Geography Club (11 page)

When Gunnar and I returned to the party, Gunnar cuddled up next to Kimberly, and Trish cuddled up next to me. Then Kimberly said, “Hey! Let’s play a game!” I had an idea she wasn’t talking about pinochle, so I wasn’t very surprised when she then announced, “Let’s play Truth or Dare!”

That perked Trish up. “Good idea!”

“I’m gonna go first!” Kimberly said. She turned to Gunnar and said seductively, “Truth or dare!”

“Dare,” he said, and at least he had the decency to sound nervous.

“Kiss me!” Kimberly said.

Sure enough, Gunnar leaned dutifully over and kissed her. Once their lips met, Kimberly pounced. Her arms slapped around him so tightly that she reminded me of a starfish prying open a clam. Except that Gunnar didn’t resist. He kissed her right back, and they started making out. Apparently, Kimberly
was
going to have sex with Gunnar, someone she didn’t even like. In fact, it looked like she was going to have sex with him there on the couch right in front of Trish and me. In any event, their frantic coupling ended what had to be the shortest game of Truth or Dare in history.

But it wasn’t quite over for Trish. “My turn!” she said.

Gee, I thought, I wonder what her dare is going to be?

But I had had enough. I stood up from the couch, and Trish sort of fell off me with a clunk. It seemed like I was always pushing her away from me, but that wasn’t my problem, was it?

“What’s wrong?” Trish said.

“Nothing,” I said. “I just don’t want to play.”

“Oh.”

“I think I want to go home.”

“Oh.”

I ignored her and turned to Gunnar, who was still on the couch playing tongue depressor with Kimberly. “Gunnar?” When he didn’t look up or even seem to hear me, I said, “Gunnar! I want to go home!”

This finally got his attention. “Huh?”

“I want to go home now.”

“What are you talkin’ ’bout?”

“What part of ‘I want to go home’ don’t you understand?” I took a step toward the door. “Now give me your keys. I’ll drive.”

“But—”

“But what?”

He scurried upright, and I tried to ignore the embarrassing bulge in the front of his pants. Then he jerked me into the kitchen. “Russ, what are you doing? You promised you’d do this for me!” I’d never seen him look so intent about anything, not even the weekend before when he’d blackmailed me into going out with Trish for a third time.

“I promised I’d go out with Trish,” I whispered. “And I did. Three times.” I looked back at her, huddled up on the couch like a dejected crab. Kimberly, meanwhile, wasn’t consoling her friend. No, she was downing another shot of tequila. I felt bad I’d hurt Trish’s feelings, but there wasn’t much I could do about it now.

“No!” Gunnar said to me. “You went out with her two and a half times! The third date’s not over yet!”

“Yeah?” I said. “Well, fucking her wasn’t part of the deal!” I wasn’t a guy who used profanity very often. But who did he think I was—Russel Middlebrook, Male Prostitute?

“Jesus, Russ!” Gunnar said. “Don’t be a dick!”

He was accusing
me
of being a dick? After blackmailing me into this date, lying about what was involved, getting drunk on me, and now refusing to let me go home?

“I’m not being a dick,” I said, not as calmly as I would have liked. “I just want to go home.”

“Yeah? Well, we’re not going home yet!” His eyes warned me not to cross him on this, but this was one lighthouse that I had no choice but to ignore.

“Gunnar, I’m not staying!”

“Fine!” he said. “Then you can walk!” We were out in the middle of nowhere, probably miles from the nearest phone. Plus, it was the middle of the night.

“Fine!” I said, and I started for the front door. This time it was no bluff. So I’d be stranded miles from home. Any place was better than this.

“Russel?” said a tiny, tremulous voice from behind. Trish. “What’s wrong? Where are you going?”

“Home!” I said.

“Huh?” Kimberly said from the couch, her fogged-up eyes trying to make some sense of me.

“But why?” Trish said.

Did I owe her an explanation? It seemed like I did. But what could I say?

“It’s not you,” I said. “It’s me. This was just a bad idea.”

At this, Trish started to snivel. So much for my making things better.

“Jesus, Russ!” Gunnar said. “You are
such
a dick!”

“Just shut up!” I said.

“
You
shut up!”

“You son of a
bitch
!” Kimberly said. I don’t think Kimberly had a clue what was going on. She was just reacting to Gunnar’s and my raised voices, and to Trish’s tears.

