“Your next
date
is Wednesday. Maybe you should get a haircut or something.”
“What is wrong with my hair?” I held up my hand. “No, don’t tell me. I don’t care.”
“That’s sort of what’s wrong with your hair.”
Even though it meant showing weakness, I couldn’t help patting my ponytail. I was low-maintenance, but not no-maintenance. That stupid smirk lit up his face again. So, naturally, I had to make things worse.
Dragging the band out of my hair, I shook my head and loosened the full effect of my blonde mane on him. I crossed my legs and leaned back coyly. “Is that better?” Then I gave him a little wink and a pout.
I waited for the witty comeback. Or even a witless one. But he just looked at me for the longest time. It got to be too much. “I have to go to class,” I said
“Yeah, me too.”
Again I waited. Because he was still standing in front of me. I sat up, shifting my weight to make it obvious he was in the way.
And still nothing.
I picked up his pen and tossed it to the other side of the room. “You dropped your pen.”
Finally spurred to action, he retrieved his ballpoint, and I took the opportunity to slink off the table and to the door. Whatever game he was playing, I needed to…well, insert some appropriate sports metaphor here because I don’t know any.
* * *
Wednesday afternoon, I opened my heart.
Please, you can’t seriously think I’m getting all mushy on you.
I opened my interview assignment, written in calligraphy on a big pink heart. Somebody on my staff had way too much time on their hands.
The Salad Bowl.
Lane four. 6:30
The Salad Bowl was the only bowling alley in town. The newest owners were Mormon and took out the liquor bar and turned it into a salad bar. It’s a good looking spread, but the smell of feet and rented shoes was still too overpowering for me to want to eat salad in there. Anyway, it looked like I had an hour of bowling to get through regardless of how it smelled.
That Foster must really hate me. You know it had to be his idea. All I really wanted to do was go home and curl up with an old Philip Marlowe movie and pretend I was a hard-boiled private detective instead of a teenage girl going on a date. Why couldn’t I have been born Humphrey Bogart?
My car felt up to the drive, so I got to the Salad Bowl on my own. Which was good because I really didn’t want to have Foster dropping me off on any more dates.
I mean interviews.
Wednesday nights were not a league night, so the place was pretty quiet. They had installed a new sound system, or maybe I could just hear the music better since it was dead. At any rate, catchy pop tunes poured out of the speakers and the walls were refreshed in new paint. It almost made me want to bowl. I still just didn’t want to eat any salad.
One lanky boy sat in the booth on lane four, both arms stretched out to his sides, like he was making a point that he wasn’t watching the door. His hair, jet black, looked a little long in the back, but not unmanageable. It was black enough that I thought maybe he dyed it. Judging from the stripes on the long-sleeve tee under his black tee, I guess him to be just this side of emo.
He stood as I approached the lane, turning slowly, and whoa…hello…Abercrombie & Fitch Boy. His blue eyes pierced the all the parts of my brain that controlled my girly hormones.
Smitten, meet the girl formerly known as Layney.
“Hi, I’m Lay—”
He held my hand in both of his. “I know exactly who you are Layney Logan, which is why I agreed to this to begin with. I’m Micah.”
“You know who I am?”
“I’ve seen you around.” His coal lashes swept down and he blushed sweetly as he smiled. “I’ve always liked your column in the
Follower
. I’m glad you guys haven’t given up on the newspaper.”
Huh.
I’d never been so close to a guy who was so…beautiful…before. My endorphins were singing. Like…opera songs. It felt similar to the time that I jumped off a cliff to get the story with the Olympic diver who was an alumnus of our school. I even liked Micah’s eyebrow piercing, and I’m not usually into body jewelry.
I declined his offer to get us drinks or snacks, so we sat on the hard plastic bench and didn’t even pretend to be interested in bowling.
“Why haven’t I seen you at school?” I asked. Because I would have remembered. Trust me. I’m not sure teeth are supposed to be that white, but it worked for him.
“I’m probably not there as much as I should be.” He smiled, wickedly even.
“So what do you do that’s so important you have to cut class?”
“I skate.”
Sk8er boy? Seriously? “Oh.”
