At First Sight

by Catherine Hapka

  Aw. I couldn’t help finding it absolutely adorable that he was so flummoxed by all the female attention. Somehow, it made him even more attractive to know that he didn’t even realize just how attractive he was.

  “So they spotted you at the show and came over?” I asked, mostly to buy myself more time to figure out what to say.

  “Actually, I posted something on Facebook earlier about coming to this show,” he said. “I think they saw that and just showed up. Don’t ask me how they got in—you and I were damn lucky to land tickets before it sold out.”

  Right. I smiled weakly, feeling like a big fat fraud.

  His expression was rueful as he glanced down at me. “Pretty lame, right? I mean, it takes a special person to appreciate the Beast. And it was pretty obvious none of those girls had ever even heard of the band before tonight. Probably didn’t even know where their name comes from.”

  “Quote from Lord of the Flies,” I responded automatically.

  He grinned. “My tenth-grade English teacher would be proud of you.” Then his smile faded a little and he shook his head. “Anyway, like I said, it was obvious that none of those girls were the one from the planetarium.”

  I nodded, knowing that Britt would want me to jump in and say something like, Of course they’re not that girl—I am! And I’ll prove it! and then grab him and kiss him like someone out of a movie …

  I was so embarrassed just imagining myself doing anything like that that I almost missed what he said next. But when I realized he was staring at me expectantly, I blinked and dragged myself out of Embarrassing Fantasy Land.

  “Um, what?” I blurted out.

  “I said, how about some ice cream or something?” he said. “My treat. You know—to thank you for helping me escape just now. Plus, I’d love to chat about the show. None of my friends are fans, so it’d be nice to hang with someone who really appreciates the Beast like I do.”

  Some ice cream? His treat? A little neon sign went off in my brain, flashing OMG! OMG! OMG!

  But I did my best to keep it casual as I responded. “Sure,” I said. “Sounds like a plan.”

  “Cool. Come on, there’s a good place just down the street… .”

  The ice cream place he was talking about turned out to be less than two blocks away. On the short walk over we talked about our favorite MTIAB songs and the band’s latest blog postings, and before I knew it we were walking into a cute little place called Chilly Milli’s. I’d been there once or twice before; it had awesome homemade ice cream and was decorated with a bunch of pictures of penguins and icebergs and stuff. The place was pretty crowded even at that hour; there was a long line of people at the takeout counter, and several waitresses in sweet little sleeveless pink parkas were circulating among the dozen or so tables.

  We found a free booth near the back. Once I was sitting there across from him, my brain suddenly went blank. He was staring up at the chalkboard listing the day’s flavors, not saying anything.

  “So,” I blurted out, desperate to break the silence before it got awkward. “Um, weird how many girls responded to that post of yours, huh?”

  Yeah, smooth, Lauren. Way to bring up the one subject almost guaranteed to make things more awkward.

  He glanced up at me, frowning a little. I could feel my cheeks going red.

  “Pretty much, I guess.” He didn’t look totally comfortable himself all of a sudden. “I wrote that message sort of on impulse. See, right after I got home from that field trip, I was thinking about meeting that girl in the planetarium, and I ended up just sitting down and writing this awesome song called ‘We Should Stop Meeting Like This,’ and I was all psyched about it. So I was thinking about that girl, and wondering who she was and why she inspired me so much, and well …” He sighed. “The rest is history, I guess. I never did anything like that before, and I had no idea what would happen, you know? Guess I’m not sure how to handle it.”

  “That’s cool,” I said. “I mean, you know, not cool that they’re stalking you or whatever. I mean, I understand. Not really; it’s not like I’ve ever had guys show up wanting to meet me everywhere I went …” I trailed off, forcing a laugh and feeling like the world’s biggest dork. “I just mean I hear you, I guess.”

  “Thanks. Anyway, enough about that; I’d rather talk about the Beast,” he said, obviously more than ready for the change of subject. And trust me, the feeling was mutual. “Did you see that crazy dude at the show?” he went on. “You know which one I mean.”

