Keeping Up Appearances

by Elizabeth Stevens

  Greg grinned. “No, he’s– Ow!” he yelled as Xander elbowed him again.

  I looked between them and wondered what Greg had been about to say.

  “I’ll, uh, meet you at your room at Recess with that caffeine, yeah?” Xander asked, wiping the guilty look off his face.

  I nodded slowly and it dawned on me just how messed up my life had become this week. Here I was, planning to meet up with the King of the Bows for caffeine of all things. Meeting up to study was…weird but acceptable. Running into each other in the hallway or him choosing to sit with me for unfathomable reasons in class was also weird…but acceptable. But…this…

  “How about we cram some study in at Recess? Will that make you feel better?” Xander asked, once again like he could read my mind.

  “Sure. Library?”

  Xander sighed dramatically. “What is your obsession with that place?”

  “What is your obsession with the JT minion?” I shot back.

  “Touché, man,” Greg chuckled as he nudged Xander.

  I got the feeling Greg didn’t care one bit that Xander was suddenly hanging around me or that we were talking or whatever it was we were doing; Xander just was, so Greg was more than happy to go along with it. But, I also got the feeling that Greg might have liked to know why at least. I wondered though if Xander even knew why. I certainly couldn’t see any reason for it.

  We hated each other.

  I hated everything that Xander Bowen was.

  Up until his recent girl ban, it was not uncommon for him to be seen hooking up with girls in the hallways. Which said nothing of all the girls he hooked up with at parties. There were rumours upon rumours of all the girls. Both coming from within the Bow camp and from the girls themselves who decided they were suddenly Bows (what better way to become a full-fledged member of the Bow Squad than to hook up with their playboy leader?). Xander wasn’t exactly your one and done type, but he didn’t date and he certainly wasn’t discerning about who he spent his time with.

  And, that was just the very thick icing on top of a multitude of other things that made the cake that was King Douche unlikable. He had no time for people he deemed below him – which was anyone not in the Bow inner sanctum – unless he was using them for a hook up. He was rude and arrogant, expecting people to do what he wanted when he wanted. He was just… You just know those people who walk around like God’s gift and you want to smack them in the face? Well, that was the King of the Bows, hands down.

  The fact that he and Jason had been enemies for years was an unspoken rule. Everyone knew. It was practically one of the first things any new person in our year was told; JT and King Douche are enemies, you pick a side – no one was insignificant to the fight. It’s how it was.

  And, I’d been ruminating on this for the whole way through Home Group and wandering down the hallway so I ended up running into Xander. Literally. Again.

  “We have to stop meeting like this,” he drawled. He grinned down at me as I pulled my hands away from his chest.

  “We could just stop meeting.” Okay, so after the last twenty or so minutes of remembering why I hated him, I might have been a little hostile again.

  “I thought we were over this,” he said as he passed me the bottle of Coke almost apologetically and headed into the library.

  I followed him without really knowing why.

  “Over what?”

  “This tantrum or whatever it is.”

  “It’s not a tantrum. We hate each other. I’m just acting appropriately. Something you seem to have forgotten about.”

  “Ah yes, stereotyping – alive and well in high schools the world over,” he said sarcastically.

  “It’s not stereotyping. We’ve been enemies for years.”

  “The git and I have been enemies for years.”

  “You hate me because I’m his…was his minion.”

  “No. You hate me because you were his minion.”

  I stopped and he kept walking into the stacks. “What?”

  “You hate–”

  “No, I heard you. What do you mean you don’t hate me?”

  “I didn’t say that.”

  “Okay. What was the ‘no’ intimating, then?” I asked, hurrying to catch up as he dropped against the wall.

  “Only that your statement was wrong.”

  “What do you think of me?”

  “I think you want to get back at the git.”

  “Before this week.”

  “I think you should have already got back at the git.”

  “Before this week, King Douche,” I ground out.

  “Still the same answer. You should have before and you want to now.”

