Dylan doesn’t write anything, but Sarah is too busy to notice. She has launched into a debate on a PowerPoint presentation versus a professionally printed book when I peek at Dylan to see what he’s thinking. He’s looking seriously at Sarah, nodding every now and again, then he reaches over to me. I flinch, but he’s just pulling a twig out of my hair. He turns back to Sarah, who seems to have a lot to say about nothing.
Then the bell rings and Sarah says, “So next Sunday at your house, El? Eleven’s good for me.” Then she strides away.
“I have some permission forms for your parents to sign or you won’t be going on any field trips,” says Mr. Ray. “Please take one on your way out. This is going to be fun, people.”
I wait for Desi by the door. She nudges me as Dylan passes us but I ignore her.
“I don’t want to do my project with them,” she hisses as the rest of her group leaves.
I shrug.
“You hate me now. Because of detention. El, I’m sorry. Detention was horrible. It was all my fault.”
“It’s okay.”
“If it wasn’t for me you wouldn’t be there.”
“I was actually just trying to explain the situation.”
“You’re too noble,” moans Desi. “If I were you I would never speak to me again.”
Then I laugh at the thought of me being Desi. After a second, she joins in. Then she pulls out the latest Delia’s catalogue from her bag and says she definitely has to have the top on page 22. She doesn’t stop apologizing about detention until I promise to meet her at the mall in her quest for the perfect look.
“You realize it’s Thursday night,” she warns.
“You owe me big-time,” I say.
13.
Thursday night is everyone-at-home-for-dinner night unless there’s something else that’s so important you can’t get out of it. It always has been. Even after Dad was gone, Thursday nights continued, but with one less place at the table. Some nights we get to sit in front of the TV and eat dinner. These are my favorite nights. But Thursday dinners are spent at the dining room table.
There are certain rules in our house that never change. When you eat in the dining room, you must have a tablecloth. You must have a bread-and-butter plate out, even when there’s no bread on the table. You must have a jug of water with sliced lemon and ice cubes and matching glasses on coasters. In a pinch, sliced oranges will do.
The best part about Thursday-night dinners is that Mom makes an effort and cooks something special. For the rest of the week it’s quick stuff, but Thursdays we have a roast or some special Italian dish that Mom’s really good at, like gnocchi or eggplant parmesan. These are dishes that her mother-in-law, Nonna, taught her, and they have become family favorites.
Thursday-night dinners can be okay unless Mom is in detective mode.
Tonight we have an early dinner so I can go out to the mall.
“How was school today, El?” Mom asks.
It’s always the same answer. I don’t know why she bothers.
“Okay,” I say.
“Anything exciting happen?”
“Nope,” I say.
“Any tests?”
“Nope,” I say.
“Any homework?”
“Done,’” I say.
“Any boyfriends?” chimes in my sister, Bella.
“Yep, five,” I say.
Then Bella starts talking about college—she’s doing a business degree—and I’m off the hook.
Sometimes Mom will tell us about her day. She works at the local Social Services office. Her stories mostly sound the same. Not enough funding. Old people needing more home care. Young mothers needing day care. I don’t know how she can stand working nine to five—nine to eight on Wednesdays—when for years she was just helping Dad out with his business. Import, export. Whatever that is.
Tonight I ask her if she misses her old life: driving around in an expensive car; meetings over lunch; being her own boss and all that. The silence at the table is punctured by the ice cracking in the water jug.
“No,” she says briefly.
I’d broken the rules. I’d talked about how things really were instead of pretending that life was great and our life before never existed.
“‘Did I tell you about my economics lecture today?” says Bella.
And I go to the kitchen and top up the water jug.
I’m sure that Leonard would be happy if I told him about Bella.
I’m sure he’d be happy if I just said hello.
Bella is my sister but we don’t look like we belong together. Ever since she was four, she’s had to be the older sister. Ever since I can remember, Bella has been there.
Bella means beautiful. And she is. Not just on the outside like girls in magazines or anything. She is a beautiful person. It takes a lot to make Bella angry, but when she is, you just need to get out of the way.
You know the girl who isn’t super pretty or super smart or super anything, but there’s something about her, some special thing, that makes people stop and smile when they see her? That’s Bella. She has a gazillion friends and they’re real friends, not just people filling up her cell phone list.
Ever since Dad left, Bella has been our family’s glue. Mom tries hard, but there are days when I’m not sure that she’s really with us. She’s acting like everything’s normal but I’m not fooled.
Bella is blonde and thin as a zipper, just like Mom. I definitely got Dad’s genes. Bella always complains that I have olive skin and she missed out. I always thought that Bella was Mom’s clone and I was Dad’s. But lately, I’m not so sure.
Maybe I’m a whole lot more like Mom than I thought.
All I know is, thank God for Bella.
Not that I’d ever tell her that.
There are just some things you don’t need to say.
14.
At the mall I find myself face-to-face with Angelique in Delia’s. Though, actually, it is more face-to-fitting-room-door.
