bullying me is not working

Chapter Two

Let’s be clear about one thing:

Lucas Thayer the third, heir of Thayer House, was obnoxious but also extremely good￾looking. Eleanor Jenson, of Hoboken, New Jersey, heir of Mike and Susan Jenson, was not.

I wasn’t ugly. That’s probably the best I could say for myself. My face was plain and I

was far too skinny, to the point of being bony. I wore the best clothes Walmart had to offer, and

even though I’d heard of make-up, I’d really never seen it up close and personal. But the worst of

it was my hair.

Up until I was about six or seven, there was nothing wrong with my hair. Then when I hit

pre-adolescence, my hair just exploded into a huge mass of frizz. It went everywhere, did

whatever it wanted, said whatever it wanted. God forbid it rained—I’d need an extra seat for my

curls on the T.

I had no clue how to tame it. Truthfully, I didn’t try too hard. When you’re working hard

to be valedictorian of your high school, there just isn’t time for hair maintenance. But lately, I

was beginning to worry my hair was becoming a major liability.

“You know who you look like?” Delia said to me once.

“Who?”

Roseanne Roseannadanna,” she said. When I looked at her blankly, she explained, “She’s

this character Gilda Radner played on Saturday Night Live. She had this huge pouf of hair.”

We looked up a photo of her online, and as it turned out, this was not a compliment.

“Let me try using a curling iron on it,” Delia begged me.

Delia was obsessed with her curling iron. I already had one run-in with it, when she

inexplicably left it on my desk, heated up. Why, Delia? I spent the night nursing a huge burn on

my finger.

“No,” I said.

“Please?”

“No!”

“Fine,” Delia grumbled. “But Luke isn’t going to like you if you look like Roseanne

Roseannadanna.”

“Good!” I shot back.

“Oh, come on,” Delia said. “You two would be great together.”

“That is definitely not true,” I said. It really wasn’t. “We have absolutely nothing in

common. He’s a rich asshole and I’m poor as dirt.”

“Exactly!” Delia cried, clasping her hands together as she got a dreamy expression on her

face. “He’s rich and you’re poor, but he’ll love you anyway. But his parents won’t approve so

they’ll disinherit him. Then you’ll have to work to support him through law school, but your love

will carry you through. Except one of you will die young and tragically.”

I rolled my eyes. “Delia, I’m pretty sure that’s the plot of Love Story.”

“Oh yeah, you’re right,” Delia said. Love Story is the ultimate Harvard movie, which they

showed to us about a million times during orientation week, because apparently it’s also the only

Harvard movie. “I think I’ve seen that movie too many times. But still, that doesn’t mean you

and Luke aren’t meant to be.”

Truthfully, even if I liked him (which I didn’t), I knew there was no way Luke would

ever like me, even if I scalded my hair with Delia’s curling iron. After the first week of school,

I’d seen Luke walking hand in hand with a very pretty blonde-haired girl. Not only was she beautiful, but she seemed to have been perfectly constructed to compliment his own looks. Even I had to admire how good they looked as a couple. If I closed my eyes and tried to imagine Luke holding hands with someone like me, the image just seemed laughable. Lucas Thayer the third

not E.ih EIlie lenson That was an immutable fact

***

Aside from choice of majors, the other thing that separated the poor/smart kids from the rich/dumb kids was how we paid for our education. I'm sure Luke Thayer's dad (also named Luke, I guess) just withdrew his petty change from one of his Swiss bank accounts to pay Luke's tuition, but my grade school teacher parents didn't have enough money to afford their third child's private college tuition. So I ended up with loans and work scholarships. The work scholarships meant that I got to pay off some of my tuition by scrubbing the toilets of my classmates.

It was the ultimate humiliation to have to clean the bathrooms of the students I had just

tecture hall

been sharing a l h hours earlier. I preferred it when I was assigned the upperclassman dorms because it meant I at least wouldn't recognize them. But because all the freshman dorms were in Harvard Yard and that was where I lived as well, my assignments were almost invariably to the freshman rooms.

