That Girl, Darcy

by James Ramos

  “I mean, after graduation,” she clarified. “You are on track to graduate on time, aren’t you?”

  Her tone was light, so I laughed. “Of course.”

  “Right,” she said apologetically. “What are your plans after that?”

  I shrugged. “Not sure. Haven’t quite made up my mind yet.”

  “Well, what are your options?”

  Haven’t made my mind about those, either. “What are your plans after graduation?”

  “I’m deliberating between majoring in art history at ASU, or architectural design at the University of Minnesota, or, as my safety, journalism at UCLA.”

  I blanched. “Such confusion, huh?”

  “Right,” she said. I couldn’t read her expression, but she seemed pensive. “You know, Mr. Williams is right about your writing. I’ve read your work. You do have a way with words.”

  “Do I detect a compliment?”

  “You have a way with written words,” she amended with a smile. “Your conversational skills leave something to be desired.”

  I chuckled. “Looks who’s talking.”

  “Exactly,” she smiled, but as she looked out over the city, the good humor melted from her face.

  “Do you like it here?” I asked her. “In Arizona, I mean.”

  She sighed. “Phoenix is a beautiful city. But I miss home.”

  “Why are you here, exactly?” I asked. “Bridget isn’t blood related to you, but you live with her and her family. Why?”

  “Bridget and I might as well be sisters,” Darcy said with a maternal smile. “Her parents relocated because of work. Bridget was terrified at the thought of leaving everything behind, especially right before senior year. So, I volunteered to come with her.”

  “But she wouldn’t have been leaving everything. She has her brother.”

  Darcy raised a brow at me. “I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but Calvin isn’t the most nurturing of people.”

  “Oh, I’ve noticed. I think it’s . . . nice of you to do that. Bridget’s a lucky person to have a friend like you.”

  “You mean that?” Darcy asked.

  “Sure.” And I did. Not many people would be willing to move to an entirely different state for their friend, even if that state was right next door. “Will you go back?” I asked her.

  She nodded. “Unless something compels me to stay.”

  She was here for her friend. I was her friend now too, at least, that’s what we had sort of agreed on not long ago.

  I moved closer. “Darcy, I—”

  “We should get back now,” she said abruptly, ducking around and hurrying away.

  I glanced at my phone. Whatever had just happened between us was gone. “Yeah, right,” I said weakly. “Let’s go.”

  We left the library through the side exit. Darcy’s pace was quick; I had to work just to keep up with her. We snuck back into the museum with no problems, just as our class was beginning to gather back at the designated meeting place. None of the others noticed us.

  “Well,” Darcy said with a deep breath as she turned to face me. “This was . . . fun.”

  “Yes,” I agreed. “It was.” I wasn’t sure if she was waiting for me to say something else, but it felt like I should. “We should do this again sometime?”

  “What, ditch class?”

  “Technically it wasn’t class.”

  She laughed. “I suppose it wasn’t.”

  “Darcy! Where on Earth have you been?” Calvin’s voice echoed from across the atrium as he came barreling toward us. He gave me a quick frown before turning to her. “I’ve been looking for you all over the place.”

  “What for?”

  “I like to keep an eye on you,” he said solemnly.

  Like you kept an eye on your sister? I thought.

  “I’m perfectly capable of taking care of myself,” Darcy said. “And besides, I wasn’t alone.”

  “Ah,” said Calvin. “I see.”

  Mrs. Lola called us to attention. I could feel Calvin glaring at me.

  As we headed toward the buses I started to ask Darcy if she wanted to sit with me. I wasn’t ready for us to go our separate ways. But I spotted my seatmate waiting for me, and so I gave her a resigned smile.

  She gave me one of her own. “See you back at school?” she asked.

  “Definitely.” Was it possible she wanted to stay with me as well?

  I shuffled onto the bus and edged my way back to the same seat as before. The others were already there, waiting to pounce on me.

