Her next period was French class, and it was excruciating. She sat on her own, not acknowledging Kainoa’s presence, but her eyes throbbed with the impulse to look over at him. She knew that if she did, she would feel horrible about herself again. She had to ignore that he was there.
This did not prove easy. Especially when it came time to pick partners for their first major project.
Normally, she and Kainoa would have paired up automatically. In fact, Emi originally enrolled in French specifically because Kainoa was taking it, too. If her parents had had their way, she would be in Japanese right now. But Kainoa said that knowing the language of ballet would give cultural context to their dancing. Now, as luck would have it, they were stuck in Ms. Labarge’s class together for the rest of the semester.
Emi looked desperately around the room for another potential partner. There was always Malia Wu, who was sort of a friend. She seemed a decent choice.
Emi had about settled the issue in her mind when she found her eyes sliding surreptitiously towards Kainoa’s corner of the room. He was sitting next to one of their so-called mutual friends, Tori. Tori had been one of those girls standing in the quad this morning, completely ignoring Emi, not even deigning to say hello. The memory of that humiliating encounter was enough to make Emi’s bile rise.
Charlotte’s advice drifted back into her consciousness.
Make Kainoa jealous.
She entertained the idea for a moment. The more I mope over him, the more pathetic I seem. If I start hanging out with some other guy…who knows?
This was the perfect opportunity to show Kainoa and his friends that she was moving on, talking to other guys…possibly dating other guys. And really, what class would be more romantic than French for a budding relationship? It was, after all, the language of amour.
Ms. Labarge was busily chattering away at the front of the classroom, reviewing the project rubric. Emi swiveled around to face the back of the classroom where most of the male contingent was sitting.
There were only five boys in her French class, not counting Kainoa. Their names were Mason, Sean, Kenji, Josh and Beau. Of the five, the obvious front-runner was Josh. Josh Stokowski.
Trying not to be too obvious about it, Emi peeked at Josh out of the corner of her eye. They’d been in the same French class since the seventh grade, but in all that time, they had probably exchanged no more than three or four words with one another. Sometimes he took the same bus as her, but she never sat next to him or paid him any heed.
She had good reason for ignoring Josh. He was notoriously a Class-A jerk.
She remembered when he first came to Staley in seventh grade, all the girls had giggled and fawned over him, because he was pretty hot. Even in middle school, when most guys still had braces and bad hair, he was a stud. There had even been a running bet over which girl would possibly dare to ask him out. Some intrepid girls invited him to dates and group get-togethers, but as far as Emi knew, he had turned them all down. And not always graciously.
She distinctly recalled Josh publically slamming a girl named Ivy Engler when she asked him to the seventh grade dance. “Are you kidding?” Josh had sneered. “You disgust me.”
That incident had pretty much sealed Josh’s reputation as a jerk. Even though nobody particularly liked Ivy Engler, the general consensus was that Josh’s cruel words had been way overboard.
After that, most people ignored him, even the guys. Josh didn’t seem to mind much. He never uttered a word to anybody he deemed uncool, which was basically the entire student body at Staley. Emi vaguely recalled that he was some kind of major track star. Or maybe cross-country. In any case, a runner. And last year he’d broken an athletic record, a feat that probablyonly contributed to his already massive ego.
So yes, in summary, Josh was a jerk.
Still, he was a handsome jerk. Almost too handsome with his intensely blue eyes and Apollonian features. He had the face of someone who knew he was jaw-droppingly good-looking and thought he was a cut above everyone else.
Emi knew she would probably just be making a bigger fool of herself by flirting with someone so obviously out of her league. In all likelihood, Josh would shut her down.
But what if she took a more subtle approach than flirtation? What if she just sat with him. Talked to him. Hung out with him. That would definitely draw Kainoa’s attention. Talking alone presented a fairly low-risk of rejection. She highly doubted even Josh would publicly reject her attempts at friendly conversation.
When Ms. Labarge finally dismissed the class, Emi had to practically sprint out of the room to catch up with Josh. He certainly wasted no time lingering to mingle with friends.
“Hey,” Emi called, almost colliding with a gaggle of freshmen standing outside the language building. “Wait.”
Finally caught up, she grabbed his shoulder. He stopped, turning around with a frown.
“Sorry, I didn’t mean to sneak up. I just wanted to ask you something,” she said. He didn’t respond, but kept standing there staring at her with a slight furrow in his brow. Emi decided to plow on anyway. “I’m Emi, by the way.”
“I know. We’ve been in the same class for three years.”
“Yeah, well,” Emi faltered. She was thrown by the trace of bitterness in his voice. “I was wondering if you wanted to be partners for the French project…maybe.”
Kainoa appeared in Emi’s peripheral vision, and her heart skipped a beat. He was definitely looking at them. She had to use all her willpower to refocus on her conversation with Josh.
She put a hand casually on Josh’s arm. “So? What do you say?”
Josh stopped walking and moved smoothly away from her grasp. “Isn’t your boyfriend in our class? Maybe you should ask him.”
Emi was surprised Josh knew or cared about her social life. “We broke up ages ago.”
Only a slight exaggeration. On the high school time scale, two months was a pretty long time. She didn’t want Josh guessing the truth: that he was part of her not-so-suave “make Kainoa jealous” scheme.
She pulled out her phone. “Give me your number and I’ll call you this weekend to figure stuff out.”
She could practically feel Kainoa’s jealous eyes burning into her as she typed Josh’s number into her phone. She had to suppress a smile. Maybe Charlotte was right. This might turn out to be a piece of cake.
Chapter 6