Lindsay's Surprise Crush (8 page)

“Hi,” Lindsay said.

Rosie didn't say hi back. She waited until Lindsay was close enough to talk to without other people hearing.

“How come you didn't say anything?” she asked, a glint of a tear in the corner of one eye.

“
What?
Say anything about what?” asked Lindsay quickly, but already dread was creeping through her.

“About Troy? About how you totally were flirting with him? Like about seventeen people said you were. I thought you said you didn't even know who he was!” she said accusingly.

“Rosie, I know it looks bad. But I can explain—I'm really sorry,” said Lindsay. “I, well, I heard he was thinking of asking me to the dance, see, but I swear I'm not going with him! I told him no! I didn't want you to be mad!” Everything was coming out all wrong. Her words sounded so lame, so, well, guilt-ridden.

Rosie's face darkened. “You know, Linz, I just don't know what to think right now,” she said. “First I hear all these rumors that you've been chasing Nick down the hall and asking him to the dance—”

“That is so not true and you know it!” said Lindsay, her temper flaring. “You're the one who started the rumor that I liked him in the first place!”

Rosie shook her head slowly. “And now you're going around saying that you could have gone to the dance with Troy, but you turned him down?”

“I'm not ‘going around saying it,' ” retorted Lindsay. “I'm saying it to you.” A sick feeling rose up in her, like when you're on a roller coaster that's slowly getting to the top of a huge rise and you know you're about to go flying down on the other side of it and you can't do anything to stop it. She wanted to stop this bad conversation with her friend, but she didn't feel like she could control where it was going. “I just heard he was going to ask me, and I knew you'd be upset, so I said I wasn't going.”

“Well, you were right about me being upset,” said Rosie, and her dark eyes flashed. “And what I don't get is why you were hanging around him in the first place, after you told me you barely knew him. Now I feel like I barely know you, Lindsay! And that's a pretty rotten way to feel about someone who is supposed to be one of your best friends. Anyway, whatever. I'm going to lunch. I'm starved.”

After Rosie left, Lindsay leaned back against the lockers and closed her eyes. She tried to make time move backward, to somehow erase and rerecord the conversation they just had. But she couldn't. Slowly, her feet carried her toward the cafeteria.

Rosie was already at their usual table, but the usual space next to her, where Lindsay always sat, didn't have a chair. There was no place for her to sit. None of her friends looked up, or called to her, or waved her over as they usually did. They were all sitting quietly with their heads down, not talking much to one another.

She looked over at Nick's table. He was sitting with his usual throng of seventh and eighth graders. It was a much livelier, chattier table than the one where Lindsay's friends were sitting, although Nick and Cassidy were sitting with their heads bowed together as though they were having a private conversation.

Panic welled up in her. Should she just go hide in the bathroom until lunch was over? She didn't want to get demerit points for skipping lunch. Plus she was starving. She'd barely touched her breakfast this morning because she'd been so nervous about her presentation.

Without looking around, she collected her tray and
utensils and got her lunch. Then she turned and headed purposefully toward the table where Claudia was sitting, eating more or less by herself, slightly apart from the clump of other kids at the end of the table.

“Mind if I sit with you?” asked Lindsay.

Claudia smiled sweetly and moved her tray a little to allow Lindsay to sit down. “Of course. Please sit!” she said.

Lindsay sat. She liked the way Claudia talked. She said “seet,” instead of “sit.”

“I enjoyed your talk this morning,” said Claudia. “It was so entertaining.”

“Thanks,” said Lindsay. “I thought yours was really interesting too.” She took a tiny bite of macaroni and cheese and tried to swallow past the big lump in her throat. “Are you homesick for Mexico?”

“A little,” said Claudia. “But it's nice here, too.”

“Do you have brothers and sisters?”

“Three brothers. Two older, one younger.”

“Oh, right. I remember that from your presentation,” said Lindsay. “And they're all really good soccer players, right? Is that what you guys do for fun back in Mexico?”

“We do play a lot,” said Claudia. “I love to play soccer.
I got very good, playing against my brothers. And at my school, I play midfielder.”

