Extraordinary<li> by Adam Selzer

of
that
could get you down.
    In the morning at school, I went straight to the theater to thank Gregory for granting my wish, but he wasn’t around yet. I guessed he was only in for one period a day.
    Cathy was sulking around in the hall by her locker, and even shaking Fred off when he tried to comfort her. When she saw me, she gave me the dirtiest look anyone had ever given me.
    It hurt. I might not have been popular, exactly, but people didn’t usually hate me enough to give me dirty looks like that. Most people seemed to like me, even. I didn’t enjoy having enemies.
    I walked up to Cathy, hoping I could settle things with her.
    “Hey,” I said.
    “Get away from me,” she said.
    “Look,” I said, “I didn’t ask for any part in the show. I don’t want it. I’m going to tell Gregory to give it back to you.”
    “I have a meeting with the little freak today,” she said. “I’ll handle him.”
    “Want me to come along? I’ll take your side.”
    She shook her head. “Just leave me alone.”
    I shrugged and walked off.
    I really didn’t want the part. The mayor’s wife doesn’t sing much, but, well, it was still more singing than I was going to be able to pull off. Some people really do come alive onstage, but I’m not one of those people.
    I was just getting to my locker when Amber tapped me on the shoulder.
    “There you are!” she said. “Where’ve you been?”
    “I was trying to find the new director,” I said.
    “And I was trying to find you! We stayed up, like, all night talking to Mutual last night.”
    I tried not to let on how jealous I was to have been left out of that.
    “He’s, like, the coolest guy ever now,” she said. “Did you ever hear of aerial hunting?”
    “Is that where they kill wolves and stuff with airplanes?”
    “Yeah. There was an airport base a mile from his ranch—he used to sneak out there at night and steal parts of the airplanes so they couldn’t take off!”
    Swoon.
    “Awesome!” I said. “He was like a superhero!”
    She leaned in closer. “And when
we
told him that, he said he was just imagining what
you
would have wanted him to do. You inspired him, Jennifer.”
    I smiled.
    Well, actually, no. I made a noise like “Squee!”
    I hadn’t seen much of it yet myself, but there was definitely some evidence that he wasn’t as much of a cowering wreck as he’d seemed to be the night before, if he was out engaging in espionage.
    “And it gets better,” she said. “We’re going on a double date tonight.
Date
. Jason specifically referred to it as a date.”
    “Please tell me you’re not kidding,” I said. “Because if you are, you’ll be missing several vital organs in the morning.”
    “Didn’t it feel good, the four of us all together again?” asked Amber. “We just, like, fit. We could retire together and buy condos in the same senior apartment complex.”
    “Let’s not get ahead of ourselves,” I said.
    But I was imagining it, too. I was imagining Mutual and me as adults. We’d live in a small, colorful apartment next door to a theater, with the million or so of his babies Iplanned to have, and we’d be mild-mannered liberal arts professors by day and environmental espionage agents by night. Everyone would think we were a couple of extraordinary people.
    I also knew I was still imagining myself with the version of Mutual that I’d always wanted him to be. I had to accept the fact that the real one might not live up to it.
    But I spent all day drawing little sketches of Mutual in the margins of my notes. If the favor I owed Gregory was kissing Mutual at the dance, I was more than ready for the challenge. No way was I letting him come back to town without getting the kiss we’d planned for all those years ago.
    When I got to the auditorium for fourth-period rehearsal, I found Gregory Grue sitting on a stool onstage, talking to Eileen Codlin, who was taking notes. All of a sudden (and this is the only time I ever, ever thought this), I