Romancing the Nerd (10 page)

Once I hit the floor and the cloud of detergent clears a little, I open my eyes. Dan stands above me, his arm stretched out toward me, frozen in shock. At least he tried to save me. His expression goes from shock to laughing his ass off in two seconds. I’m a crumpled heap on the floor and he thinks it’s funny.

I can’t help but lash out. My foot connects with his shin, lightning fast, and he buckles, his hands hitting the floor. But he doesn’t stop laughing. He crawls toward me and grabs my shoulders, pulling me up.

“Are you okay?” His words are interspersed with laughs.

He checks me for injures, but I can’t look away from his eyes. They lock, our eyes, and stay that way. His laughter stops abruptly. The setting sun filters in through the window, reflecting off the particles of laundry detergent still floating in the air, creating a fragrant mist that seems to separate us from the outside world, and his hands slide down to touch the skin of my upper arms. His fingers tense and his lips part. My gaze darts to his lips for a millisecond then goes back to his eyes, only to catch them glancing at my mouth, too. He leans in so quickly that I take a rapid, surprised breath. He pauses, his lips a hairsbreadth from mine.

“Z?” He’s asking for permission.

For some weird, totally unexpected reason that I can’t understand right now, I close my eyes and he closes the distance between our lips. It starts as a slow-moving kiss. He’s in no hurry, and neither am I because apparently all my wits, all my thoughts and concerns, have decided to take a vacation. And when his hand moves up over my shoulder to settle on the side of my neck, I’m really glad my wits decided to take a break, because this is too good.

He slants to the other side, his mouth opening just enough for him to taste my bottom lip with his tongue, and a realization slams into me.

This is my first kiss.

Chapter Thirteen

Dan

It had to be done. I felt like there was no other action to take. In that moment, if I didn’t kiss Zelda Potts, I’d regret it to the end of my days. My head wants to analyze the situation, but then I brush my thumb over her earlobe, and she makes a contented noise. All I can process is the soft smoothness of her skin and how her hand at the back of my neck sends chills scuttling all over me. I’ve had a little bit of experience with making out, but it was never like this. Those other times feel tiny and insignificant compared to this. There’s electricity and heat and a need to never
not
be doing this. And amidst all the newness and fire, there’s also a feeling of rightness and cool comfort. Like this is where I’m meant to be.
She’s
where I’m meant to be.

I register a sound, but it’s far off, not important. Then there’s a voice, and Zelda’s fingers on my neck tighten to the point of pain. I pull back and try to get my breathing under control, a futile endeavor if there ever was one.

“Zelda, honey, are you here? Whose car is that out front?” that stupid, interrupting voice asks from the front of the house.

Zelda’s eyes go wide. “My mom.”

I stand in a hurry and help Zelda up. We dust laundry detergent from ourselves and I don’t really mind that I can smell and taste soap, because underneath it is the smell and taste of cotton candy.

“Zelda?” her mom calls again, this time with a hint of worry in her voice.

“Back here, Mom.”

I try to look into Zelda’s eyes one more time before Mrs. Potts appears and kills the mood, but she won’t make eye contact. She grabs the broom from the corner and starts sweeping.

Mrs. Potts is there suddenly with her hands on her hips. “Good Lord, what happened? Oh, hello, Daniel. Haven’t seen you in forever.”

“Hi, um, Zelda had a spill, but we got the dryer hooked up and ready for duty, ma’am.” I salute her and glance at Zelda, hoping to get a smile from her, but she still won’t look at me.

Mrs. Potts takes the broom from Zelda. “I’ll finish up. You two go pull a couple of pizzas from the freezer. The least I can do is feed you for helping out, Daniel.”

Zelda pipes up quickly. “He can’t. He’s on a diet. He’s gotta go anyway, right?”

“No, actually, I can sta—” Zelda pinches the sensitive skin on the back of my arm like my MeeMaw used to do when I interrupted the “grown folks talking.” “Ow!” I yelp and rub the sore spot.

Zelda raises her eyebrows at me. “Are you sure? I’d hate for your dad to get upset about you breaking your diet.”

Is she…blackmailing me? The treacherous minx.

I squint at her, trying to convey all my hatred. Two can play the blackmail game. “I guess you’re right, I do have some homework to catch up on since we missed half—”

She pushes me into the kitchen. “Okay, well, you better get to that. Thanks for all the help. I’ll just walk you out, then.”

