Will something be different when I see Ben at school today?
I can’t seem to lower the volume on this idea, which makes catching another hour of sleep impossible. I can hear Dad downstairs making coffee. I get up and take my laptop to the little desk in the corner of the kitchen to print out my report.
“Mornin’, early bird.” Dad smiles, pouring coffee into his big travel mug and thermos. “Fresh outta worms today, but I can offer you a cuppa joe.”
“Sure.” I smile and cover my yawn as I wait for the printer to spit out my pages. Dad pours coffee into a mug that reads WORLD’S GREATEST DAD and places it in front of me on the counter. He points at the words and I laugh as he goes back to spreading peanut butter on bread. When Mom went back to work after the factory flood, her only stipulation was that everyone was on their own for lunch.
As the printer delivers page number five, Dad pauses behind me and plants a kiss on the top of my head. “First practice today?”
I nod, impressed he still keeps track of little things like this.
“Bring me home some Happy Joe’s.”
It’s a tradition we started in junior high. After the first practice of the season, Rachel, Christy, Lindsey, and I go get pizza. Our parents used to come along, but last year, we started driving ourselves.
I tell Dad I will as he latches his thermos into his gray lunch box. As he passes me on the way to the garage, he slides a crisp twenty-dollar bill onto the desk next to my computer. When I turn to tell him thank you, he just nods and closes the door behind him. I hear the automatic door open and his year-old Dodge Ram purrs to life.
I take the twenty back upstairs with my laptop and paper.
Not a bad start for a Monday.
My fear about things being different with Ben ends when I park behind the gym and see him waiting for me. He is leaning against his truck, his backpack slung casually across one shoulder, early man armed with provisions.
He bumps fists with Will, who struts off to class like he’s Captain America. As he goes, Ben turns to me.
“There you are.”
“Waiting for the T-Birds?” I ask.
“Nah. You’re the one that I want.”
I laugh, and he kisses me. We skirt the news vans, walking in the side doors at the end of the hallway hand-in-hand..
Dooney, Deacon, Randy, and Greg aren’t coming back to classes yet. The school board doesn’t want any more media attention, and the guys are all studying at home this week. Stacey isn’t back either, and I’m secretly relieved. I don’t want to have to explain to Ben what happened Saturday afternoon.
Dooney is absent and everywhere at once. His presence looms large even though his seat is empty. A bunch of guys from the basketball team have started wearing his jersey number, 12, emblazoned on armbands with Sharpies. Some of the cheerleaders have made buttons—royal blue with a yellow twelve—and are handing them out before school. I see them everywhere on the way to class, pinned to hoodies, T-shirts, and backpacks.
By the time Mr. Johnston dismisses first period on Monday morning, there is more to the story that surges through the hallways:
Phoebe broke up with Dooney yesterday.
Ben hasn’t heard from Dooney to confirm, but Christy swears up and down that it’s true. As Lindsey, Christy, Rachel, and I wade through the halls toward history, I see Phoebe close her locker with an armload of books as the Tracies approach.
Tracy bumps into Phoebe. Hard. Her books explode in all directions.
Tracie scowls and rolls her eyes, stepping over a binder. The rings have popped open, and its insides spill across the linoleum. Neither one of them stop.
Tracie doesn’t say sorry.
Tracy just yells, “Whoops!”
Then they both laugh and keep walking.
Phoebe is scrambling on her hands and knees to gather her notes and books, but no one is stopping to help her. In fact, no one is stopping at all.
I grab Rachel’s arm. “What the hell?”
Christy shrugs. “That’s what happens.”
I am about to ask her what she means when I see LeRon bump into Phoebe, still squatting to pick up her things. He knocks her sideways onto her hip as Kyle slides his size fourteen high-tops across the papers from her notebook, tearing them into pieces.
“Stop it, you asshole!” Phoebe is crying in frustration.
“You hear something?” LeRon asks Kyle.
“Nah, man. Don’t hear nothing.”
Reggie cocks his head to one side like he’s listening. “Wait!—oh—no, me neither.”
Phoebe pummels her fist against Kyle’s leg, trying to pull a spiral notebook out from under his shoe. “God. You’re such dicks.”
“We’re dicks?” Reggie says. “You’re the one who dumped Dooney.”
“Such a bitch move.” Kyle spits the words at her, kicking the spiral under his foot a little farther out of her reach.
“Right?” Reggie tosses an arm around Kyle as they start down the hall with LeRon.