“You probably shouldn’t be any plan, but I’ll break you eventually.”
“You get her wasted again, she can throw up on your couch.”
“Are you never going to get over that?”
“No.” It’s true. I think the things I saw that night will haunt me forever.
“Hey, Nastypants!” Drew picks up his pace and breaks away from me to reach Nastya just before she gets to the shop door. I half-expect the look she impales him with to kill him on contact. “What?” I hear him cajole her as I get closer. “It’s a term of endearment.” If this is his new tactic, I’m afraid for him. Before I can worry myself too much for his safety, her face subtly changes. I think she’s fighting it, but she loses, because she actually half smiles at him. Maybe it’s not even a smile. Her lips just barely turn up at the corners but on her face it stands out because of the rarity of it. I’d be disappointed that his crap is actually working on her but I don’t think it is. I think she’s amused. The smile is gone in seconds, and she walks into the room, leaving Drew in the hall just as I catch up. He didn’t even ask her about the party.
“That worked out well for you.”
“She didn’t hurt me,” he smiles, seemingly satisfied with the outcome.
“She should.” Tierney Lowell is closing her locker across the hall and turning towards us. Really she’s turning towards Drew. I don’t know that she sees me at all. Her jeans are so tight that I wonder if they’re cutting off her circulation and she’s wearing a black bra under a white t-shirt that rides up above the waist to show just enough of her skin to tease. She’s got the body to pull it off and she isn’t shy about it. The two of them hooked up some time last year and the aftermath wasn’t particularly pretty. Tierney didn’t take too well to being discarded. That didn’t surprise me. What surprised me was the fact that it had happened in the first place. She’s hard-core and he’s Drew. It never added up to me. Drew never even told me that it had happened until after it got out, and by that time it was done. Drew was moving on to another girl; Tierney was pissed and people were talking about how clueless she was for being surprised. I don’t think she ever seemed surprised, just disappointed.
Drew doesn’t respond to her and she walks away without another word.
“That one was a mistake from the beginning,” he says. Most of them are mistakes if you ask me. The constant drama doesn’t seem worth the trouble. I head in to shop and Drew takes off toward the office where he gets to spend the next period running passes around the school, flirting in the halls and generally avoiding any responsibility whatsoever.
Nastya is sitting next to Kevin Leonard at the table Mr. Turner moved her to a week ago. I’m glad she stayed there because it made me nervous having her behind me all the time. I like being able to watch everyone else without them watching me. Most people know better than to look at me anyway, but Nastya hasn’t been most people since the day she got here.
When the bell rings, Mr. Turner does a visual roll check. Then he tells one person from each table to go up to the front and pick up a materials box. I’m the only one at my table so I head up. All of the other tables have two people, except for Nastya’s where there are three: Natsya, Kevin and Chris Jenkins. She doesn’t move to get up and Chris goes to get the box. Inside are several pieces of wood, a hammer, different size nails, sandpaper and a few other items which seem to vary in each box. Kevin grabs the box out of Chris’ hands and turns it over on the table. The box of nails opens when it hits the surface and they go rolling in every direction. This gets everyone’s attention but no one moves to pick them up.
“Clean it up, Leonard,” Mr. Turner calls over to him, not seeming the least bit surprised with his idiocy. I know why Mr. Turner signed him in to this class. As much as I’d like to ignore the fact, Kevin’s pretty good when it comes to building. He doesn’t have much of a sense of artistry or style but he has an innate understanding of construction and balance. Too bad he’s such an ass**le.
Nastya is kneeling down on the floor, picking up nails and loading them up in her left hand. Chris is gathering up the ones on the table and sweeping them back into the container. Kevin is laughing. Nastya has most of the nails off the floor and her hand is close to full. I think she’s about to stand back up and then the nails are all over the floor again. I’m not even sure what happened. It’s like she just let go of them. She doesn’t even seem surprised. She just starts picking them up again. I think I’m the only one who noticed. Nobody helps her. Not even me.
Mr. Turner goes on to explain the assignment. We’ll have today, plus the next three periods, to design, plan, and construct something that’s either useful or aesthetically pleasing with whatever materials we find in the box we picked up. We are allowed to add up to two additional items of our choosing but nothing else. I’ve already studied what’s in mine and I know what I’m going to build. I spend the rest of the period measuring, sketching and planning while everyone else sits around arguing about whose idea is better and what they should make. Tomorrow I’ll start construction. The rest of them will probably still be fighting.
***
I’ve spent the past hour going through every drawer of every tool cabinet in my garage and I still can’t figure out where I put my stud finder. I slam the bottom drawer on the last cabinet shut and look at the clock on the wall. Ten-thirty. Too late to go buy another one, not that I really need it tonight, but I have nothing else on my plate right now and it’s something to do.
I stand back up and turn around, looking for something to occupy my time and she’s standing at the top of my driveway, just outside the threshold of my garage. I’m glad I don’t gasp or anything equally pathetic, because if I did, I’d probably have to cut off my balls and hand them to her. I wouldn’t deserve them anymore.
She looks almost exactly the same as the first time she showed up here, except she’s not lost or scared. She came here on purpose. We look at each other for a minute and I realize that I’m waiting for her to say something, which obviously isn’t going to happen. I’m not sure what I’m supposed to say to her, so in a bold and unprecedented move, I do nothing. I turn around and continue looking for the stud finder I know isn’t here. I pretend not to care what she’s doing but I’m hyperaware of every breath she takes. I can tell the second she decides to stop standing there. Only she doesn’t turn and leave like I expect her to; she steps into the garage.