  “Where were you?” asked Kyle.

  “Yeah, dude, we were looking all over for you,” added Lucas. “Well, not really, but still. I almost got kicked out for trying to mount this horse made out of sticks.”

  “I was . . . around,” I said, my mind still hazy. “I may or may not have made a detour to Burton Barr.”

  “You and your books,” Kyle muttered. “Lucas owes me five bucks now.”

  “What for?” I asked, not particularly concerned with his answer.

  “He said he saw you with Darcy. I told him that was crazy, and that she was the last person you’d hang out with, but he was all, ‘I know what I saw,’ so I bet him five dollars it wasn’t you.”

  “I was with Darcy.”

  They all stared slack-jawed at me.

  “Bet that was wonderful,” said Kyle sarcastically.

  “Actually,” I said with a smile, “it was.”

  “I thought you hated her,” said Mark.

  “I did.”

  “I thought she was a pretentious, stuck-up you-know-what,” said Lucas.

  “She was.”

  “So what gives?” Kyle demanded. “What happened?”

  I leaned back in my seat and stared up at where Darcy was sitting. She was with Calvin again, but that fact no longer bothered me. She must’ve felt me watching her, because she glanced in my direction, did a double take, and gave me a knowing look. I kept my eyes on hers, smiling, and slowly, she smiled back at me.

  I was close, closer than I’d ever been, to solving the puzzle that was Darcy. Piece by tiny piece, she was beginning to make sense to me. And the more I saw of Darcy Fitzwilliam, the more I was starting to like her.

  Chapter 21

  Just when I thought I was starting to figure Darcy out, she confused me all over again. I’d thought maybe we broke new ground today, but as soon as our buses pulled onto the school grounds and we all started piling out of them, she walked right off without so much as a backward glance my way. In the hallway, she didn’t even acknowledge my existence, even when I very purposefully walked right next to her. I felt like a can of soda that had been shaken to the point of bursting, and every time I saw Darcy or thought about her it shook me up that much more. I was either going to lose my mind or simply explode.

  At lunch I passed the time thumbing through my Acting for Beginners book, only somewhat paying attention to the conversation going on around me. By chance my eyes came to rest on a passage.

  An actor must know what it is his character wants. He must have a goal, or purpose, to act toward.

  I frowned and skipped through more pages. What was my goal? I thought it was to figure Darcy out, but now I wasn’t so sure. Suppose I did. Then what? I couldn’t decide. And until I did, I couldn’t move forward. I couldn’t act on a goal I didn’t have or wasn’t sure about.

  “Theoretically, a zombie apocalypse could never happen,” Mark was saying.

  “What are you talking about?” asked Lucas.

  “Did you get your degree in zombie-ology recently, Mark?” asked Kyle.

  “No such thing. But think about it. A zombie is just a walking pile of rotting flesh. What happens when you leave meat out in the sun? It putrefies. If an outbreak happened here in, say, July, it’d be over before they could bite anyone.”

  The table was silent. Then, Lucas slowly bowed his head. “And that, ladies and gentlemen, is how yo
u suck all the fun out of a conversation.”

  “One fell swoop,” said Kyle, imitating a logger chopping down a tree.

  “At least we can all sleep better at night,” said Mark defensively.

  The table was quiet again. Or maybe someone was talking, I couldn’t be sure. I was too busy thinking to notice.

  I decided for the sake of debating to say that yes, my ultimate objective was to figure Darcy out, to understand her as a person. That was it. What next?

  I came across another section, underneath the heading, “Tactics”.

  Tactics are the tools a character uses to attain a goal. The more real the goal is to you, the actor, the more convincingly you will be able to utilize tactics.

  I was familiar with tactics. Ms. Wright was fond of discussing them.

  Tactics are what define human interactions. They are the nuances of behavior that we as humans use to elicit a response from those around us, and that bring us closer to achieving our own goals.

