On my ride to school, I received a call from Fritz, so I put it through on Bluetooth.
“Hello.”
“They agreed to look into it,” Fritz said and quoted a number that seemed low.
“Why so little?” I asked.
Frank would charge me a fortune for something like this.
“I told them what happened to your friend. They dislike guys like Brandon as much as I do. They agreed to volunteer their time for now. You’re only paying for expenses.”
“Can I pay them a bonus at the end to make this right?” I asked.
“How about you owe them a favor?” Fritz asked.
“I’m not sure I want to do that.”
“They’re not the Mafia. It would be something you would willingly do, I promise.”
“Okay, tell them to go ahead,” I said and hung up.
I hoped I hadn’t just done something terribly wrong.
◊◊◊
At lunch, Wolf was entertaining us all as he explained some sexist remark. If I were his mom, I would’ve killed his dad by now. I just shook my head that Wolf was dumb enough to repeat what his dad said. If he wasn’t so damned funny, I might take issue. I mean, he was setting a bad example for the younger guys. I’d worked hard to get Yuri to back down from some of his ideas. Don’t even get me started about my little dumbass of a half brother.
Cassidy nudged me in the ribs.
“Incoming,” she warned.
I prepared myself for another girl approaching me. I was amazed one of them would face the lunch crowd; typically, they tried to catch me alone. I turned, looked, and smiled. It was Tina, the girl I’d lost my virginity to. I stood up and hugged her. This, of course, stopped Wolf’s story in mid-sentence.
“Can we talk?” she asked.
“Come on, let’s find a table,” I said.
“She can have my seat,” Cassidy offered.
“Yes, join us,” Gina jumped in.
“No, I think we’ll go somewhere more private,” I said.
“Okay, who was that?” I heard Zoe ask as we walked away.
Zoe hadn’t been here freshman year when I asked Tina out. For that matter, neither had Cassidy, Halle, Brook, or the younger guys. I glanced over my shoulder and saw that Alan had taken center stage to explain who she was. Sometimes he just couldn’t help himself.
We found a table off to the side where some freshman football players were goofing off.
“Do you mind if I borrow your table?” I asked.
The freshmen just looked at me, afraid to say or do anything. I debated whether I should tell them to take a hike, but then heard my half brother behind me.
“Come and sit with us,” Phil offered.
The four freshmen scurried to join Phil at our table. I could see the excitement in their eyes. They would be able to tell their friends they sat at the junior and senior table, which was a big deal in high school.
As we sat down, I thought back to my date with Tina. At the time, I’d been disappointed that she couldn’t date until she was sixteen. Later, I’d wished I’d waited for Suzanne to be my first. I remembered promising Tina that I would ask her out once she turned sixteen. That had never happened.
“So, what did you want to talk about?” I asked to get the conversation started.
“I wondered if you would go on a date with me?” she asked.
“When did you want to go out?”
“Tonight.”
I couldn’t keep the smirk off my face.
“You must think I sit around washing my hair Friday nights,” I teased.
“It’s just that there’s a party tonight …” she began.
I held up my hand. I remembered that Tina wasn’t really the leader in her group. When I asked her out, her friends were either jealous or didn’t believe she could get a date. I was sure she wanted to show me off. I sort of owed her for breaking my promise to ask her out. The sad part was I hadn’t made plans for tonight.
“Sure, why not?”
She got up and hugged me, and then took off to tell her friends. I wondered how long it would take her to realize she hadn’t given me any details. I knew where she lived but had no idea when I was supposed to pick her up.
In any case, it appeared our conversation was over, for now, so I returned to my table and ignored everyone staring at me. I resumed eating my lunch.
“I thought we had you trained. Spill it,” Gina demanded.
“I hope you remembered what we offered,” Tim said as he glanced at Wolf.
“What did you offer?” Alan asked.
“They offered to test-drive any girls who hit on me,” I said, and both Tim and Wolf blushed.
“Seriously?! What about the rest of us?” Phil asked.
“You all shut up. We’ll deal with you next. Don’t get him distracted,” Gina said.
“Alan said you lost your virginity to her,” Halle said with a glint in her eye.
“Alan has no idea who I lost my virginity to. Do you, Alan?”
“I, uhm, well, no, not exactly,” he admitted. “David doesn’t really share details, but …”
“Stop while you’re still eating solid food.”
“I couldn’t let you hurt him,” Cassidy said.
“I was hoping you’d do it for me,” I answered.
She gave Alan a calculating look, and he about peed himself.
“I’ll be good,” he promised, and then did the unnatural act (for him) of keeping his mouth shut.
“You still want me to hurt him? I’ve been good all week,” she offered.
“What about you whacking me with the Bo staff?”
“Dad said it was okay to hit you whenever I wanted to.”
“What? When did he say that?” I asked.
“When you called him an ‘old man.’”
I needed to apologize before she decided to follow through.
“If you need to get it out of your system, go ahead. Sorry, buddy, but it’s you or me,” I said, throwing Alan under the bus.
Alan was saved by the bell. Cassidy followed him out of the cafeteria, and I heard her tell him she’d see him after school. It reminded me of middle school all over again. Jeff, Tami, and I’d had to bail him out numerous times from an ass-kicking. Alan’s mouth had been an issue since he first learned to talk. Cassidy winked at me as she walked off to class. I knew if she did decide to give him some pain, she wouldn’t actually injure him.
◊◊◊
I pulled up to the front of Tina’s house and saw her on the porch. As soon as she spotted me, she darted for the car. Apparently, I didn’t have to meet the parents tonight. Tina’s sisters were looking out the picture window.
“You want me to smoke the tires?” I teased.
“Oh, God! Please don’t!”
I gave her a lopsided grin as I pulled out like an old woman driving. Once we were out of sight of her house, she began to talk as only a teenage girl can. I wondered how she could do it without taking a breath.
“I’m so excited about tonight. It’s been all my friends talked about all week. I promised I’d get you to bring me to their party, and it’s made this the social event of the year. They even made sure to have Mountain Dew on hand. They read your interview in Movie Weekly that said when you go to a party, you don’t drink beer, but you prefer Mountain Dew. Then they figured out how to get KIIS-FM streamed because you said in your phone interview with Ryan Seacrest that you listened to him all the time. While Ryan isn’t on Friday nights, we wanted to make sure the music was something you’d like …”
That was when I just tuned out and nodded occasionally. It was interesting that she admitted she promised I’d be at the party early in the week, but only got the nerve up to ask me this afternoon. It was good that I wasn’t a jerk, or she would have had some explaining to do.
When we arrived at the party, Tina made a point to introduce me to everyone. Lincoln High was big; after all, three area middle schools fed into it. But it wasn’t so big that over the past three years, I hadn’t at least learned the names of everyone in the junior class. I occasionally worked the lunchroom to network. Tina acted as if I didn’t know anyone. She was all smiles when the party’s hostess brought us both Mountain Dew. It seemed most of the people at the party were drinking it. I wondered how long that would last. There were some with beer, so I doubted the ‘be like David’ movement would last very long.