Sebastian stood with his hands shoved deeply into his pockets, raising his eyebrow in half-hearted surprise when he watched Mercedes come around the corner and approach the ticket booth for the football game. They made instant eye contact, and he could tell their expressions mirrored each other: chagrin. A mild irritation that they were both there, neither had the will to deny the other this opportunity. Sebastian felt like he owed her the opportunity to view him as more than a douchebag. He hadn't projected his thoughts too much yet, just acted on impulse, but he could identify his current malignance: he had never been denied so brutally. Never denied in the way that Mercedes had done; never rejected without the promise of a future flirtation. When she had stood up from the bed and looked away from him, he felt the same disappointment that he felt from his parents, constantly, and for him: that was telling. Mercedes didn't have to like him or want to be with him or want to sleep with him (though he couldn't figure out why), but he wouldn't let her move on from him with that sick taste in her mouth. He could see the taste whenever they looked at each other, and Sebastian wanted nothing more than to control everyone's perception of him.
Mercedes got into line to buy her ticket just as Sebastian neared her, handing her a yellow ticket and drawing her out of the queue.
"I could have bought my own ticket,' she began instantly, pushing her hair behind her ear. Sebastian looked at her pathetically and kept walking, the red dirt kicking up onto his jeans.
"I'm going to introduce you to my friends,' he said, nonchalantly.
Mercedes scoffed, "Yeah, right. Let's see how that goes."
"Do you know them?' he asked back, handing the ticket to the PTA parents standing at the gate. Mercedes did the same and pulled her jacket closer to her.
"No, and they don't know me. They don't even know I know you."
"I'll tell them we have a project in kinesiology, you're my partner. They won't question me."
"A project on the first week of class?"
Sebastian turned quickly, holding his hands up to illustrate his words, "Okay. Obviously, you don't listen, because I just said they won't question me. Don't do whatever this is in front of them."
Mercedes crossed her arms, "Don't do what, Sebastian?"
"The fucking attitude. I'm doing you a favor here. I'm trying to be nice, and you're purposely acting like a jerk. Would you just fucking cool it? If you're still upset with me tonight, you can let me have it on the way home. Do not embarrass me in front of them."
Mercedes laughed and shook her head, looking down. "You know what—'
"No,' Sebastian said, sternly. "We're not going to do this. They're right there."
He walked a few steps in front of her, patting backs and shaking hands. Sebastian gave a wide, charismatic smile to the group and climbed a row of bleachers before turning to Mercedes, who still had a pouted lip.
"Everybody, this is Mercedes,' Sebastian began, placing a hand on the girl's shoulder to show familiarity. "We've gone to school together for a bit, she's my partner in Earl's. That fairy is already giving out projects and shit, so I figured there's no better place to see the body in motion. Well, actually…' he trailed, and the entire group laughed.
Mercedes gave a curt smile, waved and crossed her arms again. She followed Sebastian up the bleachers and took a distant seat from him, a few inches separating the two.
"You sitting over here with us, Mercedes?' one of the boys asked, kindly, but a few hungry eyes looked at her, intending on her response to be a 'no'. While Sebastian's introduction gave her an honorary acceptance, they were all well aware what it looked like to have someone that looked like her sitting among their ranks.
"Yeah, I don't usually come to these kinds of things."
"Why not?' the same young man asked, his blond hair sweeping into his eyes.
"I live kind of far, and we already spend so much time at this place anyway. I don't want to be here any longer than I have to be,' she laughed and everyone still interested in her presence laughed along including Sebastian who had shoved his hands in his pockets and began to watch the girl closely.
A beady-eyed blonde stood a few rows down, her arms tightly crossed. She looked like she should have been one of the cheerleaders. "Where do you stay, by the way,' she asked loudly, everyone's attention coming back to Mercedes again.
Sebastian leaned forward, inching towards Mercedes a bit and opening his mouth to speak for her.
"Oh,' Mercedes hesitated, noting everyone's eyes. "Down by f—,' she stopped quickly when she felt Sebastian nudge her with his knee. He didn't look at her, but she knew what it meant. She buried her answer deep in her chest and started again. Where did everyone affluent and black live?
"Near Northwestern."
"Wow,' she heard someone from the group release. "Good area. What do your parents do?"
"Medical field,' Mercedes responded with a defeated smile. The group affirmed her while the blonde raised an eyebrow. Sebastian moved his knee back and looked at Mercedes with a sigh. The game began and everyone acted much more interested than they probably really were. Mercedes stayed silent for most of the first quarter before Sebastian finally turned to ask her if she knew what was going on. Ashamedly, she shook her head and mentioned that she hadn't watched many, if any, sports during her life. Taking the opportunity to teach her something, he pointed out who all the players were, which he knew kept girls interested much more than the game itself, and taught her a few different plays, reasons the referee might hold up the game and how scoring worked. By half time, she was cheering (for the correct team) and entertaining small conversation with some of the girls who had complimented her on her purse.
