Kody Keplinger - Lying Out Loud

I ducked into an alcove, dragging Amy with me. We pressed against the wall and stayed quiet as he walked by, alone.

He was always alone.

My heart ached for him a little, almost overriding my embarrassment.

Once he’d turned the next corner, heading toward the library, I let out a breath I didn’t know I’d been holding. Amy gave me a small, knowing smile.

“So …,” I said. “Yeah. About that stinky T-shirt.”

“How do I look?”

Amy squinted two very sleepy eyes at me. She wasn’t really supposed to be awake yet, but I was about to sneak out before her parents got up, and I needed her opinion on this crucial matter. So, with great effort, I’d shaken her out of sleep to show her the outfit I’d chosen. Jeans, newly clean and a little snug, and a hunter-green cowl-neck sweater with elbow-length sleeves.

It was the only nice top I’d brought to Amy’s with me, and I’d been saving it for special occasions or, now that I was unemployed, job interviews. Interviews that, to my intense distress, had not yet occurred. It was my good-impression top, and today I needed to make a damn good impression.

“I don’t think you’ve ever asked me that question before,” Amy said.

“Well, I’m asking you now.” I glanced at the full-length mirror that hung on the back of her bedroom door. My curls, despite my best efforts, were still a little wild, but they weren’t too outrageous. “I’ve got to be friendly with Ryder today, and Snobby McSnobberson won’t be so willing if I look like the homeless ruffian that I am.”

“It’s too early for you to use words like ‘ruffian,’” Amy mumbled. She stretched her arms over her head and let out a huge yawn. “And if he’s so snobby, why are you doing this?”

“Because he’s cute and I want to kiss his face.”

“Right.”

“The problem is, he wants to kiss your face. So today is the beginning of our master plan to change that. Which means I need to look decent, so … how do I look?”

“Like a back-to-school clothing commercial.”

“Perfect.” I picked up my backpack, gave my hair one last check, and grinned at Amy. “Today, it begins.”

“Mm-hm.” She flopped back on the bed, eyes already closed.

I hurried out of the Rushes’ house and down the street to where Gert waited. And, to my relief, she decided to run that morning.

I arrived at school with enough time to pop into the bathroom and give myself one more once-over before heading to Mr. Buckley’s class. I was feeling uncharacteristically nervous.

I might have had a major crush on Ryder, but he still couldn’t stand me. Which meant I had to ease him into it. If I could get him to tolerate me, it would only be a matter of time before he realized that I, not Amy, was the person he wanted to make out with.

This was the most crucial step of the plan, and I couldn’t afford to screw it up.

The classroom was almost full by the time I slid into my seat behind Ryder. He didn’t even look up as I walked past.

“Good morning,” I said.

No response. But that wasn’t a surprise.

I’d gone over and over the words I wanted to say to him, the phrasing I’d use to convince him to hear me out. But staring at the back of his head, at the hunched muscles in his shoulders, I felt myself start to panic. What if it just went down like last time? What if he didn’t let me get a word out? What if I made him hate me even more?

What if this was all just a waste of time?

Before I could climb out of the doom spiral I’d begun to sink into, the bell rang and Mr. Buckley appeared.

“So,” he said, walking to the whiteboard. “Who wants to talk about the Tudors?”

I sank back into my seat, the moment lost. I wouldn’t get a chance to talk to Ryder again until the end of class, and that was only if he didn’t rush out, in a hurry to get to his next class. The boy did put a lot of emphasis on punctuality.

Just when I started to think I’d wasted my nice sweater, an idea hit me.

Ryder and I may have had some communication problems of the face-to-face variety, but we were aces when it came to corresponding via text. Sure, he wasn’t aware of that fact, but I was. And he couldn’t interrupt me if my words were on paper.

I ripped a sheet from my notebook and pretended to take notes on Mr. Buckley’s lecture while secretly scribbling a note to Ryder. It took me a few tries to figure out the right words, but eventually, I had it.

Hey. So, I know we have our issues, but you’ve been talking to Amy, right? She’s my best friend, and as awful as you think I am, I do want her to be happy. So can we play nice? Call a truce? For her, at the least. — S

I’ll be honest — writing some of that made me nauseous. I had to fight the urge to rip up the paper and just write the truth, that it was me he’d been talking to. But I knew that would get me nowhere. He’d just think I was lying, ironically. Or that it had all been some mean joke.

