something good to happen. That was the main difference between them, really. Claire was always excited to be at a party, and if it turned out to be fun, that was just a bonus. There was always the promise of a great night, always the chance that something good could happen, and so she was often visibly enthusiastic. Fran, on the other hand, looked like he’d done this a million times before, like high school was so boring to him he couldn’t even stand it, and like he had very little hope that anything truly exciting would happen.
Finally that night, Fran had squeezed her leg and said, “Come on.” They stood up and he led her out of the room and up the stairs, like he knew just where to go. Claire let herself follow behind him, holding his hand, and thinking, This is really happening right now.
His mouth tasted like cinnamon gum and tobacco, and she kept rubbing her hands on his face and through his hair. They basically just kissed—well, and she took her shirt off, which she confessed only to Lainie—and when the whole thing was over, Claire wondered if it had really happened.
The events of that night just made her crush grow, and for the rest of high school, she liked him so much that she found it nearly impossible to talk to him or be around him without losing her breath or having her heart beat so loudly that she thought people could see it through her shirt. He also made her sweat, which was the most unfortunate part, although it didn’t really matter, because he never seemed interested in her again.
Claire waited all through high school for something more to happen, or at least for someone to mention it to her. She thought maybe Brian would tease her about it, but he didn’t, which seemed like a bad sign since she figured that maybe Fran had said something bad about her and Brian didn’t want to get involved. Claire would have almost thought she’d made the whole thing up, until the end of senior year, when Brad told her that Fran had made a list of every girl he hooked up with in high school and had given them all grades. “You got a B-minus,” he told her. And Claire felt relieved, of all things, so happy that she was above average, that she hadn’t failed or done anything ridiculous that would have earned her a bad grade.
Claire washed her hands in the bathroom and talked to herself in her head. It was ridiculous, all of it. First of all, where did he get off grading girls? And second, how disgusting was it that she was happy about the grade? She dried her hands on the towel and walked back downstairs and into the kitchen, where Lainie was peeking in the oven.
“Fran Angelo is here,” Claire said. She said it quietly and looked around to make sure no one could hear her.
“Oh, good,” Lainie said. She leaned down and pulled out a tray of mini hot dogs wrapped in dough. “Brian thought it was dumb to make pigs in a blanket, since we have hot dogs for the grill too, but I told him he was crazy.”
“You never told me he was coming,” Claire said. She watched Lainie poke at the little hot dogs and start taking them off the cookie sheet with a spatula.
“So? What’s the big deal?”
“Nothing. I just haven’t seen him in forever.”
“Oh, yeah. Well, Brian’s been seeing a lot of him lately.”
“Really?”
“Yeah. And anyway, I thought you’d be happy to see him. You were the one that was obsessed with him.”
“Lainie, shhh. I wasn’t obsessed with him. I just, you know.”
“Yes, I do know. You were obsessed with him.” Lainie smiled and popped a hot dog in her mouth.
“Shut up. Anyway, he was such a jerk.”
“No, he wasn’t.”
“Yes, he was. Remember he graded me? He graded everyone?”
“Oh my God, Claire. That was like a million years ago.”
“Still.”
Claire found it fascinating how Lainie could distance herself so much from high school when she was married to her high school boyfriend. Did she really not care about any of that stuff? Because Claire felt each memory freshly, like it had happened just the week before, like it was still happening twelve years later.
“You know …,” Lainie said. Now she was the one to look around and lower her voice. “He was engaged to this girl, Liz. She broke it off a couple