Whenever I got assigned to clean bathrooms in Thayer House, I'd think about Luke. It seemed like every day, Dr. Cole let him dominate the class discussions, and no matter how valiantlyI fought against him, I always left class feeling like he'd gotten the better of me. Worst of all, he always argued on the side of the most despicable character in the story, as if they were a personal friend of his. It was so blatantly obnoxious, there were times when I wanted to get up

20 off

and punch him in the face. But then I'd go off to my Computation Theory class and he'd go o to his Macroeconomics class and we'd never be forced to talk again, thank God.

It was good to think about Luke as I scrubbed toilets. I'd think about our most recent class discussion, the things I said, and the things I wished I could have said if the professor wasn't there. Then I could take out my anger on the Thayer toilets.

One day in October, I was scrubbing a particularly filthy bathroom in Thayer. Most bathrooms were just grimy, but this one had dirty towels tossed all over the floor and boxer shorts hanging off the sink. I picked them off and threw them into the living room, trying my best not to inhale. What a bunch of slobs. You just knew this bathroom belonged to a bunch of rich brats who had no experience cleaning up after themselves.

"Hey!" a voice interrupted my thoughts. It's the twelve-fingered girl who never read

Shakespearet"

I looked up and there he was: Luke Thayer. I guess it made sense he'd live in Thayer House. He was watching me with an amused expression on his face. I really, really wished I hadn't admitted I'd never read Shakespeare.

"Aren't you going to say hello?" Luke pressed me. I gave him a dirty look.

"I guess they didn't teach you manners in school either," he said with a shrug. My blood boiled. I grabbed a dirty, moldy towel from the floor and hurled it in his direction. I had wicked aim and it nailed him right in the head. He pulled it from his face,

looking ple

of. "What the hell is wrong with you?" he snapped. "You know, I could get you

aelye Fingers.

in a lot for that, Twelve

"My name is Ellie," I said through my teeth. “And it's your goddamn towel, douchebag."* "Actually, it's Steve's towel," Luke said. "He's the slob around here."

"Sure, whatever you say."

Luke watched me for a second. The towel had mussed his yellow hair and as much as I hated to admit it, he looked very sexy like that. It was frustrating that someone I hated so much could be so physically attractive.

"So tell me, Ellie," he said. "What's the trick to getting a toilet so spotless and clean?" "Go to hel" I replied.

"If you're not going to tell me," he said, "maybe I should watch."

The thought of Luke watching me clean his bathroom was almost too humiliating for Words.

You can't watch me," I said.

Then how will I know you didn't dunk my toothbrush in the toilet?" he said. I would never do that!" I was totally planning to do that.

"I bet you wish you had kept those other fingers," he mused. "You'd probably be much faster at scrubbing toilets."

That did it. I struggled to my feet, using the toilet brush for support. I poked him in the chest with the brush. Hard. "Hey!" he cried, looking down at the splotch the brush left on his chest. "You got toilet water on my shirt!"

"Listen, Thayer House," I said. "You can't talk to me that way, just because your great great-great-grandfather was some rich asshole who gave the college a bunch of money.

Geez, you're touchy, Twelve Fingers," he said. “Are you on your period or something?" I swear to god, I nearly decked him. "That's it!" I snapped. You can clean your own goddamn toilets!" And I stormed out in a huff. Unfortunately, I left all my cleaning supplies

behind and had to sneak back later and get them.

***

A week later, we got our grades back from our first paper. Dr. Cole handed them out in the last five minutes of class, and I was horrified to find a big red B on the to

top.

I never got Bs in high school. Never. Maybe an A-, if l'd been battling the flu or something. But a B? How could I get a B? My paper was brilliant! I could argue any point expertly didn't Dr. Cole know that I was captain of the debate team?

I felt something kick me in the ankle. Hard. I looked up and saw Luke's brown eyes staring into mine. "Hey, Twelve Fingers," he said. "What did you get?"

"None of your business," I snapped at him. I eyed the paper in his hands. "What did you get?"

