Chapter Twelve
CHAPTER
TWELVE
Jae
The cafeteria is a sea of rectangular tables and unfamiliar faces.
My stomach rocks gently like I’m on water.
I make my way through the buzzing room where every student has a place, and I feel the weight of a thousand stares.
I stop at the end of the cafeteria line and grab a wet tray.
This is easy, I tell myself. Just get your food and if you can’t find the club members, grab an empty seat anywhere.
Smile. Make small talk. God, I hate small talk.
The line moves forward and I take a small step.
I fight back a yawn, thinking about my sleepless night with Anne’s letter and June Baby’s picture, and then I realize I’m hugging the tray to my chest like a shield.
I look down to see a giant wet spot over my boob, reminding me of suckling lips and baby smells and colostrum.
Perfect. I turn my attention to what I can see, not the feelings roiling in my gut and chest and throat.
The food counter is separated from the rest of the cafeteria by a short wall, so when I get to the front of the line and finally see the food display, my heart sinks.
Sloppy green beans. Fried chicken with moisture spots.
Mashed potatoes thinned out with water. I didn’t expect Bellwood’s cafeteria to be just like my school’s back home.
An orange-bearded man with a hairnet scoops the food onto a plate and drops the plate on my tray.
He gives me a warning look that says he’s heard too much complaining already.
I plaster on a smile and thank him and move down the line to the register where a fluffy woman, pink from sunburn, holds out her hand and mumbles, “Three fifty.” I rummage through my wallet and drop the change into her beckoning fingers.
She shakes her head. “Can’t take that, honey. Where’s your meal card?”
“I don’t have one.”
“Well, you need one.” She drops the money onto my tray. The sound of the clattering coins makes my face warm.
I lean toward her. “I’m new here. Can I pay with cash? Just for today?”
“No can do.” She shakes her head. “You’ll need to go to the office, get a meal card, and fill it up.”
“By the time I do all that …” I sigh. Lunch will be over.
Resigned, I hold out my tray to the bearded man, who shakes his head as he reaches for it.
But before he can grab it, someone else does.
My heart can’t decide whether to sink or soar, because it’s Derek.
He’s standing over me, his eyes shadowed by a baseball cap, and he pushes the tray back into my hand.
“Here. Use mine.” He holds out a card and I stare at the half-smiling picture of him on the shining plastic.
“What?”
“Just take it.”
“You’re paying for my lunch?”
He adjusts his hat and looks over his shoulder. His mouth is moving around a piece of gum and I get a wave of mint from his breath. “Come on. Don’t make a big thing out of it.”
The pink lady behind the register taps the counter impatiently with her nails. “Use the card or get out of line, honey,” she says. “We’ve only got fifteen minutes left and you’re taking up all of it.”
I give the lunch lady the card and she swipes it twice and hands it back. She waves us away.
We step out of the line and I hand the card back to Derek. “Thanks,” I say.
He nods and walks away. Around the wall, I see him heading to a table filled with laughter and big voices.
I notice Miguel in the group, and the girl who sits behind me in English class.
Valeria, I think. For a brief second, her eyes are narrowed at me, and then she turns away.
I keep moving, drop my head to let my locs fall like a curtain.
My eyes scan the room for a familiar face, a kind one.
I can’t find the Free Verse members anywhere, and I decide they’re off on their own somewhere, leaving me to fend for myself.
There’s a Black girl named Shayla I saw in one of my classes, and when I meet her gaze, she quickly looks away.
She leans over to share wide-eyed secrets with her friends, and I don’t think there’s a place for me.
There’s an empty seat next to a teacher and I decide it’s better than standing in the middle of the cafeteria for the next fifteen minutes.
I begin to make my way there, realizing I’m nowhere closer to making friends than I was yesterday.
“Jae!”
My head snaps around in search of the voice calling my name. In the far corner of the cafeteria, William is standing and waving his arms. I let out a sigh of relief and make a beeline to the table.
“I was trying to get your attention when you walked in,” he says, sitting back down.
CJ is shoveling a spoonful of sloppy green beans into his mouth. He salutes me. “Your eyes are all puffy.”
“Thanks,” I say sarcastically. “I didn’t sleep much. Where’s Swan?” I plop down and begin spreading the green beans around my plate.
William sips on a box of chocolate milk. “She’s prepping for a presentation to the school board. On minimizing the effects of financial disparity in the student body. Basically, she’s trying to convince them to implement uniforms so the poorer students don’t get bullied.”
I take a bite of my green beans. It tastes like the flavor was completely boiled away and salt was added to compensate.
I clear my throat and pour a cup of water from a plastic pitcher at the table.
I think about Swan’s colorful jean jacket, her dark eyeliner and leopard eye shadow.
