What Passes For Normal

Chapter 8

It was the usual crowded bus ride home. Teddy stood in the aisle, leaning forward awkwardly because someone's backpack was pressing into his back. People who kept their backpacks on while riding the bus were so annoying. His own pack was right where it should be, wedged between his feet on the floor of the bus.

Two girls sat in the pair of seats next to him. The one near the window was listening to music and had her eyes closed. The other was was looking at a piece of paper she held in her hands.

Teddy frowned. Coincidences made him nervous. Yesterday he was at Songhees looking at the big board of school clubs, including the Robotics Club, and now as he stood in the aisle of the crowded bus, there it was again: Robotics Club. Printed on bright orange paper, the words were in big, goofy, robo-letters and under the heading was a picture of a robot from an old sci-fi movie. Below, there was info about the group, when they meet, who to contact, etc.

The girl had brownish wavy hair, medium-length and held in place here and there with criss-crossed bobby-pins. Her worn denim jacket had a collection of buttons pinned to it and she wore a purple and orange scarf tied stylishly around her neck. Her look was interesting and kind of retro, like maybe '80s style.

Should he reconsider joining the Robotics Club? It would be nerdy in the extreme, guaranteed, but it could be fun. This girl looked potentially cool but, really, Robotics Club?

One of the girl's buttons had a black-and-white photo of someone in an ape suit with a weird space helmet on. Another was a Japanese cartoon creature that he thought he should probably recognize but didn't. A third one was a black line drawing of a shaggy, crab-shaped thing with eyes on stalks and the letters FSM on its body. He wasn't sure how to feel about these obscure adornments. They made you want to find out more, but at the same time they seemed to be mocking you for not already knowing.

Right then she looked up at him as if she'd been reading his thoughts. Teddy quickly looked away, pretending that he'd been staring out the bus window all along even though he knew perfectly well she just caught him looking down at her.

"Do you think the robot looks stupid?" she asked.

Teddy shrugged awkwardly. The girl looked back down at the orange club poster. She was cute.

Teddy leaned down a little. "No," he said. "It looks cool. I was actually thinking of joining that club."

"You were?" she asked, squinting at him as though trying to decide if he was making fun of her.

"Yeah. Why's that so shocking?" said Teddy. The girl in the window seat rang the bell and started to get up. There was a little awkwardness as the window girl, Teddy and the robot girl squeezed around one another, but finally the other girl was gone and robot girl scooched over so Teddy could sit.

"I don't know," she said, appraising him again before finally coming to a conclusion. "Yeah, I guess you could be the type. Are you first year?"

"Yeah," said Teddy.

The type? The Robotics Club type? Teddy considered the possibility that he might actually be nerdier than he thought.

"Me too," she said. "What are you taking?"

"Earth Sciences and some math," said Teddy. "Thinking of doing Seismology or something."

"Cool!" she said. "I'm doing Engineering for now. We'll see how that goes. And you should totally join our club! We're planning some really cool stuff. Have you ever done anything with robotics?"

"Not really," he said.

"No problem! We'll get you up to speed. You wouldn't be the only noob, but I've known a bunch of the guys for a few years. We had a club at our high school. We actually went to Berkeley for a competition. In California. At the University. That was pretty amazing. Now we're just kind of moving the high school club up here to Songhees since a bunch of us are here. There wasn't a Robotics Club before. We had to start one."