Paula Stokes - The Art of Lainey

“Let’s hear it.”

Micah looks up from the plant. “She may have said something about how being the sister to the guy dating soccer star Lainey Mitchell was going to make school suck less in the fall. I didn’t know what to tell her. But if she says hi to you in the halls, promise me you won’t ignore her, okay? No being mean to my sister.”

Being friends with a varsity soccer player is actually a big deal at Hazelton, especially when you’re a freshman. It never occurred to me that this little charade had the potential to hurt anyone besides me or Micah. “Rule accepted. I would never ignore her.”

“Cool,” he says. “I just don’t want her to have a hard time. You’re more than welcome to ignore me. I got my own reputation to look out for too, and it does not involve palling around with a soccer chick.”

“Right. You wouldn’t want our classmates to confuse you with someone normal,” I tease.

“Normal is overrated.” He points at my teal streak. “You practically said so yourself.” He gestures with his head at the table next to us—the girls with the Kool-Aid hair. “Obviously not trying to be normal. So who do you think they are?”

“Um, weirdos?” I offer.

“More specific.” He lowers his voice. “I think they’re members of an all-girl rock band who just hit the big time, hence the glasses.”

“Oh, I get it.” I sneak another peek at the girls. One of them has a Happy Cheetah Band-Aid on her thumb. “I think they’re hookers who all just got beat up by their pimp, hence the glasses,” I whisper.

“Not bad.” Micah nods slowly at me and I can’t help but smile. I wasn’t expecting hanging out with him to be fun.

The two of us scope out the other customers while we wait for our food, trying to guess their identities. We’ve identified potential school bus drivers, Satanists, illicit lovers, professional ballerinas, and a coroner by the time Phoenix returns with our food. She clunks down our plates in front of us without so much as a word.

My pancakes are heart-shaped and tinted pink, with spatters of strawberry puree drizzled across the top to resemble blood. A serrated knife protrudes from the stack. I pull the knife out hesitantly and saw off a square from the tip of the heart.

The pancake is delicious, soft and sweet like it was soaked in butter before the strawberry sauce was added. The whole forkful practically melts in my mouth.

“Ohmygod,” I say. “These are totally to die for.”

“I know, right?” Micah closes his eyes momentarily. “Now you see why even normal people are willing to come here and be treated like shit.”

I take another bite. Another explosion of sweetness and tanginess. “There aren’t any illegal substances in these, are there?” I ask. “I’m feeling sort of . . . euphoric.”

Micah swallows a big bite of cheesy-bacon hashbrowns before answering. “Nope. Just good food.” He laughs under his breath. “But I have that effect on girls a lot.”

“Oh, I’m sure.” I ball up my straw wrapper and flick it at him. My aim is about two feet wide and I nearly hit Phoenix as she strolls by on the way to take another table’s order.

I study her out of the corner of my eye. Her skin is impossibly pale except for the tattoos on her back. She’s so waifish that the bones of her spine stick out, and the snake armband she’s wearing slips down around her elbow as she walks.

“So are Amber and her sister a lot alike?” I ask. Micah’s girlfriend goes to a different school and I’ve never seen her up at Denali. “All tattoos and bad attitude?”

“No,” Micah says. “Despite my choice of eatery, I’m not into being abused.” His voice softens and he looks down at his omelet as he talks. “Amber is really awesome. She’s funny and cool and amazingly talented. I felt lucky to be with her, you know?” He glances up. “Like she was probably too good for me.”

I nod. “Yeah, I felt the same way about Jason. For the first six months we dated, I kept expecting him to break up with me. And then, I don’t know, the more time we spent together, the better we seemed to match up.”

“Really? He always seemed like kind of a tool to me.”

“Yeah, but all you see is the person he is in school. He’s different with me.”

“If you say so.” Micah shrugs. “But blowing you off like that, in front of everyone? I would never do that to a girl.”

“I’m sure he had a reason,” I say sharply, even though I can’t imagine what it was. I look down at my plate and concentrate on cutting my remaining pancake into small squares.

“Forget I mentioned it.” Micah runs one finger along the edge of the Venus flytrap’s leaves again. “I didn’t mean to upset you.”

