Shuffle, Repeat(68)

No.

? ? ?

Early Monday morning, Mom parks in one of the employee lots on the U of M campus and we get out into the cold morning air. I trudge behind her, sending Oliver a text as I walk.


came in w/Mom today so no need 2 pick me up. srry hvnt called yet. super busy



He writes back immediately.


no problem! see you at school.



Mom has office hours, so she lets me into one of the galleries, where I sit on a bench and stare at a wall of turquoise canvases. I decide that both the bench and my life are hard, and that both the art and my heart are inscrutable. I sit there, feeling self-congratulatory about those poetic thoughts, until it’s time to walk to school.

? ? ?

It starts in homeroom when Lily plops down next to me. “How was your weekend?”

“Fine.” It’s not completely a lie.

“Was the fine part when Oliver almost punched Theo, or was it fine when you rolled around the back of a pickup truck with him?”

“It wasn’t a pickup truck. It was the hood of Oliver’s car.” I drop my head into my hands.

When homeroom is over, Shaun finds us in the hall as we’re all on the way to English. “How was that tequila?”

“We didn’t drink it.”

“They were too busy,” Lily tells him.

“I know,” says Shaun.

“Everyone knows,” says Lily.

“I think I have a migraine,” I tell them, and bolt.

? ? ?

After lying around the nurse’s office for a couple hours, unable to produce either a fever or some vomit, I get sent back to class. I consider ditching—just walking off campus and away from school, my senior year, graduation, life—but can’t bring myself to do it. After all, true escape is so close on the horizon, and then I’ll never have to see any of these people again. Only a few more weeks.

I just have to get through them.

Everyone would have stared at me anyway, because it’s natural to stare when a student walks into class totally late and drops a note on the teacher’s desk, but today—as Mrs. Nelson glances at the slip from the office and dismisses me with a nod—I feel all those eyes like they’re heavy objects dropping on every inch of my skin, turning it hot, pressing against my body.

Judging.

Even though I don’t look toward the back of the classroom, I know that two of the eyes belong to Oliver and they are the heaviest and the hottest of all. I can’t meet them with my own.

Because there’s nothing else to do, I sit by Ainsley, slinging my backpack onto the floor beside my chair. Given that even people who didn’t attend Saturday’s party have heard that I spent it kissing Oliver on some form of vehicle, I know there’s no way Ainsley isn’t in the loop. I take a deep breath before turning to her.

She’s smiling.

At the front of the room, Mrs. Nelson fiddles with a remote control. She’s experiencing some technical difficulties with the movie we’re supposed to watch about momentum and collisions. Apparently it gives the class license to talk, so Kaylie hops up from her lab table and drags her chair to us. “Hey, kids.”

Ainsley and I both tell her hello. My tone is wary; Ainsley’s is chipper.

“So how about that party?” Kaylie waggles her eyebrows up and down at me. She’s about as subtle as Theo.

“I know, right?” says Ainsley. “Thanks for taking one for the team, June.”

I stare at her, trying to figure out her angle.

“Oh, is that what that was?” Kaylie asks.

“Yeah, he got a little crazy about Theo and me,” says Ainsley.

“Typical,” says Kaylie.

“Thanks for distracting him,” Ainsley says to me.

“He just needed his ego stroked?” Kaylie says.

“Yeah, his ego.” Ainsley makes a suggestive gesture with her hands.

“Right.” I pull out my textbook. “That’s totally what it was about. Oliver’s ego.” Even with Kaylie’s minimal intellect, I’m certain she can’t miss my sarcasm. I shake my head and make a show out of opening my book. I ignore Ainsley and Kaylie. I shut them out.

I can feel rather than see the glances they exchange with each other. “What’s her problem?” Kaylie whispers.

I keep my eyes firmly fixed on the page.

Ainsley and Theo deserve each other.

? ? ?

It turns out even a superfast athlete can be avoided if one leaps from one’s seat and sprints away when the bell rings, especially if one then takes off in the opposite direction of how one usually goes, and hides in the girls’ bathroom until after the next class has started, even though it means one is then counted as tardy. However, it also turns out that if, an hour after that, one takes one’s lunch to the library and squirrels away into one of the study carrels, one might not be as hidden as one thinks.

I’ve just unwrapped my sandwich when the chair next to me clunks away from the adjacent carrel. Oliver drops into it. “Running, hiding, changing locations. It’s clever. You’re like a rabbit.”

“Thanks.” I don’t think my voice shakes, but I’m not completely sure. “I was actually just leaving.”

“No you weren’t.” He reaches over and turns my chair so I’m facing him. His smile is faint and his eyes are sad, and it’s stupid but I feel dizzy, like I might fall off my seat and right onto him. “I’m aware that it’s lame to ask if you got my message.” I nod and Oliver spreads his hands wide. “So…?”