  Darcy was the goal. What were my tactics? How could I solve someone like Darcy?

  She was sitting with Calvin, Luis, and Bridget. I watched her from the corner of my eye, each movement she made rippling through my consciousness. I was acutely and undeniably aware of everything she did.

  Until Lucas slammed his hands on the table. “Okay, so zombies are running rampant right now. You get one person in this building to take with you as you try to survive. Who do you choose?”

  “Why only one person?” asked Kyle.

  Mark nudged his glasses back into place. “You know, Lucas, I think in a survival situation the best number is five—”

  “Because I said so.”

  “Then I choose Elliott. He already saved my life once this year.”

  “I’d pick Darcy.” The words came out of my mouth without my having really thought about them. The table went silent, and when I looked up I saw that everyone was looking at me like I had just sprouted a third eye.

  “Why her?” asked Mark.

  It dawned on me that, given her steely exterior and her borderline misanthropic nature, Darcy would make an ideal partner in the event of a zombie plague.

  “Some end-of-the-world nookie?” asked Kyle.

  “That’s hot,” said Lucas.

  I frowned. “That’s gross.” Not really, but I wasn’t about to admit it to anyone. “Darcy is literally the only person in this building I could picture blowing the head off a zombie with no qualms at all.”

  “That’s mega-hot,” said Lucas.

  “Pretty sure she would do that to a real person, too,” said Kyle.

  No arguments there.

  “But could you trust her?” asked Mark.

  I had to think about that. “Yes.”

  Yes. In the face of just about everything I knew about Darcy. Yes, despite the fact that she had once betrayed her best friend out of jealousy. Yes, even though I was sure that I was the last person she would probably want to be stuck with during a hypothetical zombie apocalypse. Against my better judgment, I did trust Darcy. And I had no idea why.

  Lunch ended. Darcy didn’t look at me at all. We didn’t bump into each other in the hallway. It was almost as if she was purposefully ignoring me again. And I couldn’t take it. Something had changed between us this morning, and I had to find out what.

  I chose to do something about it during my free hour, which I normally spent either reading or catching up on whatever homework I wouldn’t be doing that evening. I knew Darcy had art this period, and it was easy enough to slip into the room undetected. It was a senior class, and we were for the most part allowed to come and go as we pleased. Darcy was among those who were fanned out in front of easels, all busy drawing or painting on canvases. A large, unwieldy bowl of assorted fruit was balanced precariously on a stool at the room’s center. I edged toward her, careful not to interrupt the silence.

  “Is this seat taken?” I whispered.

  She glanced up at me, and her expression softened. “What are you doing here?”

  To my immense relief there was a stark lack of annoyance in her tone. “Free period. Do you mind?”

  She shrugged a shoulder. “Grab an easel.”

  I set my bag down and pulled one of the dusty wooden easels from their rack against the wall. Once I’d set up shop at the seat next to hers she slid me a large piece of sketch paper.

  “Are you much for drawing?” she asked.

  “I had a coloring class once.”

  “Well, this is sketching.”

  “Right.”

  She handed me a pencil and I stared at the blank paper in front of me. I had no idea where to begin; I hadn’t, after all, come here to draw.

  I stalled by watching Darcy work. I liked the way she lightly slid the pencil up and down the paper, over and over, sculpting until the shapes became defined and began to resemble real objects. I liked how she worried her bottom lip as she worked and her brow furrowed in concentration. She suddenly looked over at me, and I averted my eyes.

  “So,” I began, “how was your . . . um . . . how is . . .”

  “Are you trying to ask me how my day’s going?”

  “Yes, that.”

  “Decidedly better. Now.”

  Now? “Why’s that?”

  She shrugged and said nothing, but a smile was playing on her lips. She went back to sketching, and I tried to do the same. After a few moments of trying and utterly failing to draw a circle I realized that Darcy had stopped and was watching me. “You’re pressing too hard,” she told me.

