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“I might be,” I said, still holding the card, though he hadn’t released it. “But if I win the challenge, what do I get?”
“A surprise,” was all he offered, and I shook my head. He released the card, so I used it to fan my face once. “Hopefully, a couple of fun evenings?”
“Two, huh?” I eyed the recipe then him. “So the number of evenings hinges on how soon I master this? Cause that could take a while.”
His eyes grew a bit brighter. “As long as it takes. I will see you tomorrow, Francesca?”
“Frankie,” I corrected.
“I know,” he said, turning to walk backwards. “Mais ton nom est magnifique. Comme toi.”
Holy hell, my face was hot by the time he pivoted and headed off to his next class. I wish we shared more than just AP French, but at least I got him there. Still fanning my face, I darted up the stairs and barely slid in the doors of AP Lit before the bell rang. Ms. Fajardo gave me a laughing smile and Coop rolled his eyes as I sank into the chair next to his.
When he reached for my notecard, I jerked it away and then stored it in my backpack. I hadn’t had a chance to really look over the recipe yet, but I wasn’t tipping the guys off. I didn’t need them messing up what had the potential to be a good thing.
But your name is beautiful. Like you. The compliment could have been so dorky, but the way Mathieu delivered it? Wow.
Class turned into a fun debate about the merits of literature, particularly literature that was three centuries out of sync with the times…or was it? Even Coop rallied to argue a few points, and he didn’t get passionate about much.
Ms. Fajardo pointed out that one of our ongoing assignments for the semester needed to be a journal. We could do the writing in class or at home, but we had to write every day—even on weekends. It could be a few sentences or pages, but we had to investigate literature parallels with our daily lives.
“What does that even mean?” Sasha Reader asked. “Picking out whether the lack of curtains in a classroom relates to our lack of a right to privacy at school?”
“That’s an excellent idea,” Ms. Fajardo pointed out much to the other girl’s chagrin. Sasha glanced at me with raised eyebrows, thewhat the hellclear in her expression.
“But why?” Sasha pressed.
“Because,” Ms. Fajardo answered, and without me even trying to get her attention, I knew she’d looked at me. “Frankie, why do you think we need to do this assignment?”
Coop nudged my foot with his, all but silently laughing at me. I hated getting called out in front of the whole class.
“Because the themes in literature are only themes because they serve as a metaphor for real life. Dickens wrote about the common man and his stories resonate over a hundred years later because we have orphans, we have foster kids, we have—single parent families—and financial struggles. We know what it is to be torn between a personal goal and what society thinks we should want. Literature should be like a flashlight, giving us a new way to look at our own lives.”
“Nerd,” Coop whispered even as Ms. Fajardo said, “Precisely. Now, you don’t have to be Dickens to keep the journal, you just have to write about what I would imagine are your favorite topics—your lives, how you are handling the day to day, what challenges are you facing, what goals are you setting… Before anyone starts to worry about who is going to see it, I will ask to see your journals once a week, but only to verify that youhavewritten. You will not leave them with me. I will check them here in class, one at a time, and they will go home with you.”
She continued in that vein for some time and I sighed. I had never been much of a diary keeper. I’d tried once, gave it up as a bad effort when all I could do were write long, lonely letters about the things I wished I could do or short, stupid comments about the day to day things—like feeding the cats or waiting up for Mom to come home from a date.
If I’d had one at the end of last year, I might have written some horribly embarrassing and vitriolic comments about some of my so-called friends. Thankfully, not an issue. This assignment, however, might be. Coop, of course, slung an arm around me as we headed to lunch.
“Dear Diary, today in class, I had to prove that once again I’m the only person who actually does the reading and understands it…”
I shoved him, hard, and managed to elbow him in the gut at the same time. “Get off,” I ordered. “Ass.”
“Aww, c’mon, Frankie. You know I’m teasing.”
Whatever.I flipped him off and kept walking. Not that it proved a deterrent, because he trailed right behind me down the steps and toward the cafeteria along with the few thousand other students. I really,reallyhated that everyone went to lunch at the same time.
“Coop!” Laura materialized. God, did she have Coop low jacked or something? “I’ve been looking for you.”
“Well, you didn’t find me earlier so you mustn’t have been looking that hard.”
I think I just threw up in my mouth.
Ignoring them, I cut across the crowded lines toward the doors leading outside. There were a few picnic tables out there on the shaded breezeway. if I was lucky, I could score one before they filled up. Out the door, I angled across the grass toward the oversized breezeway between the main building and the addition they’d built right before my freshman year. Two of the three picnic tables were taken, but I slid onto the third one with nary a second to spare.
A pair of freshmen with trays stared at me, and I stared right back.
With a sigh, they turned and went elsewhere.