"I think my dad is getting me a Louis for Christmas, but I don't want to jinx it. I have one at home, but I'm so scared it's going to get dirty, it's white, you know,' a brunette chatted away eagerly.
"If I had anything like that, Versace, Gucci: I would never wear it to school. They're so expensive,' Mercedes responded, making conversation, guaranteeing Sebastian wouldn't have anything to complain about on the car ride home.
"Here: this is a secret,' the girl began, talking in a hushed tone.
Sebastian looked over at the girls from his perch, a foot above the shorter Mercedes and the girl in the row below them. He pushed some of his hair behind his ear and crossed his arms. He cocked his mouth sarcastically and got the girls' attention. "I know you're not talking about me down there, Madison."
"Hey, Sebastian, bite me!' the thin girl said, flipping the bird. Mercedes looked back at Sebastian with a wide and weary look but was met with the boy's eyes bright and beaming, a wide, jovial smile and an affirming squeeze on her shoulder. She had assumed that no one ever joked with Sebastian or questioned him in any way, but, then again: she didn't know if she even saw him as human or even her equal. He and all of his friends seemed so socially isolated from her and everything she knew. It was strange to see them laugh with each other.
"Anyway, ignore him,' Madison whispered. "He's such a bitch, literally. I don't know how you're doing anything academic with him. I'd actually drop out of school if I had to be his partner in class."
Mercedes laughed, "He's smart."
"Sure. You can be smart and be a terrible student. When all of your teachers read your name and give you a good grade, it's pretty simple. Mr. Earl is one of those guys who's going to try to give Sebastian a hard time to teach him a lesson, so good luck."
Mercedes kept smiling, hoping to change the tone of the conversation. Something didn't sit right with talking about Sebastian to his friends. Even if it was light-hearted and even if it was true. He wasn't her friend, not really, and no one else in the group even knew her last name. Either way, they knew him much better than her, and she didn't care to hear what their interpretation was, as it was probably true, and much more malevolent than she wanted to entertain.
"What's the secret? About the purses?"
"Oh,' Madison began again, sticking a piece of gum in her mouth and handing one to Mercedes. The band began to roar loudly for the halftime performance, and Madison spoke loudly to compensate. "There are these great thrift stores in Dayton and Toledo, all of their stuff is marked down. Now: would I wear it to school? No. The last thing I want is someone seeing my blouse and thinking to themselves 'Gee, that looks like mom's', but… just in general? Amazing. We could go one Saturday, I'd drive. You'd love it there, and then you could wear whatever to school and not care. You got it half-off. Someone could throw a slushie at you, and you'd shrug it off. Bang for your buck, for sure. Now, the thrift stores here?' Madison motioned herself vomiting. "They're worthless."
Mercedes smiled, thinking about the piano in the consignment shop and all the hand-me-down clothes in her closet from Salvation Army. "I wouldn't know,' she lied. She talked to Madison until there was nothing left to say and watched the William McKinley High School Titan's lose the game, as was the custom, before grabbing her purse and making her way down the bleachers. Madison gave her an enormous hug and pledged to 'catch up later', the rest of the group addressed Sebastian as they walked by, either entirely ignoring Mercedes or giving her a quaint smile. A few called her by name.
"You're doing something later tonight, right?' the blonde asked, a few other students making a hoard beside her.
"To celebrate another loss? Yeah,' he responded sarcastically before giving an empathetic nod, guaranteeing the plans that Mercedes had yet to hear about.
"Okay…' the girl said, crossing her arms, her keys dangling in her hands. "Are you bringing her?"
Sebastian smirked and began to speak to the blonde in a lowered tone, looking beyond her to avoid eye contact. He took a few steps forward. "You are skating closer and closer to thin ice with me, Fabray. If you keep it up, I'll make sure the reverend makes it to my house tonight. I know he'll be overjoyed to find you on your knees,' Sebastian looked down at her. "In prayer, I mean."
"That's a threat?' she asked, stepping back to size him up.
"Oh, come on, Quinn,' he responded, putting a hand on his chest. "I never make threats. It's a warning,' he moved his hand from his shirt and placed it on her shoulder, his blank expression breaking into a smile. He laughed. "Joking."
The group, including Mercedes, began a bout of nervous laughter as Sebastian pulled Quinn in for a hug and left the group.
He sighed as he passed through the gate to exit. "I'm not a violent person, but if someone squeezed the life from her, I would personally see that they got the fucking Purple Heart."
