by G. F. Miller
22 Yes, I’m Aware This Was All My Idea
Noah stares at me. Stunned. I hold his gaze, my face a mask of tight-lipped professionalism. He blinks like the light is too bright. “Date? You?”
I shouldn’t be surprised. I’m not surprised. I’m just in pain. Some tiny part of me was harboring a dream scenario where Noah’s reaction to this proposition was to declare his undying love for me.
I make my voice cool. “That’s right. For whatever reason, JLHS decided at some point that I’m an influencer. People imitate my hair, my clothes.… The jocks have a standing virtual and literal prize for whoever can get me to date him. They call me—”
“Ice Princess.”
I twitch my eyebrow.
He shrugs. “I’m a dork. I’m not deaf.”
“Right.”
“Which is why no one will believe—”
“Greg the Waiter took our picture at Big Doug’s and posted it. And then Scarlett got ahold of it. We look… well, just trust me. Everyone will believe it.”
“What about…? What about…?” He stammers, gesturing at nothing in particular. “What about ‘I can’t be seen with you’? What about the confidentiality clause?”
“It no longer applies. The photo’s out there. All we can do is lean into it.” I sound impressively matter-of-fact. There’s no point in mentioning that my personal aftermath is going to suck in the worst way. Beyond the unavoidable broken heart, it’s going to be humiliating to go from “untouchable” status to “lovesick and dumped.”
“This is crazy.”
“Once we break up, there’ll be a queue of girls that want you. And Holly will be the first one in line.”
He looks too stunned to speak for a moment. Then he silently shakes his head.
“Noah, this is all I’ve got. My last idea.” I’m pleading. Pleading for the thing that will wreck me. I hug myself. “Either we do this now, or we’re done.”
“Done?”
“We stick to the contract. You go your way. I go mine.” It’s all I can do to stay standing as I voice the inevitable. Still, I don’t flinch.
“I thought we were friends.”
“That only lasts as long as the wish,” I lie. I’ll never stop wanting to be near him. But there’s nothing else I can do for him. It would be wrong to hang on, especially knowing what I know now—that I’ve left a trail of destruction on every life I’ve touched.
“Forget the wish, okay? How about, instead of faking things, we just keep hanging out for real. Maybe we could not park behind the dumpsters or—”
“I’m the fairy godmother. I don’t hang out. I grant wishes and that’s all.”
“I thought you were done granting wishes.”
I shrug. “It doesn’t matter. I don’t hang out.”
He looks like I punched him. Turning away, he stares at his dresser for a long moment. When he finally speaks again, he seems to be addressing his vintage Spock action figure. His voice sounds gravelly. “So, just to make sure I’ve got it straight. We have two choices: fake date for a couple weeks—”
“Ten days.”
“Or ignore each other completely. And that’s because our friendship was never real to begin with.”
I swallow. Be strong for him, I tell myself. Don’t le Fay this up. “It’s real, Noah. It’s just not… permanent.”
For a long moment the words hang in the air, silencing both of us.
“I see.” His shoulders square up. Now it’s his turn to pace. “So, if I go along with this, what happens next Friday?”
“You’d break up with me at Surya’s party.”
He shakes his head again.
My mouth feels like it’s full of chalk. “Yes. It’s the only way to keep all the mojo you’ll get from dating me.”
He stops pacing and stands right in front of me, so close that I have to hold my breath to keep from huffing Old Spice and Curl Commando. So close I have to tilt my head back to see his face. His forehead is pinched. He looks like he’s begging me for something. Which, in fact, he is. The same thing he’s been begging me for since his first stalker text—to fix what I broke, to give him back his true love.
He says, “You really want to do this?”
No! my heart screams. Don’t make me fake it when I want the real thing. Don’t make me pretend to have this just so I can give it to someone else. With my mouth, I say firmly, “Absolutely.”
“You want me to be with Holly?”
My heart is having a tantrum. It beats wildly in my chest, trying to break free and expose me as a liar. But my thoughts are more disciplined. I will not be one of those fairies who goes around getting it on with guys and trashing their lives. I want him to be happy. Holly makes him happy. And I owe it to him. I promised him. He’s my Cindy. And he’s my friend. So I set my jaw and say, “I do. One hundred percent.”
