The Taming of the Drew (20 page)

Viola was on a roll, “Admit it, Kate, you
know
getting angry at Drew won’t work. You have to do like Mrs. Broadstreet taught us last fall in psych. You remember operant conditioning?"

Of
course
I remembered operant conditioning. Mrs. Broadstreet, the psych teacher, was a legend at Academy. We’d already covered most of the basics this year — including operant conditioning and other psychoanalytic theories including Freud (gag me with a spoon), Jung and lots of others. Everyone wanted to take her course, despite the fact that we were all shaking in our boots the first day. She could nail you for a moment’s inattention without batting an eye, and she could beat a lesson so thoroughly into your head you'd be able to pass quizzes well into your nineties.

Viola beamed.

“You have to Pavlov the Dog.”

There was a gasp around the group. I felt a cluster-bomb of blushes explode all over my face.

I said, in as flat a voice as I could manage, “You think I should
reward
the Dog for good behavior?”

Viola nodded. There was a bigger group gasp.

My voice rose in disbelief, “With sexual favors?”

Viola’s eyebrows were flung upwards on her face. “WHAT?” she said. “I never said
that
.”

There was a longer, horrible silence. My blush only burned hotter, like it was phosphorescent. “But you said be like Celia!”

“Not just
you
, Kate. I meant all of us should do it.”

Stunned silence. Alex and Robin raised an eyebrow at each other. Phoebe said, through gritted teeth, “Viola, you better not mean what I think you said.”

Viola looked around the group, and then wailed, “I only meant we should be nice to him!
Especially
when he’s being nice too!”

 
Viola looked like she was going to cry. I said, “I think you’re right, Viola — we’ve got to try to be nicer. Isn’t that what Tio and Gonzo are doing — the guy-bonding thing? But it can’t be me. The Dog hates me, Vi.”

I thought someone would chime in to agree, but everyone’s gaze avoided mine.

Then the bell rang, far across the field, and we took off running, late for school.

***

In the circle at lunchtime, no one knew where to sit. People put bags on the stump, then stood around, not making eye contact, shifting hands from hips, to folded, to hanging at sides, back to hips, like no one knew what to do with their arms.

The Dog wasn’t any more comfortable than the rest of us. After icily ignoring me for first, third, fourth periods and brunch (where he stood as everyone sat, staring down the hall, arms crossed), now he kept looking at me and inhaling like he was going to say something, then stopping, frowning and turning away.

Like he kept thinking he wanted to tell me I had spinach in my teeth, or snot hanging from my nose — but then decided it wasn’t worth the effort.

It didn’t help that the Greenbacks hadn’t talked about lunch assignments this week. I couldn’t remember who was supposed to bring it, and I didn’t want to ask in front of the Dog, since he didn’t have a clue why we were doing this weird lunch rotation, and I didn’t want to discuss fund-raising in front of him.

The awkwardness was getting worse and worse when Gonzo gave his forehead a slap, “Duh,” he said, “I am such an idiot.” He went to the stump and starting digging in his backpack.

A pink color rose up his neck toward his nose as he bent and lifted foil-packets. He didn’t make eye contact with anyone. Gonzo always gets like this when he’s unwrapping his creations. It’s like they’re his babies at their first piano recital and he’s proud — but defensive and embarrassed — and worried people won’t appreciate them enough.

“I made a symbol for each of you out of pate frisee and baked it into the top of the crust, so we could tell whose is whose.” He said this too false-casual, like of course
anyone
would bake pictures into school lunches. “Yours, Viola, has the flute shape on the top, Tio’s got a book,” Gonzo gave Tio a sideways look, “a folio, really.”
 

We were all busy jostling around, wanting to reach our own calzone, waiting for a taste of the latest Gonzo masterpiece. Tio stepped forward, picked his calzone up and took an alligator-sized bite. Tio groaned, so loudly it would have been obscene, except noises like that were pretty normal in our group on the weeks when Gonzo brought food.
 

Gonzo paused in the unpacking. “That’s the goat cheese,” he said to Tio, “I thought you’d like it with roasted red peppers.” Smiling, Gonzo bent down and I heard him muttering, “Phoebe, I put a fist on yours — you don’t mind, do you?”

