by Tish Cohen
Mom grunts. “You know I don’t like you taking pleasure in the distress of others. Even if it is ‘good for business.’” She stares at me and one corner of her lip twitches. “Anyway, wherever did you learn a word like usurped? I didn’t know words like that in seventh grade.”
A couple of years ago, I looked up usurp in the dictionary and learned it means to dethrone, seize, or overthrow. I pull my jacket closed and shiver. “That word haunts me every day of my life.”
There’ll Be No Stepping Up in My Absence. None.
Crud.
I stop dead in my tracks and look around the property of Allencroft Middle School, my breath puffing out in little clouds. The place is full of ice and empty of kids. Which makes total sense, since the 8:40 bell has already rung. What did I expect…that people would stand outside in the snow, risking late slips and frostbite, because this just might be the day I return from quarantine?
It’s not like I expected a welcome sign out here. I’m not an idiot. Besides, everyone knows that tape doesn’t stick in the cold. The sign would blow away in about three seconds. Quickly, I scan the bushes at the edge of the school fence. Hmm. Nothing but snow and lost mittens.
I got up super early this morning so I could load up my backpack and get here before the bell. But halfway to school I realized I forgot my doctor’s note. And my binder. And my pencil case. So I had to go back home, and now I’m late. What I didn’t forget is the following:
1) Antibacterial wipes so I can disinfect my desktop—in case anything fungus-y or festering touched it while I was in exile.
2) A red apple for Brianna Simpson, because the skin contains Quercetin, which should make her sneeze less around Boris the guinea pig.
3) A baggie full of chocolate chips for my #1 and #2 BFIS (Best Friends in School) Susannah Barnes and Laurel Sterling. I’ll save just a few so I can bribe Smartin Granitstein not to pour grape juice in his ear at lunchtime. That’s one delight I did not miss.
4) A Wundercloth we got in the mail that’s supposed to de-smudge the smudgiest glasses. Avery Buckner’s smeary glasses could very well be the eighth wonder of the world, and should make a nice test subject.
5) Bovine Balm. For my #1 BCIS (Best Client in School) Sylvia.
If I want to see anyone before class starts, I’d better hurry. I tear across the snowy field with my schoolbag bashing against my knees and cold wind biting at my face.
The first thing that hits me inside the building is the smell of school. I suck in a deep breath and smile. Ahh, there’s nothing quite like it. Photocopies, pencils, winter jackets, and floor cleaner, all mixed into one.
Bloomer Girl, aka fifth-grader Allegra Lohman, rushes past. Not only are her boots looking freshly buffed, but her backward haircut (long in front, short in back) seems to be turned right-way-round. Which isn’t remotely possible. Hair doesn’t grow that fast. “Hey, Allegra,” I call after her. “I’m back!”
She spins around. “Huh?” For one ugly moment, she seems to not recognize me. Then she smiles and says, “Oh yeah. How was Florida?”
Florida? “No, I was sick. Deathly ill. I had the chicken pox, remember?”
“Um, sort of…”
“I was in quarantine. Total lockdown…”
But she’s already gone.
The farther in I go, the more I realize something’s not right. Brianna’s down the hall and I can see from here she has good color in her cheeks—her freckles are barely noticeable—and could that be…? I stop and squint. It is! The most vile boy in the school, Smartin Granitstein, is carrying an armload of actual library books.
I turn a corner to come face-to-face with Susannah and Laurel, who are talking to three girls from sixth grade. Susannah is my #1 BFIS for being fierce loyal and for being almost-but-not-quite famous. Famous enough from her TV commercials to need to wear dark glasses everywhere, but not famous enough that we get driven to the movies in her limo. Mostly because she doesn’t have one. Yet. And my #2 BFIS, Laurel, well, how can you not love Laurel? She only eats blue food, and she makes us laugh. Mostly at her, but she’s cool with that.
As I run over to them, the three Sixer girls scatter. Susannah and Laurel squeal and rush to hug me so hard they pick me up.
“Zoë!” says Susannah from behind her big sunglasses. “You’re back from the dead! Wait…” She backs up and lowers her glasses, but only for a split second. “You’re not contagious, are you?”
