THE FIRST TIME

CHAPTER SIX - WHATTA MAN

"What a man, what a man, what a man, what a mighty, mighty good man!"

SALT-N-PEPA (From the album "Very Necessary" (1993))

Most of Joey´s morning had felt like she was an involuntary actor in an absurd theatre piece, she didn´t know what to think of by the end of it. Pacey missing his entire first class had her worried about him, when she thought about how bad the storm the night before had been, but that worry would soon turn into a mix of confusion and anger, when he turned up an hour and a half late with the last person, she´d expected to see him with: Abby Morgan, the wicked witch of Capeside herself! As she sat there hearing Mr. Peterson scold them, before sending them to the principal´s office through one ear, while hearing the expected reactions, like a girl, whose voice she couldn´t make out, whispering "I don´t think we need to ask ourselves why they´re late" to some other girl also sitting behind her, a veritable plethora of feelings flooded through her at the same time. The biggest of which was confusion.

That confusion didn´t lessen after Peterson´s class was over, when Abby (for the first time ever, where it wasn´t to tease, taunt or make fun of her) came over to her to talk.

"Look, Joey, about that bet we made, I think we should call it off. It´s time we tried behaving a little more adult than that, don´t you agree?" Abby asked her and like a natural reaction, Joey was instantly on the lookout for any signs, that Abby didn´t mean what she was saying.

"Yeah, I guess" was all Joey could get out, while the feeling of relief soared through her body.

"I´m not expecting us to all of a sudden become BFF´s or anything like that, but this whole us being rivals isn´t helping either of us. If you´re willing to bury the hatchet once and for all, then I am too" Abby offered, but Joey couldn´t help being a little suspicious either, as to where this sudden need to make peace was coming from.

"Did something happen with you and Pacey?"

"Only that he showed me last night, that there are still decent guys left in this world. I guess that if he thinks you´re okay, it means there must be something to it. So, what do you say?" Abby once again asked her, as she held out her hand for Joey to shake. If she had to be completely honest, Joey didn´t believe entirely that Abby was sincere, still if it meant that she wouldn´t have to bother with her teasing and sly little down putting remarks anymore, it was worth a shot, at least.

That was the positive side, but the negative made up for it and then some. One thing was that she was constantly paranoid over what could have happened the night before at the video store. Especially, since she didn´t trust Abby any further, than she could throw her and although she´d never actually tried throwing another human being before, she figured that with as hard as it would be for her to just lift Abby, the throw itself wouldn´t be anything to write home about. What was almost as bad was that it hadn´t taken longer than until the lunch break, before the simple story that Pacey and Abby were late because they´d overslept, had turned into one about them being late because they were doing it in either the boiler room or the janitor´s closet, depending on whose story you chose to buy into. In some ways, she felt like she should be used to how fast and crazy the high school rumor mill ran, when it went into full overdrive, but she´d never tried being so close to the center of those rumors herself. Having tried it now, she couldn´t say that it was something, she wanted to try again, for as long as she went to that school.

"I´m so glad that mom isn´t here to see this, or she´d have a field day!" Jen thought to herself, as she looked herself in the mirror in the girl's room, after having changed into her cheerleader outfit for the pick-up shots for "Helmets of Glory", they had to shoot that morning. From what she´d been told, the picture quality on some of the footage they´d shot had turned out too grainy to be usable, meaning that they had to shoot a handful of scenes over again. She didn´t mind all that much either, since all of the cast and crew had been given their morning classes off to do it and despite her recent raised interest in her schoolwork, it was still a welcome break from having to sit still and listen. As little as the feminist in her wanted to admit it too, she had to concede that she looked kind of cute in the outfit, even if she would rather set her own pubic hair on fire than join the actual cheerleader squad, no matter how much anyone begged her to. One thing was that it was a sexist tradition, that reduced girls to being no more than pretty bodies for guys to drool over, it was also something her mom had asked her several times to think about trying out for, which in Jen´s mind was the kicker for why she shouldn´t begin to consider it.

