Geek Girl (5 page)

I’ve heard her on the phone with her friends. She’s horrified at her parents’ “midlife crisis,” which has caused them to take in a troublemaker like me. I’m their first foster. If I do my job correctly, I’ll scare them off from the idea, making me also their last.

We show up at the white-trash-family-heaven, get our fashionable rental shoes, and pick out a pocked, dirty, greasy ball that carries who knows how many diseases from the previous users. I can only hope I don’t see anyone from school, though I have no doubt about whether I will see any of my friends. They would sooner chew off their big toes than show up at Bowling Haven. Unless, of course, they knew I were here. Then they would come just to watch for their own amusement.

I’m changing from my boots to the
lovely
multicolored shoes, slowly and deliberately to annoy the cheerleader since the others are disgustingly, infinitely patient with me, when I hear a familiar voice.

“Hey, Jen, I didn’t know you’d be here.”

Trevor, his parents, and a brother I didn’t know he had are pulling into the lane right next to ours. Trevor stands there holding his personalized bowling bag, smiling. Relief and something like happiness flood me as I stand up.
Happiness? Really?
I chide myself.
Get a grip, Jen.

“Hey, Trevor. You guys are seriously here to bowl tonight?”

“Yeah. It was a last-minute thing. I thought about calling you but then remembered that Fridays are your family nights.” He says this as if it’s a desirable way to spend a Friday night and not the most torturous thing in the world. “What are the chances we’d come here and end up right next to you?” he asks as I slip the last boot off and slide my foot into the hideous bowling shoe.

“Pretty big co-ink-a-dink,” I say, and he smiles at my lame word. Behind him I can see his mother’s sour face at this turn of bad luck.

His father, who is a surprisingly masculine jock-type, and not bad-looking for an old guy, is watching us with interest.

“You wanna come meet my dad and brother?”

I shrug and start forward, only to nearly fall on my face when I trip on my untied shoelace, stopped from a full face-plant by Trevor’s hands. I hear a guffaw of mocking laughter from the cheerleader.

“Whoa,” Trevor says, steadying me. “Your lace is untied.”

Thanks, Einstein,
I think cynically, recognizing that my embarrassment is making me mean. So I keep my mouth shut, the whole if-you-can’t-say-anything-nice thing. Then he bends down to tie it for me. I push back the little warm fuzzy that tries to surface at this completely humble gesture.

By now, though, Trevor’s parents have wandered over and are introducing themselves to my fosters. Then the fosters are introducing their biologicals, and everyone knows everyone and we’re all a big happy family. Gag, choke,
and
retch.

Trevor’s brother, Todd, turns out to be eight years older than Trevor—and has Down syndrome. He smiles happily and gives everyone a hug. I would be horrified if he was
my
brother hugging all in sight, but Trevor and his parents don’t even seem to notice or think it odd. Apparently neither do any of my fosters, all of whom are happily returning his hugs. I’ve never been comfortable around anyone like him, so again I keep my thoughts to myself.

Though Trevor’s mom is by no means happy with his friendship with me, she is apparently relieved that my “family” is normal. There is no mention of the fact that I’m a foster, so I’m sure she wonders how I came to be part of this group of bright, happy folks. Trevor’s dad, Rob, seems genuinely pleased to meet me, no judgment in his eyes that I can see. I wonder idly if the Mom the Stiff had one night of letting her hair down and had a fling with some geeky nerd, or if Trevor was adopted since he doesn’t resemble his mother physically much or his father
at all
. Then Rob smiles. He has the same killer dimples as his son, same green eyes as well, leaving no doubt as to Trevor’s paternity, at least.

Trevor and his parents all put on their own personal shoes—by no means fashionable but definitely better than these three-toned clown shoes we have on—and pull out their bowling balls, custom-fitted to their hands and much better looking (and most definitely cleaner) than the bowling alley’s house balls. For just one harebrained second I wonder what it’s like belonging to a family where going bowling isn’t embarrassing, so much so that you all have your own personalized equipment.

I walk up to bowl. I’m always given top billing, I suspect as part of the do-good pact the fosters have made with one another. I would probably argue, but it annoys the cheerleader that they let me go first, so I let it ride just for that fact.

