Teen Idol (14 page)

"Hey, you okay?" Luke was patting me on the back, thinking I was choking. "Here, here’s a napkin."

I sopped up soda and tears with the napkin, then laughed.

"Oh my God," I said. "Sorry about that. I thought you said.

". . . you know, I thought you just asked me to the Spring Fling."

"I did," Luke said.

My heart gave a lurch. Not a good lurch, either, but like an
Uh-oh, I think I’m about to get hit by that bus
kind of lurch.

Because, really, the last thing I needed was to go to the Spring Fling with a teen heartthrob. I have enough problems without having to fight off a bunch of girls just to share a glass of punch with my own date.

"Before you say no, hear me out," Luke said, as if he’d been reading my mind. "For one thing, it won’t be like today. That was really bad back there, I admit. But it’s because people weren’t expecting it. If we go to the Spring Fling together, it’ll be different. Yeah, there might be some photographers or something, but everybody’ll know I’m with you, so they won’t . . . you know. Be throwing themselves at me. At least, not as much."

All I could do was stare at him. I really thought maybe the beer had gone to his head or something. Or maybe there was a camera hidden somewhere, and this was one of those reality shows. And in a second Ashton Kutcher or somebody was going to pop out and tell me I’d been punked. . . .

"The thing is," Luke went on, "like I told you, I never went to high school. So I never got to go to a school dance. And I want to see what it’s like. I’ll admit there’s a prom scene in the next project I’ll be working on, but that’s not why I want to go. I want to go for me, really. So I won’t have missed out on anything."

"Missed out on anything?" I shook my head. "Luke, you've been to, like, Africa. You've been to Europe, what, a thousand times? You sat next to Clint Eastwood at last year’s Oscar ceremony. I saw you there—don’t deny it. How could you have
missed out
on anything?"

"Easy," Luke said. "I miss out on everything normal people get to do. Jen, I can’t even go to the grocery store to buy milk without people wanting my autograph. Is it so wrong that I want to experience something every American teen but me has?"

Every American teen has NOT experienced the Spring Fling. I mean, look at me, for instance.

But I didn’t want to burst his bubble. At least, not that way. What I really wanted to do was get real about what was bothering me the most. . . .

"But why ME?" I asked him. "I mean, you could go to the Spring Fling with anybody. Trina is much prettier than me, and she wants to go with you. . . ."

"Yeah," Luke said. "But Trina’s not my friend, is she?"

I stirred on the bench uncomfortably. "Well. No."

"And Trina doesn’t like me as just a friend—the way you do—does she?"

I understood then. I knew why Luke was asking me. I knew
what
he was asking me, too.

And my heart swelled with pity for him. I know, it’s ridiculous—
me
, feeling sorry for a millionaire, a movie star who was worshiped by women all over the world, and who had his own Ferrari.

But there was one thing money and good looks couldn’t buy Luke Striker. And that was friendship. Genuine friendship, from someone who didn’t want to use him to get rich or famous herself, from someone who liked him for who he was, not the characters he played on the screen. All he wanted was to be treated like a normal person.

And really, if you think about it, what’s more normal than the Spring Fling?

He had urged me not to be little Jenny Greenley, everybody’s friend anymore. He had told me I had the potential to be something special.

But it looked like I was going to have to perform one last act of Jen Greenley niceness.

And I was going to have to do it for him. Even if he didn’t realize that’s why I was doing it.

"Sure," I said gently. "Sure, I’ll go to the Spring Fling with you, Luke."

He had looked excited—genuinely excited—at the idea. Of going to the Spring Fling. With
me
.

The poor guy.

"Cool!" he said, leaping up from the bench. "Look, I’ll probably fly back to L.A. after this. . . ." He meant the ringing phone and steady pounding on the door. "But I’ll come back next weekend to take you. To the Spring Fling, I mean. Well, really, you’ll be taking me, since it’s your school and all, but—"

"I’ll look forward to it," I said, smiling at his enthusiasm. It reminded me of the time Jake, his character on
Heaven Help Us
, learned a valuable lesson about helping the homeless, spending his Christmas at a soup kitchen, then came home to find a mountain bike some rich member of his dad’s church had bought for him as a reward.

