HOMECOMING, PART II
“Noah?” Did my
dream last night will him to be here, on my doorstep?
No, that’s too absurd a thought even for me to believe. Then why is he here?
He steps forward. “Will you go to Homecoming with me?” He hands me the rose.
“Why? What happened to your date?” Showing up at a girl’s door at eight o’clock and asking her to go to the dance with you is not how traditional dating is done in Haven.
Haven dating follows a different set of rules. Here is what should have happened: About three weeks ago, Noah should have decided on a happy, nondescript blonde to take to the dance. He should have gotten a jigsaw puzzle, written his name on the back, and distributed the pieces in a box of Kix cereal. After writing a poem to the effect of “I get a KIX out of you. Will you go to Homecoming with me?” he should have dropped the box on her doorstep. She would have replied in an equally clever way. He should have picked her up early in the day and taken her to do something like play three-legged football or go on a scavenger hunt for the needy with the other twelve couples in their group. Then he should have taken her home, picked up her corsage, and gotten into his suit, prepared to take her out to dinner someplace nice.
Bonjourno. He should be at Bonjourno right now, telling some girl I don’t know, or care to know, that her dress looks pretty. He should not be here, dressed up, asking a girl in gray sweats with a highlighter in her hair for a date.
“I don’t have a date. I’m hoping you’ll help me remedy that problem.” Noah looks so cute standing there, smiling. He doesn’t look at all self-conscious, just happy, just wondering. “Can I come in?”
“I guess.” I open the door wider. “I was studying.” The only light that’s on is in the kitchen, so he starts walking in that direction without me saying anything.
He picks the book off the table. “Biology,” he says. “How come you’re always studying biology when I run into you?”
“Because I’m always studying biology, period. So I don’t think I can go to the dance with you. Sorry.” I set the rose in my water glass. “Thanks, though.”
“What if I help you with biology, then we go?”
“Noah, why don’t you just go with someone else? Someone who wants to go?”
“You don’t want to go?” Noah asks, his big eyes wide and sad.
It must be the sad eyes that give me the sudden, stupid urge to protect him. “It’s not that, it’s just . . .” The doorbell rings. “I’ll be right back,” I say, walking over to the door.
“Is it because you don’t have a dress?”
“Somebody here order a pizza?” asks a big dark-haired guy in a red polo shirt.
I nod, ignoring the dress question, which is too ridiculous to answer anyway.
“Is that your car?” The pizza guy isn’t looking at me, which is maybe an insult, but I don’t care. Noah nods, and the guy whistles. “Sweet ride.”
I glance over the pizza guy’s shoulder. One of the two cars in my driveway has a neon pizza slice on the roof. The other one doesn’t look that sweet to me—standard Haven High “old car.” The outside lights aren’t bright, and I’m not a car person, but still. I can see what’s right in front of me: a boxy sky blue hatchback with black trim. Impressive it is not.
“Thank you, sir,” Noah says, and I look at him, all earnest-faced and cleanly shaven. “So what’s the deal, Joy? Are you embarrassed to be seen with me?”
“Does it have a turbo?” The pizza guy interrupts. I have no idea what he’s talking about, but apparently the comment’s again directed at Noah. Noah nods, and the guy does, too, before whistling again. I hate whistling. I just want everybody out of my house so I can study without talking about turbos and Homecoming dresses.
“That car’s nothing to be ashamed of,” the pizza guy says, staring like he expects better from me. “You girls don’t understand the difference between old and vintage. That baby out there, that’s a SAAB nine hundred. A classic. I know collectors who would
kill
for that puppy.” I’m sick of being harassed by this guy, and I want my food. Plus I’m disturbed by the many terms of endearment he uses for an inanimate object. But before I can say anything he finishes his thought with, “That’ll be thirteen seventy-three.”
I shove fifteen dollars onto the pizza box, giving him a minitip because of my extreme dissatisfaction with his service. He scoops up the money, handing me the box.
To complete my humiliation in front of this delivery guy I don’t even like, Noah adds one last zinger. “Is this because you’re still too in love with Zan to consider going anywhere with someone else?”
The pizza man’s eyebrows go up, and I slam the door. “It isn’t that, Noah. I just don’t really like dances. And I have this pizza here, and the whole house to myself, and I need to study.”
