First, Last, and Always Page 6

“I really wasn’t thinking anything.” I was thinking he was badass.

  “Nah. I’ve never skipped. My parents would annihilate me. My dad’s in the military. A Marine man. Skipping class would end in corporal punishment or something.”

  “My grandfather was in the Army,” I say as if it’s remotely the same thing.

  “Cool.” Walking through the doorway and into class, he sighs. “Yeah, the only way I could ever skip class is if I could somehow prove to my dad that going to class would be a threat to my life or national security.”

  “That might not be as hard as you think,” I say without even thinking. “I’ve played that war game, Call of Duty, like, a hundred times. I’m pretty sure you can prove to your dad that algebra class isn’t much better than some of the stuff that happens in that game. I mean, there’s serious mathematical artillery fire goin’ on. Half the class is hemorrhaging when they walk out the door.” Did all of that really just come out of my mouth? Shut up, you idiot! That’s the kind of thing I would only say to Miles or Lani, but never to somebody I don’t know. And never to a guy like Grayson.

  Fortunately, he laughs. “You play Call of Duty?” He sounds surprised. “Now that’s badass.” He tilts his head. “Ya know,” he says as we take our seats, “You’re one pretty cool chick, Charlotte Hubbard.”

  My chin rests into my hand as my head goes completely limp. I manage a smile.

  It happened again.

  He stopped my beating heart.

  Clutching the straps of my backpack, I hustle through the crowds of students. I’m almost to the main entrance when I notice Lani. She gives me a skeptical look. “What are you so happy about?” she asks as I approach. “You do remember we’re in school, right? AKA educational prison?”

  “It’s not that terrible.” My negative opinion of school may be waning. I’ve been smiling ever since algebra, since Grayson, replaying our conversation in my head. He even walked with me after class. All right, technically he was behind me by a foot or two, but it felt like he was right beside me.

  Lani scoffs. “Not that terrible? Says you.” She sees straight through me. “This is about Mr. Algebra, isn’t it?”

  “Possibly.”

  She waves to a minivan in the parking lot. “Crap. Mom’s here. I want to hear all about it, but I gotta run. Let’s talk tonight, ’kay?” She beams. “I want all of the juicy details.”

  “I keep telling you, there aren’t any. The most exciting thing I can tell you is that he talked to me.”

  She rolls her eyes. “Hey, there’s Miles.” She waves again. “Tell him I said hi and bye.”

  I can’t help but smile. She’s like the Tasmanian devil, the way she flies around. “Okay.” I sigh.

  “Oh, hey,” she adds, backing away, “you and Miles have my permission to talk behind my back about how fabulous I am.”

  I shake my head.

  “Just keep it to a minimum. I prefer to hear all the good stuff when I’m around.” She waves one last time before running to the minivan parked on the other side of the bus lanes. Walking out the entrance, I head over to where Miles is standing—in front of the school next to the stone lion, a statue of the Radcliffe High School mascot—where we agreed to meet.

  “Hey,” he says, stoic as the statue.

  “Hey,” I say. We both stand there with our hands in our pockets. “How’d your day go?” I finally ask.

  His shoulders lift gently. “Eh,” he replies. “It’s on par with all the other days of school. How ’bout you?”

  “Kind of good, I think.”

  “Hey, I have a favor,” he says. “I forgot to ask you yesterday.”

  “Okay. Shoot.”

  “Mom’s going to the movies with my aunt Irene tonight. She asked me to babysit my cousins.”

  I can’t help laughing. “You’ve never babysat before.”

  “Yes. I know,” he says, flatly “Apparently their regular sitter was not available. Mom volunteered me.”

  “That’s a shame.”

  He gives me a look. “I appreciate the vote of confidence.”

  I smile. “So, you need my help babysitting?” The answer to this seems obvious.

  “If it’s not too much to ask,” he says.

  “Bella and Cyndi, right?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Sure,” I say. “I’ll come over.”

  “Cool.” Miles seems relieved. “So, what happened?” he asks, following me as we walk.

  “With what?”

  “Whatever made your day so good.”

