How Not To Be Popular (7 page)

I wonder if Jack feels as worn out as I do from all the comedy, drama, and sweaty sex. Watching it, I mean.

I should leave, but I want to be cool about it. If he realizes how awkward I feel, it might imply that his presence is having a strong effect on me. In other words, that I like him. Which I don’t.

The music stops. I arch my back and stretch out my arms, trying to appear casual. Unfortunately it only makes it seem like I’m pushing my boobs to the foreground. Jack happens to glance at me right when they’re at their zenith. He abruptly turns away and starts drumming his hands on his lap. I quickly straighten back up.

I want to say “I’m not flirting! Really!” but that would suggest the opposite. So instead I blurt, “Did you like it?” in an overly cheery voice.

“Huh?” He seems rather startled, almost guilty.

“The film,” I clarify, my face going prickly as I realize what he might have thought I meant. “What did you think of the movie?”

“I liked it.” His face relaxes and his mouth bends into a sideways smile. “You sure seemed to get into it.

Especially during the scary part.”

“Yeah.” I can’t help laughing a little, recalling how I almost dislocated his shoulder.

He laughs too and we lapse into another friendly face-off, our gazes bouncing from one eye to the next.

And suddenly it hits me: I’m having fun.

Crap cakes!

This is awful. I can’t let my guard down here! Especially with a
guy
! It’s totally against the rules for me to be enjoying myself. And I haven’t moped over Trevor in two hours! Of course, I am
now
—thoughts of him are practically dive-bombing me from all directions—but that’s beside the point. I don’t want to lose sight of the reason I began Operation Avoid Friends.

I just can’t say goodbye to another friend—girl
or
boy. It would probably do irreparable damage to my impressionable young psyche, leaving me incapable of bonding with people later in life. And it could very likely be the finishing blow to my relationship with my parents.

Plus it hurts way too much.

What to do…what to do…

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My smile must be slowly faltering, because Jack mirrors the expression back at me. “You okay?” he asks. “You look so…sad.”

Great. Now he sounds like Norm.

I command the sides of my mouth to lift. “I’m fine. I was just…thinking about the movie. It was a real downer at the end. I don’t get why she had to wander away again when spring came.” He toys with the straw in his empty cup. “It’s symbolic,” he says in his authoritative film-school-101

voice. “She’s not really a person but a force of nature or something.”

“Huh.” For some reason, this makes me feel sadder.

Just then the lights come back on. Jack stands up and slowly rolls his head in a circle while rubbing his neck. Once again I sit on my hands, resisting the urge to give him a Rosie-style upper-body massage.

“So,” he says, turning toward me and looking at his watch. “It’s still real early. You want to do something?”

Oh no. Oh no. Oh no.
This is exactly what I was afraid of. He must think we’re really hitting it off.

Somehow I’ve got to remind him that I’m a loser. If only I’d dressed like a weirdo.

Wait…that’s it!
Even though I can’t completely
look
weird right now, I can still
act
it!

“You know what I feel like?” I glance around the vacant theater. The place seems huge and grand with its speakers and spotlights and dark red carpet. “I feel like…turning cartwheels!”

“What?”

I don’t look back at him. Instead I bounce out of my seat and head onto the wide carpeted aisle. I raise my arms, point my right toe forward, and do a perfect wheel-around, my hair whipping all over the place.

Then I do another. And another.

Eventually I run out of room. “Ta-
da
!” I shout, ending in the classic Olympic-gymnast pose.

Jack looks so stunned his features seem to be sliding off his face.

“You try it!” I cry.

“No, no.” He shakes his head and lets out a nervous-sounding chuckle.

I can tell this is really bothering him. So I do a few more. Now I’m getting into it, adding some roundoffs and arm flourishes. I’ve never been the most nimble of creatures, but it’s fun to use your body and stretch your limbs. Strangely enough, the more I jump and flip, the less awkward I feel.

After a while I pause to take in Jack’s reaction. His mouth has curled into a grin but his eyes are wide and spooked-looking.

Yes!
I decide to do a couple more, just for insurance’s sake, and then leave him in total shock.

