The Curtain Call Caper (The Gabby St. Claire Diaries)

by Christy Barritt

  Life’s not fair, Gabby.

  True. Especially in the Princess’s case. Not only was she rich, she was naturally platinum blonde, beautiful, well dressed, and, did I mention, rich? Somehow all that seemed like way more compensation than being dimwitted and gullible deserved.

  Plus, her family adored her. The whole clan attended every show of every play or function and even presented her with a dozen roses after the final curtain closed. They acted as if she was a terrific actress like Julie Andrews, when in actuality she usually just had to stand somewhere.

  Must be nice to have daddy buy you a part. Or care enough to come to school to see you.

  Another part of my brain kicked in and kicked hard.

  Stop feeling sorry for yourself. Look at what you do have.

  I had my BFF and our new friend Brandon.

  I smiled, and my heart sped up a fraction.

  Brandon sat just one seat over, on the other side of Becca. I glanced at my BFF and saw the dopey smile across her face.

  I immediately felt guilty. Though Becca had just laid eyes on him, I could tell she liked him. That she really liked him.

  Becca never really had crushes on guys at school. In fact, I had the impression she thought boys were silly and not worth the time. But when I looked at her now, I saw the dreamy look in her eyes.

  That’s when I knew that Brandon was my BFF’s crush, not mine.

  I tried to channel my inner Laurey and hummed “Many a New Day.” Yep, there were lots of guys out there. No need for me to get caught up with one. Sisters before misters.

  The Gorilla clapped once to get our attention. Most everyone clapped once in response and the auditorium fell silent. The queen of the middle school jungle didn’t have to clap twice.

  “Mrs. Baker says we have to get to the critical part of auditions today.” The Gorilla paused and glared at us. “Hopefully, some of you middle schoolers know how to square dance. Oklahoma is a musical . . .” Her voice faded away as squeaks of panic joined mine.

  Square dancing? Nothing in all of my mom’s music about square dancing. My mom had loved the old music and dance moves from the sixties. She’d shown me the Swim, the Surfer Stomp, the Twist, even the Locomotion. No do-si-do, though.

  My heart sank. I racked my brain trying to conjure up some long forgotten video of what square dancing looked like. All I could picture was happy, smiling people in checkered shirts and jean skirts swinging each other around. While banjo music played. In a barn with hay bales and smelling faintly of manure.

  It was no use. I didn’t have a clue what to do.

  “Would anyone like to go first and demonstrate the Virginia Reel?” Madame Cherise sounded hopeful and melodramatic at the same time. Where had a French teacher learned to play square dance music? Plus, what did she know about theater anyway except the fact she was famous for her classroom theatrics? Kids said she’d shriek dramatically and act stuff out when she conjugated verbs.

  I decided to share my opinion as an excuse to talk to Brandon.

  “Madame C is the French teacher and she—” I stopped whispering in mid-sentence and my mouth dropped open.

  Brandon stood and raised his hand. He was . . . volunteering?

  “I will.” Brandon’s voice had a confident ring to it as he stepped past Becca and me into the aisle.

  “You’ll need a partner. I’ll call as I play.” Madame Cherise appeared pleased she had a willing victim.

  “One of you be my partner.” Brandon looked expectantly at Becca and me.

  My BFF shrank into the seat, trying to disappear into the upholstery. When would she realize that was impossible for someone of her height? She shook her head vigorously.

  “I don’t know how,” she hissed in a panicked voice.

  The next thing I knew, Brandon held out his hand to me, smiling. His green eyes were encouraging, assuring, mesmerizing. My body rose of its own volition. My inner voices squabbled in panic as I debated if I was nuts or not.

  Sit down! Screamed the logical part of my brain.

  But before I could obey, the brash, reckless side of me took over. Why not? I can at least hold his hand. I can take that away, and this whole thing won’t be a total loss.

  Not that I was crushing on my best friend’s crush.

  Brandon pulled me along, up the steps, and into the middle of the stage. Then it hit me like a wave at the bottom of the giant waterslide at Water Country USA.

