I almost skipped the call. To be frank, I didn’t like Patsy quite so much tonight. And we’d had enough face-to-face conversations at this point that I had begun to worry she’d know my voice.
Only I had to call that night. To cover myself.
And then I’d see.
“Orlando!”
“Good name.”
“And?”
“That’s all. Just not bad as names go.”
“I thought I had you today.”
“Had me where?”
“Don’t be like that. I thought you fought for my honor.”
“I heard about it. That’s about as close as I got to your honor.”
“It was a guy who lives next door to me. When I asked him why he got into a fight, I said it was my boyfriend that hit him.”
“You called Biff your boyfriend?” I made my voice incredulous, not hard to do. “Don’t you think you’re being awfully forgiving here?”
“That’s not his name, but you see what I mean? This guy next door didn’t bat an eyelash at the word ‘boyfriend.’ That’s when I figured out he wasn’t you.”
I still didn’t know why she got into his car this morning, but I was pretty sure he must have been singing a different song than in the locker room. I decided to let it go.
“Disappointed?” I asked her.
“In what way?”
“That the other guy wasn’t me? Maybe I was part of the audience Biff was sounding off for,” I said. “I may have been standing there with the other half a dozen guys—”
“Don’t be disgusting.”
I had gotten a little carried away. Actually, I’d discovered it wasn’t so much that I didn’t like her. I was angry with her. It had to do with the things Biff said, sure, but I didn’t blame her for that.
I blamed her for getting into his car again.
I blamed her for giving the guy a second chance. Even though our calls were happening only because she gave me one.
I waited for her to hang up.
What I liked, she ignored the whole outburst. She went on as if I’d swallowed something the wrong way and she’d been interrupted to pat me on the back. You had to admire her style.
“So it’s true. He was talking about me.” Annoyed now. “And you do see me in school. You’re close to me every day, I think I knew that. Sometimes you’re mad at me before you call. Sometimes,” she said, “you sound like you don’t like me very much.”
“I like you,” I said, knowing I sounded like a drowning man who chooses between the call for help or a lungful of air before he sinks again. “I do.” Nothing from her. “Sometimes I say things, I don’t always know why. It doesn’t mean anything.”
I caught myself there, groveling.
“We could be friends,” she said. “You could meet me at the dance.”
“We could be better friends if you’d decide these calls are enough for you.”
“I don’t know that we could,” she said, and hung up.
The truth was, I hadn’t handled the whole conversation very well. I got angry, and then I gave myself away. A little detective work and she could narrow down her list of suspects to maybe a dozen guys. Including me.
I thought about calling back to apologize. After all, what was she asking for? To get to know me in person. That’s what this was all about at the beginning. Right? Okay, it would be a little awkward at first. Vinnie Gold, acting like he’s so cool.
She might even be angry with me for the deception. I didn’t believe that would last. I’d admitted to being someone she would recognize. Vinnie Gold, fool for love.
It was my impression that she stood behind what she said. She could accept the worst. Vinnie Gold, remember that clown?
I didn’t feel up to dialing.
If you want to know the truth, I was beginning to feel a kind of battle fatigue. Even when I was winning, it felt like losing.
I couldn’t get up the next morning. I kept pushing the snooze button on my alarm clock. It tried to get me up every nine minutes. I didn’t get up until ten minutes before the bus was due.
“Vinnie. I thought you’d gone.”
“I’m going. Bye, Mom.”
“Vin—”
Maybe I ran on nervous energy, I don’t know, but I moved at a dead sprint. The only good thing was, it was really nippy this morning. Every time I felt dizzy, I sucked in a strong, deep breath of frozen air, and when I reached the bus stop, I had the idea I didn’t look half bad. I got there just as kids were boarding, my chest heaving, ears threatening to explode with the pressure in my head.
I headed for a seat in the back, acting as if I’d never seen Patsy. And Biff? He got on the bus at the next stop. The seat next to Patsy was already taken, and he had to sit two rows behind her. Which meant nothing, really. Yesterday morning she got into his car.
What I would have liked to see, him taking the seat next to her and Patsy finding someplace else to sit.
I went into the school through the door the teams used after morning warm-ups. I’d never used it before, and I wanted to feel more familiar with this part of the building. It led down a short strip of hallway with double doors to the locker rooms and ended at the gym. I stopped in the boys’ locker room to wait for the bell, which rang moments later.
The teams came in like a herd of thundering buffalo, capable of mowing down anything standing in their way. Me, for instance. But it was a cheerful herd, and as the guys passed the showers, they broke almost immediately into a not-quite-orderly division into the locker rows, sparing my life.
I sat down on the bench in front of my locker. I was light-headed, probably from lack of food. My injuries weren’t particularly impressive—even the black eye looked like a practical joke. Thanks to the puffiness that appeared around my jawline overnight, I looked petulant rather than battered.
A few guys looked at me as if they’d never seen me before, more of them grinned to let me know they’d decided I was okay.
Biff came in from the other set of double doors, signaling he’d come through the front of the school. This was clearly a demotion. Why he’d come here was anybody’s guess, probably it just felt strange that his first whiff of school was of straight floor wax without the buffer of sweaty socks.
Anyone on a team was there in the locker room, of course. Guys said hello to Biff, but no one encouraged him to brag more. They acted like all they had on their minds was a speedy shower, dragging on their clothing, and combing wet hair.
I gathered Mr. B had given them quite the lecture about disrespecting girls, and then a hefty after-school cleaning assignment to underline his disappointment in them. So it was understandable Biff wasn’t being met with a friendly razzing.
Biff strode right to his locker without speaking to anyone. He didn’t look in my direction, and he didn’t look like he anticipated a good day. That worked for me. I left before the start-of-day bell rang.