  “Uh, no.” Great. Only like five minutes in, and I was already getting tangled in my own web of deceit. “Which crazy dude?”

  “You know. Purple spandex? Crazy Mohawk?”

  “I guess I didn’t notice him.” I was too distracted to come up with anything more creative. That was because a very interesting—and sort of scary—question had just popped into my head. Was this a date?

  It was a totally foreign concept to me, at least firsthand. Oh, sure, Britt went on dates all the time, though she rarely called them that. She’d just say a guy had invited her to hang out, or that she was going to the movies with a dude she’d just met, or that she was going somewhere fun with a new hottie.

  But I didn’t really do anything like that. I’d never even been on a “first date” before—not really. Like I said, all two of my previous boyfriends had started out as friends. By the time we’d actually started going out together, things were pretty comfortable and casual between us, which made going out seem a lot less … well, datelike. The only other times I’d done anything at all like dating was stuff like school dances, which didn’t really count and was usually more of a group thing anyway.

  A first date. The whole idea seemed kind of weird and old-fashioned to me, like something out of a movie set in the 1950s or something. Or like my parents, who had a “date night” every weekend.

  “Lauren?”

  I realized I was drifting, not paying attention to what he was saying. “Oh!” I blurted out. “Um, sorry, I was just thinking about something. What did you say?”

  He grinned. “It’s okay. I’m always a little deaf myself after a Beast show. Think they’re the loudest band in America, or what?”

  “Probably.” I couldn’t help smiling back. “The first time I saw them live, I went home and started shouting at my parents because my ears were still ringing. They thought I was a total freak.”

  He laughed. “It’s worth it, though, right?”

  “Totally! I can’t believe they’re still only a local band. They’re way better than most of the stuff on iTunes.”

  “Tell me about it. My little sister is always blasting this Top 40 garbage in her room.” He made a gagging face. “And people say the Beast gives them a headache—that bubblegum crap is migraine city!”

  After that, things got a lot better. Relaxed, even. A waitress showed up to take our order, and Riley started teasing me about ordering ginger ice cream. I didn’t mind at all; I teased him right back about his choice to mix hazelnut gelato with mango sorbet.

  Ice cream flavors aside, it turned out we had a lot in common. We spent the next half hour slurping up our sundaes and talking about everything and anything, from music to school to our families. I discovered that he was in a band called the Grovers with some other guys from his school, that he liked to go crabbing in the Chesapeake and mountain biking, and that he had a weakness for cheesy vampire movies; he coaxed me into admitting that I was afraid of the dark but loved snakes and other reptiles and had been begging my ophidiophobic dad to let me get a pet ball python for most of my life.

  I even told him about my dreams to become a fashion designer. That was kind of a big deal, actually. I didn’t talk to a whole lot of people about that, mostly because I was afraid they’d make fun of me. But Riley seemed perfectly willing to believe that I could do it.

  I also learned that Riley had spent much of his childhood moving around the world with his parents, who both worked for the State Department. The family had lived
in Germany, Brazil, Switzerland, and Lebanon before finally settling in the D.C. metro area when he was twelve.

  “Luckily, I think this is it,” he said. “The ’rents tell me we probably won’t have to move again—their jobs now are both stateside.”

  I scraped a piece of crystallized ginger off the bottom of my bowl. “Wow, that’s hard-core. I can’t imagine moving around that much.” I tried to picture what it would be like moving away from my hometown, my school, and the friends I’d had since kindergarten. “I’ve lived in the same place my entire life. Well, almost—we did move once, when I was seven, but only to a bigger house like three blocks away from the old one. It must be tough starting new schools all the time.”

  “Sort of.” He shrugged. “But most of them were English-speaking schools for diplomats’ kids and stuff, so we were all in the same boat. We pretty much knew how to get along with each other.”

  I gazed at him with new respect. “So did you have to learn all those different languages?”

  “Technically, I probably didn’t have to, since we usually lived in expat communities, and like I said, the schools were all in English. But I liked to at least give it a try.” He chuckled. “It was a lot easier to pick things up when I was younger. So my Arabic still sucks, but my German and Portuguese are both pretty good.”

