Gimme a Call (5 page)

“Wait!” Karin cries, grabbing my arm. “Is my makeup okay?”

“Perfect,” I tell her. “How’s mine?”

“Fabo. My mom’s lipstick looks gorge on you.”

I give her a big fake smile. “Does it make my braces more or less obvious?”

“Less. Definitely. How’s my breath?” She exhales.

“Minty. Mine?” I breathe out.

“Like a fresh fall day.”

“Are you guys always such freaks before parties?” Tash asks, adjusting her glasses. She’s wearing the same thing she wore to school today—jeans and a black shirt.

“Yup,” we both answer, clinging to each other’s arms. It’s our pre-party ritual.

Joelle pushes her shoulders back, strikes an I’m-hot-stuff pose in her red minidress, and rings the doorbell. I’m not the biggest fan of red. But Joelle makes it work.

“Would you like a breath test?” Karin asks Tash as we huddle outside the door.

“I’ll pass,” she says.

When no one answers, Joelle turns the doorknob. It opens onto a marble entranceway packed with Florence West students—some of whom I recognize, most of whom I don’t. Harry Travis is standing with Kellerman and Sean Puttin by the stairs. Harry’s eyes are extra blue and his cheeks are extra rosy. Definitely hot. Sean flicks up his collar. He’s super preppy—always looks like he’s about to play tennis. And Kellerman might be the only guy in the room wearing sweatpants instead of jeans.

I peer around the room, wondering if Bryan’s here.

“Joelle, Tash, hi,” Celia says, gliding toward us in low jeans and a strapless black top. “Joelle, you look like you’re here for a Christmas party. Adorable. And, Tash! I’m so glad you’re here. My parents keep their booze above the fridge and no one here is tall enough to reach.”

“Hi, Celia,” Tash says dryly. “Do you know Karin and Devi?”

Her forehead crinkles. “Debbie?”

“Devi,” I say.

“That’s a name?”

“It’s short for Devorah,” I explain, feeling my cheeks burn.

“Adorable,” she says, twirling and sparkling. She’s definitely wearing glitter on her shoulders. Next she turns to Karin. “You have adorable hair. I bet it would look amazing if you blew it straight.”

“Oh, um … thanks?” Karin responds uncertainly.

Celia blows us a kiss and disappears into the living room.

“Is my hair too curly?” Karin whispers to me, her brows furrowed.

“Ignore her,” Tash says, and closes the door behind us. The lights are low, the R & B is blasting, and I’m pretty sure it’s at least a hundred degrees in here. I slip off my sweater and cram it into my purse. I hope that in all this evening’s craziness, I remembered to put on deodorant.

I wasn’t even sure if I should come to the party after the prank call I got.

What kind of horrible, obnoxious person calls another girl and tells her to stay home and organize her closet instead of going to a party?

Maya convinced me to come anyway.

“It’s probably someone who wasn’t invited to the party and doesn’t want to be the only person stuck at home,” Maya insisted during our call. “Ignore. Go. Stop answering your phone.”

So here I am. I always listen to Maya. She
is
the smart one. I’m the pretty one. She takes after my dad, I take after my mom. Not that I’m pretty by a Florence West standard. Just a Banks standard.

Maya hates when I call her the smart one. “You’re just as smart as I am,” she always tells me. “You just need to focus on school instead of only boys.”

I miss having her in the next room giving me constant advice. During our quick pre-party phone call, my stomach ached at the sound of her voice. “When are you coming home for a weekend?” I asked.

“Already? I just got here!”

“But I miss you! It’s not like Mom or Dad will make up new words to songs and sing them with me in the backyard at the top of their lungs.”

“So visit me. Wanna come for Columbus Day weekend? Supposedly the dorm throws crazy parties. Lots of cute boys,” she added, laughing.

“Yes!” I hollered.

“We’ll look for tickets,” she promised, before saying she had to get off to get ready for a dorm party.

I hoped she’d stake out a cute boy for herself. Last year, I peeked at her diary—she should not have left it under her mattress if she didn’t expect me to read it—and I discovered that she had never kissed a boy on the lips.

While I had already kissed two boys on the lips.

Maybe Maya will find a boyfriend at her party.

I follow Tash into the living room.

Maybe I’ll find a boyfriend at
this
party.

I’m sitting on Celia’s couch, minding my own business, laughing, giggling, whatever, about to deposit a tortilla with a dab of salsa into my mouth when I hear “Hey, Sands!”

Bryan Sanderson, the spiky-haired, passionate yet average baseball player with the fabo smile, is standing in the doorway to the living room. He’s wearing faded jeans and a soft-blue T-shirt layered over a long-sleeved gray one.

As my stomach does a little jumping jack, my chip somehow frees itself from my fingers, flies through my legs, and lands on Celia’s living room sectional.

Celia’s white suede sectional.

Splat!
Omigod. Why would someone with a white suede sectional serve salsa? If I had a white suede sectional, I’d serve only white party foods, like french onion dip and cauliflower. Better yet, marshmallows. Is serving salsa not asking for trouble? Why would a couch be white, anyway? What if you have dirt on your jeans? Or an open pen in your pocket? What then?

No, no, no. I mustn’t blame the victim, aka the couch, for my inability to eat and spot a cute guy at the same time.

What do I do, what do I do?

I slam my legs together while keeping them elevated—to avoid smearing the stain—and debate my next move. Jump up and try to clean the couch? Act clueless? Confess to Celia?

Deep breath.
Deeeeeeep breeeaaaaath
. First I must assess the damage. Perhaps I imagined the whole thing. Perhaps I in fact ate the chip but, because the salsa was so mild, I barely noticed. Yes!

