Next Door To A Star

by Krysten Lindsay Hager

  “Nick!” Morgan said. “Can you get me something to drink?”

  “Uh, yeah. Sure,” he said, getting up. “Do you want anything, Hadley?”

  I shook my head and as soon as he went inside, Pilar and Morgan got up to go to the bathroom and Simone grabbed my wrist.

  “I need another soda. Come with me,” Simone said. I followed her to the picnic table and she picked up a brownie and started to eat.

  “These are so good,” she said with her mouth full. “Try one.” I ate a brownie as Simone took another one. “Isn’t Connor hot?” she asked.

  “Is he your boyfriend?”

  She scrunched up her nose. “Kinda. I guess. I thought he liked Pilar, but I guess he likes me now.”

  “Did Pilar say she was okay with him liking you now?”

  Simone got defensive. “She said she was, why?”

  “No reason. I just wondered.” Simone seemed upset, so I went on saying Pilar didn’t seem mad. I didn’t know how anyone could tell how Pilar was feeling about anything, because she always had the same expression on her face. Pilar was pretty and exotic, but she always appeared like she had sucked on a lemon and smelled a wet dog.

  “Does Nick have a girlfriend?” I asked, hoping I wasn’t being too obvious.

  “Not right now, but anyway, Connor wants me to go to a party this weekend. It’s his cousin’s party, but my mom would freak if I went ’cause he and Lucas are going to be seniors.” She rolled her eyes. “Do you think it would be okay if I said I was going to your grandparents’ house so I wouldn’t get in trouble?”

  “I guess it would be okay,” I said. Simone gave me a big grin, and even her round blue eyes seemed to smile at me.

  “Great, thanks. Have another brownie,” she said. “They’re gluten-free.”

  Morgan and Pilar came back and wanted to go to Lucas’s house and take his dad’s boat out.

  “Wait, let me ask my mom,” Simone said.

  It was obvious I wasn’t invited, so I stood there while Pilar twisted a strand of shiny black hair around her finger.

  “You guys, she won’t let me go,” Simone said, walking over to us. “Do you wanna stay here and watch a movie instead?”

  Morgan rolled her eyes and said they were going.

  “Hadley, can you come with us?” Nick asked.

  “Her name is Hayley, duh,” Morgan said.

  “Uh, no, it’s Hadley. I had it right, didn’t I?” he asked.

  I nodded. “Yeah, but…I should probably stay with Simone.”

  “Okay, cool. So…see ya around then?” he asked.

  I couldn’t stop the stupid smile that was taking over my face.

  “Yeah, I hope so.” Did I sound too desperate?

  “Good.” The five of them left, but he turned around and winked at me. My heart felt like it shot up a whole story.

  “Let’s go inside,” Simone said. She flopped across the couch in the family room while I sat on the floor.

  “My mom never lets me do anything,” she said, flinging a flowered pillow across the room. I put a cartoon in and Simone pulled her legs up and started picking at the silver nail polish on her toes. Her entertainment center had a bunch of DVDs marked with different episodes of the show Simone was on. There were like, a billion DVDs there, and I wondered why she had stopped acting.

  “How long where you on Duncan’s Corner?” I asked.

  “Three seasons. Do you want some more chips?” She got up without waiting for me to answer.

  “Is Nick a senior too?” I asked.

  “Nope, a junior.”

  I stood up to leave when the movie ended, and Simone said she’d walk me back. We went through the backyard and she grabbed a bottle of regular Coke from the cooler.

  “Ma, I’m walking Hadley home,” she said.

  We got to the backdoor and I wasn’t sure what to do.

  “Thanks for inviting me,” I said.

  “No problem. Now remember, if anybody asks, I’m going to be at your house on Saturday night, ’kay?”

  “Right. See ya,” I said and she waved without turning around. I wondered what it’d be like to be invited to a party like that.