  “Really? Say something.”

  He grinned and let loose with a torrent of foreign words. It sounded totally cool and exotic.

  “What’s that mean?” I asked.

  “It means I’m glad I ran into you tonight,” he said, licking the last of his sorbet off his spoon. “This is fun. You’re really easy to talk to.”

  “Thanks. So are you.” I smiled at him, feeling little pings of happiness going off in my brain. So was this what Britt felt every time she met a new guy? I kind of hoped not. Because this feeling was too special to waste on every other guy coming down the pike. I wanted her to find that one perfect guy … her own Riley.

  Part of me couldn’t believe I was falling so hard and fast for this guy. What had come over me? It was like I wasn’t even the regular Lauren anymore, the cautious, reserved Lauren who preferred to test the waters, take it slow, get to know a guy as friends first… .

  But the larger part of me was just glad I’d dredged up the guts to go over to Riley in the planetarium that day. Otherwise we might never have encountered each other, even though we only lived a few miles apart. And all of a sudden I couldn’t stand the thought of never having met him.

  Although I still hadn’t come clean with him. Not really. I mean, sure, I’d told him I was Planetarium Girl in that first Facebook message. But ever since then I’d let him go on believing the conclusion he’d jumped to—that I’d just used that message as an excuse to contact him because of our shared interest in MTIAB.

  And that didn’t seem good enough. I wanted him to know that I really was The One.

  Not that the truth was going to be easy. I’d seen how he reacted to the girls he thought were fakers. What if he thought I was one, too?

  I’ll be doing him a favor by telling him, I thought, trying to psych myself up. If he knows he’s found the real Planetarium Girl, it’ll be way easier for him to blow off all the others, like the girls on Facebook and the ones at the club… .

  That finally convinced me. I had to do it. For Riley’s sake. It was practically an act of charity.

  “Listen,” I said, setting down my spoon. “I want to tell you some—”

  He wasn’t paying attention. Suddenly he jumped to his feet, waving his own spoon over his head like a signal flag.

  “Yo, Marcus!” he shouted. “Guys! Over here!”

  Eight

  A bunch of people had just burst into the ice cream place and were waving and calling out greetings to Riley. At first they were milling around so much, shrugging off jackets and weaving their way between tables, that I couldn’t tell how many of them there were. But eventually several crowded into the free seats in our booth, while the rest dragged over more chairs from nearby, and I could see that there were three girls and two guys.

  “So how was the Maybe Who Gives a Crap show?” one of the guys demanded with a wide grin. He was a little shorter than Riley with sleek black hair, mischievous dark eyes, and a lean, tanned body that never seemed to stop moving. I also couldn’t help noting with approval that he was wearing a superstylish Marc Jacobs printed shirt.

  Riley laughed and rolled his eyes. “Remember how I was telling you my friends don’t appreciate the Beast?” he told me. “Marcus here is the president of the anti-fan club.”

  “Hey, what can I say? They suck.” The guy glanced at me, taking in my MTIAB T-shirt along with the rest of me. “Then again, if a hot girl like this actually tolerates them, I might have to rethink my opinion on that. Hello, beautiful. I’m Marcus.” He stuck out his hand.

  As I shook it, one of the girls let out a loud snort. “Don’t fall for his Mr. Charming act,” she advised me with a sly glance at Marcus. “He’s a total hound.”

  “True,” Riley said with a laugh. “Guys, this is Lauren. She’s a fellow Beast fan I met on Facebook. We ran into each other at the show. Lauren, these are my friends—you already met Marcus, and that’s Rachel.” He gestured to the girl who’d spoken, a stylishly dressed redhead with a pointy chin and an intelligent face. “Over there is Jake, that’s Haley, and, um …” He stopped as he glanced at the last of the girls, a petite blonde with her hair pulled back into a perky ponytail. She was wearing a pink spaghetti-strap tank that barely contained a truly impressive set of knockers.

  “Nice to meet you, Lauren,” Rachel said, while the others added hi’s of their own.