  “Oh.” That. “Nothing that interesting. You don’t want to hear it.” The topic of boys and girls is not something we talk about. It’s sort of like China: We know the country exists, but we’ll probably never get there, and the language is way too difficult for us to learn. Neither of us has ever dated or talked about liking anyone, unless you count Harry Collins, the one boy that Miles knew I had a crush on in grade school.

  On the bus we grab our seat in the back. Out the window I happen to catch a glimpse of Grayson Miller exiting the school building. Feeling my face flush, I slouch in the seat.

  “Something’s up. I can tell. What is it?” Miles presses.

  I try again to evade him. “It’s really not a big deal.”

  His lips curl up. “I’ve never seen you like this. Come on. You have to tell me.”

  “I can’t.”

  “Why?”

  “It’s sort of embarrassing,” I admit.

  “You got tackled in flag football, too?” he says.

  “No,” I laugh. “This is different.”

  He stares and says nothing. Damn. I hate the stare-and-say-nothing trick.

  Trying to ignore him only makes it worse. “Okay,” I start, planning the next sentence in my head, “In one of my classes...” I pause. For some reason this is much more difficult than I anticipate. “There’s this...” How do I explain? “What I’m trying to say is, I’m thinking now that we’re in high school I want to...I mean, maybe we should consider...I dunno, possibly trying to go out or date or whatever?”

  Miles stares at me for what feels like forever. I’m not sure what he’s thinking, but I catch a look of almost terror flash behind his eyes. At first I’m not sure if it’s my poor, stammered grammar or the topic of conversation that horrifies him more, but then I realize he thinks I’m asking him about us. “No!” I laugh, shaking my head and hands. “No. I didn’t mean you and me date each other. I mean other people.”

  The familiar stoic expression resettles. Color returns to his cheeks. “Oh.” He still seems confused.

  “It’s stupid, I know, but I was just thinking....” My voice trails off.

  “You like someone?” Miles wonders.

  I shake my head. “Not really.”

  “You do.” He sees right through me.

  I shift uncomfortably. “Well, no...There’s no one specific.... I mean, sort of.” I’m totally not making sense. “Okay,” I confess. “It’s really nothing, but there is this guy in my algebra class.”

  “A guy in your algebra class?”

  I nod. “His name is Grayson.” I lower my voice to a whisper and take a deep breath. I’m so nervous, not because I’m having these feelings, but because I’m saying them out loud. “It really is nothing,” I say. “It just got me thinking, wondering if maybe I should reconsider being an unemotional hermit the rest of my life.” That sounds more absurd than it did in my head. Miles looks at me like I’ve just told him Mars will no longer be a planet. “Anyway, this guy, Grayson, he...I dunno, he seems nice. Like I said, it’s stupid.”

  With a nod, Miles stares back at me blankly. I wait. He must think I’m completely nuts. He blinks a few times before giving me one of his usual pensive responses. “That’s cool.” He becomes silent. Blotchy spots start to form on the base of his neck.

  “You think I’m crazy, don’t you?”

  Miles shakes his head.

  “Something’s wrong. Your neck is getting all red.”<
br />
  He rubs his neck with his hand. “No. I’m fine. It’s just hot in here.”

  “Are you sure?” Maybe this is a topic I should only be talking to Lani about. He seems really uncomfortable.

  “Uh-huh.” Miles nods before a strange expression forms on his face, like a cross between a grin and a squint. It looks like the sun might be in his eyes.

  “Okay, so what do you think? Do you think any guy on earth would ever actually consider going out with a girl like me?”

  He hesitates, as if he’s trying to find the right words. I can’t believe I asked him that. I’ve put him on the spot. This is getting awkward—he’s too nice to say no to my face.

  Finally Miles nods like I expect him to, careful and serious. “Yes,” he says, with his weird squint-grin. “I do.”

  I smile. Even though he probably feels like he has to say it, it’s nice to hear.

  Miles

  Charlotte gets off the bus and I wave to her from inside the window, trying to maintain my fake smile. When the bus pulls away and she’s out of sight, I take a deep breath.