Only…I must have put my cart before the horse, because I get completely thrown off on the next one. I
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realize this when I’m at the most upside-down part, but by then I’ve gotten up so much momentum there’s nothing I can do. My left leg goes flying into the seats. I hear a popping sound and smell the syrupy odor of spilled fountain drink, and then the rest of me comes crashing down—limbs onto the seat cushions, ass on the gooey concrete floor.

“Aw crap!” I hear Jack’s cry, followed by the pounding of feet. Suddenly his brown loafers are right in front of my face. “You okay?”

“I’m fine. I’m fine. Fine, fine, fine,” I babble, as if saying it enough will make it so.

Jack grabs the body part closest to him (my right arm) and carefully helps me upright.

“See?” I say. “Totally fine.” I try to prove it by throwing my arms up in another Mary Lou Retton pose, when a chill suddenly wafts up my legs. I glance down and see my skirt lying bunched around my ankles.

So here I am, frozen in place like some half-dressed superhero action figure, wishing some real force of nature would take me up, up, and away.

The only things that fly up are Jack’s bushy eyebrows. He moves backward a small step, takes in my peasant-blouse-over-racer-striped-undies ensemble, and says, “Uh…I think the Italian judge just gave you a perfect ten.”

At this point the blood flow returns to my extremities. I bend over, grab my skirt, and pull it up, only to have it whoosh back down the second I let go. “Whoopsie…uh…I guess I snapped the waistband. Ha, ha, ha,” I blather as I retrieve it yet again.

“Here.” Jack unbuttons his shirt and hands it to me. “Use this.” I tie the sleeves around my middle, just below the skirt’s waistband, so that the shirt holds it up like a belt. “Thanks,” I mumble.

“No big deal.”

Jack looks almost rugged in his wife-beater undershirt, and I can’t help noticing his well-toned arms and shoulders. Just in case I get any bizarre urges, I move my hands safely behind me, grabbing hold of a metal armrest.

“So…” He claps his hands and rubs them together. It’s clear he wants me to fill in the rest.

“So…,” I echo, “see ya!” I quickly trot over to our abandoned seats and retrieve my purse.

“You’re leaving?”

“Yep. Gotta go!” I reply without glancing back at him. As I head up the aisle toward the exit, I start to ache, and my gait is somewhat wobbly. When I approach the door, I almost collide with an usher pulling a large rubber trash can into the theater.

“Okay. Bye!” Jack calls.

I refuse to look at him. I race through the lobby and push through the glass doors into the steamy outside air. It’s not until I’m two blocks away from the cinema that I start to breathe normally again.

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Well, I wanted to look like a weirdo and totally turn him off. Check plus on that.

If only it hadn’t been so damn painful.

When I reach our building, I hear several voices through the open upstairs windows, and the aroma of patchouli has traveled down to street level. I’m sore and cranky and the air is still suffocatingly humid.

There’s an evening breeze, but it feels like a blow-dryer on the high setting. I really don’t want to go inside and have to hug strangers and talk about my rising sign while eating overripe fruit. So, making sure Jack’s shirt is securely holding up my skirt, I continue walking down Rio Grande.

I pass a used-furniture store, a beauty salon, a lawyer’s office, and a café/pastry bar. I consider going in for some tea, but it looks like a hangout for kids my age. Being in the most antisocial of moods, I just keep going.

As I usually do whenever I’m alone with my thoughts, I start obsessing about Trevor. I wonder what he’s doing right now. Maybe he went to see the new James Bond. If he did, did he go with friends? Or a date? Or maybe the Rangers had a big picnic or campout. They must have been planning something to have had such an important meeting the other day. Unless…he lied about that just to get off the phone with me.

Just thinking about that conversation makes me feel tight and stomped on. I hated all those long pauses and the overabundance of the word “fine.” That’s not us—or at least not how we used to be.

Love is supposed to be forever, right? So how can it turn into something so awkward and bad in just a few weeks?

My nostrils start stinging and my vision goes all hazy. I can feel a big round of blubbering coming on, and I really don’t want to do that on a sidewalk in the middle of a strange city. I have to make myself think about something else.

