Going Geek (15 page)

A girl with long, wavy dark hair and bee-stung lips smiles at me, but it comes off as more of a grimace. “Hi, Skylar,” she says.

I vaguely recognize her as a girl from Baldwin House who's on the swim team. Convenient. Opposite seasons. Her name's not coming to me, but who cares when her name from here on out will be The Bitch Who Was on a Date with Leo.

“Oh, sorry, this is—” Leo begins. I interrupt him immediately. The less I know, the better.

“Wonderful. Well. Feel free to eat, drink, and be merry!” Forget that the food's been devoured or that what I just said is really more of a mangled Christmas sentiment. I whirl away, hoping that I made the most graceful exit possible under the heinous circumstances.

I glue myself to Yasmin and Jess. Shockingly, they have enough sense to not ask me what's going on. I must look like I've been struck by lightning. When Samantha passes again, I grab another handful of gummy bears and down them. “What's up with you?” she asks.

“You can only have two or three,” Jess says. I sit down and bury my head in my arms. “Oh no,” she says.

I don't know why I'm so shocked that Leo's on a date. He's Leo. I guess I thought he might have cared to at least tell me where we stood first.

“Hey.” Someone taps me on the back. I look up and manage to smile when I see Declan. He's slightly blurry, but I'm inexplicably happy that he's here.

“I didn't see you,” I say, standing up.

“That much is clear.” Declan looks amused, and I wonder if he can tell that I'm swaying.

“When did you get here?” I ask.

“Not that long ago. Had to come see our girl do her thing.” He nods at Bettina.

“That's really nice of you. You're such a good friend,” I say. Declan hadn't said for sure that he'd be here, but now I realize that it wouldn't have been complete without him. Only he and I have been able to watch this process and know how amazing it would be. I reach out and loop my arm through his.

He looks down at me, unsure but keeping me steady. I take a deep breath. “Sorry I was rude about your dorm. I don't know those guys, and it was wrong of me to judge.”

“It's okay,” he says, chuckling and patting my hand. “I understand now that you were just making conversation. Badly, but still.” I blink up at him, grateful that someone really seems to get me.

“Usually my social skills are flawless,” I say.

Declan smirks. “Debatable.”

“No, it's true! Ask anyone. Well, not just anyone. I mean, this isn't how I really am.”

“Oh? How are you really?”

“It's just, I've been kind of…not able to put my best foot forward.” I peer into his eyes, willing him to believe me.

“How drunk are you?” he whispers. I shrug, throwing both of us off balance. “Yeah, let's just sit back down until some of that wears off,” he says. “For the record, this you isn't so bad.”

Declan sits and guides me down next to him, but I still land with a plop. I rest my cheek on his shoulder and marvel at how much more comfortable my heavy head feels.

“I have to ask. Does your hanging all over me have anything to do with your ex being here? I mean that and the fact that you're totally inebriated?” he asks.

“Ugh. He's still here? With that girl? Why won't he just go away?” I bury my face in his arm.

“So is that a yes or a no?” Declan mutters. I pretend not to hear him.

Bettina lights her last balloons. The crowd's quiet again. Collectively we know that something special is coming to an end and that we're the lucky ones who were here to witness it.

“
Y
ou know that was phenomenal, right?” I say to Bettina the next morning as we get ready in the bathroom.

“Why were you flirting with Declan?” she asks, glancing at me in the mirror.

“I was? That doesn't sound right.” I scrunch my eyes, like I'm trying to picture it, when of course I know exactly how long my head was resting on his shoulder. “Well, I was drunk. That could've had something to do with it.”

She shuts off her faucet and turns to face me. “Don't do that to him.”

“What? I'm sure he understands. We all know he's been around drunk people before.”

Bettina glares at me. “Getting busted was a really terrible time for him. Do me a favor and don't bring that up.”

“I would never,” I say with a furrowed brow. Rubbing people's mistakes in their faces would be pretty hypocritical of me. Bettina packs up her caddy and leaves.