“Oh! Why don't you play for Central Falls's team, then?” asked Lindsay.

Claudia shook her head wistfully. “I did not bring my soccer shoes—how do you say them, with the bumps underneath?”

“Cleats?”

“Yes, the cleats. And also, my host family has two younger children, only in third and fifth grade. I don't like to ask them to drive me to places.”

Lindsay was thoughtful as she picked at her fruit cup. “Yeah, I can see why that might be hard,” she said.

“The bell is going to ring in a moment,” said Claudia, collecting the paper stuff from around her tray. “I must go try to understand my book for English class. I have read the chapter twice, but it is not easy still. It was very nice to talk with you.”

Lindsay smiled, even though she had that huge, annoying lump in her throat. “It was nice to talk to you, too. I'll see you in social studies.”

LINDSAY SOMEHOW MANAGED TO GET THROUGH
the rest of the day without crying publicly, but it took all her power not to. She saw Rosie in English class, but Rosie didn't even look at her. Even Sasha and Jenn and Chloe were a little standoffish, saying hi to her quickly in the hallway and hurrying on.

She thought miserably about the party at Cassidy's that would be going on that night, the one she hadn't been invited to. What would everyone be saying about her? Would anyone come to her defense if kids started saying mean things about her? In a way, she was glad she wasn't going. She could just go home and lock herself in her room and ignore everything. Well, at least until Monday.

When she got home from school, she could hear the sound of a little kid playing a simple piece, slowly and
with lots of mistakes. Lindsay's mom was often teaching a younger kid when Lindsay got home from school, as they got home earlier than the middle schoolers.

She went into the kitchen to make herself a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, since she'd barely touched her lunch. She heard the little kid leave and was just sitting down to eat when her mother came into the kitchen.

“Oh good, I'm glad you're home,” said her mom, giving her a kiss on the top of her head. “How was school?”

Hah,
thought Lindsay.
It was only the worst day of my life
. “Great,” she said dully.

“That's good. I forgot to tell you this,” said her mom, checking on something in the oven. “I volunteered for you to babysit tonight. For pay, of course. Please tell me you don't have plans.”

Lindsay was quiet for a minute. Actually, babysitting might be a good thing to do that night. It would keep her from moping around in her bedroom, wondering how much fun all her former friends were having at the world's funnest-sounding party that she hadn't been invited to. And she'd also told Rosie she had plans, so now it wouldn't be a lie.

“No, I don't have plans,” she said. “Where am I going to be babysitting?”

“Well, ah, it's more of a mother's helper kind of job,” said her mother, resetting the oven timer for ten more minutes. “A bunch of people in Daddy's office are having a potluck dinner, an engagement party for a young lawyer, and quite a few people are bringing their kids. The hostess, Mrs. Elkman, asked Daddy if he knew any babysitters. You can keep an eye on the kids while the grown-ups are having dinner. It'll be outside, mostly, although it may turn cold when the sun sets and you may be inside with them as well.”

“Okay,” said Lindsay. “What time?”

“We have to leave in . . . half an hour,” said her mom. “Daddy's meeting us there. Oh, dear, I'd better run and get dressed!”

An hour later, Lindsay found herself in the massive backyard of a large house across town. She'd barely had time to change into babysitting attire—her most comfy sweatshirt, oldest pair of jeans, and sneakers—before they'd had to run out the door.

There were six little kids, ranging in age from three to seven. Lindsay had always liked little kids, and after
she oversaw them all eating dinner, they spent a fun half an hour outside in the backyard, creating huge bubbles with oversize bubble wands, playing beach-ball tag, and drawing pictures on the walkway with colored chalk. When dusk set in and it started to get cold, Mrs. Elkman came outside and suggested that Lindsay take them downstairs to the basement, where there were lots of games to play.

“My own kids are all in college now,” said Mrs. Elkman, “but we still have all their games down there!”

When Lindsay got down to the basement with the kids, she was surprised to discover an upright piano in the corner. It was old and battered, but in tune, with no keys missing.

