One or Two Things I Learned About Love (4 page)

Nomi
says his name’s Connor. Only we’re not sure if that’s his first name or his last name. Nomi said maybe it’s both. Connor Connor. I said right, and he has a brother called Johnner. Nomi said, “You can never marry this guy, Hildy. Think about what you’d have to call your children. Donna and Bonner and maybe even Zonner. It’ll sound like you have a family of reindeer.” We couldn’t stop laughing.

So here’s what happened. Nomi, Maggie, Sara, Cristina and I all went to the mall this afternoon to escape the heat. We were having an excellent time like we always do. If I have to go shopping with my family it’s about as much fun as shaving under your arms with a dull razor. And no matter how long it really takes, it feels like it’s at least a day. (A very
long
day.) But when I’m with my friends, hours vanish like bubbles. Anyway, after we’d been in every store we like at least once, we stopped at our favourite coffee bar for a drink. Cristina had to go back to where she’d bought a skirt because she’d changed her mind about the colour again, and Maggie lost an eyelash somewhere and had to do repairs, and Sara went with Maggie so she could check on the blister from her new shoes without grossing everybody out, so I went up to order while Nomi stayed with our stuff. The guy behind the counter was new. He smiled. I smiled. (I have a normal smile, but he’s got a smile that makes you think you’ve never really seen anybody smile before. It made me feel like I was a glass of water and somebody dropped two Alka-Seltzers in me.) He said, “What can I get you?” I said, “Three iced lattes, an iced mint tea and a lemonade.” He said, “Coming right up.” And then he winked and my heart stopped for a couple of beats. While he was getting our drinks he said it looked like we’d been doing a lot of shopping, and I said, “Well, you know, that’s why we came to the mall – that and the air conditioning.” And he laughed. I guess because he laughed at my joke I got really brave and said I’d never seen him at Café Olé! before. He said that was because he’d only just started. AND THEN he said, “I would’ve started sooner if I knew you came here.” It was a good thing I wasn’t holding our drinks when he said that or they would’ve been all over the floor. And then he pointed to his shirt and I guess he said, “My name’s Connor,” and I said, “I’m Hildy.” He wanted to know if I came to Café Olé! a lot. I said, “Not as often as you do.” And he laughed again. When I got back to the table Nomi was looking at me like I’d found hidden treasure and she was waiting for me to tell her where it is. I said, “What?” She started laughing. She said, “Excuse me, Hildegard, but were my big brown eyes deceiving me or did I see you
flirting
?” I said her big brown eyes were deceiving her. I mean, have we met? I don’t even know how to flirt. In my family, Gus got all the flirting genes. Nomi said, “Well, he sure looked like
he
was flirting.” I said he was just being friendly. You know, like servers are supposed to be. I mean, good grief, everybody knows that. So they get you to buy more because you think they’re so nice and pally. “Oh right.” Nomi did her slapping-her-forehead thing. “I guess it’s true what they say about additives in our food. I must’ve been hallucinating all that smiling and head bobbing and I-think-you’re-hot body language because I eat so much junk.” And then she blew her straw wrapper at me. But all the while we were having our drinks, I kept kind of glancing over at him. Casually. Quickly. Like my eyes just happened to wander to him by accident. Maggie said, “That cute barista keeps looking over here.” Nomi made this innocent-little-me face. “Ooh… I wonder who he could be looking at?” Cristina peered over the tops of her glasses, “Did I miss something?” Sara glanced from me to Nomi and back again and said, “What’s going on?” I said they didn’t miss anything and nothing was going on. I thought I sounded pretty convincing. “Ignore Nomi. She’s been eating too much processed food. She’s delusional.” Nomi rolled her eyes like she was in some Broadway play. (She can be so melodramatic sometimes. She really should be in my family instead of me.) “Look at me! I’m delusional!” She said this really loud. You know, so everyone out in the parking lot could hear her. Heads turned. It would’ve been OK with me if the floor had opened up under my chair right then and I’d fallen through. But there’s never a trapdoor around when you really need one. I told them to stop laughing so much or he’d think we were talking about him. Maggie said, “We
are
talking about him.” Cristina pointed at me. “Look at you! Something
is
going on! You’re blushing!” My face felt like I’d been sitting on the beach all day without any sunblock. I said I thought we should be going and pushed back my chair. “You’re acting like school girls.” Sara said, “Um duh, Hildy. Don’t look now, but we are school girls.” I said not little ones we aren’t. Nomi said, “I don’t think Mr Coffee thinks you’re a little girl.” She was practically purring. They were all still laughing and teasing me as we started down the plaza. Then all of a sudden somebody called my name. “Hey! Hildy!” I turned around automatically. He was standing in the doorway of Café Olé!, waving. “Hildy! You forgot something.” I figured I must’ve dropped something when I was paying. Or fleeing. I’m always doing that. Usually disgusting used Kleenex or old wrappers. I ignored the sniggers of my childish friends and went back. “What?” I asked. “What did I forget?” And he said: YOU FORGOT TO GIVE ME YOUR PHONE NUMBER! Just like that. It was the most romantic thing that’s ever happened to me. Like I was in a movie. (But not one of Louie’s!) I’m not an expert or anything – I’ve only had the two and a half dates that nobody remembers (and the half doesn’t even count) – but usually when a boy wants to ask you out he kind of shuffles around and then blurts out something awesomely sophisticated like, “You want to do something Friday night?” I think it must be a sign of maturity that Connor could say something so clever.