“You don’t really like dances?”
I shake my head. “Not really. I don’t like dancing.”
Zan and I went to one dance. Other dances I could totally do without, and I could have done without this one, too, but part of me said prom was a must-do, at least once. So we said hi to my friends, danced one song at my request, and left. There was no elaborate day activity, no big group, no standing in long lines for pictures against cheesy backdrops. I didn’t like dances. Neither did he. We preferred each other to sweaty bodies and obnoxious DJs.
Noah loosens his burgundy tie. “Good. I don’t like dancing, either.” He eyes the pizza. “So, what kind did you order?”
“Pineapple and green pepper.” I can’t help being embarrassed. I wish I had ordered something normal people like. Why? He’s the one who showed up here uninvited. Still, the hostess in me says, “Would you like a slice?”
“Love one. I’m starved.” He takes off his jacket and hangs it across the dining-room chair. He plans to stay.
“You don’t mind pineapple with green peppers?” Most people do. Zan did.
“Nope. I like it. I’m a vegetarian.” He starts opening random cupboards. “Where do you keep plates?”
“You’re a vegetarian?” Vegetarian seems way too off-the-beaten-path for someone like him. I grab two paper plates from a lower shelf. “I didn’t know that.”
“How would you? You don’t know me very well yet, do you?”
“No,” I say. “Not yet.”
Not ever,
is what I think. Or, rather, what I want to think. Because the first thing I actually think is,
Why?
I must also say it out loud, because Noah looks up from his pizza, surprised.
“Why don’t you know me?”
“No, why are you vegetarian?”
He shrugs. “Animals are friends—not food.”
“You’re an animal lover? Seriously?” I grin. Noah Talbot, friend to animals . . . “Let me guess, you’ve wanted to build your own ark ever since you learned about the guy you were named after.”
“Hey, my man Noah was a wicked awesome prophet. You have a problem with that?”
I just shake my head and walk to the fridge.
“This is fun,” Noah says. He pops a crescent moon of crust into his mouth and swallows. “You know, hanging out. Why didn’t we do this sooner?”
He’s the one who invited himself over here. He’s eating
my
pizza, crust first into his big mouth, with his jacket (and, now that I notice it, his tie) draped over
my
chair. And he’s all, “Wow, why didn’t I mooch off you sooner?” Must be nice in Land of the Popular, where you can just assume everyone wants your company. “You know why.”
“No I don’t.” When I look at him it’s clear that he doesn’t.
“You made my boyfriend leave. You were all, ‘Hi, I’m Everything Stupid About Haven.’” Since my original water glass is now being used as a vase, I pour a second. It leaves the pitcher nearly empty.
Noah rolls his eyes, but to his credit, he doesn’t try to change my mind. “Why didn’t we hang out before Zan left, then? Before I apparently pushed him over the edge because I’m all that is wrong with the world?”
“Not all that’s wrong with
the
world. All that’s wrong with
this
world.” I can’t figure out if he understands the difference. “You want something to drink?”
His face lights up. “Do you have Sprite?”
Sprite. It’s such a Noah drink. I check the fridge door and find a can hidden behind a bottle of ketchup. I have no idea how old either of them are, but I’ve always considered food in the fridge door to have an indefinite shelf life.
“Noah,” I ask, setting down my water glass and handing him the soda, “why are you here? You should be at the dance right now, getting crowned Homecoming King or whatever it is people like you do.”
He tips onto the back legs of his kitchen chair. I hate it when people do that. I’m petrified they’re going to fall. “People like me,” he says, “get crowned Homecoming King at the
game.
”
“Oh, sorry,” I say, not sorry at all. “All four on the floor, right now.” I point at his chair. “House rule.”
“Oh, sorry,” he says, not sorry at all. He tilts his chair back to normal and looks at me. “And I’m not Homecoming King.” He looks sheepish. “I’m on the Homecoming Court.”
“Whatever.” I can feel Noah looking at me. I can’t meet his gaze.
“Yeah, that’s how I felt, too. Whatever. I just wasn’t in the mood to go out in the same group like everything is the same. It isn’t. Zan is gone.”
