Page 34 of Bad Reputation

She takes a forkful of the chilaquiles, mmming her appreciation.

“Alright, but if you could be anything at all. You could design rockets or make clothes or… anything. What would you be?”

She takes a huge bite of her tofu taco, and takes a minute to chew. “Hmmm. I think I’d be a veterinarian, maybe? I really love animals a lot.”

That surprises me. “Yeah? I’ve never seen you own a pet, I don’t think.”

She wags a finger at me. “That’s because I don’t mess with small animals. No, I’d be a large animal vet. Horses, cows… maybe bison and deer.”

“Really? Man, I can’t see you doing that.”

She chuckles. “Yeah, well. I love riding horses. I did dressage all through school. Even into college, as a matter of fact.”

“What the fuck is dressage?” I ask, imagining something that involves dresses.

“It’s horseback riding. You know, English saddles, women wearing knee-length leather boots. Horses with their manes braided. All that jazz.”

I just grunt, looking at her. I can see it though. A girl with her background riding horses makes a lot of sense to me.

“Don’t give me that look,” she accuses me. “Every single girl in my class did dressage.”

I just eat my pupusa and keep my thoughts to myself.

“Hey, do you remember the Halloween that you and Asher took me and my friends trick or treating?” Emma asks, pushing her mostly finished plate away.

“Of course I remember,” I say. “You were a fancy lady, if I recall.”

Her dimples flash. “I was the historical figure of Elizabeth Cady Stanton, one of the first leaders of the women’s rights movement.”

I shake my head, balling up a napkin and tossing it on my plate. “You’ll have to go easy on me. Remember, I dropped out of school. I’m fucking dumb, and I always will be.”

I expect her to roll her eyes, but she doesn’t. Instead, she grows solemn for a minute.

“You are not dumb. Seriously, you’re so smart. I wasn’t kidding earlier when I said you would be successful no matter what you did.”

I roll my eyes, my face heating. “Don’t say that.”

“What? Why not?”

“Because I know that you’re doing it to be nice, but it’s still a bunch of bullshit.”

She seems taken aback by that. “No, it’s not. I’m being completely honest. You might have dropped out, but I’ve seen your bookshelf at your house. Shakespeare, Herman Melville, David Foster Wallace… that is not what a stupid person reads, okay?”

I just wave her away. I know what’s true and what’s false, and the line she keeps repeating about my intelligence is just not true. “Alright. Whatever. Let’s talk about something else.”

Emma sighs. “Okay. What do you want to talk about, then?”

“Uhhh…” I wrack my brain for something else to talk about. I finally come up with something, but when I say it aloud, it sounds super lame. “How are your parents?”

There’s a palpable tension in the air. Not so much between me and Emma, but between her and her parents. I notice that she straightens her spine a little and clears her throat.

“They’re fine. They are… they’re trying to encourage me to date people that they approve of.” She looks down, fidgeting with the hem of her sundress.

“Oh.” I’m not sure how to respond to that. “Any luck so far?”

I watch her expressive face grow quietly sad. It’s painful to watch. Painful to be part of a conversation where she talks about dating people who aren’t me.

I know that I should be the only one she thinks of. She knows it too.

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