I nibble at another bite of pancake and swallow hard. “It’s no big deal.” I feign interest in the black-and-white movie until the awkward moment passes.

When our plates are empty, Phoenix slinks up to our table and rests one of her hands on the back of Micah’s neck. He makes a face at me as she runs her fingernails through his hair. “Sure you two don’t want to take our interactive tour?” She smirks as she drops the check in the middle of our table. “I’m cool with a group thing.”

Micah gives her the finger as he grabs the check.

“I can—” I start to say, but he kicks me under the table.

“I got this,” he says.

“Thanks, hon.” I give him an exaggerated smile as I reach down to rub the sore spot on my shin. Phoenix makes a gagging sound.

Micah slides a couple of bills into the black studded-leather check holder. “Keep the change.”

Apparently satisfied with her tip, she plants an air kiss next to Micah’s face. “Come back and see me sometime,” she coos as we stand up to leave. I’m pretty sure she’s not talking to me.

We head back through the restaurant and outside to Micah’s car, which surprisingly has not been vandalized in any way. He turns to me as he fires up the engine. “So what’d you think?” he asks. “Not too much torture, right?”

I’m not sure if he’s talking about the restaurant, Phoenix, or just hanging out with him. “It was pretty fun,” I admit. “Except for the shock therapy.”

“Sorry. I couldn’t resist.” He pulls away from the curb and turns south to cut back across the city. “So what now, O Great Planner?”

“I guess now you wait for Phoenix to tell Amber you’re hanging out with some other girl. And see what happens.”

He nods. “Sure, but what do I have to do for you?”

“Oh, right.” Funny. I had almost forgotten about that part of the deal. “Give me a couple days. I’ll get back to you.”

Micah nods. His phone rings and he looks away from the road just long enough to answer. From my side of the conversation it sounds like he’s telling someone he’s going to be a little late to work. I fiddle with the stuff in the center console: an insurance card, a lighter, a pack of gum, and a small, black-and-gray rectangle that looks like a knife handle. I press the tiny silver latch embedded in the metal and a blade shoots out.

Micah swerves halfway onto the shoulder. “I have to go,” he says quickly into the phone. He lets it fall to his lap and turns to me. “What are you doing? Don’t mess with my stuff.”

“Why do you have a switchblade?” I ask.

“Because I’m not old enough to own a gun.” With one hand on the steering wheel, he grabs the knife from my hand and retracts the blade. “You need to be careful.”

“But what would you even do with it?”

His hazel eyes go dark. “Nothing, hopefully,” he says. “But you never know.” I can tell he’s thinking about his dad again. Maybe the whole world becomes dangerous if you lose a parent the way Micah did.

“You work tonight?” I ask, eager to change the subject.

“Not at Denali. I volunteer at the Humane Society once a week.”

“You work with the puppies and kitties?” I raise an eyebrow. “I figured you’d be more interested in biting their heads off.”

“They let me do that sometimes after we close,” he jokes.

“No, seriously,” I say. “I never saw you as the volunteering type. That’s kind of sweet.”

“You are so dense.” Micah keeps both eyes on the road but shakes his head. “It’s not sweet. It’s court-ordered community service. Better playing with puppies than picking up beer cans and dirty diapers along the side of the highway, you know?”

“Oh,” I reply, adjusting the hem of my T-shirt dress. “So you really went to jail last year?”

“Juvie.”

“For what?” The question leaves my mouth before I even have time to think. I’ve heard all the usual rumors that you hear about someone working the loner-rocker-boy image like Micah. He smokes weed. He deals drugs. He beats up preppy kids behind The Devil’s Doorstep. I always figured the stories were bullshit.

“Why do you care?” He glances over. “You afraid of me now?”

“No,” I say quickly. And it’s true. Even if he carries a switchblade and pretends to be a badass, he doesn’t seem much different from the kid I knew in fifth grade. “I’m just trying to . . . get to know you again.”

“That’s kind of sweet,” he says, throwing my words back at me in a high-pitched girly voice. His lips curve upward, just barely. “Maybe I’ll tell you. Someday.”

Later that night, I’m crashed out on the sofa watching a rerun of a World Cup game when Bianca calls.

“Hey.” I watch as Caleb Waters puts a free kick in the upper-left corner of the goal. The crowd goes wild.