Mercedes nearly jogged to keep up with Sebastian's long, angry strides. "What are you so upset about? She just asked you about your get together thing." She tried not to sound indignant, she probably wouldn't be able to sneak into the house that late anyway, even if she had been invited.
"It was the way she asked. I know Quinn. She is the most undermining, backwards person I have ever met. You can never get one over on her. She would have insulted you the entire night had I not been sitting right beside you."
Mercedes watched the young man shake, fumbling his keys to unlock his car. "Sebastian,' she began, hoping he would stop. He kept going, eventually getting the driver's door open and leaning over to open the passenger door.
"It's really okay, I'm not offended,' she continued, sitting in the car. "I know how those type of people are. I know how you would probably act if you were in her position. I can stick up for myself. I've been my only defense for seventeen years now. That skinny little girl ain't no threat to me. If you're upset with her, don't act like it's over me, because you and I both know that ain't it."
"How is that not aggravating to you?' he asked, motioning back to the football field. "The way they looked at you. The leading questions. Madison was trying to bait you the entire conversation."
Mercedes backed closer to the window of the passenger side and shook her head. "I didn't see it that way… maybe you're just looking for something wrong."
"They're my friends. I know what they were doing. They weren't even speaking normally while you were there."
Mercedes shrugged, "I don't know. If they're as bad as you're claiming, then why are they your friends? Why would you even bring me there?,' she paused for emphasis before turning her body towards the window. "Take me home."
Sebastian drove to Mercedes's house and neither spoke. Sebastian raked over the night's events, as did Mercedes, the former attempting to decipher everything that went wrong and the latter trying to figure out exactly what had gone wrong. They pulled into Mercedes's driveway, a long walk from Northwestern, and sat in silence for a few minutes.
"Goodnight, I guess."
"Wait,' Sebastian responded, but the waiting turned into minutes before he finally spoke.
"I'm sorry. I don't want you going home thinking that tonight was terrible, and my friends hate you. I know that thoughts like that can multiply, and multiply and just send you into a spiral,' he sighed heavily.
"My parents always taught me that you have to perform perfectly. You have to be irreproachable, and then you have to apologize for your perfection. You have to portray this idea that even your best, even the pristine, can be perfected. That you have better and that even your best isn't enough for you. Even if it's not true, even if you did everything to the best of your ability, you have to keep acting like there's something more. Like you have something substantial, something better to offer. I just— I saw everything wrong with that encounter. I overestimated my ability to control… not control, I don't know,' Sebastian stopped again for a time, gathering his thoughts.
"For the first time, I was, like… I don't know. Outside of that. I saw them treating you like we treat everyone else, and I saw them attempting to hide that sanctimony for the sake of me, but I mean… you grow up with people. This isn't an epiphany or anything, I've known them my entire life. We've been like this forever, but I realized I wanted to shield you from that. I shouldn't want to shield people from my friends. I don't know what I'm saying. I'm saying I'm sorry, I should have never introduced you to them, but… I shouldn't have friends that are apology worthy. I'm not apologizing because it gets better, I'm apologizing because it gets that much worse."
"Are you apologizing because you see yourself in them?' Mercedes asked, looking over at Sebastian. He nodded, his hand gripping the steering wheel. He bit the inside of his cheek and looked out of the window. A few warm tears welled in his eyes, but he waited to speak until they subsided.
"You don't have to be like them, Sebastian. You can change,' she said empathetically, placing a hand on his shoulder.
He shook his head, bitterly. "You're so naive,' he hesitated and waited a few minutes to see how or if she would react. "I know what you think of me. I'm trying to convince myself that I'm not what I do, and that I'm just playing a role. I know that's what this is. I thought tonight I'd be able to project this image of who I really am or who I want to be, and it is so fucked… God, I don't even know what I'm saying."
"If you want to change, I think you should start with not trying to manipulate everyone and their perception of you… You seem like you're discontent with yourself or your surroundings. You can't fix that problem through other people. Whatever I think of you isn't your responsibility."
"What does that even fucking mean?' Sebastian spat back bitterly.
"All you can control is what you think of yourself. If your so-called friends can make you that upset, maybe they aren't your friends… I don't know. We obviously don't come from the same place or the same background, so maybe what I'm saying doesn't even matter. I don't think you're a terrible person. You have a lot of power that's just been shifted to you because of your dad, because of your personality, because you're just… good at being you. 'Being you' might not even be what you want though, and that's your responsibility. Finding out who you are, not trying to legitimize what you aren't… but, I mean.. I don't know you that well, and I don't know if I ever will."
"Yeah,' Sebastian confirmed. They didn't know each other that well, and, unfortunately, he had given her the image of complete disarray.
