Talk Nerdy to Me

by Tiffany Schmidt

  “Why would you want to do any of that?” Mom asked. “It sounds horrible.”

  “But if I never get to experience them, how will I discover what I do and don’t like, or learn my limits? How will I get to know myself if I’m never allowed any self-exploration?”

  “And that boy, Curtis—he fits in this schema?” Dad was spinning his apple on the tabletop. “Romantically?”

  “Maybe—No, that’s a lie. Yes, he does.”

  “But he hurt you,” Mom said. “Despite this, you want to experience more heartbreak?”

  “I want the chance to try and avoid it.”

  “High school relationships rarely last,” Dad said. “Statistically—”

  “I’m not a statistic. I’m a person. I’m your daughter. Maybe Curtis and I can overcome statistics, or maybe we won’t want to. We could date for a week, or a year, or a lifetime. We could grow apart or want different things or decide to be friends or have a devastating breakup. But any of those options sounds better than not knowing.”

  “Long-distance relationships don’t have great odds either.” Dad sighed. “But you’re not coming with us, are you?”

  I shook my head.

  “You’re choosing a future with romantic breakups over scientific breakthroughs.” Mom shut her laptop so she could lean forward and study me, disapproval all over her face. “You’re choosing a boy over family.”

  Merri would’ve admired the poetry in those statements, but I shook my head. “It’s not about him. It’s about me. I’m choosing myself. I want to see where things go—with Curtis, with school, with friendships, with interests. If I have a breakup—it won’t break me. For every flawed study you’ve sent me about the risks of teenage relationships, I can counter with an experiential anecdote—” Sera reaching for Hannah’s hand before an oral presentation. Toby signing up to perform a piece inspired by Rory at the spring concert. Fielding smiling and laughing while the melting dregs of Merri’s snowball dripped from his mussed hair. They were happier people—better people—because of their partners. Not that anyone needed a romantic partner to be complete, but it wasn’t a barrier to self-actualization either. “I’ve been your experiment for so long. Now it’s my turn.”

  Mom pressed her hand to her mouth; Dad slumped back in his chair. I tensed for their response.

  “Do you comprehend the effort we’ve put into getting you clearances or the exceptions that have been made for you?” Mom asked. “If you come with us, you could be part of something extraordinary—it will be a stepping-stone to your future success. You’re trading that for high school?”

  “I don’t need to be extraordinary.” I flattened my hands on the table to keep them from shaking. “Our definitions of a successful life don’t match. I need to figure out who I am before I figure out what I want.”

  “Your mom and I can’t stay.” Dad’s voice was quiet as he tossed his apple into the bucket for compost. “We’ve made commitments—”

  “I know. I’m not asking you to. I want to know about your life at South Pole Station, but mine is here.”

  “I see.” Mom’s eyes were glassy. “Well, if that’s your choice . . .”

  “Are you angry?” I wasn’t sure I wanted to hear their answer, but if I didn’t ask, the question would haunt me.

  “No!” I was grateful Dad replied first, because Mom looked less certain. “You’ve got a life here—we were asking a lot, for you to give that up to be with us . . .”

  “Even though we weren’t willing to make that same sacrifice for you,” Mom finished with a sigh and dabbed at her eyes. “But I’m not okay with things reverting to how they were before—reports and clinical conversations. I want to know what’s going on in your life.”

  “Good, because I’m done with logs.” I stripped off my iLive band and made a show of dropping it on the counter. “I want you to know me.”

  “There’s one problem,” Dad added. “We fired Nancy.”

  “That’s okay.” I looked around our showroom kitchen with a schemer’s grin. I wouldn’t miss it.

  “You’re a minor,” Mom stated. “Nancy may have been dull as paste, but you need a guardian.”

  I held up a hand to stop her. “Just listen. I have an idea . . .”

  44

  “You didn’t pack your passport or tickets, did you?”

  This was the third time Mom asked, so I held up my phone. “My tickets are on here, and my passport is in my carry-on, next to my gear crate, which are waiting in the car.”

  “Oh, good.” Mom checked her pocket for her own passport. I’d forgotten she was a nervous traveler. She got motion sickness too—I used to refuse to sit next to her on small planes or boats.