Monday night, when I get back to Abbot, I go straight to the kitchenette freezer. “This really isn't going to help you,” Yasmin says, pausing by the door with Jess.

Usually I don't like an audience while I have a tub of mint chocolate chip ice cream stuck to my face, but I turn around anyway. “What are you guys doing?” I ask.

“I have to run to orchestra practice, but
she
has another date with Vince,” Yasmin says, smiling proudly at Jess.

I swallow a cold lump of ice cream. “Seriously?”

“It's casual,” Jess says. “He says he likes running with me because it's getting him into better shape. And maybe we make out a little after.”

“That's great,” I say, but I know it sounds hollow. Does everyone but me have a life? I lick the inner edge of the container, which makes Yasmin wrinkle her dainty nose.

“Listen, maybe you should talk to Leo,” Jess says, looking concerned.

“Yeah. Maybe he'll bring his date.” I put my ice cream down. My appetite is gone.

“You can't give up that easily!” Yasmin says. “It's not over, because you haven't fought for him. All good romance requires a grand gesture, and you haven't made one yet.”

“Nor do I intend to.”

They exchange glances, and I glare at them.

“For all intents and purposes, you lied to him,” Jess says.

“I know this already. So what's your point? I already apologized.”

“But maybe by now he's had enough distance that he'll actually be able to hear you,” Yasmin says. “Besides, I'm sure he misses you.”

I might be talking to a crazy person. “Are you serious? Did it look like he was missing me when he had his arm around that girl?”

Yasmin looks unfazed. “Appearances can be deceiving. For all you know, he's just trying to fill the huge hole you've left in his heart.”

My laugh comes out strangled. “I wish I lived in your world, where it's sunshine and puppies all the time.”

“Trust me. Grand gesture.” Yasmin nods at me, her conviction unwavering. “We have to go, but we're not done talking about this. Think of some ideas, and we'll review them later.”

“Glad to see you put the ice cream down,” Jess adds before they walk out.

The front door slams a second later, and I feel more friendless than ever. Everyone is out of the dorm. I'm tempted to go find Bettina in the studio, but I have a feeling I'm not welcome there at the moment.

I drag myself to my room and take out my essay for Chinese class and my English-Mandarin dictionary. I'd written it in simplified Chinese characters, not realizing that the assignment was for traditional characters. Baker Laoshi, who's usually one of my favorite teachers, only gave me a day to redo it and penalized me with a third of a grade. It's a pain, but for the most part it's busywork, which is about all I can handle.

By the time Jess and Yasmin return, I've actually come up with what I think qualifies as a grand gesture to show Leo how I feel.

“That's it?” Yasmin asks when I tell them the plan. We're in Jess's room, which has no decor, unless you count a few running posters with inspirational quotes on them.

“Sorry, did you think I should spell out
SKYLAR + LEO
in flower petals on his lawn? Or hire a skywriter to proclaim my love in the airspace above the Field?”

“Ignore her,” Jess says, grinning at me. “Yasmin's always in a bad mood if practice doesn't go well.”

“I'm a perfectionist,” Yasmin says.

“Why are you in such good spirits?” I ask Jess, narrowing my eyes at her. “Never mind. I don't want to know.”

She smiles even wider. “We started our run at his dorm and barely got to the bird sanctuary before we were all over each other.”

“Okay, I get it. Hashtag blessed. God, I wish I could bleach my brain. Didn't I just say I don't want to know?”

“Prude.” Jess laughs. “There's nothing wrong with going to the soccer game this weekend—”

“But it's uninspired,” Yasmin interrupts. “Half the school is going to be doing the exact same thing.”

“But the point is, I used to go to every game, and I think he'll realize how hard it was for me to show up on his turf, no pun intended.”

