by Nancy N. Rue
“If you’re coordinated enough to do stage combat, you can dance,” Fiona said. “I can show you some stuff my grandfather taught me — it’s not that hard.”
“So — is that a yes?” Vincent said.
“Ye — ” Fiona stared to say. But she stopped and looked at Sophie.
Sophie herself was gaping at Fiona, chin to her chest. Her heart was racing, and she knew the red places in her own face were starting to match the ones on Jimmy’s.
She’s acting like boys ask us out every day! she thought. Doesn’t she know what just happened? They invited US — not one of the pretty girls — not the popular ones that know what to do around boys. They asked US!
“I’ll only go with you if Sophie goes with Jimmy,” Fiona said to Vincent.
All three faces turned to Sophie, but she saw only Jimmy’s. His head was tilted to the side, and his forehead was folded into worried wrinkles. She could see that there was a smile waiting on the other side of that anxious expression, if only she said the right thing.
Darbie was right, Sophie thought. I do feel special.
She tilted her chin up. “Can you waltz?” she said to Jimmy.
“Are you KIDDING?” Vincent said. “He can do ANY dance.”
Jimmy nodded. The smile was still waiting.
Sophie sucked in a big breath. “Then I accept,” she said.
Jimmy grinned so big she was sure the corners of his mouth were going to disappear into his ears.
“Sweet.” Vincent shuffled his feet as if he had run out of things to say, for Jimmy or himself. “We gotta go. See you in class.”
“You know it,” Fiona said.
The bell rang, and the two boys took off toward the building, bumping shoulders and slugging each other with lazy fists. As Fiona and Sophie headed in the same direction, Fiona clutched Sophie’s arm.
“Pretend you don’t see them staring at you,” she said between gritted teeth.
“Who?”
“Who else?”
Sophie didn’t have to look hard to see Anne-Stuart, B.J., and Julia gathered next to the trashcan that held the door open. All six eyes were trained on Sophie like shotgun barrels. But instead of dread, Sophie felt something else pulling her shoulders up straight.
“They’re so jealous,” Fiona said before they got within hearing range. “And you didn’t even have to ask Jimmy — he asked you.”
Sophie couldn’t smother a grin as she turned her head toward the Pops.
Fiona gave her a rib poke. “But don’t look at them! It’s totally un-Corn-Flake-like to gloat.”
So together they pretended to have important business to attend to on the other side of the door and zoned in on getting through. The Corn Pops didn’t make a move — until Fiona went inside just ahead of Sophie.
Before Sophie could get her foot over the threshold, she felt her backpack coming off and something heavy slamming behind her. She tried to turn to the right to see, but she found herself being spun to the left by hurried hands.
Once. Twice. With faces blurring past. When the Corn Pops let go, Sophie staggered and hit the metal trashcan. Its lid clattered off, revealing the smell of rotten banana peels and the sight of Sophie’s backpack half buried in garbage.
When she reached out to grab it, she heard Ms. Quelling’s voice barking from the doorway.
“Sophie, why are you digging through the trash, child?”
“I’m getting my backpack,” Sophie said. She yanked it loose and held it out at arm’s length. Stuck to the corner was a wad of green gum. Stuck to the gum was a piece of paper.
“How did your backpack get in there?” Ms. Quelling said.
“You don’t want to know,” Sophie said.
“Fine. Now go wipe it off in the restroom before you go to class. Mrs. Utley is not going to appreciate that lovely aroma in her classroom.” She scribbled out a hall pass on a pink pad and handed it to Sophie. “You are such a bizarre child. I think you’re going to graduate from here without my ever figuring you out.”
Sophie shook that comment off as she hurried to the girls’ restroom, holding her backpack away from her with one hand while she pinched her nostrils with the other. The paper was still dangling from the wad of gum.
In the bathroom, she pulled it off with a paper-towel-covered hand and was about to deposit it, gum and all, in the trash can when something on the paper caught her eye. The writing looked familiar. Only Anne-Stuart made all those curlicues.