“Nope.” I beam.
Laurel sneers at Susannah. “Worried what a couple of scabs might do to your acting career?”
“As a matter of fact, yes! One scar and my agent would drop me like an overheated latte. You think I’ll land that Neutrogena commercial with bumpy skin?”
For Susannah, who up until this point has only done commercials for bed-wetting, sanitary pads, and head lice, landing a commercial where she gets to stand at a sink and splash sparkling clean water on her glowing skin is pretty much The Ultimate.
“Whatever,” says Laurel, who seems to be still battling that troublesome zit on her chin. She pulls her blue turtleneck up to her mouth and smiles at me. “Good to have you back!”
“It was SO boring, sitting around watching Regis and Kelly every day,” I say. “Plus, I had to entertain little kids all the time. My mother’s friends kept bringing their darlings over for free babysitting so they wouldn’t have to haul drooling, wailing toddlers around the grocery store.”
Susannah crinkles her nose in disgust. “But you were contagious!”
I nod. “Exactly what I said. But, apparently, they’d all been vaccinated.”
“Bummer,” says Laurel.
“Exactly what I said.”
I unzip my schoolbag and pick through my supplies. “But I’m back and I’m prepared to fix everybody who broke while I was gone. I have a nail buffer for Boris’s split toenail, mints for Mrs. Patinkin—ever since she switched to decaf coffee, her breath hasn’t been the same…” I stop talking because Susannah and Laurel are nudging each other. “What?”
“Nothing,” says Susannah, fidgeting with her zipper. “We’d better get to class. The bell’s going to ring.”
“Forget class. Why do you guys look all nervous?”
Laurel nudges Susannah. “Tell her.”
“You tell her!”
Laurel says, “It’s just that things aren’t nearly as bad as you think around here.”
I narrow my eyes. “How not nearly so bad?”
“Things are actually good. Really good,” says Laurel.
“But how can that be?” I ask, feeling my nostrils flare. “I’ve been gone for a week and a day.”
Susannah twists her mouth to one side. “Remember Devon Sweeney—the Sixer?”
“No.”
“You wouldn’t. Before you left, she was a total dork. She hung out with the Emos behind the baseball diamond and wrote poems about her dead cat.”
“What do I care about Devon and her lousy cat?”
Laurel shifts her books to her left arm. “Because, while you were gone, she stepped up.”
Huh?
Susannah nods. “It’s true. It’s like you never left. She kind of took over.”
“It started when Annika Pruitt was having one of her ‘tragically wounded’ moments,” says Laurel. “She found out that Justin had Meredith Morgan’s phone number written on the bottom of his shoe. The very last number was worn off, but still, Annika could tell. She locked herself in a bathroom stall and Devon found her. She talked Annika off the ledge.”
I shake my head. “What ledge? You said she was in the bathroom.”
“The toilet ledge. Annika was about to dunk Justin’s history binder.”
“She should have,” I say. “Justin’s got a history. A bad one.”
“Devon said all she needed to do was fluff up her hair—” Susannah explains.
I interrupt. “She told Annika to fluff up all that hair? Right there in the stall? That’s not even sanitary. Annika’s hair is bigger
than Justin’s ego!”
“But it worked,” says Laurel. “Justin’s a sucker for curls. By that afternoon, he was following Annika around like he was on a leash.”
I’m so mad I catch my finger while zipping up my bag. Annika’s always been a loyal client of mine. So has her enormo-hair. I’ve coached it through everything from seriously nasty bangs to an even nastier home perm. Any and all hair advice comes from me and her overworked hairstylist.
The second bell rings. I march toward Mrs. Patinkin’s homeroom. Susannah and Laurel jog to catch up.
“Zoë, don’t be upset,” says Susannah. “Think of it as a good thing. Devon’s saved you tons of work. Now you can relax and focus on catching up with your schoolwork. And us. Mostly us.” She giggles.
“She moved in on my turf,” I say.
“For a few days…and now that you’ve returned she can go back to her rotten poetry,” says Laurel with a wave of her hand. “Don’t worry. You’re still the One and Only Lama in this school.”
