When It Happens (21 page)

“Are you sure? Because it looked to me like—”

“Of course I’m sure. Come on. Josh?
Ew
.”

“Whatever,” Laila says.

“Like we don’t have more important matters to discuss. ” Maggie fans her face with a napkin, which is completely ineffective. “What’s the story with later on?”

“We’re going after eighth period.”

A roar of general chaos emanates from the jock table. We look over. Dave is doing something juvenile involving his straw and his nose. How could I have missed the part where he’s so fifth-grade?

“Hideous,” Laila decides.

“Abhorrent,” Maggie adds.

“Ooh!” I say. “More reading of the dictionary?”

“But of course.”

My nerves twang for the rest of the day. But in a good way. It’s like I’m actually starting to have real experiences. Ones that actually mean something.

By the time I meet Tobey at our lockers, I couldn’t be more nervous.

“Ready?” Tobey says.

I used to have this problem with listening to myself. My soul would be screaming directions, and I’d always do the opposite thing. Normally I would back out of a plan like this. And I do feel the old me trying to ignore my heart. But the new me goes with the flow.

So I nod.

I can’t believe I’m going to cut class.

I’ve never cut class in my life.

I love how we walk down the hall, like we own it. Like we can leave anytime we want. It doesn’t matter that we have to go out the side door and sneak to the parking lot so no one sees us.

It feels incredible to be outside when I’m supposed to be inside. The sensation of freedom is intoxicating.

We drive until we get to the way-back roads. The dirt road we turn onto is a dead end. There’s nothing but trees everywhere you look.

Tobey turns the car off. He reaches over and takes something out of the glove compartment. It’s crookedly wrapped in the Sunday comics.

“Merry Christmas.” He holds the gift out to me.

“Wow. Did you wrap this yourself?”

“Of course not. I had it professionally done.”

“Impressive.”

“You deserve the best.”

I take his gift out of my bag. We agreed to exchange gifts today since we’ll be stuck doing family things for the next few days. I made him a mix CD and gave him a blacklight bulb.

I unwrap my gift. Of course he made me a mix CD, too. But then he also gave me the new White Stripes.

Tobey pushes around all these tapes and CDs covering the backseat.

I look at them. “Is there any kind of music you don’t listen to?”

“No. Well, opera maybe.”

“Who’s Jane’s Addiction?”

“They’re phenomenal. You can borrow it.”

“Okay. Thanks.”

He goes, “Here’s that R.E.M. I was playing before.”

I love how he said “before.” I love how we have this history.

Tobey hands it to me. “Borrow it for as long as you want.”

I examine the cover. “Why’s the cover orange if it’s called
Green
?”

“Stare at it.”

“I’m almost positive it’s orange.”

Tobey takes the CD and holds it in front of my face. “Just stare at it.”

I stare at it. I try not to laugh.

“Now look away really fast.”

I refocus on the glove compartment. A splotch of green hovers over it for a few seconds.

“Oh! Cool!”

“Complementary colors.”

“Yeah.”

We both sneak a look at each other at the same time. Then we quickly look out at the trees.

“So, um . . . I hope you like the mix CD,” he says. “I put ‘You Are the Everything’ from
Green
on there— that was the one you liked—and there’s some Journey and live James Taylor. . . . Oh, and some of that Led Zeppelin you liked—”

“Yeah!” I love how he always remembers what I like. “Thanks.”

Suddenly I feel that pull toward him. A tingly feeling spreads along the back of my neck when he kisses me. My brain fizzles.

“Want to get in the back?” Tobey says.

“Okay.” I don’t even care that it’s freezing.

We climb over the seat into the back. The backseat is huge. His whole car is huge. I remember how Matt made fun of it one day in the parking lot. He was like, “What’s this
Titanic
joint supposed to be? His car?”

Tobey says, “I’d turn the heat on, but if my battery dies we’re screwed.”

“It’s okay.”

“Wait.” Tobey runs out to the trunk. He runs back in with a blanket. “This blanket kind of smells,” he says. “Sorry.”

