The Classy Crooks Club

by Alison Cherry

  My summer soccer team practices at my middle school, which is about four blocks from my house. Normally, I’d walk there, swinging by Maddie’s house to pick her up on the way, but Grandma Jo’s house is half an hour from mine. So the second the little silver clock on the mantel chimes twelve fifteen, I cut her off by clearing my throat as politely as I can. “It’s almost time for soccer, Grandma Jo,” I tell her. “I better get my uniform on.” I know how much she hates being interrupted, but she also hates it when people are late, so I’m hoping it’ll cancel out.

  Grandma Jo sighs heavily and shakes her head, and for a second I’m terrified she’s going to tell me I’m not allowed to go to soccer anymore. But then she says, “Stanley will take you in the town car. Meet him in the garage when you’re dressed.”

  I dash up to my room before she can change her mind.

  The whole chauffeur thing shouldn’t really surprise me—it’s not like I thought Grandma Jo was going to drive me herself with a broken foot—but I’m still a little weirded out by the thought of some guy I don’t even know taking me to soccer. Is he going to be wearing a uniform? What the heck is a town car? Is that the normal black car Grandma Jo drives when she comes to our house for holidays, or is it like a limousine? I can’t show up for soccer in a limousine.

  My uniform is in one suitcase, and my cleats and shin guards are at the bottom of another, so by the time I’m done getting ready, it looks like my luggage threw up all over the floor. In case Grandma Jo checks my room, I shove everything under the bed and pull down the dust ruffle. There’s not a single dust bunny under there to keep my stuff company.

  I fill up my water bottle, stuff my cleats into my duffel, and pull my hair into a ponytail as I dash down the stairs. “Bye, Grandma Jo,” I call as I slip past the parlor.

  “No running in the house, Annemarie,” she calls back. “And no shouting!”

  The door to the garage is off the kitchen, and I throw it open, then jump back with a little squeak—there’s a guy in a button-down shirt and dark jeans standing about two feet from me. But this can’t possibly be Stanley. Guys named Stanley are my dad’s age and have beer bellies and mustaches. This guy looks like he could’ve walked right off one of the movie posters my friend Amy has plastered all over her room. I imagine Grandma Jo visiting all the gyms in the area and picking out the cutest guy she could find to drive her around.

  “Miss Annemarie?” he says.

  “It’s not—I mean—yeah, but—it’s AJ,” I stammer, and I feel my cheeks go pink. Oh my God, I have got to pull myself together.

  Stanley smiles. “Pleasure to meet you, Miss AJ,” he says. “I’m Stanley.” He reaches for my hand, and for a second I’m worried he might kiss it or something, but he just gives it a firm shake. I hope my palm doesn’t feel too sweaty.

  “Fenton’s Foxes, huh?” he says, nodding at the picture of the fox on the front of my orange and white soccer uniform.

  “Uh-huh,” I say, oh-so-articulately. When he seems to be waiting for more, I say, “Um, Fenton’s is the name of this ice cream parlor near my house? They sponsor us, and they give us free sundaes after our games, so . . . yeah.”

  “Sweet deal,” Stanley says. “When I was your age, my summer soccer league was sponsored by an auto repair shop.”

  “What’d they give you to eat after your games? Tires?”

  For a second I’m mortified by my terrible joke, but then Stanley bursts out laughing. No way; he actually thinks I’m funny! “Rubber isn’t quite as delicious as mint chocolate chip, as it turns out,” he says.

  “That’s my favorite ice cream too,” I tell him, and suddenly I’m not quite as nervous anymore. For a second I imagine inviting Stanley to share a Fenton’s grasshopper sundae with me when he comes to pick me up after a game. Brianna from my team would die—she’s always bragging about the eighth graders she dates. Maddie and I are pretty sure she makes it all up, though. Who would go on dates with someone as snotty as her?

  “Ready to go?” Stanley asks. When I nod, he goes around and opens the car door for me like I’m one of those respectable ladies Grandma Jo is always going on about. The car is just the normal one I’ve seen her drive before, and a tiny little part of me is actually disappointed. I slide into the passenger’s seat and tuck my soccer bag under my feet, and Stanley shuts the door gently behind me. On the other side of the garage is a big black van with tinted windows, the kind of thing you might drive if you wanted to kidnap someone. I wonder what use my grandmother could possibly have for a car like that.

