Quite an Undertaking - Devon's Story (18 page)

Gail opened her roast beef wrap. “Okay, so you dragged me out here to the busiest mall in the free world for some reason. What is going on with you?”

My stomach tied itself up in knots. I thought I was ready for this. Maybe Missy was right, maybe I shouldn’t tell Gail yet. Missy told me once that I had a set of brass ones. Darned if I could find them at that moment.

Gail pushed on. “Do you have big news or something? Or maybe you just missed me.” She batted her eyelashes and smiled, but the curiosity was plain on her face.

I put my wrap down and took a sip of my green iced tea. I kind of felt like throwing up, actually, but Gail had already witnessed enough of my bodily fluids for one day, so I took a deep breath to calm my nerves.

Gail obviously couldn’t stand my reticence anymore. “Dev, you’re killing me here. What is it?”

I felt my blush creep down my neck. Gail must have seen it because she said, “What? Did you murder someone?” She attempted a laugh, but it was unconvincing.

I faked a laugh. “No, dork. I just have to tell you something that’s really hard for me.” I looked around to see if anyone was listening.

Gail looked around, too and leaned in closer. She whispered, “What is it? You’re scaring me.”

My stomach clenched again, and I heard myself whisper, “I think I’m gay.”

Gail’s eyes grew wide. “Gay?” she said way too loudly. “How do you know you’re gay? I mean, you’ve never, like, been with a girl, right?” She hesitated before she said the word girl.

“No, but…I mean you knew you liked guys before you were with Travis, right?”

It was Gail’s turn to blush. “Okay, okay, I get that.” She took a sip from her iced tea bottle. “Did you just figure this out?”

“No.”

“When?”

“Eighth grade.”

Gail’s eyes grew wide. I could see her absorbing the information. She didn’t say anything for so long, that I thought maybe I had truly freaked her out. I mean I was this big lezzie sitting right next to her at the mall.

“Gail?” My voice sounded loud as I broke the increasing silence.

“I’ve known you for, what, eight years, and you’ve been gay almost half that time?”

“I guess so.” I shrugged, and my insides trembled. I hoped Gail didn’t see how much my hands were shaking as I took a sip of tea.

“Why didn’t you tell me before?”

I shrugged my shoulders.

She gasped. “Oh, my God. Mike!” She dropped her sandwich as if it bit her. “Oh, how awkward. I’m so sorry I did that to you.”

“I know. I didn’t know how to deal with the whole Mike thing myself. That’s why I had to tell you today. Aaah,” I faked a scream. “I couldn’t stand the pressure.”

“That’s why you didn’t want to go to Bruster. Eeks, I’m so sorry.”

“That’s okay, but I’ve got to figure out how to make Mike go away without revealing my secret. You know?”

“Yeah, and the sooner the better.” She held her sandwich out toward me. “Switch?”

I took her roast beef wrap and asked, “Why do we do this?”

“Because we’ve been friends forever, and you should have told me sooner.”

“I know.” I smiled at her and hoped we could still be best friends. “Are you okay with, you know, me?”

“Yeah, dork. It’s just going to take some getting used to. That’s all. Tell me one thing.”

“Okay.” The glint in her eye relaxed me a little.

“Did you ever have a crush on me?”

“No!” I said quickly.

“Phew.”

“Hey! Why phew?”

“Oh, I didn’t mean anything by that.” She tried unsuccessfully to suppress an embarrassed grin.

“Hey, don’t tell Travis.”

Gail didn’t say anything. She’d probably been deciding how she was going to break my news to Travis.

I said, “Not yet. Okay?”

“Oh, okay, fine. Spoil my big news. I’ll just tell him you needed consoling about your grandma with Christmas coming. Which you kind of did, right?”

“Yeah, I guess I did.”

We clinked sandwiches in salute.

“Hey,” she pointed to a blonde shopper walking by, “is she cute?”

“I don’t know.” Her question surprised me. “What am I some kind of expert now?”

“C’mon, help me out. I’m trying to figure out your type.”

I laughed and thought about Rebecca and her beautiful dark brown skin. Gail wouldn’t figure that one out in a million years. “I don’t have a type.”

“Everyone has a type.”

“Yeah, well, I don’t know what that is yet, okay?”

“Am I pretty?” Gail looked at me with complete fabricated innocence in her eyes.

“Yes, you are, but I’m not attracted to you. Okay?”

