Oh. “Well… how bad could they really be? You said there’d be drinks.”
She seemed to consider the question. “Drinks will help. I just hope we won’t need them too badly. With my family, you never know.” She bit her lip, and even though it was inappropriate of me to think this way, I kind of wanted to bite it, too. “If you’re sure it’s not a big inconvenience, I could really use the company.”
Holding up a hand for a high five, I said, “No problem. But first, we make some headway on the Urban Studies project.”
She slapped my hand. “Okay, slave driver.”
Eighteen
November
Bella
As a favor to Rafe, I wrote a spreadsheet to help tally up all the different business loans we were considering for our Urban Studies project. Truthfully, I’d never been so caught up on homework as I was this semester. Since I was still calling in sick to hockey, I had a lot of time on my hands.
“Damn,” Rafe said the next night when I showed him the spreadsheet. “We are going to win this thing.”
“We so are.” It’s really astonishing what you can accomplish when you barely leave your room. I was quite pleased with myself.
Rafe threw his soccer jacket on the desk chair and sat down on my bed, pulling my computer into his lap. “Are these interest rates accurate? They look high.”
“Of course they’re right. What do you take me for?” I gave him a nudge with my elbow. “Commercial rates are higher than regular mortgage rates. And the terms aren’t as good.”
Rafe’s dark eyes looked up at me in alarm. “What if another team doesn’t know that? We could lose the contest and all because you’re smarter.”
“Huh. Well that’s a depressing idea. It’s usually the opposite — being stupid is what bites me in the ass.”
“Me too,” Rafe mumbled.
“Although, under the right circumstances, ass biting can be awfully fun.”
His eyes got wide, and I laughed. “Don’t worry about the interest rate thing. I’ll put a range of interest rates in the write-up.”
“Good idea.” He handed my laptop back on a yawn.
“Tough practice today?”
“Always. We’re playing Princeton on Sunday night, and coach is all fired up.” He unzipped the book bag at his feet and took out his Urban Studies notebook.
“If you’re tired, we can work on this tomorrow.”
He shook his head. “I’m good. Let’s make a list of all the businesses in the neighborhood, so we can see what’s missing.”
We worked on that for awhile, with me manning the search engine on my computer while he made detailed notes in the nicest handwriting I’d ever seen from a guy.
“You’re very methodical,” I said, trying to pay him a compliment. I was trying to act like less of a bitch when Rafe was around. It made me self-conscious to know he’d seen me at my absolute worst.
“Eh,” he sighed. “Methodical is what keeps me afloat. The Harkness workload has been a real shock to my system.”
“Lots of people say that,” I said quickly.
“Do they?” he grumbled, turning the page in his notebook. “I haven’t met any of them.”
There was a knock on my door. I glanced at the clock. It was ten already, so I didn’t know who it might be. “Come in?”
Trevi opened the door. “Hey, Bella. You feeling any better?”
“Uh, sure. Trevi, this is my neighbor Rafe.”
“Hey man.” He shook hands with Rafe and then perched on my desk chair. “Bella, I have some shitty news.”
“Oh, goody,” I said, my voice light. But inside, I trembled. More shitty news? Really?
“Coach Canning made the brilliant decision to hire his son as the student manager.”
“What?” I gasped. “He gave my job away?” Even as I said the words aloud, I wished I could take them back. Because I sounded so pathetic.
Across from me, Trevi rubbed the back of his neck with one hand. “Yeah. The guys are pretty pissed off. In fact, I was thinking I’d get a bunch of them together and we’d write a letter to coach. If there’s a dozen signatures on it, maybe he’ll listen.”
“No,” I said quickly. “He won’t fire his own kid. And Coach warned me. His email said that if I didn’t come back to practice he was going to have to look around for someone else. I just didn’t think he’d do it so fast. I thought I had a little time.”