The blanket smells kind of like gasoline, but I’ve always liked that smell.

“It’s fine.”

Tobey spreads the blanket out on the seat. He kisses me.

“Are you comfortable?”

I forget the word for yes. I nod.

He starts kissing me again. His lips feel amazing.

It seems like five minutes later, but I know it’s more like an hour at least. It’s getting dark out. Plus the windows are all fogged up and my lips feel puffy.

I love how his hands feel on my body.

“Sara,” he whispers. “You feel so good.”

I kiss him over and over.

He moans. I want to take his clothes off . . . to know what it feels like. But it’s still too scary.

He says, “I can’t take it anymore.”

I love how I’m making him this crazy. And the best part is that he never pressures me to do anything.

Tobey stops kissing me. I put my arms around him. We lie next to each other for a while.

Eventually he says, “I don’t want to do this, but . . . I guess you have to go home.”

But I don’t want to go, either. I want to stay here with him, like this, forever.

He holds my hand the whole ride to my house.

And now we’re supposed to go back to our normal lives. That’s what people do. They have these amazing experiences with another person, and then they just go home and clean the bathroom or whatever.

CHAPTER 34

shocking facts

january 5, 10:04 a.m.

Shocking Fact #1: I still do my math homework.

And my grades are still decent. I’m determined to show Sara that I’ve changed.That I’ll be as successful in college as she wants me to be.

I feel so good that I’m also determined to do something crazy in pre-calc. Mr. Perry is picking people to put homework problems on the board.

“Twenty-three?” Mr. Perry growls. “Who wants to put up number twenty-three?”

Five kids are having conniptions, their hands straining to punch right through the ceiling.

Shocking Fact #2: I am currently raising my hand right along with them.

I’ve never raised my hand in math. Ever. Not even to answer a simple question. I’ve been doing all my work, but that’s as far as it goes. Nothing extra included.

Everyone stares. One girl barks out a laugh.

Mr. Perry thinks I’m joking. "Yes, Tobey? What can I do for you?” he says in this weary tone.

“I’m volunteering to put up twenty-three.”

Everyone freezes like they’re in a game of Red Light Green Light and I just screamed “Red!”

Mr. Perry is not amused.

“Very funny.” Mr. Perry starts to call on someone else.

“No, I’m serious. I did my homework. See?” I wave the paper around over my head. “And I want to do twenty-three. ”

“Very well.” But he still looks uncertain, like I might run up to the front of the room and rip some math posters off the wall. “Twenty-nine? Anyone?”

As I walk up to the board I’m grinning like crazy. I can’t help it. It’s Sara’s influence. Even when she’s not around, she’s still with me.

I know twenty-three was the hardest problem. And I know I got every step right.

Shocking Fact #3: If I didn’t know better, I would think that look in Mr. Perry’s eyes is something like hope.

There’s been tension between us ever since Battle of the Bands. Our momentum has changed. And we’re so stressed out with everything else going on.

“What key is this in?” Mike squints at the sheet music I wrote around two in the morning.

“F-sharp,” I say.

Mike squints some more. "Oh yeah duh. I see it now.”

Josh is sprawled out on the garage floor. “This floor is cold.”

“So maybe you should get up,” Mike says.

“I’m trying. My body just hasn’t responded yet.”

Mike pinches the bridge of his nose. He puts the sheet music on top of the amp. "You sound more exhausted than I feel.”

“There’s no contest in the exhaustion department,” I say. "I already won.”

“Now you know how we’ve felt all year,” Josh says. “I can’t believe how much effort it takes to maintain a C average.”

“That’s because you’ve been smoking the chronic again,” I joke.

Josh tries to throw a crunched-up Coke can at me. He slowly lifts his arm a few inches off the floor like it’s too heavy to be attached to his body. The can lands next to him with a tinny clank.

“Take that,” Josh says. He looks like he’s about to fall asleep.

“What’s happening to us?” I say. Lately it’s like we barely have enough energy to get through half of our set list. And we’re not playing up to our usual standards.