Yasmin shakes her head and sits on Jess's bed to begin her stretches. Before I met Yasmin I had no idea that being a serious cellist required a whole fitness regimen to avoid injury. “You know him best,” she says. “But just so you know, I was willing to play a private candlelit concert for the two of you.”

“That's very sweet, but I'm pretty sure that would be weird for all of us,” I say.

I'm a little discouraged that they don't seem to have much enthusiasm for my plan. But now that I've been thinking about it, I realize that I'm sick of waiting. I can't stay in limbo forever, and if Leo and I are truly over, I need to know.

I finally get up the nerve to go to the studio a couple of nights later. I don't know who I'm more nervous to be around, Bettina or Declan. Fortunately, Declan's not there. Bettina's hard at work on a clay sculpture. As far as I can tell, she hasn't taken a single second to bask in the runaway success that was Ghouls and Graves.

“On to the next thing already, huh?” I say, plugging in my laptop.

She shrugs, and while it could be modesty, it feels more like indifference. “Unlike many artists, who grow attached to their work and obsess about its importance, I'm more about the fluidity of the cycle of creativity and consumption.”

As usual I have no idea what she's talking about, but I nod. I may not get it, but I admire her ability to keep moving forward. “Where's your biggest fan?” I ask, and immediately wish I could take the words back.

“Why? You need someone to make you feel better about Leo?” she asks.

Ouch. Maybe there's more between them than I realized. Usually I'm better at reading situations. “Why don't you two just go out already? You obviously have some kind of arty connection.”

She sighs, wiping her clay-encrusted hands on a wet rag. “I'm gay, and Declan knows.” Oh. My face gets hot. It's not like I don't know other gay people, but I feel like the world's biggest idiot. “Besides, we're friends through his ex-girlfriend, and she's still not over him.”

I struggle to stay on topic and not get distracted by the fact that Declan has a past. “I'm sorry. But I mean, nothing happened. He knew I was buzzed, and he was just trying to help me. Trust me, I am not looking for a rebound.”

Bettina rolls her eyes. “Just try to be aware of other people's feelings.”

Her reproach stings, like she thinks I'm willfully insensitive or something. Maybe heartbreak hasn't had the best effect on my personality, but it's not as if I'm not trying.

O
nce again I've been called to the Calendar executive committee meeting, this time to answer “serious questions” they have about Ghouls and Graves. This meeting happens downtown at the Golden Palace, Winthrop's answer to Chinese food. For some reason this restaurant is a favorite among my fellow students. Whitney and I and the other Lincoln girls celebrated all our birthdays here. I guess they still probably do.

On my fifteenth birthday we decided that we were grown up enough to get a little rowdy. We stayed for hours, ordering Shirley Temples, begging the waiters to spike them, and laughing so hard when they got mad. I almost smile, remembering it now. Whitney gave me a silver necklace with a tiny bean pendant from Tiffany's. “I'm sick of you borrowing mine all the time,” she said before giving me a hug.

Despite all the good times, the best thing I can say about the Palace is that the food is salty, greasy, and fairly cheap.

I duck under a low-hanging red paper lantern and take a seat at the long table where the Executive Committee is already eating. They've ordered several pu-pu platters—many more than the number of people here can actually eat—and pick at things like fried spring rolls and sesame beef skewers. The Palace is not actually owned or operated by Chinese people, which explains the existence of such things on their menu. It does not appear to be a spiked Shirley Temple kind of night, which makes me wonder why we're bothering with meeting here.

“First let's cover the Masquerade Ball. Since most of us were there”—Whit darts a glance at me—“we don't have to go into too much detail.”

Elizabeth takes a deep breath. “It was a beautiful event. We had the most exquisite decor we've ever had, the menu was perfect, and the music was on point.” I read her tone as defensiveness laced with confusion.

“We know,” Whitney says. “You did everything perfectly. There's no one to blame here. It's just one of those flukey things.” It doesn't escape my attention that she's abandoned ownership of the ball.

