So this girl named Heather just got here and yesterday she saved my life, and I've already made her hate me.
I take my seat in Social Studies and try to pay attention to Mr. Hernandez, who's telling everyone to settle down and listen, but I keep thinking about Heather. I wonder what it takes to make someone un-mad at you. Maybe if I don't say anything else stupid she'll give me another chance.
It's not like it's the first time something like this has happened. I seem to have a talent for doing exactly the wrong thing, especially where girls are concerned. There was this time in third grade, when a girl named Mary Liz sat next to me. Mary Liz was good at everything. Our teacher would always hold up her paper and say, "Look how neat Mary Liz's paper looks." Mary Liz always raised her hand at the right time. She never spoke out of turn. She never, ever had to erase so much that she went through the paper and saw the shiny, pretend-wood desk peeking through.
One day, Mrs. Jaworski told us we were going to start learning cursive writing, even though Lee Han raised his hand and said, "My cousin says they don't even do script anymore at his school."
"Well, you're here at this school, aren't you?" said Mrs. Jaworski. "And we choose to teach cursive." Then she gave him one of those teacher stares that don't leave you any choice but to give up. I didn't even know that "cursive" meant script, so I was behind before we even started.
I sat next to Mary Liz. She was watching carefully as Mrs. Jaworski demonstrated cursive writing on the Smart Board.
"In cursive writing," said Mrs. Jaworski, "we slant our letters to the right, all at the same angle. Your letters should look like flowers, leaning toward the sun."
We all started writing and I tried, I really did. But my letters looked like somebody had stomped in the flower bed wearing army boots and left a bunch of broken stems and squashed petals.
Mrs. Jaworski walked around, looking over our shoulders. Every now and then she would pick up somebody's paper and hold it up. Of course, she held up Mary Liz's.
"Now, everyone, look how well Mary Liz is writing. Beautiful, Mary Liz." Mary Liz didn't smile. She just looked like she wanted Mrs. Jaworski to put the paper back down so she could write more beautiful words.
Mary Liz went back to work, and I couldn't help watching her. The pencil she wrote with was longer than mine. It'd probably only been sharpened once in its whole life. She gripped it tight, looping and twirling, forming those perfect words, all lined up in pretty rows. She had nail polish that was this pearly blue-green, just a little spot of it at the end of each finger. Every few words she lifted the pencil to look at her paper. A few times, she tucked a strand of hair behind her ear before she got back to work, writing little flowers leaning toward the sun.
"Joseph," called out Mrs. Jaworski. "Are you writing or daydreaming?"
"He's staring," said Adele Sapperstein.
"Oh?" asked Mrs. Jaworski. "And what is it that's so interesting, Joseph?"
Teachers ask me that all the time. Sometimes I actually have an answer, but they never give me time to tell them, because they don't really want to know.
Adele answered for me. "He's staring at Mary Liz."
"Really," said Mrs. Jaworski. "Well, maybe if you spent less time staring at Mary Liz and more time concentrating on your writing, your paper would look better than this." She picked up my paper and held it up for the class to see.
Everybody was laughing, at my paper and at me, and somebody said, "Joseph loves Mary Liz," and then everyone laughed harder.
And that's when Mary Liz looked like the most horrifying thing that could ever happen was happening to her. She looked at me and she was mad. She was so mad at me. Sometimes I think maybe I'm why she moved away, she looked so mad.
I took my paper and crumpled it up and threw it on the floor. Mrs. Jaworski got angry with me, which didn't make any sense at all, since she was the one who'd said it was terrible.
I ended up out in the hall, which was not that unusual, but mostly I remember that day because of how Mary Liz looked at me.
And now I've done it again.
I hear the sound of chairs scraping the floor, and everyone in my Social Studies class is gathering their stuff and going to the door.
"Where are we going?" I ask nobody in particular.
"To the library," says a girl named Carly. "Don't you ever listen?"
I don't even bother answering that. I just pick up my backpack and follow the others to the library.