He rolled his eyes. “You’re one of
those
people. Skateboarding isn’t a crime.”
I pursed my lips and gave him what I like to call my “mom” look while I waggled my finger in front of him. “Maybe not, but I believe cutting class is.”
He laughed, picking up my hand like he had every right to it. Of course, I didn’t stop him. “My absences are excused. I skate competitively. I travel a lot.”
“Oh.” Jeez Layney. Stick your foot in it, why dontcha? “Sorry about the whole judgmental thing. Not one of my best character traits.” And coupled with my lack of patience, probably why I don’t have many friends outside of the paper.
Micah, still playing my fingers despite the signed contract, waited for me to make eye contact before he said, “I hope you remember that when I tell you the next thing.”
Please don’t let it be drugs. Please?
“I’m a sophomore.”
My face fell.
I might have preferred drugs.
A sophomore?
“I was afraid of that. You don’t like younger guys, do you?” He continued playing with my fingers.
“To be honest, I don’t care for high school guys in general, not just the younger ones. I don’t date.”
“At all?”
“I’ve dated a few college guys, but for the most part I’m sort of married to the paper. It feels like cheating if I think about boys when I should be investigating something.”
“Sounds a little lonely.” He rubbed his knuckles gently up and down my arm.
“I find journalism fulfilling.”
“Layney, I love skating. It’s a passion—I get that. But it doesn’t replace other passions. You should make room for human beings too.”
I pulled my arm away from him. He didn’t even know me. “Now who’s being judgmental?”
“Sorry.” Slumping into his seat, he blew his bangs out of his eyes. “Did I screw it up already?”
I mimicked his posture and stared at the lane in front of us, all the pins at one end, set up in perfect alignment just waiting for someone to come along and knock them all down.
And I thought I didn’t know any sports metaphors.
I flipped my wrist. “According to my calculations, I have to suffer through forty-eight more minutes of your attention anyway.” I shrugged. “That’s probably plenty of time to change your luck, right?”
Micah dazzled me with his smile. God, why did he have to be a sophomore? I wanted to reach over and push his hair out of his eyes, but that would be wrong, right?
Right?
“I don’t know if forty-eight minutes is long enough. I might have to plead special circumstances and get another date.”
“Sorry, buddy. Rules are rules. You get sixty minutes and a no-contact order until after the story and calendar are published.”
“I’m pretty good at rule bending.”
I made a promise to myself to watch that boy skate sometime. I bet he was fabulous. “I get that impression about you.”
“It’s pretty big of you to sacrifice yourself like this for the paper. Having to date twelve guys. I bet no girls in school want to trade places with you or anything.”
I detected a note of sarcasm. “You have no idea. I think it just shows my commitment to the paper.”
He leaned in so close that I could see the specks of navy in his blue, blue eyes. “I’ve got something that your newspaper doesn’t have.”
“Yeah, what’s that?”
He leaned back into the same position I found him in. “A pierced tongue.”
Chapter Four
Mr. March
My staff, minus the two we’d just lost due to their lack of faith in producing a newspaper from thin air (or more likely their realization that Foster wasn’t interested in hooking up), assembled around the table, once again in an argument. Foster wasn’t grinning for once. In fact, he’d been pretty quiet the last two days. You’d think I’d be thrilled, but it made me nervous.
And just a hint concerned. I’m human, all right? Just because I hated him didn’t mean I wanted bad things to happen to him. Or at least not heinously bad things.
I stood up and brought my fingers up like I was going to whistle. Okay, so I didn’t really know how to do that, but nobody else knew that. And it worked; they shut up and let me speak. “How about we try this one at a time? Elden, what happened at the student council meeting?”
“Mr. Haney told us that that effective November 1st, any cell phone seen in students’ hands during school hours would be confiscated. The device could then be picked up only by a parent and after a fifteen dollar fine was paid.” Then he added, “It isn’t fair.”
“Fair?” I asked.
“It seems unconstitutional to me,” a girl named Evie added.