“Play us sumpin, Lih-zy!” said the three-year-old girl, Molly. “Play me the ‘Eensy Weensy Spider'!”

Lindsay sat down with Molly on her lap and played it. Immediately the rest of the kids dropped their toys and gathered around the piano, enthralled. She found a beaten-up old songbook inside the bench. She played all their suggestions, and the kids sang along exuberantly to each one. They were in the seventh verse of “The Wheels on the Bus” when she became aware that
someone had tiptoed down the basement steps and was standing at the bottom of the stairs, listening.

“Okay, guys, let's take a break,” said Lindsay after they'd finished the tenth verse. She swiveled her legs around the piano bench and found herself looking straight at Nick.

HE WAS THE LAST PERSON IN THE WORLD SHE'D
expected to find herself staring at.

“Wait, what? What are you doing here?” she stammered.

He grinned. “Hello to you, too,” he said, ambling over to the piano.

“I didn't think . . . I mean I thought . . . how do you even know the Elkmans? This is, like, a work party for my dad's office.”

“I know,” said Nick. “But Alberto and Mrs. Elkman went to college together and they're old friends, and she knew your mom and dad were good friends with my mom and stepdad, so she invited them to come. And . . . I heard maybe you might be here, so I tagged along.”

“But what about your—what about Cassidy's party?” asked Lindsay. “Why aren't you there?”

He shifted uncomfortably, dropping his eyes to the floor. “It's fine. I'll show up a little later. It's actually just a few blocks over from here, so I can walk.”

For the first time, Lindsay noticed what he was wearing. A polo shirt. Khaki pants. And his hair looked like he'd combed it. She'd never known him to comb his hair, ever. He'd once confessed to her that he just ran his fingers through it once or twice when he got out of the shower, and forgot about it the rest of the day. But she could definitely tell—he had actually parted his hair, sort of. He looked amazing. Great. He was all dolled up to see Cassidy.

She was suddenly aware of how awful she must look, with her hair in a sloppy ponytail, in her old sweatshirt and jeans. It just hadn't occurred to her that she'd run into anyone she knew.

“Hey, Boy!” said Molly, staring up at Nick. “Are you Lih-zy's boyfwend?”

Lindsay cringed. “No, he's just my friend,” she said to Molly.

“Can you be the horsie?” demanded Kyle, who was four. He was pointing up at Nick.

Nick grinned and got down on all fours, allowing Kyle
to climb onto his back. For the next half an hour, Lindsay was able to sit back on the couch and relax, watching Nick horseplay with the kids. He let them jump on him, hang from him, ride on him. He taught them card tricks. He showed them how he could stand on his head, and of course they all had to try, with varying degrees of success.

Finally, to settle them down, Lindsay put in a DVD for them. As the kids sat on the floor in front of the TV, entranced, she and Nick had a chance to sit down side-by-side on the comfy old couch.

Lindsay could feel the tension in the air between them, like a live electric wire she dared not touch. She was dying to ask him what he had thought of her presentation, and what gossip everyone was saying about her, and who was going to be at the party. But she couldn't summon the nerve. Maybe she didn't really want to know.

“I haven't heard you play piano in ages,” said Nick, breaking the silence. “You're really good, Linz. You should play in the orchestra or for one of the shows or something.”

Lindsay flushed. “Thanks. But you know I hate playing in front of people. Plus I don't really broadcast it much around school. It's not exactly cool to brag about being able to play Chopin.”

Nick shrugged. “I think it's really cool. And who cares?”

Lindsay nodded. She was remembering, in a big rush, why she liked Nick so much. He really didn't care if things were cool or not. They sat and watched a scene on the kids' DVD, showing two dogs in love with each other, sharing a plate of spaghetti by the light of a romantic moon. It was just a silly cartoon, but Lindsay felt her cheeks grow red watching it with Nick.

“So I guess you'll be heading off to your party, huh?” said Lindsay finally.

“I guess.”

“Why did you even come here?” she asked suddenly. The question came out like more of an accusation, even though Lindsay hadn't meant it to.