I pick up the greasy ball, looking down the finger holes first to make sure they are at least clear, and huck it aimlessly down the alley. It barely snags the pin on the end. I turn around to find Trevor laughing at me.

“What? You think you can do better?” I ask cynically.

He shrugs and walks up to his own alley, picks up his Darth Vader ball, lines himself up, and throws a hard, fast, perfect curve ball, knocking all the pins down.

“Show-off,” I mutter.

“Let me show you a trick,” he says as I pick up my ball again. I don’t really care to learn how to bowl, but I have his full attention, which is bothering both his mom and—for some reason—the cheerleader.

He stands behind me and wraps his arms around me, placing his hands on mine.

“Turn your hand like this,” he says, manipulating my hand. “Stand here”—he walks me a little to the left—“and don’t look at the pins.”

“If I don’t look at the pins, how am I going to hit them?” My tone indicates what I think of the lack of intelligence behind his words.

“See those arrows about halfway down the alley?” He reaches forward and points. I can feel the hard line of muscle in his arm pressing against my shoulder. This is another revelation, one that causes a little burn in the pit of my belly.
Get a grip, Jen,
I plead with myself more desperately.

“Aim for right between the middle arrow and the one to the right side of it. Take four steps, lean down on the last step and throw. But make sure you keep your thumb pointing forward.”

He steps back and, oddly, I kind of miss the feel of him behind me.
Sheesh, cool it!

“You know, Trev, you know way too much about this. Maybe you need to get a life.”

He grins, bringing the dimples out, and suddenly I want to show him that I can do this, I can do what he taught me. I turn back toward the alley and do everything he said, to the best of my limited ability. I knock down most of the pins. I am stupidly happy, and I turn with a laugh.

“Good job,” Trevor says, high-fiving me.

“Nothing to it,” I throw over my shoulder as I strut off the alley.

Now it’s the cheerleader’s turn. She’s actually a fairly good bowler, but she gets up there and throws a gutter ball, turning back with a pout on her face.

“I’m
terrible
,” she moans dramatically.

“Don’t worry, honey. You’ll get it this time,” her dad tells her.

She shakes her head mournfully and turns puppy-dog eyes on Trevor.

“Can you show me what you showed her?” she pleads.

“Sure,” the nerd says, oblivious to her obvious game. He looks a little dazed, and I’m sure he’s bedazzled by her. She is beautiful, I guess, if you like that blonde-haired, blue-eyed, all-American, wholesome girl-next-door look—which apparently Trevor does.

I glance at Trevor’s mom, and she seems a little more relaxed at Trevor’s attention on the cheerleader than on me.

Trevor follows her up, this girl who is far more his type than I am, but instead of putting his arms around her as he did me, he stands next to her and gives her the same instruction he did me. I know this is just because he’s more comfortable around me, and she dazzles him, but it makes me happy nonetheless. It also makes her
un
happy—always a good thing.

Even better when Trevor asks if I want a diet Coke, showing the cheerleader that he knows me well enough to know what I like to drink. But then in true geek fashion, he also offers to get everyone else a drink.

I watch with dread as Todd has his turn, sure he will embarrass himself. He walks right up to the foul line, ball dangling by his side. He proceeds to swing his arm backward and forward, and I fear for those sitting behind him. He releases the ball on his forward swing, and it heads down the center, knocking all of the pins down.

He turns with a cheer and a laugh to be greeted by cheers from his own family—and by my fosters as well. Trevor looks at me and lifts his brows as if to say, “See, it’s so easy, even he can bowl a strike.”
I stick my tongue out at him.

I bowl pretty good, wanting to show off a little, though I only manage one strike. Of course Trevor bowls far better, perfect in this as in everything else. He comes up with me most turns to give me pointers, always standing in close contact. The cheerleader tries to get him to do the same with her, but it’s blatantly obvious what she’s doing, to me at least.

Finally Jeff, the fosters’ oldest biological, whispers something in her ear, which makes her give a true pout, and she stops trying to get to Trevor after that, proceeding to bowl almost as well as Trevor does.