  Chapter Six

  The next day, Aunt Maggie asked if I wanted to invite one of my friends to go to the movies. I couldn’t invite Charlotte after I blew her off yesterday, and Simone had been to the Golden Globes before, so it wasn’t like she was gonna want to hang out with my stupid cousin and his friends. Clark brought three of his friends and I wound up sitting next to Uncle Stu. The movie was dumb, but Josh Haven was in it and he was so sweet. Aunt Faith called him “the boy next door,” but Aunt Maggie called him “cute, but kind of dim.” We stopped for lunch on the way home, and the guys were acting out one of the fight scenes when Pilar, Morgan, and Simone walked into the restaurant. I wanted to die when Clark’s friend Peter ran into Morgan’s leg as she was sitting down.

  “Ew, get it off me,” she said as I slumped in my seat, hoping they wouldn’t see me.

  “Sorry,” Peter said as he backed away from Morgan. She rolled her eyes.

  “Uncle Stu, can we get the pizza to go?” I asked.

  “What’d ya say, hon?” he asked. “Hey! Clark, put it down. Mister, I am gonna count to three and—” I asked again if we could leave, but by then the waitress had already brought our sodas so I was stuck there. Aunt Maggie went to get some more crayons so the boys could, “shut up and color.” While I ate, I watched Pilar fix her hair in the reflection of the napkin holder. I swear she could make a mirror out of anything. I got up to use the restroom, and my hopes of not running into them were shot in the butt when I heard Simone and Pilar come into the bathroom while I was in one of the stalls.

  “So is Lauren going to stay at your house?” Pilar asked.

  “Yeah, my Mom’s gonna pick her up from the airport,” Simone said. “Remember, nobody’s supposed to know she’s coming. I only told you guys, okay?”

  Were they talking about Lauren Gere who was on Duncan’s Corner with her? I was dying to know, so I decided to come out of the stall. Simone and Pilar exchanged a look when they saw me.

  “Hey, Hadley, what’s up?” Simone asked, pulling out her lip gloss.

  “Nothing. What’s new with you?” She shrugged as she concentrated on applying her gloss. Pilar nudged her arm.

  “We gotta go, but call me later, okay?” she said as Pilar pulled her out the door.

  Great, so I wasn’t worthy of hearing her big news. I was just good enough to cover her butt when she needed to sneak out. Whatever. I decided to forget about her…until I got home and realized I was dying to meet Lauren Gere. Simone probably couldn’t say anything about it to me in front of Pilar because she had told her not to tell anyone. She didn’t want to look like a hypocrite, right? So I called Simone and she told me to come over. Her mom was vacuuming under the couch cushions when I walked in.

  “Are you guys having company?” I asked.

  “Yeah, my friend Lauren is coming to visit soon, but I’m not supposed to tell too many people. She’s super private,” Simone said. “Want a soda?”

  “Lauren Gere? From the show?”

  “Yup. Do you want diet vanilla, cherry, or regular Coke? Cherry’s my favorite,” Simone said.

  “Could I meet her?”

  Simone stopped pouring the drinks. “Yeah, sure, but she recently broke up with her boyfriend, and she’s afraid the magazines will come down here to find her. She was dating Stephen Harmon from Fate’s Wicked Twists and they were on the cover of Teen Vogue together, and then he got a big movie role and dumped her for his co-star Tiarra Gregory. Anyway, he’s kinda been in the tabloids a lot and there’s been a lot of crap about the breakup in the magazines and stuff. She wants to hang out here and not worry about anything.”

  I promised not to say anything. We went into her room. Morgan called while I was there, but Simone told her she didn’t feel like going out.

  “Morgan, I don’t feel like it. I know, but
I have company right now. No, not Lauren, but—Morgan! Geez, let me talk! I have a headache and Hadley’s here, so I can’t leave right now. I’ll call you tomorrow, okay?”

  Simone tossed her cell phone onto her vanity. “She won’t shut up about Lauren. It’s so annoying. Let’s go watch a movie or something.” She got up without waiting for me.

  Later, I walked past the Lidstrom’s cottage on the way home, and Mr. Lidstrom was outside watering his yard. I felt so guilty when he waved to me. I wondered if Charlotte had said anything to him about what a jerk I was.

  I walked into the house and Grandma and Grandpa were about to go to the store to pick up dinner, so I went along. While my grandparents were arguing over what to get to eat, I went to look at the makeup. I wasn’t sure what I needed to get because my mom only wore blush and lipstick. Valeria said her favorite brand of mascara was Be Lashful and she “Couldn’t live without Cover Girl blush and lip gloss.” I picked up a tube of Be Lashful mascara, some blush, and a sheer pink lip gloss. I asked Grandpa if I could get some makeup and he nodded, but I don’t think he was paying attention.

