The Book of Masks (Vol. 2)

Fun in a Back Seat

Previously: "A Study Date with Stephanie" 

"Do you want to get together tomorrow night," you ask Stephanie, "do some more studying?"

"What?" she says. Again, you seem to have startled her out of a visit to a very distant place. "Oh. Well, I don't think I'm gonna have any homework," she says. "I, uh— Well, this year I tried signing up for classes where I wasn't going to have a lot of it."

"Oh, okay. I wish I'd been that smart. That makes you smarter than me in one way," you add with a smile.

She answers with a brief, pained smile of her own. It quickly turns into a frown, though. "Are we close to your house?" she asks. "I don't got a lot to keep me out, now. If I went home, could you walk home from here?"

"Yeah, I could do that," you tell her with a sinking heart, even though your house is many blocks away.

She hesitates, then says, "Nah, never mind, that was selfish of me. I can keep busy while you work. No," she insists when you protest. "I'll go get you another coffee. I need one too. I've got some reading I really need to get through, and that's the only way I can concentrate."

* * * * *

If this is Stephanie Wyatt concentrating—raising her nose from the book every few minutes to glance at her phone—you wonder what it would look like when she's not concentrating. It embarrasses you, having to let her basically babysit you while you do your math, and you hurry through it as fast as possible. To spare her and you even more awkward together-time, you throw over the reading you were supposed to do for English and declare yourself ready to go before you really are.

She was quiet all the time you were doing your math, and you don't really expect her to speak again, except to make some courtesy remarks about it being "fun" or some shit like that. But when you get out to the car, she stops before getting in, and across the roof of the sedan she says, "I was serious what I told you in there, Prescott. I don't think I'm gonna have any homework tomorrow night. That's how come I, uh, turned you down."

"I understand."

"I wasn't, you know, rejecting you."

"No, I know that."

She slaps the roof of the car a couple of times, then says, "But if we do get together for homework again, that's all that it is. Just homework."

"No, I get that." You start to stammer, and then sweat pops out all over your body. "I wasn't— No really, I wasn't, when I asked you that—"

"There's a guy I'm interested in, is all."

"Oh. Well, of course." And of course, he's not me, you add in what must be one of the most foolishly obvious silent follow-ups of all time.

"Yeah." She slaps the roof again. "There's a guy I want, and I'm gonna get him."

"I'm sure you will. Do I know him?"

"I dunno. I'm sure you know who he is."

"Does he know you want to go out with him?"

That's another one of those questions that just came blurting out. It must be something about Stephanie that makes you ask them. It's like without even trying she can just bully you into saying things you should know better than to say.

Still, even though you know it's not the smartest thing you could have said, you're in no way prepared for what comes next.

It's dark, but you can make out Stephanie's face across the roof of the car. There's shock in her expression, and her eyes go wide even as her lips peel back. "Just get in the fucking car, Prescott," she hisses. You duck your head and obey.

She gets in too, and shoves the key into the ignition. But she doesn't twist it. Instead she sits very still for a moment, and you can hear her swallow a couple of times.

Then, to your consternation, she throws the door open and leaps out, and you watch in astonishment as she runs off around the corner of The Shed.

For a moment you can only stare. Then you get out and, with a feeling like you are taking your life in your hands, you follow her.

You don't have to go far before you're arrested by the quiet sound of someone weeping nearby. Stephanie is around the back of The Shed, standing in a dark corner where a wooden fence meets the back wall of the cafe. She is hunched over, with her face averted, and she gasps and sniffles and shudders while hugging herself.

"Stephanie?" you say in a creaking voice. She stiffens, and catches and holds her breath. "I—"

It would be like touching a wildcat, you know. But you make the gesture anyway. You lightly brush her shoulder.

A violent shiver runs through her, and she seems to shrink up even further inside herself. Then she wheels and throws her arms around you. You feel yourself turn to stone as she buries her face in the crook of your neck and unashamedly sobs into it.