After checking her hair and make-up one last time, she came back out into the hallway and who should she run into, if it wasn´t Pacey, whom she thought would have found the sight of her in the outfit hilarious. To her inner joy, he instead seemed like he liked the sight of her in it.

"My, oh my, Miss Lindley! Aren´t you a sight for a pair of sore and immensely bored eyes on what already feels like a never-ending school day?" he quipped and she couldn´t help smiling to herself.

"It´s just high school, Pacey! I´m sure, you´ll survive" she joked back at him, while carefully and sneakily avoiding addressing his praise of how she looked.

"Re-shoots for the masterpiece that will be "Helmets of Glory?" he asked and she nodded in reply to him.

"Enjoy this sight, while you can. You´ll have a greater chance of getting an a plus in Peterson´s class, than you´ll have of seeing me masquerading as a member of my least favorite brainwashed cult again!" she stated, in a way that said exactly how much she meant it.

"It´s a shame, if you´re asking for my humble opinion. Not to sound like I´m hitting on you or anything like that, but it looks great on you. Take it from a guy, who considers himself a connoisseur in fine females around his own age. You would put all of those other girls to shame" he told her and instantly, she started feeling a wholesome kind of warmth in her belly, a feeling she hadn´t experienced since she´d had her very first crushes, all of those many years earlier.

"No, I wouldn´t. I mean, let´s be honest here, Pace, most of the girls on the real squad can fill this outfit out a lot better, than I can. My legs are too short and stubby, I´m not nearly as pretty as many of them are ..."

"I have to stop you, because you´re talking complete bullshit right now, Lindley! Look, I don´t have the slightest clue what it is with girls like you and Joey, that you only see your own imperfections all the time, but you both need to stop it, now! Okay, so you´re a little short and because of that, you naturally have short legs, but I can tell you for fact that there are a lot of guys here, who prefer you short girls! And if you don´t think you can match up to any other girl here, when it comes to looks, all I have to say is take a look in the mirror, Lindley!"

"You´re just saying that to make me feel less self-conscious over how ridiculous, I look!"

"Jen, if I wasn´t with Joey, there´s no doubt in my mind, who my second choice would be. Have some faith in yourself, girl!" he said to her re-assuredly and strangely enough, his words seemed to do the trick. Heck, if he thought she looked great in that outfit, maybe she should even ... no, she wouldn´t go that far to try to steal her best friend´s boyfriend, not that she would in any case! It didn´t matter how he was making her feel right now by filling her with the kind of self-confidence, she could definitely use more of or the wet dream she´d had about the two of them, making whoopee on their own little ship in the Greek Islands!

Abby had, despite the chewing out her and Pacey got from Peterson and the detention both of them were given by the principal (two things that she wished, she would have gone without), been having the best morning, she could remember having in a long time! Starting off with her making peace with Joey, something she probably should have done a long time ago, when she thought about it now, it had only gotten better from there. For once, she was the one that all the girls wanted to talk to and it had been so overwhelming, that she´d felt like she was the belle of the ball at times.

All of them were only interested in knowing one thing, what exactly had happened between herself and Pacey, and while she hadn´t lied and said that something did happen (apart from him having been the perfect gentleman all of the time, they´d spent together), she also couldn´t say that she had exactly denied it either. Say for example that she´d been asked if they´d had sex, she would reply something neutral like "I´ve never been one to kiss and tell" or ask back "Wouldn´t you like to know?", answers that with the right facial expression to match it would make them believe that something happened, while still keeping herself free from any blame, should word of it reach Pacey´s ears.

It felt like she had friends for the first time, since she was a kid! Actual real friends, who cared about what she had to say and friends that she could hang out with and do fun stuff with! So what, if they only liked her because of a tiny little, barely existent white lie, as long as they liked her?

As far as Abby saw it that morning, she´d managed to pull off the perfect crime by pure chance.

Paranoia. Even the word has an unpleasant ring to it and after a morning´s worth of it, Joey had just about had her fill of it for one lifetime. She trusted Pacey, it wasn´t that and when he´d told her the story of how he´d found Abby down by the pier and assured her that they´d slept in separate rooms, it felt to her like he was being honest. If anything, she should give him praise for being such a great humanitarian, who had helped someone in desperate need like only he could. If that wasn´t the kind of guy she´d want to be the father of her children someday, then what kind of guy would be?

