The Boy Next Story

by Tiffany Schmidt

  “Hey. Can I work here?” I looked up to see Byron standing at the easel beside mine.

  I knew of him—junior/twin/popular—from my friend Clara’s obsession with creating social diagrams, but I didn’t know him. He’d never assaulted my easel though, and he shared a name with my parents’ dog, so that was enough of a reason to say, “Sure.”

  “Your painting was kicking, by the way. Sorry it got ripped.”

  “Thanks,” I said. Possibly proving why I belonged at the edges. Was “kicking” good? Or had I just said thanks for an insult? Regardless, it was not an adjective I’d be using; it brought to mind all the shoes that had aimed themselves at my easel’s legs.

  “So, freshman, what should we call you?”

  I put down the tortillon I was crushing between my fingers. “What?”

  “What should we call you?” His voice had gone up and slowed down—the way Merri talked to dogs. He pointed to himself. “I’m Byron. So far most people in here are calling you ‘the prodigy.’ Figured you might want a chance to name yourself.”

  “Oh.” Normally being called a prodigy was a good thing? But it didn’t sound like it here. “Um, Aurora—Rory.”

  Byron unpacked his pencils onto the lip of his easel. “Nice to meet you, Aurora-Rory.”

  My eyes went wide. “No, it’s just Rory.”

  He grinned. “I got that. I was teasing you.”

  I could’ve left it right there. That would’ve been the end of the conversation and I could’ve gone back to debating whether I needed an accent color to make my shadows pop. But I didn’t. I hadn’t spoken to anyone in art in so long and it was like I had a buildup of words piled on my tongue. “Why’s everyone obsessed with the contemporary art folder? I thought there was going to be a fight over some of those prints.”

  Byron laughed—and pointed to the print he was clipping to his easel. It was contemporary.

  “Not that I have anything against contemporary art,” I babbled. I took a deep breath, ordering myself: Be impressive! Prove you know your stuff. Instead I mumbled, “That one’s nice.”

  That one’s nice? It was Snipes’s Vanity, Captured—one of the most evocative pieces of the last few decades. It hung in the Guggenheim, and the last time I was there, Merri had literally dragged me away by my hoodie, saying, “How long can you possibly look at a painting of a peacock?” The answer was “Hours” when the artist was Snipes.

  “What do you think of my drawing so far?” Byron asked me. “What would you change?” That question was a minefield and I must’ve grimaced, because he laughed. “Be honest, I can take it.”

  I took a deep breath and indicated a few places where the angles were off. When he responded positively to that, I suggested he try crosshatched shading and, at his insistence, demonstrated on his drawing.

  “You’re going to make this class interesting, aren’t you?” Byron held out his hand, palm up. I was pretty sure we’d all given up high fives back in grade school—at least unless sports or grandpas were involved—but I didn’t want to leave him hanging, and I didn’t have a clue what was cool at Hero High. Feeling more than a little ridiculous, I smacked my palm against his.

  He tilted his head. “Oh, well. Sure. Right on, I guess? But actually I wanted your phone. You know, so I can give you my number.”

  And if it wasn’t abundantly clear I wasn’t cool before, it was then. But no one had kicked me all period. The only distractions were Byron’s frequent requests for help. It didn’t bother me, but apparently Mrs. Mundhenk felt differently. “Byron, enough. Let Aurora do her own painting and you do yours. Over there.”

  He sighed as he packed up his materials to move to the other side of the studio. I thought I was in for another of Mrs. Mundhenk’s lectures where she mentioned all my “potential” and then made it clear I wasn’t living up to it. Instead, she pointed to the boy standing a step behind her. “Have you two met? You’re both freshmen, so you must have some classes together.”

  I nodded. English. Maybe history? “Chuck, right?”

  “Huck,” he corrected, and before I could cringe, he added, “Let’s pretend I thought your name was ‘Dory’ to make things equal.”

  As he spoke, he leaned a hip against a metal stool; only, the seat began to spin down, causing him to stumble. He laughed and I smiled. An embarrassment for an embarrassment—it felt good to find a peer.

