  So this is going to go down way sooner than I had hoped. How did he get over here so fast? “Sure! Yeah!” I say, my voice unrecognizably high pitched.

  Jethro leads me down a short hall and into a little out-of-sight nook. This isn’t the place I imagined talking to him. In my mind it was at his house or somewhere else private. Now the delicious smell of him is pulling me back to the Torpedo Factory again, and it’s hard for me to focus.

  We stare each other in silence for a few seconds, then suddenly burst out laughing at the awkwardness. Jethro reaches out and takes my hand. For a split second I wonder whether he’s going to kiss me. For part of that split second, I want him to.

  “My text was too much. I know,” he says. “I was just—”

  “No,” I say too quickly. “It was totally fine.”

  “Fine?” Jethro smiles. “How bad did it make you freak out? Like, was it better or worse than when Snape killed Dumbledore?”

  I take a deep breath. “Last night was…really nice,” I say carefully.

  He nods. “It was. But we can take it slow. There’s no rush. And if you wind up going to RISD, we’re only gonna be an hour away from each other next year.”

  Next year?

  As he talks about buses that run between Providence and Boston, where he’ll be at MIT, my mind races. I haven’t even gotten into RISD yet! He’s already thinking about next year? Next year—when we’re supposed to be finding ourselves at college, making new friends, getting out of Virginia and not looking back? This is getting real…fast.

  “You okay, A?” he asks me now.

  As I inhale and exhale, I know one thing for sure—I can’t trust my feelings for him right now, and I don’t want to hurt him more. I slowly pull back my hand from his, and the first cracks of worry creep across his face. Like he already knows what’s coming.

  “I care about you so much,” I say, gaining control over my wobbly voice. “But…I don’t know that this is the right time for us.”

  Jethro looks at me, processing. “You don’t know that. What about last night?”

  I feel heavy. The depth of my feelings for him, the connection we have, makes every word harder to say than the last. “It was amazing,” I say. “But, I mean, I just got dumped. And we don’t know what’s happening next year. Plus, we haven’t talked in months, and now we’re just hooking up without even thinking about it?”

  Jethro closes his eyes. Then opens them again. Finally he says, “We’ve known each other years, Anna. I know you’ve felt it. You can’t deny there’s something here….”

  I hate being so indecisive when he’s so sure about what he wants. But I can’t stand here in front of him and tell him I want to start a relationship right now either, when so much is up in the air for me.

  “I know. I know,” I say. “It’s…just…I’m really just trying to figure it out.”

  “Wait,” Jethro says now, opening his eyes wide. “Is this about Palmer?”

  The question catches me off guard. “What?”

  “Is it Palmer? Are you still in love with him, Anna?” Sadness and anger are creeping into his voice. “Am I just your goddamn rebound?”

  I swallow hard. “No. I don’t know. But I mean, it has only been a couple of weeks since he and I broke up—you know that.”

  “And you’re not over him, are you?”

  “I…I guess I don’t know what I am.”

  The look on Jethro’s face now hurts me. Like, a knife stabbing and twisting into me. I have to focus harder than I ever have to keep the tears out of my eyes.

  “I’m sorry,” I manage to whisper.

  Jethro says just two words. “Fuck, Anna.”

  He slides past me—careful, I notice sadly, not to touch me—then walks quickly down the hallway. I call his name, but he doesn’t look back.

  When he turns the corner, I let the tears come.

  There is a reason why paintings are better than photos. It’s because they are closer to true human vision. You’re probably saying Photos don’t miss anything; they capture every detail. But no lens can ever match the human eye. A painter’s brush can actually come closer to that truth than any SLR, which is part of why I avoid cameras like the plague. Of course, Rad knew all this when she assigned me the job of taking pictures of the basketball team. Payback’s a bitch.

  I get to the gym early to practice with the camera, but after a few minutes of fiddling with shutter speed, I give up. Automatic mode will do. My Xandria pass means I get one of the best seats in the house for the basketball game: smack-dab in the middle of the front row of the press box, which is just below the scoreboard.