I give my girls the secret punch for believing in me, which comes from the knuckles and involves an unexpected maneuver at the end. But if I told you any more, I’d have to kill you.
Just before I reach the classroom, I’m picked up and twirled around from behind. Which is annoying when you’re as small as me, because it’s been happening to you ever since you learned to crawl. I turn around and instasmile because the annoying picker-upper isn’t annoying after all. It’s Riley Sinclair, the Most Unbelievably Cute Guy in School (MUCGIS) and the boy I’m going to marry, and he’s wearing the shirt I gave him for his birthday.
“Hi,” I say, because his cuteness has temporarily blurred my thoughts.
“Zozers!” he says. If anyone other than Riley called me this, I’d thump them. But Riley gets extra-special privileges, for obvious reasons. “How much did you miss me?”
I hold up my finger and thumb real close together to show him I only missed him about a half inch, and he fake-dies a painful death, like I’ve stabbed him in the rugby shirt…which I’d never do on account of liking both him and his shirt way too much.
Mrs. Patinkin raps a ruler against her desk. “Take your seats, people.”
I start to follow Riley inside, when Susannah grabs my arm and pulls me back. “There she is!” She’s pointing down the empty hallway.
“Who?”
“Devon Sweeney. Did you see her?”
I shake my head. “All I saw was a flash of glossy blond hair.”
Susannah nods. “Exactly.”
I’m watching the clock in science class. It’s nearly 3:15 and I still haven’t gotten more than a glimpse of this Devon Sweeney from behind. Although, I’ve heard enough about her to rot me from the inside out:
Avery Buckner said, “Zoë, Devon’s like an angel!”
Sylvia Smye, after slipping the Bovine Balm into her bag, said, “Have you seen her legs, Zoë? They’re as long as a colt’s!”
And Riley, who’s never really approved of my chocaholicism, said, “She hasn’t eaten a speck of sugar in three years, Zoë. Can you imagine? She’s your polar opposite!”
Polar opposite, my elbow. My legs may be shorter than a colt’s eyelashes, and I’d rather be ripped apart by wolverines than go off chocolate chips for even three days, but I’m definitely angelic. If you ask the right person.
It seems I’m doomed to just miss Devon. Every time I enter a classroom, gym, cafeteria, or stairwell, she’s just left. The only evidence of Devon Sweeney’s existence I came across all day was an efficient blond bob disappearing through a doorway, a dropped pencil with teeth marks in it (I’d never gnaw on an instrument of higher learning!), and an empty bag of veggie puffs in the cafeteria trash.
Words Made of Churning Bubbles of Intestinal Gases Are Not Words. They’re Sewage.
Wednesday morning I’m sitting at my wobbly desk at the back of the class, trying desperately to ignore the vomitous haze of stink forming above Smartin’s wet boots on my left, and Alice Marriott’s prancing kitten barrettes and matching socks, which are soiling up the atmosphere on my right. It’s even less simple to ignore the crumbly stuff behind Avery’s ears, since he sits right in front of me. It’s something of a soap-scum biohazard and I’m finding it hard to look away.
Up at the front of the class, where the sun shines brighter and the air quality is better, Maisie and Brianna giggle over something in Brianna’s desk. Susannah and Laurel style each other’s hair. Riley shoots rubber bands into the trash can. And Tall Paul and Small Paul compare shoe sizes. Sigh. I miss my Frontie days.
A couple of months ago, I returned from hauling Smartin to the office for solitary confinement, and found a new girl sitting at my desk. Maisie. It seemed she needed to sit right up front with Laurel, Susannah, and Riley. Something to do with her depth-perception problem. So, just like that, she took my place among the Fronties and I was cruelly shipped to the rear to fend for myself in the slimy underworld of the Backies.
So here I sit, tiny warrior that I am.
To take my mind off Avery’s ears, I stare at Sylvia. Dear sweet Sylvia, not quite a Frontie, not quite a Backie. Just sitting in the nether region of the middle—always without a complaint. She truly is my dream client. She works exclusively with my advice and almost never double-checks with her mother. She keeps her expectations realistic. Knows no amount of advice is going to turn her into Susannah Barnes. And, she doesn’t expect success to happen overnight.
