The Boy Who Lost His Face (12 page)

David sat on his parents’ bed and waited for 8:11
P.M
. They had decided he’d call her then. They chose 8:11
P.M
. because it would seem spontaneous. If he called her at exactly eight o’clock or exactly eight fifteen, Tori would know he’d been planning the call for a long time.

Sometimes you just have to do what your friends want you to do, David realized, no matter how terrible it is. He had finally learned that. It was the opposite of what everyone had always told him. Just say no, he had been told again and again. Don’t let peer pressure make you do something you don’t want to do. Be yourself. Just say no. If your friends don’t like you for it, then they’re not really your friends.

But he didn’t have any other friends. He had said no to Roger and Randy. That was why they hated him.

Besides, Larry and Mo weren’t asking him to do anything really bad. It wasn’t as if they were asking him to take drugs or steal a car. They wanted him to ask out Tori Williams so that they could go out too. There’s a difference between “just saying no” and letting your friends down.

It was more a matter of face. If he didn’t call her up, he’d lose even more face. Besides, he wanted to go out with Tori. So what was the problem?

He was afraid that Tori Williams would just say no.

He got out the phone book from the nightstand next to his parents’ bed and thumbed through the pages until he got to Williams.

“H
ELLO.”

“Hello, Tori, this is David.”

“Oh, hi, David. I was just thinking about you.”

“Really? What about me?”

“Oh, I don’t think I should tell you
that.
”

“Maybe I was thinking the same thing about you.”

“Maybe.”

“Well, anyway, the reason I called was—Would you like to go to a movie with me on Saturday night?”

“Sure, that sounds like fun.”

Unfortunately, that conversation never happened—except in David’s head.

“H
ELLO.”

“Good evening, Miss Williams. This is Mr. Ballinger.”

“Oh, well, make it quick, Ballinger. I’m expecting a call from Randy.”

“Oh. Okay. Well, I, um, would be delighted if you would consent to have tea with me on Saturday.”

“What?”

“We don’t have to have tea. I mean, some of my friends and I are going out to a movie and I thought maybe you’d like to come along.”

“Are you asking me out on a date?”

“Yeah, sort of. Sure, why not?”

“Are you crazy? The only reason I talk to you is because I feel sorry for you. Why would somebody like me want to go out with a stooge like you? Be real, Curly!”

That conversation never happened either.

H
E NEVER
called her. There were more than two pages of people named Williams in the phone book.

He couldn’t call up each and every one and ask if someone named Tori lived there. Surely Mo would understand that. What if there was another Tori Williams? What if he asked the wrong Tori Williams out on a date?

He decided he would just have to ask her for her phone number tomorrow at school. Actually, the more he thought about it, the better he liked that idea. He’d ask her for her phone number, and then she’d ask him why he wanted it. Then he’d say because he wanted to call her up to ask her out on a date. If she gave him her phone number it would mean she wanted to go out with him. And if she didn’t give him her
phone number, then he wouldn’t have to call her and be rejected.

He put away the phone book and went into the den feeling a lot better about things. His mother and Ricky were watching television. Ricky turned and scowled at David.

“What’s the matter, Ricky?” David asked sarcastically. “Wrestling not on?”

Elizabeth was playing with blocks on the floor. She dropped a circular block through a circular-shaped hole.

David, his mother, and his brother all clapped their hands and told her what a good girl she was.

“How come I don’t see Scott anymore?” David’s mother asked.

David shrugged. “I don’t know,” he muttered. “I guess we just have different interests.”

“Yeah, Scott’s not a stooge,” said Ricky so only David could hear.

“Ba-ba,” said Elizabeth.

“Bottle?” asked David.

“Ba-ba!” said Elizabeth.

“I’ll get her some apple juice,” said David’s mother.

“That’s okay,” said David. “I’ll get it.”

He went into the kitchen and got the apple juice out of the refrigerator. As he poured it into Elizabeth’s bottle he thought about Mrs. Bayfield. At least we’re finally even, he decided, even if there never really was a curse. Everything that happened to her had now happened to him.

