The Hardest Cut by Jamie Bennett (book club recommendations .TXT) 📕

“That’s ok!  We had a great time,” I had said, but they were already talking together.  And she really was talking to him, murmuring actually, but definite words and sentences about what we had done that day.  Ben had sat on the bed, holding her on his lap, his attention totally focused on his daughter, listening carefully and answering softly back.  I had listened for a while, too, staying to watch because it was one of the sweetest things I’d ever seen.  Then I’d felt like I was intruding, so I quietly walked out.  Tessa had noticed and wiggled her fingers slightly, and I’d waved back to her.

“Tell me about your day.  Real stuff with no drug references to scare me,” I directed Marley, but she made a face.

“It sucked.”

“Why?  Wait, something with your schoolwork?”  If it was, Hallie would kill me.  They had been working together since last summer and Marley was currently pulling straight A’s, a feat I had never begun to approach in any grade of school and including college.

“No, that’s fine,” she said, waving her hand.  But she was still looking…

“Is this about a boy?” I asked eagerly.

She eyed me warily.  “Why do you think that?”

“You just reminded me so much of my friend Kiara Lee when we were freshman.  She was after the captain of the soccer team, Ryan Whitaker, and we had to follow him around the whole year and track his movements.  She was totally crazy about him, even though he was, well, not a very kind person.  She knew every single detail of his life, like his schedule, his friends, his grades, everything,” I said, which now seemed maybe a little obsessive, and yes, crazy.  “She even took his banana peel out of the trash and saved it,” I told Marley, and again, maybe that had been a bit much.

“You think I’m going to start dumpster diving for used fruit?”  She rolled her eyes, but I knew I was right.

“Who is he?” I asked, and smiled when she made the Kiara face again.

“He’s just a guy in my English class,” she said.  “It’s not a big deal.  I just think he’s…I don’t know.  He’s kind of cool, or whatever.  Like, he would be cool to hang out with outside of English.  He says really funny stuff about the book we’re reading and the teacher gets kind of mad but she laughs, too, and one time, I couldn’t find a pen, and he gave me one.  That’s all.”  She filled her straw with water and suspended it over the table.  “Can we order food or do I have to damage property to get attention at this restaurant?”

“Do you still have the pen he gave you?” I asked.

At first, she didn’t answer, but then she got a fairly goofy grin.  “Yes, ok?  Yes, I still have the pen.”

“Marley!  This is so exciting!  Crushes are so fun!”  I wriggled in excitement but that really hurt my bruised hip so I calmed down.

“It’s not exciting!  Besides when he gave me the pen, he’s never even talked to me.  Or looked at me.”  She let the water go from the straw, making a tiny pond on the plastic surface of the table.  “You don’t understand what I’m talking about.”

“Huh?  I totally do!”

“No, you don’t.  Hallie told me that you were, like, the most popular girl in the whole high school.  She said you had guys tripping over each other to get to you.”

What?  “I mean, maybe I had boyfriends, but I wasn’t some kind of bug light for men or something!” I argued.  “I definitely had guys that I liked who didn’t like me back.”  I thought about it.  “In fact, I’ve had really bad luck with relationships, not just in high school.”

“Like how?”

I wasn’t going to get into my most recent failure.  “Ok, like, freshman year.  I had a boyfriend who was fine, but I was actually in love with someone else who never even noticed me.  Not in the way I wanted him to.”  I mopped at her puddle with my napkin and the waitress came over to take our orders.  I went with my usual salad, dressing on the side.  No croutons.

“And?” Marley prompted after she’d asked for a cheeseburger with everything, onion rings, and a root beer.  Oh, to have the metabolism of the young…

“Huh?”  My eyes were at the entrance to the restaurant, because I had just seen someone come in who might be—no, it wasn’t him.  My heart slowed back down to normal.

“And, what about the guy you liked when you were a freshman in high school?” she prodded.  “The one who didn’t like you back?”

“Him?  Well, I guess that worked out for the best,” I had to admit.  “I mean, he probably would have gotten fired if anything had happened between us and the board of education found out.”

“Wait, what are you talking about?  Was he someone who worked at your school?”

I nodded and leaned forward to lower my voice.  “I was in love with the vice-principal.  He was so cute!”

Marley reeled back, horrified.  “Ew!  How old was he, fifty or something?  That’s nasty!”

“He wasn’t fifty!  More like forty.  Forty-five.  He was wonderful,” I said, remembering Mr. Irwin.  “So sweet and understanding.  I used to make up reasons to go to his office, like pretending that a teacher sent me there because I was tardy, just to hang out with him.”

She still looked a little like she wanted to throw up.  “The guy I like, Cavin, is my age.  Because I don’t want anyone to get arrested.”

“That’s good,” I agreed.  “I wouldn’t have wanted Mr. Irwin to get arrested either, but I had such a huge crush on him that whole year.  I got over it when he moved to be the principal at a school in Cheboygan.  Then, in my sophomore year, I fell hard for one of the cooks at the diner where I was a hostess.  We were