Occasionally I saw Elise in the hallway with Chad, but I went out of my way to avoid her at those times. I was afraid that if I talked to them, Chad would gaze down and give me a “knowing look,” which would mean he knew I had a crush on him. I didn’t want to face that head-on; it was easier from a distance. When he smirked about my affections, I didn’t want to be there to see it.

A lot of the time Elise didn’t ride home with us. Josh insisted on taking me home anyway, but I felt bad making him do it. Occasionally I’d ask how his logical dating theory was going. He’d shrug and tell me about the latest catastrophe. With every bad date, his list of requirements for a girlfriend grew. Not only did she have to come from a large family, she also had to be able to carry on a conversation without using the word like twenty times a minute; she had to have a sense of humor about little brothers who run through the house shooting Nerf missiles; and she couldn’t be frightened by large German shepherds who had tendencies to pounce on visitors. All in all, he wasn’t having much more luck on the dating front than I was.

The thought did cross my mind that he ought to ask me out. After all, I’d already met his family and his dog. Josh and I talked so easily. And by now he had moved up on my scale to a ten and a half.

But he never asked me out. The closest he ever got to the subject was once when out of the blue he asked, “Do you know that next year when I’m in college you’ll only be a junior?”

“I had realized that, yes.”

“I’ll live out of state, and you’ll be in high school for two more years.” He shook his head. “Two more long years.”

“Is there some point to all this?”

“No, just thinking.” He shook his head again. “Next September I’ll be on my own and you’ll be what, sixteen?”

“You were a sophomore once too, you know.”

“I know,” he said, “but it seems so long ago.”

Once Josh brought Bob home with him. Bob was helping him with some computer programming. After I got in the car, it took me a moment to notice what was different about Bob. Then I had it.

“You got rid of your glasses.”

Bob nodded. “I’ve gone with contacts.”

“They look great.” It wasn’t an idle compliment. Bob had light brown eyes with a touch of gold to them. I’d never really noticed them behind the thick glasses.

“After our homework, Josh and I are going shopping,” Bob said. “He’s making me into a new man.”

“Sounds fun.”

Josh glanced over at me. “We could use a woman’s viewpoint. Do you want to come?”

I eyed Josh suspiciously. “No, I have a report for Spanish to work on, but thanks anyway.”

The next day on the way to school, I grilled Josh about his request. “Are you trying to set Bob and me up? Is that what yesterday was all about?”

“Don’t be vain,” Josh said. “Bob isn’t changing for you. He just wants a new look.”

Elise looked back and forth between us. “What are you guys talking about?”

“If you were ever around, you’d know,” Josh said. “And besides, Cassidy,” he went on, “you ought to see him before you make any judgments. He looks good.”

“You are trying to get us together, aren’t you?” I turned to Elise. “Save me.”

“Don’t worry,” Josh interjected. “Your nose is safe. He won’t ask you out again. He thinks he ruined his chances with you after the first date. But wait until you see him.”

Elise laughed. “And when do we get to see the unveiling of Bob the hottie?”

“We’re working on my program today too, so you can see him after school when he rides home with us.”

“Can’t,” Elise said. “I have plans.”

I grabbed her arm. “Please ride home with us today. Don’t leave me alone with Josh and Bob.”

She took a deep breath, looked at the car roof, then back at me benevolently. “All right. But only because I love you, Cassidy.”

After school as we walked across the parking lot, Elise sang the words to “Someday My Prince Will Come.”

I appreciated that.

Suddenly Elise stopped. “Wow.”

I peered over at the car and saw Bob next to Josh. “Wow,” I agreed. He did look great. He barely looked like Bob anymore.

When we got to them, Elise said, “I guess clothes do make the man. You look awesome.”

The clothes did look good. They relaxed him somehow, turning him from a Dilbert-waiting-to-happen into a normal teenager, but what really made the difference was the haircut. It no longer looked unruly and bush-like. It was sleek, with just a little bit of wave to it.

“Thanks.” Bob smiled nervously then tapped the sides of his pants. Josh shot him a sharp look. Bob immediately dropped his hand.

“How’s your computer program going?” I asked.

“Pretty good,” Bob answered. “We had a problem when our transpose matrix function wouldn’t compile so we . . .”

Josh gave him another look.

“It’s going fine now, though,” Bob said.

We got in the car and talked about school. Bob did impersonations of the teachers. He was good at it.

“You ought to be in drama,” I told him.

“Don’t have time. Now here’s my impersonation of Mr. Jones as Yoda the Jedi chemistry teacher.” Bob’s voice turned high like Yoda’s. “Mmm . . . So . . . chemists you want to be? Learn the way of the nuclear force, do you?”

Elise was still laughing when they dropped me off at my house.

The next day on the way to school I congratulated Josh. “How did you do it? You turned Bob into a normal person. Into a better-than-normal person. He was funny yesterday. Where did that come from?”

“Bob is a funny guy. He just gets nervous around girls.”

I looked out the window, still shaking my head in wonder. “He didn’t mention a bug once all the way home.”

“I told him they were off limits—along with computers, the Unified theory, or anything else that would require a PHD to understand.”

“Amazing,” Elise said.

“After we work on our program today,” Josh went on, “we’re going to the mall in Moscow to see if we can attract college women. Eat your heart out, Cassidy.”

I shifted my backpack on the seat. “It never would have worked out between Bob and me anyway,” I said with a theatrical sigh. “Next September when he goes off to college, to live on his own out of state, I’ll still only be sixteen. I’ll have two more long years of high school.”

Josh glanced at me through the mirror. I could only see his eyes, but I could tell by the way they crinkled that he was smiling. He didn’t say anything, though. Elise looked questioningly from Josh to me, but she didn’t say anything either.

Really, things between Josh and I would have probably gone on like that forever if I hadn’t changed everything with a slip of the tongue.

Chapter 12

The night my tongue slipped up, Elise had come over to my house so she could copy some of my biology notes. She didn’t have them because she’d skipped out on class a couple of times, but our teacher let us have one handwritten page of notes with us during our tests.

While she wrote out the names and functions of cell parts, she kept looking at my bedroom. “Your furniture all matches,” she said. “You were one of those girls who got a canopy bed when you were little, weren’t you? I bet your parents bought you everything you wanted.”

I was sitting on my bed with my laptop, finishing off my English assignment. “There’s a flip side to having matching furniture. If you think you have no privacy with your brothers and sisters, you should try living with just your parents. They want to know what I’m doing every second of the day.”

“They care.”

“They’ve poured all their parenting efforts into one person. Me. If I get a B on my homework instead of an A, they want to know why. If I bite my nails, they notice. When I come home from school and they ask, “What did you do today?” they really want to know. They want a synopsis of my life every single day. Sometimes it’s smothering.”