They called him Frog. Maybe it was because his eyes were abnormally large, or because he was so tall and lanky, or because he had so much acne that he appeared speckled. Or maybe they called him Frog because high school was a vicious place, and high schoolers were mean. Whatever the case, when I was paired with him for a project in my world cultures class, I pushed away my disappointment, sat down next to him, and decided to find out his real name. He stared at me and swallowed twice before he answered.
"It's Frederick. But you can just call me Frog. Frederick sounds like the name of someone who plays tennis."
"Well, do you play tennis?"
"Yes, but not that kind of tennis."
I shook my head in confusion. "Are there different kinds of tennis?"
"Yeah. There's the fancy tennis you play in uncomfortably short shorts, and then there's the tennis you play against the side of a building in sweats."
"Okay, I get it," I said, slowly nodding my head. I didn't actually get it, I just wanted to move on. Although, I couldn't quite get past the fact that he preferred to be called Frog. "What does your mom call you?"
"My little prince."
I laughed before I could stop myself and his cheeks flushed bright red. "I'm sorry," I said quickly, "I didn't mean..."
"No, it's okay," he interjected, a small smirk appearing on his face. "It is a pretty ridiculous name. I don't know why she calls me that."
He looked down at his hands, causing his shaggy brown hair to fall in his face. He pushed it out of the way and glanced at me with his bulging hazel eyes, then quickly looked away. I was starting to feel awkward, so I spoke again.
"Well, I'm Kayla."
He raised an eyebrow. "I know. Everyone knows who you are."
I narrowed my eyes. "I'll take that as a compliment."
Frog scratched at a mark on his desk. "It is. You practically run this school."
At that moment, our teacher, Mr. Jacobs, stalked down the rows of chairs and glared at us.
"I hope you're using this time to begin your projects and not just to socialize."
"Of course, Mr. Jacobs," I replied, smiling innocently.
He stared at us with an odd gleam in his eye, then slowly walked away, his leather suit jacket squeaking with every stride.
I turned back to my desk, picked up the prompt Mr. Jacobs had given us and read it out loud. "Choose a unique country and explore its identifying cultural characteristics, then present these to the class in a creative way. Singing is encouraged."
"A unique country?" Frog asked.
"Yeah," I said, tapping the word with my finger. "I guess he wants us to go for something obscure.
Frog snorted. "If we want obscure, we should do Gulbrania."
I frowned. "I've never heard of it."
"Most people haven't. It's a tiny island between Norway and Iceland. They're pretty private."
"How do you know about it?"
"I was born there."
My interest piqued, I turned to face him. "Really?"
"Um, yeah," he answered quietly, seeming to shrink under my full attention.
"What's it like?"
"I don't remember much. It's cold and they do a lot of work with underwater technology."
I smiled, getting excited at the prospect of learning about something new. Of course, any place seemed exciting compared to northern Indiana. "Okay, let's do Gulbrania."
Frog shifted in his seat. "I'd rather not."
I let out a slow breath. Then why did you even bring it up? I thought, trying not to let my frustration show. We had already wasted too much time. "Alright, do you have any other ideas?"
"Zimbabwe?" Frog offered.
"It's already been taken," I said, pointing to the map at the front of the room that was filling up with the names of our classmates. I looked across the room and saw my best friend, Miranda, making faces at me. She was sticking out her tongue like a frog. I tried my best to ignore her. I glanced back at the map and spotted a tiny country next to Turkey. "How about Armenia?"
Frog shrugged. "Sure. I've never heard of that one, so it must be obscure. Do you know much about it?"
"Yeah, I was born there."
He stared at me, his big eyes somehow getting bigger, but he didn't say anything.
"I was joking," I said finally.
"I know," Frog said. "Well, at least I was pretty sure, I just didn't want to…" he trailed off and went back to scratching at the mark on his desk.
I shook my head and went up to tell Mr. Jacobs our country.
"Ah, Armenia," Mr. Jacobs said, nodding knowingly. "Land of beautiful women."
I rolled my eyes and went back to my seat next to Frog, who was avoiding making eye contact with me by staring out the window. It was going to be a long three weeks.
*****
"I can't believe you have to work with Frog," Miranda exclaimed as she sat down next to me in the cafeteria. "I would just die. You should protest it."
"It'll be fine," I said, picking the pepperonis off of my pizza. "I have bigger things to worry about." And I did. With homecoming coming up in two and a half weeks, I had to plan a pep rally and a talent show, and I also had to organize the fundraiser for the debate team. We were going to be selling T-shirts at the homecoming game. My world cultures project with Frog was inconsequential compared to everything else I had going on.
"Hey," Miranda piped up, tossing her curly blonde hair over her shoulder, "the decorations committee for the rally needs to meet on Thursday. My parents decided they wanted to have our kitchen renovated, so my place is a mess. Could we meet at your house?"
I took a bite of pizza and chewed slowly so I could have time to formulate my answer. "We could, but my mom gets really aggravated about having people come to the house ever since my father died," I said casually, the lie coming out of my mouth as easily as it had done for the past ten years.
Miranda gasped. "Oh, right. I forgot." Then she quickly grabbed my arm. "Not that I forgot about your dad, I mean, who could forget that? I just forgot your mom still has trouble with it. It's been a long time."
"I know," I replied. "I think she's getting better, but sometimes she has these episodes. I'd hate for her to break down in front of a bunch of people."
Miranda pouted in exaggerated sympathy. "Wow, Kayla, I'm sorry. I just can't imagine how hard that would be." She squeezed my shoulder. "You are so strong."
I nodded slowly and focused back on my lunch. I guess I was strong, just not in the way Miranda thought. There were times I wished my dad actually had died, it would have made things a lot easier.
Miranda continued to look at me in pity, but before I could tell her to stop worrying about it, I caught sight of the new guy, Wyatt Brooks. Miranda must have noticed me staring, because she followed my gaze to the tall football player who was confidently making his way through the cafeteria to sit with the rest of the team.
"Wow, Kayla, you must have it pretty bad for that guy if he can hold your attention for longer than ten seconds," Miranda teased. "Usually they just get a passing glance before you get back to organizing your next event."
"Stop it," I scolded. "I don't like him. I don't even know him." And yet, I couldn't stop looking at him. Strong and tan with dark blonde hair and a charming smile, he was like a breath of fresh air. I'd talked to him briefly because he'd joined the debate team. Our interaction hadn't lasted long, but it was enough for me to know that he was smart and funny.
"Yeah," Miranda sighed, fluttering long lashes that framed her blue eyes, "I wouldn't mind getting tackled by him."
"Miranda!" I exclaimed, hitting her lightly on the arm.
"Oh, come on, you were thinking the same thing too."
Just then there was a commotion in the corner of the cafeteria. I craned my neck and saw that someone had dumped a huge bowl of Jell-O on Frog, and a lot of it had gone down his pants. Everyone around him burst out laughing, but Frog just sighed and started heading toward the exit. I tried not laugh, but it was kind of funny watching him hobble out of the cafeteria with a trail of green Jell-O coming out of his pants.