  Dad’s method for dealing with her panic was to ignore it. He calmly took a sip from a mug shaped like a poodle and said, “We haven’t decided if we’re going to rent the house or hire a caretaker. It’s temporary, you know.”

  Mr. Campbell nodded, and Mrs. Campbell offered my mother a refill on her water.

  She demurred. “We’ll likely be back in mid-November, but I can’t give you a precise date because it’s dependent on our research and the weather.”

  “Don’t worry,” Mr. Campbell said. “We’ll be fine. I’ll pick Eliza up from the airport in a few weeks and keep her safe as houses until you’re back. Jennifer and I are happy to have her.”

  “She feels like one of ours already.” Mrs. Campbell hugged me, but I didn’t miss how her comment had tightened my parents’ expressions. They’d been taken aback by how readily and eagerly the Campbell family had accepted my proposal that I move in with them after an early-spring-break trip to see South Pole Station and eke out a little more time with my parents.

  Even three days later, five hours before we began our multi-day journey, my parents had paused on the Campbells’ front step to ask, “You’re not going to call them ‘Mom’ and ‘Dad’ or anything like that, are you?”

  And sitting in this kitchen, not twenty minutes after I’d reassured them I wouldn’t, they visibly relaxed as I stepped out of Mrs. Campbell’s hug and crossed to stand behind their chairs.

  “A little help out here?” Merri demanded from the doorway. She was balancing her school bag with a box she must have snagged from the car parked in her driveway. She dropped both on the foyer floor and grinned at me. “First, you skip school. Then, you don’t even help move your stuff? I hope you’re not going to be a diva houseguest.”

  “Why don’t you girls bring Eliza’s things in?” Mr. Campbell suggested. “We’ll order pizza for dinner before the Gordon-Ferguses leave for the airport.”

  I started to follow Merri outside but paused in the foyer. “She won’t be any trouble,” Mrs. Campbell was reassuring my parents. “She never is.”

  “I know I’m biased,” Mom answered slowly, “but I truly think Eliza is remarkable. Do you ever look at your daughters and swell with pride and think, ‘How did I make that amazing human?’”

  Biting back a grin, I stepped out the front door and almost stumbled off the step when a barrage of voices yelled, “Surprise!”

  I laughed around the hand I’d clasped to my mouth. Fielding, Sera, Hannah, Toby, Rory, Lance, Win, Wink, and Curtis stood around my car with bags and boxes in their hands.

  “What are you all doing here?” I asked.

  “Helping you move,” said Lance. “Though I thought you’d have more stuff. This is only going to take five minutes.”

  “My dad’s ordering pizzas,” Merri offered. Lance shifted the box he was holding to give her a thumbs-up.

  “Personally, I thought I’d come stare at you a bit.” Curtis peeled himself off the passenger side of my car. His hands, I noticed, were empty. His lack of helping had nothing to do with any lingering maladies—he’d been fine when we’d gone running yesterday. “In case you get frostbite and your nose rots off, or you fall in love with some research project and decide not to come back.”

  “We should be so lucky,” said Toby. He r
aised his hands and added “Kidding!” even before Rory elbowed him.

  Merri and I exchanged glances—she was the only one who knew that’d almost come true.

  “So, Eliza Marie Gordon-Fergus, I have something middle-name serious to ask you.”

  Personally, I wanted to ask Curtis where he’d learned my middle name. Instead I waited for the wink or flicker at the side of his mouth that meant he was trying not to grin. But his expression was earnest and focused; he was ignoring or oblivious to the way our friends were disconcerted, Sera and Hannah cutting off their conversation midsentence and Toby and Wink putting down boxes to watch.

  The attention prickled at my spine, sharpening the edges of my tongue so it sounded like a curse when I said, “Proceed.” I swallowed and added a belated, “Please.”

  “Will you . . .” He cleared his throat and shuffled his feet, but when he raised his chin, he met my eyes, and this time there was zero hesitation. “Will you—”

  “Yes.” If this was a battle of confidence, I’d grant us a tie. This time at least. I wanted months—years—of competitions. Of matching wits and intelligence and challenging each other to be better. But at the end of each day, I wanted to be on the same side. I wanted us to be a team, not competitors. I crossed the snow-crusted grass to meet him by my car and didn’t pause for a second before I twined my arms around his neck and pulled his mouth to mine. I kissed him long enough to tune out the whoops and cheers of our audience. Then I pulled back and said, “I’m assuming you were about to ask me out.”