“I'm sure it was fantastic,” I say to Elizabeth. “I would've loved to have been there.”

“For all the hype it was definitely on the sleepy side,” Lila says. Whitney raises an eyebrow and gives Elizabeth a nervous look. “Anyway, let's talk about Abbot's balloon party,” Lila continues, snatching a fried prawn with her chopsticks. She makes it sound like we were making balloon animals for a kid's birthday. “We heard turnout was better than anticipated.”

I'm smart enough to know that I'd better tread carefully here. “I mean, we had nowhere near ball numbers or even weekend-dance numbers, but still, it was surprisingly well attended. We weren't expecting much, so anything felt like a huge win.”

“Obviously none of us came,” Whitney says. “We're only going by the few grainy photos published by the
Winthrop Times,
but it seems like nothing disastrous happened.”

“Nope. Not at all.” Unless you count Leo showing up with a date.

“I guess there's no accounting for taste,” Lila says. “It just goes to show you that most Winthrop students are simpletons. We hand-deliver a perfectly executed Halloween celebration, and they'd rather go off and watch plastic bags fly around.”

Everyone giggles nervously, and I'm surprised that they all tolerate Lila insulting our school. I wish I could take back the encouraging words I said a second ago and stab them with my chopsticks.

“I don't know, guys,” Guthrie says. “I actually stopped by. It was pretty brilliant. And everyone kept talking about how chill and communal it was.”

“Ugh, whatever,” Whitney says.

Of course she'd be bitter about people cutting out of the ball for any reason, but I am surprised that she's not at least a tiny bit pleased that something new went well. “I thought you'd be happy that Abbot managed to deliver something people actually wanted to go to,” I say. “You're always on about how certain dorms don't pull their weight.”

Everyone looks to Whit to gauge her reaction. “True enough. But if people could maybe learn to calibrate their events better, it would benefit everyone. I mean, competing with the main offering on the schedule is never a good idea. Balance is key. I would think you'd know that by now.”

“I had no way of knowing Ghouls and Graves would be such a hit.” Or that the ball would be so lackluster that it would send people running.

“God,” says Whitney. “No one in their right mind would've predicted that so many people would geek out over a bunch of balloons. Next year it would have to be scheduled for a different night, clearly. And then we'd need to implement some improvements.” She looks at some of the members who are juniors. They scribble frantically in their notebooks.

I straighten up, alarmed. “Oh. Actually this was a onetime thing. Bettina's graduating, and it wouldn't be right for someone to copy her idea.”

“Well, if she's graduating, I guess it's convenient that she won't be here to police it,” Whitney says, narrowing her eyes. “Besides, it's not as if she owns the copyright on balloons.”

“Maybe not, but people will know. Faculty, other students. And it's unethical to do it without her express permission.” I'm starting to get pissed. Bettina worked hard on this project, and I'm not going to sit here while people talk about stealing it.

Whitney snorts. “You're preaching ethics now? So not only did you ruin Halloween, but you've done it with something that can't even be useful to us in the future?”

I shrug. “Sometimes you can't catch lightning in a bottle.”

“Let's not waste any more time on this,” Lila says, staring at me. “It's over. We can't use it. It was utterly pointless. Next.”

When the bill comes, I take out my wallet to contribute to the pu-pu platters. Some of the others ordered entrees, but given my budget, I'd refrained.

Whitney frowns over the very lengthy itemized receipt. Lila snatches it out of her hands. “Just split it,” Lila says. “It's so much easier.” Everyone tosses their credit cards over.

“I brought cash. Can you tell me how much I owe?” I ask.

Whitney doesn't look up, just sighs and taps on her phone. “Thirty-two seventeen, including tax and tip.”

There's forty dollars in my wallet, total. But beyond that, there is no way I'm paying that much for a couple strips of sesame beef. I almost lose the nerve to speak up, but I've already infuriated everyone, so I really have nothing to lose. “Sorry, I barely ate. Can I just throw in twelve?”