  As soon as we got home, I went up to my room and dumped the makeup on my bed. I took out my favorite picture of Valeria and tried to copy what she had done with her makeup. I smeared the blush on, but my skin didn’t glow like hers. I put the mascara on next, but I got it in my eye, which started to tear up and left watery tracks in my blush so I had to wash my face and start over. Now I knew why my mom didn’t wear mascara. I tried it again and managed to keep the mascara out of my eyes. I put on the gloss and checked myself out in the mirror. A little better, but I didn’t look a thing like Valeria. She must have used some other stuff she didn’t mention, or I just wasn’t as pretty as her. I wore my new makeup to dinner and Grandma noticed the lip gloss right away.

  “Look at all that lipstick,” she said. “Looks like you ran a lollipop across your mouth.” Not the look I was going for at all.

  “It looks nice,” Aunt Faith said.

  I leaned over and grabbed a piece of the cucumber she was chopping up for dinner. I asked her if she knew who Valeria Joseph was, but Aunt Faith hadn’t heard of her.

  “Is she a singer or an actress?” she asked.

  “She’s on a soap called Charmed Lives,” I said.

  “Your mother lets you watch those shows?” Grandma asked. “Those stories are a waste of time. Trash.”

  “I watch You Only Live Once,” Maggie said. “The storyline’s good right now—”

  Grandma gave her a look and she got quiet.

  “I don’t watch the show, but I saw Valeria in a magazine.”

  Aunt Maggie said she might know who she was, so I showed her a picture.

  “She looks like a Barbie doll,” Aunt Maggie said as Aunt Faith glanced over her shoulder. If Faith had longer hair and wore a lot more makeup, she might look a little bit like Valeria. Grandpa came in the kitchen to get the barbecue sauce and saw my magazine.

  “Hey, Chandler Ashton,” he said.

  Chandler Ashton was Valeria’s character on the show. Grandma asked him how he knew her name and he shrugged.

  “I must have seen her on a news program or something,” he said. “Am I going to do the corn on the grill too?”

  “Dad, do you watch Charmed Lives?” Aunt Maggie smirked.

  “You know your mother doesn’t approve of those types of shows,” he said. “Hadley, do you want to set the table?”

  I nodded, but I hated eating outside, because you get bugs in your face and you spend the whole time guarding your food. Clark was eating at his friend’s house for dinner, so I was stuck sitting next to Lily, who was having toddler meat sticks for dinner. She kept waving her hands around and getting hot dog water on me. Then she dumped her toddler cup over my plate and little drops of juice got on my potato chips. Aunt Maggie took the cup away from her, but my chips still had red stuff all over them.

  After dinner, Grandpa took us out on the boat. Aunt Faith stayed home because she gets seasick. I was nervous at first, but it was kind of fun when the boat hit choppy water. Grandma didn’t find it fun at all and she kept telling Grandpa to slow down. My mascara was smeared under my eyes when I got back to the house.

  “Weird question, but why does Charlotte live with her Grandpa? Where are her parents?” I asked Aunt Maggie as we walked inside.

  “Her mom passed away two years ago from a rare blood disorder. Her parents got divorced a long time ago,” she said. “I don’t know if she sees her dad—”

  “He was no good,” Grandma interrupted. “Her mother was a saint to put up with him.”

  Maggie touched my arm. “Why don’t you go over there with some cookies?” she said. “We’re going to do boring grownup stuff tonight. You should hang out with your friend.”

  I figured even if Charlotte hated me, there’s no way anyone would slam the door in my face if I had homemade cookies. So I took my chances and walked over and rang the doorbell.

  “Those cookies look good,” Mr. Lidstrom said when he answered the door. “Let’s get a nice glass of milk to go with those.”

  Charlotte took a cookie without saying anything. They were watching Entertainment Tonight, so Mr. Lidstrom took the plate into the family room. Char sat back down on the couch. She was looking through old issues of gossip magazines and some issues of Soap Opera Digest. She didn’t say anything, so I picked up one of the issues and started to flip through it.