Trevor doesn’t notice her game.

By the end of the third game, my fosters and Trevor’s parents are fast friends, and Todd is giving regular hugs to us all, his “new friends.” This is a bad development. I can’t exactly influence Trevor to the dark side if the families are going to exchange numbers and socialize.

Actually I
can
, I correct myself. It’s just going to be more difficult, take a little longer. That doesn’t exactly bum me. The fact that it
doesn’t
bum me, bums me.

⊕⊗⊕

Saturday Trevor picks me up to go to his family party. My appearance definitely causes a stir. This horrifies Mrs. Brady/Cleaver but amuses Trevor’s dad, oddly enough—and seems to have no effect on Trevor. He acts as if he shows up with a freak at every family function.

The funny thing is, because he acts that way, by the end of the night, most of them seem comfortable enough around me and treat me as if I weren’t completely different from this upright clan. There are a few who try to keep me in my place as the visiting freak show, but overall, I find myself having an okay time.

“I don’t see him turning,” my friends say at school on Monday after they’ve reamed me about missing another party.

“It’s a process,” I explain. I tell them about bowling and about the dork-family party, turning their anger into amusement. I feel a little guilty at amplifying the truth to make it more outrageous and using Trevor’s family to make them laugh, but sacrifices must be made on the way to success.

I’ve never been one to back down on a bet or a dare—even if it
is
starting to make me feel kind of like a jerk.

Another can’t-party-with-you-cuz-I-have-plans Saturday night finds me with Trevor and the rest of the geek squad at his friend Brian’s house. This time there are three girls besides me, all three confirmed geeks with absolutely nothing in common with me. They keep to themselves, flirting ineptly with the boys there. I guess I’m a little scary to them. They keep their distance from Trevor, though I can see the one girl watching him whenever she doesn’t think anyone’s looking. I’m just glad the little mouse Mary Ellen isn’t here.

Brian’s parents have made a rec room in the detached garage behind their house, with a flat-screen TV, pool table, fridge, and microwave. There are plenty of couches and bean bag chairs scattered around to accommodate large parties. His mom, who is one of the few adults who seems to take me in stride and isn’t overly judgmental of me, has already filled the room with more food than a small army could eat and filled the fridge with sodas. She even put in a few healthy food items that a girl might like to eat instead of all the usual boy foods.

We’ve just finished the newest Star Trek movie, which I actually watched. It was pretty good—lots of action, hot leading actor. I had no preconceived notions though. I’ve never seen a single episode of the original on TV. Like anyone else on this planet, though, I’m aware of the basic premise and have a very rudimentary knowledge of it. So it has been with much amusement that I’ve observed Jim scribbling notes furiously throughout the movie, clucking his tongue and grunting as he wrote. That’s more entertaining to me than the movie itself, especially as Trevor keeps glancing at Jim’s writing with a grin, then rolling his eyes at me as if to indicate how ridiculous this is.

The reason for his concentrated note-taking soon becomes clear, however.

“Okay, here are the issues,” he announces as soon as the final credit rolls—which we must watch every letter of until the very end of every single movie. Trevor groans, Brian grins, and the others all get a fanatical gleam in their eyes—except the girls. They wander off into a corner to talk, apparently having been witness to this before. “Let’s start with the stardate used in the movie.”

I jump a little as his comment incites a near riot, everyone talking over the others, even two of the girls. Trevor laughs at my reaction as they begin spouting numbers at one another, arguing about the possibility—and impossibility—of the dates. I am completely confused. Since when do dates have so many numbers and decimals in them? Where are the months? And, uh, it’s just a movie. Fictional, right?

“It’s incorrect,” Jim is arguing, “unless we have some
unexplained
time warp here.”

This comment sets off another explosion of insensible arguing.

“Wanna go for a walk?” Trevor asks me unexpectedly, speaking loudly to be heard over the commotion. I look at all the others, intent on their discussion. I feel pretty sure no one will even notice our absence.

“Sure, why not?” I say, getting up and following him out the door.

Once we’re outside, I can still hear their arguments, and Trevor waves vaguely in that direction, looking a little mortified that I witnessed the weird scene.