Casey Barnes Eponymous (10 page)

“Yeah.”

“That explains it.”

“What?”

“At that seniors only party when he hooked up with
Melanie.
 
He got really weird when I
showed up.”
 
This made Casey feel
both good and bad.
 
“Are you sure
you didn’t sleep with him?” he asked.

“Yes Yull.
 
I’m
sure.”
 
She leveled her most recent
Oreo conquest towards the sink.
 
It
missed and landed in the middle of a potted cactus.
 
“If you truly want to be a caring brother
you won’t remove that from the cactus until Tricia’s seen it.”

He shook his head.
 
“I don’t think his problem is that he hasn’t met a girl who understands
him yet.
 
It’s like a game for
him.
 
Or maybe he doesn’t get how
much he plays with girls’ heads.
 
But there’s one thing I know for sure:
 
The guy’s a narcissist.”

“We’re eating Oreos, bro.
 
Please stick to a third-grade reading level.”

“Narcissus was a figure from Greek mythology who was extremely
physically beautiful.”

“But Alex Deal’s not--”

“But don’t you see?
 
That’s how he gets away with being such a dog.
 
He plays it all shaggy sensitive band
guy.
 
Girls think he’s different
than the guys who come on strong.
 
And then, once defenses are down, he goes in for the kill.”
 

Casey stared at Yull for a moment.
 
She began to dig out the white part of
another Oreo with the top cookie layer.
 
“So whatever happened to Narcissus?”

“He could never fall in love with anyone because he was so in
love with himself.
 
He viewed those
who loved him with contempt because they thought they were worthy and they
inflicted their needs on him.
 
So
the gods came up with a unique punishment for him.”

She stacked the scraped out vanilla part onto the middle
section of another Oreo.
 
“Now it’s
like a quadruple stuff Oreo.”

“Don’t let Alex Deal cause you to pork out.”

She held up her middle finger and took a bite out of the
quadruple stuff Oreo with the other hand.
 
“What was the gods’ punishment for him?”

“They made him happen upon on a river where he saw a perfect
reflection of himself.
 
And then do
you know what happened?”

She shook her head.

“He fell in love, became so infatuated with his own reflection
that he refused to move away from the river.
 
Eventually he just withered up there
since he had all but forgotten how to eat or sleep.”

She rolled her eyes.
 
“I’m not buying it.”

“Not buying it?”

“If he got all rexy (Casey and Leigh’s word for girls who were
too thin) then his reflection would’ve taken a hit too.
 
And he would’ve fallen out of love with
it.
 
But anyway who other than a dog
doesn’t know a reflection is just that?”
 

He scowled.
 
“It’s a myth.
 
You’re not supposed to buy--”

“Next thing you’re gonna tell me is they didn’t have Oreos in
Greek myths.
 
Were you about to say
that, Yull?”

“The point is not realistic merit.
 
It’s the moral, which I do think you
get.”

She rolled her eyes.

“Alex Deal is a narcissist,” he continued, “The only thing he cares
about is himself, and, of course, his band.”

14

The next day Leigh walked over to Casey’s locker and said, “All
is not lost.”
  
For a moment
Casey thought she was talking about Alex Deal and got an excited look in her
eyes.
 
Leigh realized the drastic mistake
of her word choice.
 
“Oh!
 
No.
 
I mean…” She sheepishly took the Arcade Fire ticket out of her pocket
and held it out.
 
“Sorry.”

Casey called Leigh after her conversation with Yull the night
before and told her everything.
 
“Fuck,”
Leigh said, “are you gonna start listening to that Gloria Gaynor song now?”

“Which Gloria Gaynor song?”

“’I Will Survive.’
 
Once I went to a cousin’s wedding and that song came on and my aunt
who’d just gotten divorced grabbed all the single women at the wedding and made
them dance and sing along to it.
 
My
mom said it was inappropriate.”

“No.”

She took the Arcade Fire ticket from Leigh’s hand and looked at
it.
 
“I found it in the bottom of a
pair of boots I took to LA,” Leigh said.

“But did you find the roach--”

“Shh.
 
No.”

“Maybe you left it at Eva’s.”
 

“I emailed her last night and asked her to let me know if it
turns up anywhere.”

Casey nodded.
 
“She’ll have your back.”

Suddenly Leigh moved to block her from seeing something at the
other end of the hall.
 
But her
maneuvering was highly unsuccessful.
 
Casey peered over her head and caught a glimpse of none other than
Narcissus himself: Alex Deal, in the flesh.
 
He was with Peter.
 
She inched out from the locker so she
was standing in a place where she knew he would see her.
 

“You
will
survive,” Leigh
hissed.
 
Alex saw her.
 
She knew he did because he stopped what
he was doing for a second.
 
