She left the room, and I plopped down at the dining table with my friends. Madison was busy cutting the place cards, Lilly and Emily were tackling votive candles, so I grabbed some ribbon and tied bows around the “In lieu of favors ...” scrolls.
“I see the infamous Teresa is seated at the head table,” Madison said as she lifted her seating card. “She's seriously coming?”
“Yup. Even after the crap my uncle pulled at dinner.”
“She's just a glutton for punishment, isn't she? Unless ...” Madison trailed off.
“What?”
“Ya ever think she just wants cash?”
“For what?” I yelped.
“Thirty-five years of back child support from your deadbeat grandpa.”
“Madison!” Lilly shrieked. “The woman wants to get to know her family.”
“Sure she does... .”
“All right, drop it,” I stated, mulling over the insinuation. “I don't know what she wants, but I prefer to steer away from the conspiracy theories. Anyway, I don't want my mom to hear.”
The room quieted as everyone returned to their projects.
Madison waved another place card in the air. “Oh, so looky here. Bobby McNabb, Table 5. That's prominent placement.”
“What? He's one of the few people from Spring Mills I actually invited. I'd like to think he'd get seated above Evan Casey... .”
“Hey! Don't knock Evan,” Lilly interrupted.
“Sorry, Lil. But your boy Evan's at Table 17. Ouch,” Madison mocked.
“Mariana!”
“What? Lil, I barely know the kid.”
“He stopped you from getting your butt kicked at my tennis match.”
“No, I was defending your honor, and he jumped in uninvited. Big shocker.”
“Just like you defended Bobby's honor?” Emily asked, cocking her head.
“Well, yeah,” I snipped. “What, am I just supposed to keep my mouth shut when jerks bad-mouth my friends?”
“So your little crusade to get his film shown at school, are you doing that âjust as a friend?' ” Madison asked.
“Of course.”
“Because I don't remember you guys being close friends before,” Emily noted.
“Why are you making such a big deal out of this? We're lab partners, we have adjacent lockers, that's it.”
“Dude, he invited you to a family function,” Madison added.
“No, he invited
all of us
to his movie screening.”
“No, he invited
you
. Unfortunately for him, you dragged us along.” Emily sighed.
“Emily, seriously, if you like him, just tell him. Because
you're
the only one he's asked on a date. No reason to get all drama-queen about it.”
Emily's eyes shot up from the tangerine candles.
“Wow, you sound like your father,” she snipped.
A surge of alarm clenched my chest. All those years I thought Vince was so much like our father and that I was the odd kid out. Could I seriously be turning into my dad?
“Oh, my God. I can't believe I said that,” I mumbled.
“Whatever,” Emily shrugged. “I just wish you'd be a little more honest about what's going on with Bobby.”
“And I wish you'd do the same.”
She turned toward me and we stared at each other, dead in the eye, for the first time in a long time.
“All right girls! How we doin'?” My mom gleamed as she returned to the dining room.
The tension was so substantial that I was surprised she couldn't feel it from upstairs, but she jumped right into her designated crafts as if nothing odd was occurring. She grabbed a vase and slowly began adhering a ribbon to its base. I turned back to the project I was completing and let the conversation drop. So did everyone else.
Chapter 23
W
hen I saw Bobby standing at his locker Monday morning, he looked different. I felt almost embarrassedâlike he could tell that I'd discussed him with my friends over the weekend, and even worse, that I'd been thinking about him (a lot) since his film screening. I didn't know whether to act like his screening was no big deal, or whether I should acknowledge the spark I felt between us. Of course, I could have been imagining the spark. I could have distorted it in my mind into something that it wasn't, or I could just be letting my friends' reactions get to me.
“Hey, Bobby. Long time, no talk,” I joked as I swung the dial on my locker.
“Oh, yeah. I haven't seen you in ages.” He smiled as he looked up from his book bag. “So how was shopping?”
“Huh?” My forehead wrinkled as I glanced at him.
“Yesterday, for your Sweet Sixteen dress. You said you were going shopping.”
“Oh, yeah. Right. Glad to see you were listening.” I chuckled as I took out the books I had packed over the weekend.
“I'm always listening.”
“Ew, Big Brother.”
“I wouldn't go that far,” he stated, shoving a few spiral notebooks into his bag.
“Anyway, Lilly and I went to Dean Pruitt's office this morning, and his secretary said we could stop by after school to discuss Spring Mill's first-ever film festival.”
“Oh, it's an entire festival now!”
“Well, sort of. If we can find any other kids who've completed movies. But I was thinking at the very least we could display some student photography in the halls, maybe do a screenplay reading, what do you think?”
“I think that you thought a lot about this,” he said, gazing at me so intently that for a second, he reminded me of Alex.
A quick flash of Alex and I kissing near the waterfall in Puerto Rico flickered in my head. I hadn't e-mailed him since Teresa came to town, and I knew he was dying to hear about my family's reaction. But as I saw with Madison and Emily this summer, it's hard to keep long-distance friendships going. Even if he and I were a lot more than friends. I missed him, but I knew that keeping in touch would never move him any closer to Spring Mills. Sometimes I wondered why we bothered to communicate at all, because it only reminded us of how we would never really be together again.
“Mariana? Hey, Mariana.” Bobby snapped his fingers, startling me. “Where'd you go?”
“What? I'm sorry,” I said, shaking my head. “Anyway, Lilly and I are meeting with the dean after school, and I think you should come with us. I'm sure he'll want to speak with you.”
“Yeah, absolutely.”
