"I'll think about it," Park said.

"Is that so hard to believe?" Cal opened his carton of milk completely and drank out of it like a cup. "She wasn't even into you, you know. She was just bored, and she thought you were mysterious and quiet -- like, 'still waters run deep.' I told her that sometimes still waters just run still."

He wasn't going to think about it. He wasn't going anywhere without Eleanor. And she didn't seem like the basketball game type.

Park groaned. "Cal…"

"Sitting next to me," Cal said. "Because we're totally going out."

"Hey," Cal said, taking a bite out of his Rib-a-Que sandwich. "You should come to the basketball game with us Thursday. And don't even try to tell me you don't like basketball, Spud."

"Wait, seriously?" Park covered his mouth to keep a chunk of sandwich from flying out. "Are we talking about the same Kim?"

"But she's totally into me now, so you can hang out with us if you want. The basketball games are a blast. They sell nachos and everything."

"Kim's going to be there."

"Thanks."

# Park #

"I don't know…"

"Hey, girl," DeNice said after gym class. They were in the locker room, changing back into their street clothes. "So I've been thinking, you've got to go to Sprite Nite with us this week. Jonesy's got his car fixed, and he's got this Thursday off. We are going to do it right, right, right, all through the night, night, night."

# Eleanor #

"You know I'm not allowed to go out," Eleanor said.

"I heard that," Beebi said.

"You should come," Beebi said. Her face was perfectly round, with dimples so deep that when she smiled she looked tufted, like a cushion. "We have so much fun. I'll bet you've never even been dancing before."

Eleanor should never have told them about Park's house, but she'd been dying to tell somebody. (This was how people ended up in jail after committing the perfect crime.) "Keep it down," she said. "God."

"I don't know…" Eleanor said.

"I know that you're not allowed to go to your boyfriend's house either," DeNice said.

"Is this about your man?" DeNice asked. "Because he can come, too. He don't take up much space."

# Park #

"Gosh, Wally, that'd be dreamy."

His mom said that if they were going to hang out every night after school, which they definitely were, they had to start doing homework.

Still… She couldn't imagine the two of them going out with DeNice or Beebi. Or anybody. Thinking about going out with Park, in public, was kind of like thinking about taking your helmet off in space.

"We did Shakespeare last year at my old school… But I can't fake it in math. I can't even… what's the opposite of faking it?"

Beebi giggled, so Eleanor giggled, too. She couldn't imagine Park dancing. He'd probably be really good at it, if all the Top 40 music didn't make his ears bleed. He was good at everything.

"You were faking it today? Seriously? It didn't sound like it."

"Or not," he said. "I could not help you with your math."

"I can help you with your math, you know. I'm already through algebra."

"She's probably right," Eleanor said on the bus. "I've been faking it in English all week."

Even her mean, smirky smile made him crazy.

Eleanor moved her lips when she read…

"I meant talking." He wasn't sure what he meant. He looked down at the table. Eleanor's algebra book was covered with her handwriting, the lyrics to one song wrapped and coiled around the title of another. He saw his name written in tiny cursive letters -- your own name always stands out -- and hidden in the chorus of a Smiths song.

Park kicked her gently under the table, and threw crumpled-up pieces of paper into her hair. They were almost never alone, and now that they almost-practically were, he felt kind of frantic for her attention.

His mom said it was okay; then said she had stuff to do in the garage. Whatever.

"Seriously?" She tried to open it again.

"I know," he said, "I just… we're alone."

"You sound so creepy right now…"

"So we should be doing alone things."

"No," he said, pulling it toward him.

"Sort of…"

They tried to study in the living room, but Josh wanted to watch TV, so they took their stuff into the kitchen.

He flipped her algebra book closed with his pen.

"I thought we were studying."

"I didn't know it was there."

He didn't want to say it, he didn't want to point to it. He didn't want their eyes on those words together.

"What?" Eleanor asked.

He looked back at the book. He was going to think about this later, after she went home. He was going to think about Eleanor sitting in class, thinking about him, carefully writing his name someplace she thought only she would see.

He felt himself grin.

"What."

"That what was still happening?"

And then he noticed something else. Written just as small, just as carefully, in all lowercase letters. "i know your a slut you smell like cum."

"Why didn't you tell me?" he said.

"What," Eleanor said, trying to pull the book away.

"This," he said, waving his hand over the words.

"Nothing."

She looked -- and immediately started scrubbing the bad writing out with her pen. Her face was skim milk, and her neck went red and blotchy.

Park held onto it. He felt the Bruce Banner blood rushing to his face. "Why didn't you tell me that this was still happening?"

"Why would I tell you?" she asked. "It's gross and embarrassing." She was still scribbling.

Ten seconds ago, Eleanor had looked mean as a cat. Now she looked resigned, slumped over the table with her fingertips at her temples.

"I just… why didn't you tell me about this?"

"I don't know…" She shook her head. "It seems like it always happens on gym days."

"Do you know who's doing it?" he asked.

"Well…" she said, "I've narrowed it down to people who don't like me…"

"I thought this had stopped."

He clenched his teeth. She took the book back and put it in her bag.

"Why would you think that?"