He turned his paper over to show me the red A at the top. Even though I tried to check my reaction, I have to admit that my jaw dropped open. This was patently unfair. Luke wasn't even smart! He was just a jerk with a big mouth. There was no way his paper was better than mine.

You could read it if you'd like," he said, grinning as he slid the paper towards me. "Maybe you could learn something for your next assignment.

really wanted to punch him in his smug face. Instead, I yanked the paper out of his hand, and actually read a few paragraphs of it. And just as I thought it was awful.

Well, not completely awful. He wasn't entirely illiterate. And he did make some good points about Raymond Carver. But it wasn't better than mine. Clearly Dr. Cole was blinded by his good looks and inflated his grade. That was the only thing I could think of.

"Too bad they didn't teach you to write back in Jersey," Luke said, still grinning at me.

I didn't punch him, but I threw his essay back in his face. He blinked at me, surprised but still clearly very amused. "Violence is your answer to everything, isn't it?" he said. He held up his hand and bent it into a fist. "Too bad you didn't keep those extra fingers. I bet you could pack much more of a punch."

I was so distracted by my rage that Luke took this opportunity to yank my own essay paper out from below my left hand. He raised his eyebrows at me when he saw the B. Even though I should have grabbed it back from him, I didn't. I wanted him to read it and realize how much better it was than his own essay. That I was the one who deserved the A, not him.

"Wow," Luke said, as he lifted the first page and glanced at the second. You're certainly heavy-handed in your metaphors."

I stared at him. That was exactly the same criticism Dr. Cole had made in her critique of my initial draft of the paper.

He lifted his eyes and grinned at me. "Maybe you should stick to cleaning toilets, Twelve Fingers."

I snapped out of my trance and ripped my papers out of his hands. Luke still looked deeply amused, and I wanted to say something to wipe the smile off his face. I stuck my finger in his face, which surprised him, if nothing else. “At least I got in here fair and square," I said. “And not just because my father went here and gave the college a bunch of m

Luke looked like he had an answer to that, but before he could give it, I jumped out of my seat and marched right out of the classroom.

After that, I went from disliking Luke Thayer to downright despising him. The conversations in expos class became dominated by Luke and me throwing back and forth arguments. Whatever he said, I disagreed with. Whatever I said, he disagreed with.

But in a way, it paid off. I worked so hard studying the stories to come up with perfect arguments to shoot him down, I earned an easy A on my next paper.

Delia was celebrating too, because she brought up her tragic C on the first paper to a solid B+. We decided to rent a movie to watch in the common room of our dorm together. We lived in Weld, a dorm once inhabited by none other than John F. Kennedy himself. It seemed a bit of a travesty that a nerdy computer science girl and a nerdy pre-med should occupy the same space as such a great man, but like I said to Luke that day, at least we got in here fair and square. Even JFK probably got in at least partially because of nepotism.

It was a Thursday night, so the common room was empty. On Fridays and Saturdays, you could usually count on a bunch of drunk kids in there making out. I hadn't been drunk ever before and I'd never made out with a boy, so I generally avoided the common room on weekends. But Thursday night was safe.

Delia had a bag of popcorn, but when we went to pop it in the microwave, we found a big "out of order" sign taped to the door. "Lame!" Delia whined.

"There's a microwave in the Thayer common room," I recalled. I knew because I'd cleaned the bathroom in there.

"Great." Delia shoved the popcorn bag into my hands TIl see you in five," "Me?" I cried. "Why do I have to go?"

"Because I'm wearing my fuzzy slippers!" Delia said, pointing down at her feet, which were indeed cloaked in bunny slippers. Why did I wear my sneakers?

I didn't want to admit the real reason for not wanting to go to Thayer, which was that I was scared of running into Luke. Well, not scared, exactly. But he wasn't my favorite person

These days and I knew seeing him would put a crimp in my night. Then again, if I slipped in and

out of Thayer real fast, the chances of running into him were pretty slim.

