Boy Swap (7 page)

I get up from the table, my throat too tight to respond, and push past him and out the glass swinging doors. I am so done talking to him tonight.

Chapter 9: Enough is Enough

How am I supposed to play my flute when I’m completely frozen? It’s 7:20 on Thursday morning and Mr. Shank has us doing an all band/flags/dance early morning practice outside in the school parking lot in preparation for tomorrow’s game. It’s got to be like 30 degrees outside, I swear. Thank God the football season is almost over. I’m balancing my flute between my legs while my hands are shoved under opposite armpits, trying to warm up my fingers before I have to play again. Mr. Shank is on the opposite end of the group yelling at some clarinet players.

“My t-t-teeth are ch-ch-chattering,” my friend Emma, fourth chair flutist, says from my right.

“Freaking inhumane,” Shannon, fifth chair flutist, agrees, joining us for a quick chat.

About ten feet away, Lizzie looks over at Mr. Shank, still yelling, and decides to join us too. “Seriously, he needs mental help. Why are we doing this when there is a nice warm gym we can practice in?”

“Torture?” I offer half-heartedly. My attention is on Chris, standing in the front of the group with the percussion section. I keep seeing him looking at Cassie when he thinks no one is watching. Cassie is practicing a variety of pelvic thrusting and butt shaking moves (which they refer to as “dancing”) with the rest of her squad. Delaney dances next to Cassie and her moves are much stiffer and robotic. A small smile crosses my lips. Seeing her dancing like that reminds me of when we were ten and we would spend hours in her basement playing Dance Dance Revolution. She was always so awful at it and I always won. Which makes it kind of funny that she’s over there with the dance team now and I’m here with the band.

“At least you can w-wear gloves and still p-play your tuba,” Emma says, her teeth still chattering. “My fingers are blue!”

“Let’s envision the trip. Florida. Sun. Warmth,” Shannon says emphatically, closing her eyes and holding her face up to the sky.

“Is it working?” Lizzie asks.

Shannon opens her eyes and looks at us. “Nah.”

“I can NOT wait for our trip. I’m already bikini shopping. Online, anyway,” Emma says.

“It’s going to be such a blast,” Shannon says. Shannon, Emma, Lizzie and I are sharing a hotel room in Florida and a day doesn’t go by that at least one of us doesn’t mention how fun the trip will be. Though at this point I’m seriously beginning to wonder.

I nod and sneak another glance at Chris. He’s watching Cassie hold one spandexed leg in the air, doing a stretch. I think. I see Lizzie notice the same thing and scowl at Chris. She won’t say anything to me right now, though, not in front of Shannon and Emma.

“Listen,” Lizzie says, obviously trying to distract me. “I need your guys’ help tomorrow night.”

“With what?” Emma asks, jumping up and down now in an effort to warm up.

“With my ‘Make Jacob Fall in Love With Me’ plan,” Lizzie says. “Phase one needs to happen at the band party. You guys are going, right?”

Everyone nods. And I do too. What else do I have to do tomorrow night? I’m certainly not going to stay home while Chris is off somewhere with Cassie.

“I need one of you to get a game of Truth or Dare going and then someone else has to dare me to kiss Jacob,” Lizzie tells us.

“Oooh, I’ll do it,” Shannon says.

“Cool, thanks,” Lizzie says. “I’m hoping my kiss is like a potato chip, you know that thing they say about eating just one? Brooke, are you hearing me?” She gives my shoulder a shake.

But I’m totally distracted again. I’m on the verge of being humiliated in front of the whole band. Cassie has now parked herself in front of Chris and has his drumsticks in her hands. She’s banging on his drum and giggling and he is giving her a dopey smile. I turn and look at Mr. Shank and send him a silent plea to restart practice. A second later, thankfully, he does and Cassie returns to her spot with the rest of the dance squad.

I’ve
so
had enough.

*      *      *

I’m sitting in my English class second hour with my head resting on my folded arms, contemplating my options and waiting for class to start. I don’t have any friends in this class and luckily no one tries to talk to me.

