Promise Me Something (17 page)

Or it would have been anyway if we hadn’t run into Olive. She was walking up the stairs as we were walking down them. I looked straight ahead, intent on ignoring her, but Levi stopped in the middle of the stairwell and said, “Hey, Olive. How’s it going?”

She paused with one hand on the railing, skeptical. “Fine…Why?”

“No reason,” said Levi. “Just asking.”

I felt my cheeks burn. Why did he have to be so nice? Anyone else would have ignored her and kept walking. “We’ve got to get to the library before it closes,” I said, not looking at either of them. “We should probably go.”

“Me too,” said Olive, hurrying up the remainder of the stairs.

Levi waited until she was gone. Then he looked at me, confused. “What’s the deal?”

“Nothing.” I tried to smile like everything was fine, but my face was frozen in a grimace.

Levi looked unconvinced. “I thought you were friends.”

“Not anymore.” I forced myself to keep walking. “We got into a fight a week before winter break.”

“Why?”

“She’s gay,” I said, lowering my voice. “Or lesbian or whatever. She likes girls.”

Levi looked nonplussed. “So?”

“So,” I said. “I don’t.”

Levi raised his eyebrows. “I didn’t know you were
that
kind of Catholic.”

“What kind of Catholic?”

“The intolerant kind.”

I paused at the base of the stairs. The disapproval in his voice felt like someone dumping ice water on me. “I just meant—” I searched for the words. “It’s not that
I
care whether she likes guys or girls—it doesn’t have any effect on
me
—it just—”

Levi was watching me, waiting.

“I just wouldn’t want her to get the wrong idea about our friendship,” I finished with a shrug. I knew I sounded lame.

Levi pushed open the door at the base of the stairs and held it open for me. “Was she hitting on you?”

“No,” I said.

“Was she asking you to change your own beliefs?”

I shook my head.

“Then what’s the problem?”

“I don’t know,” I admitted, walking through the door.

“Well, I don’t either.” Levi followed me, letting the door swing shut behind him. “If you ask me, her love life is none of your business. But I guess I’m biased. I have two moms.”

I stopped dead in my tracks.

“And if you have a problem with it, you better never come over my house,” he said lightly. “Otherwise they’ll talk your ear off.”

“Levi—I’m so sorry—” I started to say. My face was burning crimson. “I didn’t mean to insult your family.”

“It’s OK.” He smiled. “I’m just saying you should think about it.”

“I will,” I said. And I meant it. “I’m really sorry,” I told him again, wishing I could take it back. “Now you probably think I hate your family.”

“Nah.” He shrugged. “You’re too smart to hate anyone. I think you’ve just never had a reason to think about any of this stuff before now.”

“You think I’m smart?” The words popped out before I could stop them.

He smiled. “I think you’re smarter than the people you hang around with. Actually, I
know
you’re smarter than the people you hang around with.”

Warmth spread from my cheeks to my fingertips. Hearing Levi say I was smart felt better than a million party invitations from Gretchen Palmer. He was right—she
was
scary.

As we reached the library, Levi slowed down, faint pink splotches forming on his cheeks. “I just remembered I left my jacket at home this morning.”

“Oh.” I slowed to a stop, a few feet away from the library doors.

“So it’s not in there after all.” He looked embarrassed. “Sorry.”

“It’s OK,” I said, smiling as we turned and headed toward the front of the school, where the buses were lining up. Either Levi’s brain was just as full of holes as mine or he was making up excuses to spend time with me. Either way, I didn’t mind.

Valentine’s Day arrived on the eve of Gretchen’s birthday. All week long, cheap carnations and paper hearts rained down like some kind of perfect, pink storm. Valentine’s Day fell on Pajama Day—or rather, Pajama Day fell on the fourteenth of February. Spirit Week was late this year because of basketball playoffs.

When I showed up at my locker on Friday morning, Gretchen was waiting for me in a pair of hot pink boxers that showed off a dark, splotchy birthmark on her inner thigh. She didn’t seem to care that it resembled a wart, or that it was twenty-five degrees outside and she was probably freezing cold. In her hand was an entire ream of glittery pink stickers, and the minute I stepped up to my locker, she reached over and pinned one to my cheek.

“Happy Valentine’s Day!” she said. “Why aren’t you wearing pajamas?”

I
was
wearing pajamas. They just weren’t cute, like hers. Mine consisted of gray athletic sweatpants and a fleece pullover. Also—in honor of Valentine’s Day—a red hair elastic. But I never got a chance to point it out to Gretchen. Before I could say anything, she stepped a little closer and whispered, “OK, important question. What are you doing tonight?”

“Going to a Ridgeway party,” I answered automatically. “Why?”

“No!” she gasped. “Really?”

Immediately, I wished I hadn’t said anything. All week long I’d been trying to avoid Gretchen without actually telling her outright that I didn’t want to be friends. Mentioning the Valentine’s party was not exactly part of my plan.

“It’s just a little gathering,” I amended. “Probably not very big.”

