But Elephant Andy is stupid. To hell with being smart. Smart never helped me.
I rotate from blueberry to apple, back to honey-walnut, over to grape. I put a blueberry and an apple on top of each other and bite into them at the same time. The flavors mix like music in my mouth.
Tears fill my eyes. I’m chewing and crying, and my face is hot. I think about Dad alone in his office while we’re here in the house. I think about O. taking April’s number even though he knew it was a bad idea. Or maybe he didn’t know. Maybe he knew and he didn’t care. Maybe April’s stock is going up. Maybe if I feed her to O., my stock will go up.
The Physics of Fame. New formulas.
I can’t figure any of them out, so I eat.
Elephant. Eats. Everything.
I eat and punch the counter and cry, and maybe Jessica is talking to me and telling me to stop but I can’t really hear her and the pies keep disappearing. I’m chewing and getting fatter and fatter—
“Andrew!”
I stop.
Mom is standing in the doorway, her face bright red, plastic grocery bags hooked in both hands. Jessica is behind her with a terrified expression on her face.
I’m covered in pie. There are crumbs on my shirt, on the floor. My fingers are stuck together. I’m fat. I’m an animal. I don’t care.
“Oh my God,” Mom says. “You’re killing yourself.”
“I tried to stop him,” Jessica says.
“Leave me alone,” I say. I know I’ll feel ashamed later, but I’m numb to it right now. I’m angry, too, but it’s far away, a giant balloon of rage drifting high above me.
“What’s going on?” Mom says. “Is something wrong?”
I can tell she cares. I could talk to her if I wanted to. I could tell her everything.
But I don’t.
38. invisible.
There are cheerleaders all around, but they can’t see me. They talk in loud voices and laugh.
April is here, too, standing off to the side with two girls I don’t know. They whisper to each other, leaning in and looking around to make sure they’re not being overheard. Since I’m invisible, I walk over so I can listen in. I know it’s probably a bad idea, but I do it anyway.
They’re talking smack, just like the guys on the team do.
One girl says, “If you were trapped on an island, and Rodriguez and Cheesy were the only two boys there, who would you have babies with?”
“Cheesy has really nice pecs,” the first girl says.
“I love Latin food,” the other says. They both giggle.
The first cheerleader turns to April. She says, “If there was a nuclear war, and Andy and O. were the only two men left alive, who would you choose?”
April bites her lip, thinking hard.
“Who do you like better?” the first cheerleader says.
“Who’s better looking?” another says.
“Who’s hot and who’s not?” the first one says.
April opens her mouth to answer—
That’s when I wake up.
39. hit or run.
It’s quiet on the third floor. Especially after school when everyone has disappeared. All the excitement and drama is gone, and you get a sense of what school really is.
Just a building.
I’m reaching into my locker when I hear April’s voice.
“Guess what?” she says.
Her face looks different. She’s wearing more makeup than usual, but there’s something else. She’s glowing.
“I went to O.’s house last night,” she says.
“That’s great,” I say.
“Don’t get any ideas.”
“I don’t have any ideas.”
“We just studied. I’m not easy or anything like that.”
“I didn’t say you were.”
April looks at me closely, checking for a reaction. How am I supposed to react?
“Isn’t it amazing?” she says.
“What specifically?”
“That I could like this guy who doesn’t even know I’m alive, and within a week I’m sitting on the couch at his house.”
I’m thinking how amazing it was when I met April for the first time. I thought I’d never see her again, and then she showed up at school. I honestly thought it was a miracle. Now I’m not so sure. Maybe miracles only seem like miracles at the time, and you don’t know what they really are until much later.
“Get this,” April says. “He calls me ‘Apes’ for short. It’s like his stupid nickname for me. Stupid and funny at the same time.”
“I have to get down to practice,” I say.
“Me, too,” April says. “I’ll walk you.”
I slam my locker closed. I pull my shirt out from my stomach.
“You and I aren’t so different,” April says.
“What do you mean?”
“A few years ago—someone like O.? I wouldn’t have had a chance.”
“Why not?”
She looks down at the ground. “I didn’t always look like this,” she says.
“What did you look like?”
“I was… pudgy.”
My mouth drops open.
“I don’t believe it. How did you—?”
“My dad sent me to fat camp,” April says.
“Oh my God.”
“The summer after eighth grade. I was the only Korean girl at fat camp. They called me the Kimchi Cowgirl. You know how fat kids can be really mean to other fat kids.”
“I know.” I think of Warner sitting on the ground rolling the dodgeball. I hated him, and he wasn’t even doing anything.
“I was beyond miserable,” April says. “But I lost weight. And when I started high school in Paramus the next year, I went from being this pudgy geek to being… I don’t know. Whatever I am now.”
“The hot girl,” I say.
“More like the hot geek,” April says.
“Is that when you did the thing with your teeth?”
“Exactly. And the contacts and everything.”
“It was like an Extreme Makeover,” I say.
“Sort of. But the thing is, you can change your body, but your head doesn’t really change, you know? I still feel like the old me sometimes. Like it all could go away any second.”
“I kind of feel the same way about football.”
“Like you could lose it all?” April says.
“Overnight.”
April steps closer to me. She gets this really serious look on her face.
“I’m glad we met each other, Andy. Really I am.”
“Me, too,” I say.
“Hey, it’s the elephant man,” Ugo says.
He’s standing at the end of the hall in his greasy, stained sweatshirt. I glance down the hall. There’s nobody around except April and me.
“Where’d you get a hot piece of ass like that?” Ugo says.
“Shut up,” I say.
“Maybe she’s from the Last Wish Foundation. Are you dying of cancer or something?” He makes a voice like a kid who can’t breathe: “I just… want… to touch a booby.”
“Come on,” April says.
She tugs at my arm. There’s a staircase at either end of the hall. We could run to the one closest, and maybe Ugo wouldn’t follow. Or maybe he’d use that as an excuse to attack. Anyway, I’ve tried running before. It didn’t work.
So I put April behind me, and I turn in Ugo’s direction.
“Your bodyguard’s not around to protect you this time,” he says.
“What’s he talking about?” April says.
“I’ll tell you later,” I say.
“O. Doug-ass,” Ugo says.
He cracks his knuckles and starts towards us.
“I’m serious. Let’s go,” April says. She’s pulling on the back of my shirt, trying to get me to go towards the stairs, but I don’t go. I stand still, and I watch as Ugo takes another step towards us.