I barely get out a “Have a good night” to Mrs. Potts before Zelda drags me to the front door.

“Don’t forget your hoodie,” is all she says before slamming the door in my face.

I want to yell. I want to bang on the door and demand an explanation, but I don’t do any of that. Can’t come off as a nutjob to Mrs. Potts if I ever want to see Zelda again. And despite her own nutjob behavior, hanging out with her and having most of that time actually be civilized felt really good.

Instead, I snatch up my hoodie and stomp to my car. I pull out my phone and type out a quick text to the puzzling female herself.

Me:
What the hell was that all about?

A second later, she responds.

Zelda:
That was a mistake. Let’s just forget it ever happened, okay?

Is she right? Was that a mistake? It didn’t feel like one. When I get home a few minutes later, I’m ready to head upstairs for a shower during which I will not need to use a dab of cleaning products, but Dad calls me from the kitchen. I round the corner and Mom’s there, too, chopping a myriad of vegetables, probably to stuff into next week’s horrible school lunches. This does not brighten my mood.

“I got another call from your coach,” Dad says as I grab a bottle of water from the fridge.

Great. Perfect. Fantastic. I completely forgot about the team meeting after school today. “Oh man, I forgot the meeting. My bad.” I whisk past Dad, hoping this will just blow over.

“My bad? You can’t miss stuff like that, Daniel. It’s important to… Why do you smell like a flower garden?”

“I was helping Zelda put in a new dryer and the box of detergent spilled.” I shrug and pray he’ll respect the fact that I was doing something nice for someone else and give me a break on the meeting.

No such luck. He takes off his trademark cap and slaps the counter with it. “That’s why you missed an important meeting? Because of a girl?”

“It wasn’t an ‘important’ meeting, Dad. I bet most of the team didn’t show up. I also bet their parents won’t be getting phone calls about them missing, because their parents aren’t crazy people. And yeah, I was helping out a friend. Is that forbidden, too? Is ‘No friends’ a new rule?” Sure, I don’t know if I’d technically call Zelda a “friend,” but he doesn’t need to know that.

Dad goes slack-jawed for a few seconds, and I realize I just stepped into a Jabba the Hut sized pile of crap. I’ve never been very good at wrangling my sarcastic mouth.

Mom notices, too, and tries to steer the conversation away from a fight. “Zelda? Didn’t you two used to hang out a lot? Red hair? A tendency to wear boots with skirts? I liked her. Would have loved to give her a thorough makeover, though.”

“Layla, not now, please,” Dad snaps at her, and she scowls at him. “That’s it, son. I’ve tried to be reasonable.”

I scoff at the word “reasonable,” which doesn’t help my case. It just earns me a tight-lipped frown from Dad.

He holds out his hand palm up. “Your phone. Give it to me. And your keys. And I’ll be changing the password on the router, so no internet until you’ve proven you can act responsibly.”

It’s my turn to stare slack-jawed. He’s completely, totally, utterly, horribly serious.

I tilt my chin up. My next words come from a place of desperation. “No, Dad.” Maybe this is me being a hormonal teenager. Maybe this is me testing boundaries. I like to think this is me taking a stand. I feel very Katniss Everdeen in this moment.

I catch Mom’s face as she looks from me to Dad and back to me. It’s like she’s watching a train wreck and just can’t look away.

My dad wipes a hand down his face, his favorite I’m-so-fed-up gesture. “Daniel, so help me God, if you don’t—” My mom’s light touch on his shoulder stops him speaking.

“I don’t like saying this,” I tell him. “I don’t like sounding like a spoiled brat, but you have no idea what these things mean to me. If you take away my phone or cut me off from the internet, I’ll quit.”

“Quit?” he asks.

“I’ll quit the team.”

Zelda

My old nemesis, conflicting emotions, tried its damnedest to worm its way back into my brain. And it succeeded briefly. For a few minutes there, I wasn’t sure if I hated Dan or not. In fact, I was starting to think I might feel the opposite of hatred for him. I won’t say the dreaded four-letter word because I defeated my enemy and am back in my right mind. In my eyes, Dan Garrett is once again the traitorous jerk he always was. In fact, he just added the descriptor “letch” to the long list of asshat qualities I have for him.