Because, you know, if you help the homeless, of course someone will buy you a mountain bike. Not.

And then the reporters—because that’s who’d been knocking at the door, it turns out. Someone had evidently heard about the near-riot at the mall on their police scanner and called the tabloids—came stumbling around the back of the condo, calling Luke’s name and snapping our photo as we stood out there on the deck.

That’s when we ducked, laughing, back into the house, and when Luke finally sent me home, with the assurance he’d be back next Saturday night to pick me up at seven.

An assurance that Trina, standing on my front porch an hour later, clearly didn’t believe.

"No way," she said. "No way. There is
no way
you are going to the Spring Fling with Luke Striker.
No way
."

"Fine," I said. "Don’t believe me. But about Steve, Trina. What’s it gonna be? Because I’m really tired of cleaning up after you every time you dump him."

Trina’s face, which was totally normal one second—well, transfixed with rage, but otherwise normal—collapsed the next. Seriously. She just burst into tears.

"How c-could you?" she wailed. "How could you agree to go to the Spring Fling with him, when you know—you know how I feel about him?"

"Trina," I said. "You barely know him. You’re not in love with
him
at all. You’re in love with Lancelot. Or Tarzan. Or worse, the kid he played on
Heaven Help Us
."

Trina threw both her hands up over her face and, sobbing as loudly as Cara Schlosburg ever had, ran from my porch over to hers. When she got there, she yanked open her front door and ran inside, screaming, "Mom!" in a semi-hysterical manner.

A second later, my own mother came out onto our own porch and said worriedly, "What was all that screaming? Was that Trina?"

"Yes," I said miserably.

"What on earth did you say to her?" my mom wanted to know.

"The truth."

Ask Annie

Ask Annie your most complex interpersonal relationship questions.

Go on, we dare you!

All letters to Annie are subject to publication in the Clayton High School
Register
.

Names and e-mail addresses of correspondents guaranteed confidential.

Dear Annie,

The only thing my dad is interested in is sports. He never paid any attention to me when I was taking ballet and art and stuff, but now I’m on a sports team, it’s like he couldn’t be prouder of me
.

But here’s the thing. I totally hate sports. I only tried out for the team to make him happy. I never thought I’d actually get on it. I stuck with it because I figured maybe I’d learn to like it. Didn’t happen. I hate the practices and I hate the games. I want to quit. The only problem is, my Dad says once you’ve accepted a position on a team you can’t quit, because you’ll be letting the team down. I’m thinking, screw the team, I want to get back to ballet. What’s you’re advice, Annie
?

Soccer Sucks

Dear Sucks,

Life’s short. The fact you hate the sport so much means there’s no way you’re playing up to your potential. The team would be better off if you quit and they found someone willing to play with heart. Tell your dad that you know he’s trying to teach you good values, but if you don’t try new things, you’ll never know what you’re best at. And you can only make time for new things by quitting the things you KNOW don’t work for you
.

Then prepare yourself for the "I’m-very-disappointed-in-you" speech. But don’t worry. He’ll get over it. When he sees you at your first big ballet recital
.

Annie

T
hat dude with
the white hair, the one who painted the Campbell’s soup cans? Yeah, that one. He said everybody gets fifteen minutes of fame.

Well, he was wrong. Because I got a lot more than a mere fifteen minutes that week after the car wash.

The E! network devoted more than fifteen minutes to the story that first day alone. And you should have seen the various tabloid headlines:

Small Time Town Gets Visit from Big-Time Star

Hunk Undercover!

Luke Goes Local

High School Heartthrob

Stud in Study Hall!

It went on and on. Suddenly, Clayton, Indiana—which you can’t even find on most maps—was in the limelight.

Journalists descended upon our little town like those winged monkeys in
The Wizard of Oz
. You couldn’t turn a corner, it seemed like, without running into Lynda Lopez or Claudia Cohen.

And I’m not going to deny that it wasn’t a little cool, at first. Everybody, it seemed like, wanted an exclusive interview with me, the girl who’d shown Luke Striker what it was like to be a real teen.

