Callie was probably still sleeping—she'd been lying low since the Halloween party, not answering her phone or texting back. It was beyond annoying. Tinsley paused outside the door to Dumbarton 303, staring at Jenny's note-filled white board. She fought the urge to wipe off all the Congratulations, Cleopatra! You're the queen! messages with the sleeve of her beige Generra sweaterdress. It wouldn't be worth it—the dress was dry-clean only.
The sound of giggling escaped from beneath the closed door and Tinsley felt irritated and left out. Was Callie having some kind of secret-secret party without her? She knocked twice and then charged into the room. It was fogged with incense and the faint scent of smoke. Callie's unmade bed looked abandoned.
Jenny's bed, however, was not. Leaning against the headboard, Jenny sat cuddled with a guy. Tinsley narrowed her eyes at the sight of Jenny, looking her usual perky, petite self. She wore a pair of pin-striped pants that looked designer but which Tinsley suspected were Banana Republic with a peasant-y white shirt beneath a snug-fitting Abbey Road T-shirt. How annoyingly hipster. Sitting beside her was that too-good-looking senior transfer student who'd once tried to pick Tinsley up in his Mustang when she was walking back to campus from Rhinecliff. She'd told him to fuck off, not liking his air of overconfidence. Drew. That was his name.
“Hey,” Jenny said, giving Tinsley a cold look, though her voice sounded almost playful. She'd clearly mastered the tone girls used when they were being bitchy to each other but didn't want guys to know it. Tinsley had invented that tone. “Try knocking.”
“I did knock,” Tinsley said, a bit more defensively than she'd intended. She leaned against the door frame, trying to look casual, but her beige sweaterdress snagged on a splinter. “Where's Callie?”
“She's at some spa in Maine,” Jenny answered, leaning back on her pillow.
Drew winked at Tinsley by way of hello, but Tinsley ignored him.
“What are you talking about? What spa in Maine?” Tinsley put her hands on her hips accusingly. Callie could be spontaneous, sure, like the time she'd caught up with everyone in Aspen over Christmas break freshman year when she was supposed to be attending a fancy state dinner in Atlanta. But going to Maine on a whim? Doubtful. “Did Easy drag her there or something?” Tinsley demanded. The smell of incense was overpowering and Tinsley covered her nose.
“I don't think so.” Jenny shook her head. She was sitting thigh-to-thigh with Drew and her lips were extra red. They'd clearly been kissing. “It was something her mother arranged.” Jenny tilted her head innocently. “What, she didn't tell you?”
Tinsley fingered the menswear Carrier watch on her wrist, borrowed from an old, forgotten boyfriend and never returned. Something was not right, she knew, but she couldn't figure out what. She needed to talk to Callie more than ever. Tinsley didn't care if Jenny didn't like her—in fact, she wanted it that way. But she missed the way she and Callie and Brett used to rule the school. She needed Callie to help her figure out how to get it all back.
Jenny stood up and moved toward the door. “Is that all?” she asked, a fake smile on her face. “I don't want Pardee to smell the smoke.” Jenny put her hand on the door as if to close it.
“Can I talk to you for a sec?” Tinsley asked, lowering her voice. She looked over Jenny's shoulder and saw Drew flipping through Jenny's iPod.
Jenny sighed. “What?”
“Is everything okay here?” she asked softly, nodding in Drew's direction.
“What do you mean?” Jenny's smile wavered. “Of course.”
“Just be careful,” Tinsley warned. Why was she bothering to give Jenny advice, anyway? It would serve her right if Drew screwed her over. But despite her dislike for Jenny, she didn't want to see a Casanova like Drew—she was just sure he had a Heath Ferro gene in him somewhere—get anything more than he deserved. “That guy is bad news.”
“Oh?” Jenny crossed her arms over her huge chest defensively.
“Yeah, you should watch out.” Tinsley could see her warning bouncing off Jenny's Teflon smile. She sounded like someone's annoying mother, telling Jenny to eat her vegetables, or to wait a half an hour before swimming after a meal.
“Thanks,” Jenny said evenly, “but you're the last person in the world I’d take advice from.” She stepped back into Dumbarton 303—Tinsley's old room—and closed the door.