* * * * *

It's Marc Garner she's in love with. That's what she admits after she has wrung herself dry of all the tears, leaving her limp as a dishrag. She is in love with Marc Garner.

You're sitting in the back seat of her car, each of you pressed up against your own door, with most of the empty cabin between you. After she had finished most of her crying, Stephanie had made noises about taking you back home, but instead had crawled into the back seat, where you had joined her after a pause. And then she let it all out.

She had known him and his sisters, Eva and Jessica, since they were kids, but it wasn't until their freshman year that she got a crush on him. That crush grew steadily, but she kept her distance, because he had a girlfriend. But that girl left at the end of their junior year, and after giving Marc the summer to get over this unwanted break up, Stephanie had started to edge up to him. She was going to get herself a boyfriend, and he was going to be it.

But (stupidly, she admitted) she wanted him to ask her out. So instead of declaring herself to him, she had played coy. And then Marc—

Stephanie nursed her temples, as though she had a migraine or was trying to fight back tears again.

But then Marc had asked out another girl. Because apparently he wasn't even interested enough in Stephanie to notice that she might be interested in him.

"Who did he ask out?" you asked.

"Girl named Hannah Westrick," Stephanie said. "She's a slut from Eastman, moved out to Westside this year. I guess he's serious about her, and— Oh, God damn it! It's like she's serious about him, too! Because she used to chase anything with a dick, and now she's—! Oh, fuck me," she groans, "she's a one-guy girl now. Or at least she's acting that way."

You expressed your sympathies; politely asked if there weren't other guys she might be interested in (which got you a very dirty look); told her she was an awesome girl who you could totally imagine going with Marc. Which is true—Marc is the captain of the soccer team, and is a very good-looking, athletic, popular guy. "Wish I could talk Marc into seeing it that way," she grunted.

But you quickly ran out of things to say, until now you say the last thing that you can say, which is: "I wish I could tell you something, but I don't know what to say."

"That's alright," Stephanie says, and she sounds bone-tired. "You did plenty just by letting me vent. I can't believe it." She grinds a knuckle into her forehead. "You know I haven't told anyone else about this? No one knows how I feel about him. What I want from him. Except you, now."

Why me? you wonder.

"I'd have to kill myself after telling any of my friends all this, if I did tell them."

Oh. You told me because we're not friends.

"So don't you go telling anyone!" she then adds, roaring to life. She leans across to punch you hard in the leg. "I mean that, Prescott!"

"Don't worry, I won't! I don't even know—" Anyone who would care, is what you were going to say, but you quickly correct it to, "—any of your friends anyway."

"Well, you don't tell anyone! If it gets out, I will know who to kill, and it will be you!"

"I swear, I won't!"

"Alright." She seems mull on a question—whether to kill you anyway, probably—then with a sharp, short sigh she says, "Okay, that's enough of this shit. I'm taking you home now." You gratefully clamber out and get into the front seat.

* * * * *

Stephanie's confession preys on you all night, which surprises you, but you can't put it out of your mind even after you try. You feel too much sympathy for her—she was really compelling at conveying the heartache and misery she feels—and are also somewhat in awe of how vulnerable this tough-skinned girl made herself in front of you. And even though she only told you all this because (as she implied) you and she are not friends, you are still humbled that she shared it with you.

Still, you feel weirded out the next day, as you approach last-period Astronomy. Typically you don't even glance at Stephanie when you go into the room, and when you do, she's got her face bent over her phone. What should you do now, today, after that very raw and soul-baring talk she had with you last night? Would it make it awkward for her if you made a point of saying "Hi"? Or would it be more awkward if you didn't?

Then you get a bright idea: Skip class, then text her to ask if you can borrow her notes.

Next: "The Games That Some Girls Play" 

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"Table of Contents (Vol. 2)" 
"The Book of Masks (Vol. 2)"