The Take Down Read online

  “Audy, I’ll see you in two minutes.”

  “But how am I supposed to survive in the meantime?”

  Just like that, all was right with the world again. Tossing me a coquettish wink, Audra linked arms with Fawn and Sharma. I blew them a kiss. And even though my favorite part of the morning was almost there—Mac time—I paused to watch my vivacious girls climb the stairs. We only had six more months together, and then it would be separate schools, states, social calendars, lives. This time was precious. Precious and finite, because more than ever, right at that moment, I had the worst feeling it was all about to go away.

  And what do you know? Like always, I was right.

  I barged into the bathroom, very Audra at a sample sale: What I want is in this room and I will have it. A freshman was picking at his face in one of the mirrors.

  “Out,” I said.

  “Oh gawd, I’m sorry.”

  The boy bumped into the sink, dropped his Doc, fumbled to pick it up, then fled. I laughed, not so much at his freshie antics, but because there at the end of the row of sinks, also laughing at them, was the latest, yet most indispensable, addition to my life.

  Mac.

  “Did you just kick a boy out of the boys’ bathroom?” Mac arched the eyebrow of ruin. “That’s a pretty boss move even for you, Ms. Cheng.”

  Utilizing my best impersonation of Mac’s strut and light Chicano accent, I said, “You’re, like, not the boss unless you make people work for you, you know?”

  As much as I would miss the girls in the fall, I couldn’t even grapple with not being around Mac. But he’d accepted early admission into NYU, and my top five schools were out of state.

  “All right, my little Szechuan baguette.” Mac snorted. “Let’s promise you’ll never do that impression again. I just heard my primos cringe all the way from Sunset Park.”

  “Wouldn’t want you to lose further cousin cred. Maybe I should stop meeting you in the little boys’ room altogether.”

  His eyes widened in mock horror. “No, don’t do it.”

  Grinning again, Mac wrapped me in a one-armed hug. As the full length of half our bodies pressed together, my brain made analogies. Hugging Mac was like crawling into a lifeboat after a day lost at sea. It was more invigorating than a pot of Dad’s Chemex. It was like setting foot on Mars after decades spent traveling through space. His soft, wild curls brushed my cheek. For the nine thousandth time, I was floored by how beautiful he was.

  Bachata beats sounded tinnily from his EarRing. As averse as Mac was to tech dependency, he proceeded through life accompanied by an endless playlist. During school that meant caving and trading in his enormous old-skool headphones for the nearly invisible slim ear cuff that everyone else permanently wore.

  He started to dance me side to side in a bachata two-step, singing under his breath. My EarRing’s Translate whispered the lyrics in English: “Time passes and passes, and I keep wanting you in my arms….”

  I gently disentangled myself.

  Before letting me go, Mac placed his lips lightly against my cheek. Just as I was about to utter my regular, discouraging “Mac,” he blew air so it made a loud farting sound. Then he cranked the volume on his Doc, did a fancy little bachata spin, and elbowed the wall-mounted paper towel holder. It popped open, revealing a jar of hair product. As he felt for his comb, hidden on the high ledge by the bathroom windows, I hopped up onto the garbage can. He said he didn’t slick his hair back until school because he was barely on time as it was, forget grooming. But he knew I liked seeing his curls crazy.

  In the mirror his eyes flicked to me because whenever we were in the same space that was what our eyes tended to do. I could still feel the press of his lips on my cheek.

  “Bow tie, huh?” he said. “Am I gonna get squirted with water if I get too close?”

  “Um, it’s called fashion? What’s that look? Flannel shirt layered under a tee? It’s so retro it’s already been out twice.”

  “Nah, I’m all the rage. Bra&Panties told me so.”

  “Ew.” My fingers paused over my Doc, mid-Quip. “What were you doing on the B&P slut’s feed?”

  “Audra sent me a link.”

  “She did?”

  “Yeah, they did a year-end music wrap-up that she thought I’d like.”

  “Oh. That was nice of her.”

  This past summer, a Brooklyn teen got e-famous for streaming half-naked pics with the username Bra&Panties. When she launched her site in the spring she wasn’t any different from all the other slutty girls who posted trying-to-look-alluring, boobs-pushed-together pics online. Then the B&P chick did a post about those girls and all the reasons they were degrading themselves. She harped on them for showing their faces. She never showed hers.