  “I don’t–”

  “I know you’ve been thinking about it.”

  I opened my mouth to refute it, but realised there was no point lying to him. “So what if I have? It’s not illegal or immoral to have thoughts, it’s just what we do with those thoughts that matters.”

  Xander nodded in condescending agreement. “Is it now? Well, I put this to you. You want to make him jealous, make him see that he picked the wrong girl, you want him to know what it feels like.”

  I wriggled uncomfortably. How dare this arrogant butt-head see through me so well. It was his damned fault I was thinking it in the first place.

  “You do. I can see it on your face.”

  “Okay,” I practically exploded. “Okay. Say I do. What does it matter? I’m one of JT’s girls,” I said it sarcastically, but it wasn’t completely incorrect, “who do I have to make him jealous–”

  “Me.” He was completely serious, all jokes aside.

  I’d been ready to go on more of a tirade, it would have been a thing of true beauty and poise. I’d been ready to bemoan my lack of foresight in selecting a niche group of friends that made me unapproachable to the rest of the school – don’t give me that, cliques are cliques no matter where you grow up. But at that, my brain just stopped.

  “Close your mouth, Holly. A bloke could get the wrong idea.”

  I did indeed snap my mouth shut, but I was pretty sure I was still looking down at him like a complete idiot. “What?”

  He gave me the sort of sinful smirk you’d expect might set you on fire, but it was wasted on me as I was still getting my head around the whole ‘him’ idea. I mean, I appreciated the smoulder somewhere very far in the recesses of my brain, but I wasn’t getting to it anytime soon.

  “Me,” he repeated. “And put it this way, you’d actually be doing me a favour.”

  “How would I be doing you a favour?”

  “You remember how I said I was avoiding girls?” he asked and I nodded dumbly. “Well, some of the Bows haven’t quite got the message. I propose you use me to make your git–”

  “Not my git,” I breathed, on complete autopilot.

  “–jealous and I’ll use you to keep the wolves at bay,” he continued like I hadn’t spoken. “A mutual understanding, as it were.”

  I blinked. “Um…what?”

  He rolled his eyes. “Fuck’s sake! I’m suggesting we fake date, Holly. We tell people we’re dating. I’m not harassed by the Bows and you can make that git of yours jealous.”

  “Not my git,” I muttered again, still by autopilot as my brain whirred.

  I didn’t know what I hated more; that I liked the idea of it or that all jokes aside I was actually considering saying yes. So, instead of coming up with an answer, I brought logistics into it.

  “How the hell is that going to work?” I asked. “Are you going to ignore all your friends, too? I can see the Bows taking the loss of their king so well,” I snorted sarcastically.

  The grin he gave me sent a shiver down my spine and not in an entirely unpleasant way. He held a hand out to me, totally unnecessarily suave. “No. I propose you join me.”

  I spluttered in an incredibly excellent way. “Join the Bows?”

  He nodded. “Where I go,
you go. And the rest of the school can fuck it.”

  “Rachel will go nuts…” I breathed, trying to think it through.

  He shrugged, his hand still outstretched to me. “Rachel can do whatever she likes. The Bows will accept anything I tell them to–”

  “Arrogant.”

  “But, true.”

  Well, I had to hand it to him, from everything I’d seen he wasn’t wrong.

  “What do you say, Holly? Wanna be my fake girlfriend?”

  I glared at him, thoroughly unimpressed with his asking out skills. “That just makes it painfully obvious you’ve never dated before.”

  He grinned and a small part of me did think it might have maybe been quite charming. “Is that a yes?”

  I ran it over in my head.

  Could I fake date Xander? I mean, I sort of didn’t hate arguing with him, so I could probably put up with him. I’d even had this weird…pull to him all that week… To the extent not all of our chats had been bickering. And if anything was going to make Jason jealous, fake dating King Douche would be the perfect way. I wasn’t talking to my friends anyway – and Xander and Greg had been annoyingly persistent all week – so what did it matter if I suddenly started hanging out with the Bows? At least, I’d have somewhere other than the library to hang out at breaks; I didn’t hate reading, but I didn’t love it. And, if I was doing a favour for Xander, maybe I could use that to my advantage at a later date?

