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“What’s the one tune you wish the band would agree to play?” he asked.
“Abba’s ‘Dancing Queen’.” Before he had a chance to reply, she added, “You thought I was going to say, ‘Whiter Shade of Pale’, right?” She pointed at her peeling skin.
He laughed. Her sarcasm was one of his favorite things about her. The way her eyes sparkled, too.
“I never understood the lyrics of that one,” he said, still chuckling.
“Me neither. Sixteen vestal virgins?”
“Who are doing cartwheels across the floor?”
She burst out laughing.
“Shh …” the librarian hissed, giving them a death glare.
They muffled their laughter and leaned closer across the two sides of the table that they were occupying. She had a fresh, lemony smell.
“For years, I wondered why they crawled under the night train until I realized they called out for another drink,” he whispered. “Though both sentences make zero sense. We should invent new lyrics, ones that actually mean something.”
She laughed. “This song makes sense without really making sense, you know?”
He looked at her. “Somehow, when you say it, it does.”
She drew herself back, away from him.
He straightened and opened his books.
In the second semester, they studied for longer hours. At her house, he met her parents. They knew his mother, but it was the first time he’d spoken to them.
“I never see you with Libby Latimer,” he said later when they were in her room. “Both your parents work at the bakery. And your dad bought it from her mom.”
“That’s why,” she replied. “She’s nice, but … I don’t know … She has her friends, and I always feel kinda bad that her mother was forced to sell because of her dad, and then my parents bought it and … I guess I think she’d resent me for it or something.”
“Do you think she does?”
“I don’t know.”
Later, when she went to make them sandwiches, he roamed around her room and looked at the various books, pictures, and girly knick-knacks she had around. On one easel, there was an unfinished painting, and several others leaned against the wall next to it. In an open sketchpad that sat on one of the shelves, he saw a self-portrait that she had made of herself. She hadn’t done herself justice in it, he thought. In the sketch, Jane held a long-stemmed sunflower, the kind he had seen in Van Gogh’s reproduction that hung on her wall. He wondered if she had sketched him or anyone he knew but didn’t want to pry. Though, later, sitting on her bed, he absentmindedly picked up the T-shirt that was thrown on it. Without knowing what he was doing, he brought it to his face and inhaled. It smelled like Jane—lemony and fresh. The unmistakable stirring in his jeans took him by surprise.
He suddenly wondered what those long legs and slender back of hers looked like naked, what her breasts looked and felt like, what color were her nipples. When she entered the room, holding two plates, he quickly threw the shirt back on the bedcover, grabbed a plate, and, right before getting up, he realized he couldn’t stand without a visible tent in his jeans. He started rambling about the material that they were studying until it was safe enough for him to go back to the desk.
Jane was too good for him to mess around with. He was nineteen, and she was seventeen. He was bound for college, and he wouldn’t casually date her like he had with one of the senior-year girls.
Sometime after, he was coming out of class and, thanks to both their heights, he spotted her at the other end of the hall. He was about to wave at her when he heard a male voice calling from within the half a billion people that poured into the hall, “Hey, Plain Jane.”
Finn looked at her face from across the crowd. She turned red.
“Plain Jane. Yes, you. I’m talking to you. Do you have the homework in Math?” the voice repeated just when Finn saw its owner’s face. Eric Hays from junior year.
Without thinking, he pushed aside the students who stood between him and Eric. With his palm on his shoulder, he made Eric turn around. The moment the blond, shorter guy faced him, Finn grabbed him by the collar of his Quicksilver T-shirt and pinned him to the nearest locker.
“What did you call her?” he hissed into Eric’s face.
“Plain Jane. Because, you know, she’s … plain and … she’s … Jane,” Eric mumbled, stuttering the more he continued speaking, the expression on his face revealing that he was realizing his mistake while he spoke.
“I didn’t hear that. What did you call her again?” He brought his face closer to Eric’s, further twisting his collar.
“Um—”