* * *
Noah picks me up for school on Tuesday, our first official day of faux dating. When I open my front door, my heart pounds at the sight of him. He’s wearing The Jeans and one of the button-down shirts I picked out way back when. It’s unbuttoned, and I can see a sliver of words on the T-shirt beneath. His fingers are tapping a hundred miles an hour against his leg. His curls are wild. The early-morning sun glints off his glasses, so that I can’t get a good look at his eyes.
“Hey.” I’m poetical like that.
“Hey.”
He seems keyed up and verging on cheerful. The total opposite of how I left him last night. I guess he just needed time to let the plan sink in.
Just like I needed time to realize that I can’t possibly be in love. What I feel for Noah is 90 percent friendship and 10 percent silly crush. Maybe 80/20. It took me most of the night to convince myself of this, and my insides are goo. I compensated with extra makeup and by adding sky-blue streaks to my stormy-ocean hair.
He bows, sweeping his arm toward his car, and says, “My lady?” He must be nervous. He’s always extra dorky when he’s nervous.
And him being dorky makes my heart squeeze. I remind it firmly that we’re just pretending. I grab my backpack, lock the door, and head for his car.
Did I say “car”? It’s actually a white minivan. It has a window decal across the back that says MY CHILD IS AN HONOR STUDENT AT STARFLEET ACADEMY.
We mutter and stutter our way through some small talk on the drive.
At school he parks the van and then runs around to the passenger side to open the door for me. It’s so chivalrous. Who does that?
As I climb out, he says, “So. How do we do this? Should we hold hands, or…?”
Holding hands sounds super nice, but I snark, “Are we pretending to be eighty years old? Brother and sister?”
He looks stumped. Ugh. Somehow we have to get 110 percent less awkward in the next sixty seconds, or no one is going to believe we’re actually into each other, and the whole plan falls apart.
I take his arm and drape it over my shoulders. My whole body instantly tries to claim this spot as mine forever. The weight, the warmth, the smell… It’s nirvana.
His arm tightens around me tentatively. I silently remind myself: None of it is real. Get ahold of yourself. To complete the ruse, I slide my left arm around him and shove my hand into his back pocket.
He jumps forward. “Hey! Wow.”
A couple of people glance our way. Through a big flirty smile, I ventriloquist whisper, “You gonna be okay?”
“Yup. Yeah. I’m good.” He straightens up. “Just, maybe warn me next time you’re going to…” He gestures nondescriptly, blushing all the way down his neck. “You know.”
“Grab your ass?” I can’t help it. It’s so fun to make him squirm. Which he does. People are pointing and gawking now. I hold my smile in place for them. “Get a grip on yourself. It’s go time.”
We walk toward the double doors, which is a fun little party for my left hand. Noah whispers, “Sorry. I’ve never been anyone’s fake boyfriend before.”
The people who were
previously looking are positively rubbernecking now. He pulls out of the side-cuddle to open the door for me. I whisper back, “You’ve never been anyone’s real boyfriend before either.”
As I slide past him into the building, he mutters, “Said the Ice Princess.”
I look at him instead of where I’m going, snagging his hand and wrapping it back around me, like I can’t bear to have an inch of air separating us. The grand entrance is not lost on the JLHS student body. Conversations falter before stopping midsentence. People literally pull out their phones and take pictures as we pass by. From somewhere in the crowd, I hear, “No way!”
Noah’s arm is tense. He leans in and says in my ear, “This is the weirdest thing I’ve ever done.”
I rise to my tiptoes and turn my lips to Noah’s ear. “False. I’ve seen the Gorn costume.”
I feel a shiver go through him. Involuntary breath-on-the-ear reaction. Nothing to do with me.
We pause at my locker, and Noah untangles us. While I dial in my combination, he surveys the hallway uneasily. “Now do I go to class?”
