Holly Black (6 page)

LOTR, PART I

“But
Rings
is an epic movie; it falls under
my
jurisdiction!” Ezra whined.

Mica shrugged. “I would argue that movies
not
based on a book fall under your jurisdiction. High fantasy literature is clearly mine. Besides, according to the schedule, you’ve sort of…um…monopolized most of the classes this week,” he pointed out, tapping at the Montgomery Calendar they had taped to the door of the media center.

“He’s got a point,” David said, nose buried in
Johnny the Homicidal Maniac
. Just a refresher; he was going to talk the cheerleader through it next week.

The student in question walked in as the two boys began to shout at each other. Ellen frowned into her book, trying to shut everyone out.

“What’s up with them?” Montgomery asked. She didn’t think members of Team Geek ever had anything to fight about.

Ellen made a face. “They’re arguing about who gets to watch
The Fellowship of the Ring
. With you,” she added a little spitefully.

“I am not spending another evening with Ezra,” the other girl insisted. “Not alone.”

Ellen’s look changed, becoming something like understanding. “I don’t blame you,” she agreed.

LOTR, PART II

Hanging out with Mica in his bedroom fell somewhere between David-on-a-bench and Ezra-in-his-gigantoid-living-room. While it was weird to be by herself with this boy, it didn’t necessarily reek of danger. In fact, she was impressed that it didn’t really reek much of anything, except for maybe the slight musty scent of hundreds of paperbacks that lined the walls. A small TV sat on a wooden crate in a corner; the home-theater experience was completed by a neatly folded Mexican blanket on the floor and a child’s stool (it said ‘Mica’ in big bright hand-painted letters).

Tall, short, and occasionally pretty people droned nonsense on the tiny screen. Montgomery found herself losing interest almost immediately.

“Hang on, this is an important bit,” Mica said, with the tiniest bit of an affected British accent. But he did it without thinking, so it was almost excusable.

“What? They going to get on miniature ponies and ride off into the sunset?” the cheerleader asked, pulling out a book and blowing dust off it.

“No, they’re—come on, this is serious.” He didn’t turn his head from the TV, his lips slightly parted around his surprisingly cute, slightly bucky front teeth. His dirty blond hair was tousled into his eyes—but unlike she’d assumed, it wasn’t actually dirty. It might even have had some gel or something in it.

“This is no mere ranger. He is Aragorn, son of Arathorn. You owe him your allegiance….”

The serious one, blondie with the ears, the
elf
, was getting all self-important. She remembered that from the first time her boyfriend made her watch it. It would continue like this for the next two movies.

“Ugh, would you
listen
to them?” Montgomery sighed, rolling her eyes and shoving the book back onto the shelf. It had looked intriguing at first, but none of the characters mentioned on the back had any vowels in their names; only a lot of ws and ys and far too many double
l
s. “It’s ridiculous the way they talk!”

“It’s supposed to be epic and therefore archaic,” Mica explained patiently. But there was an edge to his voice. “Like…well, you take French. Think of the formality of their speech like
vouvoiement
versus
tutoiement
.”

“I didn’t know you took French,” Montgomery said, impressed. “Wait, you’re not in my or Shaniqa’s class….”

“I take French Five with the seniors,” the boy said dismissively. Not bragging. Like he wanted to get over it and back to the subject at hand. He pressed play. “Anyway, think of it as trying to sound like an English version of romantic, archaic French.”

“It
sounds
retarded,” she said tartly.

“Montgomery.”
Mica was the very picture of barely controlled exasperation. “Not only are you paying us to show things like this to you and explain them to you, but this—
this
movie, is one of my Favorite. Things. In. The. World. If you don’t like it, could you at least keep the comments to yourself? How would you like it if I made fun of…”

He paused. He could have suggested any one of a thousand nasty things, from nighttime soaps to the worst sort of trashy romances.

But he didn’t.

“…whatever it is
you
like?”

They locked eyes for a moment. She bit her lip.

Whenever it was her turn to watch something
she
liked, Ryan wouldn’t stop making awful comments. Like the reality show where young designers had to sew things quickly. She didn’t even bother trying to watch it with him anymore. Hence the noir after noir after noir…

“Sorry,” she finally said. Grudgingly. She flopped down on his bed.

