I LOSE THE BLITZ.
Fuming quietly on the curb after class, I pull out my phone to call my Uber, putting in the location of the park where we’re meeting the DJ.
“I suppose we should ride together,” Ethan says, walking up to me.
I don’t look up. “Why?”
“We’re literally going to the same place, Sanger. Seems wasteful.”
Admittedly, I have run out of allowance for the month. I don’t care. Dipping into my own savings is definitely preferable to eight avoidable minutes in a car with Ethan.
“Even the shortest recess from you is the opposite of wasteful,” I reply, hitting the button to request my ride.
“Embarrassed about losing last period? I get it.” He takes out his phone, presumably requesting his own ride.
“You didn’t even write five paragraphs on the long-answer. Who turns in an exam with a four-paragraph essay?”
Ethan’s fingers freeze on his phone. “Eyes on your own paper.” His voice is low. I’ve struck a nerve.
“Hey, an A-minus is nothing to be embarrassed about, Ethan.” I walk a few feet away, putting cool distance between us as I watch the 2010 Ford Focus’s progress on my phone.
Ethan doesn’t move. He stares at his own phone, presumably following the progress of his Uber. It pulls up first. Without even glancing in my direction, he gets in, flinging his shoulder bag into the seat like he’s in some great hurry. I wait a few minutes for my Uber, which is navigating the complicated obstacles of students flocking to their cars and parents driving into the parking lot for pickups.
When I hop in, I feel my phone vibrate. I glance down, reading the message from the lock screen. It’s from Ethan.
ETA 3:22.
I realize in a flash why he hurried into his Uber. The blitz is evidently not over. He wants to be first to the park. It’s immature and idiotic, racing the mean streets of San Mateo County to reach our reunion vendor first. And right now, I’m all in.
I check the Uber app, which informs me my ETA is 3:24. “Turn here,” I instruct the driver. “It’s faster.” We cut on to one of the residential streets near the school, and I write Ethan a quick text.
I’ll be there at 3:21
Using every shortcut I know and crosschecking the route with multiple online maps, I find our way to the park, passing Dylan’s house, the Whole Foods, and the elementary school. When we pull up, I catch sight of Ethan out of the corner of my eye. He’s arrived at the exact same time.
I walk in the direction of the music I hear pulsing over the green inclines of the park, quickening my pace when I notice Ethan picking up his. We’re supposed to meet the DJ at the food truck she’s playing from, but I don’t know where the truck will be, exactly. If I follow the electronic rhythms reverberating over the hills and past the people playing Frisbee, I’ll end up where I need to be.
Ethan and I hurry in lockstep up the nearest hill, both of us stealing glances at the other’s pace. I reach the top seconds before him. My thighs burn, which I ignore because from up here, I can see our destination.
Parked near the picnic tables, the food truck is drawing a small crowd for its signature product—dessert hot dogs. Parents with strollers and groups of teenagers leave the window holding Twinkies halved to resemble buns with pieces of licorice or strips of brownie down the middle. The truck is painted entirely white, except the name scrawled in black on the front. SWEET WIENERS, reads the thick, marker-like lettering.
I cut Ethan off rounding the back of the truck, where I find the DJ booth inside the open rear doors. Soulful vocals over a skittering beat vibrate from the speakers, and a twentysomething girl with dark hair and copper skin stands in between them, her hands deftly navigating the keyboard of her computer and the knobs of her turntable. She’s slim, with big plastic glasses, and wearing a white, well-fitting SWEET WIENERS T-shirt.
I shove my hand out. “Avery Tran? I’m Alison.”
Avery doesn’t shake my hand. Hers remain working the controls on her station, like I should’ve realized they would. Feeling dumb, I withdraw my hand.
“You’re the Fairview girl, right?” Avery asks. Her hat, I notice, reads DJ RAVERY. I nod. Her eyes dart to Ethan, who appears to be reading her shirt with faint amusement. “Yeah, yeah,” she says dryly. “It’s a job, okay? Getting gigs isn’t easy in a white-dude-dominated industry. Which is why I was hype to get your email. The date’s May ninth, right?”
“Yeah. May ninth,” I say. “We haven’t officially found a venue yet”—I glare at Ethan—“but we wanted to confirm important items. The music first and foremost.”
“Definitely,” Avery agrees. She describes her reasonable rates and hours and her electrical outlet needs, and while she speaks, I find I’m impressed. She’s effortlessly professional. Multitasking with ease, she modulates the music as she runs through the details for us. “Reunions are awesome to play,” she says once she’s laid out the logistics. “Excellent throwback options, and a really drunk crowd.”
I grin. Ethan, however, laughs. It’s jarring, and I jerk involuntarily to look at him. I can’t remember him laughing genuinely, without sarcasm, instead of as a cruel punctuation mark.
