Three

I had math first period, a most cruel fate. I walked into Mr. Cooper’s class, and scoured the room for a seat near the back. The only one was next to Tom Adams, who smelled horrible. I sighed and sat down anyways. I leaned my head back over the headrest, yawning. My shirt crept up over my waistband and I tugged it down impatiently. I didn’t want to have Tom Adams as my practice buddy. Why was I even thinking about Kate’s stupid idea? Tue, my last make-out session was at summer camp and there were braces involved, but I could aim a little higher. Maybe.

I was in medium level math, filled with average kids who weren’t really smart enough to be in the honors classes. We had a mix of popular kids and the non-event type of people who didn’t really matter. Kate and I were ultimate non-people. She was content with that, and was too, most days. Like today. I was happy to just blend back here, in the cloud of Tom’s stink.

Mr. Cooper was a new teacher, and I had no idea what to expect. When he walked in, my breath caught in my chest. He was hot. He was probably in his late twenties, with curly brown hair and those cute plastic frame glasses. He was like the college guys I daydreamed about, intellectual and kind of geeky in a totally sexy way. I texted Kate the words “HOT TEACHER ALERT” and she texted back “?". I‘d have to fill her in over lunch.

“So how hot? Like teacher hot, or dude hot?” Kate was taking a bite of her sandwich, smearing mustard on her face.

“Man hot.”

“Nice. Maybe I’ll switch in. I have some evil old troll.”

“I think Ms.Lane is nice.”

“You would.”

“What does that even mean?”

“Dunno.” She chewed thoughtfully.

“Want to leave after this and smoke a cigarette?”

“Yeah, sure.”

We walked out to my car, which seemed like miles.

“This is really going to suck if it rains, you know.”

“You are so helpful, Kate.”

“Oh so Caitlin is in one of my classes, history. Great, right?”

“What’d she say today?”

“That it was good to see that I had lost some weight over the summer. Loudly, in front of everyone, in front of the whole class.”

“Did you lose weight?” we walked behind my car, sitting on the pavement, to hide from the monitors that patrolled to make sure we didn’t do anything like this.

“When have I ever weighed myself?”

“I don’t know, plus your clothes are so baggy who can even tell with you.”

“My doctor actually told me I’m perfect. 5’7 and one hundred and thirty five pounds.”

“That sounds about right.” I lit my cigarette.

“You probably gained some, with all that boobage.”

“I’m still the tallest girl ever.”

“I think there’s like a seven foot woman in the Netherlands somewhere. You’re only 5’11.”

“Fine, in our grade.”

“No, there’s that basketball girl. You’re mediocre even in height.”

“Do you have a joint?” I stubbed my cigarette out.

“Duh.”

She lit it up, and we passed it back and forth. I breathed in the weed, feeling my vision get that weird, high depth perception. Psychology was going to be just wonderful after this. The bell rang and we stood up, brushing our butts off. Kate pulled her hoodie up over her hair, trying to hide her glazed eyes.

“Hey, girls, why do I suspect a little controlled substance abuse?”

“Hello, Trevor.” Kate rolled her eyes. He was a burnout bro who always pestered her for a date. He had that sort of hair color that’s between blonde and brown, and had acne scars. He hitched up his scummy looking baggy jeans, and walked by us, laughing.

“Gross.” Kate wrinkled her nose.

“What about aiming low?” I asked

“That’s a little low, even for us.”

“Thank God. You have psych now too, right?”

“Yep. As f I don’t get enough psychobabble at my parentally mandated therapy each week.”

“Let’s scope for desperate boys without major hygiene issues for us during class. It’s a lecture; there’s gotta be one out of fifty who will do one of us.”

“Don’t bet on it.”

We nabbed seats together, luckily, as the class was full. Kate was braiding strands of her long blondish hair, her feet resting on the chair in front of her.

“Can I sit here?” we both looked up.

“Sure Aaron”, she plopped her feet down onto the floor with a smacking noise.

I wrote “Got cuter” on my notebook and showed her over the aisle. He was skinny with longish brown hair and decent clothes. He was kind of a non-event, but he grew over the summer, stretching him into the type of lanky boy I like best.

“Fuck buddy?” she wrote back.

“We’ll see.” I mouthed.

“So Alice how was your summer?” he turned around in his seat to look at me.

I normally hated that question, but it sounded cute coming from him.

“Good, we just fucked around, the usual.”

“Same here.” I tried to think of something to say that wasn’t totally horrible, but by the time I had phrased something n my head, he already turned back forward.

“Nice.” Kate mouthed. I threw a pencil at her.

“Hey, Kate, Alice.” Stacy Cartwright leaned over the aisle towards us. She was a cool girl, I thought, not popular, but artsy, with big fat dreads and a nose ring.

“You guys want to come to a party this Friday at my house?”

“Yeah, sure.” Kate answered for both of us.

“How bout you Aaron?” he turned around again and smiled.

“Yeah, sounds good.”

I knew the type of party it would be. All the weird kids from our grade had started hanging out together last year, creating our own little subversive parties without any of the cool kids from school. All the people who were ignored in class were welcome, pretty much. But not Tim Adams-people. I think they had their own parties. Maybe.

“That wasn’t horrible.” I remarked.

“Not entirely. We have a party to go to on Friday, and the perfect practice boy.”

“What?”

“Aaron. He was checking out them boobies and he’s taller than you.”

“Whatever. We have to go pick up Andrew at the junior high and bring him to the skatepark.”

“You sound like a mom.”

“Shut the fuck up.”