  He chuckled against my forehead and pulled me tighter. “Either that, or pick me up a souvenir from the South Pole. Maybe a keychain or a snow globe. My Girlfriend Went to Antarctica and All I Got Was This Lousy T-shirt?”

  I laughed. “I’ll see what I can do. Anyone else have souvenir requests?” But when I turned to the driveway, it was empty. Our friends were graciously giving us a moment. Which would likely be the last nonteasing moment either of us experienced for a very long time. Poor Curtis—at least I got a two-week reprieve.

  Speaking of: “Hey, since I won’t be here to see it, can you tell me what book you did your project on now?” I tugged on his hand, then interlaced our fingers.

  “A poem, actually.” He looked down at the driveway. “Tennyson’s ‘Lancelot and Elaine’—I wrote a modern, gender-swapped version.”

  I tilted my head. “Isn’t that the poem from when Gilbert saves—”

  “Yeah, it’s Anne-adjacent and also super emo and unrequited. Which is how I felt at the time.” He squeezed my hand and gave me a sheepish smile. “Be very glad you’re not here to see me present it. I certainly am.”

  I leaned in. “Never unrequited, just . . . ‘unprepared,’ ‘unexpressed,’ ‘uncourageous’—what word do you like?”

  He leaned in too. “‘Unforgettable.’ ‘Unreplaceable.’” He laughed at my pursed mouth. “Yes, I know that’s not a word. Still true.”

  I breathed my correction against his lips, making the kiss irreplaceable, just like he was.

  The front door cracked open, and a white mitten waved from the gap. “Is it safe to come out yet? Have you stopped mauling my brother?”

  “Yes, Wink,” we said in unison. Curtis swung our clasped hands as everyone trooped out for another load.

  “About time,” muttered Lance. “Though now I’m the only single person in the Lunch Bunch.”

  Rory and Merri exchanged looks, but somehow I couldn’t roll my eyes when Merri said, “Maybe you should talk to Ms. Gregoire.”

  “Ew, gross. She’s, like, old.” Lance recoiled, spilling socks out of the box he’d squeezed. “You are weird, little Campbell. Fielding, she is weird.”

  “That’s not what I meant!” Merri protested, scooping up sock rolls and pelting him with them.

  “Hey!” I jumped to intercept a pair Lance was firing back. “Those were clean.”

  “I’ll wash them while you’re gone,” Merri answered from behind Fielding, who was acting as a human shield.

  I laughed and went to check if the trunk was empty.

  “Hey, E!” Win called from the other side of the driveway. “Did this fall out of one of your boxes?”

  He was too far away for me to read the title of the thick black book, but I didn’t recognize it. “Nope. Not mine.”

  “Oh, that’s . . .” Huck emerged from the house. His eyes locked on Win, and he froze. Huck cleared his throat and raised a hand, then sheepishly lowered it. His dimples flickered in and out like he couldn’t settle on an expression. “That’s mine.”

  “You brought homework?” Rory grimaced. “I thought we were watching a movie and avoiding manual labor. What is that book even? Did I forget an assignment?”

  Huck hadn’t moved to take the tome Win was holding out. They were at the top of the driveway—standing a garage door’s width apart and apparently either having a staring contest or playing an impromptu game of freeze tag. Win was the one who crossed the ten feet of asphalt. He didn’t stop until the toes of his Vans almost grazed those of Huck’s suede wing tips.

  Finally Huck blinked and unfroze. “Thanks. Um, yeah, thanks.”

  I waited for Win to flay him with sarcasm or grind his vulnerability with sandpapery abrasion. Instead he ran a hand through his hair, and his voice was missing all his trademark snark when he answered, “No problem. How is it?”

  Merri sidled up next to me at the trunk, and from the smile on her face, I knew to brace my side for the elbow she was about to gleefully dig in. “Do you see sparks flying? I see sparks. Frissons, frissons, everywhere. Curtis, back me up.”