“Okay, okay. Just asking. Hey, how about her? She has a nice butt.” Gail nodded toward a girl walking by, probably a college student.

“Cut it out, dork. Don’t make me regret telling you.” I rolled my eyes for her benefit, but inside I was saying my own phew in relief.

MRS. GIBSON’S VOICE at Monday morning’s staff meeting barely penetrated the thousand other thoughts running through my head. I snuck a peek at Mike. He grinned when he saw me look at him. I refocused on Mrs. Gibson and felt my face flush. Obviously, Mike still had ideas about me. About us. This was going to be a long Monday.

Mrs. Gibson dismissed us to our assigned tasks, and I powered up my computer. Out of the corner of my eye, I watched Mike turn on his computer as well. The computer stations were aligned in a u-shape around the room, and Mike usually kept his back to me, but he had turned his computer slightly. He wanted see me better, I guess. As if to prove my point, he turned his head to look my direction. I had to stop this. Right away.

I needed to talk to Mike about the rifle team, anyway, because after going to what I thought was a girls’ rifle match, I found out that girls and guys competed equally on the same team. Talking to Mike about the rifle team might help break the ice for what I really needed to tell him.

I snuck another peek. He was hunched over his keyboard typing away. He was busy. Maybe I shouldn’t bother him. I started to open up the girls’ swimming file on my computer, but stopped myself. It was now or never. I sat up tall in my chair and grabbed a notepad and a pencil. I didn’t really need the props, but I wanted something to hold onto.

The squeaky wheels of my chair announced my journey to Mike’s station. “Hey, Mike, you got a minute?”

He saved his document. “Of course. Anything for you.”

I swallowed. He wasn’t making this easy. “I notice that we, uh, share a team.”

“We do?”

“Rifle.”

“Oh, yeah. They’re mixed. Okay, what do you want to do?”

I shifted slightly in my chair. “I don’t know. I guess we could share the space.”

“That sounds good. What about reporters?”

“I had Mary Schneider assigned to the team, but we can use your reporter if you want.”

“No. Jason Whitney was doing both basketball and rifle, so I’ll pull him off rifle. I don’t think he was that interested in it, anyway.” He winked at me as if including me in some kind of inside joke.

I swallowed again, not sure how to say what I needed to say. “All right. I’ll let Mary know she’s flying solo on the rifle team. I also, uh, wanted to thank you for a nice time on Friday.”

He beamed at me, and his cheeks flushed.

“I have to tell you, I…” God, this sucked. I looked into his expectant eyes and cringed. Just say it, you coward! “Mike, I just want to be friends. Okay? Gail pushes too hard sometimes. I like you, but just as a friend.” I knew I was kind of babbling, but I had to get it out.

He folded his arms, and I could see him processing what I’d just told him. After a moment, he sat up straighter in his chair and leaned away from me a bit. I felt bad for hurting him, but it was better not to lead him on.

“Okay,” he said after a long pause. “I’m down with that. I kind of had a feeling anyway.”

I grimaced for his benefit. “I’m sorry. I meant what I said about staying friends, though. You’re a great guy, and I’m sure there’s somebody out there for you. Somebody great. It’s just not me.”
And maybe someday I can tell you why.

“Okay.” He nodded his head toward his computer. “I should get back to this wrestling article. Mrs. Gibson’s starting her rounds.”

I turned to see Mrs. Gibson hovering over one of the kids on the other side of the room. “Oops, yeah. I’d better get back. Thanks Mike.”

“No problem.”

I wheeled back to my computer annoyed that eleventh grade was getting so hard.

GAIL AND I had the lunch table to ourselves because Travis was making up a physics lab or something.

“Great sports section in the paper today, Editor Raines.” Gail tapped the open newspaper in front of her.

“Thanks. Everybody seems to think so.” I plopped into the chair next to her. “I’ve been nervous all day long.”

“Your first editing job is kind of a big deal.”

“I know. Hey, I talked with Mike this morning.”

“Ooh! Do tell.” She thrust the paper aside and looked at me with expectant eyes. I had her full attention. “How’d he take it?”

I hid a smile behind my hand. Gail loved drama. “He took it okay, I guess. I don’t really know because I never broke up with anyone before.”

She laughed. “You guys weren’t even going out.” Something seemed to dawn on her, and she asked hurriedly, “Hey, you haven’t gone out with anyone before, have you?”

“No.”

“Phew.”