I reopen my legs and peek through. No! The chip is still there, planted on the couch cushion like a flag. I oh-so-casually reach below and yank it out, praying that it hasn’t left behind any rogue salsa. Has it?

There is a fortune cookie–shaped red smudge on the couch.

Shoot
.

I glance up to see if anyone else has noticed the disaster.

“Isn’t it ridiculous?” Joelle is saying, her arms flailing. Karin is laughing, head bobbing along, and Tash is quietly chomping on a peanut.

Why didn’t I have a peanut?

None of them are paying attention to me in the slightest. None of the million other people in here seem to have noticed me either. Maybe my braces give me the superpower of being invisible.

“Karin,” I whisper, but she doesn’t seem to hear.

But Bryan Sanderson—cute, sporty Bryan Sanderson—is looking right at me. Looking right at me and grimacing. Fantastic. I haven’t even been introduced to him and I’ve already managed to disgust him.

“Saw that,” he mouths.

I’m pretty sure my cheeks are the color of the salsa, but I mouth back, “What do I do?”

He holds up his right index finger. “Stay there,” he tells me, and heads out through the side door into the kitchen.

I bet the couch was expensive. The entire house is sleek, with marble floors and glittering chandeliers. The Kings didn’t find this couch at Walmart, I’ll tell you that. I bet it was imported from San Francisco or France or Africa or somewhere.

What if the stain doesn’t come out? Will I have to pay for the couch? Or, since I have zero money, will my parents have to pay for the couch? Will I be working off the loan for the next twenty years? Will I have to drop out of school and get a job? Am I even qualified to do anything?

Is Bryan coming back? I hope he’s coming back. Not just because he looked like he might be planning on helping me, but because he’s just so
cute
.

I wait for him, frozen in place, terrified of moving and causing additional havoc. A few moments later, he returns, holding a bottle of water like a trophy. He smiles and says, “Scoot over.”

The only plus side to this situation? Since the salsa never made it to my mouth, I am one hundred percent positive there is none stuck in my braces.

I gingerly stand, shuffle to my left, and sit back down, careful not to land on the stain. Bryan plops down to my right. He smells fresh and shampoo-y, like soap that claims it’s unscented but really isn’t.

“Are you ready?” he asks me out of the side of his mouth, as if he’s a ventriloquist.

“What do you have there?”

“Poland Spring orange-flavored sparkling water. And a vinegar-soaked napkin hidden in my sleeve.”

Adorable Spiked-Haired Boy is very resourceful. But why is he helping me? He doesn’t even know who I am. “Orange-flavored sparkling water?”

He shrugs apologetically. “I couldn’t find the club soda.”

“But why orange? Are they out of watermelon?”

He laughs.

Yay, I made him laugh! “This is not a laughing matter,” I say, and then giggle. My cute-boy giggle is even worse than my regular giggle.

“Are you ready?” he asks.

“You sound like you have a plan.”

“I don’t plan,” he says. “I just do, Devi.” His voice is teasing.

He knows my name? “You know my name?” I was not supposed to say that out loud.

“I took a wild guess. I was going to try Katie, but you look like a Devi. A Devi Banks.”

I smack him—playfully and, hopefully, flirtatiously—on his arm. His muscled arm. Hello there, muscled arm. Must stop staring at muscled arm. Must also remove my hand from muscled arm.

“Here’s what’s gonna happen,” he says. “I’m going to drench the stain—”

I shush him. “Don’t use the S word.”

He laughs again. I giggle again.

“I’m going to soak the
discoloration
with the carbonated water.”

“That’s another S word,” I whisper.

“Will you let it slide?”

“Another one!”

“I’ll try to be more sly,” he says, his eyes crinkling.

“Quit changing the subject and get back to what you want me to do,” I order.

“Fine. Step two is to rub the discoloration with the vinegar.”

I dubiously look at the stain—er, discoloration. “Are you sure this’ll work?”

“No. But I saw it on a TV show.”

“If you saw it on TV, it must be true.”

He laughs. Again.

I giggle. Again.

He cocks his head to the side and looks at the ceiling. “I think it was club soda and vinegar. Pretty sure.”

Good enough for me. I’m pretty sure I’d follow anything he said at this point. “Might as well give it a try.”

“But how are we going to do this without anyone noticing? Should I clear the room? Shout ‘fire’?”

“Why don’t I try to be a bit more subtle? Whoops. Another S word. I’m bad at this.”

“I’ll forgive you. Again.”

“You’re the best.”

Aw!
My body is back to feeling jittery, but this time, it’s a good jittery.

He twists off the bottle top and lifts the bottle up to his lips.

“Refreshing?” I ask. He has nice lips. Lips perfect for kissing.

“Definitely,” he says. “Celia’s serving pretzels outside and they’re extra-salty. See? There’s a reason I’m drinking watermelon-flavored sparkling water.”

“Orange-flavored,” I say, correcting him.

If she’d been serving pretzels in here instead of salsa, this whole mess wouldn’t have happened. Way to go, Celia. Although then I wouldn’t be having cleansing bonding time with Bryan. Way to go, Celia!

“Okay,” he says, “your job is to sit facing me, so your knees block the view.”

Turn to face him? This is getting better by the second. “Done.”

“Now, is anyone watching?”

I scan the many not-paying-attention faces. “All clear.”

“Here goes.” He whisks the bottle over the spot and wets it. Then he rubs the spot with the napkin. “This should work.”

“Promise?” I can’t help smiling—but I try to do it without showing any teeth. I really, really hate these things.

“I don’t make promises I’m not sure I can keep. But here’s hoping.”