The New Guy (and Other Senior Year Distractions)

by Amy Spalding

  “Because you’re a professional, and you take your liaison duties very seriously.”

  I’m pretty sure Em’s being sarcastic, but it’s true that I do.

  “Jules, will you ever forgive us?” Sadie deposits a cupcake on top of my notebook before sitting down next to me at our lunch table. “In the Alex excitement, you were totally forgotten.”

  “Nah, Jules is never forgotten,” Sadie’s boyfriend, Justin, says.

  “They’re choosing newspaper editor today,” Sadie says. “You’re not worried, are you? You’re obviously getting it.”

  “I’m not obviously getting it,” I say as Em and her boyfriend, Thatcher, sit down. “Natalie could get it.”

  “Pffffff, Natalie.” Sadie waves this absolutely true possibility off with a flick of her wrist. “Wheeler would be insane to pick her.”

  “He wouldn’t be,” I say, because we are as evenly matched as two competitors can be. We both have perfect GPAs, we’ve both been on the honor roll throughout high school, and we both have a solid mix of extracurriculars. “But thank you for the cupcake.”

  “Is there just one cupcake?” Thatcher asks with hope in his eyes.

  There is, but I split it with him mainly because I don’t want to make him sad but also because maybe karma will reward my generosity with the editor position. I’m not entirely sure if that’s how karma works, but I’m willing to sacrifice half a cupcake to find out.

  We used to share a bigger table with a bigger group of girls, but then people started getting boyfriends, and friends of boyfriends started joining in. So instead of being clustered together at one of the long tables, the huge group split up among the smaller round tables on the other side of the cafeteria. Now it’s just Sadie and her boyfriend, Em and her boyfriend, and me. I’ve decided it’s for the best that boys can’t be my focus right now, because this smaller table comfortably seats five. A boy wouldn’t just be crammed into my way-too-busy life; he’d have to be crammed into the seating arrangement as well.

  “Hey, Jules?”

  I look up to see that Alex Powell is standing near our table. Very near. Other tables have noticed too. It feels as if more than half the cafeteria is looking our way. But I think it feels that way because, literally, more than half the cafeteria is looking our way.

  “Hi,” I say in perfect liaison tone. “Do you need any help navigating the cafeteria?”

  “No,” he says, and smiles. Actually, he’s already smiling, but he smiles more. Alex’s smile possibilities seem vast and unending. “I navigated it pretty well. Cool if I…”

  He nods at the table, and of course on one hand it’s obvious what he’s suggesting. But on the other, I cannot believe this is what he is suggesting, so I don’t say anything.

  “Sit down,” Sadie tells him. “Justin, get him a chair.”

  “You don’t have to sit with me because I’m your liaison,” I say. “There aren’t any liaison rules about lunches or anything. There are barely any liaison rules at all.”

  “Jules, stop saying liaison,” Em says.

  Justin returns with a chair that he somehow makes fit around the table. Alex drops his tray on the table and sits down next to me as if it’s something he does every day.

  “The nachos were a good choice,” Em says with a nod to his lunch tray. Alex wouldn’t have any idea that to someone not in our little circle, that was a lot for Em to say and he should feel special.

  “That’s a relief.” Alex grins, and I can feel how it’s very much in my direction. I wish he would use his special powers elsewhere. Obviously in no real world is Alex Powell flirting with Jules McAllister-Morgan, but it’s so easy to forget that for whole seconds at a time. Plus I have no real experience to go by, unless you count Pete Jablowski, who kissed me two summers ago at gifted camp and then ran away.

  (I actually do count that.)

  “Where did you move from?” Sadie asks. “Was it somewhere colder?”

  “Ann Arbor, Michigan, most recently,” he says. “So, yes.”

  “Why did you move?” she asks.

  “My dad’s job,” he says. “It happens a lot.”

  “Oh, I’m Sadie,” she says. “This is Justin, Thatcher, Em, and of course you know Jules.”

