So Nash decided that his friend Jordan would give her the letter. And that it would be today, in the hall, at her locker, before lunch. Which is now.
I see Jordan walking down the hall, which is always easy to do since he’s the tallest sophomore. He has this slow, loping walk. I’m glued to the floor, pressed back against my locker, watching him. I just know he’s coming over to bring me the letter. Because I’m obviously the girl Nash likes.
My insides tremble with nervous excitement. Jordan gets closer.
And then he stops across the hall about ten lockers away from mine. And he gives a letter to Birgitte. Birgitte, as in Tabitha’s equally skanky best friend.
The trembly nervous thing inside of me turns into nausea.
I know I shouldn’t keep watching this. I know I should just turn away, get my lunch money and my notebook for my next class out, and go to lunch. But I can’t. I can’t stop watching them.
Birgitte rips open the envelope and takes out a folded piece of loose-leaf. She stands there reading it while Jordan waits, glancing down the hall. I follow his glance. I can barely see to the end of the hall, but I know Nash is there. Waiting to see if he should be happy or suicidal.
While Birgitte reads, Jordan fidgets. He takes his keys out of his pocket and jiggles them around. And then this really messed-up thing happens.
Birgitte starts laughing. Right in his face. And she doesn’t stop.
Jordan drops his keys. I look down the hall to see if Nash is watching, but he’s too far away to tell. I’m sure he can hear her laughing, though. If there’s someone in Australia who can’t hear, I’d be shocked.
This is all my fault. I’m the one who gave Nash the advice to do this, and now look. But I thought we were talking about me the whole time, so maybe it doesn’t count. What’s he doing liking Birgitte? Doesn’t he know how lacking she is?
Birgitte says something to Jordan. He looks too shocked to say anything back. Then she shuts her locker. She shoves the letter in her bag and walks away.
Jordan sees me watching him. I pretend I’m looking for someone else across the hall. Of course no one’s there.
And that’s when I realize why I was sort of hoping the letter was for me, even though I don’t like Nash that way. After my waiting for someone to like me for so long, this was the first time that a boy might have actually liked me for real. Instead of it always being a fantasy.
12
If Derek weren’t going out with Sierra, I’d think he was flirting with me.
We’ve only been in art for five minutes and he’s already come over here twice. One of those times was to borrow my pastels, when he totally knows there are loads more boxes stacked up on the supply table. Plus, he was all smiling and extra polite about it. Which is not exactly how I would describe the way he interacts with me under normal circumstances.
Derek comes back over with the pastel box. He holds it out to me and goes, “Thanks, Marisa.”
“Sure.” I take the box from him. I’m doing a sunset scene. Someplace warm and tropical where you don’t have to rush through life because time doesn’t matter so much.
I blend some blue and pink pastel streaks together with my thumb. Derek watches. When I look up, he goes, “I like what you did with that.”
He likes what I did with what? The whole scene? The colors? The blending? I have no idea what this boy is talking about or why he’s even talking to me, so I just go, “Thanks,” and keep working.
“Where did you learn to blend like that?”
Um, is he serious? Because I can’t tell. I mean, he
looks
serious, but he could just be setting me up for some kind of twisted humiliation. He caught me staring at him those times, so he probably knows I like him.
“It’s a natural talent,” I say.
“Is that Fiji?”
“What?”
“Your scene.” Derek points to my paper. “It looks like someplace tropical.”
Wow. He really does get what I’m doing. It’s not like I’ve drawn any palm trees yet, so how would he know unless he actually does?
“Yeah,” I go. “It is. Someplace tropical, I mean. Not necessarily Fiji.”
“I’m definitely getting Fiji.” Derek inspects my paper. “
So
Fiji.”
I smile. I can’t help it. No one’s ever gotten anything about my drawings.
He smiles back.
And he still has a girlfriend.
I stop smiling and take out another pastel.
“See ya later,” Derek says, all smiling again. It would appear that he’s definitely flirting with me.