I heard a snort behind me and realized that the Dog stood outside the group, watching us. He was shaking his head in disbelief — you know that look, the one people get on their faces when you know they’re thinking
wait until I tell the guys about this later, they’ll never believe me
. That look? That’s exactly the sneer he had.

I felt a surge of anger, hot as stomach acid in the back of my throat. Then I remembered what Viola had said just a few hours ago, and my resolution to
try
.

Get a grip, Kate, I told myself. You need to be nice, remember. I took a deep breath and turned back to Gonzo, who said, “Here’s yours, Kate.” Gonzo gave me a huge smile, his tufts of asparagus hair bobbing with suppressed laughter. He got like this when he made a culinary joke. I had to figure out what he’d done. There was, of course, a redwood on the top of my flaky-crusted calzone. So far, no surprises. I lifted it, amazed that the homemade shell could be so crusty when the half-moon-shaped pastry weighed so much. It wasn’t a bit soggy, despite being full of damp ingredients. I bit a corner and buttery taste fluttered in my mouth. I closed my eyes to concentrate, trying to find the joke hidden among all the fabulous flavors. The crust was to die for. The buttery taste was followed by a warm earthiness, then a tang of evergreen and, without meaning to, I moaned. My eyes popped open to see Gonzo pink with pleasure.

He said, “I used rosemary, and portobellos.”
 

“Oh,
Gonzo
,” I said, “It’s my own
forest
calzone. You’re a
gem
.” He turned even pinker and pretended he didn’t care, lifting more packages out

I stepped back to let others in and saw the Dog. He was further back, and, if anything more annoyed and offended, like we were weirding him out. The glorious taste curdled in my mouth. I chewed and swallowed and pushed down my anger, hard.
 

Smile, I told myself. Or at least don’t frown.

Then everyone was served, except the Dog. Gonzo’s Adam’s apple did that bobbing thing as he unpacked the Dog’s calzone. Gonzo kept his bright-red face tilted down as he said, off-hand, “It’s a football. I think I got the seams correctly placed. Of course, you’d know that better than me.”

Gonzo held the calzone flat in his palm and walked around the stump. The Dog stood with his arms crossed, waiting for Gonzo to come to him.

“It’s…it’s…well, I hope it’s something you like.”

Slowly, the Dog picked up his calzone and turned it in the light. We all watched, mesmerized, the way you watch a car skid across the road, unable to move, knowing it’s going to be ugly. “You’re one of those guys who plays in the kitchen, huh?” he asked, disapproval curling into the edges of his voice.
 

Gonzo went white, from his lips out.

I stepped forward and snatched the calzone out of Drew’s hand. The Dog frowned at me, like he didn’t believe I’d been quick enough to do that. What the Dog didn’t know was that I was
roasting
with fury. My skin felt like it was spattering rage, my anger smoking until I’d set off a fire alarm if we were inside.

“Oh yes,” I said, “Gonzo’s
exactly
like Jamie Oliver. And Gordon Ramsey. Only neither one of them is half as good as Gonzo.” I bit the Dog’s calzone and an explosion of homemade marinara sauce, the tickle of basil, and a rough meaty punch of sausage filled my mouth. I smiled and I knew it was an evil smile. “This calzone,” my words were muffled because my mouth was so full, “is not
nearly
good enough for someone like you.” I took another big bite and the smell of it filled the space around us. I saw Drew’s nostrils widen. He licked his lips and stared at my mouth as I gulped and chewed his food. I wiped drool from the corner of my mouth, “sorry,” I said to Drew, “can’t help myself.” I turned to Phoebe.

“Phoebe,” I said around the heavenly mouthful, gesturing with a calzone in each hand, “I thought I saw one last banana in your purse — you know, that brown thing in a ziplock bag, from the ones you brought two weeks ago? Could you dig it out for Drew? I’m sure that’s more to
his
standards.”

Then I turned and stomped back to the school, leaving them all staring after me.

Let the rest of the Greenbacks draw straws to decide who would flirt with the Dog when he was nasty. It sure wasn’t going to be me.

***

It’s hard to imagine how tutoring that afternoon could be more strained. Drew sat with his back to me and I sat with my back to him. That’s no easy feat in a cubby.
 