Honestly, I see Sylvia as a little bird who’s fallen out of the nest too early. Her feathers still poke out in every which direction (cowlicks), her little wings make her practically defenseless (total lack of muscle tone), and every so often there’s a worm in her beak (lettuce in her braces).
I watch as she pecks hopelessly at something in her binder. She pulls her hand away and accidentally yanks out her timetable, tearing the three little holes in the paper. For a moment, she stares at the shredded holes. She seems to slump, and her little beak tilts up toward the sky.
I dig through the office-supplies section of my desk. “Sylvia,” I whisper. She spins around and smiles. I toss her a small package of stick-’em hole-fixing thingies. I watch the plastic box sail through the air and realize, too late, that Sylvia’s holding her hands too far apart to catch it. The pack drops to the floor. It bursts open and tiny O’s scatter far and wide across the room.
Like tiny grubworms. Or maybe ringworms, because they’re round. Or tapeworms, because they’re sticky.
Just as Sylvia is picking them up, in walks Mrs. Patinkin with none other than Mr. Renzetti, our principal.
Mrs. Patinkin looks at the mess and blushes at Mr. Renzetti, who is pulling a sticky white ring from the bottom of his expensive-looking shoe. When Mrs. Patinkin sees this, her eyes bug. She says as calm as she can, “Sylvia Smye, I’ll ask you to keep your school supplies in your desk, not on the floor!”
“But they’re not—” chirps Sylvia.
“Sylvia,” the teacher says with a fake smile, “just pick them up.”
I put up my hand. “Actually, Mrs. Patinkin, it’s my fault. I threw them at Sylvia and the stupid box exploded, and then, like, ten thousand holey things flew out and—”
“Thank you for your candor and frankness, Zoë. After Mr. Renzetti leaves, I’ll ask you to write both of these qualities on the board and we’ll study them.” She looks at Mr. Renzetti. “I always like to reinforce vocabulary. If they can just learn to employ their verbiage in the real world, they’ll be that much better prepared—”
Mr. Renzetti looks up at the clock. “Can we get started here? I have a meeting in twenty minutes.”
Mrs. Patinkin practically bows. “Class, Mr. Renzetti has an announcement to make. Put down your pencils and listen.”
One of Mr. Renzetti’s shoes makes a sticky noise as he walks to the front of the room, but he pretends not to notice. He smiles. “Good morning, everybody. I’ve got some good news and some better news. What would you like to hear first?”
About a hundred hands shoot up in the air and everyone says, “Ooh, ooh, ooh!” Small Paul is practically bouncing out of his seat and Smartin’s hand is stretched so far out, his fingertips are officially Fronties.
“The better news!” grunts Smartin.
“No!” Avery spins around. “The good news always comes first!”
“You wouldn’t know good news if it bit you in the lip,” whispers Smartin. “You’d never see it coming through those greasy glasses!”
“Boys,” says Mrs. Patinkin. She’s glaring.
“How about we have a rock, paper, scissors contest?” asks Alice. “Starting with me and Zoë. Winner fights Martin. And that winner fights Avery. And that winner chooses the news.”
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. It’s a moron colony back here.
“Thank you, Alice,” says Mr. Renzetti. “But, in the interest of saving time, I’ll just go ahead with the good news.”
Avery clenches his dirty fist and hisses, “Yes!”
Mr. Renzetti looks toward the door like he’s planning his escape. “Mrs. Peebles, one of our sixth-grade teachers, is leaving the school. She and her family will be moving to Oregon next week, where she will finally achieve her lifelong dream of becoming principal of a very prominent private school. Allencroft Middle School couldn’t be more proud of our very own Mrs. Peebles.” He pauses a moment to make sure we look proud enough, but we pretty much look like our usual selves. So he continues, “Unfortunately, this means that her triplets, Dara, Lara, and Melanie, will no longer be part of our sixth-grade community. And when a school our size loses its very favorite set of triplets, it creates something of a numerical imbalance.”
Mrs. Patinkin hurries and writes numerical, then imbalance, on the blackboard for us to torture ourselves over later. Great.
