Gimme Everything You Got - Iva-Marie Palmer Page 0,63
they could go around believing they were better than the zitty, nasty teenage boys they were, but when Bobby showed up, his obvious superiority threw their patheticness into sharp relief.
“Hey, gentlemen,” he said. “Hope you’re wishing your fellow athletes good luck?”
“Of course, Coach,” Paul Mahoney said, in a fake kiss-uppy voice. “Good luck, ladies.”
Coach Stevens, the massive football coach, had emerged, and he put a hand on Paul’s shoulder pad. “Coach McMann, I hope you and your girls do the school proud.” He sounded as fake as Paul had.
Bobby cocked his head at the burly coach. “They’re not my girls. They’re their own women.” He smiled. He had a way of smiling that was so confident, it came off as a challenge, but not one that announced itself.
Coach Stevens emitted one of those laughs that aren’t one, the kind that came out your nose. “Well, good luck,” he said.
Bobby ignored him, as if the wishes meant nothing. He turned to us instead. Coach Stevens’s jaw clenched, I noticed with satisfaction.
“All right, ladies, are we all accounted for?” Bobby asked, surveying all of us. “Let’s get a move on.”
We loaded our bags at the back and boarded the bus. The inside matched the outside, with some torn seats that had been repaired with tape. But it didn’t smell bad, and that counted for something.
“Okay, I think it should take us about an hour or so. I’ve got directions and a triple-A map,” Bobby said, standing at the front of the bus and waving the map in front of us. “Should be a straight shot, but anyone here want to navigate for me? I haven’t driven a bus since I was at Southern.”
“I’ll do it.” My hand shot up. The opportunity to spend an hour near Bobby, chatting or breathing the same air or sharing a meaningful look, wasn’t one I could pass up. Besides, my fantasies had been a bit confusing since the near kiss with Joe. Maybe being close to Bobby would help put Joe out of my mind altogether. I hadn’t heard from him, and even though I’d miss our lessons, I was telling myself it was a good thing. It was a little sad, but the way Joe went through girls, if I’d let myself be one, we’d have stopped talking whether we kissed that night or not.
No one else raised their hand, and it might have been my imagination, but I thought Bobby seemed happy about that.
“You always come through, don’t you, Susan?” Bobby said, handing me the map and his directions, with the exit we should take in Wauwatosa circled in marker. “Just whisper in my ear if I get something wrong.”
My thighs tightened as our fingers touched. I took the seat behind the driver’s as everyone else dipped into seats toward the back of the bus. Tina took a seat by Wendy, Dana and Arlene paired off, and Dawn took up a whole seat with her legs stretched out. Marie and Joanie sat on seats across from one another and Marie took out nail polish and offered to paint Joanie’s toenails. Lisa Orlawski—the only Lisa of the team’s original three to make it this far—opened an issue of Seventeen and asked who wanted to take the quiz, and Sarah raised her hand to go first. Franchesa’s mom had sent snacks with her, and she shared the bags of chips and cookies with everyone else.
As we pulled away from school, Bobby cocked his head back and said, “We’re probably okay until the first toll, but then can you count out the change, please?” He handed me a coffee can of coins.
I took out Ms. Lopez’s latest assignment, Great Expectations, a book I was angry at. A novel about Miss Havisham when she was young, and her first-person account of how she wound up living in her cobwebbed mansion with her crumbling wedding cake, would have been more interesting than whiny Pip. I read the same sentence five times without absorbing anything, then shut the book.
I took out a quarter and a nickel for the toll and held them in my hand, to be ready. Then I dropped them back in the can, not wanting to give Bobby sweaty coins.
Behind me, the team was laughing and shrieking, and when we finally hit the toll, Bobby said, “You know, I think I can manage, if you want to join the team.”
I shook my head, even though he could at best see me only out of the corner of