Author's Note: ((smiles sheepishly)) Aw c'mon, it's only been a month and ten days late, right? ((newsies bombard me with rotten fruit)) AHH! Dude, they weren't lying when they said they had perfect aim... ((tried to regain dignity while wiping squashed oranges off t-shirt)) Ahem. HAPPY BIRTHDAY, LIZ!! I LOVE YOOOOU!! YOU'RE BLOODY BRILLIANT AND I'M SORRY IT TOOK ME SO FRIGGIN' LONG TO GET THIS FIC OUT FOR YOOOOOOOOUUUUUUUU!!
Newsies: HOORAY FOR LIZ!!! ((do several pelvic thrusts in quick succession))
Dutchy: ((rubbing his tummy)) Aww man... Is it possible to get whiplash in your abdominal muscles? I think I killed something...
Disclaimer: The newsies belong to Disney, the lyrics to "You're The Top" belong to Cole Porter, and Liz belongs to herself. Tanya, however, belongs to me—as does the snoozing study hall teacher and the angry hall moniter.
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Lonely at the Top.
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High school sucks, man.
Ahh, study hall. No two words in the English language do I consider more beautiful, more lovely, more wonderful. There is absolutely nothing else I would rather do for 47 minutes than sit in silence, watch the teacher snore loudly behind his desk, and tap the rhythm of Guns N' Roses songs on my desk with my pencil—or, as the case may be, listen to my ex-boyfriend flirt with a beautiful, bubbly blonde.
Dude. That was some pretty sweet alliteration right there.
But that's beside the point.
Somehow, simply staring at Dutchy across study hall did not seem to be satisfying my need to cause him excruciating pain and suffering. My attempt at voodoo on my Spanish homework had proved to be entirely unsuccessful, and he hadn't even felt the paperclip I had flicked at his head. Indeed, he appeared to be entirely unaware that I even existed anymore. If looks could kill, I thought furiously, he probably wouldn't even notice.
"Ohh, I like you so much, Dutchy!" his newest acquisition was squealing in an irritatingly high voice. Tina, I think her name was. Or Topanga. "You are so adorable!"
Dutchy smiled at her. The smile he used to flash at me across the classroom during math class. Yeah he was adorable—but he was mine! I decided to focus all my energy on sending him the most evil, poisonous glare I could manage.
He didn't see me.
"I like you too," he said with a grin. He leaned forward. "Hey listen. Do you wanna go somewhere?"
She stopped, her blue eyes wide. "What—do you mean, like, right now?"
Dutchy sighed slightly. "No, not right now. I mean tonight or something."
He was asking her out.
"Are you, like, asking me out?" the girl squealed.
Yep.
"Yep," he answered. "Whaddaya say?"
I drew a chain of donuts and tubas down the margin of my paper, wishing I could block out their conversation. "Of course I'll go out with you!" the girl—what was her name??—giggled. She paused. "Oh, but my boyfriend might be upset. I'll have to ask him first."
I glanced up and saw with satisfaction that Dutchy was resting his forehead on his hand in a look of repressed exasperation. Ha.
"You don't understand, Tanya," he said.
Ah, Tanya. I knew it started with a T!
"At words poetic, I'm so pathetic that I always have found it best to let 'em rest unexpressed," he said, winking at her. "I hate parading my serenading, as I'll probably miss a bar; but if this little ditty is not so pretty, at least it'll tell you how great you are."
Oh my fucking lord.
Did he just say ditty?
I chewed thoughtfully on the cap of my pen, carefully trying not to look at the pair of them. This was all beginning to sound very familiar, but I just couldn't place it. Where the hell had I heard it before? I tried to concentrate on putting my textbooks in alphabetical order on my desk.
"You're the top, Tanya," he said.
"I'm the what?"
"You're the Coliseum. You're the top—you're the Louvre Museum," he continued flirtatiously. "You're a melody from a symphony by Bach!"
"Strauss," David corrected without looking up from his English notes.