  It’s killing me not to say anything, but I can’t hold it in anymore.

  I, Miles Fiester, am in love with Charlotte Hubbard.

  I’ve been totally crazy about her ever since the third grade, the second week of school, at recess, when Penny Tollman called me ugly on the playground. I remember the moment as if it happened yesterday. Everyone else laughed, but not Charlotte; she stepped right up to Penny Tollman, put her face in hers, and said, “Don’t you dare talk about Miles that way. He’s my best friend.” I’d never seen Charlotte act that way before—we were two of the quietest kids in our class, socially awkward even then. But that was it. Charlotte stole my heart and I’ve been trying to find a way to tell her ever since.

  The first time I made an attempt was on Valentine’s Day of that same year. It seemed like the perfect time. Everyone decorated a shoe box, cut a slit in the top, and we were given paper hearts to write notes on. One paper heart for every student: twenty-six cutouts to slip into twenty-six decorated boxes.

  I didn’t follow instructions. We were supposed to personalize each heart, but I didn’t want to. I knew immediately that there was only one thing I wanted to write, one public announcement I decided to make on Valentine’s Day, about the one person I wanted as my Valentine. So I wrote three words on every single heart-shaped piece of paper: Miles loves Charlotte. There wasn’t anyone else I wanted to give a valentine to. I just wanted to make sure everyone, especially Charlotte, knew how I felt, so I wrote our names in big, bold capital letters; then I folded up the twenty-six individual valentines, and, just as everyone was getting ready to file out for lunch, I secretly slipped one into each of the students’ boxes. Our teacher’s plan was to have us open our boxes and read all of our valentines at the end of the day.

  I couldn’t wait to see the look on Charlotte’s face when she realized how I felt about her. I pictured her smiling, blushing, telling me she liked me too. But then something happened at lunch. More specifically, something happened just after lunch, at recess: On the playground, under the jungle gym, Harry Collins kissed Marissa Delaney. And she kissed him back.

  Charlotte and I saw the whole thing from the swing set. “What’s he doing?” she cried, halting her movement.

  “What’s wrong?” I asked, slowing my swing down too.

  Charlotte continued to stare at Harry and Marissa as they went their separate ways, laughing with their friends, sneaking shy glances at each other as the girls around Marissa giggled and the boys around Harry jabbed him in the side.

  With pools of tears forming in her eyes, she said, “I thought Harry liked me.”

  My heart sank. “What?”

  She nodded slowly, still staring out at Harry. “Julie sits next to me in music and she said he liked me. She said he was going to give me a valentine today. Harry told her last week. And yesterday he sat by me in gym class, and...” Her voice trailed off.

  Nearby, Lenny Grapinski overheard Charlotte’s comment and laughed. “No way,” he yelled over to Charlotte. “That’s a bunch of bull.”

  Charlotte switched her attention from the tragedy happening in the middle of the playground to Lenny. “What did you say?”

  Lenny’s lips curved and slithered like a snake when he smirked—a stark reminder of how badass we were all supposed to think he was. “Julie lied. There’s no way Harry Collins could ever like you. You aren’t pretty enough.”

  Charlotte’s arms fell to her sides.

  Even in third grade Lenny didn’t have a filter or a conscience.

  Stepping off the swing, I faced him. “Cut it out, Lenny. You don’t have to be mean.” I had hoped a tough voice would emerge from some secret, courageous place inside of me. It did not.

  Lenny scoffed at my lame attempt at heroism. “Shut your face, Fiester. I wasn’t talking to you.”

  With a deep breath, I dug in my feet and clenched my fists. “Just leave her alone.” I sounded like a squeaky mouse.

  Lenny didn’t flinch. “What’s the matter? She can’t handle the truth?”

  “I mean it. Leave her alone.”

  He took a step toward me, mimicking my stance. His, of course, was more believable. It was clear that anything else I could have said wouldn’t have helped. Lenny would have won the battle of words because he would have replaced them with his fists, and he could have taken me out with two swings. I’m not much of a physical fighter. That would require courage and brawn and traits that live somewhere in my dreams. The only logical choice was to back off and let him have the last word.