  Let’s celebrate and adore ourselves but not confuse our bodies with our identities. Screw boys. Let’s be sexy for ourselves.

  “A teenager wrote that?” Mom asked when I showed her the feed. “Sounds like a marketing firm.”

  In June the B&P slut (my name for her) got mentioned on bigger media channels and even NYMag. Next click, she had a full-on designed website, her pics looked Vogue-worthy, and she was giving fashion and dining-out advice. Nowadays her skimpy outfits were regularly “brought to us by” the next-big-deal fashion designers, and she ran a column on new products she called Die-For-Worthy.

  Girl was making bank.

  Since day one, my girls were obsessed with her.

  Me?

  Progressive or not, she got rich off of boob pics. I’d rather follow girls who were advancing in life solely thanks to their brains.

  Mac grinned. “Aww, amorcita, are you jealous? Why would I need to see faceless pics of half-naked girls when I’m friends with the most beautiful girl who refuses to let me get her half-naked? Hold on, it’s like the perfect combination.”

  “Har, har.”

  My Doc dinged. Mac groaned. Since our class schedules never overlapped, every five minutes we could get together was sacred.

  [ ]T minus seven, six…

  He loudly cleared his throat. I held out my Doc.

  “I plead extenuating circumstances. I think someone’s messing with me.”

  Scrolling through the creeper messages, he frowned. “What happens when it gets to zero?”

  “Does something have to happen?”

  “Why else have a countdown?” Noticing my insta–panic expression, he set down his comb—only half his head gelled back—and adjusted my bow tie. “Tranquila. It’s probably spam. Sharma can fix it. Or maybe it’s only clocking the seconds till you jump from the high dive into a barrel of water.”

  “Still with the clown jokes.” I rolled my eyes, hopped down off the garbage can. “You’re the funniest one, Rodriguez. Come on, time to go learn stuff.”

  “Be right there.”

  Completely unconcerned that the bell was about to ring, Mac hummed as he tweaked his curls, a residual smile gracing his lips. Mac was the primest cut of meat at Prep and he was rumored to be better at crunching numbers than all our math teachers combined. Don’t think he wasn’t entirely aware of both these facts. I’d almost made it to the door when he called out.

  “I heart you, Ronald.”

  Here we were again. Audra would have played it coy and said I know. Fawn would have told him the truth, that she hearted him too—like, a lot—because her philosophy was to spread love every chance she got. And Sharma…actually, I have no idea what she’d have said. She wouldn’t have been in that bathroom to begin with. Boys were so beneath her.

  So what did young, confused Kyle Cheng say to the boy she adored more than anything yet refused to date? Why, she played it off like it was a joke, pretending to hear only the least meaningful word in his sentence.

  “Ronald? As in McDonald? Ugh. Let it go, Rodriguez.”

  In the mirror Mac’s easy grin faltered.

  “Skip out of calc to see me in lunch?” I asked.

  “Sure,” he said, resurrecting his smile. “
Always.”

  [ ]T minus five, four…

  Mad dash to English. I slid into my seat next to Audra, late for the second time that day. Luckily, Mr. E. was tardy, too. As usual, our chairs were arranged in a circle so we’d be forced to talk to one another about the literature we were reading.

  “Sharmie duck out for an emergency zombie strat session?” I asked, noting her empty seat. “Twenty bucks plus her crack code that downloads Teenzine on your school tablet says that Mr. E.’s skiing in Vail and we have a sub.”

  Audra’s red heels were kicked off beneath her desk. She’d barely glanced up as I sat down, and I couldn’t tell if it was because she was miffed that I’d been gone longer than promised or because she was just that absorbed in who-knew-what on her Doc. As had been the case more and more frequently these past few months, she had it set to privacy mode. Since the screen only decoded for her retinas, all I saw was black.

  “Deal,” she said, still without looking up. “Now credit my account and zip that crack over because Brittany Mulligan posted that she saw Mr. E. go into Dr. Graff’s office before first bell. My guess is meeting ran long?”

  “Damn.”