No
call. No message. I didn’t really have anything planned for today so I spent most of the morning and afternoon just hanging around kind of waiting. It was like waiting to speak in front of the class. (Which to me is a lot like waiting for your turn to be hanged.) You have to pretend to be listening but all you can really think about is when it’s going to be your turn. The difference is that when I have to speak in front of the class – or be executed – I’m nervous and terrified, and today I was nervous and excited. I know I’m being ridiculous. Even I know that “I’ll call you” doesn’t mean a boy’s going to call the minute he gets home. It’s not a promise. (Nomi says that most of the time it’s more like a threat.) But I still kept checking my phone every ten minutes. I even called myself from the landline to make sure it was working. (It was.)

Was relieved that I had something to do tonight. The whole Mob went to play beach volleyball and then for pizza. Cristina acted all surprised that I showed up. She said she thought I’d want to stay home and wait for Mr Coffee to call. I explained that the whole point of a cell phone is that you take it with you so you don’t have to spend half your life sitting by the telephone waiting for a call the way people used to. That’s why they were invented. To liberate us. Maggie said yeah, but I wasn’t going to hear my phone when I was charging through the sand to hit the ball, was I? Reminded her that I do have voicemail. He’s allowed to leave a message. And besides, I said, he can always call back, can’t he? Cristina said, “Dig you, Ms Cucumber. You’re getting the hang of this dating thing pretty fast.” Maggie said she didn’t see how he could call back if he’d never called in the first place. She thinks she’s funny. Nomi said I shouldn’t worry, it’s only been one day. Worry after a week. I said I wasn’t worried Connor wouldn’t call. Why would he say he’s going to call if he isn’t? It’s not like I
made
him say he’d call. It was his idea. If you have the idea to do something, why wouldn’t you do it? Sara said well, yeah. That makes sense. But personal experience suggests that it doesn’t mean that’s how it works. Kruger, who can remember any melody after hearing it once, never remembers when he’s supposed to call her. Or maybe Connor changed his mind. It’s been known to happen. So that all made me feel way better. I was jiggy today because I didn’t know
when
Connor would call, not because I didn’t think he would. But the girls got me so worried that I kind of lost concentration and collided with Kruger. He thinks I broke his nose. Thank God it wasn’t his hand.