  Everyone was going to witness my crash and burn. Or my second crash and burn, if you included the spotlight. Which didn’t count. It wasn’t my fault.

  Why don’t I think before jumping in to these things?

  Brandon leaned close, his minty breath in my ear, and a hand on the small of my back. “I got this. Just follow my lead. We’ll be great!”

  I nodded. The music started. Brandon led and I followed. He not only knew what he was doing, he did it effortlessly. I could almost imagine the two of us as leads in the play. Dancing together. Totally graceful, completely in tune, undeniably in love.

  Then I tripped over my own foot and came back to reality.

  Mrs. Baker, Mr. Zollin, and Madame Cherise applauded. Titters in the audience, like crickets in the night, chirped softly. I couldn’t care less. My eyes were held by Brandon’s. We’d done it. Plus he was still holding my hands. Both of them.

  The magical moment almost made up for the vomit, detention, scattered books, spotlight, and a new snide remark from the middle of the auditorium—that with my frizzy, red hair I was a shoo in for a tumbleweed part.

  Almost.

  After a quick squeeze, Brandon dropped my hands, and we scooted off stage.

  “Looked good,” whispered Becca. She sounded sincerely shocked. She turned to Brandon. “When did you learn to square dance?”

  “Dance classes. I’ve done just about every kind under the sun.”

  “Wow,” Becca said.

  The adult powwow was breaking up. Madame Cherise shook Mr. Zollin’s hand like it was a pump handle. All three of them smiled.

  Good. Maybe everything would work out for this play after all.

  ***

  After some more auditions and additional instructions, Mrs. Baker stood at the front of the auditorium and clapped. “Everyone up on stage.”

  I glanced over and saw the Diva trying to drag Mitch onstage with her. He shook his head and pointed into the lights.

  “Not a good idea,” he muttered. “Especially not if there really is a ghost that haunts this place.”

  The Diva rolled her eyes. “That rumor has been around for years. That’s all it is—a silly rumor. Don’t be superstitious.”

  He shrugged. “Well, I’m not taking any chances. I’ll stay out here and keep an eye on things. Besides, I’m not a dancer.”

  The Diva pouted. “Fine. Have it your way.”

  I poked Becca and jerked my head toward them. “Trouble in paradise?”

  She shrugged.

  The Caveman jammed his hands in his pockets and sat down instead of following the Diva.

  “Find a partner,” our director ordered.

  Unfortunately, Becca and I both tried to partner up with Brandon and collided. My BFF stared at me, hurt and shock lining her gaze. I immediately regretted my hasty actions.

  In that brief moment, Donabell took advantage of the situation and slipped past us both to latch on to him.

  “Sorry,” I whispered. “It’s just that we, he and I, we’d been . . .”

  Luckily, I didn’t have to finish because Mrs. Baker was unintentionally coming to my rescue.

  “Paulette,” she ordered. “You be the new boy’s partner.”

  I couldn’t decide whether to be disappointed for myself, relieved I wasn’t bumping out my best friend, or delighted the Diva had been thwarted. Donabell settled for an eighth grade boy, cutting all of us a sharp look. I wondered what Mitch thought of all of this. In my mind, he’d react with a proper amount of jealousy, but nothing too over the top. After all,
he was a gentleman, concerned about the well-being of his girlfriend . . . and a ghost.

  “Everyone watch Paulette and . . . what was your name again, dear?” Madame Cherise queried over the top of her cat glasses.

  “Brandon. Brando Coe.”

  “Everyone watch Brandon and Paulette and follow suit.”

  Brandon started to protest, but I sliced my hand in front of my throat. Becca reinforced the message by doing the same thing. Brandon shrugged, took Paulette’s hand, and moved to center stage.

  That was where Donabell had planned to hold court. She stepped aside, causing the insiders of Devotees to move out of her way while trying to maintain their proximity to her. It reminded me of a kid bringing a model of the solar system into science class last year.

