A Little Something Different (9 page)

“Really? What? Are they making smoothies?” I ask, leaning around her, trying to see the food area. “I heard there are supposed to be smoothies. And weren’t you getting us more hash browns?”

“Maribel,” Lea says seriously. “Gabe was here.”

“Oh! Fun!” I say. It’s only sort of fun. This is going to be another one of those stories about how she gazed at him adoringly while he stared out the window or something. That’s how a lot of the Gabe stories go these days. I’ve been thinking that I might have to counsel her into finding a new object of affection.

“We talked,” she says, her eyes wide.

That is not what I expected. “What happened? Leave no detail behind.”

“All right,” she says, composing herself and folding her hands on the table, leaning close to divulge. “So, I finished going back through the line to get more of the triangle hash browns, and I was thinking about how delicious they were, so I didn’t look both ways to see if I was walking in front of anyone.”

“That is so unlike you. You’re such a stickler for pedestrian traffic rituals, even indoors.”

“I know, right?” she says. “So, out from the other side comes Gabe and we collide, sending our trays to the floor and making a huge gross mess.”

“Oh no!” I say, though inwardly I’m relieved that I didn’t have to deal with the mess. I’m kind of a terrible friend sometimes.

“He immediately drops down and starts cleaning it up, picking up pieces of plates and cups. I grab the garbage can and bring it closer and then get some napkins to try to clean up all the drinks. When I crouch next to him he says he’s sorry. And then we both just kind of keep saying sorry over and over again. And I tell him he’s kneeling in maple syrup and he doesn’t hear me at first and then he says it’s no big deal.”

I nod along with the story because I have a sense that it’s going somewhere.

“Then the janitor comes up and says he’ll take it from there. And Gabe puts his hand out to help me up!”

“That’s really cute,” I say, and I mean it. I smile then and assume that’s got to be the end of this story.

“And then!” she says, her eyes going wide.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa, there’s an ‘and then’?”

“Yes! More than one even!” she exclaims. “Gabe kind of lingers, wiping his hands, so I linger and I decide to introduce myself since I haven’t ever, really. And he says he’s Gabe. And then I babble about how I wanted to talk to him in the past but I didn’t want to bother him or anything. And then basically when I feel like I’m probably going to die from embarrassment he says he didn’t want to bother me either.”

She pauses, beaming, and again I think that must be the end of the story. It’s a good story considering they’ve never spoken to each other before.

“And then he basically asked me if I wanted to walk home with him!”

“Why did you say no?”

“Because you’re here and I didn’t want to abandon you.”

“Damn me! And being here! And you being a good friend and not abandoning me.”

“It’s okay, Mar. It probably would have been really awkward.”

“Or maybe not,” I say.

“And then I told him I liked his essay and that I looked up that tree online and he looked so embarrassed. In conclusion, I want to hug him.”

“I like that conclusion,” I say, grinning.

“He’s so shy. Like I knew he was shy, but somehow, up close like that, where it was just us, he seemed even more than shy. Tense and afraid. I think he was almost relieved when I said that I had to stay.”

“That makes sense from what you told me about him.”

“And then I would have gone into my awkward-and-reserved mode, or even worse, trying-to-fill-the-void-of-silence mode, and it would have been a terrible walk.”

I look at her sympathetically. Those are two modes that she falls into quite often.

“Oh, God, I like him so much. What am I going to do?” she says, flailing dramatically and slumping in her chair.

“Is it finally time to take action?” I ask, slamming my fist on the table.

She sits up straight. “I think it is. But Danny said he’s not into girls. There’s no changing that.”

“We need confirmation on that. It’s the one piece of the puzzle that’s not quite coming together. We’ll figure this out, okay?”

“You’re so nice to me. Why are you so nice to me?”

“Because,” I say, shrugging. “We’ll get Bianca on it too. She’s great with this stuff. She’s like a CSI agent, putting together pieces of mysterious boys’ lives for the greater good.”

“It’s so stupid to like him this much. I was doing fine until he read that essay in class.”

“Lea, calm down. We’re going to do this and you’re going to be so happy.”

“You know, normally, I would be like, that’s great, but what if he’s a jerk? But I know he’s not a jerk.”

