Makin' the Moves

CHAPTER 6 

Bud Stud couldn’t wait to get home from the beach so he could get to his yearbook.  According to Alice, two girls thought he was cute.  He  knew one of them – she had been in a couple of his Spanish classes with Mrs. Ontiveros, but he also knew she had a boyfriend.  He’d seen her at the park with Juan, and after that fiasco at the prom, he had made up his mind to stay clear of girls with boyfriends.

He turned to the sophomore section of the yearbook, looked for her name, and at first glance, he thought to himself that his parents would never approve.  His friend Rob flat out said, “NO WAY!”  His folks expected him to someday date a nice All-American girl – preferably blond and blue-eyed like himself.  Nope, this was NOT going to wash with his parents, but he thought he’d ask around anyway.

None of his buddies knew her, but from what Alice had said, she was squeaky clean, didn’t have a boyfriend, drives a van with “JESUS SAVES” in red, glow-in-the-dark lettering on the back.  Not a problem, as long as she doesn’t push religion down his throat.  She was also on drill team, and they were practicing at school everyday for the rest of summer until school started.

So, he and a couple of his buddies went to Channel Islands’ campus to watch the drill team practice, and sure enough, there they were, and there she was.  She looked nothing like her yearbook picture,  but his friends still didn’t think she was worth his time.  But hey, SHE liked HIM.  She had his picture up in her wall.  That right there demanded he MAKE time to learn more about her.

One of the perks of being vice-president of the German Club was that he got to work Registration, and got to register for classes early.  He had seen her at the orientation meeting, so he knew she would be working at the Foreign Language table with Mrs. Ontiveros.  He’d already registered for a class with Mrs. Ontiveros for Spanish 3, but he found out that she was taking Spanish 3 with Mr. Varnava, so while she was on a break, Bud Stud walked to the Foreign Language table and asked Mrs. Ontiveros if he could switch classes.  It was a lot easier than he had thought, because Mrs. Ontiveros was grinning at him from ear to ear when she switched his homeroom to second period Spanish class with Mr. Varnava.  “She’s a very sweet girl,” winked Mrs. O conspiringly.

On the first day of school, he was early to Mr. Varnava’s class, and sat at his assigned seat.  He recognized people as they trickled into the room – Gale, Norma, Gricelda, Debra – all nice girls.  Then SHE walked into the room, looked at the seating chart, sat at her assigned seat:  front row, in the center of the class – and began chatting with Gale.  He walked quietly to Mr. V and asked for permission to sit behind her.  Mr. V nodded with a grin, and  he picked up his books, moved to the seat directly behind her, and sat down.  This was going to be a great year.

A few weeks later, he decided he was going to take a chance and make his move, but he’d never done this thing before.  At least not since sixth grade, when Lucrecia became his “girlfriend”, but he blew it when just as she closed her eyes for their first kiss, he had run away instead. 

So now, how does one tell a girl he likes her?

*******

“How does a guy say that he likes a certain girl?  Was that the way?”  the note began.  I had found the note tucked in my Spanish textbook, written in pencil on lined notebook paper in neat, rounded cursive. 

 

I was on cloud nine, ever since the day Bud Stud asked the teacher if he could move his seat to the one behind mine.  He never said much, except to answer a question in his marginal Spanish. 

I looked forward to Period Two, which was homeroom and therefore fifteen minutes longer than other classes, and it was also Spanish 3.  Sometimes, when the bell rang at the end of class and I stood up, I’d feel a sharp sting in my scalp, and I’d find a strand or two of my hair wrapped around the screw at the back of  my chair. 

Sometimes I’d get up and feel unfamiliar weight on my head, and as I would spin my head around, pencils would start flying around me…tied to single strands of my hair.  Sometimes there would be only one pencil, but more often than not, there would be three or four or more.  I’d look around, but no one would make eye contact with me, and most especially NOT Bud Stud.  Even Gale would just smile at me.  So, I would walk out of second period trying hard to hide a smile, with my head held high and pencils hanging from my hair.  Sometimes a pencil or two would fall to the floor, with a strand or two of hair still attached to it (hmmmm…that might explain my lack of hair now!), but I didn’t care.  I picked them up, and during third period I’d carefully remove the other pencils from my hair, and add them to my ever-growing pencil collection at home.

So, after weeks of silent, speechless torture, instead of my hair tied to the chair or pencils hanging from my hair, there was this note, and it said he liked me.  Bud Stud liked ME.

Chapter 7:  Off the Wall