  All except for Marcus. He’d just jumped out of his chair and rushed over to the nameless blonde’s chair, looking excited. “Dude,” he said to Riley, reaching down and squeezing the girl’s bare shoulders. “Surprise!”

  “Uh, what?” Riley looked confused and a little wary.

  Marcus laughed. “Don’t look so suspicious, bro. It’s good news. See, I finally tracked down the one and only Planetarium Girl for you! Voilà!” He stepped back with a sort of bow, gesturing dramatically to the girl in front of him.

  She giggled. “Hi, Riley,” she said with a cute little tilt of her head. “Nice to see you again. I didn’t get a good look at you there in the planetarium, but I’m glad to see that you’re just as cute as I thought.”

  Riley looked startled for a second, but he recovered quickly. “Oh, wow,” he said. “Hi there. What’s your name?”

  “I’m Chelsea,” the girl said. “But you can call me Planetarium Girl if you want. Or you can call me The One. Just as long as you call me.” She giggled again.

  Geez. This girl had more lame pickup lines than Britt. I was guessing she got away with it because, like Britt, she was super hot. The rest of her body was just as amazing as her boobs, topped off by a pretty round-cheeked face with big blue eyes.

  “Um, nice to meet you, Chelsea.” Suddenly seeming to remember I was there, Riley shot me a look. “Guess I can finish the intros now. Chelsea, this is my new music buddy, Lauren.”

  “Hi,” Chelsea said, though it was hard to tell if she was actually talking to me or not, since she never took her eyes off Riley.

  I was glad that he was looking at her again now, since I suspected my own face might be giving away my reaction to the latest introduction. “My new music buddy,” huh? Wow, romantic. Not.

  “So am I the coolest or what?” Marcus demanded as he dropped back into his own seat. He grinned around the table, his gaze finally settling on me. “Not sure if you know about my man’s recent heartbreak, Lauren. But see, he met this special girl on our last class trip and he’s been desperately searching for her ever since.”

  “Yeah, so I heard.” I was surprised at how normal my own words sounded. Did that mean I was getting more comfortable with my own lies? I wasn’t sure I liked the thought of that.

  “So Riley was so love-struck after meet
ing his mystery girl that he ran right home and wrote her a song—” Marcus cut himself off, spinning in his chair and leaning across the table to stare at Riley. “Hey, that reminds me. I told Chelsea here you were dying to sing that song for her. So how about it?”

  “Not right now, bro.” Riley smiled and shrugged as he glanced at Chelsea. “No offense. I just want to get to know you better before I get into that sort of thing. Hope you don’t mind.”

  “Not at all.” She reached up to adjust one of her straps, letting her hand linger near her cleavage. “I like a guy who wants to know a girl better before he gets into, you know, that sort of thing.”

  It was all I could do not to roll my eyes. No wonder he seemed willing to believe this imposter might be Planetarium Girl. She was full of clever lines like the one I’d somehow managed to spit out without thinking that day in the dark. Only, unlike me, she was actually capable of coming up with them in the light, too.

  Meanwhile Marcus was shaking his head. “I told you,” he said to Chelsea. “Dude’s a hopeless romantic.”

  “I don’t mind. When you find that one person you just can’t stop thinking about, it’s worth the wait.” She reached over and touched Riley on the arm. He looked down at her hand, not seeming to mind seeing it there. Touching him.

  I gritted my teeth. This “date”—or whatever it was—which had started out awkward and then turned awesome, had suddenly taken a steep downward dive into awfulness. For a second all I could think of was figuring out a way to extricate myself before I did something crazy, like jump up on the table and pound my chest like King Kong while shouting that I was the real Planetarium Girl… .

  “So Lauren,” redheaded Rachel said, turning to me as Chelsea continued to flirt shamelessly with Riley. “You’re into music, huh? What else do you like besides Maybe There Is a Beast?”

  I blinked at her. “Um … ,” I began stupidly. Then my brain kicked back into gear. “I like all kinds of stuff. Rock, alternative, punk—the basics. Although my parents went through a major reggae phase a couple of years ago, and I actually still listen to Bob Marley sometimes.”