No messages. Morale losing altitude. Nomi said maybe Connor lost my number. I reminded her that he wrote it on his hand so it’s not like he was going to throw it out by accident or anything. She said that maybe he accidentally washed it off. They have all those signs in the bathroom: EMPLOYEES MUST WASH HANDS. She says she’s sure people accidentally wash off numbers they wanted to keep all the time. More often than you’d think. Which means that I’ll have to go back to Café Olé! as soon as I can. But what if Nomi’s wrong and that isn’t what happened? What if he just changed his mind? Like Sara said. Then I can never go back to Café Olé! Not even if every other coffee bar in the county shuts down. This stuff could really make you crazy. My dad was actually working on the deck when I got home so I gave him a hand just to take my mind off my phone for a while. I hammered his finger.

I
decided to start acting like a sane person again. (And not hurt anyone else.) If he called, he called. And if he didn’t at least I know that some really cute guy was once interested in me, even if it was only for five minutes. I left my phone home today so I wouldn’t feel it in my pocket whispering,
No call … no call … still no call … are you sure you gave him the right number…?
like some evil genie. I told my mom it needed a charge and to call me on Ely’s cell if she wanted me for anything. We were really busy on the stand, and Ely was in super-hilarious mode, and Broccoli Man came and wanted
exactly
19 ounces of onions, so that took a while, and Green Pick-up Guy also showed up and wanted to know what happened to my fan and I told him about Zelda and the dinosaurs and the flood and he was very sympathetic (he has two brothers), so the day went a lot faster than yesterday did. But as soon as I got home, I checked to see if anybody had called. Of course, no messages. Doom loomed. I called myself from the landline. Phone working just dandy.

I was in the shower. Where else? I mean, if you’ve been waiting more than 48 hours for someone to call you, when else would he call? I didn’t even bother turning off the water. I just jumped out, dripping. There was soap in my eyes and water everywhere and I knocked the bowl of shells my mother keeps on the toilet tank on the floor reaching blindly for my phone. (Why do we have fish on our shower curtain and a bowl of shells on top of the tank? It’s not an aquarium, it’s a bathroom.) Heedless of the risk of electrocution by wet electronic device, I pounced on my phone like a cat on a mouse. I said, “Hi”. He said, “Hildy?” I didn’t say
well who were you expecting to answer
? Like I would’ve if it was Louie or someone like that. I said, “Yes”. He asked me what I was doing. I didn’t say I was standing wet and naked in the bathroom with soap in my eyes. I said, “Nothing much.” He said he just got back from work. He said it was frantically busy all day. I said, I told you, it’s the heat. It’s driving everyone into anything that’s air-conditioned. Have you seen the buses? People are just riding back and forth for hours. And I bet the supermarkets are packed tighter than battery farms. While he laughed I rubbed my eyes with a towel. Blind but now I see! He’s a senior at Priestly-Hamilton (or will be when school starts), that’s why I’ve never seen him before. Besides the fact that he’s only just started working at the mall. (And because I don’t go to games. He plays a lot of games with balls.) He had some pretty funny stories of stuff that had happened at Café Olé! since he’s worked there. He said he used to think most people were mainly normal, but now he’s not so sure. I said that’s what working with the public does. You realize that most people are a little nuts. And some are a lot nuts. We were laughing so much that he didn’t hear his mom yelling till she started banging on his bedroom door. He said he better go. I said I had to go too. (Which was true. The heat had dried me off but I didn’t have any clothes on and the water was still running.) I had one leg in my shorts when my phone rang again. It was Connor. He said he’d been so involved in talking to me that he’d forgotten to ask me out. (How cute is that?) I’m seeing him on Thursday. It’s his day off. (I don’t want to start out by making problems so I didn’t say anything, but it isn’t my day off, of course. I figure I can probably swap with Mike for one of her days.) He says he has a great idea for what we can do. He doesn’t want to go somewhere noisy or crowded. He wants to go somewhere where we can talk and get to know each other. I said, “What? Group therapy?” He said it’s a surprise. Oh goody.