  “We’ve moved Huck up to Advanced Art. Since it’s two weeks into the year, I was hoping you could catch him up and maybe be friends! I think it will be nice for you both to have another freshman in here.”

  I stared. Mrs. Mundhenk said, “Great,” then tapped her clunky red wool clogs together like a folksy Dorothy from Oz. “All right then, carry on.”

  I watched her retreating back while Huck clipped a piece of scrap paper to the easel beside mine. Maybe now that there were two of us, I’d be less likely to come in and discover my pencil tips broken every morning, my kneaded eraser full of dirt, my thumbnail sketches missing.

  I glanced sideways at him. Huck was tall, with a long-limbed gangliness that screamed growth spurt. He was wearing suede navy oxfords with khakis and a red lacrosse jersey. That was Toby’s team. I knew nothing about the game beyond sticks and balls. I’d always meant to watch Toby play, but I’d gotten distracted in the space between intention and action, and now his knee injury was keeping him out for the season.

  “Um, welcome. Hi.” Why was I so awkward all the time? I frowned at my paper. I wished Mrs. Mundhenk hadn’t used the word “friends.” It made my stomach knot with loneliness. I didn’t even know this kid, but those seven letters made my throat itch like patheticness was pollen and I was covered in it.

  “Thanks,” he answered, but instead of turning toward his own easel, I felt his eyes on me. Maybe if he stared long enough, he could tell me what was wrong with my piece, because something was. The drawing might be technically fine, but it felt . . . spiritless. Lost. A bit like me. Dangit! Why did she have to say friends? Now it was all I could think about.

  “Why are you looking at me like that?” I snapped when I couldn’t take it any longer.

  “I’m trying to come up with a way to suggest we be pals without sounding like a creeper . . . or a toddler.”

  “What?” I whirled toward him, panic-eyed. Had I been thinking out loud? Merri did that sometimes.

  His mouth lifted in a mischievous grin that made dimples appear in his cheeks. “Just hear me out a sec. Maybe Mrs. Mundhenk is on to something.” He held up a fist, lifting a finger for each reason: “One, we’re the only freshmen in Advanced Art and that probably means we both like art. Two, we’re two of the few freshmen who didn’t attend Mayfield Middle Academy and haven’t been together since kindergarten. Three, we both have all-day detention tomorrow, and I don’t know about you, but I’ve seen The Breakfast Club, so I know that’s like friendship boot camp.”

  “Of course I have.” Clearly, he hadn’t met Merri, because that answer was obvious. She and rom-coms went together like a wrecking ball and flying bricks, which was often how it felt when she crashed into my room and demanded I watch them with her. “You were at the party too? I thought I was the only freshman.”

  “I was there. Not my best decision.” He shrugged in an exaggerated motion, his square shoulders brushing the tips of his hair. “I’ve got more reasons if you’re not sold.”

  “Let’s hear them,” I said, but honestly he could’ve stopped after the first one. Or even at zero—just the desire to be my friend was good enough. Did that make me a loser?

  “Four, we have a lot of classes together: English, history, French—and if we’re friends I can look at the doodles you’re always drawing without seeming nosy.” He gave me a sheepish one-dimple grin and I laughed. He lifted his thumb. “And five, we both love coffee.”

  I wrinkled my nose. “No. I don’t.”

  “You don’t want to be friends?” He cringed, but he was quick to hold up both palms and say sincerely, “That�
�s cool—I didn’t mean to pressure you or anything.”

  He turned to his easel and I fought the urge to smack my palm against my forehead. “No,” I clarified. “Yes, we can maybe be friends—but no to coffee. I hate it.”

  “As your friend . . .” He paused dramatically. I snorted and nodded. “I regret to inform you that you’re wearing a whole lot of something you hate on your shirt.”

  “My sister got a little enthusiastic with her travel mug.” I’d put down my pencil somewhere midconversation and fully turned toward him. A strange sensation fluttered under my ribs—not quite hope, but at least not the bleak despair I’d felt since my first week here. “Does that invalidate reason number five?”

  He shook his head. “Five, I really like coffee, and now I don’t have to worry about you stealing mine.” I laughed, but his face was earnest when he added, “Seriously though, no pressure on the friendship thing. I can stop working on our friendship bracelets anytime.”