I trekked out of my dorm into the yard. I was only wearing a sweater and it was freaking

cold, although at least I had my hair to keep me warm. New England was colder than Jersey by a

noticeable margin. I heard on the radio that it was supposed to snow soon.

I was shivering pretty violently by the time I reached Thayer House. Gripping my bag of

popcorn in my raw, red fingers, I raced in the direction of the common room. I noticed there was

a couple making out on the couch, but I figured I wouldn’t disturb them if I slipped in there and

popped some corn real quickly.

Except just my luck: half of the couple was Luke Thayer.

I cursed to myself. I should have known when I saw all that damned blond hair. He

looked up when I entered the room, as did the girl he was kissing. I didn’t know who she was but

she was really beautiful, and I was pretty sure it was a different girl than the last one I’d see him

with. But really, who the hell knew?

“Twelve Fingers!” Luke exclaimed, his face lighting up when he identified me.

I didn’t even look at him. I marched right to the microwave and shoved the bag inside.

Unfortunately, I had no idea how long it was supposed to go in for or how to work the controls

on this stupid microwave.

Luke noticed me struggling. He climbed over the back of the couch and landed

practically right at my feet. “Get away from me, Thayer House,” I snapped.

But Luke didn’t budge. “Can’t even work the microwave?” He clucked his tongue. “This

is kind of a disgrace. How’d you get in here anyway? Maybe they needed to fill their New

Jersey quota.”

“Well, they definitely filled up their arrogant rich asshole quota,” I replied. Stupid

microwave. If Luke wasn’t staring at me, I would have been done with the popcorn ten minutes

ago.

“What did you get on the SATs?” Luke asked me.

“I got a 1600,” I replied honestly, lifting my chin to him. A perfect score. Beat that,

Thayer House.

“Oh yeah? Me too.” He grinned at me, then pressed a button on the microwave, which

whirred into action. “I guess working microwaves wasn’t on the test.”

I stared into the microwave, willing the popcorn to pop faster. “What are you doing here,

anyway?” he said. “Don’t you live in Weld?”

I narrowed my eyes at him. How did he know that? “Yeah, so?”

“So you can’t use our microwave,” Luke said. “That’s illegal. The popcorn is rightfully

ours if you pop it here.”

“My keycard works here, so that means I am allowed,” I argued.

“Nuh-uh,” Luke said. He turned to his date, who was studying her nails. “Hey Lindsay,

we’ve got some popcorn here. Ellie here is donating it to us.”

Lindsay lifted her vivid blue eyes. God, she was really beautiful. “I don’t want it. I’m on

a diet,” she said. Even though she probably weighed about as much as that bag of popcorn.

“Lindsay doesn’t want the popcorn,” Luke reported back to me, like I wasn’t standing

right there. “She’s on a diet, apparently. So I guess I’ll let you keep your popcorn.”

I gave him a dirty look. “Wow. How gracious of you, your majesty.” He leaned in close to me and I could smell his aftershave. It occurred to me that I’d never

been so close to a man who wore aftershave before. He smelled… nice, actually. “But you have

to give me a handful,” he said.

I shook my head, clearing it of the intoxicating aroma of aftershave. “No way.”

“You’re not leaving this room if you don’t give me some popcorn,” he informed me.

“Watch me.”

The microwave dinged and we both jumped. I reached for the door, and Luke grabbed

my wrist. His grip was strong, his hand warm, and he might have hurt me if I was trying to resist,

but for some reason I wasn’t trying. I hated the fact that at that moment, I would have given him

popcorn or pretty much anything else he wanted from me.

“Luke?” Lindsay’s voice interrupted our little face-off. “What are you doing over there?”

She didn’t sound angry, only terribly bored. I wasn’t a threat to her, obviously. It was

pretty clear someone who looked like me wasn’t stealing Luke away from someone who looked

like her.

Luke dropped my wrist. “You got off easy this time, Twelve Fingers,” he said to me. His

brown eyes met mine. “But trust me, sooner or later, I’m going to get that popcorn.”

Not if I had anything to do with it.

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