How (Not) to Find a Boyfriend

by Allyson Valentine

  He holds out his hands. I reach for them, my eyes never leaving his, and he pulls me close.

  “Friends. As in boyfriend and girlfriend,” I say.

  Time stops. The air that fills the space between us grows sweet and warm. I am a butterfly with taste buds on the bottom of my feet, standing on the sweetest flower under the bluest sky. Not a Monarch. Not a Cabbage White. I am a whole new taxonomic anomaly—the wing-flapping, pom-pom-shaking, chess-playing creature called the Nothing but Nora. Adam leans forward. My eyes drift closed, and when our lips touch I understand why kiss rhymes with bliss. And for the first time in a long time I don’t try to talk my crazy heart off the ledge. I leap, and it is luscious.

  Adam presses his lips to my earlobe and whispers, “‘Boyfriend and girlfriend.’ I like the sound of that.”

  He kisses me on my cheek, my chin, on the bridge of my nose.

  “That’s what I want. It’s what all the swaps were about.”

  This time I initiate the kiss, pressing my lips hard against his, wondering what would happen if I allowed them to part ever so slightly, and when they do, I discover that Theo’s Coconut Kiss and Earl Grey are two flavors that were meant for each other.

  Oh my god. We are kissing! We are kissing at Molly Moon’s! As we pull apart, Adam asks me a question. “The swaps,” he says. “Were they worth it?” He places a tender hand on my cheek and looks into my eyes.

  I close my eyes and press my cheek into his hand. “They were worth it. They were so very, very worth it.”

  “And now they’re done,” he says. “Right? No more swaps?”

  I pull away, still holding his hands, and smile up at him. “Just one more to go.”

  My final move.

  Twenty-Two

  TODAY, THE DAY OF THE FINAL football game, I wait for Adam by the bike rack. Despite the grayness of the morning and the cold, misty air, I glow inside as he pedals up to greet me. He lets his bike clatter to the ground and folds me into an urgent kiss that makes me want to pull him down onto the sidewalk right then and there.

  “I brought you a present,” he says. “Close your eyes.”

  I close my eyes and hold out my hands. He places one foil-wrapped chocolate kiss into each hand, one for each week since our first kisses at Molly Moon’s. Someday, I will need a wheelbarrow to hold them all.

  “Did you miss me?” he asks.

  “Terribly,” I say, kissing him again. It has been exactly twelve hours, thirty-three minutes and fourteen seconds since Mom demanded that we break up last night’s chess game, which could have gone on for hours. Sitting side by side on the sofa, each of us hyperconscious of the warmth where his thigh and mine press together, our chess games move at a glacial pace. Neither of us is ever in a rush to be done.

  Adam sighs as we pull away from our kiss. His arms, those awesome arms, are wrapped around my waist. I gaze up at him, my hands clasped at the back of his neck, and cannot believe I am allowed to do this!

  “Sarah texted me about thirty times this morning,” he says, grinning. “She is so excited!”

  “Vanessa is, too,” I say.

  “Looks like your final swap is working out according to plan.”

  “They always do.”

  It is really hard to laugh and kiss at the same time.

  I arrive at the locker room to find Chelsey putting the finishing touches on the glitter star that surrounds the Teapot’s left eye.

  “Y’all, is this just the best day ever, or what?” the Teapot drawls.

  Chelsey had been skeptical at first about the Teapot cheering in Vanessa’s place at the final game. But at practice on the Monday following the chess tournament, the Teapot proved beyond a doubt that she knew her stuff. And the fact that Mrs. Teapot is taping the game to send it to Aunt Jean-Louise over at Louisville made it an offer Chelsey couldn’t refuse.

  My phone vibrates in my pocket. “Look at this.” I show the incoming text to the Teapot and Chelsey.

  Good luck at game. Conference AWESOME. Tell Sarah thanks for trading places with me. And break a leg!

  In the attached picture, Vanessa and her mom smile outside the convention center where Vanessa is overjoyed to be attending the US Intellectual History Conference. Her mom is hardly recognizable without the ancient cheer sweater.