  I know to Alex it must look like I’m part of—well, not a popular crowd, but at least a cool one. Everyone could fill their own square in some sort of person bingo. Em’s in all black in the way that’s not gothy but artsy and intimidating, Thatcher’s glasses are orange, so everyone knows he’s really comfortable with himself, Justin—who looks like the skater that he is—has a tattoo on his right bicep because his older sister is a tattoo artist, and Sadie generally exudes cool but also specifically has very violet hair as well as a tiny hoop through her nose.

  It’s fate that this is my crowd and that these are my friends. Sadie’s parents and my parents are best friends, and have been since before we were born. We were destined to be best friends, which is why our lunch table most certainly looks like A Lot of Cool People, plus me, wearing J.Crew.

  I don’t think it’s ever too early to put forward a professional appearance.

  Sadie’s questions seem to have ended for at least the moment, which is good because I trust Sadie’s good intentions but not necessarily her ability to refrain from asking about obvious topics of interests. So I’m a little relieved that Alex has a chance to eat his nachos, and also that he’s not forced to confront his past as a singing and dancing dreamboat.

  He looks over at me right as I think the word dreamboat, and I have a split second of thinking he has magical mystical mind-reading powers. “So what are the liaison rules?”

  I’m nearly as sure that he’s teasing me as that he doesn’t have any psychic abilities, but I’m not positive. I force myself just to smile and not inform him of the required liaison bullet-point items and time limits. How does anyone deal with boys full-time? I’m exhausted trying just to be normal.

  Talk turns to the usual subjects as people finish eating, and I stay quiet for an assortment of reasons, like Alex’s presence, like that Sadie generally carries enough conversation for all of us, like my memorized multi-item list of why I’m the best choice for newspaper editor.

  After the warning bell rings, Alex walks side by side with me out of the cafeteria. “I just have to take a left to get back to Maywood Hall, yeah?”

  “Correct,” I say, accidentally in my perfect Eagle Vista Academy Reception Committee Vice President Jules voice. Even for me, I’ve been a severe dork in front of Alex at this point. “I’m going that way too, actually.”

  I now vaguely remember from glancing at his schedule this morning that we have Topics in Economics together, and I think American literature too at the end of the day. Obviously I didn’t memorize his schedule on purpose; it’s just hard not remembering when you have the same classes. If I were a question-asker like Sadie, I’d get to the bottom of why Alex is hanging around with me, but I’m keeping it all locked inside. Plus he’s new, and I’m an expert on the school, so it’s likely incredibly obvious.

  And, anyway, by the time he selects a desk near Sadie and me in American lit, the last class of the day, my brain in overdrive mode has shifted from figuring him out to my Why Jules Should Be Newspaper Editor checklist.

  “Are you nervous?” Sadie asks me. I know she means to whisper, so I’m okay that other people probably hear her. “He’d be crazy not to pick you.”

  I glance over at Mr. Wheeler, who takes roll call every day by “studying the classroom,” which means we always get at least five minutes to talk while he squints around the room figuring out attendance. “We’ll see. And, yeah. I’m nervous.”

  She leans over and tousles my hair. We’re almost exactly the same age—I’m only a month older than Sadie—but I never mind when she takes care of me. “Text me as soon as you know. We can celebrate or mourn accordingly tonight.”

  “I’m not sure I can,” I say. “Mom and I are making meatballs, so that’ll t
ake a long time, and I have a lot of homework.”

  “Try,” Sadie says because she seems to have stumbled upon time-bending abilities I’ve never been able to manage myself. If I have meatballs and cellular and molecular biology to worry about, I have no idea how socializing can also be slotted in. “Also save me some meatballs.”

  “That much I can promise!”

  “What’s up?” Alex asks. “Being nervous, I mean. Not the meatballs.”

  “They’re announcing newspaper editor after school today,” I say, just loudly enough for Alex and Sadie to hear me. “And it’s a really big deal to me.”

  “She’ll obviously get it,” Sadie says. “Jules is a very organized genius, if you haven’t noticed.”

  “She’s already a VP,” Alex says. “Editor too? Is that allowed in the constitution?”

  After the last bell rings, I file out with the rest of the class, even though Mr. Wheeler’s classroom doubles as the newspaper office. I like putting away my books and getting out my special red notebook and folder that I only use for this.