  “What?”

  “Your drawing. Here, let me.”

  She took my hand in hers and began slowly caressing the paper, making soft strokes with my hand. I prayed she didn’t notice the goose bumps that sprang from my wrist and traveled all the way up my forearm.

  “Don’t worry if it doesn’t come out right the first time,” she said in an almost whisper. “Feel it out. Use your intuition.” She continued to slide my hand up and down the paper, forming lines and new lines on top of those, until at last she released it. “There,” she said with a smile. “That vaguely resembles an apple.”

  I beamed with pride that I had met with her approval, even if it was over something as small as a picture of a fruit. I couldn’t help thinking that this was how it was supposed to be when two people got along, when they shared a connection that was more than superficial. The way I felt around her was different than the way I felt around anyone else. On some level, I understood her. At least, I was starting to. And I was starting to think that maybe she understood me, too. This didn’t feel like solving a puzzle, or trying to figure out some mystery. This was beginning to feel like something else entirely.

  * * *

  After school Lucas was waiting for me in the foyer. “So, about your Darcy situation. I did a little digging.”

  My Darcy situation. I wasn’t quite fond of his wording. “And?”

  “And my conclusion remains the same.”

  “Really? Why’s that?”

  He inspected his fingernails, like it had all been a piece of cake to him. “According to one of my various sources—who shall remain anonymous—in her fifth period art class she said, and I quote, ‘I think brown eyes are underrated. In fact, on the right face they can become the most appealing of all eye colors.’”

  “I was with her during her art class. I didn’t hear that.”

  He raised an eyebrow. “Who said it was today? Wait, what the heck were you doing in her class?”

  “Brown eyes are also the most common,” I said, side-stepping his question. “So she could have been talking about anyone, or just in general.”

  “She also said you were ‘classically handsome.’”

  “How do you know that?” I asked, though I already wanted to believe him.

  “Anonymous source.”

  “You expect me to believe that?”

  He grinned. “Nope. That’s why I
conducted a little experiment of my own. Earlier in class I not-so-casually brought you up in conversation, and guess who all of a sudden started eavesdropping?”

  I rolled my eyes. “C’mon, Lucas, that’s crazy.”

  He held up his hands. “Just hear me out. Here she was, just minding her own business and acting like no one else was even in the room with her—which is standard Darcy behavior—until I mentioned your name. All of a sudden she’s glancing my way, leaning toward me, dropping her pencil so she could come over—”

  “She didn’t.”

  “She did. Twice.”

  I shook my head. His “evidence” was shaky at best, but I wanted so badly to believe that maybe Darcy did feel something about me. It was a ridiculous notion, but it was one I desperately hoped was true. Even so, I shrugged it off and tried to play casual toward the news. “That’s all fine and dandy, Lucas, but even if it is true, what’s it to me?”

  “Nothing, given that you can’t really stand her. I just thought it was kind of funny that someone who—by your own admission—used to hate your guts can all of a sudden have the lovey eyes for you. Who knows? Maybe the feeling’s mutual.”

  I paused. Lucas looked at me with a knowing eye, but I didn’t dare tell him just how right he might be.

  My conversation with Darcy kept popping back into my head. The way she’d talked about her plans for her future, like she was so certain of everything working out just like she’d said. Lucas was the same way.

  I knew what I needed to do, and when I got in from school, I set to work at once. I made four sandwiches, took them with me to my room, and closed the door behind me. I gathered my laptop, a copy of my transcript, and a notepad. I shoved everything else off of my desk and sat down to the task at hand.

  Tonight, I was applying for colleges.

  It was a strange and complicated process. I’d never done this before, and it took me a while to figure out the logistics of it. But gradually, with a lot of time and every ounce of patience I could muster, I figured it out.

  I wanted to see Darcy again. I thought about going to the Manor, and twice I even started to put my shoes on to go. But I didn’t go.