  Outside, the band warms up, and music drifts in through the open locker room windows. Jazmine jumps onto a bench and dances. Becca marches in place. With a hairbrush, Gillian bangs out the beat on a locker. The Teapot grabs a megaphone and belts out the tune “There’s No Business Like Show Business.”

  “Did I ever thank you for talking me into doing cheer?” Krista asks.

  “I don’t think so. Did I ever thank you for agreeing to do it?”

  She holds out her hand. I shake it. “Thanks,” we say at the same time. During those awful weeks following the homecoming game, I couldn’t wait for football to be over. I dreaded the fact that we’d be cheering all winter at basketball games. I wondered if it was too late to switch to gymnastics. Now, I can’t imagine doing anything but this. It’s not that I’ll wind up like Vanessa’s mom, wearing my skirt and hair bow at the old folks’ home. But for now? I know I made the right choice.

  “Okay, girls, last game of the season. Are you ready to give it all you’ve got?” Chelsey, who has climbed onto the counter over by the sinks, holds out her arms like she’s hugging the world. We shriek and hoot, and with our pom-poms on our hips, we leave the locker room and jog out to the football field one last time.

  “Okay, let’s start with some stretches.” We spread out in front of the bleachers and warm up, stretching and jumping. I do a couple of tumbling passes on the damp ground. The band has taken their seats in the bleachers, and the stands fill with parents who file into the parent section and students who practically knock one another over as they pour into the student section.

  I can’t believe it’s really our last game of the season.

  “Nora!” I look up to see Joshie jumping up and down in the second row. Beside him Bill waves. Mom blows me a kiss and points with her thumb to the person standing beside her.

  I catch my breath. “No way!” I run up the steps, scramble into the bleachers and hurl myself at my brother Phil. “I can’t believe you’re here!”

  “Believe,” he says.

  “It has been killing me to keep this a secret,” says Mom, who is wearing the sweatshirt I gave her last week, which says CHEERLEADERS ARE SUPREME! and features a picture of Ruth Bader Ginsburg, former cheerleader and Supreme Court justice. There is a place for cheerleaders on the feminist agenda!

  “I came out early for Thanksgiving,” Phil explains, “so I could catch a game. And kick your butt in chess.”

  “I don’t know about that,” I tell him. “I’ve got a new regular partner, so I’m pretty on my game these days.”

  Krista calls from down on the sidelines. “Nora! Chelsey says to get back in line.”

  I kiss Phil’s cheek and turn to leave.

  “Wait,” he says. “Before I forget. Dad wanted me to deliver this.” Phil removes a chain he’s been wearing under his shirt. A brass key dangles from the end of the chain. He drapes it around my neck. I examine the key.

  “What is this for?”

  Phil shrugs. “I have no idea. Dad said you’d figure it out. Or if you can beat him in an online game of chess, he’ll tell you.”

  “Nora!” Krista calls again.

  “Gotta go.” I gallop down the steps and have just joined the rest of the squad when I hear my name called from a different direction.

  “Nora!” Adam waves from the steps where he is standing with Eric and Mark. He runs down to the track, wraps his arms around me and lifts me off the ground, spinning in a circle as we kiss. He tilts his head to the clouds and exclaims, “I can’t believe I’m dating a cheerleader!”

  “A chess champion,” I correct him.

  “Cochampion,” he corrects me back, and kisses me again.

  “Oh, for
crying out loud. Is this is a football game or a love feast?” barks Chelsey.

  “Fest,” says Becca.

  Adam grips my shoulders. “See you after the game?”

  I smile. “If I’m lucky.”

  We line up and grab our pom-poms, ready to get the crowd chanting as they continue to pile into the bleachers.

  “Come on, y’all, let me see those pearly whites!” A woman who could only be the Teapot’s mother stands between us and the bleachers. She is large and round and dressed all in purple—and in front of her, she’s got a digital movie camera fixed on a tripod. “Go on, give up a cheer for Aunt Jean!”