  When people see or hear about my schedule, the automatic assumption is that I’m padding my college applications. Yes, I have newspaper, reception, and student council. Yes, during summers I have one of those I-file-unimportant-paperwork-because-my-parent-works-here internships. Yes, I walk dogs one weekday afternoon and one weekend morning every week. But it’s not only so I look good to Brown, or to any other school. All this stuff matters.

  Okay, maybe not the filing. But everything else! And at least at the office I get to dress business-casual like I’m an adult, and the department assistant always buys me lattes when she picks up coffee orders for all the lawyers.

  Alex leans against the locker next to mine. “Thanks for showing me around today. Liaison or not.”

  “Oh, it’s just because I’m—” I cut myself off from any more liaison talk. “You’re welcome.”

  “See you tomorrow,” he says.

  I think he’s going to walk away, but he doesn’t. “Oh! See you tomorrow too.”

  “Good luck with newspaper.” He grins at me before heading off down the hallway. I don’t know why the smile feels like the first one anyone’s ever shown to me, so I focus on switching out my books and walking back into Mr. Wheeler’s office.

  I sit down next to Thatcher, who’s already been the photography editor for the past year because he’s really talented but also because he owns his own camera, and it’s a really fancy one. Mr. Wheeler swore up and down that the camera wasn’t to blame or thank for Thatcher’s title, but we all suspect otherwise.

  My bullet-point list is written in my red notebook, and I turn to it and reread while people file into the room. I’m only on item number four (Showed leadership capabilities by becoming the first Reception Committee member to be elected vice president as a sophomore) when I hear Thatcher’s camera’s shutter click.

  I close the notebook as quickly as I can. “What are you doing?”

  “When you become editor, you’ll be happy that I captured a moment right before,” Thatcher says. Maybe he’s right, but I believe in jinxing down to my core, and hearing him say when makes a little shiver rock through me.

  “All right, guys, let’s get started,” Mr. Wheeler says, walking to the front of the room. He’s wearing a slouchy cardigan you’d expect to see on a very old man, not someone younger than my parents. It has elbow patches like a classic professor would have, but I feel like the slouchiness and cardiganiness take away from the academic grandeur they might otherwise suggest. “It’s our first meeting of the school year, and we have a lot to accomplish.”

  He begins his spiel for the freshmen, who are all turning in writing, design, or photography samples today. Only some of them will make the staff, and we’ll all have to drop whatever we have fourth period to take newspaper then instead.

  I assume Mr. Wheeler’s speech will go on awhile longer, so I sneak a peek at my list again. But I know the list by now, and I know all the reasons I can do this. And even though I can’t deny Natalie deserves it probably just as much, I can’t imagine my senior year writing for the Crest without being the editor.

  Natalie always has a steel look of determination and grace, but I still want to survey her face for any hint that she’s feeling what I’m feeling right now. But in glancing around the room, I realize something.

  Natalie’s not here.

  In fact, a lot of people I expect to see aren’t here. Even with the big crowd of tiny young freshman, there are a lot of empty desks.

  “We always start each year with a new editor,” Mr. Wheeler says, and I feel my pulse thudding in my neck and my wrists. My mouth tastes like pennies. Is it weird that I know what pennies taste like? “Every editor’s been a senior who’s been on board since freshman year.”

  Is he leading up to saying But this year is different, the way reality shows that have been on for ten years suddenly put contestants on teams or make men fight against women? Oh my god, I really watch too many reality shows.

  “And this year’s editor will be someone who’s worked very hard the past three years—Jules McAllister-Morgan,” he says. “Jules, would you like to say anything?”

  I do have a speech, because my parents have emphasized being prepared for big life moments. But all I can say is, “What about Natalie?”

  “Natalie’s decided not to be on staff this year so that she can focus on other extracurriculars,” Mr. Wheeler says. “Lucky for me, huh, I don’t have to make a tough decision between you two. Okay, moving on to the existing staff.”

  What about my speech? Mr. Wheeler couldn’t really have thought it consisted of What about Natalie?, could he?

  “All right, guys, let’s talk about attendence.”

  I guess he could.