And when word that Luke and I were going to the Spring Fling together got out, which it did, and plenty fast—I saw Trina on the Style network, telling some reporter, "Yeah, Jen’s my best friend. She’s going to the Spring Fling with him"—the requests for interviews came rolling in so fast, my dad finally took the phone off the hook.

Because, you know, it wasn’t like I could
do
any of these interviews. I mean, Luke’s my friend.

You don’t go on TV and talk about your friend.

Oh, sure, when somebody shoved a microphone in front of me as I was getting off the bus to school in the morning or whatever, and went, "Jenny Greenley, was it hard keeping Luke Striker’s true identity a secret?" I’d answer them, just to be polite. I’d be like, "No."

Or "Jenny Greenley, can you tell us what you’re wearing to the dance?" I was all, "Oh, you know, a dress." (A dress my mom picked up for me at L.S. Ayres, because I couldn’t go to the mall for fear of being mobbed by worshipful tweens. Because it turns out if you’re going to the Spring Fling with Luke Striker, that kind of makes you a celebrity, too.)

And when I got cornered by this reporter from
Teen People
, who asked me, "What’s the truth about your relationship with Luke Striker? Are you two in love?" I was all, "You know what? We’re just really good friends."

Because that was the truth.

But whatever. I wasn’t going to sit down for an in-depth chat about Luke with
Regis and Kelly
(even though, you know, they asked me to, but what—I was going to fly to New York?).

The funniest part about the whole thing was the people at school. They didn’t feel the same compunction I did about not talking about Luke to reporters. You should have seen Karen Sue Walters on Fox TV, going on about how Luke had given her tips on her solo in "Day by Day." Yeah, whatever, Karen Sue. I happened to know Luke had said maybe two words to her, and those words had been, "Nice song."

But she was making out like he was her vocal coach or whatever and that this was her ticket to stardom.

Even Mr. Hall got in on the act. He snapped up every interview that came his way and always ended each one with, "And the Troubadours will be performing at the Bishop Luers Show Choir Invitational—that’s Bishop Luers—this Friday. Try to stop by!"

Yeah, whatever, Mr. H. I’m sure all of America wants to see the Troubadours warbling out "As Long as He Needs Me" (I’ll Klingon Steadfastly).

Still, it got old pretty fast, the reporter thing. By like the third day, I was over it. I was over Trina’s being mad at me, too. She was all, "Oh, Jen’s my best friend," to the cameras but totally giving me the cold shoulder in person. It seemed like she couldn’t forgive me for

a) calling her on the Steve thing, and
b) agreeing to go to the Spring Fling with Luke.

There was one other thing she couldn’t forgive me for, even though it wasn’t my fault. In fact, I had nothing whatsoever to do with it. And that’s that Steve—good old dependable Steve—had gotten tired of listening to Trina whine about Luke Striker . . .

. . . and dumped her.

Yeah. Dumped Trina. And told me at lunch—he started eating with us, while Trina stayed in the choir room—that he didn’t regret it a bit. He was going to Kwang’s Anti-Spring Fling party, and couldn’t have been happier to have his freedom at last.

Geri Lynn, though, didn’t seem as happy about her decision to give her own soul mate the heave-ho. It wasn’t that she was unhappy about having broken up with Scott. It was more like she was unhappy that Scott wasn’t more upset about it. Every time I saw her, she started asking me searching questions about Scott. Did I think he liked someone else already? Because she had the feeling he liked someone else, and that’s why he hadn’t protested at all when she’d dropped the hammer on him. Didn’t that mean he must like someone else? Had he said anything to me about it? Not that she cared, but . . .

The truth was, back before that day at Luke’s place, I might have coddled Geri along. I might have been all,
Why, no, Geri Lynn, he hasn’t said anything to me. But I’m sure he’s still hurting from the breakup. If you miss him so much, why don’t you call him and ask him to come over? You two were so great together, you should really get back together
.

No way. Now I just went, "You know what, Geri? You broke up with him. It’s over. Move on."

Geri’s eyes got all big, and she looked like she was going to cry, so I had to apologize afterward (even though I still didn’t say I thought they should get back together).