Josh is my boyfriend.
It’s a miracle that after only a single weekend, we are a real-life, not-just-in-my-dreams couple. Every morning, he arrives at my door before Kurt so that we can have a few minutes alone before breakfast. And then he joins us in the cafeteria. I think, maybe, he needed reassurance that he wouldn’t be sitting at an empty table. It’s strange to realize that Josh – detached Josh, composed Josh – worries about these things, too.
It might even explain the detachment.
We’re inseparable until our schedules split apart in fifth period. But we reunite after school, and I walk him to detention. If Kurt is the expert of roads less travelled, Josh is the expert of rooms long forgotten. All day long, he sneaks me into spaces that are cramped and hidden and neglected, and we kiss through the darkness until the warning bells ring.
I work on homework while he’s in detention, and when it ends, we all have dinner in the cafeteria. And then we re-separate from Kurt. We leave campus for the privacy that our dormitory no longer allows. It means that I usually visit the Treehouse twice – once with Kurt in the afternoon and once with Josh in the evening. We spend our nights in liplocks, sweet and earnest, while fumbling sublimely around things less innocent.
When Josh dated Rashmi, they were notorious for their public displays of affection. It was torturous. I was both envious and repulsed. With me, he’s quiet. He holds my hand and steals my kisses, but he saves most of his affection for when we’re alone. I think he understands that I don’t enjoy drawing attention myself. I also think, perhaps, he’s placed a higher value on his own privacy.
Even so, our relationship hasn’t escaped the notice of our classmates. But I’m happy. Despite my shyness, I still want to parade him in front of the entire school. I want to shout, Look! Look at this perfect boy who wants to hold my hand!
On Friday, Hattie startles us from behind in the hall. “So you’re the guy who busted my sister’s nose. Either you have the best aim or the worst. Which is it?”
“Pleasure to meet you,” Josh says.
“Whatever. Isla, I need forty-six euros.”
“Why?” I touch my nose self-consciously.
“Because I want to buy a weasel skull and put it on this one girl’s pillow.”
I try not to sigh. I’m not successful.
“She’s my friend,” Hattie says.
“No,” I say.
“Ugh, fine. Maman.”
We watch her stalk away. “Was she for real?” Josh asks.
“I’m never sure.”
He shakes his head, mystified. “Your older sister isn’t like that, is she? We had studio art together my freshman year. She always seemed cool—”
“She is.”
“Yeah. She always seemed like…she had things figured out. Like she had the motivation and confidence to do anything.”
I smile. “That’s Gen, all right. Last summer? She shaved her head and came out as bi. My parents really like her new girlfriend. But my mother is pissed about her hair.”
Josh laughs. When I drop him off at detention that afternoon, I run into another opinionated force. The head of school stops me. “I’d be concerned,” she says, “but Monsieur Wasserstein has been remarkably punctual, as of late. You must be the reason.”
I’m not sure how to respond.
The head looks down at me through her glasses, which are perched on the tip of her nose. “You’re a bright girl. Be careful there.” And then she strides away.
I don’t appreciate her tone. Or her presumption that hormones might be getting in the way of my intelligence. Is she afraid that Josh’s attitude will rub off on me? That I’ll stop caring about my education? Well, she can take her concern and shove it up her ass. But when I open my bedroom door a few hours later, Josh is also unusually cross.
“It backfired,” he says. “You know that whole detention-on-the-Sabbath idea? I asked the head about it, and she went straight to my parents.”
I wince.
“Yeah. And even though this time the excuse is – in theory – legitimate, my parents agreed that I’m being impudent, and now I have two additional weeks of detention.”
I’m shocked. “Two weeks? But that means—”