Build Me Up Buttercup

Jack, September

It's the first day of my senior year, so I have a bunch of softball classes lined up. I've never been the strongest student, squeaking by with mostly Bs and Cs. I just don't have the attention span to focus. I've been considered a troublemaker since first grade because I can't seem to keep my mouth shut while the teacher's talking. All my report cards said the same thing: "Good attitude, but too social."

I haven't taken any advanced levels, either. I'm not exactly going to dazzle admissions committees with my GPA or extracurriculars. No student council or National Honors Society. Dad suggested Future Farmers of America, but I don't have any desire to bring home a clutch of baby chicks and try to keep them alive or raise calves or foals. I get enough of that at home. My only extracurricular activities are football and fishing.

So, anyway, that's how someone like me finds himself in floral design. I hear it's an easy A. The most interesting thing about the class so far is that it's mostly girls. I spot Bree when I walk in the door and slide into a seat at her table.

"What are you doing?" Bree asks when I plop down across from her.

I flash my most charming smile. "Sitting next to the prettiest girl in class."

She just gives me a look, tilting her head as if to say "whatever." She kinda knows how I roll, and that I tend to blow a lot of smoke. She is pretty, if you like that type. She's got this soft peachy skin, but she wears way too much bronzer or whatever you call it. And her giant bottle green eyes are slightly overdone, with super long lashes that look like falsies. Her boobs aren't fake though. They're real and proportioned to her small frame. She's got long legs, toned from all the tumbling she does in cheer. Her hair is a bleach blonde color, like a Barbie's. Every guy's wet dream, I guess. It's probably why Cash keeps her hanging on. She's like arm candy, his own personal trophy that he puts on display to prove what a winner he is.

"No, Chap, I mean why are you taking a flower arranging class?"

I shrug. "A man can never get too much culture, I find."

"Culture?" She laughs. "Yes, you are so cultured, Chappie."

I wink at her. Even though most guys drool all over her, I just don't see her like that. Some people think she's got a mean streak, but I know the truth. She's just hiding. She hides herself away really well. But we're friends, despite her tendency toward bitchiness and poor taste in men.

After class, we're walking to lunch together when she turns to me and says, "So I saw you with that lesbian at the party Friday night."

I glance down at her. "How do you know she's a lesbian? Did someone tell you that?"

"No, but I mean, look at her."

I nod. "It's possible, I guess. I don't know her all that well. Mostly, she just seems lonely. Seems like she could use a friend. I figure even lesbians need friends."

She shrugs. "Her sister's annoying."

"Emma?" I ask.

"Yeah, that little chipmunk who somehow made varsity as a sophomore."

"Is she good?"

She waggles her head side to side, looking up at the ceiling. "She's okay. Honestly, it's just because she's so tiny and acrobatic. We needed someone for the top of the pyramid."

"But you don't like her."

"No. And if she keeps flirting with Cash, she's going to wish she were never born."

I stop and throw my head back with my hands over my face. She stops too and turns to me.

"What, Chap?"

I slide my hands down and look at her as she gives me the stink eye.

"Oh, I don't know, Bree, but has it ever occurred to you that Cash might be the guilty party here? I mean, he's your boyfriend, not her."

She huffs out a deep breath. Then she mutters, "I'll have an easier time controlling the chipmunk than I will controlling him."

"Sounds like a real healthy relationship."

"Yeah." She sighs. She knows what a dickhead she's dating. She must really love him to put up with his horseshit.

When we get to our table, Bree peels away from me and sits down next to Cash and crew. I find a seat at the opposite end near Marshall and Lamar. Cash shoots daggers at me from the other end of the table. Dude is hella insecure.

I scan the cafeteria looking for Peyton. She's walking at a quick clip to the doors leading to the patio. Aw, girl. That's where all the skaters and potheads sit. I wonder if what Bree said is true. Maybe she's searching for her people, if that's a thing. I doubt she'll find many around here who'd have the grit to advertise though. This isn't exactly the best community at embracing alternative lifestyles.

I get up from the table and head outside—may as well offer her a place at the football table. She is one of us, after all. When I find her there in the shade, she's hard at work scraping the inside of her sandwich with a plastic baggie. Then she tosses the mayo covered bag aside and starts lining the bread with potato chips. I can't help but smile. She really is one of a kind.

When she senses me there, she starts, and snaps her head up, squinting into the sunlight behind my head.

"What're you doing to that poor sandwich, Thomas?"

"Fixing it." She takes a bite.

"You wanna come sit at our table?" I point to the team behind the glass.

Her gaze follows my hand, stops and studies, and then turns back up to me. "That's okay. I'm just gonna read." She takes a book out of her backpack and flashes it at me.

Something twinges in my gut, something that feels a lot like rejection. "Suit yourself," I say, doubting that I sound as breezy as I hope.

All through lunch my attention keeps drifting out the window. Marshall narrows his eyes at me and then turns to follow my line of sight.

"What do you keep looking at?"

Oh, I'm just stalking the new kid... "Thomas. She's just out there, alone. Reading."

He nods. "Probably Great Expectations."

"How do you know that?"

"We have the same English class. It's our first novel."

"Wait, she's in AP English? With you?"

He nods.

"Is she smart? I mean she must be pretty smart."

Marshall just shrugs.

All of a sudden, the twinge in my gut grows. 

And for the first time in my life, I wish I were smart too.