Not an hour after talking about effyeah’s awesomeness, how he wants to meet her, and how he wants to hook up with her (yes, I know he didn’t actually say that last part, but I know he was thinking it), he’s making out with a girl in a laundry room. Granted that girl was me in both cases, but it doesn’t matter because he doesn’t know that. And I don’t care how great that kiss was, or how it felt comfortable and exhilarating at the same time, the mission is not abandoned. If anything, I’m ready to get really serious.

“What was that all about?” Mom is propped against the inside of my door with a sort of suspicious look on her face.

I shrug. “No idea. You know Dan. He’s weird.”

She raises one eyebrow. “He wasn’t the one acting weird, dear.”

Oh man, I hate it when she
dears
me. It makes me feel like I’m five years old again, and I just flushed that twenty dollar bill down the toilet. That “dear” is rife with pity, a kind of “aw, poor thing, she doesn’t know any better.”

“It was nothing, Mom. Really.”

I open my laptop, which causes Mom to sigh and leave. I temporarily think about printing out a picture of Dan so I can throw things at it, but that might come off as slightly crazy. Okay, more like licking-the-windows crazy. Instead I tick off the accomplished parts of my eight-part plan. One through four are done and done well, in my opinion. Now I just need to remain vigilant and move onto outsmarting him.

I check over the dirt—I mean, the scientific data I have on him already—but none of it is even near the breakthrough I really want. All the mean things he’s said in our chats about his so-called friends seem to be stuff he has no problem saying to their faces. It’s frustrating. In our chats he’s called some of his teammates “knuckle draggers,” he’s called a teacher a “barnacle on the hull of the education system’s ship,” and he’s referred to our cheerleading squad as, “the succubi of school funding.”

Who am I to argue with all of that? I did argue about the cheerleading thing because I tried out in ninth grade, and I can say for certain that those chicks are athletes. And when I protested, he conceded the point, saying, “True. I’m not suggesting more money needs to go to the other sports. I just think more money needs to go to academia.”

Damn him and his logic.

So yeah, the stuff I have on him now is kind of…silly? Nonexistent? I need more. I need something that will blow the walls off his assumed persona.

He messages me then, at the very moment I’m planning his downfall.

Dantheman:
Please, God, tell me you haven’t abandoned me, too?

It takes a second for me to get my emotions under control. Effyeah is the only one who doesn’t know the depths of his assholeness. He’s looking for sympathy, and as much as I want to cuss him out, I can’t.

Me:
Why would I abandon you? You of superior knowledge, you of elevated wit.

It doesn’t hurt to revisit the second part of the plan as often as possible. He is a vain being, after all.

Dantheman:
*polishes nails on shirt* Thanks. It’s just been a rough day. Got into it again with my dad a second ago. Had to pull out the big guns.

There he goes again with trying to make me feel sorry for him. Nope, nope, and nope. I am immovable. I am an iceberg and he is the
Titanic
. Grumpy Cat is my spirit animal.

Me:
Awww, that sucks. What big guns do you speak of?

Dantheman:
Told him I’d quit the team if he took away my internet connection. I know it sounds like first world problems, but you’re kind of my lifeline to sanity, atm. Sorry if that’s a bit forward, but it’s the truth.

Oh lord, Grumpy Cat, give me strength.

Me:
No, it’s cool. I’m honored.

Dantheman:
And in the spirit of being completely forward and honest, I feel I need to tell you something.

Yes! Is this it? Is he about to reveal his deep dark secret? Please, please, let this be it.

Dantheman:
I kissed Zelda Potts today. Not sure if that means anything to you. I think you and I have a connection, but I don’t know if you feel the same. If you do, I wanted to be honest. If not, well, that sucks, but it’s cool.

I throw my head back in exasperation, and it clunks against the headboard of my bed. I don’t give a second thought to the goose egg that’s probably going to form in a minute or two. This is his big, dark secret? I don’t know whether to be insulted or disappointed.

Both. Let’s go with both.

And what the hell is effyeah supposed to say to this? Is she supposed to be okay with it? If I want to keep chatting with Dan, other-me has to be okay with it. I think. God, I don’t know. If other-me is okay with it, will that be unrealistic and make Dan suspicious?

Dantheman:
Was that weird? That was weird. I’m sorry. Forget I said anything.

Crap, I’m taking too long to answer.

Me:
No, I just…

I just what?

I slam the laptop closed and toss it onto the end of my bed like if I put distance between it and me that’ll solve something. So much for remaining vigilant.