The Great Date Auction

"You have to help me," I begged, looking around the auditorium. It was rapidly filling up with friends, acquaintances, teachers, and everyone I had ever made fun of or been rude to in my life. With each new face, the possibilities for humiliation only increased.

"You're the one who volunteered to get auctioned off as someone's dream date," David countered. "It's not like I made you do it."

I narrowed my eyes into blade-thin slits. "You totally made me do it, jerk."

David gave me a smug smile. "This is what happens when you let people give you a double-dog dare."

OK, I admit I never should have risen to the dare. But when Patty Nickerson bopped over to our lunch table two weeks ago to ask if one of us would volunteer for the Regional High School Great Date Auction — well, the whole thing had seemed so ridiculous that it actually, for a brief moment, seemed like a good idea. Fact is, neither David nor I are particularly Great Date material. Neither of us is totally unpopular, but we're not exactly among the reigning gods and goddesses of the quadrangle either. We were — at best — demi-gods. Well, more like gnomes, really.

"These auctions are offensive, anyway," I'd said once Patty trotted off to recruit other victims. "Are we living in the 1800s? The whole thing is a joke."

"That's why you have to do it, Liza," David said before taking a swig of his Dr. Pepper. "While everyone else is all dolled up, you could dress up as the World's Laziest Date. Put on your pajamas, rent a DVD from Blockbuster, and walk in with a big bucket of popcorn."

Actually, it was a pretty funny idea. I could picture myself onstage, wearing my pink fuzzy slippers and munching popcorn while Analissa Jenkins and Melanie Wallace stood behind me in designer dresses. The mental image made me laugh out loud, and a little piece of the carrot I had been munching caught in my throat. I took a quick drink of chocolate milk to dislodge it.

And that's when he said it: "I double-dog dare you to do it."

Which is why I am, right now, at this very moment, standing in our school's auditorium in my pajamas and fuzzy slippers, holding a Jackie Chan DVD and a tub of Orville Redenbacher.

I groaned. "This is serious, David," I told him. "What if nobody bids on me? You can't just let me go up there and humiliate myself."

"Really?" David folded his arms across his chest. "Yet it's so tempting.…"

I grabbed his collar, yanking his face right up to mine. "Let me put it to you this way — you'd better help me, or else the yearbook will end up with one of your baby bathtub pictures."

Apparently, this mental image was vivid enough to do the trick because my oldest friend in the world finally choked out, "What do you want me to do?"

"That's more like it." I released my grip. "Bid me up," I said.

"I'm broke," David protested.

"You always have money, cheapo," I told him. It's true. David has been socking away every nickel of his allowance since he was 9. He hates to spend. The only thing he ever bought me was an ice-cream cone when we were 13, only because he had a two-for-one coupon.

"Maybe I would prefer to spend my money on a real date."

I snaked a finger into my pajama pocket and fished out a bill. "Here's a twenty." I pushed the money into his hand. "Just bid on me. And don't let me go to anyone gross, either."

"How do I know who you think is gross?" David asked.

I lifted my eyebrows. "You're kidding, right?" As if we hadn't spent the past three years' worth of Saturday nights eating pizza and playing Who's Hot/ Who's Not in his basement rec room. David knew every guy I'd ever looked at, just like I could name every single one of his million three-week crushes.

"Please, David," I said. I wasn't kid-ding anymore. I was really scared. I could just imagine me — standing by myself at the center of the stage while the audience sat in silence, not bidding. I'd have to be in therapy for the rest of my life. If not longer.

He pressed his lips together, the way he does when he's considering something. "OK," he said at last.

"Next up is Liza Cooper," Patty announced as I bounced onstage waving my DVD. My three best girl friends — Emma, Grace and Lally — let out a cheer from the third row as the rest of the crowd politely clapped.

Don't let them smell the fear, I thought to myself as I shoved a handful of popcorn into my face.

"She's offering the World's Laziest Date," Patty said, "complete with action movie, popcorn and sarcastic comments. The bidding will start at five dollars."