All she heard during the morning, or that was the way it seemed at least, were whispers about Abby and Pacey and the pity stares she´d been getting had gotten her so frustrated, that at more than one point, she´d been prepared to say "to hell with it" and just taken off to anywhere, where she didn´t have to listen to more of it. If it hadn´t been for her knowing that Bessie would have chewed her out for leaving school early and that faking an illness had never worked with her in the past, she might have done it too.

Somehow, she´d made it to the lunch break without entirely losing her mind and finally having Jen to talk to again, after her having been "Jen-Less" all morning thanks to reshoots for the unintentionally funnily named "Helmets of Glory", helped a little with her terrible mood. Something had to as well, because the food being served in the cafeteria that day did very little to do its part in cheering anyone up.

"Are you guys finally finished making Cliff´s testosterone-fueled homage to himself?" Joey asked, while getting ready to take another bite, she knew she would regret taking moments after she had.

"I think so. Boy, the food here today is terrible! This is the worst pile of crap, they´ve served us up yet, in the time I´ve been here!" Jen exclaimed, before pushing her plate to the side.

"They sure know how to make bringing your own lunch sound like the best idea in the world, don´t they? I mean, what the hell is this even supposed be or taste like?" Joey agreed, before giving up on eating any more of it herself.

"Luckily for us, I´ve come prepared for an event like this" Jen told her and got two apples out of her purse, one of which she handed to Joey.

"Thanks. You´re almost up there with Pacey in the running for "Capeside´s Humanitarian of the Year"!" Joey joked, with an easily detectable hint of sarcasm in her voice.

"Cool! What can I win?"

"You win the right to live here for the rest of your life, where you´ll become a soccer mom and ..."

"Stop it! You know that I can´t take hearing horror stories like that one!" Jen quipped, while acting like she genuinely was scared of the prospects of that being her future.

"Would you rather spend the entire morning overhearing gossip about what your boyfriend supposedly did with a girl, you can´t stand?"

"I thought you said that you made peace?"

"Just because we have a truce doesn´t mean I have to like her or even pretend to! Do you think they could have done it? I mean, he is a fifteen-year-old virgin boy and with as low as she´s willing to stoop ... I don´t want to think it, but I can´t help myself!"

"For the record, I don´t believe in a million years that Pacey would do that you. He´s a fifteen-year-old boy yes, but he´s also Pacey and in spite of a few things he´s done, while I´ve been here, my sixth sense tells me that he has a well-developed moral core to him. As for Abby, I wouldn´t entirely bet against it, but as they say, it takes two to Tango, right?"

"You have also heard the other expression "Where there´s smoke, there´s usually a fire", I´m assuming?"

"Joey, you´re the luckiest girl in this entire school! What girl here wouldn´t give the tip of her right pinky finger, for just a taste of what you and Pacey have? I´ve never tried anything like that and I´m not sure that I ever will, so will you do me a favor and not let some dumb false rumors, that everyone will have forgotten about in a day or two anyway, ruin a fantastic thing for you?" Jen explained, while looking Joey deeply in the eyes and the way she said it made Joey feel silly for even beginning to doubt that Pacey had told her the truth and only the truth.

"Okay, you´re right! I´ll try to avoid letting them bother me too much. And you will find your own great love someday, Jen! I couldn´t be surer of it. Maybe, it could even be Dawson?"

"Yeah, could be" Jen answered pretty indifferently and it didn´t seem to Joey like she had much in the way of faith in it. Why, the way she´d been talking Pacey up just then, a casual observer might think that Jen instead had a crush on Joey´s boyfriend! But that was just crazy thinking, right?

Right?