Sophie let the gum plop into the garbage can and shook out the wrinkled paper. It was Anne-Stuart’s penmanship, all right, and her bad spelling.
Dear Julia,
B.J. is making me mad the way she is chaseing Jimmie. She knows I like him and that’s the onley reason she’s doing it. He dosen’t like her and she’s always hanging around me, so now he thinks I’m just like her and I’m SOOOO not!!!!!! Tod asked me to the dance and I’m going with him. It mite be kinda fun because you’ll be with Colton. Du-uh! Everybody knows you’re going out. I thot Jimme and I were going to be until B.J. I thot she was my friend, but your a much better one. She’s not the onley one who is out to get me. Those freeks — Soapy and Fiona and them — their trying to get Jimmie away from me just to be hatefull. Like they can. Once he sees that Soapy is WEIRD, then he’ll WISH he was with me. If that happens, I’ll just break up with Tod.
LOL!! What if B.J. is the only one of us who doesn’t have a date at the dance!!!! I don’t mean to be meen, but I think she deserves it.
TTFN,
Your best friend, Anne-Stuart
P.S. I know you won’t tell BJ about any of this. We can’t trust her. Just throw away this note after you read it.
P.P.S. After lunch I’m going to ask Jimmie one more time. Will you please keep B.J. out of my way?
Sophie dropped the note in the trash and went to the sink to scrub her hands.
Fiona would say that was the most heinous thing she ever read, Sophie thought. Anne-Stuart’s turning one of her friends against another one. And wishing her almost-best friend would be the only one without a boy to be with at the dance. How grotesque is that?
She ripped some paper towels from the dispenser and went after a red juice stain on her backpack.
I can’t even imagine doing that to one of my friends. We made a pact, sure, but we ALL broke it —
Except for Maggie.
Sophie froze and watched her face go pale in the mirror. Kitty and Nathan. Darbie and Ian. Fiona and Vincent. Herself and Jimmy.
Maggie and No One. Sophie left the water running as she turned away from the mirror. It was too hard to look at her own face. We broke our promise to Maggie. We’ve left her out. We aren’t any better than the Corn Pops.
Sophie didn’t know how long she had stood there leaning against the sink, chasing the same accusations around in her head, when the bathroom door swung open and Willoughby appeared.
“THERE you are!” she said. “Fiona is about to go nuts.” She sniffed. “What stinks?”
“I do,” Sophie said. “I’m disgusting.”
Willoughby brought her nose closer to Sophie.
“No, it isn’t you.” She reached behind Sophie and held up Sophie’s backpack. Water poured from one corner into a puddle on the floor. “It’s this. It smells like garbage.”
Sophie grabbed the backpack and whirled around to turn off the faucet. Water was creeping dangerously close to the top of the sink.
“I know who did this,” Willoughby said.
“Me too,” Sophie said.
“And I also know why.”
“Me too.”
Willoughby squinted her hazel eyes at Sophie. Two tiny lines formed between them.
“Aren’t you mad?” she said.
“I’m mad at myself,” Sophie said.
“Because of Maggie being the only one who hasn’t been asked?”
Sophie felt her eyes bulge. “How did you know that?”
“I heard Fiona telling Darbie and Kitty just now.
”
“Now everybody’s going to know what horrible friends we are!” Sophie could hear her own whine out-Kittying Kitty’s.
“I’m not going to tell anybody,” Willoughby said. “I swear.”
Sophie dragged her backpack behind her, trailing water across the restroom. “I have to go talk to the Corn Fla — my friends.”
She turned toward the door, but Willoughby caught her by the strap of her pack.
“There’s one more thing you should know,” she said. The two little lines were cutting into the bridge of her nose. “Maggie isn’t just going to be the only one in your group who won’t have a boy. She’s the only one in the entire CLASS.”
“What about Harley and — ”
“Those girls aren’t even going at all — they think it’s lame — and B.J. just now asked Eddie, in case she can’t get Jimmy to go with her.”
“I’M going with him,” Sophie said miserably. Just ten minutes ago that had made her feel special, like a princess. Now it was the very thing that made her want to escape into a bathroom stall for the rest of her life.
