someone catches on.”
“Where is he?” I say too quickly. Angelo, who was walking backward toward the food line, now stops.
“Outside,” he says, looking at me very carefully. “Why? You miss him?”
I’m blushing, but I’m too busy backtracking to pay much attention.
“I just didn’t think he was here, that’s all.”
“You been looking for him.”
“No, I haven’t—”
“What’s the deal with you two? You doin’ it?” He sits down and whacks me too hard on the shoulder. “Come on, you can tell me. I know everything about him. He won’t care.”
“Why are you asking me if you know everything about him?” I say, sort of proud of myself for a second.
He’s a little puzzled until his brain catches up with his ears. “All right, I don’t know everything about him. But he tells me about all the girls he bangs, so you can tell me if you’re doin’ it.”
I’m unprepared for the jealousy. It dries out my mouth. A slow smile crosses his face.
“Look at you. You’re all pissed off that he’s with other girls.”
“I’m not pissed off. I don’t care. He can do whatever the fuck he wants.” I figure if I throw in the F-word, it’ll sound better, but of course, since I’m not really practiced at throwing in the F-word, it just sounds stupid.
“You two are doin’ it! Did he ‘pop your cherry’?” he asks with air quotes. “How old are you, anyway?”
I amaze myself by starting to cry. It comes out of nowhere. Tears pool in my eyes, and I know that if I move my eyeballs at all, or if I blink, those tears will spill on the table. So I look down, trying to be still, concentrating on keeping my last little shred of pride intact.
He whacks me again, a little more gently this time. “Sweater, gimme the details,” he says, conspiratorially. “Jamie’s gonna tell me anyway.”
“Tell you what?”
I’ve wanted to see Jamie for five long days now so that I could apologize and set the record straight about the name thing. And any other time, I’d be thanking god that he showed up to get Angelo away from me and off the topic of my “cherry.” But right now, I’d rather be taking a test I didn’t study for than have to see his face. I make the fatal mistake of turning my head slightly, and a fat tear splats on the table. I glance up. Then two more fall. Angelo, to his credit, looks a little mortified by the waterworks.
“I’m just trying to get Sweater here to tell me what’s goin’ on, that’s all. I didn’t do anything. I swear, Jame. I didn’t touch her or nothin’. Well, I hit her on the shoulder but not hard. I didn’t hit you hard, did I?”
I can’t answer, even though I feel bad that he feels bad. We all just sit there. Teenage boys don’t know what to do with a crying girl. Even the crying girl doesn’t know what to do with the crying girl.
“I’m gonna go get that coffee now, Jame.”
“Yeah, you do that.”
“I hate when I make girls cry. Fuck,” he says. He wanders off, looking over his shoulder, completely bewildered.
The cafeteria seems to go silent as Jamie sits down across from me. “What did he say?”
I’m memorizing the initials scratched into the top of the table. JH, JG, SW, SR, TR. My throat is so constricted from trying not to cry that it aches like the worst strep ever, and I’m afraid of what my voice will sound like if I talk. Mostly, I just want to keep my nose from running in front of him.
“Rose.” I love the way he says my name. It starts somewhere in his chest and it has a Z instead of an S. My eyes rise to meet his, and he looks so concerned that I almost start to cry again. “What did he say to you? Was it about your dad?”
It would be a lot easier to explain my reaction if I were crying about my dad. And maybe I am for all I know. My mom warned me in her annoying therapy voice that I might cry about him without even realizing that that’s why I was crying. Maybe that’s what’s happening now.
Jamie reaches out his hand, but it stops just short of mine on the table and rests there. He’s got ink on his thumb, but other than that, his hands are immaculate. Beautiful. Strong. I can see the blood in his thick veins. I want to run my finger along them. I bet the insides of his forearms look the same way. I imagine pushing up his sleeve to look.
I shake my head and wipe my face. “Angelo was just teasing me,” I say.
“About what?”
I take a deep breath. “You.”
“Me?”
“He wanted to know if you and I were having sex. And whether I was a virgin.” The word sets my blushing mechanism off at full force. I can’t believe I put the issue of my virginity on the table, but I want him to hear my version of the story— Who knows what the heck Angelo will tell him.
Jamie smiles a little. “He just can’t get any, so he always wants to hear what everybody else is doing.” He pulls his hand back. “Not that we’re doing anything.”
Another tear, hopefully the last one, begins its descent, and I wipe it away before it hits my cheekbone.
“That’s why you’re upset?” he asks.
I nod my head. And it could end right there. I could just call it a day. But my mouth won’t stop running. “He said you tell him everything, about all the girls you…” My throat closes up again, and I can’t finish the sentence, never mind ask him about Regina.
“‘All the girls’? What girls? Do you see any girls around here?”
“He said that you…that you’re with a lot of girls.”
“Forget him.”
“You’re not with a lot of girls?”
He looks at me with mild curiosity and he’s about to say something when it occurs to me that I’ve been waiting for five days for the opportunity to apologize to him. “I’m sorry, Jamie,” I blurt out.
“For what?”
“For the other day. In your car. I knew your name. I’ve known your name since I was in seventh grade. But I was too—”
Angelo puts Jamie’s coffee and a doughnut between us.
“The doughnut’s for you, Sweater,” he says, and he sits at the end of the table, purposely looking the other way. Jamie takes his coffee and stands.
“I’m goin’ outside.” I’m not sure who he’s talking to. “Angelo,” he says sharply. Angelo gets up fast, without saying a word or looking at either of us.
I watch them walk toward the courtyard door. Angelo pushes the door hard, a cigarette already in his mouth, and disappears. Jamie turns, and I think, but I’m not sure, that he winks at me. He’s gone before I can manage a smile. I’m so exhausted and confused that I can’t even eat my doughnut.
prevaricate (verb): to stray from the truth
(see also: to lie like a jerk)
5
“HEY, WAIT UP!” Robert yells as I’m walking to school. It’s the middle of October. It’s cold, I’m miserable and Robert is the last person I want to talk to. I crank up the volume on my iPod and pick up my pace as some old-school Public Enemy blares in my ears—Peter would be proud.
If anyone ever tried to figure out who I am based purely on my iPod, they’d never be able to do it. Public Enemy is followed by the Pussycat Dolls and preceded by Patty Griffin. I love my Florence