At this point, I want to just, I don’t know, break up with Chris, I think. Yeah, there are a lot of feelings there and I know I still love him, but I just cannot take this anymore! He so obviously wants Cassie. It’s getting embarrassing. What if other people are noticing? Why hasn’t
he
broken up with
me
? Well, I guess I know the answer to that—Cassie’s boyfriend, Carter. It isn’t like she’s going to break up with Carter Jones, a senior on the Varsity Wrestling Team. He placed third in state last year and everyone is betting he’ll place first this year.

I flip my head so I’m facing the other direction and lay it back down on my arms. Carter Jones is in this class, but I’ve never spoken to him. He’s answered some questions in class before, and he seems pretty smart. What does he see in Cassie? It’s not like he doesn’t have other options. He’s hot. Tall, good build, big green eyes, and wavy dark brown hair. He could totally play the lead on a hit Disney teen show. I wonder if Carter ever notices Cassie’s blatant flirting with other guys?

Say I do break up with Chris. Then what? Well, then I’m thrown out of Boy Swap and forced to surrender my precious pink scarf, I imagine. I return to the pits of social obscurity. Any rungs I’ve climbed on the popularity ladder vanish and I drop back on the ground with the rest of the band nerds. That’s kind of sucky.

So where does this leave me? If I break up with Chris then I have no boyfriend and no chance at popularity. If I stay with Chris then I’m semi-popular (okay, let’s not exaggerate. More popular.) but miserable. This is so not fair. Why does Cassie get to have everything? Why does she get to be popular, have her boyfriend, have
my
boyfriend…

WAIT. Wait just a minute. I’ve got it.

Chapter 10: Don’t Get Mad, Get Swapping

DUH.

Huge, freaking, major DUH! Why didn’t I think of this before? It’s not like Boy Swap is a one-way street. Sometimes I can be so dense. Why am I just sitting around letting girls date my boyfriend and boo hoo hooing over it when I can be doing the same exact thing? I have the same access to all of their boyfriends that they have to mine. Any boyfriend of a girl wearing a pink scarf is up for grabs! But I think I will focus my attention on one very specific guy.

Carter Jones.

This is so perfect! I can picture Cassie’s face now as Carter and I walk hand in hand…I don’t know…somewhere. Wherever it is, it will be absolutely perfect because
she
will be the one having to share
her
boyfriend for once. Ha. We’ll see how she likes it.

Now I’ve got to be really clever about this if I’m going to get Carter to date me. I can’t just go up to him and ask him out. He’ll be all, ‘Shoo, band nerd’ or something. No, I’ve got to plan this very carefully. A list. I need to make a list.

What time is it? 4:34 p.m. I have to leave for the football game in another 15 minutes so I won’t be able to get much planning down now. But I can get a good start. I walk over to my computer, launch a Word document, and sit down to make my list.

STEP 1: BEAUTIFY

I know I’m not bad looking or anything but I’m going toe-to-toe with Cassie Deegan here. I’m going to need to get Carter Jones cute-worthy. Let’s see.

1) Get cute haircut. Highlights?

2) Get eyebrows waxed.

Sigh. Drastic times call for drastic measures.

3) Buy push-up bra. Extra padding?

This
is
Cassie I’m competing with.

4) Buy a pair of BUTTZ.

I’ll never compete with her teeny thighs but with modern body-wear-shaping technology, I sure can try.

That’s a good start for now. I can take care of most of this list at the mall tomorrow. What’s next?

STEP 2: RESEARCH & DEVELOPMENT

1) Research Carter Jones.

a) Google him

b) Check Facebook

c) Search through yearbooks

d) Casually gather info from Rayne (blech!) in band. Her older brother is a wrestler (I think?)

2) Develop plan to get Carter to date me.

Shoot. That last one is going to be tough. And I have to get to the game. I’ll have to work on this later.

*      *      *

This week’s half-time show has a 70s theme so we are marching to a medley of songs like “Disco Inferno” and “I Will Survive”. The stadium has its usual field lights on but for this show there are additional strobe lights panning across the field. The band is still sporting the usual orange and black polyester ensemble but the flag twirlers are all in big bell bottoms and wide-collared shirts and the dance squad still managed to find a way to show off their bodies with spandexed tops, micro-minis, and platform boots. I guess I should give them credit; no matter how cold it gets during these performances, they are dedicated to showing as much skin as they can bear.

