Blue Eyes and Other Teenage Hazards (3 page)

“Oh.” And then, because I felt I ought to say something else, I added, “I guess you two don’t get along.”

“Sometimes we do. Sometimes we don’t.”

An awkward silence came between us.

I shifted in my chair. “Well, I’d better go. If you want help finding your classes tomorrow, I can give you a tour in the morning.”

“That’s okay. It’s such a small school. How hard can it be to find things?”

To Elise’s credit, she got up and showed me to the door. She even thanked me for the cookies and told me goodbye. I half expected she wouldn’t.

I walked back down the street shaking my head. I had hoped for someone who was funny, smart, nice, and not a drama queen. Out of those things, I’d gotten, um, nothing.

I went inside my house and sat down at the kitchen table. Mom was on the other side surrounded by charcoal sketches. She was a freelance artist and frequently worked all day on her projects. This meant dinner would be something Dad picked up on the way home from work. I was clearly excused from kitchen duties tonight, but I still sat there, staring off at the cabinets and replaying the scene with Elise in my mind.

“What’s the new girl like?” Mom asked.

“Sort of psychotic.”

Mom glanced up from her paper pad. “Why is that?”

“I think it’s because she comes from a family of psychotics.”

“And what did this psychotic family do?”

“Yelled at each other.”

Mom went back to her pad, making quick, dark strokes on the paper. “If that’s your criterion, then we’re occasionally psychotic too.”

“Yeah, but at least we don’t flip each other off.”

“And we can be mighty proud of that.” Mom laughed, and suddenly it did seem funny—the thought of my parents and I giving each other the finger. Despite what my mom had said, we hardly ever fought, let alone yelled at each other. My life was quiet, predictable, sane. That’s the way I liked it.

So who cared if Elise was rude? Eventually I’d find another best friend. And I still had Faith and Caitlin to eat with and talk to. I probably wouldn’t see much of Elise at all.

As I stood at the bus stop the next morning, rereading parts of Macbeth for honors English, an ancient white Nissan pulled up. Elise leaned out of the passenger side. “Hey, Cassidy, do you want a ride?”

After yesterday’s reception, I couldn’t believe she offered. I stood there with the book open in my hand and stammered out, “Sure,” because I couldn’t think of an excuse to turn her down. I climbed into the back seat and noticed Josh was driving. He didn’t say anything to me, but Elise turned around so we could see each other. She was smiling like she was happy to see me.

I put on my seatbelt. “It’s nice that your parents let you have the car for school. That’s still a matter of debate at my house.”

“It’s Josh’s car,” she said, “and he never lets anyone forget it. I’m surprised he doesn’t ask for cab fare.” Without glancing at her, Josh said, “That could be arranged.”

Elise ignored him. “My parents would never let me take one of their cars to school. I don’t know what I’ll do next year when Josh graduates.”

“Ride the bus,” Josh said.

“No way. I’ll have to date someone who owns a car.”

Josh came to a stop sign, looked both ways, and almost stopped all of the way before he went through the intersection. “You could always get a summer job and save up for a car like I did.”

Elise let out a snort. “I doubt there are many high-paying jobs for teenagers in Pull man. So hey, that means you’ll have to get some measly minimum-wage job next summer—just another one of those small-town benefits Mom and Dad were so eager to have us experience. Maybe McDonald’s is hiring. You’d look spiffy in their uniform.”

He shook his head. “We’ll probably be too busy helping Mom and Dad with their store to get jobs.”

“You mean you’ll be busy with the store. I’ll be stuck at home babysitting.” Elise wrinkled her nose. “And with what they’ll pay me, I won’t even be able to afford a bike.” She let out a martyred sigh. “It’s settled. I’ll have to find some hot guy with a car.” Josh smiled. “I’d better warn all the upperclassmen with wheels.”

“Just remember,” she said, sending him a sharp look. “I know where there’s video of you running around in nothing but Batman tighty underwear. You don’t want to see that make its way around the internet, do you?”

“I was six at the time,” Josh said.