“Why are you doing this, anyway? I don’t really get it,” Mica admitted, crossing his legs and relaxing a little.

“Ryan likes all of this sort of…stuff,” she said as she waved her hand around. “I mean, a little. Not like you guys like it. And I don’t get it at all. I thought maybe if I did, I would get him more. I really like him, you know.”

“That’s…” Mica thought carefully. “Kind of generous.”

“Um, yeah,” Montgomery said, picking at his
Star Wars
quilt.

The obvious question was finally spoken.

“Is he doing the same thing for you?” Mica finally asked.

“What is this, Geek 101 or the
Dr. Phil
show?” the cheerleader snapped. “When I want relationship advice, trust me, I won’t be paying the dysfunctional club.”

He made a face
. “Touché.”

“What about you?” she relented. “Like…you and Ellen seem perfect for each other. How come you never dated?”

“Who said we didn’t?” Mica said quickly, turning back to the TV and groping for the remote.

“Really?” Montgomery’s eyes widened at the new information. Gossip—even here, among these people—was juicy.

“Look, it just didn’t work out, okay?” he muttered, pretending to fix the screen format.

“Oh my gosh—did you guys
do it
? Is that what happened?”

“Hey. Monty. Shut your freaking trap and watch the elf, okay?” the geek growled, hitting
play
. “You’re watching a movie you hate to impress your football-playing BF. Ix-nay on the relationship advice-ay. When I want pom-pom advice, trust me, I’ll go straight to you.”

“‘Monty,’” the cheerleader said, giggling a little. “I kind of like that.”

LUNCH BREAK

“So, how’s your…
secret project
going?” Susan stage-whispered across the table. Montgomery kicked her under it. Her best friend was sitting
right next
to Ryan, who, breaking convention, was not as dumb as a football player could be. He had already questioned the unmarked bootleg in her purse—something she didn’t usually carry with her cell phone, makeup, and tampons.

Ryan wasn’t paying attention, though; he was shoveling the second of a trio of cheeseburgers into his mouth, the juices dribbling around to his chin. It would stain his white shirt with permanent greasy smears.

“It’s going well,” she said casually, as if it was about something for history class. She studied her limp salad. Then she cleared her throat and got Ryan’s attention by tapping him with her fork. “Hey, there’s a making of
Star Wars
special on tonight, on the History Channel.”

“Yeah?” Ryan said, surprised. He swallowed quickly. “For real? How’d you hear about it?”

“I don’t know…. Maybe you could come over and we could do our homework and
watch
it.” Which was really a way of saying “do our homework and
make out while we ‘watch it.’”
It certainly got his attention.

“Oh, you can’t,” Susan said, pouting. “There’s Reese’s party tonight. You two have to come.”

“I don’t know….” Montgomery said unenthusiastically.

“Well,” Ryan said, torn.

“Come on! I’m going to wear my new top, the one with the
zip-down
,” Susan said flirtily, wheedling Ryan.

“Hey,” Montgomery warned, surprised at her friend’s forwardness.

“You know I’m just kidding,” Susan said, backing down immediately. “I was just giving some added incentive.”

“Hmm.” Montgomery reached over and stole one of Ryan’s fries, biting it in half, hard.

SF TV: THE SCIFI CHANNEL VS. PBS AND THE MAJOR NETWORKS

After practice Montgomery took the bus over to Ellen’s house for what would be, barring some wonderfully cataclysmic event, an incredibly boring afternoon.

The lone female member of Team Geek promised she would start slowly, beginning with socially acceptable nerd TV (
Lost
,
Heroes
,
Smallville
,
Buffy
the
Vampire
Slayer
), then easing into the more commonly known serious sci-fi with a series of old- and new-school matchups (
Dr
.
Who
1–8 vs.
Dr
.
Who
9 and 10,
Stargate
SG1
vs.
Atlantis
, old
Battlestar
vs. new
Battlestar
), ending with a very brief foray into the hardcore geek-but-not-forgotten (
Max
Headroom
,
Misfits
of
Science
,
Friday
the
Thirteenth
, plus some sort of Canadian–Luxembourgian Dracula series).

