“Why wouldn’t I be?”
“Julia, the man collects food in his mustache. He wears pocket protectors, which I’m pretty certain have been out of production since the eighties, right around the time his kind-of-sometimes mullet-hairdo thing went out of style. He makes jokes about irrational numbers. He’s a total cliché of a math teacher. I’m almost certain that he’s not a real person; he’s Frankenstein’s monster but made up of math-teacher clichés. I heard a rumor that he’s got all the known numbers of pi tattooed on his ass.”
“That’s a stupid rumor. And I can’t wait until I undress him and dispel it once and for all.”
Dave was mostly sure the comment was a joke, but he still felt a pang of jealousy. The bell rang, and everyone gathered their belongings, rushing toward the door as if already free for the day. Jenny Owens said, “Shit,” and tried to scribble in a few last-second answers.
Julia stood up, folding the Nevers list neatly and grabbing her belongings. She stepped into her sandals and gave Ms. Romero a little wave as they walked out into the hallway. Dave followed behind, still trying to figure out if Julia was joking.
o o o
“I’ve never been a stalker before,” Dave said. They waited for the Chili’s hostess to find them a table near where Marroney and a handful of other teachers had gathered to enjoy a Friday afternoon happy hour.
“This isn’t stalking. This is organizing a coincidental run-in.”
“That’s a stalkerish way to put it.”
After obsessing for the rest of the week over how to best seduce Marroney (Dave shuddered every time she said it), Julia declared Friday to be a Never day. After school, they’d go to Julia’s house and dye their hair in a bright display of their individuality—individuality purchased from a box at the CVS. But before they could do that, Julia and Marroney had to have their meet-cute. “Prepare for a lot of flirtatious giggling and some charming repartee,” Julia had said when they were outside the school, waiting for Marroney to leave so they could follow him. “And that’ll just be coming from him.”
Now Dave watched Marroney struggle to find the straw in his margarita, his tongue flicking out blindly. He wondered if Julia would call her own bluff anytime soon. Marroney was wearing a mustard-colored short-sleeved button-up shirt with a coffee stain on his collar. His tie had little calculators on it. Five other teachers were at the table, including Ms. Romero and Dave’s AP Chem teacher, Mr. Kahn. Each of them had a giant fluorescent-colored frozen margarita in front of them.
Dave and Julia sat in a booth perpendicular to the teachers so they could both see as the teachers delved into a bottomless basket of chips and salsa. On his first attempt, a fat blob of red salsa fell from Marroney’s chips and landed squarely on his tie.
“You know, I didn’t get it at first,” Dave said, turning to look at Julia, who was smiling in Marroney’s direction, “but you’re right. This has the makings of a great seduction.”
“Your tone says you’re trying to be sarcastic, but I’m failing to understand the joke.”