  “Congrats,” Thatcher whispers to me.

  For what? I want to ask. For just not quitting? If Natalie were here, maybe I wouldn’t have earned this. Maybe I didn’t even earn this. Maybe I’m just the one who’s sitting here. Why isn’t Natalie here anyway? Why would she want to leave when this was her destiny as much as it was mine?

  Mr. Wheeler discusses attendance and hands out some forms, and then I realize he’s staring at me. I dismiss it for a second because unfortunately Mr. Wheeler and I know each other pretty well. He rents the guesthouse in the backyard behind ours, and for some reason my parents have befriended him. Sometimes they give him our leftovers like he’d starve without us. Isn’t he a grown-up with a job, and can’t grown-ups with jobs feed themselves?

  “Handing over the reins to you, Jules,” Mr. Wheeler says, and it hits me that even though I only got the job because Natalie’s whereabouts are unknown, I still have to do the job. So I get up and take story and photo ideas.

  I thought it would feel exciting and powerful, but it just feels like writing things down on the whiteboard. I feel like myself.

  After class, Thatcher and I hang back with Carlos Esquivel, the layout editor. I expect Mr. Wheeler will say something big and inspirational and then maybe I’ll stop feeling so blah about all of this. Mr. Wheeler, do you want me to feel uninspired?

  “Good work, guys! See you tomorrow.”

  I guess he does.

  CHAPTER THREE

  Mom’s already at home when I get there, but both dogs fling themselves at me like they’ve been without human interaction for decades. Since I know I’m probably too old to fling myself at Mom with the same panic-slash-relief, I sit down on the floor of the front room and focus on petting Peanut and Daisy.

  Mom walks into the room with her hands behind her back, which is strange and suspicious. “Hey, how’d it go?” she asks.

  “Um, it was okay.” I shrug like this year’s goals and dreams don’t all feel like a letdown. “What are you hiding?”

  Mom presents a cupcake to me with a little flourish of her hands. I wonder if I missed a memo that the fate of a school newspaper decision can only be managed via cupcakes.

  “Thanks,” I
say because it’s not her fault Sadie’s cupcake arrived first. “I’m editor.”

  “Oh my god, Jules! Congratulations!”

  “It doesn’t mean anything.” I stand up quickly because Peanut has his eyes on my cupcake. I wouldn’t share it with a dog anyway, but I can tell from the candy disc decoration that it’s from Sprinkles, and they do have the best cupcakes in all of LA. “Natalie quit the paper or something. So Mr. Wheeler basically said I got it because he didn’t have to pick.”

  “Aw, I can’t believe he would say it like that,” Mom says, because, again, my parents adore Mr. Wheeler. “And of course it means something.”

  “It doesn’t feel like anything,” I say. “I didn’t even get to make a speech.”

  “You can make your speech for us.”

  I choose to suggest starting on the meatballs instead of giving my slaved-over speech to my mom and two dogs.

  Daisy and Peanut trail us as we walk into the kitchen, and as Mom’s getting everything out of the refrigerator, I think to grab my phone. I have a bunch of texts. Sadie wants to know how it went, Em knows how it went because of Thatcher and is congratulating me, and then Sadie—

  Well, then Sadie has sent a second message containing something completely crazy, and I do not want to deal with that right now.

  “I went to McCall’s for the meat,” Mom tells me as she’s taking ingredients out of the refrigerator. “So it is very freshly ground.”

  “That’s exciting,” I say, because to Mom it is, and on a good day I guess it would be for me too. But I can’t get my mind off something, and now, thanks to Sadie, it isn’t the sadness of the way I became editor.

  So can we talk about the fact that Alex freaking Powell is clearly into you?

  Okay, I can’t just not think about the fact that Sadie’s texted me this bit of insanity.

  “Is Darcy going to be home on time tonight?” I ask, even though I don’t know why on time is something I say. It’s as normal for Darcy to rush in at the tail end of the meal, calling out apologies as she throws a plate of leftovers in the microwave as it is for her to be here before I set the table. But Mom doesn’t usually plan anything too elaborate unless she’s pretty sure it’ll be one of those latter nights and not the former.