The popcorn turned to Styrofoam in my mouth as an excruciating silence lapped over the room. The bottom fell out of my stomach, but I barely had time to feel faint because, in the next moment, I heard David shout, "Five!"

A whoosh of air seeped out of my lungs, and I managed to swallow my popcorn. Then Tyler Reese raised his hand and shouted, "Six!"

Oh, lord. Not Tyler Reese. Lally and Grace actually refer to him as Mister Yuck, which is kind of mean but freakishly apt, given that his face is as perfectly round as those stickers my mom used to put on poisonous substances like toilet bowl cleaner. He also usually wears an expression like he just tasted something bad. And, OK, here's the truth: He's smelly. This sounds really shallow, I know, but his personality is a little off so I don't feel too bad about it.

"Seven!" David cried.

Remind me to kiss you later, I thought about my best friend.

"Do I have eight?" Patty chimed in.
Remind me to kill you, Patty.

"Eight!" Tyler hollered.

"Nine," David said.

Tyler's permanent frown got more permanent. "Twelve."
Oh, geez. Why is Tyler even bidding? Have I ever even been nice to him?

I wracked my brain but came up empty. Note to self: Stop being nice to people.

But David, bless him, cut to the chase. "Twenty!" he cried.

OK, so it's my money he's spending, I thought. At least it's for a good cause.

"Twenty!" Patty grinned madly. She looked at Tyler. "Do I have twenty-one?"

Tyler folded his arms across his chest.

Oh, this was perfect. Thank goodness I'd asked David to save my butt. I owed him one, that was for sure.

"No other bidders? All right. Twenty. Going once…going twice…"

"Twenty-one!" called a voice.

I bunked out into the audience. Was that…was that John Marks? I heard an "Ohhh!" from the third row — my friend Lally, most likely — and knew the answer had to be yes.

John Marks is in three of my classes, and is known by everyone as a total sweetheart. He has long, shaggy blond hair and a lopsided smile. He's cute but not in a totally obvious way. He'd never made it to my Who's Hot list," but, now that I was standing up on this stage to be auctioned off, I wasn't so sure why.

John Marks. Not bad. And he's bidding twenty-one dollars on me. The highest bid of the night so far had been thirty, and the lowest had been five. Poor, poor Bo Ivendarg. Nobody wanted him because his girlfriend Haylie Cooper had busted him making out with her best friend Nicole at a party the week before. Haylie's posse had let it be known that anyone who bid on Bo would pay in blood and tears, so when it came time to ante-up, Nicole was the only bidder. Anyway, point being — twenty-one was a respectable bid. John Marks was a cutie, and this night had turned out way better than I had planned.

"Twenty-one, going once," Patty announced, her red lips brushing up against the microphone.

I looked out at David. His face was a question mark. I could tell he didn't know whether to bid on me or not.

I gave him a thumbs-up. Way to go, my friend,

He nodded. Then he put up his hand.

"Twenty-two!"
What?

"Twenty-three," John shouted.

"Twenty-five," David snapped back. His blue eyes flashed. I knew that look. That's David's dug-in look. It means he's not going to give up on something. It's a look I had seen a zillion times over the years — during Monopoly games, Zelda, arguments, soccer matches, crossword puzzles, you name it.

Stop it! I beamed at him mentally. I made some frantic arm motions, but I guess they didn't carry the meaning I intended because Patty looked at me and said, "Well, it looks like Liza is excited to be raising money for.

John broke in. "Twenty-eight!"

"Thirty!"

I groaned. I am standing up here, going broke because my best friend is a total idiot.

"Thirty-five," John said.

David didn't let up. "Forty!"

"Fifty!" This, inexplicably, was from Tyler, who had somehow gotten swept back into the action.

"This is exciting!" Patty chirped. "It's our highest bid of the night! All right, fifty dollars, going once…"

Ohmigosh, David, if you stop now, I'm going to kill you. Double-kill you. I looked down at him. His blue eyes were locked on me, his expression unreadable. What is he waiting for?

"Going twice…"

"No, wait!" David shouted. He took a few steps toward the stage, and people parted to let him by. "Two hundred forty-three dollars and…" he dug into his pocket. "Sixty-seven cents!" he said, flipping through the change in his palm.