  I’ve been thinking about Jethro for almost every minute I’ve been awake during the past two days. Feeling his body up against mine. But now I’ve messed everything up. I made my bed, and I have to lie in it alone. Totally alone.

  Suddenly, taking photos of Palmer and the basketball team feels like sweet relief from thinking about Jethro. (Yeah, yeah, I see the irony.)

  Just then, I see Rad cutting through the crowd like a Prep mom late for CrossFit, holding my press pass out like a hot venti latte. Nikki’s up behind her, waving.

  “Hey, girl,” Nikki greets me.

  “Don’t let your sweaty palms drop that Nikon, Soler,” Rad says, cutting straight to the chase. “The Xandria can’t afford to replace it.”

  “Has anyone seen Mattie?” asks Nikki, blowing a bubble with her gum.

  “No,” I say, “but I haven’t been looking. You talk to him?”

  Nikki shakes her head miserably. “He hasn’t said anything to me at all. He hasn’t called or texted since last night. I mean, I saw him at chapel yesterday, and so I texted him afterward but I didn’t hear back until, like, ten p.m.”

  “And have you texted him today?”

  “Twice. And sent him a DM, but that was just a link to something on BuzzFeed.” Now she looks a little sheepish. “And…I called him.”

  “Just once?” I ask.

  “I left two voice mails. The first one got messed up.”

  Rad shakes her head. “A call is like the equivalent of ten texts. Don’t make me confiscate your phone. No more until you hear back from him, Cinderella.”

  I still haven’t said a word to either of them about Jethro. And apparently he’s also nursing his own romantic hangover alone; not even the boys have said a word about him except to casually mention he’s been home sick.

  The Prep warm-up theme song comes on—Eminem’s “Lose Yourself.” Rad starts to lead Nikki toward their seats in the bleachers and points me toward the press box. Over her shoulder, Rad says, “Slim Shady is speaking to you: This opportunity comes once in a lifetime. I.E., don’t disappoint me.”

  “Are you seriously quoting Eminem, Rad?” Nikki laughs as they walk away.

  When I’m alone again, I start snapping pictures of the crowd. The gym is packed tonight—it always is for home games. But there’s a special excitement in the air. This is Palmer’s first game back from his injury. Everyone wants to know: Is he the same player? Does he have the same speed and spring and pop?

  Recruiters from major colleges have been calling Palmer since he was a freshman. But when he stepped on his teammate’s foot at the beginning of November—twelve days before early National Letter of Intent Day—he twisted his knee and was carried off the court. The following week, word got out that he had a ligament tear, and several of those schools, including Duke, began to back
off.

  I could only imagine how it really made him feel. Imagine is what I had to do, because he refused to talk about it. Except for once, when I mentioned the upcoming regular National Letter of Intent Day, in April. I asked if he was going wait till then to sign with a school, to see if Duke would start sniffing around again after he healed. That day, Palmer referred to himself as “damaged goods” with a bitter laugh and then shut down. Soon we started seeing each other less, Palmer insisting that he was fine and that he just needed to focus on his recovery. I tried to respect his space and pretended I was okay with being walled off, but it hurt.

  Then, on the Friday before holiday break, I felt a tingle of excitement when Palmer texted me. His message was brief: Can we get coffee tomorrow? Killer ESP @ 2? I just knew he was going to apologize for acting cold and moody lately. I’d forgive him. Of course I would. If ever there were a time for forgiveness, Christmas is it, right?

  King Street—the main stretch of shops in charming Old Town Alexandria—was jam-packed with people picking up last-minute gifts, the air filled with that manic energy people have during the holidays. Outside the window of ESP, groups of Prep kids walked back and forth on the sidewalk. Rad and Nikki actually came in for a coffee of their own, but we avoided eye contact and pretended to not see each other—our miserable standard operating procedure at the time.

  Palmer was late. Five, ten, and then twenty minutes late.