Then he
turned around and walked away.
 
She
looked down.
 
“Let’s go to the
movies after school today,” Leigh said.

“Your parents don’t let you go to the movies on weekdays.”

“We’ll lie to them.”
 
She remembered something.
 
“Oh
wait I have that meeting.”

“What meeting?” Casey asked.

“Talent show.
 
They
asked me to do artwork for the posters.”

“It’s fine, I have a lot of T.V. to catch up on.”

Leigh shook her head.
 
“Come with me to the meeting and we’ll go to the movies afterwards.”

It was one of those school days that passed in a slow, boring
hum punctuated by bells and unpleasant moments.
 
Casey was no stranger to those days but
this one was a real standout.
 
En la
clase de español Señor Griffin commented, when he checked homework and saw that
she yet again did not have it, that she needed to get out of whatever “funk”
she was in and get back to doing homework the way she had been at the beginning
of the year.
 
As soon as Señor
Griffin passed, she sent a note Ben’s way.
 

All your fault, homework horder.
 
P.S. You will score mega karma points if
you help your neighbor in Spanish class get out of her ‘funk.’
 
He penned a
response.
 
Why don’t
you ask your friend from yesterday to get you out of your ‘funk’.
 
She felt sad but also
flattered.
 
Burn,
she
scribbled,
but that’s a no can do.
 
He takes Greco-Roman and was born a
hermaphrodite.
 
P.P.S. Feel free to
pass that knowledge around to as many people as possible.

He wrote for a minute, started to slide the note under his
elbow then paused, added something, and passed.
 

I’m not interested in passing dirt on that
dude, but thanks for the scintillating and, I’m sure, 100% true
information.
 
P.S.
 
There are websites with tutorials on
Spanish grammar.
 
You can always use
one of those when you don’t get the homework.
 
She sighed and
responded.
 
But that
would be proactive and constructive.
 

He shook his head.
 
Casey was wondering what he was going to write next when the bell rang
to end class.
 
Ben, as usual, was out
of his seat and through the classroom door quicker than lightning.

Math class was another variant on the all-enveloping web of
social connectivity that was Walton High School.
 
As she walked in Maxine French watched
with a narrow-eyed look of perusal passed down by her bull shark predecessors.
 
Casey assumed it would end there, but as
soon as she sat Maxine whirled around, folded her arms over her chest, and
raised an eyebrow.
 
“Peter told me
you were at their band practice.”

“Um.”

“With Alex.” Maxine looked her up and down.

Casey slumped into her seat and wondered if it was true that
every once in a while people could spontaneously combust.
 

“Did Miss Kinsey have her little talk with you yesterday?”
Maxine asked.
 

Casey sighed and put her pen down.
 
“Yes.
 
But she said she’d wait until today to
call your parents.”

“My--what are you talking about?”

“You know.
 
About
you cheating off my test.
 
I mean to
be honest I told Miss Kinsey I’d be fine with letting you off just this once,
but she seemed keen on doing something.”
 

“You cheated off my test!” Maxine said, “That’s what she was
going to talk to you about.”

Casey shook her head and shot her a faux earnest look.
 
Her little line of B.S. was a suicide
mission.
 
As soon as Miss Kinsey
entered the room she would clarify matters and Maxine’s feathers would
unruffle.
 
But at that moment in
that school day watching Maxine get bent out of shape was just what the doctor
ordered.
 
Casey began to sing
“Lonely Days, Lonely Nights.”

“Are you singing?” Maxine asked in disgust.

“No.” Casey swung into the second verse.

“Yes you are.
 
And
you’re lying too.”

Miss Kinsey entered.
 
Casey stopped singing.
 
Maxine
scowled and turned to face the front of the room.
 
Casey yawned.

In the library, she wrote a genius playlist that included
Sufjan Stevens, Iron and Wine, AND Belle and Sebastian.
 
It might very well have changed the life
course of the red-faced football player who could not remember the name of his
English teacher.
 
However it was
horrifically disregarded when he tossed it in the trash and ignored her plea to
read the copy she quickly wrote up.
 

English class did not do much to ease the pain.
 
About a third of the way through Mrs.
Edwards placed everyone into their
Beowulf
project
groups.
 
Casey’s relief about it being
group work time (time to text Leigh while Mrs. Edwards wasn’t looking!) was squashed
when Catherine Hightower whipped her notebook out and began reading her ideas
for the three-part essay they were going to write.
 
Each one of them would be responsible
for writing ten pages.
 

“And,” Catherine said with a beady-eyed grin, “I think we
should use primary sources.”

Casey looked from Catherine to Sukh, baffled.
 
“What’s she talking about?”

“I am not sure,” Sukh said, “Catherine,
Beowulf
is a primary source.”