Except did that make them even, really? What if
she didn’t put a curse on him? What if it was just one coincidence after another? Then nothing that happened to him really made up for the suffering he had caused her.

He pictured her again, lying helplessly on the ground, her face covered with lemonade, her legs in the air.

He stuck Elizabeth’s bottle into the microwave for a few seconds to take the chill off. He started to screw on the nipple when the phone rang.

“Hello?” he said, answering it. “Hello?”

Nobody answered.

He hung up, then brought Elizabeth’s bottle back to the den. “Here you go,” he said, handing the bottle to her. “Good, fresh apple juice!”

“Ba-ba!” said Elizabeth as she took it from him. She turned it over above her head. The nipple fell off and the apple juice poured all over her face.

I
T WASN’T
the curse, David tried to tell himself later as he sat on his bed. I just forgot to screw the nipple on Elizabeth’s bottle. It was because the phone rang. The phone had rung as I was about to screw the nipple on and then I just forgot about it. It could have happened to anyone.

He wondered who it was that called, then hung up. Maybe it was Mrs. Bayfield. Maybe she called to make him forget to screw the top on the bottle, so that it would pour all over Elizabeth.

No, it couldn’t be her, he realized. She only knew his first name. There was no way she could know his phone number.

Of course, if she really was a witch, and if she could somehow know the exact moment he’d be getting Elizabeth apple juice, then she could also know his last name, phone number, and who knows what else about him.

“Hey, David,” said Ricky.

He turned and looked at his brother.

Ricky was standing in the doorway. His middle finger was raised and pointed at David.

F
RIDAY MORNING
David put on what he thought were his best and luckiest clothes. He needed all the
luck he could get. Not only was he going to ask Tori for her phone number, but also he had to explain to Mo why he hadn’t called Tori last night. Not to mention the fact that the curse was back.

“No blue jeans?” his mother said when she saw him.

He shrugged.

“Well, you look very nice,” she said.

He wore a baggy pair of gray drawstring pants and a long-sleeved pullover shirt with no collar. The shirt had blue and white horizontal stripes. He kept the shirt on the outside of his baggy pants. He wore his regular dirty sneakers.

“You look like a stooge,” Ricky said under his breath.

David ignored him. He didn’t care what Ricky thought. All that mattered was what Tori thought.

When he got to school, Larry and Mo were waiting by his locker. He took a deep breath, then slowly headed toward them.

“So what’d she say?” asked Larry.

He took another breath.

“You better not say you didn’t call her,” warned Mo.

“I didn’t call her,” said David.

“I knew it!” said Mo. She turned to Larry. “I told you he’d wimp out.”

“I didn’t know her phone number,” David explained. “There were over two pages of Williamses in the phone book. What was I supposed to do, call each one?”

Mo shook her head in disgust.

“You should have found out her phone number before you went home yesterday,” said Larry.

“How? I couldn’t talk to her until four seventeen. Look, I’ll talk to her today. I got it all figured out. I’ll ask her for her phone number. If she gives it to me, then I’ll know she wants me to call her up. If she doesn’t give it to me, then it doesn’t matter anyway.”

Mo and Larry looked at him, unsure.

“By the way,” David said, “the curse is back. Of course you don’t care about that.”

“What happened?” asked Larry.

He told them about the apple juice pouring onto Elizabeth’s face. They both giggled at the word
nipple
.

“Wait,” said Larry when he had stopped giggling. “You said it was apple juice, right?”

David nodded.

“Then you got nothing to worry about,” said Larry. “So long as it wasn’t lemonade. You just forgot to
screw the nipple.
” He and Mo giggled again.

David also told them about his brother giving him the finger.

“Look, you said you’re going to ask her for her phone number?” asked Mo.

“Yeah.”

“Then quit making excuses!”

David started to say something, then stopped as Roger and Randy walked past them. He could feel himself tense up as they approached, and then feel the tension leave his body as they passed.

“They seem to have stopped hassling us,” said Larry. He laughed. “I think they’re afraid of Mo.”

Mo smiled.

“Yeah,” David agreed. “She’s our watchdog.”

He didn’t know why he said that.