  When I turned around to face Charlotte, her lower lip was quivering. The tears she’d tried to hold in were now trickling down her cheeks. The cruelty of Lenny’s words pushed her over the brink. Hurt and embarrassed, she jumped from the swing set and ran to the far end of the playground, where she disappeared behind a tree. As difficult as it was, I ignored Lenny, who was still chuckling like a hyena, and I walked over to find Charlotte on the ground, her legs curled in, knees tucked up into her chest. I wasn’t sure what to say to make her feel better, but in all honesty, I was also feeling down myself. I had no idea she liked Harry Collins. She never mentioned that to me before. My chest was in knots as I approached. “Charlotte?”

  “Go away,” she grumbled with her head down. “I just want to be left alone.”

  I dug my hands into my pockets. There are a thousand things I could have said that day, but the one thing that flew out of my mouth was: “You shouldn’t like Harry Collins.” They were not the most comforting words, I know, but it was the first thing that popped into my head.

  She sniffled.

  Trying to come up with something better, I added, “Look, don’t listen to Lenny. He’s just stupid.”

  More sniffling.

  When she didn’t say anything for a while, I thought about walking away—that’s what she asked for; what she wanted. But then she wiped her nose and said, “You’re right. I shouldn’t like Harry.”

  The way she spoke was promising, as if she had some epiphany, like maybe she should consider someone else. Hope returned for a split second.

  “I shouldn’t like Harry,” she repeated adamantly. “I shouldn’t like anyone.” For the second time that day, my heart fell. Then she added the nail in the coffin. “I hate boys!” she growled. “I hate boys and I hate Valentine’s Day! Miles, I swear, I’m never going to like another boy ever again.”

  FYI—it’s entirely possible for your heart to sink lower than the lowest point on your body, below your feet, into the ground, still attached to your skin by the smallest of small veins, which act as chains dragging you down, pulling painfully on every major surface of your body. I know this for a fact, because it happened to me just after she said she would never like another boy ever again.

  “Really?” I managed to squeak out.

  “Yeah. I mean it. Never,” she affirmed with tight fists and narrow eyes. After another sniffl
e she looked up at me, gave a meager smile, and said, “Thanks, Miles. I’m glad we’re friends and that you aren’t like all the other stupid boys at this school.”

  She had started to say something else, but by then it was too late. Before she could get in another word I was running from the playground toward the school. I ran as fast as I could into the building, down the hallway, into the classroom, and I tore open every single Valentine’s Day box in the room. I found the first heart with Miles loves Charlotte, and I ripped it into a thousand pieces. Then I moved on to the next box, then the next, then the next. She couldn’t see what I had done. I didn’t want her to hate me. I didn’t want her to not be my friend. Grabbing the next box, I tore open the top and sifted through the handwritten hearts. Found another. Rip. Rip. Rip. Next. Sift. Got it. Rip. Next.

  “Miles? Oh, my God, Miles! What’s going on? What are you doing?”

  The teacher was standing in the doorway. I’m not sure how long I’d been in the room, but it was clear that recess was over. The students were standing behind the teacher. Everyone was gawking at me. They looked horrified. Charlotte stepped to the front of the line. When she saw me, she looked more confused than everyone else. Then she looked around the room, at all of the valentines shredded on the ground. Thank goodness I’d found every last one I’d made. As soon as Charlotte realized what was happening, she smiled at me. Then she laughed; then everyone behind her laughed. Everyone was laughing but the teacher. And me, of course. I was told to go to the principal’s office.

  Charlotte still laughs about that day, but only because she thinks I ripped up all the cards in protest of Valentine’s Day for her. She has no idea what the real reason is. That’s the day I swore that I would never tell Charlotte or anyone else how I felt about her. Not unless I was absolutely sure she felt the same way about me. She’s never mentioned anything about liking another boy, and I convinced myself, since that day on the playground six years ago, that eventually, if I was patient, Charlotte would realize the only guy she really needs has been standing in front of her all along.

  Things never seem to go exactly the way you want them to.