More Than Good Enough(16)

“So I’m going to jail now?” She dug around in the avalanche of wadded-up papers.

I busted out a laugh. Where did she come up with this stuff? This girl was so smart. And just a little off. In other words, exactly my style.

“Don’t worry. I won’t blow your cover,” I told her.

“Pinkie swear?”

We linked digits, just like the old days.

“Good.” She unfolded a crinkled doodle, then rescrunched it. “Because I’m broke and I can’t bail myself out.”

“Me neither. I’ve been working for my fam on the Rez, but I keep blowing all my tips on Meat Lover’s pizza. If I don’t feed myself, it won’t happen.”

She punched the locker shut. Behind us, a bunch of sophomore chicks were talking in Spanish. The only word I understood was loco.

“Was that your dad?” Pippa asked. “I mean, the footage we saw in class.”

I winced. “He’s kind of unavoidable.”

“I’d like to meet him.”

“That’s what you think.” All I needed was for Pippa to swing by the house. Dad would probably talk smack about me. Or worse: creep her out with his amazing mack daddy skills.

“Actually, we have no choice. You’re my partner. We’re supposed to be filming each other’s ‘family life,’ remember? Unless you want to fail this class.”

“I can’t afford to fail. Thanks for reminding me.”

“I should interview your dad,” Pippa said. “Wouldn’t that be amazing?”

No, actually it wouldn’t. “Aren’t we supposed to avoid ‘talking head’ interviews?” I asked.

“This could be a voiceover. Bet he’s got a lot of stories.”

“True,” I said. “But here’s the deal. Nobody wants to hear it.”

“What makes you say that?”

“Because we live on a reservation in the middle of the Everglades. On weekends, my dad plays Early Bird bingo in the Game Lodge. How’s that for your documentary? A real life Miccosukee tribesman. Or maybe you prefer something more exciting, like alligator wrestling?”

“Sounds good,” she said. “But I might need to borrow a zoom lens.”

The bell clanged and everybody bolted for the stairs. I stood back and watched them stumble over each other. What had I gotten myself into? I couldn’t let Pippa see how pathetic my life had become. It was just too humiliating.

“Where are you headed now?” God, I sounded like a stalker.

“Computer Basics,” she said. “Actually, it’s not too basic. This kid, Sean, was supposed to teach me the magic of ‘cascading style sheets’ so I don’t screw up this quiz. I emailed him a million times but he never wrote back.”

The computer lab was on the other side of auditorium: a long, concrete slab facing the football field. We walked across the grass together. It was nice to get away from the endless rows of doors, all those numbers making you feel small.

We turned a corner and there was the building, rising up against the scalped-looking bushes. I had to do something. Fast.

“Let’s just stay here,” I said.

The Hole was looking worse than usual. I scooted around a shopping cart tipped upside down in the grass. Studied the plastic seat, with its X’d out pictures of smiling stick people: HAZARDS CAN RESULT FROM IMPROPER BEHAVIOR.

I tugged Pippa behind the cart. “Now we’re invisible.”

Playing pirates.

The classrooms went blurry. I rubbed my face on my sleeve and peered through the cart’s metal slats, trying to get a good look at who-knows-what.

We crouched there, not moving.

I bent a little closer, as if by gravitational pull, and kissed her, gently, on the lips.

Then something even more amazing happened.

Pippa kissed me back.

It happened so fast, I might’ve hallucinated the whole thing.

“Wait,” I said as she scrambled away from me. Away from everything. I called her name, but she was already headed to class, her hands stuffed deep in her pockets.





six



When I got home from school, I couldn’t stop thinking about Pippa’s kiss. At first, I thought she was into it. Now I wasn’t so sure. And if she really did feel that way, could it destroy the thing we’d found again?

Here’s a bigger question:

Could we take that chance?

My ex was the second girl I’d ever kissed.

Pippa was the first.

Afterwards, we never talked about it. We were in fifth grade. It didn’t mean anything. That’s what I kept telling myself.

The kiss today replayed in my mind. Why did she pull away? We were at school, which made it kind of awkward. But nobody was around. No kissing police or pervy teachers with nothing better to do than hand out detentions. Guess she just wasn’t prepared for it. Or maybe that was a lie I wanted to believe in. As long as I didn’t think too hard, I could almost forget it.

On Saturday morning, I padded barefoot into the kitchen. When I squinted through the window, Uncle Seth was in the backyard, talking to a Miccosukee woman in a straw hat. He used to be married, but his wife died in a car accident a long time ago. Sometimes I wondered if he had a girlfriend. Not that I was the world’s expert on that subject.