She waved her hand in his direction as if to erase this point. “My camera works. It wouldn’t be hard to capture some of your less-than-flattering behavior. I’d start listing things right now, but I don’t want to gross out Cassidy.” Josh made a scoffing sound. “Like what—you mean all the times I don’t act like a girl?” Elise leaned closer to me and lowered her voice to a conspiratorial tone. “He lets the dog lick his face. That’s like frenching with a canine.” Josh shot Elise a look, taking his eyes from the road for the first time. “No, it’s not. Sheesh, Elise, what have you been doing on your dates?” She smiled at him smugly. “Are you going to warn the upperclassman about that too? I’ll have a boyfriend with wheels in no time.”

“And a few communicable diseases,” he added.

“Cad,” she said and laughed—a sound that was light and airy and told me that this sort of teasing was normal between them. It was as if all the yelling—all the flipping off of yesterday—hadn’t happened. Elise seemed so nice, so normal that I almost expected her to say, “Oh, by the way, I have an evil, psychotic twin sister. You may have met her.”

Another thing hit me about Elise. Although she had nearly called me boring for preferring homework to partying, the girl had a vocabulary: cad, canine, capture some of your less-than-flattering behavior. Elise was smarter than she let on.

“What’s your class schedule?” I asked her.

She pulled out a paper from her backpack and handed it to me. It was so crumpled, I wondered if she’d wadded it up at some point. I could imagine her doing that—crumpling it up and throwing it across the room. Maybe I would have done the same thing if my parents had uprooted me. It made me want to help her, to make all of this easier for her.

“We’ve got lunch and Honors English together,” I said.

She looked down at the Macbeth book in my lap. “Is Honors English doing Shakespeare all year?”

“That and Greek literature. Oh, and we’re also going to read some Chaucer in the original text.” Elise took the schedule from me, pulled a pen from her backpack, and crossed out Honors English.

“Hey, it’s a fun class,” I said. “We’re going to put on The Tempest in a couple months. Everyone will have a part.” Elise added more pen marks across Honors English. “Which means the teacher will make us memorize large chunks of sixteenth-century dialogue. Forsooth and forthwith—I just don’t think so.”

Josh said, “The lady doth protest too much.”

More hand fluttering on Elise’s part. “Beware the ides of March—and any teacher who makes you write essays on that phrase.”

“It’s all much ado about nothing,” he said.

The two of them could even banter in Shakespeare quotes. Impressive. I slipped Macbeth into my backpack. “I think you’ll be able to handle Honors English.”

Elise gazed at her marred schedule. “I wonder if they offer dance during that hour. What are the easy classes?”

“I wouldn’t know,” I said.

My comment made Josh laugh, although I wasn’t sure why. I hoped I hadn’t come off sounding arrogant.

After Josh parked the car, he walked beside Elise and me to the school. Yesterday I hadn’t noticed how tall he was and how broad his shoulders were. It made me feel suddenly self-conscious. I wasn’t sure if it was rude to walk beside him and only pay attention to Elise or whether it would be presumptuous to start a conversation with him when he’d only given me a ride because his sister had asked him to.

Anjie’s brother had been in seventh grade. I had no idea about the social mores of friends’ hot older brothers. Before we went our separate ways, I inserted an awkward “Thanks for the ride” into the conversation, and he shrugged and said, “No problem.” I helped Elise find where her locker and classes were. Despite Elise’s prediction that it would be easy to find everything in a small high school, it wouldn’t have been the case. Pull man High had apparently been designed by a frustrated artist looking for a creative medium.

First of all, the school was orange and yellow—two colors I’d grown to hate by the time I was halfway through my freshman year. Second, there was hardly a regular geometric shape anywhere. All the classrooms were sort of trapezoidish. It was as though the builder had dropped walls anywhere he fancied. The hallways were so confusing that the administration had painted giant arrows on the walls to show which direction certain classes were. The cafeteria was an open, sunken room off the main lobby. The library was two stories in the middle of the building. The architect had also dropped two minibuildings a short distance from the main one. I’m not sure what purpose those buildingettes were supposed to serve off by themselves, but we had to trudge outside to get to our math classes—a fact everyone appreciated from October to April, when it was freezing.

