Page 49 of The Art of Us

But his grandfather kept apologizing anyway. Kal agreed with his mom. Bodies were weird. No use making it weirder by getting awkward.

“Sorry, boy,” his grandpa said as Kal mopped up the liquid.

Kal had to shuffle the conversation playlist, or his grandfather would be apologizing to him all night. So he told him all about taking Ireland to the observatory. It was enough of a change in topic that his grandpa seemed to forget what had been causing him distress.

“You like her?” his grandpa said when his mom left the kitchen to run errands.

“Yep.”

His grandpa nodded. “You kiss her yet?”

When Kal’s face heated, his grandpa grinned knowingly and pointed a bony arthritic finger in his direction. “Never take a girl’s kiss for granted. They’re special from the first to the last.”

Kal knew his grandpa was thinking about his grandma. They’d been a good couple, the kind of couple-goal people should aspire to if they wanted to succeed in relationships. Kal was glad his mom had stopped him to help so he could have the chance to hang out with his grandpa. He and his grandpa ate their cheesy eggs and talked about dating.

When they were done with dinner, Kal hated leaving for Cooper’s house. It wasn’t that he didn’t like being with Cooper; Cooper’s friends were just not his scene.

Most of the people in their area would be consideredmiddle-income kind of people. Kal was. Cooper was. But Cooper hung out with the few who towered over middle-class standards by a stratosphere. Some of them were okay enough, like Mara, but more often than not, Kal would rather eat a scabby Band-Aid than hang out with any of them. Usually, he didn’t have to because he wasn’t in their sphere or whatever, but sometimes, like today, Cooper called in a favor.

Kal wasn’t late or anything, but Cooper still acted relieved to see him—as if Kal had ever bailed on him before. “Why you so tense?” Kal asked.

“She’s here.” Cooper pointed to a pretty, dark-haired girl who was talking with the basketball team’s hero, Nathaniel Fredericks. “Her name’s Alison. Alison Lopez. And she’s ... dude. She’s all the things.”

“Well, I’m here for you, man. Literally. I’m here. So let’s get started.”

The good news was that Asha and Bailey were there too, though Bailey voiced displeasure at the number of jocks, cheerleaders, and trust-fund kids. Asha, in typical Asha fashion, didn’t seem to mind who anyone was. She was just glad to be there.

They played two songs. The standard “Cry Free!” and “Sink or Swim,” which was a cute little song about love and getting the girl. Cooper had handpicked the music selection with the very obvious intent to woo Cooper’s girl. Just thinking the wordwoomade Kal laugh. When they finished, the small crowd cheered and clapped, and Alison had eyes for only Cooper.

Achievement unlocked.

Kal meandered to the snack table to see what looked interesting.

“You must get a lot of love with an act like that.”

Kal looked up to see Rowan standing there. He made some noise that was neither agreement nor disagreement. Speakingto Rowan wasn’t exactly something he’d been dying to do all night. Luckily, or unluckily, Rowan didn’t really need Kal to say anything. It was like the guy couldn’t get enough of hearing himself talking.

“You know that girl Cooper’s talking to? Yeah, she hit on me earlier, but I know my boy Coop likes her, so I told her no way.”

Lie, Kal thought. Asha had already told Kal that Alison was dying to talk to Cooper as much as he wanted to talk to her. She wouldnothave been hitting on Rowan. Kal looked around for a way out of the conversation. He didn’t want to start anything at Cooper’s party, especially when Rowan was the school’s golden boy, but it seemed Rowan was determined to talk only to Kal, because as Kal walked away, Rowan followed.

Rowan pointed at one girl with straight red hair and said, “Sadie’s a total swipe left. Just not very good, you know?”

“Dude. Seriously?” Kal said, shaking his head. “Not cool.”

“What? I let her down easy. She can’t help that she’s not my type,” Rowan said and then pointed to a blond. “Not like Meg. She wanted to be serious, though, so I had to cut her off, if you know what I mean.”

The wordliewas on repeat in Kal’s head. Because there was no way Rowan’s brags could be true. Kal doubted Rowan had ever gone out with most of the girls he was pointing to. The guy vibed skeeze.

“So you dating that Raine chick?”

Kal tensed. “Yep.”

“Well, that’s too bad.” He smacked his lips. “Too, too bad.” He grinned at Kal as if they were sharing an inside joke. Kal didn’t get the joke. Didn’t want to get the joke. And he did not want king skeeze thinking about Ireland.

Rowan went back to talking about the girls at the party. But he’d gone from insisting they all wanted him to disparaging their looks and getting crude about it.

Kal thought about his grandpa and the way he respected women and realized that listening to Rowan was not respecting anyone. “Look, Rowan. Let me just stop you right there. I think maybe you believe that this is guy-bonding talk or whatever, but really, it’s not.”

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