  We do a cheer. The Teapot and Chelsey break into a dance as the band blasts out a boppy jazz number. The band stops, and Geoff’s voice echoes through the stadium, “Ladies and gentlemen-men-men, please welcome your Cutthroats-oat-oats!” He waves to me from the announcer’s booth. I wave back, then search the bleachers for familiar faces. I spot Stuart Shangrove beaming beside his girlfriend. A few rows below them a large-breasted girl in a tight sweater jumps up and down and in the aisle closest to her, Mitch captures the moment on film. Over in the parent section Krista’s mom and dad are dwarfed by Dex, who is planted between his future in-laws with an ear-to-ear grin.

  The crowd leaps to their feet, clapping and stomping as the football team bursts onto the field from behind the bleachers. Leading them is Eric, who is truly a gifted trout. He blows kisses, gesturing with his flippers from his big spongy fish lips out to the crowd, and totally hams it up as he dances out onto the field. Who would have guessed that it’s possible to turn cartwheels with caudal fins?

  By the time the game is over, we have cheered our hearts out. The football team has won in an astonishing comeback victory, and Chelsey is on the sidelines doing an up-close-and-personal cheer for the camera. Look out, Louisville, here she comes! The football players surprise us by running out onto the field with Jake in the lead. They do one of our standard dance formations with deeply exaggerated butt waggles. Then, Eric starts a conga line, and before long a massive trail of football players, cheerleaders and even some fans snakes its way around the football field. My hands rest on Krista’s shoulders. Behind me, the Teapot’s hands are on my hips.

  “Chelsey asked me to stay on cheer through basketball season.” The Teapot shouts to be heard over the din.

  “Did you say yes?” I shout back.

  “No, ma’am. I said ‘HELL YES’!”

  The band winds down. The crowd thins out. The football players head off to the showers. My family comes down to the field to say good-bye, and Mom asks me to invite Adam over for dinner.

  Adam Hood at a Fulbright family meal? If anyone can handle the pressure, he can.

  We’re putting our gear back into our bags, and I shriek when Adam appears out of nowhere and hugs me from behind. “I didn’t mean to scare you! Eric and Mark are taking off,” he says. “I told them I thought I might have alternate plans.” He brushes a stray piece of hair off my cheek, then kisses it. My cheek. Not the hair.

  “Guess what!” I gush. “My brother Phil is here! You need to come to my house later for dinner so you can meet him.”

  “Will I really be required to answer math problems?”

  “Only if you ask Bill to pass the salt.”

  He pulls me into a hug and kisses me long and hard. So much for the theory that Adam Hood is PDA averse. “Want to go grab an ice cream?” he asks.

  I wince. “Remember? I need to stick around and clean the stadium.”

  I’ve told Adam about the Hamlet paper and the paper I gave Highlights. He knows the truth about the ill-fated ride to school and that it will be months before I can legally have him in the car. And he still likes me! “I’m dating a convict,” he says, grinning. “And, no big deal about cleaning up. I’ll do it with you. I mean, I’m kind of part of the problem, right?”

  Is he awesome or what?

  With large plastic garbage bags in tow, Chelsey and her boyfriend take the parent side of the bleachers. Adam and I take the student side. Krista and Dex have offered to stick around and tidy up the band section. Dex, it turns out, thinks Adam is awesome because not only can Adam talk basketball like a pro, he has two cousins who play basketball for the University of Colorado Buffaloes. Our double date with Dex and Krista at the prom is going to be amazing!

  With all of us pitching in, we’re done cleaning up in almost no time.

  “Whew! That was a lot of work,” Chelsey says, draining her water bottle. The guys carry the loaded garbage bags to the Dumpster. Chelsey stares up into the bleachers. “I wonder how messy the stadium gets in Louisville.”

  “I suspect you’ll find out,” Krista says.

  Chelsey gives me her off-the-charts-PQ smile. “Hey. Thanks, Nora. For the whole video thing with Sarah’s aunt Jean.” She claps excitedly. “Check this out.” She straightens her skirt and launches into a cheer:

  Look out, Louisville

  Here I come

  Chelsey’s gonna take you to Number One!

  Boys love race cars!

  Girls love horses!