I don’t want to be here as much as I used to. And I don’t think I’m alone.

“We’re in a rut,” Mike says.

Josh yawns, still on the floor.

“Maybe we should . . .” I want to say maybe we should take a break for a while. I’m still making up work from last marking period, and I only have like a week left to get it all done. Plus now that I’m maintaining an A average, I have to do all of these stupid projects and reports and stuff. And after the Battle of the Bands fiasco, it occurred to me that maybe we’re not going to be famous after all.

Maybe we’ll even break up.

“Should what?” Mike looks at me.

“I don’t know. I was just thinking . . . we’re all so busy and tired, and . . . it’s not the same. Practice, I mean. Maybe we should . . . take a break?”

This perks Josh up.“You can’t take a break if you’re trying to make it.” He pushes himself up into a semi-sitting position. “You have to work at it all the time.”

“I know that,” I say. "Don’t you think I know that?”

“So what are you saying?” Mike demands.

“Just that maybe—” But then I stop. I haven’t even thought about what to say yet. “Forget it. Let’s just take a break and . . . How about I play my audition piece? I could really use some feedback.”

Mike calms down a little. "What are you playing?”

“You had to write your own piece. I haven’t titled it yet.”

I swing my guitar strap over my head and strum a few chords.Then I start playing from memory. That’s one sweet skill I’ve always had—being able to play without sheet music. I can also sight-read pretty decently. So at least I have those things going for me. Because diverting the judges’ attention away from my lacking academic history is the only thing that will save me.

This song I wrote is definitely my best work. I want to show them how good I am. It’s really technical in some places, but I don’t think it’s too busy. Just enough to distract them from my transcript.

When it’s over, I try to read their faces.“Well? What do you think?”

Mike and Josh exchange a look.

"Ummm...” Josh squints and massages his temples like he has a colossal headache.

“What was that supposed to be?” Mike says.

“My song, scumwad.”

“So, what? You’re playing that in public?” Josh shakes his head. “Bad idea.”

“Yeah, maybe you should...What do you call it when it’s like lip synching, but with a guitar? Strum synching?”

“I think the term you’re looking for,” Josh says,“is pluck synching.”

“Okay, you ass-munchers. Seriously. How was it?”

Josh pushes himself up off the floor. "Incredible.”

“Seriously?”

Mike nods. "They won’t know what hit ’em.”

Maybe this can really happen. And maybe there’s a real chance that Sara and I can stay together next year.

“Let’s bounce.” Josh starts to pack up.

“Are we still on for tomorrow?” Mike says.

“Why wouldn’t we be?”

During the ride to my place with the dark trees moving past us, I think about Sara. I wanted to tell her the whole truth about Cynthia before, but I couldn’t. I don’t want to scare her off. But it has to come up sometime. Especially if things keep going the way they are. The couple of times we’ve hooked up since my car have been just as intense, even more. But here’s the thing. I don’t want to hurt Sara. If she knows there was someone before her, would that scare her away? Would she think I’m like Dave, just using her for sex? And if she knows it was Cynthia, will she still like me?

CHAPTER 35

shocking discoveries

january 11, 9:18 a.m.

When Mr. Perry turns back to the board, I throw the note on Laila’s desk.

Yesterday when I was over at Tobey’s, we were studying and he went out for his usual snack-break provisions. I always let him go as long as he gets Oreos with mint filling. So while he was out, I kind of snooped around his room. I found condoms in his nightstand drawer. And then under some laundry on the floor there was this notebook with all these lyrics about girls. The last thing he wrote was this really intense song about having this really intense sex with some mystery girl. It couldn’t have really happened, though. Tobey said he’s never had a serious girlfriend before me, so there’s no way he’s had sex. He’s not the kind of shallow guy who would sleep around. Just the thought of him with another girl is infuriating enough.

But that song. It was so real. Like it already happened.

The note lands on my desk again. I cover it with my hand. Mr. Perry babbles about the Chain Rule. I slide the note to the edge of my desk. I transfer it to my lap. I unfold it slowly to minimize crackling sounds. So far it says: