Peace, Love, and Baby Ducks Page 9

  “It’s late,” I say. “Want me to sleep in here?”

  “I don’t care, whatever.”

  Her tone is totally lackluster, and I rise. I’m not sticking around if I’m not wanted.

  “Wait, I do,” she says before I reach the door.

  I keep going.

  “Carly, I said I do. Come back.”

  “Chill,” I say. I go to my room and return with my iPod, which I plug into Anna’s sound dock. I adjust the volume superlow.

  “Not your hippie-dippie music,” Anna groans.

  “Yes, and if you’re lucky, you will one day learn to appreciate it.” I crawl in beside her, and Cat Stevens’s voice wraps around us.

  “Hey, Anna?”

  “Yeah?”

  The darkness is no longer frightening, but simply dark. I can barely make out the cracks in the ceiling. “I’m sorry you had a crappy day.” I pause. “In PE.”

  She’s silent.

  “Coach Schranker was a jerk,” I go on.

  She’s still silent.

  “He was a total jerk, Anna. You did nothing wrong.”

  “Except not dive,” she whispers.

  LOVE

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  THE BOOK OF COLE

  Anna can be soooooo slow. It drives me up the wall, as her slowness has a direct impact on me and whether I get to school on time.

  Anna’s morning routine, as observed from, say, her light fixture:

  6:30 A.M. Shrill beeping alarm goes off. Everybody in the house can hear it, everybody but Anna.

  6:35 A.M. Extremely cool older sister marches in wearing cherry-themed pj’s and punches the off button on Anna’s alarm. Extremely cool older sister says, “Anna, wake up.”

  6:45 A.M. Shrill, fire-alarm-esque alarm blares again. Extremely cool and unlazy older sister strides back in—damp from shower—and shakes the lump under the covers which is Anna. “Get up,” she says. Takes screaming alarm clock and places it next to Anna’s ear. Cranks up volume.

  7 A.M. Brisk and efficient mother pops head into room and says, “Anna. It’s seven o’clock. Anna? Respond, please. Anna, say something to let me know you hear me.” Anna grunts and possibly flails an arm out of the covers.

  7:15 A.M. Brisk, efficient, and annoyed mother returns to Anna’s room, pulls covers from Anna’s body, and says, “Anna. GET UP.” Extremely cool, unlazy, and fully dressed sister makes bonus appearance to tell mother that she is enabling her daughter by allowing her to do this every single day. Sister climbs onto bed and shoves Anna from behind until Anna slides into a heap on the floor. Anna makes pitiful sound. Anna regards sister and mother with bleary eyes.

  7:30 A.M. Anna dozes while standing in shower. (Light fixture can report this thanks to auditory clues such as drumming water, more drumming water, and no shampooing or other soaping/ shaving/washing sounds.)

  7:45 A.M. Anna aims blow-dryer at head for a really, really long time.

  8 A.M. Anna sighs, looks longingly at bed, and is drawn to it like a moth to the flame. Is this close to snuggling back in when extremely fed-up older sister bellows from downstairs that IT IS TIME TO GO AND YOU WILL BE LEFT IF YOU DON’T GET DOWN HERE NOW. Which is a lie, as mother-slash-enabler refuses to leave Anna behind, despite encouragement. Light fixture suspects mother of not wanting Anna in house all day, as mother has more important things to do, like catch a rerun of Law and Order before heading off to Pilates.

  By 8:01, the light fixture is finally left in peace. I am in a state of near apoplexy, however. I can’t wait till I get my license and can drive myself to school, because I will leave Anna behind, and too bad for her.

  “Anna!” I complain as she sighs and mopes and roots through the pantry for something to eat. “We have to go. We’re going to be late!”

  “Carly’s right,” Mom says. “Grab a protein bar and let’s go.”

  “I don’t want a protein bar,” Anna says.

  “I have a French essay to turn in,” I say to the air. “She’ll give me a zero if it’s late.”

  “Wasn’t it due yesterday?” Mom asks.

  “Yes, but I left it at home. She said she’d give me until this morning.”

  “Hmm,” Mom says, and the message is: Guess you should have turned it in on time, huh?

  At last, we load up into Mom’s BMW and drive to school. Mom drops us off, and I sprint up the outside stairs and into Grady Hall, where the girls’ homerooms are. Madame d’Aubigné’s room is on the third floor, but Madame d’Aubigné is nowhere to be seen.

  “Where’s Madame d’Aubigné?” I ask Caitlin, who’s in the front row pressing a jewel into the polish on one of her nails.

  “She went to the office,” Caitlin says.

  I jog back down to the first floor.

  “Hi,” I say to the secretary. The last time we exchanged pleasant ries was when Anna was sent here for looking at porn. “Is Madame d’Aubigné here?”

  “Have a seat,” the secretary says. “She’s making some copies.”

  I hear the whir-whir-whir of the Xerox machine. I slip off my backpack and drop into one of the plush leather chairs.

  “Are you here to register for the Summer Expo?” asks Jackie Owens from my PE class.

  “Huh?” I say. I didn’t realize there was anyone else in the office but me, but there Jackie is, sitting primly in a worsted wool skirt. Actually, I have no idea if it’s worsted wool. Worsted wool just seems like something Jackie would wear.

  “The Summer Expo. Enrichment activities for the summer.”

  “It’s November,” I say.

  “Which is why it’s time to start planning. If you don’t, all the good programs get filled.”

  “Uh, okay.”

  “You cannot waste a whole summer,” Jackie says. “Summer internships are the kinds of things they’ll look for on your college applications.”

  “I already did one,” I say. “This past summer, I volunteered for the Student Conservation Association.”

  Jackie’s not letting this go. She’s earnest as she says, “You need to do an enrichment activity every summer. One enrichment activity doesn’t cut it. Do you realize we’ll be seniors in less than two years? Do you realize how competitive college admissions are?”

  I make an aaargh sound and put my head in my hands. I can do this with Jackie because Jackie’s not the kind of person who notices when someone makes aaargh sounds. At least, not when college admissions are being discussed.

  “I’m thinking Vanderbilt, Davidson, and UVA,” Jackie says. “Safety: Savannah College. What about you?”

  “Gross. Blech. Boring. This is not what I want to talk about.”

  “The decisions you make now will affect the rest of your life, Carly.”

  “Anyway, I might not even apply.”

  “To college?” Jackie laughs. “Yeah, right.”

  “Maybe I’ll take a year off. Maybe I’ll get a Eurorail pass and travel around Europe.”

  “When has anybody from Holy Redeemer not gone straight to college? Can you name one example?”

  I don’t have to think about it, because no, I can’t. Two years ago, Harriet Mackey told her parents she’d sent in her acceptance forms to Kenyon, when in truth she hadn’t, that rebel. Her parents didn’t find out until the registration check didn’t go through. Right away her father called Kenyon and explained the “mistake,” and everything got worked out. Peyton, who lives in Harriet’s neighborhood, says that whenever Harriet comes home, she says, “I love Kenyon so much. I’m having the best time.”

  “So that means I’m not allowed?” I say to Jackie. “I have to go to college straight out of high school just like everybody else?”

  “Uh, yeah,” Jackie says. “If you want to make anything of yourself, you do.”

  A guy I’ve never seen before steps into the office. My heart stops, and then it soars back fast and fluttery. Because he’s my age (ish), and he’s gorgeous. Not in a button-down and khakis way, like the majority of the guys at Holy
Redeemer, and not in a fake-grunge way or a jock way. He’s just. . .

  Whew. The air goes out of me.

  “Carly. You’re staring,” Jackie says under her breath. But she is, too.

  The guy’s got blue eyes, dirty-blond hair, and a faraway expression. He’s very James Dean in his jeans and T-shirt, only his jeans fit him a whole lot better than James Dean’s ever did. James Dean wore his jeans too high. In those posters of him, they’re, like, up to his waist. But this guy wears his jeans just right. They do what good jeans should do, which is make his butt look amazingly, fabulously, adorably guy.

  “Hey,” he says to the secretary. “I’m supposed to check in with Mr. Perkins and get my books.” His voice is low-pitched and sure.

  “He dips,” Jackie whispers, jerking her chin at the telltale round outline of a tobacco tin in his jeans pocket. Dipping, in Buckhead, is the equivalent of sneezing all over the salad bar at the Lone Star Steakhouse. It’s trashy, it’s tacky, and it just isn’t done.

  “He’s beautiful,” I whisper back.

  “You must be Cole,” the secretary says. She stands and smiles. “We’re so glad to have you. Come this way, I’ll show you to the headmaster’s office.”

  “Yeah, okay,” he says.

  Jackie straightens her shoulders and says loudly, “So anyway, I think you should really consider the Summer Expo. You could go to D.C. and be part of the mock congress. Or you could do a summer intensive at Fidelity Bank and learn about investment portfolios.”

  Cole glances at us. His eyes skim over Jackie—I swear they do, they skim right over her—and land on me. I’m filled with unexpected courage, and I try to convey through the air that I am more than I appear.

  “I would rather eat my own shoes than learn all about investment portfolios,” I say, still holding Cole’s gaze.

  He grins, and my blood dizzies.

  Holy cats, I think I’m falling for this guy. Or rather, I think I already have.

  And hard.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  UNLEASH THE BEAST

  By my free period, the word has spread: there’s a new guy, and he’s hot. I feel special because I actually saw him. And I know his name. Cole. Cole, Cole, Cole, Cole, Cole.

  I tell Peyton about seeing Cole in the office, but I keep our we-are-kindred-souls moment to myself. I do think we might be kindred souls. If I felt a jolt as strong as I did when our eyes locked, then surely he did, too, right? Surely he felt something? It would be unfair of the world to give one person a jolt like that and not have it be reciprocated.

  During my free, I go to the Hut with Peyton. Lydia tags along. They’re hoping for a Cole sighting, and I am, too.

  “I’m going to get a Snickers,” I say. “You guys want anything?”

  “No, thanks,” Peyton says.

  Lydia shakes her head. “South Beach.”

  “You sure?”

  “I’m sure.” She takes in my low-slung jeans. “I don’t know how you can eat so much and stay so thin.”

  “Oh, please.” Weight is an issue I refuse to get into with Lydia, because she gets very uptight about it. Like at the blood drive Holy Redeemer held last month, for example. Lydia stood in line and donated her blood and got her Dixie cup of lemonade and short-bread cookie, which she didn’t eat. Then, when she found out I didn’t donate, she got pissed.

  “I tried, but they turned me down,” I explained.

  “What do you mean, they turned you down?” She wasn’t pissed yet, just baffled. “Do you have AIDS?”

  “Yeah, I have AIDS, Lydia.”

  “You do? Oh my God.” Her eyes went glassy, and I could tell she was scrolling through past memories to see if we’d ever shared a needle or sucked each other’s blood.

  “Lydia, get real. You have to be over a hundred and ten pounds or they won’t let you donate.”

  “Oh,” she said. She pressed her lips together. “I’m not over a hundred and ten pounds, and I did it anyway. I just lied.”

  Uh-huh, right. Nobody cares what size you are, I wanted to say, although of course everyone does.

  “Did you know that eating refined sugar is linked to Attention Deficit Disorder?” Lydia says now, determined to take all the fun out of my soon-to-be Snickers.

  “I’m sorry, what?” I say.

  “Attention Deficit Disorder,” Lydia repeats.

  “I’m sorry, what?”

  “ADD,” she says, spacing it out slow and loud.

  I blink. “Are you talking to me?”

  “She’s being funny, Lydia,” Peyton says. “Come on, let’s go claim a sofa.”

  The two of them leave, and I fish a crumpled bill out of the bottom pocket of my backpack. It takes two tries to get the machine to accept it. I punch B-6 for a king-size Snickers, and oh, the lovely thunk as it hits the tray.

  “I’m telling Lydia about Mr. Burnett,” Peyton says when I drop down by them. “About how wacky he was today.”

  “Ooo, wacky!” Lydia says, making wacky hands. “I’m so wacky!”

  Mr. Burnett is our English teacher. As today is Tacky Tie Tuesday, he wore a wide tie with dancing hula girls all over it.

  I rip open my Snickers. “I like Mr. Burnett. At least he tries.”

  “Teachers shouldn’t try,” Peyton say. “Anyway, he’s like fifty years old.”

  “And he’s bald,” Lydia says.

  “And he’s got a beer gut,” Peyton says. “He looks like Homer Simpson.”

  “He shows clips from Monty Python skits every Monday,” I tell Lydia. “Then on Friday, when he gives us our quizzes, he sticks in a quote from one of the clips. If you get it right, you get extra credit.”