Before I could second-guess my decision, I folded up the slip of paper, tapped Ryder on the shoulder, and tossed it into his lap. I watched him eye it for a minute, not touching the paper. Like he thought it might explode or contain anthrax or something.

“Don’t be so dramatic,” I whispered.

He sighed, just loud enough for me to hear, then picked up the note. Slowly, he unfolded it and began to read.

It took him forever. His eyes must have scanned over the words a thousand times. It was agonizing. But, at last, he picked up a pen and began to scribble his own response.

I held my breath as Ryder folded the paper back up, neater than I had, and quickly tossed it over his shoulder onto my desk.

I scooped it up and almost tore the paper as I scrambled to read.

Fine. For Amy’s sake — truce.

I grinned as every muscle in my body relaxed, relieved.

Only to then go rigid once more as Mr. Buckley’s lecture shifted away from some Henry or another and onto Ryder.

“Mr. Cross,” he said. “Did I just see you pass Ms. Ardmore a note?”

“Uh …”

“Because I don’t know how they did things at your old school in Washington, DC” — Mr. Buckley paused as some of our classmates chuckled — “but at Hamilton, we don’t condone note passing.”

“Mr. Buckley, I —” Ryder began.

“He wasn’t passing me a note,” I cut in.

Mr. Buckley and Ryder both turned to face me. But I was totally cool. Because while communicating with Ryder may have made me a nervous wreck, lying about it was something I could do in my sleep.

“Excuse me, Ms. Ardmore?”

“Ryder wasn’t passing me a note,” I said. I’d already swiped the paper off my desk and hidden it in my lap while Mr. Buckley was looking at Ryder. “He was … tossing me something else.”

“Oh? And what’s that?”

“I’m not sure if I should say, Mr. Buckley.”

“You can either say it to me or the principal, Ms. Ardmore. Your choice.”

“Oh, okay. Ryder was tossing me a … uh … sanitary napkin. It fell out of my purse and he was giving it back to me.”

“A … oh.” Mr. Buckley’s face had turned quite red.

Ryder, however, looked confused. I wondered if he’d ever heard a pad referred to as a sanitary napkin. Since he hadn’t grown up reading Judy Blume novels, I doubted it.

“Sorry about that, Ms. Ardmore,” Mr. Buckley choked out. “I didn’t mean to draw attention to … such a private matter.”

“No big deal,” I said. “It’s just a pad.”

Now Ryder had caught up. But, to his credit, he looked only slightly uncomfortable. Which was more than I could say for Mr. Buckley. While the class broke out into giggles, he looked totally mortified.

God, male teachers were so easy.

“Let’s get back to England, shall we?” He turned to the board.

I sat back in my chair, fighting a smirk. It paid to be shameless.

After another half hour of taking notes, the bell rang. I leaned forward as Ryder shoved papers into his neatly labeled history folder.

“Sorry if I embarrassed you,” I said.

“You didn’t.”

His voice was stiff, and he didn’t look at me as he got to his feet. I stood, too, and for a minute, I thought he was going to walk out of the classroom without another word. But to my surprise, he turned to face me.

“Thank you,” he said. “For the lie. The weird, slightly over-the-top lie that, nonetheless, kept me out of trouble.”

Did he just use nonetheless in casual conversation? Oh, I knew I liked him.

“Hey, what are non-enemies for?” I asked. “Besides, it was my note. I couldn’t let you take credit for my rule breaking. People might start thinking you were cool.”

The corners of his mouth twitched, like his lips wanted to smile but his brain refused to let them.

I saw it, though. And somehow, I knew I’d just succeeded at something.

“See you around, Ryder,” I said, my shoulder grazing his as I moved past him, heading for the classroom door.

I didn’t look back, but part of me, the part that had seen a thousand bad romantic comedies, hoped he was watching me walk away.

Amy was waiting for me outside of the classroom, and we headed toward second block together.

“How did it go?” she asked.

I smirked up at her, Ryder’s almost-smile flooding me with unexpected confidence. “He’ll be mine soon enough.”

Okay, so maybe I was a little overconfident. Just, like, a tiny bit.

But so far my plan was working pretty brilliantly. On Tuesday, I asked Ryder if I could borrow a pen, and he let me. And on Thursday, he helped me pick up my books after I accidentally-on-purpose knocked them off my desk.