  But, no. It was ridiculous. You didn’t just fake date someone to make someone else jealous. It always went so well in the books and movies.

  “No…” I said slowly.

  Xander’s smile stayed in place, but his eyes lost that humour. “Why don’t you think about it? My offer isn’t going anywhere.”

  I wanted to tell him that I wasn’t going to think about it. It was just a no from me and it would never be anything else. But, who was I kidding? I was going to be thinking of very little else now.

  “I need caffeine,” I sighed.

  “Your wish was my command,” he answered as he indicated the bottle in my hand. “Sorry. That was the best I could do.”

  I nodded numbly and slid onto the floor next to him. Our shoulders rested up against each other but we didn’t study. We didn’t even talk. I just sipped my Coke and tried not to think about fake dating Xander.

  He didn’t mention it the rest of the day. But, every time he looked at me, there was this humoured question in his eyes like he was daring me to admit my answer was never really a ‘no’. That he knew I was this close to saying yes.

  But, I couldn’t. It was immature and stupid and it was Xander-freaking-Bowen for God’s sake…

  Chapter Seven

  Saturday was the worst. At least I’d had homework to distract me for most of the week. And, Mark when he was being an unhelpful wiener. But, all that was done now so I tried to turn to my favourite movies to keep my mind off the sadness that crept in whenever thoughts of Nancy and Jason hit me.

  But, all that did was make me remember all the times I’d watched these movies with them. The sleepovers we’d had, the secrets we’d shared, and the times we’d been so close.

  While I tried not to let my self-imposed exile and epic-dick-behaviour weigh me down, I actually answered a couple of messages from Jess, Nigel, Amy and a couple of the others about what I was doing that night. I’d avoided them during lunch the day before by claiming Xander’s idiocy needed my immediate attention. Jess had found that idea scandalous, but I’d assured her that Madame Renoir was to blame for that one – the fact I was one of the top students in French helped me get away with saying I’d been roped into tutoring duty.

  I told my friends that I’d come down with something heinous – we blamed Xander for a while – so I wouldn’t be able to make it that night to the various things people were up to. I chatted and gossiped with Jess and Amy in particular for a while about things I’d missed out on during the week. I skimmed over the Jason and Nancy parts and hoped they didn’t notice. Midway through my conversations, my fingers opened up my chat with Xander.

  I found myself typing and I’d hit send before I knew what I was doing.

  Holly Aberdeen:

  I’m waiting for the perfect time to call you back.

  So, okay, yes… I might have spent a lot of the week giving the Vengabus a break and listening to that song after he’d first mentioned it. It felt kind of poignant just then. I could relate it to how I felt about Jason (I’d love to find some place where we were okay again, where he and Nancy had hooked up and I hadn’t acted like a spoilt brat) and also to how I was going to keep telling my heart we didn’t feel about Xander (there was something oddly comforting and refreshing about him, and if I could find a time and place where I didn’t feel weird exploring that then that would be great).

  The bloop of my phone pulled me out of my musings.

  Xander Bowen:

  I’d have to have called you first :P

  Holly Aberdeen:

  I suppose you would.

  I went through my movie list and tried to find something to watch. I flicked through the Horror section because I figured I’d find something there that would take my mind off my woes. Neither Jason nor Nancy had ever been Horror fans. So surely, that would be the best idea. I finally settled on Mama, which looked suitably scary.

  A little bit later, my phone went off and it sounded far too loud in a moment of quiet on the movie. So, I jumped far more than necessary as my heart pounded like mad.

  Xander Bowen:

  You messaged first.

  Xander Bowen:

  You okay?

  Holly Aberdeen:

  Eh.

  Xander Bowen:

  The git being a git?

