The Boy Recession

  I’m also pretty sure that Diva is going to force me to take her to the prom. And I’m sure she’ll force me to wear some ridiculous suit and buy her flowers and rent a limo. My so-called girlfriend is a psycho. Every free second I have, she’s texting me about dumb stuff, like my clothes. On Sunday night, she let me know that I should wear “that green shirt” to school on Monday. I actually remembered, and wore it, but when she saw me in the morning, she was pissed off.

  “I said the green shirt,” she said.

  I looked down and pulled the shirt away from my chest to see the color.

  “This is green.”

  “It’s blue.”

  So on top of all the other crap I’m dealing with, I think I’m color-blind.

  “Hunter! I got a surprise for you!”

  As soon as I walk in the door, my dad is all over me. He’s holding a bunch of DVDs.

  “Check these out: Singin’ in the Rain, West Side Story, Phantom of the Opera, Fiddler on the Roof. I asked the guy at the counter for musicals with strong male leads. This Billy Flynn is a great character, but in Chicago, it’s all about the girls. Next year they should do Phantom. You need a male lead with a dark side.”

  “Uh-huh,” I say, sitting on the stairs and dropping the bag with my new agenda in it. When I first got cast as Billy Flynn, my dad rented Chicago the movie, and he got really into it.

  “Whadda you think, movie marathon tonight?” my dad asks. “I got popcorn, too! None of that organic crap Mom gets. Real popcorn.”

  “Uh, maybe later,” I tell my dad. “I gotta take a nap first.”

  I leave the agenda on the stairs and drag my ass into the kitchen. I just need five minutes to myself, during which I can make a grilled cheese with half a stick of butter.

  “Hunter!” my dad calls. “You’re not eating dairy, are you? I read it messes with your vocal cords!”

  CHAPTER 21: KELLY

  “Cougars Among Us: Julius Juniors and Their Freshman Boy-Toys”

  “The Boy Recession©” by Aviva Roth, The Julius Journal, February

  I don’t know if it’s from being shut inside for months or lowered immunity from my SAD, but for two weeks I’ve had this horrible cold that won’t go away. I don’t feel sick enough to go home, but I can’t play the flute because I’m coughing so hard. On Tuesday, we were teaching the flutes their first notes, and after I interrupted our lesson for my fifth coughing attack, Johann suggested cautiously, “Why don’t you go get a drink? I can take over here.”

  When Johann said that, Hunter looked over at us and smiled, which made me realize that he knows we’re dating. Maybe he read Aviva’s stupid article about Julius cougars, which didn’t mention me by name but might has well have. Is there any other junior girl dating a “musically inclined freshman with a penchant for clogs and diminutive woodwind instruments”? I don’t think so.

  So Hunter knows, but he hasn’t said anything. Last week it seemed like he was in a bad mood, and I hoped he was a little upset about me dating someone, but it turned out he was just tired from musical rehearsal.

  Today, after our PMS lesson, I’m sitting on the piano bench, feeling sorry for myself. Hunter is on the bandstand, putting the drum set back together, and Johann comes over to me.

  “How are you feeling?” he asks.

  “I’m okay,” I say, sighing. “But I don’t think I can go to the movie tonight. I just don’t want to cough through the whole thing.”

  “Okay, no problem at all,” Johann says politely. “Oh, and, um, my mother gave me something for you. This tea. It’s for colds, I guess. But if you don’t want it, you…”

  He takes an envelope out of his pocket and hands it to me.

  “That’s so sweet! Thank you so much. Thank her for me,” I say, before I start coughing again.

  “I can call you tonight, if you want,” Johann offers.

  “Sure! Yeah.”

  “Is eight o’clock okay?”

  “Oh, you can call whenever. I’ll be home all night, so…”

  “Okay. I’ll call at eight, if that’s okay.”

  “Okay. Eight is perfect.”

  Johann kind of nods at me and walks away, and I sit on that piano bench, holding his mother’s Austrian tea, counting how many times we just said “okay” to each other, and thinking, So this is what it’s like to have a boyfriend. It’s not exactly a Taylor Swift song.

  Taylor Swift is always singing about front porches and screen doors, stars and lakes. In her songs, there’s always a boy in a truck, or a boy throwing rocks at a window, and it’s always a dewy summer night, and everyone’s always kissing by a lake. In my life, there are no guys driving trucks or throwing rocks at windows. That’s not Johann’s fault, though. I mean, he just turned fifteen, so he can’t drive. I guess if he wanted to throw rocks at my window, he’d have to walk or have his dad drive him. But that wouldn’t be very spontaneous.

  Not that Johann is spontaneous. He is definitely a planner. The couple of times that we’ve gone to the movies, we picked them three days in advance, and Johann read all the reviews. I picked him up in my dad’s station wagon, and he paid for the tickets. The first time we went out, I tried to give him money, but he said, “I couldn’t allow you to pay.” In some ways, I’m really lucky. I doubt any other girl I know has a boyfriend who takes her out and holds the door for her and brings her Austrian tea. The way things are going around here, I may be the closest thing to Taylor Swift that Julius has right now. Of course, Taylor Swift usually kisses the boys in her songs, and Johann and I haven’t kissed yet. But it’s probably my fault. I’ve had this phlegmy cold almost the whole time we’ve been going out. Every time I talk to someone, I end up hacking in their face until they run away or politely hold a folder in front of their face. I don’t know how long I’ve been sitting on the piano bench, spacing out, when Hunter knocks over the cymbals and they clatter against the bandstand.

  “Sorry, sorry!” Hunter says, popping his head up from behind the drum set. “Did I freak you out?”

  “No.” I shake my head. “I think I’m in a NyQuil haze.”

  Hunter takes a big leap over a bass drum and comes down from the bandstand.

  “Whoa,” he says, looking down at me. “That tea smells pretty strong.”

  “Does it?” I hold the envelope up to my nose and sniff. “I can’t even smell it, I’m so stuffed up.”

  I put the tea down and take a tissue out of my pocket to blow my nose. But Hunter stops me. As soon as I bring the tissue to my face, he reaches down and pinches the fattest part of my nose.

  “Wait, stop,” he says.

  I look up at him over his hand and ask, “What are you doing?” But my voice is nasal from having my nose pinched, and that makes both of us laugh.

  “You’re not supposed to blow your nose,” Hunter says.

  “I’m not?”

  “No one is. It’s bad to blow your nose. Seriously! I read something about it. Blowing your nose makes your head explode or something.”

  I guess I’m making a horrified face as I look at him, breathing through my mouth, because Hunter laughs and corrects himself.

  “Not explode, I guess. But it’s something about the pressure in your head.”

  I don’t take the tissue away from my face, so Hunter doesn’t take his fingers off my nose.

  “I’m probably really snotty,” I apologize.

  “It’s okay,” he says, and leans down and whispers in my ear, “my hand isn’t that clean, anyway.”

  I laugh, and Hunter lets me use my tissue.

  “Hey, so you and Johann are going out?” he asks as I cross the room to the garbage can.

  I’m glad that my back is turned when I say, “Yeah, I guess so.”

  “That’s cool,” Hunter says. “He’s cool.”

  When I get back to the piano, I ask, “How’d you know? Did you read Aviva’s article?”

  “What?”

  “In the school newspaper.”

  “Oh, no,
” Hunter, says, moving his legs so I can sit on the bench. “I just heard you talking about taking him to the movies. So I figured either he needed someone to get him into a PG-thirteen movie, or…”

  He’s making fun of me. I can’t believe he’s making fun of me. I look up at him with my mouth open.

  “He’s fifteen!”

  “I know, I know,” Hunter says, laughing.

  “He’s not that young!” I protest. “He’ll be able to drive soon! Well, in, like, a year.”

  “No, but seriously,” Hunter says, “he’s a good guy! He is. He’s smart, and he knows his stuff with music. And he’s very… ironed.”

  Hunter runs his hand down the front of his own shirt, which is very… not ironed. Hunter’s shirt is faded and wrinkled, and his knees are coming through the holes in his jeans.

  “That’s probably good for you, right? An… ironed… guy?” Hunter asks me, drumming absentmindedly on his bare knees with his fingers.

  “I thought so,” I say, trying not to sound too miserable, watching Hunter’s hands the whole time.

  CHAPTER 22: KELLY

  “Promise Rings or Pretense? The Reality Behind Julius’s Celibacy Trend”

  “The Boy Recession©” by Aviva Roth, The Julius Journal, February

  We thought this was the perfect day to tell you how much you mean to us,” a freshman girl says to Pirate Dave as she hands him a huge bouquet of expensive-looking flowers.

  Dave takes the bouquet in one hand and examines it critically.

  “Are these hybrid tea roses?” he asks.

  “Well, the florist guy didn’t say….” the girl says.

  Dave sighs and slams his locker.

  “To be honest, I prefer American beauties,” he tells her. He gives back the bouquet and walks away.

  She calls out weakly, “Happy Valentine’s Day!”

  I’ve been dreading Valentine’s Day. “Quick,” I say, tugging on Aviva’s arm. “Give me your sunglasses. And your coat. And your scarf.”

  We stop by the lockers, and Aviva unpeels her layers. “Are you incognito?” she asks me as she slings her messenger bag over her shoulder and we keep walking.

  “Yes. I’m hiding from Johann,” I tell her. “It’s Valentine’s Day, and I’m hiding from my boyfriend because I’m scared he’ll do something romantic.”

  “Does Johann usually do romantic stuff?” Aviva asks.

  “Not really,” I tell her. “I mean, he holds doors for me when we go out. And he pays for dinner. And once he gave me his sweater when I was cold. But I guess that stuff is more polite than romantic.”

  “Has he kissed you yet?”

  I shake my head.

  “Hug?” Aviva asks.

  “Not even a handshake,” I tell her.

  “So you have nothing to worry about,” Aviva says. “I doubt he’s gonna suddenly get romantic today and whip out his piccolo and serenade you in the hallway.”

  “Ugh,” I say. “Don’t even say that. Don’t put that idea out in the universe.”

  “It won’t happen,” Aviva reassures me, and then grins. “A little man in clogs playing a teeny tiny flute is waaaay more Saint Patrick’s Day than Valentine’s.”

  My disguise is pointless, because Johann is nowhere to be seen. Hunter is, though—hanging out in his usual doorway spot with Derek.

  “Hey, Hunter,” I say to him, after I give Aviva back her sunglasses.

  “Heyyyy,” Hunter drawls back, with his slow smile.

  Out of nowhere, Diva comes barreling toward us and jumps on Hunter, slamming his head back into the lockers.

  “Whoa,” Hunter says into Diva’s face, which is an inch away from his.

  “Happy Valentine’s Day!” Diva screeches.

  Then she kisses him.

  The rest of the day goes by and I don’t bump into Johann once. At some point I realize that it’s probably because he’s avoiding me, too. I’m sure he has no clue how to act on Valentine’s Day, between the fact that he’s never had a girlfriend before and the awkward sham of a relationship that we have. Just as I let myself start to feel really lonely, I hear raised voices in the hallway.

  “I can’t believe you took my prom date to Burger King!” Pam yells at Amy. Then, before Amy can answer, Pam turns to Josh and says, “I can’t believe you went to Burger King with her!”

  Julius seniors are allowed to go out to lunch, and Amy and Josh just came in from the parking lot in their big coats with Burger King bags in their hands. They were stomping the snow off their boots when Pam came up to confront them.

  “Whaa…” Josh begins, but Pam rips the greasy bag out of his hand, and then he whines, “What the hell? I need that Whopper. I’m starving.”

  “He’s your prom date, not your boyfriend,” Amy tells Pam, rolling her eyes, tired of Pam’s tantrums. “We just went to lunch together. Nothing happened.”

  “Yeah, nothing happened,” Josh echoes.

  “What?” Pam looks up at Josh like he’s an idiot. “No! I don’t care what you two do. Go make out. I don’t care.”

  She turns to Amy. “But do not take my prom date to Burger King. He’s gonna weigh five thousand pounds by the time we take our prom pictures. I did not give Eugene two hundred euros to import me a pair of French Spanx so I could take professional pictures next to a bloated, greasy doofus.”

  Poor Josh. Pam just called him fat and ran away with his lunch, and now Amy won’t share her fries with him. I guess someone is having a worse Valentine’s Day than I am.

  When I get to the chem room for double lab period with Hunter, he doesn’t say anything about Valentine’s Day or Diva. In fact, the class is totally normal until an announcement comes over the loudspeaker, letting us know that the school is conducting an emergency earthquake drill. Over the sound of everyone cheering that lab got interrupted, we hear our teacher Mr. Winther say something about taking cover under a table until the shaking stops. There’s no shaking, but Derek jogs over to a desk and slides under it like he’s sliding into second base. Eugene goes over to another desk, sighs, and lays the handkerchief he always carries on the ground, kneels under the desk, and starts texting on his BlackBerry. Hunter and I crawl under our lab table.

  “My little sister, Lila, would be so excited about this,” I tell Hunter. “She loves natural disasters. She watches The Weather Channel all the time, and she’s only seven.”

  Hunter laughs. “Sounds like she’s gonna be one of those tornado-chasers one day. I’m clueless—I didn’t even know we had earthquakes in Wisconsin.”

  I shake my head. “We’ll probably never have one. They mostly happen at fault lines—like, where the plates of the earth meet each other. The plates shift, and everything gets shaken up.”

  “Wow.” Hunter turns his head back to look at me. “You’re an expert.”

  I laugh. “I had to learn enough to prove to Lila that we’ll never have one.”

  Being this close to Hunter, I’m suddenly aware of his breath, and I start to feel nervous.

  I have to ask. I have to know about him and Diva.

  I say, “So this is how Julius celebrates Valentine’s Day.”

  “Ughhhh,” Hunter says with a sigh. His shoulders sink.

  “What?”

  “I don’t know,” Hunter says. “Valentine’s Day is just so annoying.”

  He accidentally puts his left hand down on my right hand, balancing all his weight on me for a second.

  “Sorry!” he says, and then continues. “No, like, probably Valentine’s Day can be cool with someone you like. Like, are you and Johann doing something?”

  “No,” I say quickly. “I didn’t even see him today.”

  “Diva wants me to buy her something,” Hunter says. “But I’m not. She’s so annoying. She just, like, randomly told people we’re dating.”

  “So you’re not dating?”

  I can feel my pulse in my throat.

  “Nah. I dunno. I mean, I guess we are.”

  I lift my head a
nd blurt out, “I don’t even like Johann. I don’t really know why we’re going out.”

  I want Hunter to look relieved or excited. But instead he looks sympathetic. Does he feel bad for me?

  “He’s a nice guy, though,” Hunter says.

  “I just… He’s… I don’t like him like that,” I say. I know I sound completely desperate, but I keep going. “I don’t even know how we ended up going out.”

  Hunter smiles. “Well, I know how I ended up going out with Diva…. I got drunk and passed out, and she took advantage of me.”

  We both laugh out loud. Hunter’s eyes are so ridiculously blue, and I know that I’m staring at him for longer than I should, but he’s looking at me, too. I’m scared to move any part of my body, including my eyes.

  Hunter moves his hand, and it lands on mine again. This time he doesn’t say sorry, and I don’t want him to. Then he tilts his head, and I realize that he’s about to kiss me….

  And the loudspeaker crackles, and Hunter retreats, banging his head against the table.

  “Thank you for participating in this emergency drill,” Dr. Nicholas’s voice booms over the loudspeaker. “Please resume your classes.”

  Mr. Winther picks up the discussion. “As I’m sure most of you realize, we did not have a real earthquake today. However…”

  No, it wasn’t a real earthquake. Nothing shifted today. But I have hope. There are definitely fault lines here.

  CHAPTER 23: HUNTER

  “Anonymous Senior Gives Tell-All Report About Being Forced into Prom Contract”

  “The Boy Recession©” by Aviva Roth, The Julius Journal, February

  I feel like shit.

  Actually, I feel worse than shit. I feel like dog shit in a paper bag that Derek set on fire on someone’s porch. My head hurts. My neck and shoulders hurt. I feel like I’ve been lifting weights, even though obviously I haven’t. And I’m more tired than usual this week. Musical rehearsals have been wearing me out, but this is a different kind of tired. I’m just dragging my ass around. I don’t even have the energy to pretend I’m not sleeping in class.