"Strauss!" said Dutchy quickly. "You're a Bendel bonnet, a Shakespeare sonnet—you're Mickey Mouse!"
What came first, History or English?
A B C D E...
English.
"You're the Nile," he was saying sweetly. No matter how hard I tried to block him out, his voice was carrying easily across the classroom so that I was sure my face was the color of a ripe tomato. "You're the Tower of Pisa. You're the smile on the Mona Lisa. I'm a worthless check, a total wreck, a flop—but if, baby, I'm the bottom, you're the top!"
Ohh.
I nearly cracked my tooth on my pen as realization hit me. I knew what he was quoting! It was "You're the Top" by Cole Porter, my favorite song from Anything Goes! Ohh, that bastard...
"Ohh Dutchy," Tanya breathed. "That's beautiful! Did you make that up yourself?"
Dutchy flashed her another devilish smile. "Of course I did, sweetheart," he said in what was obviously fake modesty. "There's plenty more where that came from. I'd do anything for you."
ASSHOLE!
I stood up, slamming my notebook shut and ignoring the grunt of my sleeping study hall teacher. "Dutchy Dudynsky, you are a phony and a fake!" I shrieked.
"Those are two synonyms, Liz. That's terribly redundant," said David calmly, eyes still on his notes.
"Shut up, Dave." I turned back to Dutchy, who was staring at me in surprise. "Look, I can understand you dumping me because I treated you like shit, and I can understand you hacking into my account on the school computer system and putting porn as my background so the monitors would kill me so that you could get back at me for shaving you dog's back in the pattern of a Byzantine cloak as an April Fool's joke—BUT NEVER, IN ANY SITUATION, WILL I EVER FORGIVE YOU FOR PLAGIARIZING COLE PORTER!" I then proceeded to curse extravagantly, which would have lead to possible expulsion from high school in the case that my study hall teacher were awake.
Luckily for me, he wasn't.
Finishing up my profanity trip by flipping Dutchy off with a flourish, I picked up my newly alphabetized textbooks, swung my bag over my shoulder, and promptly left the room. I didn't care if I got a detention for ditching study hall halfway through; Spot would probably be there this afternoon, so I could hang out with him. I just couldn't stand looking at Dutchy's face any longer.
Exhaling softly, I sat down and leaned back against the lockers. Maybe I was overreacting. I mean, it wasn't like he was plagiarizing Stephen Sondheim or anything... It was just that that was my favorite, favorite song from that play, and I knew he was reciting it just to piss me off. That seemed to be his new hobby.
I groaned and let my head drop onto my pile of textbooks. I knew perfectly well that our break-up was entirely my fault—I had been distracted and I had ignored him and I had been a complete asshole. It wasn't that I didn't love him, though. I did. I was just very concerned with the fact that I was failing chemistry.
Dutchy, who had been in 12th grade chemistry by the time he reached his sophomore year, hadn't really been able to understand that.
And so we broke up. A week ago. And he had already flirted with just about every girl in our grade, and a few seniors, too.
What. The. Hell.
I couldn't figure out whether he was trying to get back at me for the way I treated him, or if he was just a manslut. Either way, I was not happy. "AAAAAAAUUUUUGH," I groaned.
The teacher in the classroom across the hall stopped in mid-lecture and glared at me. I kind of laughed.
"Liz?"
I looked up. "Hey, Dutchy," I said pleasantly. "What's goin' on?"
He probably would have been happier if I had punched him in the face. He cringed and gave me the once over, as if trying to figure out what I was getting at. I ignored him and examined the hole in my sweatshirt, just above the thumb. Now how had that gotten there...?
"I, um... I wanted to talk to you," said Dutchy finally, shoving his hands into his pockets.
"About what, pray tell?"
"About... about study hall, I guess."
"A fascinating subject," I said dryly. "Please, tell me all about study hall."