“She doesn’t seem like the type to go for uniforms.”
“She’s not,” William says. “She’s proposing it for next year.”
“I’m guessing Swan graduates this year?”
“Yup.”
“Then why even bother?”
“In regard to Swan, the more fitting question is, why not? She will literally do anything—”
“Except calculus,” CJ interjects.
William nods. “Except calculus. Math in general, actually. Don’t ask her to count her fingers.”
I think about Swan and CJ during the club meeting, how he rested his head on her stomach as she stroked his hair. “Are you and Swan—”
William chokes on his milk and sets down the carton, thumping his chest. “CJ and Swan? What? Boyfriend and girlfriend?” He shakes his head and laughs.
“We’re the very definition of amor platonicus,” CJ says.
“Oh.” I turn back to my plate and push aside the chicken. I’m still not crazy about eating meat. Not when I don’t have to. I sweep my fork through the runny mashed potatoes and try to scoop up as much as I can.
There’s a chorus of ooos at the other end of the cafeteria and we all crane our necks to see.
It’s Valeria. She stands behind Derek with her arms around his neck, hugging him close.
Her black hair falls over his shoulders and she plants her red lips on his cheek.
He’s as still as glass. Even from where I sit, I see the tension in his jaw.
Slowly, he removes her hands from his shoulders, fills up a cup of water, and drinks it until it’s empty.
CJ lets out a big puff of air, his cheeks chipmunk full. “Derek Patel,” he says simply, then pulls out a piece of paper from his notebook and starts folding it.
I stare at my potatoes like they’re a Jackson Pollock painting. “He paid for my lunch.”
There’s silence. I look up to see CJ’s hands frozen midair.
“Huh? Derek?” he asks.
“Yeah. I didn’t have a meal card, so he paid for my lunch.”
His hands get back to work, folding quickly until he’s made a 3D star.
“Well, he was a nice kid in middle school. Maybe he’s coming around again.
Or maybe he just hit his head and forgot he’s supposed to be a complete asshole.
” He pulls out another sheet of paper and folds quickly, as if talking about Derek makes him anxious.
We’re all quiet and I poke the chicken with my fork, sad that Uncle Rowan ruined my two-year vegetarian streak, annoyed that Derek’s wearing a girl around his neck instead of sitting with us. Annoyed that I give a damn what Derek Patel is doing.
As I watch CJ make another star, I suddenly remember how small Uncle Rowan made me feel. What are you going to do? Fold them into origami and sell them at craft shops in the Bahamas?
I carefully unfold CJ’s star. I write: Poetry is when an emotion has found its thought and the thought has found words.—Attributed to Robert Frost. CJ reaches for it, reads it, grins, and pushes it toward William.
Then we’re all quiet, writing words on sheets of paper and letting CJ fold them into origami.
“We’ll leave them around school,” William says, his tongue sticking out the corner of his mouth as he writes. He writes his lines, signs them TFVS.
CJ pulls out another paper from his notebook. My eyes fall on his name written across decorative tape in the upper corner: Christopher James Tillman.
“Wait …” I close my eyes and try to reach for a memory that’s taking shape. First day of school. Shuffling feet. Heavy breaths. What the hell were you doing at my house, Tillman?
I slap my forehead. “You’re Tillman!”
“Huh? Yeah.” He shrugs, still folding. “Why?”
“It was you. You got into a fight with Derek in the bathroom.”
He stops and falls back against his seat. Looks at me with his thin green eyes. “How do you know about that? He told you?”
“I was there.”
“Huh?” he and William say at the same time.
“It was the first day of school and I was too nervous to come to the cafeteria alone, so I hid in the girls’ bathroom. Embarrassing, I know. But it turns out it wasn’t the girls’ bathroom.”
“Holy shit on toast,” CJ says.
“So why did he do it?”
“What?”
“Threaten to beat you up.”
CJ pauses. He blinks wildly behind his glasses. His lips start forming words he never says, until finally he bends over his folding again, quiet.
William’s shaking his head and rubbing his temples. “Ay yay yay.”
“It’s okay, CJ,” I say. Because I’m not telling them the whole story, either.
That I heard Derek sobbing and left the stall to talk to him.
That my heart nearly stopped when I saw him because, behavior aside, he is quite possibly the most beautiful person I’ve ever seen.
And I don’t tell them that my stomach flip-flops when I see him, and how much I hate it.
Maybe I want to have a little piece of Derek to myself, even if it’s just his secrets.
“Well, have you and Derek decided on a venue for the poetry reading?” William asks.
“I’m meeting him after school Friday,” I say. “Hopefully the first place we find will be perfect and we can move on.” I can move on, I think.
William and CJ carry on with a conversation I can’t follow. All I hear is What the hell were you doing at my house, Tillman?