  Gonna get As in all my courses

  Go-o-o-o-o-o, Louisville!

  The guys, back from dropping off the garbage, clap.

  “Isn’t she something else?” says Chelsey’s boyfriend.

  She is. She really is.

  We all head off the field, but Adam takes my hand and stops walking. “Oh. I forgot something up in the bleachers,” he says. “We’ll catch you guys later?”

  The rest of the garbage crew leave. I look at Adam. He looks at the sky, and we run hand in hand to the top of the bleachers.

  “What did you forget?” I ask, slightly out of breath, looking around for a scarf or some gloves.

  He drops onto the uppermost bench and pats it, and when I sit beside him, he turns to face me. “What I forgot is that I’ve always wanted to make out with a cheerleader in the bleachers.”

  Make and out. Two words that are okay alone, but put them together and, zing!

  We eventually come up for air and my face is freshly sanded by Adam’s sparse stubble. He drapes an arm over my shoulder and pulls me close. “Look at that.” He points to the gymnasium roof, where the sun glints off a metal vent beside the faded chessboard. “It would be fun to go up there with you and play sometime.”

  “Mmm. I’d like that.”

  “Eric and I tried to get up there once,” he says. “But they keep the door to the roof locked.”

  I smile and touch the outline of the key that hangs from a chain around my neck. “You know, I have a feeling we’ll figure something out.”

  Dad knows how to give just the right gift.

  Adam breathes out a contented sigh. “They say that chess is a lot like life,” he says. “And I would definitely say that as chess games go? This one is better than anything I could have hoped for.” He leans in and kisses my hair.

  I breathe in the cool fall air and nestle into Adam’s arms. There is nowhere in the whole wide world that I would rather be. “I know exactly what you mean,” I tell him. “I wouldn’t swap it for anything.”

  Acknowledgments

  I am humbly grateful to all the family and friends who have supported me while I whiled away hours with Nora, Adam and the rest of the gang. There are a few amazing people who cheered me on in over-the-top ways:

  A huge Herkie jump for the creative geniuses on Penguin’s publishing team who initially came up with the concept for How (Not) to Find a Boyfriend, especially Julia Johnson and Jill Santopolo, the head cheerleaders who helped shape Nora’s world. Goooooo TEAM!

  A touchdown stance for the faculty and students at Vermont School of Fine Arts. A pike jump for my ever enthusiastic friends at the Western Washington Chapter of the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators.

  A high V for my writing (and reading) friends who looked at early drafts and were proud of me anyway: Lily Garfield, Diana and Elsa Bonyhadi, Holly and Renee Chaffin, Hea
ther Singh, Kathy Douglass, Linda Valentine, teen readers Mallory Fortier, Julia Cochran and Christina Paoletti, and my critique group buds (in order of height) Lori Heniff, Madeleine Wilde, Molly Hall, Cora Goss-Grubbs, Tom Brenner, Elizabeth Koenig and Joni Sensel.

  A fervent pom-pom shake for Mark Pfister, ever generous with his chess brain and his humor, and cheers for Martin Caspe, who churned out game scenarios for the final chess scene.

  A clap and a stomp for the Issaquah Coffee Company for serving up goodies and solitude and the Teahouse Kuan Yin for understanding that writers, when put together in quantity at one table, are not as quiet as one might expect.

  A punch stance for Julie Wood, therapist extraordinaire, because every storyteller needs a compassionate listener, and deep gratitude to some special fans in the stands who were there to pick me up whenever I toppled off my pedestal: Meg Lippert, Jen Harrison-Cox and Arnold Valentine.

  A thunderous round of applause for the students and faculty at Issaquah High, especially counselor Melanie Bonanno, biology teachers Elaine Armstrong and Lena Jones, cheer coach Laura Couty and her fabulously talented cheer squad.

  Finally, a roundoff into about thirty back handsprings for Ari and Eli, who always kept it real and appropriately taunted me about scenes too ridiculous to show even my critique group (I still maintain that you could get an infection from a wound inflicted by a plastic knife covered with cake frosting), and Evan, the sweetest husband in the world, who always believed it was just a matter of time.