Faking Normal (11 page)

We’re all a little shocked when it’s Heather who says, “Be nice now. Bodee’s harmless.”

There won’t be a better time to come clean about the dance I promised Bodee before they add any other disparaging remarks. “Look. I’m not gonna lie.”
Completely.
“Bodee’s a friend. I didn’t plan on it when my parents moved him in with
us, but now it’s hard not to get to know him a little. And I feel—”

“Sorry for him. Yeah, so does the rest of the school. What a whack job! His dad, I mean,” Hayden says.

“Yeah. That’s why I promised my mom I would dance with him at least once tonight.” I use every pitiful expression I know, including an over-the-top sigh. “You know, so he’s not completely alone.”

Collie shoots me a sly grin. “Does that mean you’re gonna let Janna have a dance with my man here?”

“No,” I say, because it’s what Hayden expects to hear, and I want this night to be drama free. But Hayden’s a guy who’s been stroked and adored by Janna for a year and a half. They probably have firsts together, and if she wants him back, she’ll get him. She’s got that conceited
I’m gorgeous
laugh, too. But it means nothing to me. After the dance, she can have him.

In fact, I stand to make ten dollars if she does.

“Janna causes a problem tonight, I’m gonna let Heather tell her where she can go,” Hayden says.

“Aww. That sounds like the perfect job for you, honey,” Collie says, and squeezes Heather’s shoulders.

Jackass; instead of looking at her face as he refers to her, Collie focuses right on
the girls,
as Heather calls them. He didn’t used to be that way.

“And she can take a crack at Bodee, if the dude wants more than a dance,” Hayden says.

“Y’all always let Heather fight your battles?” I am only semi-teasing.

“Uh, yeah,” the guys say together, and bump fists like they’re on the football field. Heather laughs like she thinks it’s funny too.

I’m starting to think I’ll owe Heather ten dollars. Hayden is not sounding like a guy Heather had to talk into going out with me. And I don’t get that. Because last year, guys did not form a line to ask me out.

So I have to wonder. Did
he
change me? The image of blue Hawaiian swim trunks rips through my brain. Rips through the peace I’ve held on to so firmly tonight. Did he . . .
do
something to me that guys can
see
on the outside? Now do they want to do it too?

Craig and Kayla both commented that I’d changed over the summer. All the trauma feels like it’s happening inside me, but maybe it’s leaking out.

“You know we’re kidding about Bodee?” Heather asks with a laugh. “He’s the most undatable, nonthreatening guy at Rickman. You’re more likely to sleep with Collie than date Bodee Lennox.”

“Yeah,” I say.

Collie steals a kiss from Heather and quickly says, “Hon, please don’t pimp me out.”

Even though the night air is warm, I shiver and pull away from Hayden’s arm.

“You cold?” Hayden asks. “Because I can warm you up.”

“I’m fine.” I say it fast, but Hayden is already digging in the inside pocket of his suit coat. He shakes a little metal flask at me and then at Collie.

“All right! Your brother came through,” Collie says.

“Doesn’t he always?” Hayden says. “It’s better than a blanket,” he promises me.

“Alexi’s a wine cooler girl,” Heather tells him with a wink at me.

“Oh,” Hayden says.
“Okay.”

Saying I’m a wine cooler girl is like saying Bodee’s chatty. But I give Heather an appreciative look for her protective comment. I’m off the hook. Even if I did want to drink tonight, it would definitely not be from Hayden’s flask.

“Well, we’re gonna have a good time tonight, buddy,” Collie says.

“Just don’t let Coach Tanner catch you again,” Heather warns. “You’d have been suspended last time, if he hadn’t agreed to keep your little secret.”

“Suspension would have been easier. He ran us the next day at practice till we puked,” Hayden says. “That was punishment enough.”

“Probably the reason he didn’t tell is he did the same thing in high school. Right, Alexi?” Collie asks. “Hayden’s older brother says Coach was wild back in the day.”

“I don’t know,” I say, thinking another reason might be that Craig couldn’t win without his star football players. “I
was, like, seven when he was that age.”

That little flask makes me nervous on so many levels. Because it turns an otherwise decent guy into an octopus with eight hands. Or, at the least, an idiot. But I can’t say anything. This is my night to act normal. My night to forget. And to remember that I still like guys. Guys who think I’m attractive and want to hold my hand. And buy me dinner. And get cheesy, stupid dance pictures taken with me so my mom can put them in her scrapbook.

