Click Here (to find out how i survived seventh grade) (19 page)

Rosie shook her head. “We don’t talk about that kind of stuff. We used to, but he wanted me to do all this stuff for him — kind of like what he asked you to do — and I got tired of it.”

“Yeah, I know what you mean.” I stared at my hamburger, trying not to imagine what Jilly and Mark might be doing and hoping they weren’t in one of Mr. Foslowski’s closets.

“At least it’s Friday,” I said. Two whole days where I wouldn’t have to run an obstacle course to make sure I didn’t see them together.

“Told you.”

I looked up. Serena was standing next to me, holding her lunch tray. “Told you, told you, told you,” she said. You’d think she’d be happy, rubbing this in my face. But she looked like she was about to cry.

“Yeah,” I said, surprising myself with the lack of irritation in my voice. “You told me.”

She’d told me once when she was at the window, and then again yesterday at play practice. Jilly had been late, coming in with her hair all messed up. Serena had taken one look at her, rolled her eyes, and said, “She’s disgusting. He’s disgusting. Can’t they find a janitor’s closet somewhere?”

I didn’t want to think about them doing what I only did with my pillow.

“I know,” I said, before I could stop myself. Omigosh. I had actually agreed with S.W. out loud. What did that mean?

“You don’t know anything,” Serena said, rebraiding her pilgrim braid over her shoulder. I watched Mr. Trubey rifling through his music. We were going to start any minute.

“I know you’re jealous,” I said. “You wish it was you in the closet with Mark.”

“And what about you?” Serena sneered. “You’ve been drooling over him since the first day of school! He’s, like, the only one in the entire school who can’t see it.”

I remember freaking out when she said that, wondering if it was true. Wondering if —

“Just ignore her,” Rosie said, bringing me out of Freak Out Mode and back to the cafeteria. I watched Serena weave her way to another table. It was weird, but I almost felt sorry for her. At least Mark and I were friends. He still wouldn’t even talk to Serena.

Rosie and I got to the bus at the same time that afternoon and climbed on. She automatically took the seat in front of mine, knowing I was saving it for Jilly. I thought that was pretty cool. We were real friends now and it didn’t bother her that I sat with Jilly most of the time.

“Save the spot next to you,” I said. “I have a feeling she’s going to miss the bus again.” Before I left her at her locker this morning, Jilly had asked me to save her a seat.

“I always do,” I said, not pointing out that yesterday that spot was empty because she’d missed the bus because she’d been doing I-don’t-want-to-imagine-what with I-can’t-say-his-name. I had a feeling it would happen again today.

Rosie sat backward so she could see me, her head resting on the back of the seat in front of hers. I sat with my back to the window, my feet hanging out in the aisle. I did not want to catch a glimpse of anything that might happen out there.

“Here she comes,” Rosie said. “Looks like she’ll make it.”

I bit my lip. Don’t ask, don’t ask. But my tongue seemed to have a mind of its own. “Is —”

“Yeah, he’s with her,” Rosie said, totally knowing what I was going to say. She gave me a tortured look. “Maybe you should read or something until she gets on.”

“Why?” I said, wanting to look but not wanting to look. “Are they holding hands?”

Rosie nodded slowly.

“Are they …”

“Do you really want to do this to yourself?”

I sighed. “No. I just need to face it. I need to accept it. He’s still my friend, right?”

“Right,” said Rosie. “But accepting it doesn’t mean you have to have a front-row seat to their … stuff.”

“Right,” I said. I crossed my arms over my chest. “Let’s talk about something else.”

Rosie brightened. She got on her knees and draped her elbows over the back of her seat. “You’ve got to come over and see my new computer — it’s got all the latest stuff on it.”

“I don’t want to hear about it,” I said. “My mom’s is totally the latest and greatest, but the computer for me and Chris is, like, two years old. Ancient.”

“A dinosaur,” Rosie agreed.

“Hey, guys.” Jilly stood in the aisle, nudging my feet. I swung them to the floor and she plopped down beside me. I remembered in one of the romance novels I’d read how the woman glowed when she was in love — gag, gag, double gag. What a bunch of poopola. At least that’s what I thought, until I saw Jilly’s face. It glowed. And it wasn’t that greenish-white glow-in-the-dark color we use at Halloween. This was a soft pink, eyes alight kind of glow. It made my heart sink to my stomach.

“Everyone find a seat,” said the bus driver, his hand gripping the handle that closed the door.

“Wait!”

We all looked up. Mark bounded up the stairs, stopping briefly as he scanned every face before spotting the glowing one sitting next to me. He strode down the aisle, leaned over, and kissed Jilly full on the mouth. I was so shocked, I just stared at them, their lips pressed together, their heads turned so their noses nearly touched.

