Kissing Ted Callahan (and Other Guys)(7)

“Hey.” Lucy bounds up next to me. “Did you get my message last night?”

She still acts like maybe it’s bad cell-phone reception. By now I feel like she’d ask if something was wrong, though she should already know what she did and how small and pointless it made me feel.

“No, sorry.” I shrug. Inside my chest, my heart feels caged. Life is basically good: Ashley is annoying, but Mom and Dad are fine, school is also fine, Ted is awkward but maybe attainable (!!!), the band is okay. But without Lucy, I’m not fine. Up until this school year started, there wasn’t a single day when I didn’t risk getting a late slip in one of my classes because it was so much more important to talk to Lucy at her locker instead.

“Did you have Yearbook yesterday?”

I’m pretty sure somewhere Lucy has a list of topics she can still discuss with me. Getting her voice mails, Yearbook, our mutual classes, the band—sort of. The music part of it at least.

“I did. It was mostly boring.” If things hadn’t changed, I know I’d be dying to tell Lucy every last bit of the car ride with Ted. She’d know everything about Ted! As things stand now, she doesn’t even know I like him. And now that she’s a lady of experience, I’m too embarrassed to tell her about crushes and nonaction and mermaid books.

“Too bad. Normally, Yearbook’s probably a big bucket of excitement,” she says.

“You can’t carry excitement in a bucket.”

“A backpack? A… what do you call those bandanas hobos carry on sticks? A bindle?”

“Excitement can’t be contained.” I nod toward my chemistry classroom. “See you in English lit?”

“Oh, sure,” Lucy says with a nod, and I can see how she didn’t think our conversation was over yet. She waves before heading off down the hallway. I watch her instead of walking into chemistry, but it’s like all I can see is our paths away from each other, dotted lines tracing how separate we’ve become.





CHAPTER NINE



Top Guys--by Riley


I think this is way too personal of feelings to put in a list! Reid is making me do this.


The Crush

He is smart, handsome, principled, and he has good taste in music. The end!

Everyone else

Not even worth discussing!





CHAPTER TEN



to: [email protected]

from: [email protected] subject: fencing club!!

hi ted!!





Why am I using so many exclamation points!?! Delete!


to: [email protected]

from: [email protected] subject: fencing club

dear ted,

how are you today? i’m pretty good. i’m writing to you about fencing club.





Why do I sound like he’s my pen pal forced upon me from an interschool correspondence league? Delete!


to: [email protected]

from: [email protected] subject: fencHing club just kidding!! what’s up for fencing club?





Maybe I shouldn’t remind him of how I can barely speak English in his presence and how just maybe that was some kind of Freudian slip brought on by how badly I would like to, among other things, French-kiss him. Wait. Does anyone even call it that? Or was that just in books about teenagers I read when I was twelve?


to: [email protected]

from: [email protected] subject: anything + everything

you are so smart and so cute and i like your messenger bag and someone told me they saw you at sunset junction last summer so i have a feeling you might have great taste in music and the way i’ve seen you put on Burt’s Bees beeswax lip balm makes me think you’re probably a really great kisser so can we just DO THIS, TED, CAN WE?





Yeah, I am not sending that one.

After forty-five minutes, I do not have a masterpiece, but I’m pleased enough to hit send.


to: [email protected]

from: [email protected] subject: Fencing Club hi ted,

i’m emailing about the fencing club because i am definitely interested in joining. i don’t know if it’s like yearbook with staff positions or whatever but i’m not picky, as you probably already know from the roar (like anyone else would have so happily covered the new fertilizer used on the courtyard flowers!).

—riley crowe-ellerman

www.thegolddiggersmusic.com





I tell myself I won’t sit at my computer refreshing my inbox, but of course that’s what I do. Going downstairs isn’t an option. Ashley has friends over, and I’m not up for stepping into their bubble of giggling and eye-shadow experimentation.

My phone seems to radiate its lack of activity, and I remind myself that even if Lucy calls, I won’t answer, so what does it matter? I still turn it off and on, just to check, even though I’ve never done that and had magical missing voice mails or texts appear. But, miraculamazingnessly, when I look back at my computer, there’s a (1) beside my inbox.

The bolded, brand-spanking-new email is, indeed, from [email protected].


to: [email protected] from: [email protected] subject: RE: Fencing Club