King Dork Approximately by Frank Portman

Author:Frank Portman [Portman, Frank]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-0-375-98567-6
Publisher: Random House Children's Books
Published: 2014-12-08T16:00:00+00:00

SCIENCE BE DAMNED

The sudden absence of Celeste Fletcher from her former spot in the red beanbag in Shinefield’s basement during our band practices was a source of unspoken tension. At our second practice without her, Shinefield finally ventured to break the silence and ask me about her.

“Chi-Mo, my man,” he said, because he said things like “my man” and Chi-Mo was one of my old nicknames, as you’ll know if you are acquainted with my previous explanations. “What’s the deal with Celeste?” According to Shinefield, he had seen her only once since the semester had begun and hardly talked to her at all; most of his many calls to her had gone unanswered. When he had reached her, she had informed him that she was busy with school and had a lot going on in her life, and when he’d pressed her on the matter, she’d told him not to flatter himself and that she needed space.

“Do you think she’s messing around with some other guy?” he asked plaintively.

Well, Einstein, I thought, what do you think it means when a girl says she “needs space”? God, these math geniuses can be dumb. I was in a bit of a quandary, if a quandary is what I think it is. On the one hand, I did have information that Shinefield wanted, perhaps needed, and I was, technically, his sort-of friend. But on the other hand, we were engaged in a delicate experiment in drum conditioning in which he was the subject, and I didn’t want to introduce data that could complicate the results. This was a matter of Science. But now you have to imagine that I have another hand growing out of my forehead, say, or perhaps we could just use one of my centipede’s feet, because on the third hand, I was pretty pissed off at Fiona all on my own, so in the end I said “Science be damned” and threw caution to the wind.

“Science be damned,” I said, to Shinefield’s puzzlement, though Sam Hellerman had seemed to follow my train of thought and twitched warningly. I plunged in, however, and told Shinefield about Todd Dante and the jacket.

“Jesus,” said Shinefield, powerfully affected, and if I was reading his face correctly, his expression said something like: “A ‘letterman’ jacket? Seriously? What kind of terrible Bye Bye Birdie/Grease sound track/Happy Days/Revenge of the Nerds/Leave It to Beaver place are they running over there?”

These were good questions. Shinefield was looking wounded.

“Radio silence,” said Sam Hellerman, out of the blue, sparking yet more puzzlement, this time from both of us.

He went on: “That’s the only possible way to salvage a relationship with a girl who says she needs space.” He said he was serious: no calls, no messages, no contact whatsoever. Give her time to figure out that she misses you and make her wonder what you’re up to. Then, he continued, when the thing with the jacket guy crashes and burns—which it will—and she’s feeling sad and vulnerable just like

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