One Mississippi, two Mississippi, three Mississippi.

I had to turn and look out the window for four Mississippi. I didn’t know if they would have gone on to five or not because the bus driver started yelling over the “wooooooooo” of the crowd cheering them on.

“None of that on my rig! You on this bus, kid? No? Then hop off before I take off.”

“You should just come home with me,” I heard Jilly whisper. Mark chuckled. Then I heard another sound that was probably a quick peck and Mark’s footsteps moving rapidly down the aisle, clunking down the stairs.

Jilly sighed beside me, but I couldn’t look at her. I couldn’t look at anything because for some stupid reason, my vision was blurry.

Saturday, November 9

Ok…so remember when I said I was lucky when Chris saw Amanda kiss that guy? Well, FORGET IT. CHRIS was the lucky 1. He was a good 50 feet from where Amanda and that guy were mashing. I was like 5 INCHES from Jilly when Mark planted 1 on her. I thought I would die right there on the bus.

I’m living a nightmare…keep seeing their lips pressed together in my mind, like a song that I’ve put on continuous loop…playing over and over and there’s no Stop button in my brain and I’m about to scream. What happened to Mr. Shy and Blushing??? What happened to the guy who kept asking if I thought she’d go out with him??? Where did this Mr. Cool, I’ll-Kiss-You-in-Front-of-the-World guy come from???

I tried to avoid Jilly today…didn’t think I could look at GFKG (Glow Face Kissing Girl) without bursting into tears or some other stupid thing. But she said she had a homework emergency and could I please come over right away. Even though it was hard, it was harder thinking that if I kept this up, we wouldn’t—couldn’t— be friends. I had to figure out a way to deal with this. Homework…Ok, I could talk about homework.

I should have known better.

I only helped her with 2 math problems before she started talking about Mark. She goes, have you seen his ears? Like, duh, I sit behind him in 3 classes. She starts saying stuff about them being “attached” and wasn’t that the cutest thing? I couldn’t help it, I go, attached? Like, to his head? She ignores me and goes off on his earlobes, how some people have attached earlobes and some are detached and that her sister Molly told her all about it. I guess Molly learned it in her genetics class and was sharing this incredibly exciting information with Jilly, who acted like they were having a discussion about hairstyles or clothes, not EARLOBES. How could she be talking about EARLOBES? That is so stupid. And what does this mean, anyway? They were talking about genes. Were they getting married or something?

That thought just about sent me over the edge, so I took off. I couldn’t bear to hear about another of Mark’s body parts and what Jilly may or may not think about it.

Strange and Mysterious Things

Tyler left a not-so-anonymous note in the slot in my locker. I knew it was from him cuz there was a smear of hair gel that smelled just like his head. Carla was dying to know what it said—she found it and knew exactly who it was from, too—but I didn’t show her…too personal. But I will share it here cuz I want to remember it in case I lose the original:

If you ever slowed down

long enough to see

what is right in front of you,

you might be amazed

to find out who thinks you are

beyond beautiful.

—An Admirer

Beyond beautiful. No 1 has ever called me beautiful, let alone “beyond beautiful.” Well, my dad has (beautiful, without the “beyond”), but he doesn’t count. Come to think of it, I don’t think anyone has ever called me pretty or even cute. It’s a pretty good poem for a geeky nerd-type guy. Hmm. That makes me wonder if he copied it from somewhere. I bet he did. He could never come up with something that good, could he?

He’s got nice eyes. But that hair? It’s got to go.

chapter 19

Mixed Messages

“Mom says we have to get our shoes today.” Chris walked toward me, his basketball smacking back and forth in his hands. It was Sunday afternoon and I was supposed to be cleaning my room. But I had too much to say to myself on my personal, private, no one-will-see-but-me web page.

“Okay.” With a click the web page disappeared and I was back at the desktop. I logged off and turned around. “You’ve got a booger.”

“Do not,” Chris said, but he pulled his wrist across his nose anyway. “What’s that?” He pointed to the disc I had ejected from the drive.

“None of your business,” I said, running upstairs to hide the disc in my room.

Chris knew exactly what shoes he wanted and picked them out and paid for them right away. I needed more time. A shoe was very important when you had feet like mine. Not only did it need to give the appearance of a smaller ped, it had to be comfortable and sturdy. It was a very scientific process.

“I’m going to get a Coke at the food court,” Chris said after I pulled out my sixth pair of shoes. He handed me a wad of cash. “Meet me there.”

After trying on several pairs, I finally made my purchase. Swinging the bag from my wrist, I headed for the food court. I was so busy trying to swing the bag in perfect circles around my wrist that at first I didn’t notice the commotion in front of the Orange Julius. But then I heard a girl’s voice, loud and angry.