After I’d shown Elise around, I took her to the library to see if Faith or Caitlin were there. They weren’t, but Chad and Mike were. After we walked by them, Elise said, “Who is that gorgeous blond guy?”

“Chad Warren. He’s one of the junior jock gods, but he also takes trig and chemistry, so he can’t be all good looks and muscle.” I could have told her more. I knew Chad was the starting wide receiver for varsity football, was the third leading scorer on the basketball team last year, and also ran the 100-meter dash in track. He was student body rep for his class, had two older brothers, drove a dark-blue Toyota, and took weeklong skiing trips with his family every winter. I also knew his address.

When you come down to it, there’s a fine line between adoration and stalking.

Elise cast another look at Chad over her shoulder. “Moving to Pull man just got a little better.”

“Well, if you ever find a good way to get his attention, let me know. I’ve been trying for years.” Elise managed to drag her gaze away from Chad and back to me. “What, is he stuck up or something?”

“No, he’s just, you know . . .” I shrugged. “He’s Chad Warren.”

We walked slowly around the library, so we could look at him without being conspicuous. “Have you ever talked to him?” Elise asked.

I kept my gaze straight ahead. “It’s not that easy. He’s an upperclassman.”

“So is my brother. You didn’t think talking to him was hard, did you?”

“Um . . .” Now that I thought about it, I realized that during the car ride to school, Josh and I had both talked to Elise but hadn’t said anything to each other.

“You’re a wimp,” Elise said. “But since you’re my friend, I’ll give you the first shot at Chad. You have until the end of the day to talk to him before he becomes fair game.”

“What?” I blinked at her. “How am I supposed to talk to him today?”

Elise nodded toward his table. “He’s sitting right there. Go up and say something to him.” I made little incredulous grunts. “You can’t force these things.” We had circled all the way around the library but kept going, just like those Jane Austen characters who took turns around the room. That had never made sense to me until now.

“Come on,” Elise said. “You’ve liked the guy for years but have never spoken to him? What are you waiting for, the angel Gabriel to announce you?”

I looked over at Elise with her flowing black hair and blue eyes, all confidence and tan. She couldn’t understand. The problem with living in the same small town all your life is that people don’t just see you, they see who you used to be. They remember every backward, stupid, humiliating thing you ever did. They remember that you used to be short and scrawny with bad hair and no fashion sense. You can’t erase it. It drifts behind you like a kite tail.

I had to wait for the right casual moment to talk to Chad—the moment where it didn’t look like I was hitting on him. That way if he wasn’t interested, I’d still have a shred of pride left.

Faith and Caitlin walked into the library, saving me from explaining this to Elise. “There are some of my friends. You should meet them.” I steered her in their direction.

After I made introductions, Faith said, “How do you like Pull man so far?”

“Well, you have some cute guys here.”

“True,” Caitlin said, “but we’re always looking for new talent. We hear you have an older brother. What’s he like?” Elise glanced over at me, and I was suddenly embarrassed that I’d told Faith and Caitlin about the new family moving into Anjie’s house. It made me seem gossipy. I wasn’t. I‘d just been eager for them to move in.

“I’m not a good judge of my own brother,” Elise finally said. “What has Cassidy told you?”

“Just that he’s a senior,” Caitlin said.

Then everyone looked at me. “Josh is pretty cute,” I said. On a scale of one to ten I gave him an eight—nine if you counted the fact that he could quote Shakespeare. Chad was a twelve.

Elise smiled at my appraisal. Caitlin raised her eyebrows suggestively. “We’ll have to meet him sometime.” Caitlin was the type who rotated through crushes as though dating were a relay event.

Elise compared schedules with Faith and Caitlin then and was relieved she had some classes with them. They spent the rest of the time telling her about the teachers she was in for and various homework horror stories. I was just glad the topic of Chad had been pushed from Elise’s mind.

Elise saying I should talk to him today? Crazy talk.

As we split up to go to first period, Elise said, “If you want a ride home, meet me at my locker after school. And remember,” she added, “you have until the end of the day to speak to Chad.”

I met up with Elise on the stairs at lunch time. “How have your classes been?” I asked.

She trudged down the steps slowly, a lunch bag in her hand. “I’ve got to get out of my honors classes. You have way too many overachievers at this school.”

