Free Enthusiasm by Polly Shulman Page A

his e-mail address on my palm—writing I preserve to this day, and will as long as hygiene permits it!” She held her hand up triumphantly, palm out.
    “Yup, I saw that part,” agreed Zach. “Well, aren’t you the lucky girl! Won’t you please, please give me another pancake? Surely I deserve a booby prize.”
    She shot him a look of scorn and handed the pancakes to me instead. But although I tried to eat as if nothing had happened, they stuck in my throat. As soon as I could, I escaped to my father’s house to brood over my troubles.

Chapter 8
    I Renounce my Dream ~ I maintain my Dignity ~ I carry boxes ~ I E-mail .
    W as Ashleigh right? Had Grandison Parr, over the course of the previous evening, developed feelings for Ashleigh?
    There could be no doubt about her feelings for him . I knew that enthusiastic gleam in her eye all too well. Had I been deluding myself, daring to imagine that he might like me ? Sitting on the bed in the room I shared with Amy’s sewing machine, I went over the events of the previous evening in my mind, just as I had through the night. What a difference there was this time! Every clue that had raised my hopes could equally well dash them.
    At first, Parr’s promptness in rescuing us from the turkey-faced doorkeeper had seemed like evidence that my hero had noticed me, and maybe even liked me. But was that just wishful thinking? Wouldn’t the gallant fencer have sprung to the aid of anyone in distress? Or maybe—I shuddered at the thought, then shuddered at myself for shuddering—maybe it was Ashleigh’s daring and charm that had persuaded him to help us. After all, her liveliness, along with her rapidly developing maturity of looks, seemed to appeal to guys—especially in that crimson dress. Even Zach had noticed it. Why not Parr?
    Then, Parr danced the first quadrille with her. I had put that down to her energy—she had pulled him onto the dance floor. But he certainly hadn’t tried to resist, and they seemed to be enjoying it, chatting away. When he and I waltzed, our conversation seemed stilted and awkward. (Remembering the waltz, I felt his hand once again on my mind’s waist and shivered with pleasure and distress.) The night before, when I looked back on our first conversation, I hoped its awkwardness might be due to our mutual attraction. Maybe he felt shy with me at first, just as I felt with him. But maybe not—maybe he merely found me dull.
    Nobody could ever find Ashleigh dull.
    Then there was Parr’s long disappearance during the ginger-ale quest. At the time, I wondered whether he had been trying to abandon me entirely, but when he showed up with the elusive soft drink, I was touched. What a lot of trouble he’d taken for me, I thought. Now, though, Ashleigh’s theory seemed equally likely: that he was trying to spin out his time with her.
    The other apparent signs of Parr’s feelings toward me—his friendly teasing, his disapproval when creepy Chris got too close, and his Cinderella remarks, which put him in the role of the prince—also melted away on closer inspection. I bit my lip to keep from crying with jealousy. Why did Ashleigh always get everything ? Not only had she taken over my enthusiasm for Jane Austen, but now she seemed hell-bent on stealing my secret love!
    For a long time I struggled with myself, feeling bitter resentment and condemning myself for it. After all, I could not question Ashleigh’s generosity or the purity of her motives. When she fell for Parr, she had no idea that I had gotten there first. You could even say the whole thing was my own fault for not taking her into my confidence from the start. Ash would never have looked twice at a boy she knew I liked. She was too loyal. For my sake, she had even given up her plans to become a nun at age eight, when she learned that Jewish girls couldn’t enter a Catholic sisterhood. If she had known my feelings, I believed she would have tried to suppress her own.
    No, if somebody had to