“Yeah. Um. I guess I’ll see you at lunch.” I notice Scarlett and Gwen waiting in the wings and give them a little finger waggle.
Noah’s eyes flit toward them and then lock back on me. He swallows. He looks stumped again, his hand hovering. “See you at lunch.”
The Awkward Walk Away isn’t going to impress anyone. So before he can get away, I wrap him up in a quick, tight hug. His arms come around me and he takes a deep breath. Then he lets me go and leaves.
In my head I chant, It’s not real, it’s not real. My heart thunders anyway. They do not call this a crush for nothing.
23 Just When You Think Everything Is Finally Going According to Plan
Noah isn’t six feet away when Scarlett and Gwen scurry to my side. They squee and jump around so that there is no way Noah can’t hear it. Scarlett whisper-squeals, “Ohmigod, ohmigod. I was the first one that knew!”
“Yeah, how did you get that photo, by the way?” It doesn’t even matter at this point. I simply hate unsolved mysteries.
Scarlett says, “My cousin Terryn’s boyfriend is super into cars. He follows that Camaro Dreaming guy. So I guess Terryn saw it on her boyfriend’s feed and reposted it because she thought you guys were cute. And then I saw it on her feed and was like, ‘Hello. I know those guys.’ So were you two, like, secretly, tragically dating all year?”
Gwen sighs like that’s the best thing she’s ever heard.
“No. Not all year. We actually just made it official. We weren’t keeping it secret. It’s more like we were trying to figure us out first. You know?” I so rarely give Scarlett inside scoops that she looks like she’s going to swoon with joy.
Gwen says, “But, Charity…” She pauses, twisting her phone in both hands like it pains her not to be looking at it. “Isn’t he kind of… um… a total dork? I mean, you could go out with anybody.”
“I guess I like dorks.” I shut my locker and wave my way off stage left.
* * *
Noah is waiting for me right inside the doors when I walk into lunch. He gives me my favorite eye-crinkling smile, and I respond by wrapping both arms around him for some extra-public PDA. He obligingly reciprocates, resting his chin on top of my head. It’s been an exhausting morning, so—even though it’s only for show—I secretly draw strength from that hug. I smash my face into his T-shirt and breathe him in, just for a second.
Then I turn my face so everyone can see my flushed cheeks and lovesick eyes. When everyone who cares to has had ample time to take pictures, I pull back. Next we go through the lunch line, and even the lunch lady looks at us like we’re adorable while she scans our IDs. We find a table in the courtyard and sit.
I should create a point of contact, but what would be best? Subtle yet possessive? I decide to wrap my foot around his ankle. He looks startled and then gives me a half smile. I unscrew the cap on my orange juice. “How’s your day so far?”
He leans in conspiratorially. “Are you kidding me? Surreal! Random dudes—guys that have literally never spoken to me before—keep fist-bumping me. That Poms girl, Gwen, stared at me in Spanish—the entire hour. And Surya Agrawal walked up to me out of the blue and handed me a ten-dollar bill.”
I can’t help laughing.
He says, “Seriously, what am I supposed to say to stuff like that?”
I slide my hand across the table and thread my fingers through Noah’s, mostly for show. But not really. “Don’t worry. In a day or two everyone will be over it.”
Except for me. I’m pretty sure I’ll never be over it.
Noah tightens his grip on my fingers. “This is the best part of my surreal day.”
I force myself not to react. He’s in character. That’s all. I quip, “The taco bites or the fruit cup?”
“Being with you.”
A wistful little voice in my head says, This is real. Say something true. And I want to. But I’m scared. But maybe we could really be together. But fairy godmothers don’t keep their Cindies. Only awful fairies try to steal Prince Charming. Besides, he loves Holly.
I jump up like there’s a bee on my seat, ripping my hand away from Noah’s. “Taco sauce! I need some of those, uh, little packets of taco sauce.”
And I run away. All the way to the condiment station. I press my finger between my eyes and breathe.
In the two minutes it takes me to get a grip on myself and then grab a fistful of hot sauce that I don’t even want, Noah’s two AV club friends have commandeered my spot at the table. They don’t see me approach because they’re busy bowing to Noah and chanting, “We’re not worthy!”