Again Whitney keeps her gaze on her phone. “Fine. I'll subtract your twelve dollars and recalculate everyone else's bill.”

No one objects, but they do avoid looking in my direction. Maybe everyone would be happier if I were actually invisible.

I'm the first to leave, but Whit corners me just before I reach the door. “How could you do that, not only to the Calendar but to me?”

“What?” I ask, confused.

“You deliberately upstaged us and ruined the ball! You never shared the details of your idea and kept talking about it like some quaint little surprise.” Her arms are crossed, and her pretty face is twisted into a scowl.

“You mean, if I'd said ‘balloon art,' you would've known it was going to be a campus-wide phenomenon?” I ask.

Whitney snorts. “Let's not get carried away.”

Her derision makes me abandon any humility. “You heard Guthrie. People are using the word ‘spectacular' to describe it,” I say.

“Next time you propose something, you better be ready to disclose it fully,” she says.

“Fine. But as we all agreed, Ghouls and Graves's success wasn't predictable. Instead of wasting your time doing damage control on a bad event, why not celebrate the success of a good one?”

I continue out the door. If Whit ever thought of herself as my friend, I don't see how she could be this unsupportive and threatened just when I finally feel like I did something right.

Opal has the unfair advantage of being able to talk my ear off when I have no place to hide. Like when I'm in bed, head buried under my comforter, trying to sleep. “People really want us to do something for Rally Weekend. No one wants another formal dance.”

“What do you mean? The Cotillion is a hundred-year-old institution.”

“Yes, and it shows. People are ready for something a little more progressive than velvet and corsages,” Opal says.

The Beecher School has been Winthrop's main rival forever. Each fall Rally Weekend centers on a football game where student spectators from each school trade insults through witty poster slogans. Alumni take over the Winthrop Inn, faculty assign less homework, and students party, watch the football game, and hook up at the Cotillion. It's tradition.

My plan for Rally Weekend is to stay in bed and wait until it's over.

“Come on,” she pleads. “Consider all the poor souls at this school who hate the stuffy culture of Rally Weekend. The Cotillion is hellish for us.”

Opal's point makes some sense. Funny, I never thought about what all the unattached people did over the weekend. I never had to worry about it—at the very least, I went with a boy as friends. Now that I'm on the other side, needing a date for a football game and a school dance seems ludicrous.

Once I utter anything resembling an agreement, Opal will hold me to it, so I say nothing.

But the next morning I surreptitiously check the Calendar schedule. As luck would have it, our next turn in the rotation falls on Rally Weekend. Although part of me doesn't want to admit I'm seriously considering this, I already know what I'm going to propose.

When a boy I've never spoken to before passes me a note in US History, I know that Abbot has gained some weird alternate-universe-type momentum. He has a pierced eyebrow and wears black steel-toe boots with shorts, even with the forty-degree temperatures we've been enjoying recently. I unfold the paper while Mr. Karchmer isn't looking.
GHOULS AND GRAVES WAS RAD
, it reads.
THOUGHT ORIGINALITY WAS LONG DEAD AROUND HERE.

I shrug and offer a modest smile before folding the note and slipping it into my bag.

But he's not done. He falls into step behind me after class and talks my ear off all the way to the Canteen. “You guys should do something for Rally Weekend,” he says. “This place needs more interesting options. And Rally Weekend is the perfect time to make that statement.”

“Have you been talking to Opal?” I ask.

“Huh?” he says.

“Never mind. Nontraditional isn't exactly my forte.”

“Well, anyone who thought to pull off Ghouls and Graves has my complete respect. I thought you were the brains behind it, but I guess I heard wrong.”

He takes off for Lower Left (of course), and I find myself wanting to call him back. “You weren't wrong,” I want to say. “That was me. I can do it again.” I sigh.

Suddenly the prospect of upsetting Whitney and the rest of my old friends seems not only like a good idea but a necessary one.