A Song for Sweater-boy

By Vanessa North

Ash Cooper has made a mess—an angry prank turned into a criminal mischief charge and now he's on probation. Jamie Allen has a talent for pattern recognition, but he's not so great with people—how can someone as well-liked as Ash Cooper not have all the answers? An unlikely friendship springs up between them as they navigate senior year, a probation sentence, and—oh god—homecoming.
 

Please note: some minor changes have been made from the original version published in the How We Began Anthology.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Vanessa North
• Release date: May 1, 2019
• ISBN: 9781386918554

Vanessa North

Vanessa North is a romance novelist, a short fiction geek, and a knitter of strange and wonderful things. Her works have been shortlisted for both the Lambda Literary Award and the RITA© Award, and have garnered praise from The New York Times, The Washington Post, and Publisher’s Weekly. She lives in Northwest Georgia with her family: a Viking, twin boy-children, and a pair of large dogs.

Book preview

Chapter One

Jamie

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"Hello. My name is Patrick James Allen. My friends and family call me Jamie, but everyone else calls me ‘Sweater-Boy.’ I like to knit because knitting is orderly and relaxing. I’ve been knitting for nine years. My senior seminar project will have something to do with pattern recognition. Mathematics, physics, I haven’t decided. I like both. Since I was sixteen years old, I have spent exactly sixty-eight hours in prison. I have friends on the inside, so you don’t want to mess with me."

Dead silence meets my introduction to the class, then Kaycee laughs. She gets my sense of humor. Lots of people think I don’t have one. But I do. It’s just a little esoteric. Once Kaycee laughs, everyone else does too, and a couple of people talk behind their hands. I see Jacob Borden texting someone from the back row, and we’re not supposed to text in class. I almost tell the teacher, but remember what Kaycee said about snitches, and stop myself just in time. I hope he wasn’t texting something mean about me, because I just saved his ass, and probably his phone privileges too.

Um, thank you Jamie, please have a seat. Mr. Kennedy gestures to my chair. I give him a tight nod, then sit down next to Kaycee.

Nice, bro, she whispers. The prison thing was hysterical.

You should come with us this week, I whisper back. Find yourself a prison husband. I’m only joking about the prison husband bit, but Kaycee is a little boy-crazy. At least, that’s what my mom says. Then she says stuff like I should know, I was just like her. And that’s just weird, who wants to think about their mom being a teenager having lustful thoughts? Ew.

Kaycee starts laughing, too hard to cover it up, and of course, Kennedy calls on her next.

Ms. Becker, your turn.

She flashes me a quick smile, then approaches the front of the room. Kaycee is super shy—not like social anxiety or anything, she doesn’t have a diagnosis, but she really doesn’t like standing in front of the class. She told me once it was because she wore braces—she got them off junior year, so it shouldn’t bother her anymore, but it still does. I can tell because her hands are shaking a little. I give her a thumbs-up and she smiles big at me. Her teeth are really pretty now.

Hi, I’m Kaycee-Ann Becker. I want to major in technical theater in college, and my senior seminar project is going to be about costume design and textiles. I’ve been sewing since I took Home Ec in middle school, and I’m fascinated by clothing design.

People nod politely. Everyone likes Kaycee. She’s not in the In crowd, but she’s not one of the freaks either. She’s just nice to everyone, and everyone’s nice back. She’s really pretty too, but we’re just friends. I feel like I need to clarify that for everyone. Not a couple. Just friends.

She slides back into her seat and wilts against the wall, her knuckles all white where she’s gripping the sides of her chair.

Your teeth look really great, I whisper, and she smiles at me.

Thanks, Jamie. Sometimes I have trouble reading her smiles, because sometimes they aren’t expressing happiness or anything, but Mom says they’re still real smiles, they just serve a different social function. She says Kaycee’s fake smiles—I can’t help it, that’s how I think of them—sometimes help me know when I’ve done the right thing socially. It’s weird and I don’t know how to respond, so I just go back to my knitting.

I keep my knitting in my lap while the rest of the class gets up to speak, each in turn. I have permission from the school, because it keeps me from stimming and distracting the other students, but knitting in class feels like I’m getting away with something. Yeah, Jamie. You rebel you. Knitting and purling a hat like a badass.

I stifle a giggle, and even though I’m knitting, I have to reach up and run a finger across my eyebrows.

Jacob Borden wants to do his seminar project on football statistics. Why am I not surprised?

I almost drop a stitch when Ash Cooper walks to the front of the room. His locker is close to mine, so I see him a lot. I want him to like me, because I think he’s beautiful, but he usually just side-eyes my sweaters and makes out with his girlfriends. Not at the same time, obviously.

He dyes his hair black, and he wears a lot of jewelry for a guy. Big metal rings on both hands, pierced ears. I’m pretty sure he flat-irons his hair. He licks his lips when he stands up in front of the class, and a piece of metal flashes. I think he’s showing off the tongue stud—why else would he lick his lips like that?

I’m Ash. I’m not going to college. I’ve been playing guitar since I was five, so I’m going on tour as soon as I have the diploma. He looks out at the class and makes this weird face, pushing his lips out a little. Then he licks his lips again, and I blush, because tongue stud, and yeah, I googled why someone would want one of those. I look down at the hat in my hands as he says the next bit. I’m writing a rock opera for my senior seminar project.

As he walks back to his seat, I can’t help thinking that if he’d been holding a mic at the end, he’d have dropped it.

After class, I’m digging in my locker for a new pen when a body slams into the door next to mine, and the face sucking starts. Ash is pressed up against the orange lockers by a girl with blue pigtails and hairy legs,