We are in the middle of “YMCA” and moving into formation to spell the actual letters, Y-M-C-A, on the field. I’m the right-bottom corner of the “A” and Cassie is about fifteen feet in front of me. She and the other girls are contorting their bodies into the different letters of the song as well. Cassie has her left arm punched in the air and her right arm holding her right leg up so that she looks like the letter “Y”. For just a brief moment I want to run to the sideline where the pile of disco ball props are stored and bowl one right into Cassie’s left leg. But I don’t. That would probably be too obvious. It’s nice to think about, though.

The medley ends and we march off the field in a single-file line. I climb the ten rows up to my seat in the flute section and unstrap my giant black hat. I place it in my lap and concentrate on the big white fluffy plume, pretending the feathers need combing. I’m NOT going to the percussion section at the bottom of the stands to meet Chris, that’s for sure. No way. We can still be boyfriend and girlfriend, or whatever, but I’m not extending myself. The other flutists leave to get drinks or go to the bathroom and I’m left by myself, still working on the plume.

Chris comes bounding up the metal steps and a moment later is standing in front of me. “Ready for our hot chocolates?”

Is he
kidding
? Like I’m supposed to just merrily skip off to the concession stand and get hot chocolates like everything is normal when he has a date with Cassie in an hour? Puh-lease.

Well…technically I am. Since we are still “together” and all. Ugh! This BSC stuff is so hard! Fine. I’ll get a hot chocolate. But I’m NOT going to like it. And he can forget about the extra whipped cream. I’m not indulging in any extra calories. Especially not when I’m trying to get a date with Carter Jones.

“Sure,” I say. “Let’s go.”

Chris takes my hand and I let him lead me down the bleachers and toward the concession stand. As we are about to get in the back of the line, we almost run smack into Cassie and Carter carrying their own hot chocolates. Well, isn’t this interesting? I’ve never seen Carter at a game before but he must have suddenly felt compelled to attend one. Gee, I wonder why? Chris and Cassie both look completely shocked and even pale a bit at this near collision. No one says anything. Carter looks back and forth between Chris and Cassie with a puzzled expression.

Oh for God’s sake, does no one have better recovery skills than this? I mean
really
.

“Hi, Cassie,” I say, with a bit of annoyance in my tone. I turn to Carter and sweetly say, “Hi, Carter.” I bat my eyelashes at him. It’s never too early to begin flirting—though I do wish I was sans band uniform.

Carter blinks a couple of times at me, like he’s trying to place how he knows me.

“I’m in your English class,” I say, leaning toward him a bit. “With Mrs. Miller? I’m Brooke.”

“Oh yeah,” Carter says, smiling now. I’m not sure if he’s happy because A) of me, B) it’s polite, or C) English is his favorite class. “Hey.”

I smile again. Carter looks expectantly at Chris. Chris is doing his best to look anywhere but at Carter or Cassie. Cassie is still mute. Funny how when
her
boyfriend is around, she’s just not her normal, flirty, bubbly self.

“This,” I say, nodding in Chris’s direction, “is Chris.”

“Hey,” Carter says again with a nod at Chris.

More silence.

“Well, it was so nice running into you guys,” I say. “We better get in line for our drinks. I’m freezing.” I rub my arms briskly with my hands just to really bring it home.

“Oh, yeah. We better get back to our seats with ours,” Cassie says, lifting her cup.

Hallelujah! She speaks!

“See you in class, Carter,” I say sweetly.

“Yeah, see ya,” he says and gives me a little wave.

Carter and Cassie walk back toward the stands and Cassie briefly looks over her shoulder at Chris. I roll my eyes. These two are freaking unbelievable.

Hmm. I wonder if Chris’s family dinner has suddenly been cancelled?

We get our drinks and walk toward our seats. “You go ahead,” I tell him. “I want to run back for a heat sleeve. The cup’s burning my fingers.”

Chris nods and keeps going. I return to the front of the line at the concession stand. Blech. Delaney’s standing there. Well, I don’t have to talk to her. Just need to reach by her really fast and grab a sleeve.