She looked devastated. “But it’s my birthday!”

I broke eye contact and glanced down the hallway, wishing I’d had the presence of mind to make up a better excuse—a sick relative, maybe, or some kind of family bowling tournament.

Gretchen put on her best puppy dog face. “You don’t have to go, do you?”

“Sorry,” I said, looking down at my shoes. “I promised someone.”

“Who?” She narrowed her eyes.

To my relief, the bell rang just as I opened my mouth. I changed the
e
sound in Levi to the
i
sound in “I better go.”

“Well, this royally sucks.” Gretchen slung her purple backpack over one shoulder. “If one more person can’t make it, I’m going to have to push back my party.”

“That’s fine,” I said. “I mean, that sucks. I mean, happy birthday.”

“Whatever.” She rolled her eyes. “At least wear a freaking sticker.” Then she tore off another glittery heart and jabbed it at my shoulder.

Real, honest-to-God pajamas. That’s what Olive was wearing during English. Red and green plaid flannel pants with a matching button-down top—the kind of set that goes on sale at Macy’s right before Christmas. I wasn’t sure what shocked me more: the sight of her in flannel or the fact that she was voluntarily participating in School Spirit Week. Still, as I passed her desk on the way to mine, I said, “Nice pj’s.”

“You too,” she answered.

For a split second—literally half a hundredth of one—I thought maybe something had softened between us. I actually felt relieved just long enough to picture myself sitting with her after school in the parking lot, saying something like, “Sorry I overreacted to you being gay. I’ve been thinking about it, and maybe I was wrong.” But then she looked away, and the feeling evaporated as I watched her flip open her bloodred moleskin notebook. She leaned over, scribbling something in a slant across one of the pages.

English took off to a slow start as Ms. Mahoney made us read aloud from
The House on Mango Street
. The room was warm, and my mind grew soft and spongy as I followed along in the book. I found myself wondering if Olive knew how obnoxious she looked scribbling in her journal, but then I started thinking about getting one of my own, just to annoy her. I’d write about Lucy for the most part, but also about the people at school and Levi and those dim, wispy, cotton candy thoughts I would have been embarrassed to tell anybody else. Somewhere along the line, my eyes got heavy and I let them close.

I slept for a good five minutes with my chin propped in my hand. It wasn’t a deep sleep, but it was a peaceful one, and when I woke up, it took me a moment to realize that someone across the room was reading aloud from
The H
ouse on Mango Street
. There was a faint tapping on the front right side of my desk, and I blinked at it groggily, my dream and reality not yet clicked into place. It was only when I realized someone was trying to pass me a note that I woke up.

It was David Beck, my Language Arts partner from sixth grade. He was a short, skinny boy with bad skin, and even though we’d known each other forever, we didn’t talk much. I couldn’t think why on earth he was passing me a note now. Snatching the folded paper from his hand, I propped up
The House on Mango Street
and opened the note behind it.

Reyna—

I just want you to know that I submitted a poem about you to the lit mag. Don’t have an aneurysm. I changed your name. Also, I kept it to five lines, since that’s all the space you deserve in my life. Good luck living with yourself, you stupid, timid bitch.

—Olive

At the sight of the familiar handwriting, my heart revved up like a getaway car and zoomed off, leaving me in a cloud of dust. Olive was sitting two rows ahead of me, tapping her fingernails against the desk. The sight of it infuriated me. Cramming the note into my pocket, I stared at my copy of
The House on Mango Street
and watched the words swim around on the page like fish scattering in a pond.
When I am too sad and too skinny to keep keeping, when I am a tiny thing against so many bricks, then it is I look at trees
. None of it made sense.

A minute later, David’s hand appeared again, hovering by the side of my desk. Even though I knew better, I reached over and snatched the note.

Don’t you have anything to say to me?

Yes
, I wrote back.
Has anyone ever told you that you need braces?

When David handed it to Olive, her spine shot straight up as she whipped around to stare at me. Eyes wild, knuckles red, she grabbed her pen and scrawled something else. David passed it back to me.

Let’s be honest. It’s not my teeth you find so odious
.

If I had known what
odious
meant, I might have denied it. Instead I just folded up the note and didn’t write back. At the end of the period, when David stood up to sling his backpack over one shoulder, I tapped him on the arm and said, “Thanks.”

“Sure.” He looked embarrassed. “Any time.”

“One thing.” I lowered my voice as Olive shoved a couple of binders into her backpack, followed by the tattered moleskin notebook. “Next time, just rip up the note.”

History was made in fourth period History.

Five minutes into Mr. Murphy’s brain-bleeding lecture on the Byzantine Empire, Tim Ferguson walked into the room carrying a hall pass, a handful of roses, and a tiny, pink teddy bear. I did a double take. He was also wearing a tutu.

Mr. Murphy dropped his jaw as soon as the door swung open. “What the hell is this?” he demanded as everyone in the room burst out laughing. Behind me, I felt Olive move her feet off the bar at the base of my chair. We hadn’t made eye contact since English.