Jen was fighting a hard fight to stay the perfect friend to Joey and usually it was pretty easy for her, considering the, in her own estimation, pretty decent acting skills, she´d worked up from lying to her parents before she came to Capeside. For whatever reason however, this was one of the days where she had a very low limit for how much "Joey & Pacey Happy Talk", she could stand listening to for one school day. This gave her the chance to observe other things at school and one thing she couldn´t help noticing was how many friends Abby all of a sudden (and rather suspiciously) seemed to have! It was like all of a sudden, she´d gone from a total nobody to being the queen bee and it reminded Jen of something, she´d seen back home in New York.

"Lily Malone" Jen said to Pacey, who looked confused as to who or what she was talking about.

"Lily who?"

"She was a girl; I went to school with back in New York. In two words, she was a friendless loser, right up until a story started circulating about her having had sex with Eddie Woodrow, the starting point guard on the school basketball team. Suddenly, she started having lots of friends, in spite of the whole thing being a complete and total lie on both their parts!" Jen explained and it looked like she now had his full attention.

"Are you sure?"

"I got him to confess it to me, when we were both high out of our minds and after I´d just had sex with him. So, yeah, I´m pretty sure. She wanted to be popular, he wanted to get a clingy ex-girlfriend off his back and together, they came up with a way to make it happen. There was some brilliance to their deviousness, you have to give them!"

"Someone could make a movie out of that story. Is there any particular reason however, why you decided to grace me with this tale from your home city? Not that I didn´t enjoy hearing it, or appreciated how short it was, it just came without much in the way of context leading up to it!"

""I´m sure you´ve heard all of the rumors about you and Abby today?"

"It´s been impossible not to. My tactic is to let all of it go in one ear and out the other".

"You mean, like you do in most of your classes?" she asked teasingly.

"Exactly!" he joked and Jen couldn´t help herself from giggling a little.

"I can´t say that I approve too much of those tactics, when it comes to your classes, but we´ll save that conversation for another day! Haven´t you seen how popular Abby has all of a sudden become? Makes you want to ask her a few questions, doesn´t it?" Jen said and could see frustration building up in him in front of her eyes.

"What have you been telling people?" Pacey asked Abby, when he´d caught up with her, in spite of her constant (and sometimes pretty creative) ways of avoiding him all day, since they´d left the principal´s office together.

"I haven´t told them anything, that isn´t true!" she semi-lied in a poor attempt to easily get out of this, the latest in the long line of problems, she seemed to be a master at getting herself into.

"But?"

"I haven´t told them either, that we didn´t do it. I´m so sorry, Pacey! I just wanted them to like me! I totally get it if you hate me now, so if you want to tell everyone that I was lying and you never want to talk to me again, I understand. I know that ..." was as far as she got, until his laughter, to her utter confusion, interrupted her.

"You fake lost your virginity, just so some girls would like you? That´s by miles more pathetic, than anything I´ve ever done!" he got out through his laughter and thanks to his laugh having (for reasons she couldn´t explain and only since the evening before) the effect of making her want to laugh too, she had to give in and laugh along with him at how pathetic, she was being.

"I know, it´s yet another low point for me! You´re really not angry with me?"

"Abby, with what I´ve found out about you over this past day, I actually understand why you did it, crazy as it sounds. Do you really want friends like that, though? Girls, who only like you because they think you did it with me?"

"It beats having no friends, doesn´t it?"

"To them, you´re the flavor of the week. I´ll bet you a hundred dollars that this time next month, it will have been at least a week since any of them last spoke to you, because by then no one, except for us two, will even remember us being late for school or those dumb rumors about us anymore. What you need is real friends".

"Friends like you?" she asked and the way she looked so hopeful made it impossible for him to say no.

"There´s also Jen. She likes you, even if she hasn´t told me in so many words and when you´re this Abby, the girl I spent a night hiding out in a videostore from thunderstorm with, I don´t have all that much against you either" he told her with a sly smile on his face.

"I guess, I can settle for that!" she replied smilingly. "I really am sorry, Pacey. I can´t imagine that this will do wonders for your reputation".

"I doubt that I could have sunk much lower after that whole Miss Jacobs ordeal either way! If anything, it´ll help me to win over the most sexist and immature of the boys at school, who I´d say make up around ninety percent!"