“Why ‘phew’ again?”

“Because I don’t want to miss that. I want to see you happy. I mean you kept this secret of yours for almost three years. Three years!” Although she said it in a joking tone, I knew she was serious.

“Oh, quit. That was the only thing I ever kept from you.” Except Rebecca. “I don’t have a secret lifestyle or anything.” Not really.

“You know. I thought you liked Chris Spencer. Remember him in sixth grade? You always wanted to hang out with him.”

I had to laugh. “Chris Spencer? Oh, my God. I just wanted to ride his bike.”

Gail laughed with me. “His bike? I can’t believe we hung out with him all those times, and all you wanted to do was ride his…ride. Oh, man. I could have sworn you liked him.”

“Chris? No way.”

“You know what? I just figured something out.” She looked rather smug. “You like Jessica Alba, don’t you?”

I didn’t say a word, but I knew my grin would tell her all she needed to know.

Gail pushed me with her shoulder. “Oh, my God. I should have seen it! All those stupid magazines. I thought you liked the flame guy, and all this time you were in love with the invisible girl.”

Gail didn’t know how right she was. Rebecca was turning into the invisible girl right at Grasse River High School. Lately, I’d only seen her during French, and we barely spoke to each other then. That was going to change, though, when my devilishly clever Operation Black-and-White began later.

I looked around the cafeteria hopeful that Grasse River’s new invisible girl would actually show up. I couldn’t look too long because I didn’t want to catch Jessie’s eye. I knew exactly where Jessie was in the cafeteria because I had developed a kind of self-defense radar about her. That’s why I stayed in the crowds in the hallways and went straight to all my classes. At my locker, I was faster than a NASCAR pit crew. Constantly looking over my shoulder was getting old fast, though. I wished Rebecca would talk to me, so I could tell her about Jessie wanting to beat me up. Maybe she could get her to back off or something.

Gail interrupted my thoughts. “Hey, you like someone, don’t you?”

I couldn’t lie to her. “Yeah, I guess.” I felt myself blush.

“Who is it?” Gail grabbed my arm as she scanned the cafeteria.

“You don’t know them.” What a coward, I couldn’t even say the word ‘her’ to my best friend. I didn’t know if Gail knew Rebecca or not, but I wasn’t ready to reveal my crush yet. I mean, I wasn’t sure if I could get anywhere with Rebecca, anyway.

“C’mon, try me. Is she here? In the cafeteria?”

Talking like that with Gail felt weird, really weird, but it felt oddly freeing at the same time. “No, she hasn’t been here since…” I trailed off not sure I should tell Rebecca’s business.

Gail leaned in closer always ready for good gossip. “Ooh, drama. She hasn’t been here since what?”

I decided to tell her. “Since she broke up with her girlfriend last week.”

“Oh, my God. I can’t believe there are, like, lesbians at Grasse River. That’s so…”

“What?” I wasn’t sure if she was going to say, “gross” or “disgusting” or “creepy.”

“Cool. That’s so cool. Who knew? It’s like a covert operation or something. Oh, my God. There must be gay guys around here, too.” She looked around the cafeteria with her eyes wide. “Ooh, do you think Frank’s gay? He’s kind of effeminate.”

I had unleashed a madwoman. “I don’t know. It’s not like we have secret decoder rings or something.”

“Okay, so tell me this. We’ve eaten lunch in this cafeteria practically every day for two and a half years, and during that whole time you’ve been checking out chicks?”

I blushed furiously. “Keep your voice down. Just this year, I guess.”

“How is it I’ve never noticed you doing this?”

I tried my best to plaster a look of disbelief on my face. “One word. Travis.”

She scrunched up her face. “Yeah, I guess I am preoccupied, but I like him so much it almost hurts.”

I sighed. “I know the feeling.”

“Oh, Dev, you got it bad. C’mon, who is it?”

I looked at her with the most serious expression I could muster. “Not yet, okay? I’m still kind of new at this whole thing.”

She tried her best boo-boo face on me, but I wasn’t Travis. I, unlike Travis, was immune to the Gail Marsters boo-boo face. “Nice try.”

She shrugged. “Oh, well. It still works on Travis.”

“Speaking of Travis.” I pointed to him as he made his way toward us. I watched Gail’s face light up when she spotted him. I felt a momentary twinge of envy. Would I ever have someone in my life that would make my face light up like that? Or, better yet, would someone’s face ever brighten for me?