I am hovering outside Desi’s door while she tries on a million different things, when Angelique’s hand snakes over the top of a nearby cubicle door. She’s holding something blue. I know it’s her hand because she is wearing Eric’s ring. It’s a chunky Gothic thing but Angelique makes it look elegant.
“Could I have this in the pink, please?” she asks.
I look around. There isn’t a sales assistant in sight.
“Sure,” I say.
It’s not as if I’ve got something better to do.
I head for the racks and dodge the helpful sales assistant.
Please understand that when I say “helpful,” I am being sarcastic.
I finally spot a pink version of the frothy blue top I am holding when the assistant looms over from behind a rack of coats to make a suggestion.
“That’s a lovely top,” she says.
I nod and sidestep her, but she blocks my way.
“That’s a size 4,” she says, looking at me meaningfully.
“Uh-huh,” I say.
“These tend to run small,” she says. Then she pointedly looks me up and down and pulls out a size 10.
Sounds of the shopping mall fall away: the crash of carts, the kids crying, and the never-ending announcements of this hour’s special. The sales assistant is smiling but looks smug, like she’s bagged herself a trophy.
There are plenty of things I can think of to say to her. Like, do you realize you have lipstick on your teeth? Did you know that outfit you’re wearing is meant for teenagers? Do they have a name for that hairstyle? Just thinking of these things makes me smile back at her.
“It’s okay. It’s not for me.” I brush past her and return to the fitting rooms. “Here you go,” I say, waving it over the top of Angelique’s door.
“Thanks a lot,” she says. The next moment she bursts through her door to check it out in the full-length mirror against the back wall. She turns around a few times to get a look at the total effect. A little frown creases her p
erfect brow. “Hmmm.”
“It looks good,” I offer, even though these words nearly stick in my throat.
Angelique looks at me for the first time, registering that I’m not a sales assistant.
“Oh, hi!” she says.
She’s realized I’m someone on her social fringe. She doesn’t know my name. Then again, why should she? I wonder where all her friends are. Angelique usually has at least one or two fans wherever she goes. Maybe it is their day off.
“El, can you take some of this stuff?” complains Desi.
Half the store appears over her door. It takes me ages to put everything back on the hangers. During this time, Angelique stands in front of the mirror. Then she disappears into her fitting room and reappears in the blue top version. Finally she catches my eye in the mirror just as I glance at her.
“I hate shopping by myself,” she says.
“Which top do you like the best?” I ask.
“I like the blue best,” she says. “But Eric says pink is my color.”
“So buy the top that you want to wear,” I say. “I mean . . . you look good in anything.”
Angelique gives me a nervous smile before disappearing back into her cubicle.
Desi finally decides on a cream silk tank top that she can’t live without. Not surprisingly, it looks very similar to five other cream tops she has. As the cashier wraps the tank top, Angelique puts the blue top on the counter and takes out her wallet to pay for it.
“Thanks for your help,” she says.
Desi squeezes my arm as we leave the shop and whispers incredibly loudly into my ear, “Omigod, that was Angelique Mendez.”
“I know.”
“I didn’t know she knew you.”
“She doesn’t,” I say.
Part of me is celebrating a victory for girls everywhere who dress for someone else. Another part is pleased that Eric will miss out on seeing his girlfriend dressed the way he wants.
Which is when I decide that I really am a horrible person. That I don’t deserve anything good to happen to me. And even if Eric Callahan threw himself at my feet right now, I would just have to walk away. I would give him one long embrace, and say, “No really, please go back to Angelique. You deserve someone better than me.”
Then I turn on my heel and bump into someone outside the store.
“Sorry,” I say.
“Hey,” Eric says, gripping my arm gently to steady me. “Are you okay?”
I swear violins begin playing right at that moment. The shopping mall lights glint off Eric’s blond hair like we’re in a shampoo commercial. I catch sight of his perfect teeth as his lips pull back in a slight smile. His breath is warm and minty in my face. I know I should be breathing but I’ve forgotten how. A puzzled look crosses his face, but is gone in an instant. Then he gives a little wave, so I wave back—until I realize he is waving to someone behind me. It is Angelique.
Eric lets go of my arm and I nearly fall to the floor. I realize the violins are just the Muzak wafting through the mall’s speakers. I finally take a gulp of air.
“See ya,” I say lamely, but he doesn’t hear me.
“Omigod, that was Eric Callahan,” says Desi.
I’d forgotten she was there.
“Wait until I tell Margot that you touched Eric Callahan in the mall.”
“How about something to drink?” I say. “I’ve got some coupons.”
“Can we share a large mocha? I love the mocha,” says Desi.
If there’s one thing I love about Desi, it’s that she is easily distracted.
It’s much later, after I lose Desi in the bathrooms, that I go back to Delia’s and buy myself the pink top. I take the size 10. I don’t try it on. I pay for it as if I’m making a drug deal, looking over my shoulder every three seconds like I’m about to be arrested, then I push it to the bottom of my bag. And it’s like I’m two people in one body. There’s the weird-acting me, who’s just bought a pink frothy top that she actually doesn’t like, and there’s the other me watching the weird-acting me, thinking, “Hello, what’s going on here?”