Mo flipped him off, then turned and walked away.

“I’m sorry,” David said to Larry. “But see, that proves the curse is back.”

“It proves you’re an asshole,” said Larry.

“I didn’t do anything,” said David. “She’s just supersensitive.”

“Well, you just better ask Tori out,” said Larry.

“Why? Just so you can go out on your
pretend
date with Mo? That’s bullshit and you know it. You’re just afraid to ask Mo out on a real date, so you’re trying to get a free ride from me.”

Larry flipped him off.

T
ORI
W
ILLIAMS
was already sitting at her desk when David entered Mr. MacFarland’s class. She was having a very lively discussion with the girl who sat next to her, Lori Knapp. Tori was gesturing wildly about something and they were both laughing.

David planned the route to his desk so that he walked in front of her. He wanted to see how she’d react to him.

She didn’t react at all. She just kept talking to Lori. As near as David could figure, they were talking about nose jobs.

He sat down at his desk and leaned back in his chair. It didn’t matter anyway. He didn’t have to ask her out anymore. She’d probably just flip him off too.

Is that it? he wondered. Is the whole world going to give me the finger? Is that my punishment?

He imagined that for the rest of his life wherever he went, to the store, to the park, everyone who saw him would say, “Oh, you’re David Ballinger,” then flip him off. He’d get on a bus, and all the passengers plus the driver would point their middle fingers at him. He’d go to a baseball game and suddenly the whole crowd would stand and shout, “Hey David Ballinger!” with their middle fingers raised high in the air.

His chair toppled over. He fell on his back with his legs in the air.

“Mr. Ballinger,” said Mr. MacFarland.

He scrambled to his feet and quickly reset the chair. “Excuse me,” he said.

After class he remained seated as he watched Tori walk out of the room. She never looked at him. He gathered his things and headed out. He was halfway to his math class when he stopped and hurried back the other way.

He slowed down when he saw Tori. He walked behind her for a while, watching her red hair bounce and flow across the back of her yellow shirt. He stepped up alongside her.

“Hi,” he said.

Her green eyes flashed as she turned and looked at him. “Hi,” she answered.

They slowed their pace.

“Did you hurt yourself?” she asked.

“What? No.” He shrugged. “It was just sort of embarrassing.” He looked at the underside of his elbow,
where it had hit when he toppled over in his chair. There was a grayish mark on the shirt.

“That’s a pretty shirt,” she said.

“Thanks. It’s my lucky shirt.”

“It’s nice. You look like a Greek poet.”

He smiled. “You want to know why I wore my lucky shirt?” he asked.

“Why?”

They stopped walking. “Well, there was something I was going to ask you,” he said. “Except it doesn’t matter because now I don’t have to ask you anymore.”

“I wanted to ask you something, too,” said Tori.

The bell rang. All around them kids scurried into classrooms.

“What’d you want to ask me?” asked David.

Tori smiled. “You tell me what you were going to ask me.”

David folded his arms in front of him. “It doesn’t really matter now,” he said, “but, um, I was going to ask you if you had a phone.”

“No!” she said instantly. She blushed. “I mean yes, of course we have a phone, but, uh, I hardly ever use it. Why’d you want to know that?”

David shrugged. He was taken aback by her sudden defensiveness. “What’d you want to ask me?” he asked.

“Is Maureen your girlfriend?”

“Maureen?” he asked. “Mo? No. She’s just a friend.”

Tori pushed out one side of her mouth with her tongue. She looked toward a classroom, as if she needed to be going.

David uncrossed his arms, nervously put his hands behind his head, and stretched. “The reason I was wondering if you had a phone,” he said, “was because I was just sort of wondering what your phone number was. I mean, I might want to call you up sometime to find out about homework or, you know, ask you out or something, and there’s probably a lot of Williamses in the phone book.”

Her green eyes were looking right at him. “You want my phone number?”

“I guess,” he said. He stretched again. As he raised his arms the drawstring on his pants became untied, and his pants fell down.

In one motion he turned, pulled up his pants, and ran.

He didn’t stop until he reached the rusty iron gate in front of Mrs. Bayfield’s mansion.