But why? He’s never talked to me before. So why now? He must be attracted to my new magnetism. When Sterling gives me tips for making new friends, she always says that people pick up on your energy and respond to you in subconscious ways. So if you exude positive energy, people will be nicer and they’ll want to be around you more. Maybe Derek’s picking up on my energy.
And that’s exactly what I want. For certain people to be on my wavelength. Because those are the people I want to be friends with. Or more than friends with.
Except I don’t want to be more than friends with boys who already have girlfriends. That’s just tacky. And boys who scam on some other girl when they already have a girlfriend? What does that say about them? But the thing is, it’s Derek. I don’t even remember the whole first week of art because I was staring at him so hard my concentration blocked out everything else.
I can’t get him out of my mind. So after dinner, I lock myself in the bathroom that I share with Sandra. I always practice violin in here. The acoustics rock. Something about how the sound waves bounce off the tile.
I’ve only been practicing for a minute when Sandra pounds on the door.
“Can you
ot
?” she yells. “I’m trying to read!”
“So read downstairs,” I yell back.
“No! I want to read in here!”
“Well, I’m sorry. I can’t help you.”
“Quit playing!”
“I can’t! I have to practice!”
“Mom!”
Sandra screeches. I hear her door fling open. Then she pounds down the stairs, thumping like an elephant. She always walks like that. It drives me crazy.
This piece I’m practicing feels really delicate. Like how a kiss would sound. Not that I’d know about kissing. I went to one dance in seventh grade and kissed one boy for one second. That’s it. And even when I was in the middle of kissing him, I wasn’t counting it as my first real kiss. It was more like a practice kiss. And the fact that I knew it was a practice kiss while we were kissing basically means that I shouldn’t have been kissing him.
I focus on the music. I have laser-sharp focus.
Bang bang bang!
“Get
ut
!” Sandra yells.
“No!”
“I can’t hear myself think!”
I unlock the door and whip it open. “Both of us have to live here, you know,” I inform Sandra.
“It’s been the joy of my life.”
“So you’d better get used to it. I’ll never be first violin if I don’t practice.”
“Fine, but why do you have to practice in here?”
“It sounds better.”
“That’s such a lame reason!”
“It’s still my reason!”
“This sucks!” Sandra flings herself across her bed. “I have to read!”
“What’s going on in here?” Dad says. He’s standing in Sandra’s doorway, doing the Dad Grimace he always gets when we fight.
We both start yelling at the same time. I’m like, “I have to practice and this is the only good place—” and Sandra’s like, “She won’t let me read!” and Dad’s like, “Hold on! One at a time. Marisa.”
“You always take her side!” Sandra wails.
“I’m not taking sides,” Dad clarifies. “I asked her to explain first. Then you can go. See how that works?”
Sandra scowls.
“Like I was saying,” I go, “I have to practice and it sounds better in the bathroom.”
“There’s a reading quiz tomorrow!” Sandra yells.
“Okay,” Dad says. “Is this the only place you can read?”
“Unbelievable! Why don’t you ask
her
to move?”
“Marisa.” Dad turns toward me. “Is this the only place you can practice?”
“No, but it’s the best place.”
“And this is the best place for me to read,” Sandra interjects.
“It seems we have a conflict here,” Dad concludes. “How do you girls think we should resolve it?”
He does this sometimes. Instead of being Harsh Dad, he likes to be Friendly Dad. Which is cool when you know you’re wrong, because then he takes it easy on you and you don’t really get in trouble. But this time I know I’m right. I just want him to tell Sandra to shut up and stop being such a baby about everything.
Sandra and I glare at each other.
“Tell you what,” Dad says. “Why don’t we compromise?”
I groan. The translation of
compromise
is
no one gets what they want
. It’s all about trying to make someone else happy instead of yourself. But they’re not happy either because it’s a compromise instead of what they really want.
“Marisa, you can practice for half an hour here, but then you have to move downstairs. Is that fair?”
No. “Yeah.”
“And Sandra, why don’t you either read downstairs for now or do something else?”
“Fine,” she huffs. “But it’s your fault if I fail my quiz.”