"AAAAAAUUUUUUGH, YOU'RE SO OBNOXIOUS WHEN YOU'RE MAAAAAAD," he moaned, putting his face in his hands. The teacher across the hall leaned forward and slammed the door shut to block our voices out. I laughed again.
"You know what I'm trying to say," said Dutchy after a moment.
"I do indeed," I answered solemnly. "I'm just sadistically amused by your incapability to articulate your thoughts when you're upset, to be honest."
Dutchy stared at me. "How long were we together?" he asked slowly.
"Seven months and twenty-six days."
He blinked. "How?"
I paused at this, staring down at my Algebra book. He had a point; all of our friends were absolutely mystified at how Dutchy and I had managed to stay together for so long. He was bony and charming and blond, and the fact that he spent most of his time poring over enormous volumes with tiny print had earned him a pair of thick, rimless glasses. And he had spent five years of his life with me—first as a best friend, and then as more than a best friend. It didn't seem to make sense, somehow, because I was tall, curvy, loud, and sarcastic... The exact opposite of my boyfriend. I know they say that opposites attract, but this seemed to be taking it to a bit of an extreme.
"I don't know, Dutch," I said finally.
We sat there for a few minutes in silence, me still chewing on my pen cap, and Dutchy cleaning his glasses obsessively on his sleeve. After a while, he decided to clean them on my sleeve instead. I sighed. "That was a pretty lame stunt you pulled in study," I said.
"Yeah, I know." He didn't take his eyes off my sleeve, but it didn't matter—even if he had been looking at me, he wouldn't be able to see me. He was almost completely blind without his glasses on.
"Why'd you do it, then?" I pulled my arm out of his hands, and he shrugged and reluctantly replaced his glasses on the bridge of his nose. "If you knew it was lame, why'd you do it?"
He shrugged. "Tanya's a pretty lame girl. I figured she didn't deserve anything better than a lame stunt."
"Shut up, you know what I mean," I laughed.
A grin spread slowly across his face. "I'm serious, Liz! I mean, look at her—she's cute and bubbly and blonde—"
"You're blond, Dutchy."
"Shut up. What I'm trying to say is, she's the absolute stereotype of the kind of girls who manifest this fine institution; completely artificial, with unnaturally large breasts and unnaturally small waists."
I waited, but he didn't continue. "Well...?" I prompted. "Why the hell were you wasting your precious study hall time with her, then, if her boobs freak you out so much?"
He laughed, and then the smile faded from his face like a window being wiped clean. He cleared his throat awkwardly. "I, ah... I really don't know. I just felt kinda..." and he said the last word so quietly that I couldn't hear it at all.
"Kinda what?" He said it again, quieter this time, and I threw my hands in the air. "Incredibly horny? Bored out of your mind? WHAT? Good heavens, Dutchy, how the hell am I supposed to forgive you if I can't even hear what the hell you're saying?"
"I'm not looking for forgiveness," he said.
"I know, but I really want to forgive you. Holding grudges is exhausting."
He smiled slightly. "Well, in that case, I'll tell you. I felt incomplete without you there."
Whatever I'd been expecting him to say, it certainly wasn't that. Wow. I stared at him. "But you dumped me."
"And for good reasons, too," he agreed. "You were ignoring me."
"Chemistry."
"What?"
"I was failing chemistry. That's why I was ignoring you."
Dutchy considered this for a moment, and then decided not to comment. "What I'm trying to say, Liz, is that I really, really miss you. You're really the top, and I'm desperate."
"I think the fact that you were flirting with Tanya Philbin makes that pretty obvious," I said dryly.
"Don't say that."
I sighed and closed my eyes, leaning my head back against the lockers. "You're right. I shouldn't say stuff like that. It's just—I get kinda screwy around the people I really care about." I smiled slightly. "It's lonely at the top, y'know."
I couldn't see his face, but I was sure he was raising an eyebrow at me. "What the hell is that supposed to mean?" he asked.