My eyes wanted to roll so badly—but I simply closed them until the feeling passed. “It’s been two years since I’ve had U.S. history, but I’m pretty sure the constitution didn’t promise the right to bear cell phones.” I blew my bangs out of my eyes. “Let’s try this again, only this time, let’s pretend we’re reporters. Elden?”
“It isn’t fair!” Elden chimed in. Again. “And my name is Alden. Still.”
Whoops.
“Fair means nothing,” I said. “Lots of things aren’t fair. Try again. Where’s the story?”
Blank faces. And a very bored co-chief at the other end of the table, spinning his pen through his fingers and staring out the window.
Fine. I stood. “Is the seizure legal?”
“How would we know?” asked Elden, or Alden, whatever.
“We find out. That’s what we do. That whole
reporting
thing
and all.” Energized, I continued. “Eld—Alden, interview Haney. And I’m changing your name to Frank. Find out where the mandate came from. School board? Teachers’ lounge? Then research city and state statutes for limits of power. Do they have the jurisdiction to impose fines? Is it lawful to confiscate student property if it isn’t illegal or dangerous? What recourse do parents and students have?”
Frank scribbled furiously, and I began pacing. “Evie, interview a few teachers. Get some opinions from their trenches, but try to find a sampling of for and against. It’s important that we show both sides, or the story becomes opinion not reporting.” I stopped at Foster’s seat and kicked his chair.
He sighed but relented. “Chelsea, get student reactions. Look especially for alternative ideas from the study body that might satisfy the issues that led to the ruling. Is there a compromise?”
While he was speaking, he held up his right hand holding a pink slip of paper. I snatched it from his fingers and strode to the other side of the room to open it in peace.
The Paint Pot.
Table three. 7:00.
Seriously? Foster didn’t look at me, but he must have felt my glare, because the grin that crossed his face was the one he reserved for tormenting me.
The Paint Pot was one of those places where you paint your own…well, pot or mug or plate or whatever. They bake it for you in their kiln and then you have an immortalized piece of pottery to commemorate…your blind date with Mr. March.
I’m not one of those people who saves little pieces of memorabilia. The past belongs right where it is as far as I’m concerned. My favorite holiday is New Year’s Day—I never have a problem saying goodbye to the old year and hello to the new.
The crew filed out, leaving Foster and me alone. Again. I didn’t understand why that made me feel so weird lately. I mean, the only feelings I harbored for my lost relationship with Foster were not the kind that make your stomach feel full of butterflies. Maybe a rock tumbler full of stones…but not butterflies.
“Was the Paint Pot your idea?” I asked.
“Actually, no. The girls are being surprisingly independent on this venture. And they are taking it very seriously.”
I checked out his grandpa shirt. “But the Salad Bowl—that was all you, wasn’t it?”
He gifted me with the smile signifying another point for Team Hell. “Yeah. I remembered how much you used to love bowling.”
“I hate bowling.”
“I know. I just told you I remembered.”
I sucked in a deep breath and tried to think of my happy place. Unfortunately, we were already standing in my happy place and it was less than joyful.
“How are the photo shoots going? Any proofs?”
Mr. Self-Satisfied snickered. “Don’t you worry about the photo shoots. Your job is clear—we just need you to stand around and look pretty for a while.”
I was about to berate him when he stopped me.
“Or at least fair-looking, if you think you can manage it.”
It hurt. I knew he was only being mean because I was poking him about having to take beefcake photos—well, that and the fact that he was evil. But it still hurt.
I stormed out, riding the waves of my righteous anger for the rest of the day.
* * *
Arriving at the Paint Pot ten minutes early still didn’t get me there before my date. I peered in the window and saw a very big linebacker sitting at a table already. I wonder if Foster didn’t tell the guys to be there at a different time than me just so I wouldn’t have a chance to get comfortable with my surroundings first.
My pocket buzzed. I pulled out my phone but didn’t recognize the number.
“Hello?”
“Hey. It’s Micah.”
My heart skipped a beat. “How did you get my number?”
“I can’t give you my sources, Ms. Reporter. I heard you had another date tonight and just didn’t want you to forget about me.”
Like that was going to happen. “You are breaking the rules,” I said sternly through a smile.