  Finally, he walked in at 2:25 with an apologetic, slightly shell-shocked look. He put his coat on the chair and offered to get me another mocha cappuccino. I started to chatter away, about what, I can’t really remember. Palmer warmed his hands on his coffee mug, the color returning to his face after he’d come in from the arctic cold.

  But finally he looked up from his black coffee and into my eyes. Then said—blurted out, really—“Anna, I’m sorry it’s been so hard. I couldn’t send you a text. I couldn’t wait to tell you that—” He paused, and for a heart-stopping second, I thought he was going to finish the sentence with I love you.

  Instead what I heard was: We can’t hang out anymore.

  Time stopped and then restarted, but it was like I was under water, where everything is very slow and almost silent.

  I tried to blink. I couldn’t even blink. “I don’t…” I mumbled. “But why?”

  “I need to focus on basketball,” he said. The sound of his words stretched out like a record on half speed. Palmer looked back into his coffee and then up at me, trying to make a reasonable and apologetic face. “I need to focus on my recovery and next year, and besides, you deserve better, Anna.”

  So why is it that, despite the fact that Palmer has spent the past month and a half treating me like a stranger, and despite the fact that he dumped me right before Christmas, and even despite the fact that I saw him cozying up to Vanessa just two nights ago, I’m nervous for him tonight? It’s because I know how anxious he is. I know that somewhere this afternoon, he was clutching a toilet bowl, sweating. That he might even have had half a beer before he went to the locker room to try to calm himself down. That even with me here, my head still swirling with both him and Jethro, no one in this gym is feeling more anxious right now than Palmer.

  I hear a whistle signaling that the game’s about to begin. I point my Nikon lens at the gym floor, where the proud members of the Prep spirit squad stand flashing their pom-poms. Vanessa’s pretty, blond teen-queen ponytail is bouncing bossily as she barks orders at her less pretty, less blond minions. She says something to Jocelyn, and, though I can’t hear what it is, I’m guessing it’s a request that Jocelyn tie her shoe, because a second later Jocelyn is on bended knee, fiddling with the laces of Vanessa’s size 7 all-white cheerleading sneakers.

  Yikes, Jocelyn, get a grip. I snap a picture.

  My camera’s eye drifts in Palmer’s direction. I feel safe behind the Nikon. Palmer’s teammates are still in their jackets and sweats, but he’s already stripped down to his shorts and tank top, a light sheen of perspiration coating his skin. He’s on the free-throw line, a brace—dark blue, to match Prep’s navy-and-white colors—on his knee. He sinks the first shot, but the second hits the backboard and bounces off the rim.

  I snap a picture as Wallace pats him on the shoulder.

  Middle-aged refs in zebra-striped shirts gather at center court. Palmer moves to the middle and stands in a semicrouch directly across from a player from the opposing team, the St. Andrew’s Bobcats, his knees bending and unbending, his fingers flexing and unflexing. The whistle blows again, and seconds later Palmer has the ball.

  Over the next ten minutes, he takes shot after shot, and I take shot after shot of him in action. He’s fast, like the Road Runner, and he hasn’t lost an inch off his vertical. True, he makes fewer assists than normal, ignoring wide-open teammates to charge hard to the basket. At one point Wallace mouths, Dude, what the fu—? after Palmer hits a low-percentage three-point shot, even though Wallace was jumping up and down, arms waving around like, Hey, I’m in the paint!

  Whatever watching Palmer is making me feel, I don’t think it’s love. Maybe it never really was love. The breakup does still feel raw, of course. But the truth is, there are bigger things on my mind. Let’s start with how unsure I am about getting into a relationship with Jethro now when I was just in a relationship that swallowed me whole. Or the fact that Jethro talking about next year made all my anxieties about getting into college that much worse. Most of all, the fact that Jethro really, really deserves someone who knows what she wants, who doesn’t just sleep with him without thinking even a little bit about his feelings.