Noah is Rocket Fuel Red. The two proceed to shamelessly man-crush on Noah loudly enough for me to hear it from ten feet away. Loud enough that half the cafeteria is watching.
“Dude, you are the playa of all playas!”
“Henceforth and forever you shall be known as Playa One!”
Noah rubs his forehead. “Jeez, guys. Just be cool.” He glances around and seems to realize the full extent of the audience, including me. He tacks on a groaning, “Please?”
AV 1 sits, uninvited and undeterred. “Freaking A, man!”
AV 2 says, “Check this out.” He holds out his phone, displaying a photo. I close the distance so I can get a clear look. It’s Gwen sitting at a desk. The picture was snapped from behind her. Past her mass of black curls and over her shoulder, you can see that she has doodled on her math notes Dorky is the new sexy. Noah and I exchange a glance over AV dudes’ heads.
AV 1 grabs Noah by the shoulders. “Do you realize what this means?! Our dating pool just turned into a freaking ocean! This is—”
“Look, guys, it’s my girlfriend, Charity!” Noah extricates himself from AV 1’s grip, tripping backward over the bench in the process. He manages to stay upright with three hops and a half rotation. Once he’s stable, he gestures broadly at the table. “Charity, this is Carlos and the Mouth.”
I give them a single wave hello.
Carlos laughs nervously while the Mouth, apparently oblivious, keeps talking. “It’s crazy that just yesterday you were sitting here whimpering about—”
Noah cuts him off. “Awesome, guys. That’s great.” He grabs my hand and tugs. “So Charity and I are going to go… make out. Now. For a while.”
Carlos’s response is a double thumbs-up.
The Mouth attempts a high five but misses, primarily because Noah’s not participating.
We back away slowly. Carlos calls after us, “Never forget where you came from!”
Noah whispers, “I’m really, really sorry about that.”
We wheel around to escape and more or less collide with Kade and Holly on their way in. Kade, who is typically chill, seems kind of stressed out. Holly seems stressed that he’s stressed.
Holly’s hand is in Kade’s back pocket. I shoot Noah a look that says I told you so times infinity. But then I feel bad, because he looks like he accidental
ly got toothpaste and orange juice in his mouth at the same time. Still so in love with her, obviously.
I reach for his hand and give it an I’m here with you squeeze. He clears his throat. “Hey, Holly. Kade.”
Kade says, “Hey, man.”
Yeah, he for sure doesn’t know Noah’s name.
Holly says, “So you two are, like, a thing now?”
“Yup.” I don’t hesitate. I wrap my other arm around Noah possessively.
Kade says, “Cool. So I guess you’ll be at the par…”
The room spins, and I tighten my grip on Noah as a new scene replaces this one.
Kade is in the football coach’s office. He hands the coach a thin stack of papers, stapled in the corner. On the front it says “The Social and Cultural Impact of Gutenberg’s Printing Press.” The date in the header is two days from now, and there’s a red, circled “84%” in the upper-right corner.
Coach looks down at the paper, then shakes Kade’s hand. “You squeaked in, champ.” Coach crosses his arms over his chest. “You’ve been on academic probation all week. This makes you eligible, but are you ready to face Loma Linda tonight?”
Kade says, “Put me in, Coach. I wanna play.”
“Right, Charity?” Noah nudges me.
“Huh? Yeah. Good.” I have no idea what I’m agreeing to. Or where I am. I blink. Holly and Kade. Cafeteria. Tuesday.
Holly shrugs. “Okay. Well, see ya.”
They walk on past. I silently tell the Universe to get a new flunky, because I’m not touching this. The Universe responds by lighting a flare right between my eyes. I press my palm against it with a sharp inhale. Noah guides me out the door, ducking his face close to my ear. “What did you glimpse?”
He’s the only person who has ever noticed me glimpsing.
I mumble, “Kade needs help with his World History paper. I guess he’s on academic probation from football. He has to get an eighty-four percent to be eligible to play in the game on Friday.”