*****

Our first game of the season is against New Caney tonight. I got my jersey at the pancake breakfast this morning, number 32, in honor of the man, Jim Brown. When I board the bus, most of the players haven't arrived yet, but I spot Peyton sitting toward the back all alone, eyes closed, her face turned to the window. I take a deep breath and make my way down the aisle, determined to play it cool.

"Sweetness!"

She looks up and rolls her eyes.

I plop down next to her, even though she didn't invite me. She's wearing 34, Walter Payton's number. Everyone called him Sweetness.

"Walter Payton, huh?"

She crosses her arms over her chest. "Greatest running back of all time."

"Aw, girl. Everyone knows it's Jim Brown."

We have a pretty heated debate about it. Brown is probably the best power back in history. Payton was shiftier. She finally busts out her phone and Googles the stats.

She hands me the results. "Numbers don't lie," she says with a smug look on her face.

"Numbers can't measure the heart of a champion," I say with mock seriousness, nudging my shoulder against hers. The familiar electricity tingles in my arm. She looks up at me with a puzzled look in her eyes, like she felt it too.

But it's probably just wishful thinking.

After she fully dissed me at lunch on Monday, I've tried to give her some space. Seems like she's got stuff going on that I know nothing about. And doesn't have any inclination to tell me about any of it.

But she did say something weird the other day. It was one of the first scrimmages where she actually got to play. They had her at safety, defending the pass. She played awesome. Textbook coverage. I told her so after practice, and that I knew she'd get her chance to play in a game eventually.

She wouldn't look at me, eyes glued to the pavement. But I saw sadness or regret in the slope of her shoulders.

"I hope you're right, Chaplin." Her voice cracked, for like a millisecond, and I knew she was trying not to break down.

"It's really important to you, isn't it?"

I know guys like to play, but it is just football, after all. It's not like it's life or death.

"What's important to me?" She asked.

"Playing, like in a game."

She nodded. "It really is."

"Why?"

Her gaze fixed on the horizon beyond my shoulders, then shifted back to me. "Because," she whispered. "I promised I would."

Something about the haunted expression in her eyes stopped me from asking who she made that promise to. But I've wondered about it ever since.

*****

After we get our asses whooped in New Caney, we head back to the school to be greeted by droves of students waiting in the parking lot, like always. Win or lose, everyone hangs out in the lot after a game to let off some steam.

I'm tired, beat up. Powered down the middle all night long. I really don't know how Jim Brown kept it up for almost a decade.

Anyway, I'm not in much of a mood to party. As I make my way out of the locker room, I see Bree standing in the shadows of the breezeway by herself. She's vaping. I pause there a minute looking at her, weighing whether to approach her.

"Hey, Chap," she calls softly.

I walk in her direction, and as I get closer, I see she's crying.

"What's wrong?"

She shakes her head and takes a pull from her vape.

"That shit's not good for you" I tell her.

"I know," she says. "Terrible for the skin." She fishes a small bottle of Fireball out of her bag and takes a swig.

"And neither is that," I say, nodding at the whiskey.

"I seem to be drawn to everything that's bad for me." She shrugs and extends the bottle in my direction, offering me a drink.

"No thanks," I say.

"That's right," she says. "Sorry. I forgot."

She's means she forgot about my dad. Bree's one of the few people here that knows I've sworn off booze on account of my dad's alcoholism. He seems to be recovered now, but I don't know that I'll ever recover from that phase of our lives.

"So why are you over here in the dark? What sorrows are you drowning?"

"Same sorrows as always."

"Cash?"

She nods. "We broke up."

"Oh, man. I'm sorry."

"Thanks." She sniffs a little.

"What happened?"

"Oh you know, same shit, different day. I saw him with the chipmunk, and I just kind of snapped."

"What were they doing?"

"He was sitting with her at Dairy Queen. Today, before the game."

"That's why you broke up with him?"

"No. Not just that. It's everything. I don't trust him, and I hate it. I hate how paranoid I feel all the time. I hate that he makes me feel so insecure, so needy. I couldn't stop thinking about what you said. You're right, it's not healthy. He's terrible for me. But just like everything else, I can't break the habit."

"What did you tell him?"

"I told him that I couldn't do it anymore. That I don't like constantly monitoring his interactions. That I don't like wondering who he's texting with or what secret relationships he's keeping from me. That I don't like myself when I'm with him."

"Damn. Good for you, Bree."

"Yeah, I just wish I felt good about it."

"How'd he take it?"

"Not so well." She pauses and takes another pull from her vape. Then she blows out the smoke in a long, steady stream. "He, uh...he blamed you."

"Of course he did." I roll my eyes and shake my head. "Why me?"

"He accused me of having a thing for you. He said, 'you're grasping for excuses to end it because you've already started something with Chaplin.'"

"Jesus. You called bullshit, right?"

She shrugs. "Not really. I didn't do anything wrong. I wasn't going to let him turn the tables on me like he always does. Whenever I confront him about some shitty thing he's done, he always manages to twist the story so that I come out the bad guy. And I fall for it. Every single time."

"So what did you say?"

"I told him that I wish he were more like you. I think I said, 'Chap's a good person. He's honest and kind. He would never betray me. I'd be lucky to have someone like him.'"

"Christ."

"I know. Sorry. I just couldn't help myself. For once, he was jealous, and it felt so good to turn the tables on him. To make him feel as insecure as I always do."

I rub my face with both hands. "This isn't going to end well," I say.

She shakes her head, taking another swig from her bottle. Then she reaches out and squeezes my hand. "It's true, though."

"What's true?"

"I meant what I said. I'd be lucky to be with someone like you," she says softly, and looks up at me with those huge green eyes still glistening with tears.