“B.J. doesn’t know that yet,” Willoughby said. She tucked her poodle hair behind her ears. “But when she does, she ISN’T going to be happy. Trust me.”
Sophie wasn’t sure she could trust Willoughby — but she definitely knew she was right. Too right.
Nine
What are we going to do?” Sophie said when she and the Corn Flakes caught up between science and math. She was afraid she was going to start crying. Kitty already had.
“I don’t think we should do anything until we have a plan,” Fiona said. “Nobody call Maggie and tell her. We’ll think of something by tomorrow.”
“We should all pray about it,” Darbie said. She looked at Kitty. “You can pray even if you don’t go to church.”
Sophie didn’t feel a twinge this time. She felt a STAB. She still hadn’t talked to Jesus.
I haven’t told him one thing in days, she thought. I wonder if he’ll even listen to me right now. I can’t just go back and start asking him for stuff now.
For once, somebody else was going to have to come up with something. All Sophie could think of between then and the next morning was more heinous things about herself.
She was the one who had said Maggie was “one of us.” And then ten minutes later she had told Jimmy she would go to the dance with him — and left Maggie sticking out like a sore toe.
She was the one who was always telling the girls they couldn’t be un-Corn-Flake-like to the Corn Pops. But the minute some boy had made her feel special, she had forgotten about one of her own friends.
There’s only one thing to do, she thought on the bus the next morning, and that’s tell Jimmy I can’t go to the dance with him.I’ll just hang out with Maggie — and we’ll have even more fun.
But in the next second she knew that wouldn’t work. Fiona had said she would go with Vincent only if Sophie went with Jimmy. Sophie couldn’t imagine doing that to Fiona, who had already arranged to give Vincent dancing lessons.
“You going to that Bible thing again?”
Sophie jumped. Gill was hanging over the seat in front of her, ball cap on backward.
“It’s today,” Gill said.
“Yeah,” Sophie said. There was another stab. She had offered to take Maggie with her. What if Maggie wouldn’t go now because Sophie didn’t even act like a Christian — betraying her friend?
“I’m going,” Gill said. “Me and Harley. I like that Dr. Peter guy.”
“Me too,” Sophie mumbled. That was the final stab: Dr. Peter was going to think she was the most awful person on the planet.
Fiona met Sophie as she dragged herself off the bus.
“You can lose the long face, Soph,” she said. “Maggie’s mom called Kitty to tell her to get Maggie’s homework because she isn’t coming to school today. That means we have more time to think of a plan. I have an idea.” She looped her arm through Sophie’s.
Sophie’s heart lifted. You decided not to go with Vincent?
“I say we ask Dr. Peter about everything today in Bible study.”
Sophie sagged. “In front of Harley and Gill?”
“They won’t tell Maggie. Besides, the one I’m worried about is Willoughby. Have you noticed she’s everywhere we are lately?”
Sophie nodded. Maybe Willoughby could come in and take her place and Sophie could just disappear.
Sophie felt heavier as the day went on, although Darbie and Fiona were counting the hours until it was time for Bible class. Sophie just knew Dr. Peter was going to be so disappointed in her — though not more disappointed than she was in herself. That wasn’t possible.
“You okay, Dream Girl?” Mama said to her when the three of them climbed into the car after school.
Sophie suddenly wanted to pour it all out to her. She might be disappointed in Sophie too, but she was Mama. She still had to love her.
Dr. Peter had juice and a giant cookie for each of them when they arrived in the beanbag room. Sophie turned hers down.
“You’re getting as bad as Maggie,” Darbie said.
“I bet that’s why she’s sick,” Fiona said. “She doesn’t eat enough.”
“I never have that problem.” Gill looked wistfully at Sophie’s uneaten cookie. “Can I have yours?”
“I feel stress in the air,” Dr. Peter said as he pulled his red beanbag closer to the circle. “Anything you want to talk about?”
“We thought you’d never ask,” Fiona said. She looked quickly at the two Wheaties, but Gill said, “Go for it.”