“I’m going!” I said.

“Fine!” Gunnar said. “Go! Get the hell out of here! While you’re at it, you can go to hell!”

“Russel!” Trish said. “Wait!” But there was nothing I could say to her that would make it make sense, so I didn’t wait.

“He’s an asshole,” I heard Kimberly say. “Let him go.”

“But don’t think this is the end!” Gunnar called after me. “I’ll get you for this!”

I didn’t listen to any more. I pushed open the door and stepped out into the cold dark night, the remnants of my ship all wrecked and unsalvageable on the rocky shoals behind me.

At least I still had Kevin. He was the one I called when I finally found a pay phone over two hours later. I woke him up, but when I told him where I was and a little about what had happened, he immediately agreed to come and get me. (I called my parents too and told them not to worry—that Gunnar had had a flat tire on the way home, but that we’d called AAA.)

Forty minutes later, Kevin finally arrived in his parents’ car. It was almost two in the morning.

“You okay?” he said once I’d climbed inside.

“Yeah,” I said, but I wasn’t okay, and he knew it.

I started to tell him what had happened, but I’d barely even begun when I burst out bawling.

“Hey,” he said. “Sokay.” Then he held out his arms for me, and I buried myself against his chest.

I’d never cried in anyone’s arms before, but I have to recommend it. It felt really good.

After that, I finally told the story of everything that had happened that night. He just listened, and when I was done, he told me that I’d done the right thing by leaving, and that I didn’t have anything to be ashamed of by crying. Then he kept holding me and stroking my hair and telling me that everything would be all right.

“Thanks for coming,” I whispered.

“Hey,” he said. “We’re a team, you and me. Don’tcha know I’d do anything for you?”

Like I said, at least I still had Kevin. I wasn’t sure what I’d do if I ever lost him.

The following Monday, I had no one to sit with at lunch. Min still wasn’t talking to me, and I sure as hell wasn’t sitting with Gunnar. So I sat with the Jocks. Now that I was a member of the baseball team, this seemed perfectly normal. But, of course, I made a point of not sitting right next to Kevin.

“’Sup, Middlebrook?” Ramone said to me, and I nodded my hello. My star had faded a bit since I’d hit that winning home run over a week ago, but people still acknowledged my existence.

“Then what happened?” Nolan was saying to Jarred. I’d interrupted a conversation in progress.

“What do you
think
?” Jarred said. “Man, she was
begging
for it, squirming around like a baby!”

“Yeah?” Nolan said.

“Oh yeah!” Jarred said. “And then once I started going at her, she couldn’t get enough. She was begging me for more!”

That’s a lot of begging, I thought. Who was Jarred dating—a homeless person? But ever since I’d joined the baseball team, I’d known that if I was going to spend a lot of time with jocks, I was going to spend a lot of time listening to them brag about sex, especially on Mondays. For some reason, all the sex talk had been easier to stomach before Kevin and I had got together. Now that I had some idea what real intimacy was, it just made the guys sound like idiots, and cruel idiots at that. I glanced over at Kevin, but he was staring down at his food, which I took to mean that he was thinking the same thing.

Before Jarred could say any more, a hush swept over the lunchroom. I immediately knew what had happened. The lunchroom crowd reacted this way for one reason and one reason only. Someone had done something to Brian Bund.

I turned to where everyone was looking.

Sure enough, there was Brian Bund standing by a pair of double doors that led into the darkened school theater. Someone on the other side of those double doors had just pushed him out into the cafeteria. That wasn’t all they’d done. They’d also wrapped a bra tightly around his chest, then smeared lipstick and rouge all over his face.

A nanosecond later, the lunchroom exploded in laughter. The thunderous roar hit him like a wave, and Brian actually stumbled backward a little.

I scanned the lunchroom. Once again, it seemed like almost everyone was laughing—from the Guy Jocks to the Computer Geeks. A few of the laughs looked a little forced, but most people looked like they really were busting a gut. I couldn’t help but notice that Terese, sitting with the Girl Jocks, was laughing. There were two adult lunchroom monitors, and even one of them was smiling a little.

But then I spotted Min, sitting with her other friends. She wasn’t laughing. Belinda and Ike were sitting with their friends too, but neither of them was laughing. I looked for Kevin’s reaction, but Ramone was in my way, and I couldn’t tell if Kevin was laughing or not.