Despite herself, the cheerleader was a little intrigued to see Ellen’s house. She had to admit that this little extracurricular project was interesting at least in how it revealed the personal lives of people she hadn’t really given a wet slap about before.

She could hear the shouting before she even rang the bell.

“Oh, they’re upstairs,” Mrs. Ellen’s-Mom said with a smile, as if nothing was wrong, or she was deaf.

Montgomery mounted the very-normal, very-family wooden staircase with a growing sense of dread. At the top, at the end of the hall, inside a door covered with pictures of stars and space things (and
very
old stickers of unicorns), was exactly the sort of scene she was afraid she was walking into.

Mr. Ellen’s-Dad was yelling. Ellen was standing as calmly as she could, a thin trickle of a tear along the outside of her cheek. She was obviously trying not to see the cheerleader standing there, but quickly wiped her face, embarrassed.

“Oh, and there you go,
crying
again,” her father screamed, noticing her gesture. “For heaven’s sake, why can’t you be more like your hero—what’s his name? Schmock? Spock? Something stupid? The one with no emotions. Why do you have to be
so emotional
about everything? You’re just like your freaking grandmother…crying over
everything
. Are you going to
cry
when an employer yells at you?”

Montgomery looked down at the floor and gave a small cough.

“What? Oh, you must be Montgomery,” he said, calming down immediately.

But whatever small token he was paying to social decency failed against an urge he just couldn’t resist. He immediately turned back to his daughter.

“Look at her—why can’t you be more together, like her?
She
looks like someone who’s going to college! Not wasting her time with stupid online games! Nice to meet you,” he added, striding angrily down the hall.

“Hey,” the cheerleader said after a moment, with a twisted, understanding little smile.

“Hey,” Ellen said back, sniffling, wiping her nose with the back of her hand. Everything was silent in the house. Dust fell; it was hard to tell where Ellen’s father had gone. Montgomery could tell that though they were from opposite worlds, at that one moment the two girls understood each other completely: What had just occurred
totally sucked
.

The cheerleader noticed Ellen’s outfit with sadness: the tucked-in T-shirt printed with a weird, garish logo, the boy jeans that were actually cut for a boy, the cracked leather belt, the sneakers with duct tape and pins. Not slobby
or
punk enough to make any statement other than “lame.” Oh, Ellen was going to college. She was super-smart.

She just wasn’t going to interview well.

“Um. I don’t really feel like watching TV. Here,” Ellen finally said.

“No problem,” Montgomery said easily. But she found herself a little disappointed.

Weird.

Here was just the sort of wonderful act of God she was hoping to preempt the afternoon of
très
boring geekery—she could be at Ryan’s in forty-five minutes if she raced—and now she sort of felt cheated.

She stole a quick glance around and behind Ellen, trying to take in as much of the room as she could before she left. It was similar to Mica’s, but different in a few key, girly areas. A box of tampons. Some stuffed animals. Paisley bedclothes.

A constellation of plastic painted spaceships—
star
ships—drifting from the ceiling.

On her desk was an explosion of things incongruous to the rest of the room: piles of neatly-folded cloth, measuring tape, diaphanous fluff, cones of thread. There wasn’t a sewing machine or anything else crafty in sight save a neatly organized set of model paints.

“Sorry you came over,” Ellen muttered, kicking her toe.

“We could go see a movie or something,” Montgomery found herself suggesting. “Is there anything science fictiony out? You could coach me through it.”

“Nothing good,” Ellen sighed. “But…I’ll see anything. Bad comedy. Crapulent thriller. Explody spies. Anything except for something dumb and chicky.”

“
The Sweet Smell of Success
is playing at the Art House,” the cheerleader suggested hesitantly.

Ellen gave her a look somewhere between surprise and respect. “A classic, huh? Okay. Yeah. Sure. That’d be great.”

The two girls regarded each other for a second, suddenly realizing that they had somehow just agreed to go see an (almost) normal movie together, almost normally. Almost like friends.

“All right. We’re outta here,” Ellen said, grabbing her wallet, fleeing the touching moment.