Fiona picked right up where she’d left off the week before and filled Dr. Peter in. Sophie couldn’t look at him. She didn’t want to see herself falling from her place in his eyes.
He was quiet for a minute after Fiona was finished.
“Uh-oh,” Fiona said. “Even you don’t have an answer?”
“I have several,” Dr. Peter said. Sophie didn’t have to look to see that there was no twinkle on his face. “But this is one of those situations where it’s going to make a lot more sense if you figure it out for yourselves.”
“If we could do that, we would!” Darbie said. “We’ve been pounding our brains!”
“I didn’t say I wasn’t going to help you. I’m going to give you an assignment that I think is going to make it all very clear.”
Sophie was glad she could keep her eyes on her Bible. But when Dr. Peter told them to imagine themselves in the story of the rich young man in Mark 10, and Sophie saw that Jesus was in it, she wanted to pull the whole beanbag over her head.
What if Jesus doesn’t want me in his stories, the way I’ve been ignoring him lately? she thought.
“ ‘As Jesus started on his way’ ” Dr. Peter read, “ ‘a man ran up to him and fell on his knees before him. “Good teacher,” he asked, “what must I do to inherit eternal life?” ’ ”
“Does that mean go to heaven?” Fiona said.
“Basically, yes,” Dr. Peter said.
“Gotcha. Go on.”
Sophie imagined herself on her knees with Jesus looking right through her. If there was anybody who needed help getting to heaven, it was her right now.
“ ‘Why do you call me good?” Jesus answered. “No one is good — except God alone.’ ”
That was kind of a relief, Sophie decided.
“ ‘You know the commandments: “Do not murder, do not commit adultery, do not steal, do not give false testimony, do not defraud, honor your father and mother.’ ”
Sophie was pretty sure she hadn’t broken any of those, even with Maggie. Still she bowed down even farther in front of Jesus. She couldn’t feel this bad and not have disobeyed some rule.
Dr. Peter read on. “ ‘Teacher,” he declared, “ ‘all these I have kept since I was a boy.’ Jesus looked at him and loved him.
‘One thing you lack,’ he said. ‘Go, sell everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then co
me, follow me.’ ”
Fiona gave a long, low whistle.
“What?” Dr. Peter said.
“MY parents would go straight to you-know-where. They’re all about their stuff.”
“This guy was too — and, Fiona, we can talk about your parents later. For now, let’s continue.” Dr. Peter’s eyes scanned the page. “ ‘At this the man’s face fell. He went away sad, because he had great wealth.’ ”
Sophie had a hard time imagining herself slinking off sad. If there was one thing she wasn’t, it was wealthy. She decided to stick around in her mind for the next part. Maybe she was supposed to be somebody else in the story.
“ ‘Jesus looked around and said to his disciples, “How hard it is for the rich to enter the kingdom of God!” The disciples were amazed at his words. But Jesus said again, “Children, how hard it is to enter the kingdom of God! It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.” ’ ”
Sophie heard herself gasping as she and the disciples looked at one another in dismay. A camel can’t pass through the eye of a needle! she thought. She knew her face was puzzled as she looked at Jesus.
“ ‘He said, “With man it is impossible to be saved, but not with God; all things are possible with God.” ’ ”
Sophie waited at Jesus’ knee for him to say something more, to explain how this would help her make things right with Maggie.
But Jesus drifted away, and Dr. Peter closed the Bible.
“No offense,” Fiona said, “but that doesn’t help.”
“It will,” Dr. Peter said, “if you do this assignment I’m going to give you.” He passed out hot-pink sheets with some words and blanks on them. “I want you to take this home and see what happens. I think you’ll be surprised by what you figure out.”
“Can we work on it together?” Darbie said.
Dr. Peter wrinkled his glasses up on his nose, and for an awful moment Sophie wondered if he was so disappointed in all the Corn Flakes that he was going to tell them no — they had done enough together. But finally he nodded his head of spiky hair and said, “As long as all of you work to find the right answers.”