"Well you said I'm the top," I said, turning to face him. "You also said Tanya was the top, but unless you're scared of my boobs too, I think it's safe to assume that you really mean it when you say it to me."
Dutchy laughed the first genuine laugh I'd heard in days, his head falling back against the lockers and his shoulders shaking. "Krueger, honey, that's why I said all that crap to Tanya," he said, still chuckling.
"What?"
"Will you stop being insanely slow and just take me back, already?" he said suddenly, looking at me.
"...What?"
He laughed again. "Look, I was sick of you ignoring me, so I decided to get you to look at me. Plagiarizing Cole Porter was a last resort."
"Well I would hope so," I grumbled.
He groaned and closed his eyes. "Why do you have to be so goddamn DIFFICULT??"
I pondered this for a little while, a smile tugging at the corner of my mouth. "Will it be too cheesy if a plagiarize Cole Porter back at you right now?" I asked finally.
Dutchy didn't answer, but he looked at me with those startlingly gray eyes that I had always loved. Whoa.
"I'll take that as a yes," I said after a second, and I cleared my throat. "Your words poetic are not pathetic—on the other hand, babe, you shine! And I can feel after every line a thrill divine down my spine. Now gifted humans like Vincent Youmans might think that your song is bad, but I got a notion: I'll second the motion, and this is what I'm going to add." I grinned. "You're the top. You're Mahatma Gandhi! You're the top! You're N—"
I never got to finish my plagiarism, because Dutchy's lips were on mine before I could even get the next word out. He reached out and held my wrist with his bony hand, and at that moment I felt more content and satisfied than I had ever felt in my life. I didn't care that the teacher across the hall had stopped and was staring at us through the window in her door; I didn't care that my textbooks were making loud thumps as they topped, one by one, from my lap; all I cared about was Dutchy and me.
Dutchy and me. Dutchy and me. Not Dutchy and Tanya. Not Dutchy and Cole Porter (thank god). Just Dutchy and me!
Pretty soon afterwards, a hall monitor found us making out on the floor and promptly threw us into detention, declaring that she was going to be sending a note to our study teacher letting him know that we had cut class. Dutchy flipped her off when her back was turned, and then together we sashayed to the office, arm in arm.
I can honestly say I have never been happier in my entire life. High school rocks, man.
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Author's Note: ET VOILIA! ((does a happy dance)) I FINISHED, I FINISHED!
Dutchy: It took you a pathetically long time, though.
White flag!! You will never show me mercy, will you, Dutchy?
Dutchy: Nope. ((goes over to hang out with Liz))
((sighs)) Ah well. At least he's cute. Y'know, it took me a year and a half to realize how incredibly adorable Dutchy is. The same thing happened with Snitch—I watched "Blood Drips On Newsies Square" last weekend, and I was like, "DUTCHY AND SNITCH ARE MAD SEXY?!?! WHY DID NOBODY TELL ME?!?"
Snitch: You missed out, sistah. ((goes over to hang out with Lute))
((sobs)) AND NOW I'M STUCK WITH RACETRACK!!
Racetrack: HEY! I'M MAD SEXY, TOO! ((smacks me))
He's right...
Anyway. HAAAAAAAAPPY BIIIIIIIIIIRTHDAY TOOOOOO LIIIIIIIIIIIIIZ!! And now, the newsies and I shall perform a short piece of plagiarism we have constructed all by ourselves. Ahem. Boys...
Newsies and Saturday: ((sing)) Oh flowing words and Spot's little birds, the proudliest sight there is—when gray and sere our hair hath turn, we still shall revere the lessons learned, in our days with dear old Liz! Our daaaays with deeeear ooooold...
Dutchy: ((sings Glinda's painfully high "oh-oh-oh"s))
Newsies and Saturday: DEAR OLD LIZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ!
HAPPY BIRTHDAY, LIZ!!! Please leave a review, my faithful readers, and be sure to wish our beloved singin'-newsies-goil a happy, happy birthday!
-Saturday