The Boyfriend List

It’s all a lie. When you hate someone you used to love, and you think he’s done something awful—he probably has.

You’re not going to love him again.

He’s not going to apologize, or come back to you.

He probably doesn’t even ever think about you at all, because he’s too busy thinking about someone else.

Face it. There’s not going to be a happy ending … at least not with this hero. So don’t go mooning around thinking that your breakup is only the crisis before the big romantic scene, because I’m here to tell you that it’s not. When you are dumped, you are dumped, and the guy isn’t going to change his mind and realize that suddenly he loves you instead of that girl he’s flirting with in the refectory, now that he’s free.⁸

Jackson smiled at me that morning, first day of school.

The day after that, he said, “Hi.”

“Hi back,” I said.

The day after that, he said, “Hey, Ruby, what’s up?” and I said, “Not much.”

But the day after that, and this was before Kim had even noticed Finn and his stud-muffinly qualities, I got a note in my mail cubby. I used to get notes all the time, from Kim and Nora and Cricket, but this one was folded up into quarters, with a funny drawing of a frog on it. I knew who it was from, somehow, without even opening it.

Inside, it read: “The frog was for Awful Ariel Oliveri (AAO). Not for you. Sorry.” And then: “P.S. I just got my license. Need a ride home?-Jackson.”

My dad came to pick me up after school. He waited in front of the main building for forty-five minutes. I was long gone.

We went to Dick’s, this drive-in burger place that I’d always heard juniors and seniors talking about, but that I had never been to, since at that point none of my friends was old enough to have a driver’s license. I’m a vegetarian, so I got fries and a milk shake. Jackson got a burger and a root beer float. We sat on the hood of his big old boat of a car, a Dodge Dart Swinger that had once belonged to his uncle.

He told me a little about Japan. He spoke some Japanese for me when I questioned his ability.

I did my riff on my family.

He said he wanted to row crew this spring, but he was worried, since he hadn’t been in a boat since before he went away. He talked about the food in Japan, and said he ate raw fish. I said that French fries were better with Dijon mustard.

He said he was a ketchup man all the way.

I said, If you tried the mustard, you’d become a convert.

He said, I have tried mustard.

I said, Was it Dijon?

He said, No. Just regular.

I said, Then you haven’t tried it.

Oh, he said, have you tried mayonnaise?

I said, Mayonnaise is gross.

He leaned in close, and said, Really, you don’t like it?

Ick, I said.

And he kissed me, and whispered, “I love mayonnaise.”

He kissed me again—

—and I didn’t feel like a loser

—and I didn’t worry that I couldn’t kiss right

—and my glasses didn’t get in the way

—and I didn’t wonder if he’d tell his friends

—and I didn’t wonder if it was a joke.

This is Jackson Clarke, I thought, who put the frog in my cubby. This is Jackson Clarke, who used to have braces. This is Jackson Clarke, who’s been to Japan. This is Jackson Clarke, whose tongue tastes like root beer. This is Jackson Clarke, who used to seem ordinary. This is Jackson Clarke.

I kissed him back.

He drove me home.

And there actually was a sunset.

1 I am an idiot, I know.2 Doctor Z says, maybe I wanted it to be discovered and put my feet up subconsciously on purpose. I say, if I did that, I must have been some kind of eleven-year-old masochist (someone who enjoys pain) because I had never been so embarrassed in my life; it was so embarrassing it actually hurt. And if I was a masochist at eleven, then imagine how messed up I am by now. Just commit me to the asylum and be done with it.

   Doctor Z says, Maybe there were larger reasons you wanted people to know. Maybe it was a way