Tinsley stepped back to avoid having her nose smashed. Fuck her, she thought. She turned and breathed deeply, the way she did before serving in a tense tennis match.
Tinsley made her way back to her room, shuffling her Miu Miu stacked-heel pumps this time instead of clomping them. A door on the hall suddenly opened, and a girl she didn't recognize slipped down the hall toward the bathroom. The hallway filled with laughter and shrieking, and Tinsley peered inside the room, catching a glimpse of Sage and Benny and a couple of girls trying on various dresses and modeling them in front of one another. So Dumbarton hadn't turned into a nunnery after all—she was just totally out of it.
Fuck, Tinsley thought. I wouldn't take my advice, either.
19
OWLS “OF THE OPPOSITE SEX MAY VISIT EACH OTHER'S DORM ROOMS DURING PROPER VISITATION HOURS, BUT THREE FEET MUST REMAIN ON THE FLOOR AT ALL TIMES.
The smell of Drew's soap permeated the room, providing a nice masculine complement to the girly smells of Jenny and Callie's hair products and fragrance bottles. Drew ran his fingers through Jenny's hair, her body tingling as his fingertips brushed her scalp. They both sat on the bed, leaning against the worn wooden headboard.
She thought about how easy it had been to just shut the door in Tinsley's face. Why hadn't she done that from the beginning? Why had she ever let Tinsley get underneath her skin? A few weeks ago Jenny had been angrily packing her bags, ready to be expelled. Now here she was, kicking back with her savior, a senior who was obviously totally in love with her. Meanwhile, Tinsley sat atop the ash heap of the Formerly Popular.
“You're so pretty.” Drew touched Jenny's cheek, repeating the words for at least the dozenth time since she'd met him.
Jenny blushed for the dozenth time, too, her rosy cheeks always giving her away. “So you've said.” She liked the cool way the words came out of her mouth, like a smoke ring blown across the room.
“How come you don't have a boyfriend?” Drew asked. He rubbed his hand across his slightly stubbled chin. The stubble made his strong cheekbones even more defined.
“Who says I don't?” Jenny shifted a little on the bed, trying to straighten her slumping back against the headboard. Her father—in an awkward attempt at having “the talk”— had told her that if she was ever going to be on a bed with a boy, she should never, ever get anywhere close to lying down. Jenny scooted off the bed to relight the incense stick on her dresser. When she climbed back, she made sure to sit cross-legged.
If Drew minded, he didn't show it. “I asked around about you.” He leaned back, arms crossed over his chest. His hunter green wool sweater brought out the brilliant green of his eyes. “I did my homework. I’m a good student.”
“Oh, yeah?” It gave her a little thrill that someone would ask around about her. She imagined him in the Lasell locker room, pulling on his gym clothes and saying casually, “So, what do you know about this Jenny Humphrey girl?” Not that she wanted to be the subject of guys’ locker room talk, or at least, not the dirty kind—the isn't-she-cute kind, if that even existed. “Well, don't believe everything you hear,” she said coyly. She inched a little closer to him, wondering exactly what he had heard, and from whom.
Drew smiled again and put his arm around her. She waited for the inevitable, the gravity of his arm pulling her into his orbit for another kiss. But instead, Drew's hand just rested loosely on her shoulders, as if they were sixth-graders walking home after school. It was nice.
“Why not?” Drew asked, scratching the back of his head with his free hand. A lock of sandy brown hair stood up in the back. “It was all very flattering.”
Jenny narrowed he
r brown eyes flirtatiously. “Like what?” she demanded, trying not to sound too eager.
Drew's arm tightened, pulling Jenny a little closer. Her whole body felt electrified. “Like, not only are you funny and cool, but you were definitely voted to have the most kissable lips.”
“Really?” Jenny started to say, but then Drew's lips were on hers. She kissed him back, his lips tasting of toothpaste. Drew moved his free hand to her knee. His grip was firm, and she felt like his hand was burning through her wool trousers. The thrill of Callie being gone now made Jenny slightly anxious—the safety net of interruption was suddenly gone.
“Hey, I just remembered,” Jenny pulled back. She reached out and laced her fingers in his, stalling his roaming hand. “They're playing Casablanca over at Berkman.” Berkman-Meier, the music building, had a small auditorium where they sometimes played old movies on weekends.