"Try ninety-nine, Pacey! I swear, some of the boys here must have missed an evolutionary link between modern humans and cavemen!" she stated, as he nodded in agreement with her.

"If you want to find a way to make it up to myself and Joey, there is one thing, you can help me out with and through that, also indirectly help out Joey".

"Just tell me what to do and I´ll do it! Unless ... it isn´t us having a three-way, is it?" she had to ask and seeing him shaking his head at the idea brought her a brief feeling of relief.

"No! It´s nothing like that! I need you to tell me what the most romantic thing you could think of someone doing for you is and then help me to make it happen for Joey".

Although Joey would never be her favorite girl in Capeside, Abby still felt like it was the least, she could do for them, all things considered.

Joey had a sucky shift at work to match the bad day, she´d had at school. Not counting all of the times, she´d seen people she knew from school pointing at her and no doubt recounting the story, she couldn´t wait to die out in no time, her bad mood had also made every minute feel like ten and from the time, she got there, she wanted to leave again ASAP. The only positive was that she had the evening off, but knowing that all that awaited her were her schoolbooks, made it a small comfort at the most. The wasn´t even anyone to drive her home and on the near four-mile walk, more paranoid thoughts kept flooding through her head. If Pacey had slept with Abby or just made out with her, it would mean she´d have to break up with him and she didn´t want to do that either. Now that she´d gotten used to him doing little things to spoil her all the time, when they were together and not the least, making out with him (something that thoughts of alone could help her get through any long school or workday), it wasn´t something she wanted to give up on easily either. Maybe, she could forgive him, as long as they hadn´t gone all the way. If they´d gone that far, then it was definitely over!

Those thoughts evaporated very quickly, when she saw what awaited her on their front lawn. Because there stood Pacey waiting for her by a small tent, with a pink and white rose petals spelling out "I Love You, Joey" on the ground in front of it.

"If you hear a story about Mrs. Palmer freaking out over someone stealing her roses over the next days, don´t be too surprised! I wanted it to spell out "I Love You, Joey. You´re the Only Girl for Me" and in much larger letters, but she was about to catch us, so we had to make a run for it".

"You and ... ?"

"Abby. She had a little to do with those rumors going out of control and wanted to help me do this, as a way to apologize to you. I mean, it was my idea, but she didn´t object to having to help me with it and for Abby ..."

"That´s a step up! I love it, Pacey! Somehow, you keep making this adventure we´re on, better with every day that passes by. I want you to know that I didn´t believe in any of that stuff, people were saying today and if you want to be friends with Abby or whatever, I guess it´s okay with me. From what you and Jen have told me, she really is a sad case, isn´t she?" she asked him and from the look on his face, she could see that she wasn´t far off in her assumption.

"She needs someone to help her right now. If you don´t want me to ..."

"In case you´ve forgotten it, Pace, I´m a girl with a mom, who died two years ago and a dad in jail. Do you know how lucky we were, that it was one of the better tourist seasons this year? That´s the money we´ll have to survive on in the lean months at the restaurant over the winter. I have a baby nephew, who keeps me up, when I should be sleeping, we live in an old house with a poorly insulated roof, that only barely helps to keep the cold out in the winter and has pipes, that constantly clog up, because they should have been replaced decades ago! In other words, if anyone knows what it feels like to be a teenage loser in this town, you´re looking at her! I would feel like such a bitch, if I told you that you couldn´t help Abby out and I happen to like that I can look in the mirror and not have too many complaints about the girl, I see in it. Maybe ... and I can´t believe I´m saying it ... I could even try to become friends with her! I´m not guaranteeing anything, though! Let me make that clear!" she told him before being interrupted by the kind of sweet kiss, that made her instantly forget about all of the bad things that had happened that day.

"That´s all, I ask. Shall we?" he gallantly asked her, before pointing down to the blanket and the picnic basket placed on top of it, that awaited them.

Jen spent that evening trying to study, but she kept regularly finding her thoughts being interrupted by short, unwanted fantasies of things, her inner most primal self, wanted to do with Pacey.

By sheer coincidence, Abby was doing the exact same thing.

END OF CHAPTER SIX