Parallel

your thumb blocks your view of your subject’s face.” Smiley blond girl disappears. “Now open the closed eye and shut the open eye. Your subject should appear to have moved from behind your thumb.” Voilà. Smiley blond girl reappears.
    I slide my thumb up the aisle until Josh comes into view. He’s looking right at me, one eye closed, arm outstretched, face obstructed by his upright thumb. When our eyes meet, it takes considerable effort not to grin. There are forty-two people in our class, and he picked me.
    Smiley blond girl is forgotten. I close my left eye and inch my thumb forward until Josh’s face disappears behind it. I close my right, then slowly open my left. There he is again, left ear just grazing my thumb. I watch as he mirrors me, aligning his thumb with mine. We stay like that for a moment, right eyes closed, arms outstretched, just staring at each other. At this distance, I can just make out the mole beneath his left eye. I inch my thumb toward it.
    “It is all a matter of perspective,” I hear Dr. Mann say. I switch eyes again, and Josh’s face disappears. Why do you assume he’s not interested? the voice inside my head asks. He smiles at you every day.
    “Miss Barnes?” Dr. Mann’s voice jars me back to reality. Crap! I have no idea what he just asked.
    “Um, would you mind repeating the question?” I ask, bracing for the old man’s reaction. I hear several snickers.
    “I have yet to ask one,” our teacher replies. “I was simply going to invite you to put your arm down.”
    The snickers turn to chuckles.
    My left eye flies open as I quickly drop my arm. With Josh’s face hidden behind my thumb, I hadn’t noticed that he’d looked away. Or that the rest of the class had started staring at me, the only person in the class still facing backward.
    I spin in my seat. “Sorry, I was just . . .” With no coherent way to end that sentence, I trail off, dropping my eyes to the metal surface of my desk and feigning preoccupation with the two boobs someone has scratched into it. Fortunately, Dr. Mann quickly resumes his lecture, so the collective attention soon moves on. I, however, remain mortified. So you were staring at him for an inordinate amount of time. So what? For all he knows, you were looking at the guy in front of him. I steal a glance at Josh’s row. The guy in front of him has cystic acne and a unibrow. And I’m pretty sure he’s wearing eyeliner.
    When the bell rings at the end of the period, I shove my textbook into my bag and beeline for the door, desperate not to make eye contact with Josh.
    “Abby!”
    No such luck.
    Josh is a few steps behind me when I turn around. As I wait for him to catch up, my heart goes from steady beating to wild pounding. Thrown off by his nearness and by my own jitters, I forget that he’s the one who called out to me and immediately start talking.
    “I just wanted to see what you were up to tonight,” I say. A perfectly normal thing to say when you’re the one initiating the conversation. A little weird when you’re not. Josh just goes with it.
    “Oh, you know,” he replies. “The usual. Back-to-back reruns of CSI . Maybe some Pringles.”
    “Are these your preferred weekend plans?”
    We step aside as the room clears. “‘Preferred’ implies a preference among several choices,” Josh points out. “I’m the new guy, remember.”
    “Why don’t you come to Ilana’s party?” The words pop out without my planning them. Never mind that I’m not actually going to the party I’ve just invited him to. This is what happens when I don’t have a plan. I cannonball into disaster.
    “A party, huh?”
    Not: “Sure, I’d love to!” or “Yeah, sounds great!” Just: “A party, huh?” How does one even respond to that? Is it a question? A stall tactic until he can figure out how to let me down gently? I backpedal.
    “Yeah, a bunch of us are going,” I say quickly. “It’s a group thing.”
    “Cool,” he says. “Sounds fun.”
    “Okay, great! We’ll pick you up around eight.” I turn to go, expecting him to follow me out. But he just stands there. I look back at him, not wanting to be rude but not wanting to be late to journalism either. Our adviser is super laid-back, but not about lateness, especially not when the tardy staffer is her editor in chief.
    “Don’t you need my address?” he asks.
    “Oh! Yes. Duh. Your address.” I rip a piece of paper from my notebook and hand it to him just as the warning