Gretchen bit her bottom lip and looked down at her scuffed sneakers for a second. When she didn’t say anything for a while, he said that it was too crowded inside and that they should go to the backyard. He led her through the crowd, slowly squeezing between random, isolated dance-offs and couples already making out. At the kitchen table, Joey Planko was sitting in just his underwear, organizing some sort of drinking game that involved a deck of cards and a beer mug in the middle of the table. Girls were sitting two to a chair to join in on the game.
Outside, someone had started a bonfire in the middle of the yard. Which was impressive and a little worrying, considering that Julia’s house had neither a fire pit nor firewood. Someone standing by the fire finished his beer and tossed the can into the fire, where it immediately crumpled in on itself. Dave and Gretchen caught up to Vince at one of the kegs. He’d just finished pouring a cup, and when he noticed the two of them he immediately handed it off to Gretchen and poured another two.
“Congrats on getting on the ballot, man,” Vince said. “That was pretty badass what you guys did. Just the idea to build a tree house on school property is ballsy. Were you high?”
“Nope,” Dave laughed.
“The tree house is so great,” Gretchen said, nodding. She sipped shyly from her beer and looked around the party. She looked so lovely, and he wished they were elsewhere, some place they could be alone.
“Well, all the more credit to you. I don’t know why you’ve been hiding these past four years of high school, but I wish you’d shown yourself earlier. It’s a shame everyone’s figuring out how cool you are this late.”
“I can’t imagine how many cool things you and Julia have done,” Gretchen said. She was holding her cup with both hands and smiling, but she didn’t meet Dave’s eyes. “Be honest, how many times have you saved the world from imminent destruction?”
“Once or twice,” Dave said, mustering a smile. He spotted Julia coming outside, yelling, “All right, which of you bastards fed my cat cheese puffs?” She made her way around the party, checking people’s hands for evidence, finally stopping to chat with the Kapoor triplets, who were wearing different shades of the same pastel polo shirt, the collars, of course, popped.
Dave, Gretchen, and Vince stood in their little circle. Gretchen and Vince started talking about some project for their French class. Dave took constant, tiny sips of his beer, the mild bitterness coating his tongue. He looked up at the sky, where clouds were rolling in to cover up the stars. It felt like all he could do was stand there, and that even if it started to rain he wouldn’t be able to move. He was tired of inaction, tired of not having learned a thing from years of sitting still. It built up in him, like the desire to kiss Gretchen had on their date, but this time more powerful, more urgent. As if this was his last chance, a momentous fork in the road. If he chose inaction now, inaction it would be for the rest of his life.
“Hey, Vince, you mind if I talk to Gretchen for a sec?”
Vince stopped talking midsentence. “Uh, sure, man.” He gave Gretchen a look and then made his way toward the house.
“Sorry if I interrupted that,” Dave said. He picked a leaf that had fallen into his beer and flicked it onto the grass. “I’ve been meaning to talk to you about the other night.”
Gretchen shifted her weight from one foot to another. She looked down at the grass, too. If there was one thing Dave would ask of adults at that moment it was why people his age were constantly looking down at the ground, and if they would ever grow out of it. “You don’t have to, Dave, it’s okay. I get it.” She shrugged and smiled, a smile that felt somehow rehearsed, like the way he’d kept it in mind on their date at the harbor to compliment her looks.
“What do you mean?”
“It’s okay; I get that you’re with Julia. I’m sorry if I came on too strong.” Her smile faded to more of a lopsided grin. The hand not holding her beer reached across to her elbow, the turquoise ring catching a glint from the backyard lights. “I still like spending time with you, so—”