  I snorted again. I knew he was joking, that this whole conversation was wink, nod nonsense, but dangit, part of me wished it was real. That it was possible to fast-forward through awkward and get-to-know-you and be instant BFFs. I’d never had a “best” friend. I’d been a part of the group but never the other half of anyone’s necklace.

  Clara, the only other friend I’d made at Hero High, was still mad I’d gone to the Rogue Romeo party without her. It didn’t matter that the party had ended with me being escorted home by Headmaster Williams or that I’d be spending the next two Saturdays in detention while she was cheerleading at football games. Apparently not inviting her had violated some fledgling friendship code.

  Everything about Hero High dynamics exhausted me: trying to interpret my classmates’ subtle changes of expression, inside jokes, secret crushes, and historic rivalries. I’d given up on finding a spot for myself in the preestablished invisible social hierarchy they’d brought with them from their private middle school.

  I flicked a curl of pencil shaving at Huck. “Let’s call it a friendship test drive.”

  “I’ll take it.” He bent over his easel where he’d been making lazy shading gradients. I don’t think he meant for me to see how relieved his exhale was. Did it make me a bad friend if I was glad that maybe I wasn’t the only one so lonely at Hero High?

  3

  Huck and I didn’t talk for the rest of class. Maybe we were both worried about doing or saying something awkward and scaring each other off . . . Or maybe that was just me.

  When the bell rang, I shoved my pencil bag in my backpack and rinsed off my charcoal-smudged fingers. Normally I raced out of the room, like the side-eyes and snide comments were chasing me, but now I paused with my hand on the door. On the wall beside me was a giant display about the school’s founder: Reginald R. Hero. He’d been an artist—a famous tile maker—and because of that, the arts program here was endowed and supplied in ways I’d only dreamed about in my charter school classes last year. When Huck caught up, I shuffled my feet. “Um, ready for English?”

  My personal answer was No, never, but he flashed his dimples. “Let’s go get our Gatsby on.”

  I groaned and my fingers tightened around the strap of my bag. “Don’t tell me you’re enjoying that book.”

  Huck pulled a water bottle out of his backpack. “So far it’s a story about rich people and parties. What’s not to like?”

  Well, my family certainly didn’t qualify as the former—not with all the loans for Lilly’s college, the bills from her upcoming wedding to the senator’s son, and the Hero High tuition that wasn’t covered by financial aid. And from “Ring Around the Rosy” through Rogue Romeo, I’d never fit in at parties. So, there was quite a lot not to like in Huck’s statement.

  “I just don’t get the book.”

  “I’m sure you’ll figure it out,” said Huck as we reached the classroom door. “Besides, I don’t think it matters what Ms. Gregoire makes us read; she’s always going to make it sound fun. It’s pretty much a consensus on the lacrosse team—if Ms. Gregoire’s not your favorite teacher on campus, you’re doing something wrong.”

  I’d had a similar conversation with Clara last week. She’d practically inserted Ms. Gregoire’s name in the first cheer she’d learned on her new squad. And at every family dinner, Merrilee practically levitated while talking about how great she was. Merri thought she was magical. “Like, literally magical, Rory. She makes stuff from the books happen in her students’ lives. Eliza doesn’t believe me, but pay attention and see what you think.”

  I was paying attention. I was paying such close attention that my notes were practically a transcript of her lectures: “I don’t want you to analyze, I want you to invest—put yourself in the story. I want you to immerse yourself in these words, then give me your personal reaction.”

  What did that even mean? Because whatever it was, I was doing it wrong. I’d be lucky to make it to Halloween without getting a second yellow academic warning.

  Huck winked at me and headed to his seat halfway around the circle. As I sat at my desk, Clara did the same thing she’d done all week—averted her face and sighed loudly.

  I was way too exhausted to endure another period of her silent treatment. Except, here in this classroom, wishes had a way of coming true in weird, warped outcomes, because Clara turned and spoke to me for the first time since Monday’s “I don’t understand how you could go to that party and not bring me!”