We were forced to listen to Nate and Curtis have a whispered argument about who caused the Saturday Dino-Dog date disaster, until Bianca said, “That’s it. You’re both so busy going after each other, it’s like neither one of you thinks I exist. I might as well not be here. Tio, let’s go to the side-room. Maybe that way I can at least get some of my English homework done.”

Drew and I half-stood to watch them go into a room with a glass window. Bianca pulled out a thick book. I recognized the cover from English two years ago. It was Romeo and Juliet.

My heart went tu-tung like an arrow hitting a target. Tio stood frozen at Bianca’s side, staring at the book in front of her.

You can do this, Tio
, I wanted to shout it at him but had to stand there, gripping the styrofoam wall.

Then, like an act on a screen, I saw Tio pull out a chair and sit facing Bianca, the book open, bridging the distance between them. The Dog said, “What are they studying?”

“Oh, you know, stodgy stuff. The classics,” I said with an it’s-so-boring flip of the hand, “Shakespeare.”

We both sat. Then there was the twenty-minute Curtis-and-Nate-argument about whose fault it was that Bianca left, until the Dog rose like a Death Star over their barrier to glare down at them. They fell silent.

***

Today’s Tweet:
Draft #1
He deserves to never eat a Gonzo meal, ever (a fate worse than death), if hurts my friend’s feelings.
 

Draft #2 He
smothers,
doesn’t trust,
protects his sister. Sort of. Discard.

Posted Tweet:
Today the Dog explores the power and value of silence.

***

The next day, give him his due, or perhaps it was because of six straight school days of no lunch, but whatever the reason, Tuesday at lunch we found the Dog waiting for us in the trees. We Greenbacks drifted out to the sides, filtering into the clearing, but Gonzo hung back, picking at the string knotted at the top of his backpack.

“Here,” Drew said, moving close and hoisting Gonzo’s bag right out of his hands. Drew walked to the stump and put another hand under the bulging bag, lowering it to the surface like it was a screaming baby that had finally gone to sleep.
 

Drew stepped back with a ta-dah! flourish of his palm and said to Gonzo, “C’mon, dude, show us your magic.”

The breeze shifted and light flickered across all our faces. I wasn’t surprised that Gonzo’s ears were red, but I didn’t expect the frown on Drew’s face, that bit of anxiety, as we waited for Gonzo’s reaction.

Gonzo cleared his throat and said, reluctant, like he’d been put on the spot, “I overslept, so I only made a couple of frittatas.” He moved closer, like he couldn’t talk about his food without being near it. “And a few corn-fritters.” He took another step and slid an arm in the top of his bag. “And some lettuce wraps.”

I saw people swallow and edge closer.
 

Tio’s voice burst out, “Get out of my way! You guys want to be pussies about this, go ahead, but I want my Gonzo meal!”

In a flash, Tio charged the Dog from the side, and my heart stopped in my chest. Tio slammed into Drew, but Tio might as well have slammed into one of the trees. Drew didn’t budge at all. In fact, Drew ignored Tio and reached over and shoved
Gonzo’s
chest, a lazy swipe that had Gonzo staggering backwards, the top of his backpack still in his hands.

“NOOOO!” cries erupted, but before the food could fall, Gonzo righted himself, whirled, and gave Drew a furious, leaning-forward, punch —
bam
— on the upper chest, Gonzo’s whole weight behind it.

Drew rocked a few inches back from the blow, then straightened with Tio still churning, pushing at his hip without moving him at all. Drew said, with a nod at Gonzo, “Nice swing.”

There was a pause, then Gonzo, his ears still pink, said, “Thanks.”

Helena and Phoebe and Viola and I stared at them and each other in disbelief. I choked out, “What
happened
? Didn’t he just
assault
Gonzo?”

Alex and Robin were smiling. “They’re bonding,” Robin said.

In our shocked silence, Alex shouted, “Let’s eat!”
 

People surged forward and there was laughing and shoving and then I saw Drew haul Tio up onto his shoulders in a fireman’s carry and dump him on the grass outside the circle. Tio scrambled up and darted around Drew, who walked — slow — back to where Gonzo served food on paper plates, like Drew wasn’t sure if he should be there.
 

Weirdly enough, Gonzo paused with the last plate in his hands, and looked at me. I realized everyone was looking at me. I gave Gonzo a short, embarrassed nod okay, then Gonzo handed the sagging last plate to Drew.