  “Here,” she said, pushing something toward me. It was a picture of Jack Brogger.

  “Thanks,” I said, hoping the gesture meant she wasn’t too mad at me anymore. “What’s new?”

  She shrugged and kept turning pages. Then she looked up. “Do you want to go downtown tomorrow and hang out at noon?”

  “Yeah, I’d love that.”

  She nodded slowly. “Okay.”

  Uncle Stu sent me a text saying it was getting late and Grandma wanted me home, so I got up to leave.

  “See you tomorrow?” Char asked.

  “Definitely.”

  Chapter Seven

  Simone called me the next morning and asked me to come over. I knew I should go meet Char, but I didn’t know if Simone would ever invite me over again. I mean, it wasn’t like TV stars regularly called my house. Okay, so it wasn’t like anybody called my house, so I couldn’t tell Simone I was busy—especially when Lauren Gere was coming to town. Instead, I called Charlotte and told her I couldn’t hang out today. She started to ask why, but I said my grandpa had to use the phone. I felt so crappy lying to her, but I figured she’d understand if she had the chance to hang out with Simone, wouldn’t she?

  Simone was sitting on her bed when I walked in her room. She was wearing a tiny orange t-shirt that showed off her tan stomach, designer jeans, and a pair of straw platform Steve Madden sandals. I had never seen anybody at Goodacre Academy wearing clothes like that. Brittany and Isabella would die if they saw me hanging out with somebody like Simone. I would have to get somebody to take a picture of us together before I left Grand Haven so I could show everyone back home I was friends with a TV star. I wasn’t sure Simone considered me her friend, but still, she had invited me over.

  “So guess what? Major news. Nick Jenkins e-mailed me about you,” she said.

  I sat down in a chair that was like a giant birdcage, and it swung out underneath me.

  “I hate those chairs,” she said as I almost fell out. “My mother has a thing for shabby chic. It’s so weird. Promise me you’ll never attempt to sit in that thing in front of Nick.”

  “Sorry, so what exactly did he say?” I asked. “Don’t leave anything out. Not even one word he uttered.”

  “He wanted to know how long you were staying in town and if you had a boyfriend and…wait for it…if you had asked about him.”

  “What did you say?” I leaned so far forward that I almost tipped out of the stupid chair again.

  “I played it totally cool. I said, ‘She might have asked. I can’t remembe
r. I want to say she did ask about you, but it was such a crazy night.’ Then he asked if I’d bring you along the next time we all go out together.”

  “Seriously? Are you for real?” Is this when she was going to ask if I’d come to the party with her so we could all hang out together?

  “Yup. He said you were super funny and sweet and he definitely wanted to get to know you better. Do you want something to drink?” she asked.

  I hated diet soda, but Simone always drank it, so I said I wanted a diet vanilla soda. She came back with two bottles, and I moved to sit on her bed because I kept bumping my head on the birdcage chair. She kicked off her gorgeous sandals and motioned toward my sneakers.

  “I can’t stand wearing shoes in the summer,” she said.

  “Me neither. I, um…couldn’t find my sandals,” I said. “So…anyway, is Nick going to be at that party tomorrow?”

  “Oh yeah, he’ll definitely be there,” she said, and I held my breath as I waited for her to invite me to go with her.

  “So, is it still okay if I say I’m at your house tomorrow?” she asked, leaning forward. I could smell her lime-scented body lotion. I didn’t know what to say, so I nodded and she jumped up. “Great, let’s go get some ice cream.”

  As I followed her out the door, I felt defeated. Like I had gotten so close, but still wasn’t getting asked to hang out with the popular crowd. But Nick had asked about me, and that was something.

  Simone wanted to go to the ice cream place where all the high school guys hung out, but there was hardly anybody in there when we walked in. She ordered a waffle cone with cookie dough ice cream, which was my favorite flavor too.

  “Ew, there’s nobody good here,” she said, looking around for a table. She went back to the guy behind the counter. “Can I get this dipped in sprinkles?” she asked, leaning across the counter and smiling up at him.

  He dipped her cone and told her it was on the house even though the sign said it cost a dollar for sprinkles.