  The model had been huge, and he had trouble getting it through the classroom door. It wasn’t working because all the planets were rigidly attached to their sun. Right now, the Devotees looked like that, desperate to maintain their orbital position while the wannabees tried to replace them.

  Becca and I exchanged snickers.

  “People can be really stupid, making a big deal over twelve inches,” she said.

  I knew she had forgiven me.

  The remainder of auditions was taken up with do-si-do, circle round, and promenade. Donabell kept mumbling things about ghosts and making spooky, ghost-like noises.

  “She’s stumbling around like a sleepwalking mule,” I griped, motioning toward Donabell.

  Becca stifled a giggle.

  It was true. The Diva kept peering into the back of the auditorium. I wondered if Mitch had left or was sulking in the back. I peeked, but the place looked deserted.

  Mrs. Baker asked Brandon to stay back when she dismissed the rest of us, and Becca chattered on and on about him from the moment we were out of earshot until she climbed into her mom’s maroon Olds.

  I always waited around until my BFF’s ride arrived, then walked the three blocks home. Some days I detoured past the park where my brother Tim had vanished. Not that I expected I’d find him sitting on a swing, waiting for me to walk him home.

  No one used the park anymore during daylight hours. Not after Tim. It had become one of those rundown places the rougher teens slunk off to at night to get in trouble or tell ghost stories.

  This place wasn’t haunted by ghosts. But I did wonder if I could say the same about the auditorium at my school.

  CHAPTER 6

  “There are no such things as ghosts,” Becca’s scornful voice faded in and out as I tried to juggle the phone, a glass of tea and a bowl of ice cream.

  I knew that would be Becca’s reaction. She and her whole family were down to earth, health nuts who didn’t even own one TV. Instead, they did 5K’s or Volksmarches together every month or two as a family bonding exercise, and they never, ever ate any junk food. No, they took vitamins and probiotics–a fancy name for live bacteria.

  Yuck.

  “It’s like eating yogurt, but without the calories,” Becca had explained.

  “Without the taste, you mean?” I had countered.

  I had nothing against yogurt if it was frozen and topped with gummy worms. But not at the Chapman’s. Anything sweet and tasty was banned at their house. While most parents worried their child might become hooked on drugs, Becca’s agonized about sugar addiction. Becca wasn’t even allowed to sleep over at other people’s houses since she might be exposed to chocolate cake, cheese puffs, or caramel corn.

  The horrors.

  “I think Mitch was just talking about a theater ghost because the Princess is so gullible,” Becca added.

  I agreed.

  The conversation about the place being haunted had continued, scattered here and there throughout practice.

  Everyone knew Paulette was not only gullible but slow to detect sarcasm and joking as well. What no one knew was why Paulette was in a crummy public school instead of some rich kid prep place where everybody wore navy blazers and was named Muffy and Channing.

  The Zollins were the Bill Gates of our community—billionaires. But I wondered if it were really true. If they were that loaded, they’d live somewhere exotic like Paris or Rio, not Virginia Beach, Virginia. I said as much once, and Donabell had haughtily replied I was too poor to understand what having offshore accounts meant.

  Just to argue, I said it was incredibly stupid to keep your money in a bank on a boat or on one of those oil rig things rather than in a bank on land. Donabell then explained in front of her entire flock of fawning sixth grade flatterers what an offshore account was.

  I’d thought of at least a million clever retorts. Just not that day. Not that the incident had been indelibly burned into my psyche or anything.

  But really, if the Zollins had that much money, couldn’t they buy a private school so Paulette could be in musicals there?

  “Did the Diva ever come clean about it not being the 50th anniversary of the death of a student who fell from the catwalk and died during Macbeth?”

  Becca didn’t wait for my response, which was good because I’d just deposited a heaping spoonful of Bunny Tracks ice cream on my tongue. “I hate how she pretends to be such a great friend of Paulette’s but does stuff like that.”