“No one’s telling you you can’t read,” Dad tries to reason with her. “I’m just saying—”
“Yeah, Dad,” she interrupts. “I get what you’re saying.”
Sandra always thinks Dad takes my side. She’s convinced that he loves me more and always has. Which is ridiculous. But when Sandra has an opinion, that’s it. It’s carved in stone. You can’t convince her anything else is the truth, even if it obviously is.
13
Nash and Jordan organized our school’s First Annual Wii Championship. Sterling and I decided to go watch. So far, all that’s happened is a lot of hyper boys are swinging themselves around and looking like fools.
It’s in the gym. Everyone’s sitting on the bleachers. Some kids from student council are setting up another big projector screen next to the one already there. Apparently, playing on one screen isn’t exciting enough.
Derek’s here. He’s sitting in the next section, one row down. The corner of my eye is like glued to his face, waiting for him to look at me. It tingles with anticipation.
I saw him right when we came in. That’s why we’re sitting where we are. We came in and there he was and I was like, “I
so
know where we’re sitting.” But I didn’t go right up to his section or anything. That would have been too obvious. Over here is much more subtle.
Suddenly, Derek turns to look in my direction. I do that thing where the boy you like is watching from over there so you pretend to have a riveting conversation with your friend, all exaggerated hand motions and animated expressions.
“What’s wrong with you?” Sterling says.
“Did you see that?”
“See what?”
“He looked over!”
“Who? Derek?”
“Of course Derek!”
“Oh. I didn’t really notice.”
“How could you not have noticed?”
“Maybe because I’m not obsessed with him like some people?”
“I’m not obsessed.”
“Really? How many times have you told me about him flirting with you in art?”
“Well excuse me for noticing.” I don’t know why she’s acting like it’s such a crime to be excited that a boy might like me. I mean,
really
.
“You
do
know he’s going out with Sierra, right?” Sterling goes.
“Of course I know that. Everyone knows that.”
“So then why are you so interested?”
“I’m not that interested.”
Sterling looks at me.
“I’m not!”
“Okay,” she says. “Whatever.”
Nash gets up to play. He’s playing against Julia. She’s the first girl who’s gone up.
The gym door bangs open and a group of four girls comes in, squealing all loud. Most of the people watching the tournament don’t even notice, they’re so glued to the screens. But I notice. Because Sierra is in that group of girls.
I was so relieved when I saw Derek here without her. I was hoping that his flirting with me plus being here without her would equal him liking me. And maybe not liking her so much anymore. But Sierra runs across the floor and clatters onto the bleachers right over to Derek.
She kisses him. I look away.
“Do you feel like getting out of here?” Sterling says. “It’s kind of lame.”
“Yeah.” I can’t be here another second.
Sterling leads me out to the vending machine area and buys a pack of Chuckles. We sit on the floor. Sterling takes out a yellow Chuckle and chews it.
My brain won’t shut up. It’s doing that noisy brain thing where the horrific scene with Derek kissing Sierra is playing over and over, making it impossible for me to focus on anything else.
Focus on something else. Do not let obsessive thoughts take over your life.
“Why don’t boys like me?” I go.
“Boys like you.”
“Not the ones I like.”
Sterling eats a red Chuckle.
“Look,” she says. “You’ll find who you’re supposed to be with. Just because all the boys here are buttwipes doesn’t mean your boyfriend doesn’t exist. He’s probably just somewhere else, is all. He’ll find you.”
“But
when
?” I can’t take it anymore. The waiting. The wanting.
Something inside me snaps. I hate myself. I hate that I have to deal with this. I hate my life. And I hate how I can’t count on anyone to be completely there when I need them, exactly the way I need them to be.
I feel horrible in my room all night until Dirk’s show comes on.
“Did anyone else watch
America’s Slackers
tonight?” Dirk goes. “What’s up with these inane reality shows taking over the airwaves? And now we’re celebrating stupid people who sit around all day doing nothing? While awesome shows like
Freaks and Geeks
get canceled? What’s wrong with this picture?”