  Just before the quarter buzzer, Palmer hits a three-pointer for eighteen points total, setting an all-time personal record, not to mention an all-time school record. As he trots over to the bench, running a gauntlet of high-fives and butt slaps, he looks up unexpectedly, and our eyes lock from fifty feet away.

  Apparently he wasn’t expecting to see me.

  Suddenly I feel like a stalker.

  I have as much right to be here as anybody, I tell myself, straightening my spine, tightening my jaw. I have a duty. And there’s no letting Rad down twice.

  But from the hitch in Palmer’s step as he walks back onto the court, I can tell: I’ve broken his concentration.

  —

  The second quarter starts, and suddenly Palmer is bricking shots left and right. Which doesn’t keep him from taking them. Prep’s lead is only nine points now. When Palmer’s fourth shot in a row bounces weakly off the rim and the St. Andrew’s point guard rips the ball out of the air and sprints down the court for an easy layup, whatever pleasure I might have experienced at seeing I still had the power to distract Palmer turns to dust. I feel sorry for him.

  Finally, Prep’s coach calls a time-out.

  As Palmer and the other players walk to the bench with their heads down, I hear Bill Meade, Palmer’s father, yelling above the noise of the crowd. I turn my lens and zoom in for a closer look. Mr. Meade is standing courtside with a wild look in his eyes, smacking his hands together so hard, it must hurt. I’m glad that the camera blocks most of my face as I linger on him and his wife, Palmer’s mom, Michelle, who is seated to his left. Palmer’s friends call her a MILF right to Palmer’s face, and it’s such an obvious, incontestable fact that Palmer doesn’t even get offended, just laughs and shakes his head, asks only that they use MILMLT (Mother I’d Like to Make Love To).

  Mr. Meade is an agribusiness executive (in other words, the boss of a giant corn farm), and Mrs. Meade is a homemaker. They both grew up in Indiana, where Mr. Meade played college basketball. They told me all this when I was at their house for a family dinner just a couple of months ago. They were both pretty friendly and welcoming, despite the fact that I wasn’t the kind of girl they were used to seeing Palmer with. So it was a shock when I got a glimpse of the scary intensity hidden beneath Mr. Meade’s polite midwestern exterior. When I went to the bathroom, I overheard Mr. Meade through the heating vents, in the next roo
m railing on Palmer about the upcoming season, insisting that he had to prove himself if he was going to reach the highest level. That he had to focus. It was a pretty crappy way to talk to a kid with anxiety.

  As I stare at Mr. Meade, I wonder—is this the pressure from all sides Wallace was talking about back at Vanessa’s? Did his parents finally push him too far after the injury, make him think he couldn’t handle a girlfriend too?

  The ref’s whistle blast brings the players back onto the court. Palmer stands at the top of the key, knees bent, fingers fluttering like he’s playing an invisible piano. Moments before Dylan Johnson inbounds the ball, Palmer looks up and over. At first I think he’s trying to find Prep’s coach. But his gaze sweeps right past and gets to the press box and homes right in on me again.

  I give him a stupid wave.

  The rest of Palmer’s second quarter is stellar. Maybe it was my wave, I don’t know. Maybe he was feeling guilty and my wave helped him focus. Whatever the reason, there are no more lapses in concentration, no more dips in intensity. But St. Andrew’s keeps it tight, neither side ever having more than a four-point lead.

  In the last five seconds of the half, Dylan inbounds to Wallace, who throws a long pass to Palmer, and Palmer, at least twenty-five feet out from the basket, jumps high in the air, the ball leaving his hands only just before the buzzer goes off.

  The ball swishes through the net, not even touching the rim.

  The gym explodes, everyone jumping to their feet.

  The Prep players circle around Palmer, give him low fives.

  Then, a second or two later—before the players can leave the court for halftime, before fans can head to the bathrooms and food trucks outside—the entire gym stops in its tracks. Kanye West’s “Good Life” has started blaring over the sound system.

  And something’s flashing across the giant LCD screen.

  A headline in big, bold letters: