CHAPTER 9

ONLINE

Trevor left after we practiced for about an hour. I don’t think people really need to practice things like the wood block and guiro, but we stood there scraping and hitting things until we felt like we were pros.

After I got ready for bed I sat down in front of the family computer to do a little research. We had only one computer, and my parents made us keep it on a small table in the middle of our family room.

My dad tried to make it sound like it was a good thing, but Libby and I knew the real reason was because our parents wanted to know what we were doing. We used to keep the computer in the office nook near the kitchen, until Libby got busted looking up

That was when my dad decided to put the computer in the most public place in the house. I didn’t really care because I usually used it only for games or homework. Tonight, however, I needed it for other reasons. I was having multiple girl problems, and I wanted to see if there was something I could do to correct them. Janae still wouldn’t speak to me, and now Kat was here. I wasn’t exactly smooth in the “lady” department.

I had seen a TV show where they gave out some advice to people who were having trouble with their girlfriends. They had mentioned a website where you could find ideas to help make things better.

I typed in the address and pressed ENTER. There were tons of dumb ideas for boys to impress the girl of their dreams. They seemed silly, but it said they were guaranteed to work. Quickly, I wrote down a few. My dad came into the room and saw the list I was writing.

I just nodded and quietly hoped he would go away. My dad started talking about how he used to impress my mom. He went on and on about all the cute things he did. He described how he used to comb his hair and polish his shoes so that …

I wanted to simultaneously throw up and die, but he kept on talking. He told me about their first date, their second date, and their third date.

He told me what flowers were appropriate for a fourth date and how girls love it when you call them by their first and last names. He kept talking about my mother and his relationship with her so much that I thought maybe it would just be better for me to become a monk and never even date girls.

I thanked my dad for no reason and ran off with my list. When I got to my room I closed my door and there was Kat. I screamed in the most manly way I could.

Kat had come through my window, and she was trying to get back into the closet. Puck was there with her. He was obviously not a very good guard dog. Kat pulled as hard as she could on the closet doorknob. I explained to her that Beardy wouldn’t open up until the time was right.

I knew what Kat meant. My closet usually mixed creatures up, but she didn’t seem to be a mash-up. I thought maybe if we took a moment to think about why she was here it would help.

Kat told me she had been using her bow and arrows to shoot at the gong. She kept them hidden so she wouldn’t waste the arrows. It wasn’t easy for me to talk to girls, but I just went for it. I told Kat about everything I had learned about Katniss from reading The Hunger Games. Kat told me that it did sound a lot like her, but there was another part of her that didn’t match up with Katniss.

Kat couldn’t whistle either, which was weird, seeing how in The Hunger Games she could. I didn’t know why she wanted to sing, but whenever she tried, nothing came out of her mouth.

Kat knew she was here to help me, but she wasn’t totally sure how yet. When I suggested she could start by telling Janae that I wasn’t such a bad guy, she smiled and asked me if she could read my copy of The Hunger Games. It was a weird request, but I found my copy and gave it to her. She thanked me and promised she was going to find a way to help me, then she climbed out the window.

I closed the window behind her. Kat was something else. I mean, she was sort of interesting. I sat on my bed and looked at the list of ideas I had gotten from the internet to impress girls. I wanted to get Janae to forgive me, but for some reason every time I saw Kat, my thoughts about her got bigger while my thoughts about Janae shrunk.

I changed into one of my dad’s old concert T-shirts and got ready for bed. Then I found the second book in the Hunger Games series, Catching Fire, and began to read.