If He Had Been with Me

The breakup happens and there are days of discussion. Jamie is annoyed with Sasha, but I defend her right to end the relationship. The boys are vague in their reports on how Alex is doing. They try to tell us that they don’t talk about Sasha when they hang out, but that is too ridiculous to be true.

In August, Angie gets a new boyfriend, also from Hazelwood High, but this one is, to our amusement, on the football team and rather preppy. Angie warns us about this first, swearing that he is actually very cool and knows all sorts of good music. I wonder what kind of warning he is receiving in turn about us.

We make plans to meet Angie’s Dave on a triple date to the movies. Brooke and Noah ride with us to the mall and we laugh and wonder aloud about Preppy Dave. I’m determined to like him for Angie’s sake, but I worry a bit about the boys.

“This is going to be hilarious,” Jamie says.

“Don’t tease him too much,” I say.

“I’m not going to be mean to him,” Jamie says. He rolls his eyes even though he’s driving and I glance at the road for him. “But we might need to do a tiny bit of hazing, you know, just to make sure this prepster is good enough for Angie. Right, Noah?”

“We can’t have Angie with someone who doesn’t deserve her,” Noah says.

“You will both behave,” Brooke says. I twist around in my seat to watch her glare at Noah. “Or you will both be in trouble.” She turns the glare over at her cousin in the driver’s seat, but he obviously can’t see her so she smacks the back of his head.

“Hey!” Jamie says. He reaches one hand back and grabs at her knee; the car swerves and we all laugh and scream. Brooke squeals the loudest as Jamie pinches the soft place above her kneecap and we laugh again. Jamie rights the car again and we speed down the road, talking loudly now above the radio and laughing as we trade threats back and forth with the boys.

I feel a pang of guilt knowing that Sasha and Alex are at home while we’re all out without them, but it’s just the way things are now. Maybe someday they’ll both be seeing other people and we could have a quintuple date.

***

Angie, with new pink streaks in her blond hair, is waiting for us at the food court with a tall broad-shouldered boy who has vibrant red hair. She waves enthusiastically when she sees us and tugs on his hand as she points. She is wearing the authentic poodle skirt she bought last spring, and he’s wearing a polo shirt. They couldn’t look more odd together if they were different species. He looks nervous as we approach and that immediately endears him to me.

“Hey,” Angie says. “Everybody, this is Dave. Dave, everybody.”

The boys, in what I know is a tactic to try and throw him off, shake hands with Dave and introduce themselves formally. Noah fakes a British accent. Dave copies their formalities with a straight face but manages to convey the same mocking air as them, and I’m hopeful for him.

We have an hour until the movie starts and so we wander around the mall. When Brooke and I move next to Angie so that we can admire her new hair, the boys suddenly flank Dave. I’m worried again, but they seem to have decided to think of him as some sort of pet. Jamie tells Dave that he also owns a polo shirt. It’s black and has a little man on it riding a horse. Noah, still faking his British accent, says he only wears his polo shirts when he is playing polo, but he would defend to the death the right for any man to wear polo shirts at all times. Dave laughs and tells them that he also owns a pair of ripped jeans; perhaps he can wear them next time they meet and Jamie can wear the polo. Noah thinks it’s a jolly idea.

I had been curious and surprised when I first heard about Dave, but now in person I can see his appeal. He’s bashful and frequently pink-cheeked under his freckles. His smile is crooked and unassuming. By the time we are buying our tickets, I am charmed.

There is something adorable about the way Dave looks with us, one lone khaki-clad sheep in a pack of rebel wolves. Even his expression is sheepish as he talks with us and holds hands with Angie. As we wait in line, she tells us in a whisper that he was worried that we wouldn’t like him since he was different.

“Of course not,” I say. “We aren’t like that at all.”

“I know, that’s what I told him,” she says.