  Becca was a defender of the underdogs. That was probably why she was my friend. I had been an underdog at Oceanside Elementary when we became friends. Becca’s mom had been many of the students’ elementary school teacher, which presented Becca with a unique set of struggles. In fact, Becca probably could have been one of the cool kids except during our fifth grade year, her mom—Mrs. Chapman—had gotten on Donabell’s bad side over the saving of seats at lunch.

  The practice wasn’t allowed but anyone who dared sit in a seat Donabell wanted for her clique suffered public humiliation until the Diva’s wishes were informal law. Kids learned quickly where to park their trays and bag lunches with just a sharp look. When Mrs. Chapman noticed what was going on, she wouldn’t let Donabell circumvent her or the rules to get her way.

  The Diva had fought back the only way she could. She and her inner circle of Devotees had been really mean to Becca because the Diva couldn’t really do anything directly to Mrs. Chapman.

  Since I was already on the Diva’s bad list, Becca figured she might as well sit with me, as far as possible from the Diva. What started out as survival at lunch and on the playground blossomed into a true friendship, even if our home lives were as different as day and night.

  Before I could say anything about the ghost, Becca launched into another monologue about Brandon, how cute he was, how well he danced, how cute he was, how glorious it would be if all three of us were cast and if she ended up as his dance partner, how cute he was. Did I mention that she thought he was cute?

  “But what if someone is deliberately trying to sabotage the play?” I hypothesized, trying to steer the conversation off Brandon. I didn’t want to slip up and agree too heartily that he was the most adorable thing I’d seen since . . . well, ever. “Maybe Principal Black tampered with that light so he doesn’t have to hang around until rehearsals finish?”

  It was school policy an administrator had to be in the building if students were present. I really didn’t think Principal Black was responsible, but I had no other suspects.

  “He has to be here anyway for clubs and basketball,” Becca reminded me.

  She had a point. Before I could back up my hypothesis with absolutely no evidence besides gut intuition, she continued.

  “I think it’s like Brandon said–the light falling was good karma because the auditions were postponed and he was therefore able to participate.”

  I didn’t know about karma, but . . .

  “Why did the light take this long to fall?” I countered.

  “Because it took this long for some klutz to stumble into the curtain,” my BFF said smugly but with a hint of amusement.

  I replied in mock horror, “You’re blaming this on me?”

  We both started giggling, and I f
elt all the tension melt away.

  “I do think it was weird how the missing scripts showed up on the seats in the front row at that first audition,” Becca said. “I know they weren’t there when they started auditions. It was the first place Mrs. Baker looked.”

  “So who moved them? The ghost?” I asked sarcastically.

  “How about aliens from outer space?”

  We both dissolved into giggles.

  “I bet the ghost was one of Brandon’s ancestors,” Becca continued. “Coming back from the dead to give him a hand and make sure he got a part.”

  I’d never heard my friend like this before. I hardly knew what to do with her.

  “They just wanted to make sure he had a chance to audition,” Becca said. “Now that its mission is accomplished, the ghost will go back to wherever. Speaking of haunting, I hope that boy haunts our lunch table for the rest of my life.”

  “Becca! Snap out of it!”

  “Gabby, you are too funny.”

  “Hey, leave my red hair out of this,” I quipped. “I just have a vivid imagination and a mind like a steel trap.”

  “More like a steel sieve,” she jokingly retorted.

  In the background, I heard her dad reminding her she had other things to do.

  “I’ve gotta run, Gabby. Later, gator,” Becca said, initiating our end-of-conversation ritual.

  “In a while, crocodile.”

  “Gotta go, buffalo!”

  “See ya at the zoo, kangaroo.”

  * * *

  I dragged the diary out from under my bed, determined to write something—anything!—so next time Becca asked I could honestly say I was journaling in it. I opened the book. The empty pages gawked back at me, giving real meaning to the phrase “blank stare.”

  “Dear Diary,” I began and scribbled through it.

  I hated that phrase. It was so mom’s generation and way too close to the word diarrhea in both the dictionary and my mind. Of course, maybe a diary was a place your mind could have diarrhea.