I shrugged. “Most of our parents are either professors at WSU or engineers at Schweitzer Labs.” She let out a grunt like this was a bad thing.

I didn’t ask more about her classes because I spotted Samantha walking down the stairs in front of us. “There’s the other girl on our street,” I told Elise. “Let me introduce you.”

We caught up to her so quickly I almost didn’t have time to worry about how Samantha would react to Elise. Perhaps it was selfish, but a part of me worried that Samantha would like Elise too much. After all, why shouldn’t she? Elise was pretty and, right now, charming. The type of person who could blend in with cheerleaders.

“Samantha, hi!” I said. “This is the new girl on our street, Elise.”

Samantha forced an unconvincing smile. “Hi.”

I hadn’t been Samantha’s BFF since elementary school, but I still knew her well enough to interpret that look. She wanted nothing to do with Elise. I didn’t know why but could only assume it had to do with whatever Mrs. Taylor had found out about her.

“Samantha was planning on delivering those cookies with me,” I said, “but she couldn’t because . . .”

“Cheerleading practice ran over,” Samantha said.

“Oh, that’s right. Cheerleading practice. I guess that’s hard to get out of. Anyway, you should get to know each other. Why don’t you come and eat with us today, Samantha?”

Samantha’s smile grew even more forced. “I can’t. I have to sit with my friends. They’re waiting for me.”

“They can live without you for one day.”

“Sorry. I really can’t. See ya.” She practically sprinted the rest of the way to the lunchroom.

Elise watched her go. “Are you the leper or am I?”

“That’s Samantha’s friendly way of making you feel like a valued member of PHS.” Elise shook her head. “Cheerleaders. Some things are the same no matter where you go.” I showed Elise where my table was. Faith was already there. I joined Caitlin in the hot-lunch line.

I was beginning to think my father was right about the universe conspiring with you to make your wishes happen. And not just because it turned out that Elise was smart, funny, and nice—the jury was still out on whether or not she was a drama queen—but because Chad Warren stood in line right in front of me.

I watched the back of his head: the way the florescent cafeteria lights brought out the highlights in his hair, the way his flannel shirt and broad shoulders made him look like a lumberjack.

According to Elise, if I talked to him right now, he’d be off limits for her. The universe was nudging me. I didn’t say anything though. I’d already looked like an idiot yesterday morning in the library, and if I said the wrong thing now, I could doom myself to be forever Chadless.

I had to think of something good to say. Something intelligent and sophisticated, preferably.

“What’s for lunch today?” Caitlin asked me. “I can’t see the sign.”

“I can’t see it either.” And then I saw my opportunity. I touched Chad’s shoulder and, sounding as intelligent and sophisticated as I could, asked,

“Do you know what they’re serving?”

His gaze drifted to mine, casually taking me in. “Tacos or stew. They’re both all right.” I smiled at him. “You’ve tried the school stew? You’re a brave man.”

“Yeah,” he said smiling back at me. “It’s one of the requirements for being on the football team.”

“They make you eat the school stew to be on the football team? That’s rough.” He laughed and I felt tingly all over. The line moved, and he turned around again. Caitlin gave me a knowing look. She was dying to tease me about talking to him, but she couldn’t say anything with him standing right there, so she just smirked a lot. When we got to the food, I asked for the stew.

Chad turned to me. “You decided to try it, huh?”

“I’m a brave woman.”

He smiled at me again, and I tingled all the way back to the table.

When I sat down, Faith leaned toward me. “Did my eyes deceive me, or did I see you talk to our hero, Chad Warren?”

“We spoke,” I said, sending Elise a triumphant look.

Elise bit into a carrot stick. “See, I told you it wasn’t hard.”

Caitlin put her hand over her heart and fluttered her eyelashes. “They exchanged pleasantries about the school stew. It was so romantic.” I opened my milk carton. “This is why I never tell you guys anything. You make the biggest deal over the smallest thing.”

“Am I hearing right?” Caitlin asked. “Talking to Chad Warren is a small thing?” I took a bite of the stew. “Hey, this really isn’t that bad.”