  Holly Aberdeen:

  He’s not a git.

  Xander Bowen:

  Yes, he is.

  Xander Bowen:

  Huh. That is so much less fun over message…

  Holly Aberdeen:

  *sigh* I’ll make it up to you Monday.

  Xander Bowen:

  :D I look forward to it.

  Xander Bowen:

  Anything I can do?

  Holly Aberdeen:

  What, no great innuendo?

  Xander Bowen:

  Thought you might stop talking to me if I did that.

  Xander Bowen:

  I can if it will make you feel better?

  Holly Aberdeen:

  Eh.

  Holly Aberdeen:

  What are you up to tonight?

  Xander Bowen:

  *gasp* are you asking me out, Holly?

  :P

  Holly Aberdeen:

  I *was* pretending to take an interest in your life. But, now you’ve ruined it.

  Xander Bowen:

  Haha! Well, in the interest of your interest, a few of us are heading to Dan’s soon.

  Holly Aberdeen:

  I assume you lot think that’s fun.

  Xander Bowen:

  Angling for an invitation? ;)

  Holly Aberdeen:

  Uh, no. I’d rather do tequila suicides than go to a Bow party.

  Xander Bowen:

  Good little Holly Aberdeen knows what a tequila suicide is?!

  Xander Bowen:

  Also, if you ever do come to a ‘Bow party’ – seriously who calls it that? – we are doing tequila suicides!!

  Holly Aberdeen:

  Everyone calls it that.

  Holly Aberdeen:

  And, no, we’re not.

  Xander Bowen:

  Yes, we are.

  Xander Bowen:

  Hate to love you and leave you, but I gotta go get Greg. Wanker’s whining.

  I’ll talk to you later?

  Holly Aberdeen:

  Maybe.

  Xander Bowen:

  Tease.

  Holly Aberdeen:

  Douche.

  Xander Bowen:<
br />
  :*

  I ignored his kisses and went back to my movie. But, I was smiling again. There was something about his ability to annoy me that made me smile. It was ridiculous and I had no idea how someone I hated and found so annoying could make me smile with such regularity. But, I preferred that over the wallowing so I decided not to analyse it too much. I was just going to go with it. Besides, it was sort of fun to hate him to his face.

  I let myself get totally immersed in my movies. And, I spent more time hiding behind a pillow and feeling like I was about to jump out of my skin than moping about Jason and Nancy. So, that was a plus at least.

  Still when my phone went off again, it freaked the crap out of me and I picked it up while I busied myself with a sip of drink. Which was snorted out my nose as soon as I opened the picture that Xander had sent. It was dark, so I had to turn the brightness up on my screen. But, it was a picture of him and Greg doing one of those stupid duck face poses.

  I wiped my chin and laughed as I replied.

  Holly Aberdeen:

  Is this pre-tequila suicides or post?

  Xander Bowen:

  I wouldn’t dare tequila suicide without you!

  Holly Aberdeen:

  Oh no, please. Be my guest.

  There was a short gap, then I got another picture of Xander kissing Greg’s cheek while Greg made a hilariously sassy face.

  I decided then and there that Greg was fun. He might have even been good people. But, given that he was Bow Inner Sanctum, I was going to delay judgment until I knew him better.

  Holly Aberdeen:

  What *are* you two doing?

  Xander Bowen:

  Thought we’d include you on the shenanigans.

  Xander Bowen:

  Greg says it’s your turn.

  Holly Aberdeen:

  My turn for what?

  Xander Bowen:

  A picture.

  I rolled my eyes but knew he’d just be even more annoying if I didn’t. So, I opened my camera, freaked myself out by the image I got as it opened on front camera, struck a delightfully stupid pose with my tongue out and the peace sign, and sent it. I looked over it and knew I looked plain as; my hair was in a messy bun and I was in my pyjamas. It was a picture I’d never send anyone else. But, I didn’t really care. I wasn’t trying to impress anyone here.