Free Trinkets by Kirsten Smith Page B

fucking dick,” Moe says.
    “How’d you know that?” I retort. “We don’t even have any of the same friends.”
    Moe looks away and shrugs. “I know people.”
    “Has he done that before?” Elodie asks, coming over and touching my arm. I don’t want to answer her, but I remember at the Homecoming Dance in the fall, Brady got hammered and accused me of flirting with Greg Devorian. I’d been talking to Greg about some rock-climbing trip in Wyoming he went on the year before. I’d been rock climbing once in Colorado with my family about six years ago, and it was one of the few times we’d all gotten along really well. My brother, Jake, would tell me ghost stories every night, and we’d do relay races on the hill outside our hotel. My mom and dad cuddled in the hotel room, and my dad taught Jake and me to fish. For once we were far away from everything, doing “family stuff,” and it was nice.
    When Brady came out of the bathroom, he saw me talking to Greg and he walked up and yanked me away. He’d been jealous of Greg ever since the guys on the lacrosse team started calling Greg “Horse” for reasons involving anatomical size and scope. Boys and their fragile, fragile egos. For a second, I’d had a naive hope that Horse might step forward to defend me or something, but he quickly backed away, disappearing into the crowd of dancing students. That’s when the toxic heft of my reputation became clear. I was Brady’s girlfriend, and he could do whatever he wanted to me, even if it meant twisting my arm at a dance in front of half the school. Greg Devorian may have had a big dick, but at that moment his balls were nonexistent.
    “That’s, like, abuse,” Elodie says softly after I tell them the story.
    For once Moe is silent, appraising me with her big brown eyes encased in black liquid eyeliner. She abruptly leans over to her desk and fidgets with her iPod.
    “I know what’s gonna cheer you up,” she says. The sound of a Katy Perry song suddenly comes blasting out of the speakers on her desk.
    “Are you serious?” Elodie laughs.
    “Why, yes, I am,” Moe says. She starts dancing, bumping and grinding in a hilariously rhythm-free manner, her cherry-red hair flying all over the place.
    “Katy Perry sucks,” I offer.
    “I beg your pardon?” Moe speaks with mock offense.
    Elodie nods in agreement with me. “She’s pretty bubblegum.”
    “What’s wrong with bubblegum?” Moe asks.
    “Aren’t you friends with stoners and goths?” I ask. “I thought you guys listened to death punk or speed metal or grindcore.”
    “Well,
they
do, but I love my pop music,” Moe says. “Can you blame me when you hear this jam?” She does another little shimmy. “C’mon! Dance!”
    I look at Elodie, who shrugs and stands up, giving Moe a hip bump. And suddenly Moe and Elodie are dancing to bubblegum as it blasts around us.

Teenage Dream
    Tabitha is cracking up
    because Moe is doing the Jerk.
    I break into the Dougie
    and just then
    a guy walks by the open door.
    He is a few years older than us, maybe,
    and he’s tall and has floppy hair
    and a Led Zeppelin T-shirt
    and endless brown eyes
    and he looks right at me
    and Moe yells,
    Get outta here!
    And he looks at me
    and says,
Nice Dougie,
    and walks off.
    Who was that?
Tabitha asks.
    My brother
, Moe says,
    and they keep dancing.
    I try to move,
    but I am frozen in place
    because other than Brady Finch,
    I’ve never seen
    a guy that handsome in
    in all my
    teenage dreams.

JAMS
    We bounce down the stairs, still singing that Katy Perry song. Without the music, Moe sounds more like a dying goat, but she doesn’t seem to care. It’s kind of amazing how she’s able to act like an idiot and be totally comfortable with it. I’ve been so caught up with needing my privacy that I felt like I couldn’t be myself. I had to be what everyone expected me to be. But here I don’t need privacy at all.
    As I’m putting on my boots, Moe stops me.
    “Wait. This is for