  This was my cue to tell her she was being absurd, that there was no such thing. I shh’d her instead, stepping around the car to spy closer.

  “Did my brother just ask about a book?” Curtis’s awed words were so quiet I barely caught them, though he’d whispered directly in my ear, causing shivers on my skin.

  I shh’d him too.

  “I haven’t started it yet.” Huck scratched the back of his neck, suddenly remembering he’d left Rory’s question hanging and turning to answer her. “It’s not homework. It’s this extra-assignment thing from Ms. Gregoire. I’ll tell you later.”

  “Oh!” Rory’s eyes widened and searched the driveway to meet Merri’s, then mine. She knew her sister would nod and smile, but I didn’t think she’d expected me to as well. “If Ms. Gregoire wants you to read it, you should. Like, right now.”

  Huck shook his head. “I’ll do it later. But maybe the movie can wait. It looks like there’s a lot of boxes out here.” The person he turned to for confirmation wasn’t me—the owner of the completely reasonable number of boxes that were already unloaded—but the guy still standing way too close. “Do you guys need some help? I’m Huck, by the way. Huck Baker.”

  Win’s answering smile was enormous before he adjusted it down to a grin. I couldn’t hear what he said though, because they’d dropped their voices.

  “Did that happen? Is this really happening?” I wasn’t sure if it was Merri or Curtis asking, but both were gawking.

  “Leave them alone.” I pulled them back a step. “Merri, you are twelve kinds of obvious. Curtis, your brother will never forgive you if you interfere.”

  “Fine. But I’m singing the ‘Sitting in a Tree’ song to Win on the way home, and good luck, Huckleberry.” Curtis spun the box he was holding. The last one. Should we put it back in the trunk as some sort of decoy for Huck? No, that was absurd. They’d had their meet-cute, and I’d done my part by distracting my nosy duo. The rest was up to Huck and Win . . . and maybe whatever book Ms. Gregoire had assigned.

  “Can I take this in through your balcony, Short Stack?” Curtis asked. “I’ve heard about how you climb it, and I want to try.”

  Merri laughed. “Sure. Knock yourself out—not literally though. Check to make sure it’s not icy before you step on the wall.”

  Once he was gone—whistling loudly as he walked past the pair of flirting boys—I pulled a
small gift bag from the back seat. “This is for you. I’m not saying I was wrong about magic or Ms. Gregoire, and I’m not saying you’re right either. Just that some things are open to interpretation.”

  Merri shoved aside tissue paper and pulled out a notebook. Embossed on the cover was a quote from Einstein: Imagination is more important than knowledge. Knowledge is limited. Imagination encircles the world.

  “I got myself one too—I figure since I’m going to be unplugged for the next two weeks, I might want a place to write stuff down.” I fished mine out of my carry-on and held it up. It was green with a quote from Anne of Green Gables emblazoned across the front in a carroty-orange font: It’s delightful when your imaginations come true.

  It was a different Anne quote about imagination that I’d used as the centerpiece of my English paper: “I’ve just been imagining that it was really me you wanted after all . . . It was a great comfort while it lasted. But the worst of imagining things is that the time comes when you have to stop and that hurts.” I disagreed—if I’d learned anything from Anne’s impetuousness, from my own forays into rule-breaking, it was that rejection was worth the risk of asking to be valued. Imagination was worth the pain of reality.

  Merri hugged her notebook to her chest. “It’s perfect. They both are.” She grinned and hip-checked me as I bent to put mine away. “And so we’re clear, what I’m taking away from this conversation is that you, me, Fielding, and Curtis are going on soooo many double dates when you get home.”

  “Maybe.” I nudged her shoulder with mine. “But I owe Curtis a solo date first. Want to help me plan it?”

  She nodded frantically. “I have so many ideas already.”

  “Eliza!” Mom called from the Campbells’ front door. “Do you want to show me your new room? I want to make sure you’re settled.”

  I started up the path with Merri beside me. Settled. The word rested lightly on my shoulders and felt right against my tongue. I’d spent so long as a restless outsider . . . but now I was settled, and right where I belonged.