The two me’s only get together when Desi tells me a joke as she leaves me at my front door. I feel a jolt as I snap back to reality and wonder how on earth I made it home.
15.
My Friday starts well, with an Eric sighting across the courtyard. He is bouncing a basketball, first with one hand then the other, through the gap between his walking legs. Just the sight of his broad shoulders and big hands makes me stop and watch until he’s out of sight.
It’s the second day of detention—make that my last day. I have thought of something to write. Desi and I get there early. There’s a lanky-looking guy already sitting down. His legs barely fit under the desk.
“Basketball player,” whispers Desi. “His name’s Coop.”
I already know this. He’s one of the guys in the newspaper group.
I sit quietly, ignoring Dylan, who has come in and chosen to sit right next to me even though the room is full of empty desks, and I steadily fill the white space on the blue-lined paper. I use lots of dialogue, because this comes easily. I write about my first day of school. How Mom gave me my special schoolbag, with the pink lunch box and matching pink thermos, and kissed me quickly on the cheek. “Remember your manners, listen to your teacher, and don’t chase boys,” she’d said.
I write about the smells and the sounds and the strangeness of it all. About the boy who pulled at my hair ribbons. About the girl who became my best friend in five minutes. About the teacher who smelled like some flower that grew in my garden and who reminded me of home so that I cried and had to use her lace handkerchief. About Bella meeting me at lunch break and showing me off to all her friends. “This is my sister,” she’d said. “Don’t mind her, she’s weird.”
There are still five minutes of detention left when I finish counting my words. There are 494. I come up with a heading that takes me over the 500 mark—The First Day of the Rest of My Life. I count again—503.
I glance over at Dylan’s page. He seems to be creating some artwork that has its origins at the gates of hell, with skulls and flames and spider-webs. Nice. Desi has been fidgeting the entire time. She doesn’t seem to have written much.
I stroll up to Ms. Clooney’s desk and patiently wait for her attention. The red second hand on the large wall clock spins smoothly around the dial.
Well, don’t mind me.
Whenever you’re ready.
Finally Ms. Clooney looks up.
“Yes?” she asks.
“I’ve finished.”
I wait while she reads. She is still reading when the end-of-lunch bell sounds.
“Right,” she says finally.
I feel my shoulders drop a little as I relax.
“There’s only one problem,” she says, gathering her work together.
I hear Dylan shift in his seat.
“What?”
“There aren’t five hundred words here,” she says, handing me back the paper.
That’s when I realize she hasn’t been reading at all. She’s been counting the words.
“There are five hundred three words,” I say lamely. “I counted twice.”
“Then you must have counted the title,” she says. “The title doesn’t count.”
I grab a pen to write some extra words, but she is sailing out the door.
“See you Monday,” she says.
I throw the pen at the door as she heads up the hall.
Desi picks it up and hands it back to me. “She really hates you.”
Dylan shakes his head a little.
“Nah,” he says. “As special as Ariel Ariel is, I think Clooney is just mean to everyone.”
He hands me his artwork and turns to go.
He’s out of uniform. I watch him walk out, his skinny-leg jeans clinging to his . . . clinging? Argh! I am losing it. I fix Eric in my mind.
“Pleasant thoughts,” I whisper. “Pleasant thoughts.”
> But somehow Eric turns into Dylan, and Dylan’s jeans are on an endless replay loop in my brain.
It’s only later that night that I discover Dylan’s artwork. I’d shoved it into my bag. Instead of the dragons and flames and the weird-looking plant that I’d seen before, it was a new piece. It was just patterns, curling into each other with lines and circles, all done in blue pen. Among the circles is a long number that I assume is his cell phone number.
As if!
16.
I add another thing to my list for Leonard. What does it mean, Leonard, I would ask, if a boy, a boy you don’t like, gives you something—say a piece of paper with his cell phone number on it—and instead of shoving it into the garbage you hide it in your underwear drawer?
That’d stump him.
17.
Friday is movie night with Margot and Desi. It has been ever since I moved to Blair. But tonight I don’t feel like leaving my cramped bedroom. This is the fifth day since I found out about Eric and Angelique, but the pain is still raw. I want to keep poking at it, just to make sure the wound is real. I need to do this in my own space. I want to wallow. When Bella yells out that Margot is at the door, I consider hiding under my comforter. Instead, my feet walk out of my room, I give Mom a peck on the cheek, and close the door quietly behind me, just in case the cat lady from next door pokes her head out her door as I leave. She is always doing this.
Cat Lady started talking to me a couple of months after we moved in.
“Nice weather for ducks,” she said last week when it was raining.
I doubted even the ducks would be interested in standing in the rain. It was hitting the entry hall window at a 45-degree angle and threatening to break the glass.
Yesterday I caught her throwing tree branches over the fence.
“What’s good for the goose is good for the gander,” she’d said.
I started to think the woman was obsessed with poultry, so I just smiled politely.
“They dropped their stuff over here yesterday,” she explained. “So how’s your mom?”
Chasing Boys Page 3
