I have a sudden desire to stab Sarah in the throat with a pen. Too bad mine are all felt tips and wouldn’t do more than leave a dot of black on her skin. “Did he say something to you? Or are you just spinning your own little web of insanity?”
“I don’t want to betray his confidence,” she says loftily, hugging her books against her chest. “So I probably shouldn’t say anything else. But just be aware that he’s noticing.”
“Noticing what?”
“How you and David are suddenly besties . . . and maybe more.”
I could still throttle her, right? You don’t need a sharp pen to throttle someone. Or do you? What the hell is throttling, anyway? “Are you serious?” I say. “You guys know what the situation is—?that this is all about Ivy and Ethan. And if James has a problem with that, he can tell me himself. And if you say stupid things like your religion is more ‘real’ than other people’s, then I’m going to call you on it.”
“Fine,” she says angrily, and we walk in silence to class and don’t speak to each other for the rest of the day.
That evening, Ivy shows me a text from Ethan.
Your very hot. Can I see you soon?
“Nice.” I hand the phone back to her. “So are you going to see him again?”
“Do you think I should?”
“Absolutely. I like that boy.”
“Okay,” she says. “But can I also do something with Diana this weekend?”
I shrug. “Ask Mom.”
“I want you to take me.”
Apparently all of this chauffeuring and chaperoning of her and Ethan has made her more dependent on me, which is ironic, given that my original goal was to make her less dependent. “I do have a life of my own, you know.”
“You take me to see Ethan.”
“That’s different.”
“Why?”
“Just because it is.”
She gazes silently past my shoulder at the wall behind me.
I sigh. “Fine. I’ll drive you if I don’t have other plans, but there’s no way I’m taking you all the way to Alhambra or wherever she lives. We can meet near school or something.”
“I’ll ask. I got her cell phone number—?it was my idea.” She sounds proud, and maybe she should—?I don’t think she’s ever planned a get-together with a friend before. Maybe this whole Ethan thing really has motivated her to be more social, which would be sort of amazing and great. “I’ll text her.”
“You do that,” I say with a yawn.
When I enter the cafeteria on Tuesday, I spot David sitting alone at a table as usual, eating pasta and keeping his eyes on his laptop screen. As I watch, a piece of penne falls out of his mouth and onto his keyboard, and he just picks it up and sticks it back in his mouth, then swipes at the keys with a napkin.
He glances up and our eyes meet. He raises his hand with a gesture that seems like maybe he’s beckoning, so I come over. “Hey,” I say. “What’s up?”
“We have to see our grandparents on Saturday. Can you guys do something on Sunday?”
“I think so.” I idly swing my lunch bag from my fingertips. “Let me find out what Jeannie and Ron’s plans are.” I prefer to call my mother by her first name when I’m talking to other people. I’m sure there’s some deep psychological reason why. “If they’re going out, Ethan and Ivy can hang out at our house together. If they’re not . . .” I stop. “Your house isn’t any better, is it? I’m running out of ideas. Everything seems potentially disastrous.”
“Not everything,” David says. “There’s always the Roller Derby. They couldn’t possibly draw attention to themselves there.”
“Or pro wrestling . . .”
“Or we could take a different approach,” he says. “Send them off to high tea at a snobby hotel. Like tearing off the Band-Aid all at once—?just get the worst over with and then nothing else can possibly feel as bad. Are you just going to stand there, or are you going to sit down and eat with me? Or does the very fact I even suggested it demonstrate my ignorance of the school social hierarchy and its unwritten rules?”
“D, all of the above,” I say, and plop down on a bench across from him after only a fraction of a second of hesitation. I wasn’t planning on eating with him—?I always eat with Sarah or James or both of them and whatever other friends are around. But it’s ridiculous to stand there clutching my lunch and talking. Not just ridiculous—?kind of rude, like he’s not worthy of total lunch commitment. “But now you have to close your laptop. Unwritten rule number one of eating lunch with another human being is that you have to pretend to want to talk to them.”
“I’d rather look at you anyway,” he says, and closes the screen and shoves the laptop away from him.
I was unwrapping my bagel, but I stop and stare at him. “Was that, like, a compliment? Or some sort of . . . I don’t know . . . pleasantry?”
“Yes,” he says, flushing and looking away. “It was a pleasantry. A misguided attempt to make social conversation. And now that you’ve made me feel stupid for saying it, and ruined the word pleasantry for future generations, you have successfully convinced me never to say anything nice to anyone ever again.”
“You can’t blame me for being surprised.” I take a big bite of my bagel. I didn’t have time to toast it, and I didn’t put enough cream cheese on it, so it’s basically a big dry bite of stale bread. I drop it back down in disgust—?it’s not worth eating.
David tears a chocolate chip cookie in half. “Want some?” He holds a piece out to me. The chocolate glistens, and the brown-buttery inside looks like it will be chewy, which is how I like my cookies. I can’t think of a single reason to refuse. So I reach for it.
“Thanks.” We chew together for a companionable moment. “That was really good,” I say after I’ve swallowed.
“I know.” He balls up the wrap it came in. “It was a pretty big sacrifice on my part to give you half. I’m already regretting it.”
“I’ll make it up to you someday, somehow. This, I swear.”
“How about giving me your firstborn child?”