  “How’s your friend without benefits doing this morning, Ms. I Didn’t Have Time to Pee?”

  “Hmm?” I grabbed a Sani-Wipe and swabbed down my school tablet. “I was in the restroom.”

  Audra cleared her throat, then read from her Doc in a slightly falsetto voice.

  “‘Kyle Cheng just kicked me out of the boys’ bathroom. Awesome.’ That was Josh Tolbern’s status six minutes ago. You could have just said you were going to meet Mac. Though I still say not screwing around with Mackenzie Rodriguez is like not speeding in a Porsche. You didn’t have to lie. Or hide, for that matter. Or are you just into vertical urination now?”

  Sharma had set up our Docs so we were pinged anytime our name was mentioned anywhere. Only Audra’s system was set to receive all our pings. I hated when she actually checked them.

  As I hid my Doc in my lap, my cheeks burned. Audra prided herself on saying exactly what she thought, exactly the way she thought it. “Boys do it all the time,” she’d say. “Why do girls get shackled with having to be nice?” It used to be one of my favorite things about her. But these types of Porsche comments were exactly why I hadn’t told her I’d gone to meet Mac. They were why Mac and I were meeting in a bathroom to begin with. He used to wait for me at the end of the Walk by Coffee Check. Until Audra’s judge-y looks and in turn catty, then fawning, Mac-focused snipes forced us into hiding.

  “Whoa, there, cowgirl,” she said, finally glancing at me. “No need for the between-the-eyebrows crease. I was teasing.”

  Sometimes it was hard to tell. When I didn’t respond, she switched to a nicer Audra tone. “Must not have gone so well today, huh?”

  “No,” I said, letting down my guard. “It always goes well. That’s kind of the problem.”

  Going back to her Doc, Audra sang under her breath, “Only you would think that’s a problem.”

  Before I could reply, a familiar voice said, “Mr. E., rewriting essay equals waste.”

  In one synchronized movement the entire class looked up from their laps and smirked as Sharma followed Mr. E. into the room. Their constant butting heads about Sharma’s lack of proper usage regarding, well, anything in the English language was a running joke in class. I wished I had something that tied me to Mr. E. like that. Leave it to Sharma to track down our missing profess. Guess it wasn’t an undead-related emergency.

  “It’s a waste of what, Ms. Clarke? Complete your sentence. Is it a waste of time? Energy? File space?”

  “Tap all three,” Sharma said.

  “Don’t let someone else fill in your blanks.”

  Whether it was that Sharma was on his heels or that he was late from his meeting with Dr. Graff, I had to say, teach looked flustered. He didn’t take his normal perch on the corner of his desk. Instead he stood behind it and knuckled his chin as his eyes cast around the classroom, barely seeing it. Glamour Stubble—that was Mac’s nickname for Mr. E.

  The man could get mani-pedis for all I cared. Hot was hot.

  As if he could read my thoughts, Mr. E. looked directly at me. It wasn’t a casual glance. It was like he was looking for me, purposefully. My face flushed. Audra snickered. There wasn’t anything more stereotypical than having a crush on your hot, young teacher, but, well, there it was. Audra and I were obsessed. Sharma had stopped sitting with us in class because she said our raging hormones interfered with her Wi-Fi reception.

  “The essay reads like code, Ms. Clarke.” Mr. E. finally looked away from me to rifle through the drawers of his desk. “And if I know anything at all anymore—which I don’t think I do—it’s that I’d rather read your unique thoughts on a novel over some regurgitation of online opinions.”

  “‘Unique thoughts’?” Sharma laughed. “Don’t exist. And not regurgitation. Essay equals the best selections from lifetimes of collected knowledge of people way smarter than me.”

  moiPoint 123,083,505 to Sharma.

  audyMr. E.: 0.

  “I hope I never see a day when ‘collected knowledge’ trumps an individual’s visceral emotions.” Mr. E. slammed a drawer shut. “And dare I ask, if enough people wrote that the sky was green, would you believe that? Knowledge needs a source. Or else there’s no way of differentiating guerilla propaganda from true learnedness. Don’t believe everything you see online, Ms. Clarke.”