I try out a few general topics—college, the state of the world, the weird gunk that suddenly appears beneath my fingernails—but somehow, everything takes me back to Trevor. Finally I hit upon a definite non-Trevor-like subject: Jack.

I can’t help smiling a little when I remember Jack’s rapid-fire laugh, like the sound of whirring helicopter blades. Or that stupefied look on his face as I began my spur-of-the-moment tumbling routine. It was the first genuine fun I’ve had in this sauna of a city. Even though I can never let it happen again, it was nice while it lasted.

It seems strange that I could share a moment with a guy like him—some rigid, bureaucratic type who bosses students as if he’s been deputized by the principal. Maybe that’s just it. Maybe we can be easygoing with each other because we know we could never seriously like each other. Like I could Trevor…

Crap-a-roni!
I’m doing it again!

Is there no safe issue my sad, sore little mind can take on?

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I come to a stop and glance around. As I’ve headed in the direction of downtown, the street has changed. Up ahead I see parking garages and office buildings instead of funky eateries and renovated Victorian homes. To my left, just across the street, is a small thrift shop. Naked vintage-looking mannequins stand in various poses in the display window—some holding knickknacks, some perched on retro furniture. Repo Sessions reads the puffy 1960s-style lettering on the roof. Since I’m still not ready to head home, I decide to venture inside.

“Welcome!” calls a man sitting on a stool behind the cash register. He’s supertall, with long sideburns and a mini pompadour. The sleeves of his Western shirt are rolled up to reveal a Betty Boop tattoo on his left arm. “Can I help you find something?”

“Just looking,” I reply.

He gives me a nod and goes back to reading an issue of
Interview.
I heave a little sigh of relief. Seeing that I’m the only customer in here, I was afraid he’d want to engage in small talk. And I really don’t want to converse with anyone right now.

Holding my big woven bag against me to keep it from bumping things, I wander around the various racks and displays. An old stereo console is playing synth-heavy 1980s music—Duran Duran, if the displayed album cover is correct. Beaded curtains and old posters cover the wall. I see one of Jane Fonda as Barbarella, all slinky in her silver halter and space boots. (It’s one of the few movies I’ve seen.

One of Les’s favorites. Go figure.) Then there’s one of a blonde in leggings and a white headband.

Physical, it reads above her head. I start wondering if our shop has headbands like that.

If only I’d dressed weirdly today. Maybe then Jack wouldn’t have even spoken to me and I wouldn’t have had to resort to doing gymnastics in my underwear.

From now on, no more dropping the act—ever. It’s too risky. I don’t want to like anything about Austin. And if I remain in a superloser state, I can move about unbothered and unwelcome, like some enormous two-legged virus.

I cock my head as I hear the faint rhythm of girly chatter. Gradually it grows louder and louder, until two skinny, salon-chic females walk through the open doorway. I’m not sure, but I think they were with the group in the café.

Looking them over, I decide that they must be from some other high school, because these two are definitely dominant types. I can tell by the way they move, all languid and strutting. Two lionesses that know they’re at the top of the food chain.

I pretend to look at a collection of Happy Meal toys while listening in on them.

“Oh my god. This stuff is so old.”

“Yeah. Look at this. It’s, like, from the eighties or something.” They both speak in that lazy drone specific to their breed, full of bubbles and pops and very little melody—as if they already have so much, they are now completely bored with life. I sometimes wonder if this is why I never cracked the top tier of popularity in any of my schools. I have a naturally bouncy, somewhat dramatic voice, probably from the Les half of my genetic makeup.

The taller one, with the white-gold hair, is clearly the leader.
Why are all power princesses blond?

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“Oh god. Is that supposed to be a clock?” She turns to her lady-in-waiting, her pug nose all wrinkled in disgust. “Can you believe they try to sell this stuff?” I instinctively glance over at the clerk. He shoots me a tiny smile and rolls his eyes as if to say “Don’t worry. I’m used to this sort of crap.”

Just then the queen Barbie lets out a supersonic squeal. “Oh my god! Look at
this
!” Her friend stands on her tiptoes to look over the girl’s shoulder. “No way!” she exclaims with a snort.