“I’ll bet Coach has plans with your sister. He won’t catch us tonight.” Hayden conceals the flask in his large hand like a magic trick. “Our only plan is to celebrate. Just like every other guy on the team. Right, Collie?” Hayden slings an arm around my shoulder. “You don’t mind, do you, Alexi?”

There’s a pause as Heather, Collie, and Hayden wait to see how I’ll respond.

“Long as you don’t confuse me with Janna,” I say, and think I deserve an Oscar.

Everyone laughs, and Hayden takes a sip while we’re still in the shadows of parked cars. From here, I see the open gym doors and hear the music. Dane’s probably happy because a popular rap song is blaring out lyrics I’d never dream of writing on the desk.

A nagging sensation, the one whispering that Hayden is a creep who’ll try to take advantage of me, is back. Along with the need to tear at my neck. My knuckles are white from gripping my clutch, and I take a deep breath.

“Ready to go in?” I ask, and hope the dark camouflages the panic in my eyes.

“Absolutely,” Hayden says.

In we go. Collie and Heather. Hayden and I. And the flask.

As Hayden hands over our tickets, I think about Bodee. Is the ten-dollar bill crisp or wrinkled? Has he kept it wadded up in his pocket since she gave it to him or flattened between the pages of
Hatchet,
where I imagine he stores important things? Will it hurt when he hands it over to Mrs. Ramsey for entry into his first dance? Guilt is a good distraction from my fears. And so is Bodee. He’ll be behind us somewhere.

“You want pictures?” Hayden asks.

“Sure,” I say, as if I haven’t already thought about this.

Hayden smiles and pulls me along toward the tacky photo backdrop.
A Knight to Remember.

We move closer together at the photographer’s insistence.

“Beautiful couple,” the old man says, looking at us through the lens.

The camera flashes and he takes one more, promising we’ll have our hard-copy memories in a week. Perfect. By then, we won’t even care about the dance or the twenty he shelled out to stand by the life-size statue of a black knight made of plastic.

And the girl who is not Janna.

When we leave the lit hallway and step into the gym, it takes my eyes a minute to adjust to the disco ball and strobe lights. My ears beg for a pair of plugs as my heart rate matches the bass from the DJ’s speakers. There are nearly six hundred
students at Rickman High, but there must be a thousand people here. Well, probably not, but it already smells like a thousand.

“Check the newbies.” Hayden points at the edge of the gym. The freshman class is a border of braces and shyness.

“Hey, you were just like that once,” I say.

He eyes a boy who’s wearing a bow tie with a plaid shirt and says, “I was never like that.” And then points to a couple slow-dancing to a fast song and says, “I was a lot more like that.”

“You and Janna were sort of legendary,” I say.

“It’s your job to hide me tonight,” he says.

Hide him. Is he kidding? As he pulls me toward the drink table, heads twist around as girls get a look at the football player attached to my side.

“Oh God, there she is,” he says.

“Where?” My eyes sweep the room in search of the Janna-monster. I’m only partially looking for her, because I’m Bodee-watching, too. I can barely see the people next to us for the fog machine in this corner. Where is my Kool-Aid friend? Would he stand along the edge with the boy in the plaid or in the corner like the girl wearing a tux?

“Over there.” Hayden flips his head toward the entrance.

Janna’s top-heavy and bottomed-out, and the girl by the entrance looks a few cup sizes short of Hayden’s ex. “You sure that’s her?”

“Oh yeah.”

The girl turns to the side to talk to a friend, and I can tell Hayden is right. The familiarity between them is something that only comes from spending time together. Across a crowded, dark room, Hayden knows her shape. Will I ever know Captain Lyric that way? Or Bodee?

The Captain’s probably here somewhere tonight. Dancing with another girl who doesn’t complete him any more than Hayden completes me.

I play the Where Is Captain Lyric Right Now? game. What if he’s Janna’s date? Now that would be ironic. Or the boy in the plaid? I hope not. Hayden? What if I’m already on a date with my perfect guy?

“Just need enough to take the edge off sharing a room with Janna,” Hayden says as we reach the drink table.

I’ve got an edge like the Grand Canyon, and nothing takes it off. “Whatever,” I say. Hayden can’t be my Captain. The Captain doesn’t drink. Or in my fantasy he doesn’t.

