I stared at the note on my desk, trying to figure out my next move. I changed the face of my teacher on the paper to one of horror and passed it back to him. His shoulders chuckled with mirth before we went back to our tests. That had been it. He still talked mostly to his friends that surrounded our desks during class, but every once in a while, he would send me a look when something was funny. So far, I had made him laugh exactly two times.
So… we were friends, right? Friends could ask friends to the dance. The pit in my stomach grew into a tree.
“Penny!”
By that time, I had made my way to where Gina stood next to our shared locker. Her expressive eyes looked me over as I approached. “You feeling okay?”
“I’ve been better.Yourfault.”
She smiled as she tossed her auburn, Disney princess hair over her shoulder. “You’ll be fine. It’s not like it’s a real date or anything.” She wasn’t wrong. We were only in the 8thgrade. The dance would just be held after school because nobody could drive yet. Getting a “date” probably just guaranteed us some dances.
“Did you tell him?” My best friend was busy looking over my shoulder down the hallway, no doubt searching for my twin.
“I didn’t tell him. I just told him to check his locker before going home.”
“Do you think he’ll say ‘yes?’”
“Positive. Now can we stop talking about you liking my brother? I already feel like I might puke.”
She laughed and opened her locker, rummaging through her bag of toiletries. “Just think, if he says yes, you get to talk to him!”
I leaned against the locker next door. “The key word here is ‘if.’”
Gina applied a thin coat of lip-gloss, checking herself out in the mirror that was pressed against the inside door. “Did you bring the candy gram?”
“That thing burning a humongous hole in my backpack? Yeah, I brought it.” I hadn’t wanted to do any sort of grand gesture to ask him to the dance, but Gina insisted we had to do something, so we settled on a candy gram. Everyone liked candy, right? She made one for Matt, and I made one for Chase, which meant we spent all night surrounded by a pile of candy bars, coming up with lines like, ‘I love snickering with you in class,’ and ‘it would be worth a 100 Grand if you’d go with me to the dance.’
What have I done?
Gina was not deterred. Of course, it was easier for her; she knew Matt would say yes. Given the general amount of time I have spent actually talking to Chase, his niceness was still up for debate. I nudged Gina to the side and checked my own reflection in the mirror. No new pimples had appeared on my red, blotched cheeks since that morning, and I had no hidden boogers in my nose. I checked for food in my braces and picked out a speck of pop tart.
“The bell’s going to ring any minute,” Gina said. “Then you go to his locker and I’ll go to Matt’s, and we’ll make the drop.”
“Josh said he’d hang around his locker for a minute after the bell, so he can get you in,” I told her, clutching the shoulder straps on my backpack as if they were a lifeline. “Did you ask Mike to do the same for me?” Mike was Chase’s locker partner.
“He’ll be there. He said he might be late, but he’ll be there.”
The bell rang and we parted ways, each of us carrying our loaded backpacks to our intended lockers. Chase’s locker was down in the corner of two connecting hallways surrounding the practice gym. I peered down the hall and saw him, Pete Davis, and Jason Malcom standing next to his locker, laughing loudly at something. Pete and Jason were both in social studies with us and, while Jason was okay, Pete wasn’t my favorite person. I moved to wait in the hallway, located behind his locker, until they left. As the middle schoolers began to disperse toward their various classes, their voices became louder. I leaned against the wall running perpendicular behind them, ready to wait it out, just out of sight.
But not out of hearing.
“I heard Brandi Templeman was gonna ask you to the dance, Jase.” Pete’s laughter took on a higher pitch, as if he were doubled over, laughing at the thought. “But she couldn’t find a dress big enough to fit her.”
The two boys laughed, albeit a bit stiffly.
“Shut up, Davis.” That was Chase’s voice. Relief warmed my heart. Good, I was glad he was going to put Pete in his place for his mean comment. I had sat next to Brandi in algebra the year previous and we had bonded over our hatred for Mr. Young’s surprise pop quizzes he enjoyed torturing his class with.
“I heard Kat Hunter wantedyournumber,” Chase said, laughing.
The boys guffawed while I rolled my eyes, disappointment flooding through me. It felt a bit like watching an interview of a celebrity who played a role in my favorite movie. They were usually a letdown after falling in love with the character they played on screen.
“You better watch out, Riley,” Pete added, through the laughter. “I hear that Penny chick from social studies is into you.”
I stiffened at the sound of my name. My heart dropped. How could he have heard that? I hadn’t told anyone, except Gina, and she would never say anything.
“Penny who?”
Despite being on edge while listening to this conversation, I felt a bit hurt. How could he not know who I was? He had passed me a note! I made him laugh. Twice! Did that mean nothing?