  “So, how did you end up working for Grandma Jo?” I ask when Stanley gets in beside me.

  “She’s friends with my grandmother,” Stanley explains. “I was looking to make some extra money, so when Mrs. Johansen hurt her foot, my grandma recommended that she hire me for a little while.”

  “Huh,” I say. I never really considered that my grandmother might have friends. “Is your grandma, um, a lot like mine?” I mean prim and proper and stuck-up, but I’m afraid I might offend Stanley if I come out and say that.

  He laughs. “Not really. She’s a lot more eccentric. I’m sure you’ll meet her, so you can judge for yourself.”

  I’m afraid Stanley and I are going to run out of things to say really quickly, but we get into a pretty lively discussion about pro soccer, and there’s not one single awkward silence. Before I know it, we’re pulling up to Benedict Middle School, right behind the blue minivan that belongs to Amy’s family. Amy’s butt is sticking out of the backseat as she rummages around, looking for something on the floor. I’m about to open my door when Stanley hops out of the car and opens it for me. Amy straightens up in time to catch him standing at attention like a soldier while I gather up my stuff, and her mouth drops open.

  “Have a good practice, Miss AJ,” Stanley says. “I’ll see you at four.” He’s smiling like maybe it was more fun driving a twelve-year-old kid to practice than he expected, and I smile back.

  “See you,” I say. “Thanks for the ride.”

  Maddie comes around the corner as Stanley shuts the door behind me, and her eyes get huge, just like Amy’s. The second he pulls away in the car, they both pounce on me. “Who was that?” Amy breathes without even saying hello. Her super curly hair is poking out in all directions from the humidity and trying to escape from her ponytail.

  “That’s Stanley,” I say. “Remember how I told you I’m staying with my grandma this month? She broke her foot last week, and she hired that guy to drive her around until it heals.”

  “Whoa,” Maddie says. “Like a chauffeur? That’s an unexpected perk.”

  “He’s foxy,” Amy says, pointing to the fox on her uniform. Maddie groans and rolls her eyes, and all three of us crack up. When Maddie laughs, I notice she has new turquoise rubber bands on her braces.

  “He’s really nice,” I tell them. “We talked about soccer the whole way here. He plays too.”

  “What position?” Maddie asks, suddenly a lot more interested. She doesn’t care about boys at all, but she really cares about soccer. When I tell her he’s a center forward, she nods, impressed.

  As we walk through the gate and onto the field, I notice a couple of huge crows hanging out a few yards ahead of us. I divert our path so we make a wide arc around them, and Maddie automatically moves to my other side so she’s between them and me. She really gets how much I hate birds, since she was with me when I had my Bird Incident in kindergarten. We were at the duck pond near our houses with my mom and Ben, and I spotted this giant white swan paddling around with all the ducks, exactly like the one in a picture book I loved. I ran over, all excited to feed it a piece of bread, but the swan chomped down on my fingers so hard that two of them broke. I started screaming, obviously, and I guess the swan thought I was going to fight back, because it reared up, hissed in my face, and karate-chopped me right in the stomach with its wing. My mom managed to chase it away before it could do any more damage, but it was still scary enough that I never went near
a bird again. Luckily, Maddie ran away before it could get her, too.

  “So, how are things going at your grandma’s house?” Maddie asks as we plunk our stuff down near another group of girls from our team. “Is it as awful as you expected?”

  “Not with Staaaaan-leeeeeey around, it isn’t,” Amy says, giggling and batting her eyelashes. She watches a lot of sappy romantic movies.

  “Except for him, it’s pretty awful. The house is super creepy, and everything smells like old ladies, and Grandma Jo won’t let me watch TV or play video games or have you guys over.”

  “Man, that’s the worst,” Maddie says. “You know you can come over whenever you want, right? My parents never care if you stay for meals or sleep over. They love you.”