Hayden doctors and drains the drink. “Now, I’m ready to dance,” he says.

“Me too,” I say, hoping to get us away from the drink table.

As I join him on the dance floor, the Captain and Bodee aren’t the only thoughts filling my head. My personal silencer is here too. Reminding me Heather was the one who rejected the alcohol, not me. Suggesting that when Hayden’s hands want to linger in places they don’t belong, I’ll let him do whatever he wants.

We dance two fast songs before Collie and Heather and
Liz and Ray make our twosome a circle.

“Hey,” Heather screams over the music. “We lost you after pictures.”

The flask moves between Hayden and Collie. And back again.

Liz rolls her eyes. “Neither of you need that.”

Maybe they do, because that’s when Janna steps into our circle and puts her mouth up to Hayden’s ear and her hands around his waist.

Whatever she says gets an angry look from Hayden. “Where’s your date?” he asks, and doesn’t sound like himself.

“He left me. Alone on homecoming,” Janna says with a pout.

“I can’t imagine why,” Heather says.

Janna’s like a three-year-old who just lost her favorite stuffed animal. I see Hayden soften, and for a moment, I almost feel sorry for her. Almost. Then I think, What a nervy bitch. But I’m not going to tell her off; I’m too curious to see what Hayden will choose.

“Hayden, baby”—there’s alcohol in that whine—“dance with me just once for old times’ sake. I’m sure Allie won’t matter, er, mind.”

“Her name’s Alexi,
Janie,”
Heather snaps.

Hayden leans over to me and says into my ear, “This might be the only way to get rid of her. Any chance you could find Kool-Aid now? We could get these dances over with.”

I nod and leave the group as the first slow song begins.
Couples bump into me as they sway to the music, their bodies entwined like snakes.

I don’t have time to wonder where Bodee is before he taps my shoulder. Like he’s been here all along. “Now?” he asks, just loud enough to hear him.

“Yes, please.” There are tears on my cheeks as he puts both hands on my hips.

“I don’t have to touch you,” he says.

“It’s not you.” I put my hands on his shoulders so he knows I’m telling the truth, but he only uses his index fingers and thumbs to touch me.

“Okay.” I see sympathy as the light of the disco ball catches his eyes. “He matters more than you planned?”

“No.” I swipe the tears away. “It just sucks not to matter more than that. It took him less than three dances to take Janna back. I didn’t think he was anything special, but I thought we’d make it longer than pictures and alcohol.”

“I’m sorry.” Like a willow in the wind, Bodee bends toward me and says, “Love is awkward sometimes.”

“But I don’t love Hayden.”

“Good.” Bodee touches my cheek. Only as he shows me a tear on his finger do I release the breath in my lungs. He smiles, but it’s not a happy smile, and says, “I meant you have trouble loving yourself.”

“You think?” I ask.

“I do,” he says.

God, I wish this song had a million verses.

“Can I stand closer to you?” Bodee asks.

Considering we’ve locked our arms, and Hayden and Janna and Janna’s boobs could fit between us, that sounds like a great idea to me. “Yes.”

He moves maybe an inch closer to me. A tiny bend of his elbow. And then he uses the happy, teeth-showing smile. We’re close. Closer than Hayden and I were moments ago, and Hayden had been all up in my space.

“I have a secret,” Bodee says.

He can tell me anything.

“Yeah?” I ask as a hand wraps around my bicep and tugs me away.

“We’re leaving. Now!” Hayden says.

UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE

HarperCollins Publishers

..................................................................

chapter 11

“WHY?”
I ask Hayden as I look over my shoulder at Bodee. He’s wearing another of his unreadable expressions. Maybe fear. Or even anger.

“Because I can’t stand to be in the room with that”—Hayden uses a word for Janna I can’t quite hear over the guitar riff that ends the slow dance—“for another minute.”

Couples break apart. Ahead of us, people clog the path to the exit, but Hayden’s shoulders part the dance crowd the way he dodges through the defensive line. Behind me, there are arms and torsos and blue dresses and gray suits and punch glasses and striped ties. But there’s no Bodee.

I plead with Bodee’s mind as if we are somehow connected. Follow me. Help me.

“Janna. Ohh. I hate that girl,” Hayden says. “She ruins
everything.” And that’s not all he says, but it’s all I listen to as he drags me after him.