June kicked my grabbing hand with her free foot. I dropped the first foot.
It hurt, I said, it hurt.
June made the noise “Tch” ≠ “I love you.”
“June and Gurion,” Miss Gleem said.
“Sitting in a tree!” sang someone I didn’t spin to look at.
“K-I–L-L—” sang Vincie, who then yelled, “Fuck!” because Nakamook had punched him.
I said, Why are you mad at me?
June said, “Stop talking to me.”
I said, But why?
Miss Gleem said, “You’ve both got detention tomorrow.”
“Tell me what I did,” I said to June.
“Eliza June Watermark,” said Miss Gleem, “you pick your things up and get over here. Now.”
June got away from me so fast, she forgot her sketchbook.
Nakamook disagreed. He said, “She left it for you.”
We were gathered on the curb of the bus circle by then — me, Benji, Vincie, and Leevon. June had cut out of the cafeteria as soon as Miss Gleem dismissed detention. I had run into Main Hall with the sketchbook but wasn’t able to find her, so I went to the front entrance and looked out the window. Just buses in the circle.
I asked the Deaf Sentinel if he’d seen her.
“Show me your pass,” he said.
Detention’s over, I told him. I said, No one needs a pass anymore.
He said, “I guess I’m off-duty, then.”
Robot, I told him.
He chewed his pencil.
I ran outside to the circle to look in the windows of the buses. No one was in the buses.
I dropped my backpack and tore my coat off. I swung the coat over my head and let go, but it only made me angrier, and cold. Puddles were slushy. Molecules were slow. I slammed my fist into the flank of bus 2. Blood went to my knuckles and my fingers got warm. I switched which hand held the sketchbook and hit the bus with the second fist.
The driver, who I’d assumed was gossiping like usual with the other drivers on the grassy island in the middle of the bus circle, came down the chunky steps saying “Hey.” I’d never seen him before.
Hey? I said.
“Stop doing that,” he said. “Don’t hit my bus.”
I said, You’re not Marnie.
“Marnie’s got the flu. Don’t hit her bus.”
I said, As long as you don’t tell me not to hit it again, I’ll only hit it once more.
I hit the bus. This time with my head.
“Jeez,” said the driver. He got back inside.
My friends showed up.
“Your head’s all red,” said Vincie.
Leevon banged his head on Vincie’s backpack, which was huge with textbooks. Vincie met the pavement on his knees and Leevon stumbled backward til he sat on the curb. When they got their bearings they wrestled.
Did you see June? I asked Benji.
“No,” he said, “but calm down.”
I said, I kissed her and I thought she loved it, but then she kicked me and forgot her sketchbook.
“She left it for you,” he said, “so you could bring it to her.”
I said, How would you know that? And why did you call her? She said you called her last night.
“I know because I called her, and I called her because, I don’t know, man — you’re in love with her and you’re my friend and being in love with her’s making you act a little, I don’t know… out of character? Uncharacteristically insecure?”
Insecure how? What do you mean insecure?
“That’s what I mean. And how you just had to be early, had to arrive first to detention. And the way you got about Berman. And the super-knit brow thing you’re doing right now, like you’re trying to make your eyeballs explode. This is what I mean. And I wanted to make sure she knew you weren’t a dork, that you’re dorked out only in this one specific area because you’re in love and that is new for you, and also I don’t know her that well, and I wanted to make sure she wasn’t gonna somehow accidentally dissapoint…that she wouldn’t…doesn’t matter. That part was groundless. But look. You’ve got her notebook because she left it for you, but it’s good here to hesitate. It’s good here to wait awhile. Stop bouncing around like a spaz, okay? Joke around with your friend Nakamook and don’t bring her that notebook. Just laugh like I’m saying a bunch of really funny stuff and make her come and get — look out.”
A pebble struck me sharply on the back of my neck. I spun and saw June. She ducked behind a hedgerow halfway to the entrance.
“Don’t go there,” Benji said.
I went.
“At least slow down!” he shouted after me.
June was bundled in her coat, laying down behind the bushes.
I said, Why—
And she swept my legs out at the ankles. I fell next to her, still holding the sketchbook.
“Still love me?” she said. “Even though I’m mean to you? Even though I kicked you twice and hit your neck with a pebble and made you bring me my sketchbook and then tripped you?” she said. She said, “I wouldn’t love you if you did that to me. If you did that to me, I’d think you were a dentist. I would think you were crazy, too, and I wouldn’t trust you and every morning I’d bake a clay doll that was shaped like you, and every night before I slept I would smash it on the floor beside my bed and kneel on its shards with no pants so my legs would bleed and I could hate you even easier the next time. But don’t worry about it, I disappointed my teacher and she hates me now, too, so at least you’re not alone.”I was too glad she was talking to me to be angry at her.
Miss Gleem doesn’t hate you, I said.
June said, “I don’t care.”
I said, It’s a little bit like what happened to me in Brodsky’s office yesterday afternoon, and you told me—
“I don’t care!” June said.
I said, If you didn’t perform the hyperblinker action, Miss Gleem would have known you helped destroy the props yourself, and she’d feel even worse — so even though your hyperblinkering was artful, it was kind. You saved her some pain.
June said, “Go away, Gurion.”
I said, Why?
She said, “I don’t want you near me.”
I said, Then you go away.
She didn’t go away. She got up on her elbows like she was going to, but she didn’t.
You just want me to think you’re crazy, I said.
“Get bent,” June said.
You want me to think you’re crazy since I can’t convince you Miss Gleem’s not disappointed, I said. Because if I think you’re crazy, I’ll tell you you’re crazy, and then you might believe it. If you believe you’re crazy, you get to doubt everything that you know to be true but wish were untrue. That’s why you kicked me — because it was the kind of thing a crazy person would do. And that’s why you’re telling me to go away now — because it would be a crazy thing to tell me if you really meant it. And that’s your secret plan, but it doesn’t make sense.
“Why doesn’t it?” she said. Her voice had less nails in it.
It’s yossarian, I said. If I tell you you’re crazy and you believe it, then you have to doubt that you should trust my opinion to begin with because how can a crazy person judge whose opinion to trust? They can’t. They’re crazy. So then you have to doubt that you’re even crazy because the person who told you you’re crazy — me — might not be trustworthy. And you come out with nothing that way. And so I come out with nothing. So I’m not going to tell you that you didn’t disappoint Miss Gleem. And I won’t tell you anything that would mean that you’re crazy. You did disappoint her — not tons, but a little. And you aren’t crazy.
“I hate that,” June said.
Me too, I said.
I didn’t know what I meant, just that I should agree with her.