The Pretty One (12 page)

thirteen

audition (noun): a trial hearing given to a singer, actor, or other performer to test suitability for employment, professional training, or competition.

Up until now I have always wondered what the parties my sister went to were like. One thing is certain. I thought they would be a lot better than this.

Lucy and Drew aren't here yet so I'm sitting by myself on a sleek leather couch in Danny Warner's giant house watching George and a group of music majors belt out Broadway tunes beside a baby grand piano. They're each trying to sing louder than the other, each trying to be showier and peacockier and practically head butting one another out of the way.

“Megan,” George says, waving me over. “Come join us.”

“No,” I say. “That's okay.”

“Come on,” George says. He puts his hands together like he's praying and puckers his lips like a baby. “Please. One song for George.”

Ew. I hate baby talk and I especially hate baby faces.

I see him whisper something to Danny, who's playing the piano. Danny begins playing a different tune as George looks in my direction. He puts a hand on his heart as he begins sing:
“You are so beautiful…to me—doooooon't you seeeeeeee? You're everything I liiiiiiive for—”

“Okay!” I exclaim, jumping up and raising my hands as if surrendering. This is worse than Chinese water torture. “I'll sing.”

“What do you want to sing?” he asks me.

Everyone is silent, waiting for my answer. They look at me in this impatient sort of way, like they want me to hurry up and sing so they can get back to trying to be the next Hilary Duff or whoever.

“But first,” I spit out. “I just have to…ah, get some water.”

I make a beeline out of there and into the kitchen. I practically sigh with relief when I realize I'm alone. As the crowd in the other room erupts into a rendition from
West Side Story,
I pour myself a glass of water and glance at the bowl of chips sitting on the middle of the table. I was so nervous about my date that I didn't really eat much dinner. I did, however, eat two doughnuts when I got home, but as my father would've been quick to point out, doughnuts are loaded with fat, not protein. I gnaw on my thumbnail as I calculate the calories in my mind.

“Man, I hate these things.” I hear a familiar deep voice say.

I yank my thumb away from my mouth and spin around. Drew is standing in the entranceway to the kitchen.

Just the sight of him makes me go weak in the knees. “What things?”

“Parties,” he says, as he walks over toward me.

“Really?” My heart is clanging in my chest and the room is starting to spin. “I never heard of anyone who didn't like parties.”

“Do
you
like them?” he asks, obviously surprised that some people might disagree.

I swallow back the lump in my throat as I try to think of a response that will totally wow him with my wit and intelligence. “I don't know…this one seems a little, well, maybe not so good. But I haven't been to many, to tell you the truth.”
That's
the best I could do? That's the response that was going to wow him?

He crosses his arms and leans up against the counter, about an arm's length away from me. “You're lucky. They're all pretty much like this.”

I'm breathing again, but after my last lackluster response, I don't trust myself to speak.

“I have a strategy. I try to find one person I can stand and talk to them until I'm bored. Then I wait a reasonable amount of time and I make my getaway.”

“How long have I got?” I say, thinking out loud.

A smile forms in the corners of his mouth. “How much time do you want?”

Even though Drew is staring right into my eyes—something he rarely does—I don't look away. “I don't know. I can be pretty long-winded sometimes.”

Holy crap. Am I actually flirting? How can I be flirting when I don't know how?

Over the pounding of my heart I hear the music change gears as George starts to sing,
“Theeeeeeeere's a plaaaace for us, Soooomewherrrrrrrrrre a place for ussssss…”

“You're funny,” Drew says, smiling. He sounds a little surprised.

Funny.
I'm funny. I try to think of something to say that would prove his compliment is merited, but my mind is a blank. Where's that hilarious retort when you need it? I'm so nervous the glass of water in my hand is actually shaking.

“Maybe we should find a quieter place. How about outside?” Drew nods toward the glass doors on the opposite side of the kitchen.

“Okay,” I say breathlessly.

