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“Shut up,” she laughed. “You’re all cool and confident, and…” She paused and I heard the song at the same time as her. “Sorry, is that guy singing about punani?”
My laughter was silent. Just hearing the word ‘punani’ coming out of her mouth was humorous enough. Realising she knew what it meant was another thing altogether. I was already starting to think she wasn’t quite the sweet, innocent girl I’d thought she was…and that was not helping.
“Yeah,” I answered.
“Huh. It’s catchy.”
Of course, it was. It was Scooter.
I chuckled and nudged her. “I’ll teach you all the words later. Come on, you were telling me how great I am.”
She scoffed. “Sure. No. But you… I don’t know. I just didn’t picture you outside that charming, cocky, with-it persona.”
“Yeah, because you’re nothing like that at school,” I pointed out, my voice heavy with sarcasm.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” she asked.
“Because you’re totally not the popular, cool girl with the perfect hair, the perfect grades, the perfect family, the perfect everything.”
She sighed heavily. “Yeah, but am I really?”
“Well, no.” Because it had become obvious to me that Little Miss Popular might not be as perfect as everyone thought. And it had very little to do with her knowledge of ‘punani’. “Because you’re more than just some teenage jerkoff’s wet dream. Only just mind.” She bumped my shoulder and I couldn’t stop myself laughing. “What?”
“Not cool,” she laughed.
“Why? You trying to tell me that you’re oblivious to the effect you have on the male population in this town?”
She blinked and looked at me like she legitimately had no idea what I was talking about. “What effect?”
Laughter bubbled out of me completely unbidden. She really didn’t know? She didn’t know what people thought of her? Did she really not know why Mason Carter was supposed to ask her out?
“Seriously? You ever wonder why everyone thinks you and Carter would be perfect together?”
“Uh, because he likes me?” was her uncertain reply.
I could tell just how much shereallyliked him. “Okay, I’ll brush aside your obvious desire for him. It’s because you’re the same. He’s you, you’re him. You’re both the idiotically popular, hot kids–”
“I’m not popular.”
I mean, she was. “You’re not unpopular.”
“What? What does that even mean?”
I continued like she hadn’t spoken. “And, it would be a total travesty if the two of you didn’t get married as soon as exams were over and have a million beautiful babies.”
“Please tell me you heard that somewhere. Because that just sounded heinous coming out of your mouth.”
I couldn’t agree more. “Thankfully, yes. I did hear that somewhere. Quite a lot of somewheres actually.”
Mum was in book club and they occasionally used to meet at our place. I’d heard A LOT even then about how perfect Piper and Carter would be together. It was like half the town was living vicariously through just the idea of the pairing.
“What do you think about it?”
“About what?”
“Me and Mason.”
“Am I supposed to have an opinion?” I hoped I sounded surprised because I wasn’t really the sort of person she’d normally ask that kind of question, rather than surprised to find I did actually have an opinion. “Seems to me that’s your business.”