"Help how?" She shoved the book toward him. "Do you want to kick it?"

"Maybe…"

"It couldn't be just anyone. It would have to be somebody who could get to your books without you knowing about it."

"Are you going to kick them?"

Why had he thought that? Because she was with him now?

He put his hand over her wrist. "Maybe I could help."

She rubbed her eyes with both hands. "I feel like now you're intentionally asking me stupid questions. You're like the worst detective ever."

"Do you leave your books in the locker room?"

"You need to take this seriously," he said.

"Ha." She was still covering her face. "Who doesn't like me in gym class."

"Who doesn't like you in gym class?"

"No," she said firmly, squeezing her hands into fists, "this is exactly the sort of thing I shouldn't take seriously. That's exactly what Tina and her henchgirls want me to do. If they think they're getting to me? They'll never leave me alone."

"Tina is the queen of the people in my gym class who don't like me."

"What does Tina have to do with this?"

Park thought of the Tina who sold him out in the garage and made fun of people on the bus… But then he thought of all the times that Steve had gone after Park, and Tina had pulled him back.

"Tina would never do anything this bad."

Eleanor looked hard at him. "Are you kidding? Tina's a monster. She's what would happen if the devil married the wicked witch, and they rolled their baby in a bowl of chopped evil."

"I've known Tina since we were kids," he said. "She's not that bad. We used to be friends."

"It was the sixth grade. It was nothing."

Park couldn't think of how to answer.

But it did. Because it was making Eleanor look at him like he was a stranger. It was making him feel like a stranger. He knew that Tina had a mean streak, but he also knew that she wouldn't go this far.

"Did you kiss her?"

"Why does it matter?" Eleanor's eyes were dark slits in her face. If he lied to her about this, she'd never forgive him.

"Tina? You went with Tina?"

"But you were boyfriend and girlfriend? Did you hold hands?"

"Well, she's dating Steve now."

"I don't remember."

"You don't act like friends."

"None of this matters."

"None of it matters now," he said. "It's stupid… Tina and I went together in the sixth grade. Not that we ever went anywhere or did anything."

"Why does that matter?"

What did he know about Eleanor? Not much. It was like she didn't want him to know her better. He felt everything for Eleanor, but what did he really know?

"You always write in lowercase letters…" Saying this out loud seemed like a good idea only for as long as the words were on his tongue, but he kept talking. "Did you write those things yourself?"

That night, Park lay in bed thinking about Eleanor thinking about him, writing his name on her book.

"If I were going to write a note to myself, calling myself a dirty slut," she said it matter-of-factly, "you're right, I might not use capital letters. But I would definitely use an apostrophe… and probably a period. I'm a huge fan of punctuation."

She shook her head and stood up. He couldn't for the life of him think of how to stop her.

"No," she said, her voice catching. "I don't want to talk anymore."

Then she snapped out of it. She started stacking her books.

Eleanor paled from pale to ashen. It was like all the blood in her body rushed to her heart, all at once. Her speckled lips hung open.

"What are you doing?" he asked.

"Eleanor…"

# Park #

She walked out of the kitchen, just as Park's mom was coming in from garage. His mom looked at Park with a face he was beginning to recognize. What do you see in this weird white girl?

"I don't know who's been writing on my books," she said coolly. "But I think we just solved the mystery of why Tina hates me so much."

Tina had asked Park to go with her, and Park had said yes -- because everybody knew that Tina was the most popular girl in class. Going with Tina was such powerful social currency, Park was still spending it.

He tried to think about why he'd defended Tina.

She'd probably already scribbled that out, too.

Why did it matter to him whether Tina was good or bad? Eleanor was right, he and Tina weren't friends. They weren't anything like friends. They hadn't even been friends in the sixth grade.

Being Tina's first boyfriend kept Park out of the lowest neighborhood caste. Even though they all thought Park was weird and yellow, even though he had never fit in… They couldn't call him a freak or a chink or a fag because -- well first, because his dad was a giant and a veteran and from the neighborhood. But second, because what would that say about Tina?

And Tina had never turned on Park or pretended he didn't happen. In fact… Well. There were times when he thought she wanted something to happen between them again.

Steve would kill him if he hooked up with Tina.

On homecoming night, when she came over to have her hair put up, she'd stopped in Park's room to ask what he thought of her strapless blue dress. She'd had him untangle her necklace from the hair at the back of her neck.

Like, a few times, she'd come over to Park's house on the wrong day for her hair appointment -- and ended up in Park's room, trying to find something for them to talk about.

He didn't even think Tina really liked him, deep down. It was more like she didn't want him to get over her. And not-so-deep down, Park didn't want Tina to get over him.

Park always let these opportunities pass like he didn't see them.

Plus, Park didn't want to hook up with Tina. They didn't have anything in common -- like, nothing -- and it wasn't the kind of nothing that can be exotic and exciting. It was just boring.

Park rolled onto his stomach and pushed his face into his pillow. He'd thought he was over caring what people thought about him. He'd thought that loving Eleanor proved that.

But he kept finding new pockets of shallow inside himself. He kept finding new ways to betray her.

It was nice to have the most popular girl in the neighborhood offering herself to him every now and then.