“Seen it,” Drew yawned, flashing his rows of perfect teeth. Jenny briefly wondered if his parents were orthodontists.
“Yeah, but it's a classic,” Jenny protested mildly as Drew swept her long curls away from her neck and kissed her right beneath the ear. It felt so good she thought she might pass out. “And it's in black and white.” She almost added, Which is so much more romantic, but stopped herself.
Drew shrugged. “I never see movies twice.” His breath was hot on her neck.
“Never?” Jenny asked incredulously, trying to think unsexy thoughts—the smell of her cat Marx's canned cat food, the tapered mom jeans Angelica Pardee was wearing that morning. She pushed Drew away lightly.
“Never,” Drew answered resolutely, his eyes on Jenny's mouth, like he couldn't stop thinking about kissing her even when he wasn't kissing her. It was kind of sweet.
“I’ve seen Pulp Fiction, like, a hundred times,” Jenny confessed. She reached up and twisted her long hair into a knot at her neck. “And True Romance about a hundred and fifty.”
“Brad Pitt is legendary in that movie,” Drew agreed. He pretended to be smoking pot from an invisible bong made out of an empty honey bear and did his best Brad-Pitt-as-Floyd impression: “They, uh, went out for cleaning supplies.”
“Fight Club was awesome,” Jenny ventured. She'd only seen it once, and had tried to read the book, but wasn't sure that she fully understood what was going on. Someone had tried to tell her that Brad Pitt and Edward Norton were the same guy, but that didn't make any sense to her.
“Didn't see it,” Drew said. “All that macho guy stuff isn't for me.” He pulled her back in close. “I’d rather spend time with the fairer sex.”
Jenny giggled nervously at the word sex. She gave him a light peck on the lips before hopping off the bed. “Then come on. You can't get more romantic than Casablanca on the big screen, can you?”
Drew shrugged. “Yeah, sure, I guess.” He stood and searched for his shoes. She didn't even remember him taking them off. He followed her to the door without further resistance. She'd let him kiss her after the movie, and maybe once during. He was her savior, after all.
And the hero always gets a kiss.
From:
[email protected] To: Undisclosed Recipients
Date: Saturday, November 2, 4:15 P.M.
Subject: MAÑANA—Impromptu MOVIE DAY!
Dear all,
I’ve been lucky enough to obtain—through various back-channel wheeling and dealing—an advance copy of the new Ryan Gosling/Jennifer Connelly movie. Don't ask how, just come and check it out. Tomorrow afternoon at 2 P.M. in the Cinephiles screening room. Ail are welcome—bring friends! Free popcorn and treats for all.
See you then!
xo,
Tinsley
HeathFerro: Bro, what up? Come to our first MEN OF WAVERLY meeting — just a bunch of dudes getting together with some beer.
JeremiahMortimer: Sounds fun, at least the beer part. But I don't go to Waverly. =)
HeathFerro: We're willing to overlook it. Tonite, field house, 6 p.m.
JeremiahMortimer: Man, stuck on bus home from VT—won't get in till late. But next time.
HeathFerro: All right. But you'll miss the tickle-fights!
20
WAVERLY WILL TEACH BOYS HOW TO BECOME MEN.
“Men,” Heath Ferro intoned from his position atop a mountain of blue floor mats in the back corner of the field house. He stood right beneath a giant faded maroon banner that read DIVISION II CHAMPS, 1978 and featured a silhouette of a lacrosse stick. “Start your engines!” He lifted his forty-ounce glass bottle of King Cobra malt liquor into the air and twisted off the cap in triumph. Scattered around him were Brandon, Lon, Ryan, Alan, and Teague Williams, all in various forms of athletic wear.
Easy rolled his eyes as he crossed the green rubber floor in his Levi's and black fleece. The field house smelled vaguely of sweat and jock straps. He felt like he was back in Lexington, where summers were spent in the woods with contraband whiskey snitched from unguarded liquor cabinets, throwing empties at the freight trains as they whizzed by. Was sitting around with a bunch of prep school guys in polo shirts and expensive sneakers in an underheated field house any better?