“Why do you care if Zan’s gone?” Now I do look at him, because what right does he have to get all weepy about this? It’s not the same for him as it is for me. “You have a ton of other friends.”
Noah looks surprised, then his eyes get serious. “Just because I have lots of friends doesn’t mean I care about each one of them less.”
Wow. Didn’t see that coming.
And there’s no denying it: I’m humiliated. Like honestly humiliated. Because Mr. Haven High Homecoming Court, who doesn’t need a girlfriend or even a best friend for that matter, might actually have some depth after all.
And he knows. He definitely knows, because my face has gone red or pale or blank or whatever it’s done. He knows what I’m feeling. So he does something far more gracious than anything I’ve done tonight: he changes the subject.
THE ART OF HOMEMAKING
“So what gives
with the books?” Noah says. “I’ve been wondering all night.” He tips back on his chair for a second, but only a second, before remembering.
I forgot about the books. I always forget about the books when someone new comes over because to me, the books have always been there, as much a part of the house as the sofa or the knife block. We have books on shelves, of course: our kitchen flows into our dining room which flows into our family room and every available inch of wall space has bookcases. But we also have books in stacks. Well, not just books—old periodicals, too. It’s like we have a dozen almost-finished games of Jenga on our floor.
“It’s my mom’s job,” I say, relieved to be talking about someone other than Noah or Zan. “She sells books.”
With his mouth, Noah says, “Oh, cool.” But with every other part of his body, Noah says that this space looks less like a Barnes & Noble and more like a garage that needs to be cleaned.
“It’s an eBay store,” I explain, before biting into my pizza. “Someone’s in the Kitchen with Diana. She sells vintage cookbooks, like the 1952 edition of Betty Crocker. And other stuff that’s hard to find.”
“Oh, cool,” says Noah, and this time I know he really means it. He picks up a copy of a World War II–era cooking magazine in not-bad condition. “So how does your mom manage to find these?”
“Thrift shops, garage sales, used-book stores, the usual suspects. She has an eye for the good stuff.” As I’m saying it, I already know this puts an end to the conversation. What is there to say after that?
Since I’m expecting the silence, the pause seems much longer than it really is. Noah flips through
Fun Theme Parties
circa 1967 and I consider grabbing another slice of pizza, just to have something to chew on, just to have something to do besides look up or look down. Something to do besides think about the person I’m really thinking about. The person I’m going to be thinking about for the rest of my life.
“I don’t know why I’m telling you all this,” I say, finally.
“I do,” he says. “It’s because you don’t want to talk to me about Zan.”
I laugh, but it’s a miserable laugh. “If I talk to you about Zan, I’ll never stop.”
ZAN
I want to
hold on to Zan the way a junkie resists rehab, or a dieter rationalizes a chocolate éclair; the way forbidden lovers run from inevitable consequence. The instant gratification of one last time makes me shake with satisfaction. But when his memory is gone I feel the aching return like a bruise that won’t heal.
HOME LEAVING
“I can’t talk
about him to anyone else.” It’s just occurred to me that although Noah will never be a friend, maybe in some ways he’s better than a friend. “My friends won’t even let me mention him. To them, he’s just some ex-boyfriend that we’re never to speak of again.” I start tapping my pink highlighter against my biology book. Do I say it? Do I want to? Do I dare?
“I miss him, too,” Noah says.
That’s all I need. “Then let’s go find him!”
“What do you mean?”
Fun Theme Parties
is open to a picture of a football cake, with green glass bowls of M&M’s next to it. “We already know where he is. His parents already know where he is. He doesn’t need to be found.”
“He doesn’t
want
to be found. There’s a difference.”
Noah looks at me, confused, before turning back to his book. “If he doesn’t want to be found, than why would we want to go find him? He obviously doesn’t want to see us. Or anyone from his ‘deep, dark past.’”
“We are not part of his past! All he needs to do is see us and he’ll remember that!” I start in on my Mattia spiel. “Listen, we get three school-excused absences to check out colleges. Besides, UEA break is next week anyway. We can take your car! You know, since it’s vintage and all. I totally want to road trip in that!” That part, of course, isn’t the truth. But since it’s something I
wish
was the truth, I don’t think it qualifies as a lie. “We can go to Claremont, stay with my friends there, and find out where Zan—”