“God, I’m likeflunking,” she says. “Give me a break.”
“It’s the first day of school,” I point out. “You aren’t flunking yet. We’re good students.” We are, it’s true. I don’t really have one subject I’m great at like Len and Lauren, who are amazing at science, or Charlie, who is a star history student. She likes to come over and ask my dad questions about warsI’ve never heard of. That’s how into it she is. But my GPA is pretty good.
“Youare,” Olivia says. “I don’t even know why I’m in calc. I should have taken stats like a sane human being.”
We trudge up to the table where Rob and Ben are sitting with Jake. The three of them are pretty close, although Ben is more of a recent addition. He didn’t really join our group until sophomore year. Charlie tried her best to keep him away longer, but he and Rob became superclose. If you ask me, Ben is actually a really stand-up guy. Charlie gives him a hard time about being nerdy because he doesn’t surf like Rob and Jake. I suspected something was going on this summer, and I’m not surprised Olivia and Ben are together, but the match is still funny. I always saw Ben as one of those guys who would end up a writer living in New York, sitting in cafés drinking black coffee and owning old Moleskine notebooks. Olivia drinks iced chai tea lattes and owns a Louis Vuitton book bag with the wordMIAMIbedazzled on the front. So you can see the disconnect there.
We drop our bags down near them, and I see Charlie’s; brown leather, worn and classic—totally her style.
“She inside?” I nod to Rob. Casual, cool. Like my heart isn’t beating three million miles a minute becausewe are going on a date tonight.
“Yeah.” He tilts his head to the side and squints at me. Since this morning everything he does seems like flirting. “How are you?” he asks, like it’s the most important question in the world, like he’s asking me how to defuse a nuclear bomb. I shrug, and he picks up his sandwich, offering it. “Want a bite?” Turkey and mustard. No tomato. He’s been eating the same thing from the school cafeteria since we were freshmen.
“Sure.” I take it and peer around the courtyard. Lauren is sitting with Dorothy Spellor. John and Matt are in a corner, playing Hacky Sack. Charlie is right. Everything is, I guess, in order.
“Another year,” Charlie says, waltzing up behind me, “and theystilldon’t have the good peanut butter.” She smiles at Jake and sits next to him.
Olivia has collapsed herself down next to Ben and is complaining about the fact that no one cares about seniority at this school, which basically ends up being an argument for why she should be allowed to cut in line in the cafeteria. Ben puts an arm around her shoulder and gives her an affectionate squeeze.
“I agree,” Charlie says, waving an apple around. “It’s totally absurd that we have to wait.”
“Should we even bother getting food?” Olivia asks. She’s craning her head over me to look into the cafeteria.
Sometimes we spend our lunch periods off campus, which islegal if you’re a senior. We used to do it last year too. I think the teachers knew, but I can’t be sure because we never got caught. Mr. Davis just used to make really pointed statements like “I could really go for a Subway sandwich right about now,” after we had just thrown the wrappers away.
The way lunch works senior year is that you can go off campus for your free period or lunch but not both, and if your free period happens to be before or after lunch, so that they’re right up against each other, you can leave for an hour and fifteen minutes. It turns out this will happen to everyone once in the school week, so it’s fair, I guess, but it still makes no sense. Why wouldn’t you get to just take off two full periods? Why deny us those extra fifteen minutes? This is the stuff about high school that I don’t understand.
I think that since we can legally do it this year, it holds less appeal, but it’s only the first day of school, and no one leaves on the first day of school.
Rob’s sandwich is kind of soggy, and as I hand it back to him, a piece of turkey falls onto the table.
Jake has Charlie in a headlock, and she’s squealing loudly, and Ben and Olivia seem to be immersed in conversation, although about what, I really couldn’t say.
I look at Rob. His shaggy hair is falling down in front of his face, and he looks so painfully cute, I just want to put my arms around him right here in the courtyard.
“I have to go,” he says, “but I’ll see you tonight?”
I nod, and he smiles. He leans in, but then Charlie and Jake break apart and so do we. Was he going to kiss me? Not possible. No way. Not here. Tonight?
“Later,” Rob says to the table, and then takes off toward Cooper House.
“Dude, the cove, after school,” Jake calls out after him, and Rob turns around and gives a little salute. It’s not directed at Jake, though. It’s straight at me.
“All you guys think about is surfing.” Charlie leans her head briefly on Jake’s shoulder and exaggerates a sigh.
“That is not all we think about, yo,” Jake says, tickling her.
I am still buzzing from Rob being so close and the promise of tonight that it takes me another minute to realize I’m actually hungry. “Come on,” I say to Olivia, and we both stand up and start walking over toward the cafeteria.
“Can you get us sparkling water?” Charlie calls, and I give her the thumbs-up over my shoulder.
The cafeteria is pretty small for a high school of our size. There are only about fifteen tables, given the fact that everyone, or at least upperclassmen, eats outside. When it’s raining, we usually take our food into Copper House or the PL. The inside of the cafeteria is depressing, and it’s basically all freshmen.
Taylor is in line, and Olivia scoots up to him, shimmying herhips in between him and Dan Jenkins so she’s smack up against him. Taylor, I mean. Dan notices, though, and starts tapping Steve Gesher on the shoulder to get him to see that Olivia’s hip is touching Taylor’s hip.
It’s not really all that surprising. She still flirts with Taylor a lot.
“Grab me a veggie,” I say to Olivia. “I’m gonna go get the water.”