  “Isn’t that wacky?” Peyton says. “The reason Carly likes it is because she’s wacky, too.”

  Lydia smirks, and I feel the tightness of not wanting Peyton to be such a phony. More and more, I see her pretending to be someone else.

  Beside me on the sofa, Peyton watches while I eat my Snickers.

  “Break me off a bite, will you?” she says. “Not from the spitty end.”

  “You said you didn’t want anything.”

  “Just a little. Just one bite.”

  “I specifically asked,” I say, because I hate it when she does this. “I said, ‘Does anybody want anything?’ And you said no.”

  Peyton and Lydia share a look.

  “It’s just a candy bar,” Lydia says.

  Peyton holds out her hand. I break off a bite from the nonspitty end and reluctantly give it to her. I asked if she wanted anything, and she said no.

  “Hey,” Lydia says, nodding at the door. “Is that him? The new guy?”

  I follow her gaze. It is him, and he’s every bit as gorgeous as I remembered. He pauses to get his bearings, and I’m struck by how . . . in control he is. If it were my first day at a new school, I’d be a quivery splat of self-consciousness, and I’d probably be off hiding in the bathroom.

  Cole glances around, taking it all in. He doesn’t look nervous. He doesn’t look eager. He just looks mildly interested.

  “Oh my God,” Peyton says. She pops the bite of Snickers into her mouth and chews like she’s on a mission.

  “Is he a sophomore?” Lydia says. “Please tell me he’s in our grade.”

  “I don’t know,” I say.

  “But weren’t you there when he came to the office?” Peyton says.

  “The secretary didn’t get out her bullhorn and announce what grade he’s in. She just took him to meet Headmaster Perkins.”

  Cole strolls to the drink machine. He feeds in two dollars and punches the tab for a Monster energy drink.

  “Unleash the beast,” Lydia murmurs.

  He opens his soda, and we can hear the hiss.

  “Look how cute he is, popping his top!” Lydia cries, drawing her hand to her chest. “Be still my heart!”

  “Can I hold your Monster?” Peyton asks in an innocent school-girl voice.

  “Just remember, I saw him first,” I say.<
br />
  “So, what, you own him?” Lydia says.

  Yes, I want to say. He tilts his head and swigs his drink. His Adam’s apple moves up and down.

  “I don’t think any of us need to worry,” Peyton says, the implication being that he is too crushilicious for all of us. “Especially you, Carly. You’re too wacky.”

  The two of them giggle and my feelings are hurt. Peyton makes exaggerated puppy-dog eyes at me and says, “JK. LOL. Enter.”

  “Ha ha,” I say.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  A LIFE OF FAITH DEMANDS ACTION

  I want to meet Cole. I really want to meet him. This is my one and only life (as far as I know), and all the time people are telling me to make the most of it.

  There’s just one problem: when it comes to boys, I’m a wimp. I don’t mean to be. I just am. All I do is sit wimpily on the steps of Ansley Hall almost every afternoon after school lets out, listening to Cole play his guitar. I’m one of a thousand other girls doing the same thing, but pretending not to. One day in November, I get so wrapped up in how Cole’s fingers flit over the strings that I forget to go meet Mom at pickup.

  Anna has to come and drag me away. “It’s three-forty-five.”

  “Not yet.” I want to stay and gaze at Cole.

  “Mom’s waiting. I’ve got a dentist appointment, remember?” She’s loud enough that Cole glances over, and I think, Oh, great. Yes. Of all the things you could overhear me talking about, let’s make it the dentist, shall we?

  “Shhh,” I say. Several of the other girls nod.

  “Come on,” she says. “Today’s the day I get my teeth whitened. I don’t want to miss my appointment.”

  “Riiiight, because heaven forbid you don’t match all the other Barbie dolls with their neon-white teeth.” Am I imagining it, or is Cole suppressing a smile?

  “You know Dr. Smiley won’t hold my time slot,” Anna complains.

  “Dr. Smiley has halitosis,” I say, and I launch into a highly amusing riff on our dentist, whose name really is Dr. Smiley. I end with, “Anyway, can you honestly live with yourself if you pay a thousand dollars to get your teeth whitened? You could feed an entire third-world nation for a month with that much money.”