“Right,” Faith said. “We’ve all had the school stew before, and we know why you really like it.” At fifth period, I waited for Elise outside of our English room. I figured by this point in the day she’d probably forgotten where the rest of her classes were. The room was on the second floor near the balcony that overlooked the landing. When it was nearly time for class to start and she still hadn’t come, I went to the balcony to see if I could spot her. She was at the bottom of the stairs. “Elise!” I called.

She looked up and saw me, but just then Mrs. Harris walked to the classroom door. “The bell is about to ring, Miss. Woodruff.” She had a deep, strict voice that sounded like it belonged in a Dickens novel—like she was some character who was perpetually scolding orphans. She tapped at her wristwatch. “A tardy means an extra paper to write.”

“I’m just showing Elise where the classroom is.” I motioned down the stairs. “Elise Benson. She’s new.” I turned back to Elise and waved to her to hurry.

She didn’t hurry, and she eyed Mrs. Harris wearily.

The bell rang, but Mrs. Harris waited with me for Elise to finish plodding up the stairs.

When she reached the top, I said, “Our room is that one over there. Did you get lost?” Elise kept her gaze fixed on Mrs. Harris. “I . . . um, I think I’m switching out of Honors English . . .”

“Oh come on,” I said. “You can handle it. You were quoting Macbeth this morning.”

“Miss Benson,” Mrs. Harris said in her you-are-a-bothersome-orphan voice, “In the future, class starts directly on the hour. See to it that you are sitting in your chair at that time.” She made a sweeping motion toward the door. “Ladies, after you.” I walked in. Elise hesitated. “I think I’m supposed to be in regular English.” Mrs. Harris didn’t budge. “There are seats in the front. We look forward to hearing your opinions.” Elise sighed, walked in, and dropped into one of the chairs in the front. I sat in the second row. I would have gone to sit by her, but Mrs. Harris doesn’t let us move around. She takes roll by the seating chart.

During the class discussion on whether or not Macbeth was a heroic character, Elise never voluntarily answered a question. Every time Mrs.

Harris called on her though, she gave good answers—and that was without reading Macbeth recently. I knew she would be fine in Honors English, and I was glad to have a friend in the class. We could study for tests together.

When the bell rang, Elise left right away. I didn’t think about that too much. She was closer to the door, and I figured she wanted to make sure she wasn’t late to her next class.

I didn’t think about it at all until after school when I went to her locker to catch a ride home with her.

She was just shutting her locker and hefting her backpack onto her shoulders. The two of us walked toward the front door. “So how did the first day go?” I asked.

She adjusted her backpack. It looked like it held every school book she owned. “I’ve had better.”

“They don’t expect you to get caught up on everything you’ve missed by tonight, do they?”

“Let’s just say I’ll be busy for awhile.” She walked fast paced, looking straight ahead. “Which doesn’t matter, since I’ll have nothing else to do anyway.”

Oh. She was back to mourning California. We walked silently for a couple of minutes, swept away by the tide of students moving to the door. I didn’t know how to cheer her up—or if that was even possible. I figured it wasn’t a list of activities that she missed anyway. It was her friends and probably a boyfriend. It was memories and that comfortable feeling you have when you’re home. It was fitting in.

We’d reached the school’s front door and went outside and down the front stairs. “If you give it some time,” I said, “you’ll like it here.” She rolled her eyes.

“In the winter, there a lot of great places to ski. Have you ever been skiing?”

“Waterskiing.”

“Well, it’s the same thing except it’s downhill.”

“And it’s in the frozen wilderness instead of a warm, sunny beach.”

Josh was waiting for us at his car. Elise climbed into the front seat, and I got into the back. “I’m just saying we’re never bored.” Elise leaned against her seat like she had a headache. “Of course you’re not bored. You’re too busy cultivating a sense of wonder to ever be bored, aren’t you, Cassidy?”

Suddenly it hit me. Elise’s evil, psychotic twin sister was back, and I was trapped in the car with her. “What are you talking about?” I asked.

She let out a disgusted huff. “Like you don’t know.”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.” Except I suspect you may be unbalanced and never make sense for long anyway.