  “I know,” I say, and it feels really nice to hear that I’m wanted somewhere. “Thanks. I don’t know if my grandma will even let me go to your house, though. She’s making me do etiquette training every day after soccer.”

  Maddie looks horrified. “Really? Like that book she got you?”

  “I think so, yeah.”

  “Isn’t that, like, cruel and unusual punishment or something?”

  “What even is etiquette training?” Amy asks.

  “I don’t know. Probably, like, learning to ballroom dance and do housework and sew.”

  “Sounds like a sneaky way of getting you to do chores for her,” Amy says. “What if she makes you do her laundry and stuff? Oh my God, what if she makes you fold her old-lady underwear?”

  I’m in the middle of taking a swig from my water bottle, and I spit my water all over the grass when she says that. “That is so disgusting.” I gasp, and Maddie and Amy both double over laughing.

  I’m just getting my breath back when snotty Brianna comes striding through the gate. When she tucks her hair behind her ears, I see that she’s wearing huge diamond earrings to practice again, and I roll my eyes. Seriously, can’t she go five seconds without reminding everyone how rich she is? She waves to her best friends, Sabrina and Elena—we call them the Bananas, since you can spell that word by shoving pieces of their names together—and then, weirdly enough, she heads straight toward us.

  “Hey, Maddie,” she says, much louder than necessary. “I’ve got something for you.”

  I don’t think Brianna’s ever said a single nice thing to any of us, and the smirky smile on her face makes my heart speed up. Elena’s already giggling at whatever’s about to happen, and Sabrina looks a little worried—she’s actually pretty nice if you can get her on her own. Brianna looks both ways to make sure everyone on the team is watching, and then she unzips her duffel bag and pulls out a handful of fabric. I can’t tell what she’s holding at first, but then I see a strap and a zipper, and I realize it’s a heap of dresses. Even though she has them all crammed in her bag like that, they’re probably crazy expensive.

  “I was cleaning out my closet yesterday, and I found all these old dresses I’ve already worn a couple times,” she says to Maddie. “They’re so out of style I was about to donate them to Goodwill, but then I realized I could give them straight to you instead. I figure that’s where your family shops these days, since your mom got fired.”

  A ripple of whispers goes through the soccer team, and Maddie’s face turns the reddest I’ve ever seen it. “My mom did not get fired,” she snaps.

  “Oh, does it make you feel better to say ‘laid off’?” Brianna says, making air quotes with her fingers. “It’s the same thing in the end, you know. No job, no money, no nice stuff.”

  “It’s not the same at all,” Maddie says.

  Brianna shakes out one of the dresses and holds it up against her body. It’s purple and covered in sparkles, totally the opposite of Maddie’s style. “You should really take these. I mean, I know they’re not new, but they’re a lot closer than anything else your mom can buy you now. At least you’ll know who wore them before you.”

  “Leave me alone, Brianna. I don’t want your stupid castoffs.” Maddie’s trying to sound strong, but her voice is trembling a little.

  “So touchy,” Brianna says. “Well, I tried. If you want to look tacky, that’s on you.”

  Coach Adrian strides onto the field with a big bag of soccer balls, and he claps a bunch of times to get our attention. “What is this, a fashion show?” he says. “Put the dresses away and get ready to work. Five laps around the field.”

  “I was just trying to be charitable,” Brianna says. She drops the dresses on the ground as if she wants to prove how little they matter to her and takes off running, her long hair swishing back and forth. She always wears it down at practice even though the rest of us pull ours back; she must think it looks cool when it whips around in the wind. Her minions fall into formation behind her. Sabrina looks back over her shoulder for a second as though she wants to apologize, but Brianna grabs her arm and pulls her forward.

  Amy starts fiddling with her shoelaces. “You guys go ahead,” she says. “I think I’ve got something in my shoe. I’ll catch up with you.” It’s obvious she’s avoiding running with us because she doesn’t know what to say to Maddie. I don’t really know what to say either, but I take off running next to her anyway. When you’ve been best friends with someone your whole life, you can’t avoid them just because you’re uncomfortable.

  Maddie and I run in silence for about ten seconds, and then she says, “I hate Brianna.”

  “Of course you do,” I say. “She’s literally the worst person in the entire world. Except for, like, Hitler.”