  “Oh, it’s you.” Her words were neither quiet nor logical. Who else would be in my assigned seat? It didn’t make her disdain hurt less. I liked Clara. I liked her a lot. She’d been the first person to smile at me when I’d been hovering in the corner during last summer’s freshman orientation. She’d excused herself from a conversation and come over, saying, “You’re new! Come sit with me. I know most of this stuff already because my brother, Penn, is a junior here. Plus, I already know practically every other freshman in this room. I’ll tell you about them if you tell me about you!”

  We’d texted all summer. She’d hugged me on my first day and saved me a seat in every class we shared. Until the Rogue Romeo party, we’d sat together at lunch and in Convocation, which was a whole-school assembly at the end of every day. This week I’d been back to chilling with the dust bunnies in the corners. I was over it.

  I leaned forward and whispered, “Are you ever going to forgive me? What if I promise to never go to a party without you again? Or just never go to a party?” The second option was way more appealing.

  “Did someone say ‘party’?” asked Ms. Gregoire as she breezed in from the hall in a jewel-green sleeveless maxi dress. The fabric was printed with gold foil eyeglasses, which matched the gold sandals peeping out below the hem. The colors complemented her dark red hair perfectly; the bangles on her wrist added a tinkling punctuation to her gestures. I had to give it to her; no matter what I thought of her assignments, she knew how to dress. And make an entrance.

  She reminded me of a more stylish Ms. Frizzle from The Magic School Bus, only instead of science, she got way overenthusiastic about books. One day in class I’d kept track of the number of times she’d made comments about “seeing ourselves in the story”—by the time the period ended, I was at seventeen.

  So far, we were two chapters into The Great Gatsby and the only thing I saw was confusion. I didn’t need more than thirty-eight pages; I was over this book already. It annoyed me as much as Merri’s dog—also named Gatsby because my sister loved this novel as much as her drooly, shedding mutt. But then again, she’d chosen Fielding over Toby, so clearly her taste in all things was questionable.

  “Thank you all for your beautiful reaction pieces on the opening chapters,” Ms. Gregoire enthused once we’d all settled in and unpacked for the period. “Some of you are there! And some of you are almost there.” Our desks were arranged in a ring, which made the center feel like a stage and always made her speeches feel like theater-in-the-round. She had a habit of walking in circles as she spoke, and
she was leaning against my desk when she added, “Some of you haven’t quite made it to West Egg yet, but I have high hopes.”

  I knew that was a story reference—the book took place on two imaginary islands off Long Island: East Egg and West Egg. And from the way she was discreetly tapping a finger on my desk as she spoke, I was pretty sure I was the “some of you” who was too dumb to get it.

  I’d been the slowest in a class before. I’d been the one who needed extra help. But usually I could identify what it was I didn’t understand. With The Great Gatsby I felt lost. So much of what filled the pages didn’t seem to matter, or if it did, I couldn’t figure out why.

  Did we need a whole page describing a billboard for an eye doctor? Was that important? What about the dog Tom buys for his mistress? Merri said any time there was a pet in a story, it was significant. She could give whole speeches about Hedwig. But this dog didn’t even have a name.

  In the first chapter, Daisy had said she hoped her daughter would be “a beautiful little fool,” and that’s how I felt while reading. But unlike Daisy, I didn’t think that was “the best thing a girl can be in this world.” Or maybe Daisy didn’t really think that? I couldn’t keep up with the lies and posturing of these characters.

  “Today, let’s read together.” Ms. Gregoire proposed this with breathy enthusiasm, high eyebrows, and a dramatic inhale, like she was waiting for us all to clap or cheer for her suggestion.

  And dangit, when I looked around the classroom, everyone else seemed ready to pull out pom-poms or do the wave. Clara was hugging her book to her chest. Dante was drumming his dark fingers on his cover. Huck had already flipped to the page.

  “Do I have any volunteers to read?” she asked. Every hand in the room went up. Well, every hand except for mine. “How wonderful. Let’s see . . .” She tapped her lip and rotated as I slumped down in my seat. “We’re going to read a few pages, then stop and discuss. How about Keene, Clara, Dante, Elinor, Gemma, and Huck. Does everyone remember who’s reading before them? Huck, I’m going to stop you before you get to the bottom of your page. Don’t be surprised when I interrupt.”