  There was a gentle knock on the classroom door. It was Mr. Parish, the art teacher. Forgetting about his perfect pompadour, Mr. E. ran a hand through his hair and nodded. Audra txted me question marks and a disconcerted face. Another creeper message bumped hers away. But it wasn’t just one. It was a wave of them.

  [ ]T minus…

  Three.

  Two.

  One.

  Ready?

  Smile

  “Oh God,” I said.

  Audra craned her neck to see what I was looking at. I held my Doc like something might burst out of it. But nothing happened. I looked up. Mr. E. was staring at me again. This time, when our eyes met, he blushed and mumbled something about having to take a personal day. “Mr. Parish will be sitting in for me until a sub gets here.”

  We all shifted nervously in our seats as Mr. E. shrugged into his blazer.

  “Everything okay, Mr. E.?” Audra asked.

  “Of course, of course. Before I go, I just want to say…”

  Mr. E. took the bust of Mark Twain’s head off his desk, then simply stood there, cradling it. Someone in his family must have died. There was no other explanation for his stunned expression.

  “T MINUS TEN, NINE, EIGHT…” the numbers shouted from my Doc.

  The entire classroom jumped. Mr. E. almost dropped Mark Twain. My Doc was furiously vibrating, speaking in its no-name sender voice, volume on high.

  “Where is that coming from?” Mr. E.’s eyes landed on me. “Ms. Cheng?”

  “I’m sorry. I thought it was on mute.” I fumbled to shut it off.

  None of the other hundred txts I’d received in the last few minutes had come through in audio mode. This one was preset that way, like it was meant to get me in trouble.

  “SEVEN, SIX…”

  “Gosh, I’m sorry.” My classmates snickered, like I was doing it intentionally. “It has a virus or something.”

  “FIVE, FOUR…”

  “Geez, Kyle,” Audra said under her breath. “Swipe it off already.”

  Why hadn’t I asked Sharma to look at this before class? Because you were too busy clandestinely meeting with your unboyfriend, said Audra’s voice in my head.

  “THREE, TWO…”

  Pinpricks of sweat formed on my forehead. No one was snickering now.

  “Ms. Cheng, please shut that off this instant!”

  “I’m trying!”

  Before I could swipe it off, the next-best thing happened. My charge died. My Doc powered off. I tossed it on my desk. Sha
king his head, Mr. E. left without another word. For the first time in my life, it felt good to put my Doc down. Little did I know, right at that moment, my life as I’d known it?

  So. Totally. Crashed.

  The whispering started immediately. Stupid, shallow girl, I imagined that people were talking about my bow tie. I actually smiled at a group of freshies who pointed at me, like I was doing them a social favor. Sharma and Audra had second period together and always took off right after English, which meant Fawn found me first. A cartoonist couldn’t have drawn her eyes any bigger.

  “Kyle, what the fudge?” she squeaked, dragging me into the nearest girls’ bathroom.

  It was empty. She braced herself against the closed door, intent on keeping it that way.

  “Audra already reamed me out,” I said. “Sorry. I won’t lie about our meet-ups again.”

  Fawn also thought I was wasting Mac’s valuable resources, but her exasperation made sense. She was tagged kissing so many random boys that she used a sort filter. Anytime a pic surfaced where her face or lips were pressed against a boy’s (or the occasional girl’s), the image was immediately sent into a G-File album labeled OOPS. Fawn was completely boy-crazy.

  “Meet-ups? I had no idea you two were…I mean you…and everyone’s saying he was sent home. How are you in one piece right now?”

  Sure enough, there were her hands, skittering over me to make sure her words were true.

  “Wait. Mac was sent home?”

  “Oh gawd. Mac. Has he seen it? What did he say?”

  This was becoming less humorous by the second. I put my hands on Fawn’s shoulders, forcing her to meet my gaze.

  “Fawnie, what’s going on?”

  “You don’t know?” Her eyes filled up. “You haven’t seen it?”

  “My Doc died.” I didn’t mean to shake her, but I did. “Seen what?”

  Fawn was the most dramatic crier ever. The first time I saw her cry—over a documentary about the NYC public school system—I thought she was kidding and laughed. But now, watching her pouty lip quiver like she’d downed ten grande lattes, I didn’t find it the least bit funny.