Still holding on to my glass of water, I wrap my arms across my chest in an attempt to hide my shaking hands and deafen the sound of my heart thwacking against my chest wall. He pulls open the French doors and motions for me to go first. I step outside. It's a warm fall night, nearly sixty degrees, but I wouldn't have cared if it were freezing. Drew shuts the door and looks at me. After all the noise inside it seems extremely quiet. Almost too quiet. And dark.

Drew gives me a little grin. It seems like he's still waiting for me to say something, something funny, something that reeks with hilarity, but what? My cheeks grow warm as I pretend to admire the little tiny landscaping lights twinkling in the yard. Funny, funny, funny. The only thing I can think of are the horrible jokes my uncle Stanley likes to tell at Thanksgiving.

“I thought you were long-winded,” he says, resting his arms on the balcony railing and surveying the view right along with me. “You seem pretty quiet to me.”

I drop my arms and lean over the balcony, balancing my water on the railing. “I'm trying to think of something funny to say,” I reply honestly.

“You don't have to be funny on my account.”

“That's good because all I can think of are ‘your momma' jokes.”

He raises an eyebrow. “Your momma?”

“You know, your momma is so fat people jog around her for exercise. Your momma's so old she ran track with the dinosaurs.”

“Huh,” he says, and goes back to staring into the yard.

Did I just tell Drew some “your momma” jokes from my uncle Stanley's Thanksgiving table repertoire? “I've got some other things, but they're not that funny.”

“‘Your momma' jokes are hard to beat.” Drew sounds serious, but his smirk is giving him away. “But give it a try.”

He's so close I can feel his breath on my cheek. I don't look at him for fear that one more close encounter and I might fall over the balcony in ecstasy, dropping the two stories down and splattering across the stone patio.

“One is your combat boots.”

“Go on,” Drew replies.

“I noticed they're the same ones you wore last year. Does that mean your feet stopped growing?”

“Seriously, this is your subject?” he asks playfully. “Maybe we better go back to ‘your momma' jokes.”

It's all the encouragement I need. I look him directly in the eyes and smile. “The second one has to do with plays, since I know you like them. I was trying to think of an intelligent question so I looked through Lucy's playbooks, but I didn't come up with anything.”

“You did this before you came tonight?”

I nod.

“You were trying to think of something to say to
me
?”

Uh-oh. I hadn't intended on admitting that to anyone, especially to him. “I just meant, well, we're going to be spending some time together because of the play and all and, well, I just wanted to make sure we had some things to talk about.”

“That's sweet,” Drew says, grinning again.

A car door slams and we both instinctively turn toward the sound. I can hear kids talking and laughing and even though we can't see them, I have a feeling it's more drama students arriving for the party.

“So what about you?” Drew asks. “What kinds of questions would I ask you if I was trying to make conversation?”

“Food.” I immediately cover my mouth. Did I just say
food
? Oh man, I'm hopeless. “I didn't mean to say that. Ask me again.”

“No take backs. So what's your favorite food?”

It's so ridiculous that I can't help but laugh. “Sausages.”

Drew begins to laugh, too, and I'm filled with a surge of pride. “Can I ask you something?” I say.

“About my boots or my momma?”

“If you don't like parties then why are you here?”

It seems like an obvious question but I can tell from the surprised look on his face he wasn't expecting it.

“Good question. I'm trying to make myself do things because if I gave into my instincts, I would just be a hermit. And also because, well, sometimes I get lucky and find someone I really like talking to.”

Drew is looking me in the eyes again. My spirit starts to soar right along with my heart. Is he talking about me? Am I the person who is going to make him lucky? Please God,
please
?

Just then we're interrupted by the sound of the glass door behind us sliding open. “Here she is!” George calls out, bounding outside to join us. He's out of breath and rivulets of perspiration are beading on his forehead. “I didn't want you to think I was ignoring you.” George gives me a peculiar look. “Aren't you hot?” He reaches out and unzips my hoodie.

