I started off the conversation, asking Lara how her day went. She went on and on with all her boring cheerleading stuff: how she’d mastered some new tumble and she was going to be second from the top of the pyramid. Like some guy would actually care about any of that. If there were an Olympics for Boring, Lara would be the all-time gold medalist.
Marci was cracking up. “You’d think she’d never talked to a guy before,” she said. “Let me have a turn!”
Marci doesn’t know about Lara and me and how we used to be best friends, and about Lara’s problems in middle school. She doesn’t know what I know: that Christian probably is the first guy who has ever shown interest in Lara. And he’s not even real.
“Sure,” I said, letting her sit in the chair.
“I know!” Marci said. “Why don’t we pretend Christian’s got a big dance coming up at his school and have him hint that he’s going to invite Lara?”
“Why didn’t I think of that?!” I said. “I’ve been getting so bored of flirting with her. At least this will give us something else to talk about so I don’t have to keep lying and telling her she’s cute and pretty.”
“Lara’s kind of cute,” Marci said. “I mean, she’s not a total dog.”
For some reason this annoyed me. She didn’t know Lara when she was Lardo. I was the one who was friends with that girl. I was the one who had to listen to Lardosaurus cry and complain.
“Well, she’s not my type,” I said, trying to cover up my annoyance with a joke. “Anyway, let’s look on the East River High website and see if they have an actual dance coming up, just in case Lara thinks to check.”
We were in luck. The weekend before Thanksgiving there’s the East River High homecoming parade, football game, and dance. That gave us plenty of time to string Lara along with the hopes of a fake date.
So do you have any big plans the weekend before Thanksgiving? Marci (as Christian) asked Lara.
Not really. I think we march in the homecoming parade. The cheerleaders, I mean.
You don’t have a dance?
Well, there’s a dance, but I doubt I’ll go.
Why not?
Oh, you know. Not my scene.
So … if we had a dance at East River, that wouldn’t be your scene?
Marci and I laughed as we watched the cursor blink, picturing Lara completely freaking in front of her computer as she tried to figure out how to respond. It took her long enough.
I guess that would depend … on who I was there with.
So, hypothetically, if you were there with someone like … me?
“I wish I could see her face right now,” I said. “I bet she’s peeing herself.”
“I know, right?” Marci said. “Come on, Lara, tell your boyfriend what he wants to hear!”
“I’m not her boyfriend yet,” I said. “Don’t rush things.”
“You’re not her boyfriend at all!” Marci said.
She had a point. But I’m the real Christian. He’s my creation. I wanted to be the one in control, the one setting the pace.
If it were … hypothetically someone like you, then it would definitely be more of my scene. : )
“Look! She went smiley face on him!” Marci said.
“DON’T ASK HER YET!” I said frantically. “Tell her you’ve got to go.”
Marci looked at me like I’d flipped.
“Why? We were just starting to have fun.”
“It’s more fun to string her along,” I said. “That’s what Christian would do if he were a real guy, right?”
“Yeah, I guess.” Marci sighed as she typed, Talk soon, gotta go.
I could just imagine Lara’s disappointment as Christian logged off so abruptly after teasing her with the idea of the dance.
A few years ago, my phone would have been ringing right away, and we’d have dissected every sentence of the chat for meaning. But that’s the beauty of this whole thing. I know exactly how Lara thinks.
Two days later, I tell Marci she has to come with me to the media center during our open period because I’ve got something to show her.
“This better be worth it,” she says. “Because Taylor Goodhew is in the student center, and no offense, but he’s a lot cuter than you are.”
Marci’s one of my best friends, but when she’s pursuing a hot guy, she’ll dump Jenny and me in a heartbeat. That’s just the way she is. It’s annoying, but you learn to live with it because she’s fun to hang out with the rest of the time.
“You’ll have time to go to the student center afterward,” I tell her. “Trust me, you want to see this.”
I find a free computer that isn’t close to other students and go to Wanelo. I know Lara’s screen name from back when we were friends. And I show Marci the “Cute dresses for the Dance” list she’s set up.
“Oh. My. God,” Marci says so loudly I have to tell her to shush before the librarian does. She lowers her voice. “The girl is, like, totally delusional. She’s making lists of dresses to go to a dance with a guy that doesn’t even exist!”
“I know! Isn’t it hysterical?” I tell her. “And look at the dresses!”
“This one just screams loser,” Marci says.
“What about this one?” I say. “It’s like she wants to be Ariel from The Little Mermaid but in tenth grade.”
We go through the entire list, shredding all of Lara’s choices. Marci’s having so much fun dissing Lara, she spends the whole open period with me and doesn’t even care that she missed going to the student center to hang out with “way cuter” Taylor Goodhew.
NOT A-FREAKING-GAIN. I am so sick of this! Every time I need the computer to do homework, Lara’s on it. I thought since she made varsity cheerleading she’d be out of the house more and getting a life.
To be fair, she is out of the house more at practice and stuff, but the problem is when she comes home, she’s glued to the computer. And judging from how she’s all smiley and smug, I’m betting you anything she’s not doing homework all the time she’s on it, even though whenever I say I need to get on she swears she is.
Type, type, type.
Plink!
That’s Facebook chat. She so isn’t doing homework, the giggling, lying dork.
That’s it. It’s my turn.
“Lara, I need the computer now. I’ve got homework to do. You’re just messing around.”
“I’m not,” she says. “I’m chatting to someone about my homework.”
Seriously, I can’t understand why God doesn’t just strike her down with a lightning bolt. It’s so obvious she’s telling great big whopping lies.
“I’ll give you twenty minutes, and then I’m calling Mom,” I say, furious that, as usual, I’m the one who ends up giving in and letting Lara get her way.