I looked at Josh to see what his reaction to all of this was, but I couldn’t tell from his back. He’d started the car and was guiding it through the parking lot with one of his arms calmly draped across the steering wheel. He was probably used to these outbursts.

Elise shot me a look over her shoulder. “Those were the words Mrs. Harris said while talking about Macbeth. She said we should cultivate a sense of wonder about the artistry of the language.”

I vaguely remembered this, but I couldn’t see why Elise was so upset about it. Shakespearean English was artistic. Poetic. Something you couldn’t gulp down but had to take in slow, savoring sips.

“I told you I wanted to drop Honors English,” she said. “I was going to skip that class and get my homework done. But no, you dragged me into English in front of the teacher.” Elise looked up at the car’s ceiling. “I bet I could have gone for months before they caught me. And then I could have said I misunderstood my schedule and thought I had a study period. So not only did I not get my math and biology done, I have to write a paper comparing and contrasting Shakespearean heroes.”

Josh didn’t say a word about this, just looked straight ahead as he pulled out onto the road.

“I’m sorry,” I said. “But you can’t skip class for months—you have to take four years of English to graduate. What if they made you take summer school to make it up?”

She grunted. “I’d like to see them try.”

“That’s easy. If you don’t do what they want, they don’t hand you a diploma.” Another grunt. “Who cares about graduating?” She shoved her backpack off the seat and onto the floor. “Forget this. I’m not doing my homework. I’m going to go find someplace to party.”

“At three o’clock on a Tuesday? Good luck with that.”

“Anything is better than contrasting Shakespearean heroes.”

“Actually,” I said, still trying to make her see reason. “I can think of a lot of things that are worse. Like washing dishes for a living because you didn’t graduate from high school.”

She stared out the window, her chin raised stubbornly. “I didn’t expect you to understand.”

“You’re right. I don’t understand.” I don’t understand how I let myself get trapped in this car with you, and I especially don’t understand why I introduced you to my friends when I had an inkling you were insane all along.

We rode quietly in the car for a while. I studied the back of Josh’s neck. It bothered me he hadn’t said anything, that he hadn’t taken a stand one way or the other. I couldn’t determine whose side he was on. Judging from the fact that he had quoted Shakespeare this morning, I guessed he wasn’t the type that skipped classes, but his silence seemed to indicate otherwise.

Elise turned around again, “Seriously—is getting shiny new As on your report card all you want from life? You’ll jump through whatever hoops your teachers and your parents wave in front of you just so you can get a little bit of praise?”

“Those As on my report card are going to get me into a good college. Hopefully with a scholarship.”

“So you can do the whole thing over for your professors. Has it ever occurred to you that no one in real life cares about the similarities and differences in Shakespeare’s heroes? No one cares about most of the stuff they force us to learn and regurgitate. It’s just a waste of time.”

“Learning isn’t a waste.” Jump in any time to support me, Josh. “Mrs. Harris isn’t trying to teach us about the differences between Hamlet and Macbeth, she’s trying to teach us how to think.”

Josh never said a word; he just kept driving. He may have even slowed down to prolong the agony of the conversation.

“Some of us already know how to think,” Elise said. And with that, she turned forward and ignored me. Graveyard silence filled the car. At last we reached my house. I nearly leapt out onto the sidewalk.

“Bye, Elise.” Thanks for nothing, Josh.

I shook as I walked inside. Elise hadn’t just attacked Mr. Harris’s homework assignment, she’d attacked me—who I was. I cared about those shiny little As on my report card. According to Elise that meant I didn’t know how to think.

Mom was in the living room with her sketch pad. “You’re home early.”

I dropped my backpack on the floor and sank down on the couch. “I got a ride home with Elise. You know, the psychotic new girl on our street.”

“Did she flip you off on the way home?”

“No, she told me I was jumping through hoops to get the praise of my teachers and parents.” Mom made sweeping lines on her paper. “Like that’s a bad thing.”

“I don’t jump through hoops,” I said crossly. “I do a thorough job because I care about my education.” Mom looked up from her paper. “I was just joking.”

I didn’t answer, and Mom went back to her drawing. “Maybe you shouldn’t hang around with Elise. I don’t think she’s the type of friend you want.”