It's an intimate act, a boyfriend-girlfriend thing to do, and from the expression on Drew's face, it has not escaped his attention. Drew glances from George to me, as if he's trying to figure out what the connection is.

“Hey,” Lucy says cheerfully to me, stepping out onto the deck. “I was wondering where you were!”

She gives me a big cheeser, like I'm the Mary-Kate to her Ashley even though I haven't spoken with her since the incident in our bedroom and had no idea that she had even arrived. “Hey, Drew,” Lucy says, turning her significant charm on him. “So what are you guys doing out here? Let me guess—shop talk! No more of that!” She playfully wags her finger at Drew.

Drew laughs as the two of them share a meaningful gaze. It only lasts a split second but it still counts.

“Can I have a sip of your water, babe?” George asks me. Drew raises his eyebrows as if to say “Babe?”

I want to push Lucy off Drew and tell Drew that I don't belong to George but instead I say, “Um, okay,” and do my best not to look repulsed as I hand him my glass.

“Come on, Drew,” Lucy says, giving him a tug on his arm.

“Come on where?” he asks.

“Jane found a Scrabble board. I need you and your dictionary.” Lucy looks at me and says rather knowingly, “Drew always carries a dictionary.” She turns back toward Drew and leans into him, flirtatiously reaching her hand into his shirt pocket. “Where is it?”

Question, tease, touch.
I can barely stand to watch.

“Not there,” Drew says with an uncomfortable chuckle.

“Where then?” Lucy reaches behind him and feels up his butt. “I got it,” she says, pulling it out of his back pocket and showing it to us.

I think I'm going to be sick.

“All right,” Drew says, grinning at her. “I'll be your partner.”

I have to do something quick! Question, tease, touch. Question, tease, touch! “You always carry a dictionary?” I ask.
Question!

“Always,” Lucy responds. “He learns a new word each day.”

George takes a few loud and noisy gulps of my water, then wipes the dribble off his chin with his sleeve. “He's a writer. He likes words.”

“Here's one,” Lucy says, dodging out of the way as Drew tries to get his dictionary back. “Gemeinschaft,” she giggles. “A spontaneously arising organic sexual relationship.”

“What?” Drew smiles and takes the dictionary back. He holds it up to the light of the moon so that he can see. Even though Lucy was reading just fine in the dark, she leans in on him, her chest resting on his arm as she pretends to read it again over his shoulder. Much to my dismay, Drew doesn't jab her in the boobs with his elbow and knock her off the balcony. Instead he smiles and says, “Not
sexual
. Social. An organic
social
relationship.”

“Oops,” Lucy says with yet another flirtatious giggle.

She's good, I'll give her that. But it's not over yet. “I think dictionaries are cool,” I announce in a really loud, unnatural voice.

Drew, Lucy, and George gape at me. “Oh really?” my sister says, in a smug tone usually reserved for sarcastic replies to our mother. “That's funny considering the only time I've ever seen you use a dictionary is when you put it on the chair and stood on it so you could reach the Halloween candy Dad hid from you in the top cupboard.”

I stare at her, speechless. In one fell swoop Lucy announced to the man of my dreams that I was not only stupid but stupid with an eating disorder.

“We should probably get to that Scrabble game,” Drew says quickly, as if he's aware that we're on the verge of a major sister slugfest.

“See you guys,” Lucy says cheerfully as she follows him out.

George hands me back my water. “Here you go.”

Even in the dark, I can practically see his saliva floating around in the remaining water. “That's okay. Keep it.”

I follow George back in and sit by myself on the couch taking turns glancing from my sister and Drew playing Scrabble, to George singing at the top of his lungs, to my watch. By the time George asks me if I'm ready to go I feel like I've been sitting on this couch for hours instead of just one. I ignore my smiling and waving sister and shoot Drew a quick salute good-bye as I follow George to the door. I make a mental note to delete the photos my mom took in front of the fireplace when I get home, since I definitely do not want to remember this evening. Nor will I ever attempt to question, tease, and touch again.