“Walsh.” Heath nodded at Easy's approach, hopping down from the mats like a gymnast. He shoved Easy in the direction of an open Waverly duffel bag on the floor. “Grab a cold one.”
Easy leaned over and lifted a relatively clean maroon Waverly sweatshirt to reveal a row of Cobras resting against an unopened bag of cubed ice. He reached in and pulled out a sweating beer.
The first gulp tasted like raw sewage, but the second gulp went down a little easier. He hadn't been able to clear the mess in his head since the night of the Halloween party, and Callie was still MIA. He'd texted and e-mailed her with no response, wanting to apologize for his unnecessarily harsh words. He was still pissed at her, but it was the wrong way to end things, and he owed her an apology for that. He'd glanced around the nooks in Maxwell Hall, where she liked to lay out her homework and then read Vogue instead, but there was no sign of her. She'd probably escaped to the city to stay at a fancy hotel and rack up some serious credit card bills.
He took another swig of beer, trying to drown out all thoughts of Callie.
“Are we all here?” Brandon asked impatiently. He unscrewed the cap on his forty, gingerly took a sip, and then screwed it back on.
“Jeremiah, our honorary St. Lucius member, couldn't make it,” Heath said, looking around the circle and nodding to all the guys, who all held their beers with expectant looks on their faces. “But otherwise I think we're all here. Welcome to the first meeting of the Men of Waverly club.” Heath raised his bottle, which was half full, and the others raised theirs, too.
A silence fell across the field house as everyone sipped from their bottles, each waiting for the other to say something. Now what? Easy wondered what Mrs. Horniman would think of his new extracurricular.
“Anyone catch that skirt Jenny Humphrey was wearing at lunch?” Lon Baruzza asked. “It was like this.” He held a hand high on his thigh to demonstrate.
“She's hot,” Alan agreed, rubbing his stubbled chin with his fist. Easy's roommate had left the dorm half an hour before the meeting for a little tokeage in the woods. He'd been home in Vermont last weekend and had come back with some of his hippie parents’ freshly grown buds.
“She looked good at the Halloween party, too,” Brandon added, taking a sip of beer. Easy felt like he'd completely lost touch with Jenny. He still felt oddly protective of her, and was uncomfortable hearing the guys talk about her like that. But since she'd gotten reinstated at Waverly, she was always surrounded by a flock of people. Brett and Alison, naturally, but also a ton of other girls and guys whom Easy didn't really recognize. Not Julian, though, he noted, thinking about it for the first time. What had happened with that?
“Dude.” Lon pointed the mouth of his beer at Brandon and leaned back against a weight rack. “What would Sage think about that?”
“Nothing.” Brandon shrugged. He switched his
bottle from one hand to another. “We're not married.”
“I’ll drink to that,” Heath said, taking another giant swig. “Girlfriends are great—but it doesn't mean we can't still look at other girls.”
“It also doesn't mean they still can't look at other guys—or girls, if they prefer,” Ryan said casually, leaning his head back against the stack of mats. He wore a cable-knit gray cardigan that looked way too soft for a guy to be wearing.
“Nice try, Reynolds.” A dreamy look crossed over Heath's face, which seemed to happen lately every time Kara was brought up. “Kara's welcome to look at all the girls she wants.” He leaned against the weight bench and crossed his ankles over each other. “I’m the fucking luckiest guy in the world.”
Easy felt a warmth settle on his cheeks as he continued to work on his beer. He'd never been a huge drinker—at least not until recently—but he hoped that Heath had brought enough for everyone to have a second round. The conversation around him began to seem fuzzy, and he closed his eyes for a moment, feeling the buzz crawl into his brain.
“No sleeping, Walsh,” Heath called out. “You have to drink if you close your eyes.”
Easy's eyes popped open. “What?”
“Take a drink,” Heath commanded. “Right now. Those are the rules.”
“So, are we, like, planning on doing anything? Or is this club just going to be an excuse to get together and get drunk?” Brandon spoke up, yawning. He glanced at the silver Dolce & Gabbana watch on his wrist, looking like there was someplace he'd rather be. Easy leaned forward, elbows on his knees, waiting for Heath's answer.