The crowd murmured, and I heard Emma, Grace and Lally gasp. I'm dying, I thought as I stood under the light. My heart has stopped and I am passing into the next 'world. I am going to have to borrow money from my parents to pay for my own non-date. I am going to have to mow the lawn, babysit my sister and take out the trash until I turn 30. This… is…. horrible.

"I guess a lazy date is the way to go!" Patty announced. "Two hundred forty-three dollars and sixty-seven cents, going once." Her face was glowing.
Well, at least somebody's happy.

"Going twice…Sold!" Patty cried. She turned to me. "Congratulations!" She put her hand over the microphone and leaned over to whisper in my ear. "This is so great! You've just raised a ton of money for the Boosters!"

I stuck my hand in my bucket of popcorn and tossed a few kernels into the air. They fluttered down on me like confetti, like rain. "Yippee."

"Liza!" David called, trotting after me as I strode down the hall. "Liza, stop!"

The metal bar was solid and cold under my hands as I slammed it down, burst through the fire doors and stepped into the cool night air. The moon hung overhead, a gleaming thumbnail.

David followed me. "Liza, I'm sorry."

I shook my head, grinding my teeth. "Why did you do that?"

He took a step back. "Well, you gave me a thumbs up and…"

"The thumbs up meant 'good job!'" I punched him on the arm, hard. "It meant 'OK, John Marks — not gross!' It meant 'done deal!'" I punched him again.

"Ow!"

"I'm not giving you two hundred and twenty-three dollars, David," I said, folding my arms across my chest. "I'm not paying for your mistake!"

"I don't expect you to give me the money." David looked really hurt, and I suddenly felt like a complete jerk. After all, he had been trying to help me. He'd only done what I asked him to do. This mess was my own fault.

For a moment, I couldn't speak. "I'm sorry," I said finally.

David nodded. "Hey, at least you don't have to go out with Mister Yuck."

"There's a positive spin," I agreed.

"And…" he cleared his throat. "It won't be so bad for you to have to go on a date with me…right?"

"We spend every Saturday night together, anyway," I pointed out.

One of David's shoulders darted up in a shrug. "But not on a date." He dug his fists deep into the pockets of his khakis. "I mean, you'd rather hang with me than John Marks, right?"

"Not two hundred and twenty-three bucks worth," I said. "John's a nice guy."

"It's not like he ever made your Who's Hot list," David insisted.

"It's not like he's on my Not list, either," I shot back. I thought for a moment, imagining myself curled up on my family's couch next to John Marks. What would we talk about?

What does anyone talk about on a first date? Who knows? I spend all my time with Emma, Grace and Lally. Or with David. It's not like I have a huge amount of experience to draw on. Still, David always says I'm interesting to talk to. And I can usually make almost anybody laugh. "I'll bet John and I would have had a pretty decent time together."

"Yeah." David looked away, toward the darkness of the parking lot. He ran a hand through his wavy brown hair, then jammed his fist back into his pocket. "That's precisely what I was afraid of," he finally muttered.

Gravel crunched, and light traced across his features as a car pulled out, turned and drove away. He looked down at me and, suddenly, I understood.

David hadn't been doing me a favor. He had been bidding on me. For real.

"Do you…" I started, but before I could even finish formulating the question, he leaned forward. I could smell the sweetness of his breath — I could tell he had eaten something chocolate — and the clean, familiar smell of his shirt. And then he kissed me.

We were so close that our noses were almost touching. He cradled my face in his hands. "OK?" he asked. His voice was low, an almost-whisper.

I felt dizzy, almost breathless. My mind was whirling with a ton of questions: But what about our friendship? How long have you felt this way about me? How long have I felt this way? Is this all a big mistake?

But, in the end, I didn't ask any of them out loud.

In the end, all I said was, "Yes."

Liza is clueless that she's so crushworthy…until she finds herself on the auction block.

'She's the world's laziest date, complete with action DVD, popcorn and sarcasm.'

By Lisa Papademetriou