I could feel his eyes burning into the side of my face. But I didn't return his stare.
Â
Madison and Emily joined the campaign. I knew they would. Madison couldn't stand being left out of anything, though she did warn that the timing was inconvenient given all the work still to be done for my party on Saturday. But I assured her (more times than I could count) that the party would go off without a hitch and that the film festival probably wouldn't occur for quite a few months even if the dean agreed.
“All right, so what's the plan?” Lilly asked as she walked over to my locker.
“The plan is to ask the dean and see what he says,” I responded as I slammed my locker shut. Madison and Emily were already waiting patiently beside me.
“That's it? We need to have more to our pitch than just a simple âask',” Madison stated.
“Like what?” I leaned back on the lockers as we waited for Bobby.
“Well, Bobby's our big selling point. We need to stress the importance of his movie to the overall psyche of our student body. Touch on America's void in understanding foreign cultures. And emphasize the lack of support for the arts at our academic institution,” Madison said as she scanned her text messages.
“
Caray
. Did you just come up with that?” Lilly asked, expressing her disbelief.
Madison chuckled and looked up from her phone. “No, my dad's in marketing. He just texted me that strategy. I left him a message about it an hour ago.”
I giggled. “Gotta love Mr. Fox.”
“At least one of our parents is useful,” Emily added.
When we were in middle school, Madison, Emily, and I insisted that we should be able to perform a
Nutcracker
routine during our school's Christmas pageant. There were already plans to have a holiday play, two chorus performances, and a visit from Santa Claus, so we thought it only fair that we should get to add our ballet rendition to the lineup. Only the principal insisted that the schedule was predetermined and that there was no time for another event. Madison immediately informed her father, and he formulated a strategy to highlight the importance of our contribution to enhancing dance appreciation among the local preteen demographic. He wrote out an entire speech we were to give our principal with a half-dozen visual aids (photos of us performing at our last recital contrasted against images of hoochie dancers in rap videos). The principal had no choice but to agreeâplus if he didn't, he knew he'd probably have to sit through the whole pitch again, only this time given with conviction by Madison's father.
“My dad said to ask Bobby to bring a copy of his movie to give to the deanâas an advance screening, of course. And he should bring photos from his trip to Ireland to improve the dean's visual connection to the project.”
Just then, Bobby turned the corner and walked toward us.
We quickly gave him a brief recap of Mr. Fox's strategy and in turn, he yanked two photos of Ireland from his locker door and grabbed a burned copy of his movie from his backpack. We headed to Dean Pruitt's office, and his secretary quickly escorted us in.
After a ten-minute razzle-dazzle presentation, including all of Madison's father's advice, the dean finally got a word in edgewise.
“So Mr. McNabb, you'd like to hold a screening of your movie?” Dean Pruitt confirmed, as he leaned back in his brown leather desk chair and tapped his silver pen on the oak desk in front of him.
“Yes.” Bobby nodded.
“Well, all right then. I think it sounds like a wonderful idea. I'll talk to Suzanne and see where we can fit it on the calendar. I'm thinking it might make a good send-off before Thanksgiving break,” he stated, as he made a notation in a leather-bound notebook.
I smiled widely at Bobby, then glanced at my friends, who looked just as happy.
“Is there anything else?” he asked, noticing we were still in the room.
“Oh, um, no. Nothing. That was it,” I stammered as we all stumbled to our feet and swiftly exited the office.
“Nice work,” Madison whispered, elbowing my side.
“Yeah, thanks,” Bobby added, resting his hand on my shoulder as we walked past Suzanne, the dean's secretary.
I glanced down at Bobby's hand and he quickly pulled it awayâthankfully just moments before Madison spun around.
“All right, now that that's over with, let's move on to the more important stuffâparty plans. Has everyone responded?” Madison asked, grabbing my arm and dragging me away from Bobby.
“Yes, everyone I invited plus a few dozen extras. The seating chart is officially set.”
“Perfect, so how are we gonna handle your entrance?”
“Um, it's at my house. Unless you wanna show up an hour early and watch me walk down the stairs, there will be no entrance.”
“
Mariana
!”
“I agree with Madison,” Emily stated as we strolled out of school and toward the student parking lot. “You need to start getting into the spirit of the day.”
“And what spirit would that be?” Bobby asked.
Emily bit her lip. “Um, well, this
is
her party. She's the host. If she doesn't psych herself up to have fun, then the entire thing is gonna suck,” Emily explained, tugging at a lock of her dark mocha hair.
“Emily's right,” Lilly stated. “I went to this
Quinceañera
once where the girl was completely miserable. Trust me, she ruined her own party.”
“I'll have fun,” I confirmed, as I spotted Madison's car ahead. “As long as you don't pressure me into having fun.”
“Fine,” Madison huffed as she unlocked her car. “Bobby, you need a ride?”
“Uh, no.” He gestured to a beat-up black sedan across the lot that looked as though it had seen its prime more than dozen years ago. “My parents didn't buy me a new car for my birthday.”
“Don't feel bad. I'm sure if my father has his way I'll be getting a savings bond on Saturday.”
“Ah, the gift that keeps on giving.”
“Yeah, whatever.”
I peered up at him as my stomach swished. Something about the scene, him standing over me in front of a parked car, felt like the end of a romantic evening. As he looked at me, saying nothing, I half expected him to lean down and kiss me. I quickly looked back and saw that all my friends had piled into the car.
“So, I'll, uh, see you tomorrow,” I cheered as I climbed into Madison's car, killing the moment.
As soon as I shut the door, she swiftly pulled away.