Meanwhile, Brian panicked. This was too much, even for him. Unlike that time when people had thrown food at him, he didn’t walk slowly for the door, steady and dignified. No, this time, he clawed desperately at the bra around his chest, finally managing to tear it off, even though it had obviously been tied tightly in back. Then, throwing the bra to one side, he went racing for the bathroom where he could wash off the lipstick and rouge. And while the makeup was thick, it couldn’t cover the terror on his face. He looked like a tortured four-year-old, and I wondered how anyone could possibly find that expression funny.

A second later, Nate Klane and Brent Ragell rounded a corner into the cafeteria. They were both jocks—Nate was even a member of the baseball team. And maybe it was the way they were walking (an even cockier swagger than usual), but somehow I knew they’d just come from inside that darkened theater. They’d done their stuff to Brian, pushed him out into the lunchroom, then exited out a back door. Now they were pretending—barely—that they didn’t know what had happened.

No one in the cafeteria was buying it. They knew Brent, they knew Nate, and they knew what they had done. The laughter got louder still—I almost expected people to start applauding—and Brent and Nate acknowledged their deed with little smirks and tiny little bows.

I doubted they’d get in trouble for their actions. Maybe they’d acted alone in this, but they hadn’t really been alone. They’d been acting for the whole school. That’s why no one, not even Brian, would tell on them. Besides, they were jocks. Jocks got special treatment. And as long as I ate lunch with them, I’d get special treatment too.

Funny thing, though. Even though I was sitting at a table jammed with people, I suddenly felt almost completely alone.

The next day, at the meeting of the Geography Club, the air was so cold you could have carved ice sculptures. There was Ike’s ongoing resentment of me. And Min and Terese, who normally giggled and whispered before the start of every meeting and who held hands during the meeting itself, weren’t even looking at each other. (Had they had a fight? Since Min was no longer speaking to me, I didn’t know.) Even Belinda seemed cool toward everyone.

It didn’t help that Min brought up the subject of Brian Bund again right off the bat. We’d had a pep rally the previous Thursday, so this was our first meeting since the Tuesday before, when we’d last argued about Brian.

“Everyone saw what happened to Brian yesterday in the lunchroom,” Min said.

“Yeah,” Kevin said. “So?”

“So you still think we shouldn’t let him in the Geography Club?”

“We talked about this last week,” Terese said, sounding irritated.

“So?” Min said. “I want to discuss it again.”

“There’s nothing to discuss,” Kevin said. “We already had a vote.”

“Then I’ll use my five minutes.”

Nobody could argue with that. During your five minutes, you were supposed to be able to say anything you wanted, and no one could interrupt.

So for five minutes, Min told us again how she thought we should invite Brian to join our club. I won’t say everything she said because, frankly, we’d covered all the arguments the week before.

When she was done, we were silent for a second. Then Terese said, “Okay. Who’s up next?”

“Wait a minute!” Min said. “I want another vote.”

“We already voted,” Kevin said. “Last week.”

“So? There’s no rule we can’t have another vote.”

“Yeah, well, you already had your five minutes. It’s somebody else’s turn.”

“Yeah?” Belinda said. “Well, now it’s
my
turn, and I think we should have another vote too.”

“That’s not fair,” Kevin said.

“Let’s just have another goddamn vote!” Terese shouted. That shut everyone up.

Kevin sighed. “Look, we all know what we’re talkin’ about. Anyone wanna change their vote from last week?”

Min looked at Terese hopefully. “Terese?”

“Min!”
Terese said through clenched teeth. “We talked about this, okay?” That’s when I knew they had been fighting, and that Brian had factored into it big-time.

When Terese said this, Min got the saddest look in her eyes, like she’d just seen a mother watch her own baby die. I knew then and there that Terese and Min were finished. This thing about Brian had been a jigsaw tearing through their relationship.

“Anyone else?” Min said, and I desperately tried to avoid her gaze.

No one said anything for a second. Then Ike said, “I do.”

“You do what?” Terese said.

“Want to change my vote,” Ike said. “I think we should ask Brian to join the club.”

“What?” Kevin said. “Why?”

Ike shrugged. “I guess it was seeing him in the lunchroom yesterday. I mean, everyone has a breaking point. Well, Brian’s got to be getting pretty close to his. So what if he went and did something extreme? I’d feel really bad knowing we could’ve done something to help him, but we didn’t.”