  “Hitler’s dead.”

  “That’s true. I guess she’s the actual worst.”

  “How did she even know about my mom? I barely told anyone. You didn’t say anything, did you?”

  “Of course not. I’d never do that. She probably has spies. Evil people always have evil henchmen.”

  “What is her problem with me?” Maddie says. “I never did anything to her. And it’s not like we can’t afford clothes. My dad still has a job. We just have to, like, cut back a little.”

  “I know,” I say. “You don’t have to explain it to me. Don’t let her get to you, okay? You know how much she loves reminding people she has it better than everyone else.”

  Maddie glances over at me. “Not better than you.”

  “What are you talking about? We’re not rich at all.”

  “Yeah, but your grandmother is. I know it’s only for this month, but right now you have stuff even Brianna doesn’t have, like a cute chauffeur. You should totally rub it in her face while you can.”

  I’m not usually a show-offy person, but Maddie’s right—someone has to put Brianna in her place, and for the first time, I might actually be able to do that. Brianna has terrorized practically all of us at one time or another. In fourth grade, she told the whole class that my cleats were so smelly they made our coach puke when he accidentally got a whiff of them. Last year she made fun of Amy’s new haircut so viciously that she cried in social studies. At the soccer barbecue last month, she told everyone how sorry she felt for our goalie, Chloe Savitsky, because she’s adopted and doesn’t have “real parents.” She’s a total menace, so if I have something I can use against her, it’s pretty much my responsibility to take advantage of it.

  “You’re right,” I say. “That’s a great idea. I’m totally in.” When Maddie gives me a weak smile, I know I’ve made the right choice. Nobody gets to make my friends feel like crap.

  My first opportunity for revenge falls right into my lap at the end of practice. We’re all changing out of our cleats and gathering our stuff when I hear Sabrina say, “Hey, check out the cutie by the black car.”

  We all look up, and there’s Stanley, standing by the town car. “Whoa,” Brianna says. “Who is that?”

  Right on cue he sees me looking and waves, and I wave back. “That’s Stanley,” I say, super casually. “He’s my grandmother’s driver; I’m staying with her right now. He’s not bad, right?”

  “Oh my gosh,” Sabrina gushes. “He
drives you around every day? You are so ridiculously lucky.”

  “I know, right?” I say. “He’s really nice, too. So funny and smart and easy to talk to. We get along so well.”

  “Sabrina, are you coming out on the yacht with us on Sunday?” Brianna interrupts, obviously trying to draw her friend’s attention back to herself. “If you want to go, you need to meet us at the dock at nine.”

  “Yeah, sure,” Sabrina says, but she turns right back to me. “So, is he in high school or college?”

  “College,” I say. “He’s nineteen.”

  “Wow,” Sabrina says. “Doesn’t hanging out with him make you super nervous? I’d have no idea what to say.”

  I give her a breezy shrug. “Not really. My brother’s the same age, so I grew up talking to older boys. I’m sure it would be no big deal for you either, Brianna. You must be used to having long conversations with older guys, since you’ve dated all those eighth graders.” Somewhere behind me I hear Amy giggle, and when I glance over at Maddie, she’s smiling.

  “Of course I am,” Brianna snaps, but her cheeks are getting a little pinker. Stanley is so far from an eighth grader it’s like they’re not even the same species, and she knows it. She swallows hard, and when she speaks again, she sounds like her snotty old self. “It’s too bad he doesn’t have a cooler car—that town car is a serious snoozefest. I bet Stanley would have a great time driving one of my dad’s Jags. Or maybe the Mustang.”

  “I mean, he always seems like he’s having a pretty good time when he’s driving me around,” I say. “But maybe he just enjoys the company.”

  “Whatever,” Brianna says. “I have to go.” She gets up and slings her bag over her shoulder.

  “Me too,” I say. “Shouldn’t keep Stanley waiting.”

  Maddie mouths Nice and gives me a sneaky thumbs-up, and I feel better than I have all day. As I gather the rest of my stuff, I make a promise to myself: If I have to spend a month living in my grandmother’s stuffy house, I am not going to let it go to waste.