“Yeah, we’re depending on you to make the night fun,” Ethan says, his voice easy, light with flippant charm. It’s a version of Ethan I rarely see, one that leads me to wonder who he is when we’re not competing. “I mean, Sanger’s not,” he adds. “She’s incurably dull.”
I draw back, actually stunned by how harsh and unprovoked the insult is. Ethan cozying up to our cool prospective DJ is a normal level of mildly annoying for him. Insulting me in front of her is a different degree of shitty. It’s unacceptable.
I can’t let it stand. Raising my voice over the synthesizer noise now streaming from Avery’s speakers, I lay into Ethan. “If people wanted your opinion, they would ask,” I say. “But they don’t because nobody wants to subject themselves to a conversation with you.”
Ethan sneers. “I have plenty of conversations with plenty of people.” He says it like it’s obvious, but I hear combativeness straining his voice.
I face him fully, ignoring Avery waiting awkwardly to my left. “Really? I’ve spent practically every waking minute with you this week, and I haven’t seen you have one conversation over five minutes long with anyone except me.”
“Yeah, well, being around you doesn’t exactly inspire friendliness.” His nonchalance disappearing entirely, he feverishly runs a hand through his hair. “This week has been my idea of hell.”
“If you’re miserable, Ethan, feel free to drop out of the reunion. Why don’t you just drop out of Fairview while you’re at it too?”
“One more week like this one, and I just might!”
Ideas dance through my head of annoying Ethan enough he genuinely drops out. The thought is wonderful. I imagine my gloriously Ethan-free days, editing with only cooperative writers who never have controversial opinions on the Oxford comma, getting 100 percent on every test because I’m not racing him and the clock, not being infuriated at seven every single morning when I first see his face.
It feels like victory. Like freedom.
While I’m envisioning this new world, though, I notice Avery out of the corner of my eye watching us skeptically. “I’ll send the contract over to you after my set, and we’ll finalize location and hours later,” she says stiffly, halting the retort I was preparing for Ethan. “Quick question. Do you have a supervisor I can correspond with on this?”
My victory fizzles out. I face Avery, shame rushing through me. “We’re the ones who will be coordinating everything. I assure you, you can email or call us anytime and we’ll be capable of handling your requests.”
Avery studies us a moment longer. “Okay. No problem. There’s one thing I forgot to mention, though. When I’m working for minors, I require a larger portion of the payment up front.”
I nod, mustering as much dignity as I can. I know what’s happening here. Our DJ didn’t forget to mention this deposit. She just saw Ethan and me fighting like kindergarteners, and she decided we were unreliable and immature. The horrible part is, I don’t even fault her. We were immature. I’m instantly angry and ashamed of myself for behaving exactly the way people expect I will.
“Of course,” I tell Avery, fighting to recover my composure. “Thanks so much for meeting with us.”
Avery nods once and returns to work. Ethan and I walk away from the truck, not speaking as we cut through the crowd waiting for their candy-decked hot dogs. I feel his glare on my back, following me onto the path over the emerald grass of the park’s hills. It’s obvious he’s not chagrined by our public outburst. I resent him all the more for it—silently this time.
Once again, it’s Ethan not caring enough and doing whatever he wants despite the reasons or repercussions. I honestly don’t know if I envy him for his detachment. The liberation must be nice, not holding himself to the cage of requirements and personal standards I confine myself in. On the other hand, without those requirements, I don’t know who I’d be. The emptiness from which Ethan’s impulsiveness seems to come is just a little terrifying.
A chilly wind is gusting over the park when we reach the curb, where Ethan and I instinctually separate and wait silently for our respective Ubers. Ethan stares at his phone while I watch the passersby, the dads in fleece vests walking golden retrievers and the kids playing tag. I don’t give Ethan the gratification of glancing over when his Uber, again, arrives minutes ahead of mine.
In the car on the way home, I feel my phone vibrate with a text from Ethan.
By the way, for losing the blitz, you’re wearing a T-shirt to school on Monday.
He’s obviously aiming to pick another fight. My fingers itch with the impulse to reply, to inform him what a shortsighted waste of a task this is.
For the first time, I don’t. We crossed a line today. One I’ve toed with him a long time. Competing with Ethan has always been a high-wire act of proving my worth while not appearing unprofessional. I’m aware of how constant bickering and infighting makes me look. I’ve just always felt I gain more than I lose when it comes to our rivalry. Now . . . I’m forced to reevaluate. What’s the point of beating Ethan if I end up looking less capable in the end?
It’s time I recognize how childish our competition is. I can’t allow another repeat of today.
My phone buzzes again. I flip it over, ignoring Ethan the whole way home.