No one said anything, but we all knew what Ike meant. What if Brian killed himself? Coming from Ike especially, this was pretty powerful stuff. Once again, I’d been wrong about Ike. I never in a million years expected him to change his vote on this. But even though I knew he was doing the right thing and everything, I also hated him more than ever right then. Because with Ike voting with Min and Belinda, that meant the vote was now three to two. If I voted with Kevin and Terese, then the vote was three to three, and we still wouldn’t ask Brian to join the Geography Club, just like Kevin wanted. But if I changed my vote too, then the vote was two to four, and Min would get her way. In other words, my vote wasn’t symbolic anymore. Suddenly, it mattered. Thanks to Ike, I was now the deciding vote!

“Russel?” Min said, with guarded optimism in her voice. She knew how close she was to winning this argument, and I knew that all would be forgiven if only I voted her way. And even as annoyed with Min as I was, I still thought she was right about Brian Bund, and I really did want to vote her way. But then I saw her and Terese sitting there stiffly, not talking, not touching. I thought, Is that what will happen to Kevin and me if I vote against him? It seemed impossible that we could break up over such a stupid issue. But it had been enough to drive Min and Terese apart, hadn’t it?

I knew I couldn’t handle not having Kevin to talk to and hold. We were a team, him and me. He’d said so himself. I couldn’t stand being alone again.

And so I sold Brian Bund out for a third time. (The same number of times the apostle Peter denied Jesus Christ, in case you’re interested.)

“I’m sorry,” I said, eyes downcast. “No.”

For a second, Min just sat there, stunned. Then suddenly, she bolted upright. “Fine!” she said, seething. With that, she started for the door. It was pretty clear she was never coming back.

I could have stopped her. At any point before she reached that door, I could have piped up and said I’d change my vote, and she would have stopped. But who knows how Kevin would have reacted to that? It was a no-win situation.

So while I could have stopped Min, I didn’t. She disappeared out into the hallway.

“Min!” Belinda said. “Wait!” When Min didn’t reappear, Belinda hurried after her.

After that, Terese said, “Screw it!” And without so much as a good-bye, Terese followed them out.

That left Ike, Kevin, and me. We didn’t even have a quorum.

The three of us didn’t say anything. We didn’t have to. We all knew what had happened. The Geography Club had come undone.

That afternoon at baseball practice, I struck out. Four times. The harder I swung the bat, the faster the ball seemed to whiz by me at the plate. This was a metaphor for something, and I was pretty sure what it was.

The truth was, I hadn’t had any home runs since that first game eleven days before (I hadn’t even had that many
hits
), and people were starting to notice. My fielding was better, but only a little. I wasn’t absolutely the worst player on the team—that was Christian Coles—but I was definitely in the bottom third.

Kevin and I hadn’t said anything to each other all practice long, but this wasn’t strange. We usually made a point not to act too chummy at practice. What was different was that after that meeting of the Geography Club, I didn’t particularly
want
to talk to him. This was ironic; I’d voted against Brian so Kevin wouldn’t be mad at me, and now here I was, mad at him.

Afterward, he caught up with me on the way to the locker room. “Russel?” he said. “You okay?”

“Yeah,” I said, and kept walking.

“Hey,” he said, and I stopped, but I didn’t look his way. He looked around for a place where we could talk in private, then finally led me into the trees behind the bleachers.

“What’s goin’ on?” he said. He was flipping a baseball in his hand. He was nervous about something, but I’d never known him to do that with just me before.

“Nothing,” I said.

“I know it sucks not being in the starting lineup,” he said. “But you’ll get better. You’re just havin’ a bad week.”

“It’s not that,” I said. “I couldn’t care less about that.”

He nodded once and looked away. “I know. It’s that thing with Brian.” So Kevin knew what was going on after all. “You think we should’ve let him into the club. You only voted the way you did because you thought that’s how I wanted you to vote. Didn’t you?”

Yeah, I thought bitterly. And now you’ve made me choose between you and my best friend. But all I said to Kevin was, “It’s no biggie.” I turned to go. “We should get back to the locker room before anyone notices we’re gone.”

“Wait,” he said.

I stopped and looked back at him. He hadn’t stopped flipping that baseball into the air.

“I think you should vote the way you want,” he said. “For Brian, I mean.”