“No, he’s quite obviously not a jerk.”

“Ugh, you know who totally is a jerk though?”

“Who?”

She tips her chin a few tables over.

“Who is that?”

“Victor from creative writing.”

“The one who was a douche to you guys the other day?”

“Yup.”

“Damn him.”

“Damn him indeed.”

Casey
(Gabe’s friend)

Gabe’s twenty-first birthday is in the midst of finals. I feel kind of bad, because there’s just no way I can go out hard for him in the middle of my exams, but we find a random afternoon that we both have free to at least go to the bar together for cheap slices and drafts.

“Happy birthday,” I say, holding up my mug to clink with his.

“Thanks,” he says before taking a sip. “Sucks that Sam couldn’t come.”

“It does, but he promises he’ll make it up to you.”

“I think I’m scared.”

I laugh. “When are you finished with finals?”

“I had an in-class exam for two of my classes, I had one final this morning, then I have a stats final on Monday, and I still have to hand in my creative writing paper on Thursday.”

“Have you finished the paper?”

“Haven’t even started it,” he says around a bite of pizza. “I wanted to work on everything else first. The other classes I was worried about. I think I have this one in the bag. I’m still about to have an anxiety attack about stats.”

“Want me to help you with it this weekend?”

“Yeah, that would be great,” he says. “My head gets all jumbled.”

I nod.

“I, um. I talked to Lea last night,” he says.

“And you waited all this time to tell me!”

“We’ve been hanging out for like ten minutes.”

“Still, ten minutes too long.”

“She was … really nice.”

“As usual.”

“We were at midnight breakfast,” he says.

“Why wasn’t I invited to midnight breakfast?”

“I didn’t think you’d want to go.”

“You should have texted me.”

“Fine, I’ll keep that in mind for the next time.”

“Good. I’m glad you’re learning.”

“We literally bumped into each other. It was mostly my fault. My elbow just completely gave out.”

I nod sympathetically. “That damn elbow.”

“It pretty much ruined my life,” he says, rolling his eyes. “But now at least it gave me a chance to talk to Lea.”

“Glass half full.”

“Anyway. After we finished cleaning up, she was so … cute. She introduced herself like we didn’t know each other. But it was so unassuming.”

I smile. “Sounds like your kind of chick.”

“Seriously. And she said something about not wanting to bother me, and I had to keep myself from like yelling at her that she could never bother me. But instead I said something about how I didn’t want to bother her either. And then we kind of both stood there for a minute.” He shakes his head, blushing. “I offered to walk her home, but her friend was there so they were staying.”

He stares at the table.

“Sounds like a good interaction.”

“It was. She said she liked the essay I read in class.”

“A very good interaction.”

“Do you think it was too much? Me asking to walk her home?”

“Not at all. You live in the same place. It was thoughtful. I’d go so far as to call it gentlemanly.”

“Cool.” He pauses, scratching his head. “I had a lot of trouble hearing her.”

I nod, but stay quiet, because between this and the elbow thing I think he might talk about something substantial. He’s like a deer; I don’t want to make any sudden movements and startle his thoughts away.

“It’s like, I get so nervous. And I don’t know where to look. And my ear is saying, ‘Watch her mouth,’ and my eyes are like, ‘Look anywhere but at her mouth!’ It’s hard to break the habit of years and years of not looking at people.”

Oh, man, he looks so sad. I don’t know how to help him with this. He doesn’t usually talk like this, and now I’m panicking and I have no idea what to say. I am the worst friend ever.

Maybe I’ll make a joke?

“What about your nose? Does your nose get a say in the matter? Or your toenails, Gabe?”

“Shut up, don’t be an asshole,” he says, but he’s smiling now at least. And at least he’s not offended by my teasing.

“I think your left nut has an opinion, too.”

He laughs. “I know it’s dumb.”

“It’s not dumb,” I say, shrugging. “It’s a little arbitrary. You have to do what’s good for you in the moment. And don’t obsess about it.”

“Yeah, you’re right.”

“I’m always right.”

“She’s like … really pretty, even prettier up close.”

“I have to point out that you’ve seen her up close a bunch of times.”

“Yeah, but this was different,” he says, smiling. Then he screws up his face in pain and pinches the bridge of his nose. “My essay was kind of lame. About being shy. I feel stupid now because she remembers it. And associates me with the lameness.”

“I think that could probably work in your favor.”

“Sam kind of said the same thing.” He looks up at me, his face relaxing. “How do you figure?”

“’Cause it means she already knows you’re shy and it’s obvious she didn’t think it was lame if she brought it up.”

“Huh, I hadn’t thought of it like that,” he says, looking impressed. “Want another slice?”

“Definitely.”

When he comes back to the table, I can’t keep my mouth shut. “You know I only tease you like that ’cause you’re awesome, right?”

“Yeah, whatever.”

“No, I’m serious, Gabe. I’m sorry if you thought I was like minimizing anything. I just want you to not get so down on yourself,” I say, measuring my words carefully.

“I know. I’m working on it.”

“Cool.”

He nods and takes a deep breath. “Can you maybe help me with this Lea thing? I don’t know what I’m doing.”

“Of course,” I say. “I’ll tutor you in stats and getting the ladies.”

“You’re such a dork,” he says. “Forget I asked. I’m going to get Bailey’s help.”

“No way!”

“Or Sam.”

“I score way more chicks than Bailey and Sam put together!”

He makes a dubious face and we move on to other topics.

Squirrel!

It smells like snow and I can’t remember where I hid all of my acorns.

The boy and girl are walking toward each other but don’t see each other yet and I hope they smile.

I think they’re going to smile.

I wonder if they know where all of my acorns went.

They get to the walkway of a building and they look at each other for a minute, just standing there in the cold.

“Hi, Gabe.”

“Hi, Lea.”

Then I remember that I hid them behind a gigantic bush last time I saw this boy and this girl. But last time I saw this boy and this girl they didn’t say anything to each other. Maybe now they’re going to be friends!

Acorns are my friends!

Inga
(creative writing professor)

Something makes me look up from the paper I’m grading and through my office window I see Gabe and Lea standing outside red faced and smiling. I can’t believe they’re here at the same time. I feel giddy to the point that I should be embarrassed. No one should feel this invested in a couple they aren’t a part of.

I tell myself to be cool as I wait the endless moments for them to walk down the hallway to my office. Then I see him pull the door open for her.

“Hey, guys!” I say as they walk in.

“Hi,” Lea says.

Gabe waves.

“We, um. I mean, I am turning in my paper. I don’t know why Gabe is here,” Lea says, her face getting redder.

“I’m here to do that, too,” he jumps in.

“You guys didn’t come together?” I ask, my heart sinking a tiny bit.

“No, no, we ran into each other outside,” Lea explains. But she still can’t keep her eyes off Gabe as he goes through the folder in his backpack.

“Is it snowing out yet?” I ask, wanting to keep them here a little longer.

“No,” Lea says, shaking her head. “It smells like it could.”

“Like it could what?” Gabe asks, looking at Lea.

“Like it might snow,” she tells him.

“I didn’t know it was supposed to snow.”

“They said it might flurry,” she explains.

“It’s cold enough,” Gabe says.

I feel like I’m intruding on their conversation, mundane as it is, but they’re still both holding on to their final papers for dear life and I don’t want to interrupt them. For all I know I might have the chance to see them set up their first date right this very second. I look back and forth between them like it’s Wimbledon.

“Um, are you done with finals?” Lea asks. Be still my heart, I think she might actually be asking him to hang out right in front of me. I have never been lucky enough to be privy to this moment before. Calm down, Inga, be still, don’t scare them away.

He pulls off his beanie, revealing some impressive hat hair. “I, um, yes.”

“Are you going to be around tonight? I think my friends and I are going out.”

His shoulders droop and he frowns. “It was my birthday last week,” he says. “I promised my mom I would be home for dinner tonight. Because I didn’t see them then. She baked a cake and everything. I, uh, well…” He pauses, and I hope Lea can see how regretful he is. That he’s not making up an excuse.

“Happy birthday last week,” she says, smiling.

“Thanks,” he says, also smiling. Then he shakes out of his stupor. “We should hand in our papers.”