Ready or Not

by Meg Cabot

  “I get it,” I said. “Sorry. I guess I just got…you know, carried away.”

  Susan sighed. “I hope I didn’t make a mistake,” she said softly. “Letting you and David take this class, I mean. I thought you were ready.”

  I glanced at her kind of sharply.

  “We are ready,” I said hastily. “I mean, I am. And David is, too. We both are.”

  “I hope so,” Susan said with a faintly worried air. She laid a hand on my shoulder as she straightened and then walked away. “I really do.”

  Not ready? Not ready for life drawing? As if! I worked furiously through the last fifteen minutes of class, anchoring Terry to a background, concentrating on showing the whole, and not the parts. I’d show Susan Boone who wasn’t ready. See if I didn’t!

  But there wasn’t enough time to really do what I’d wanted, and at the end, when it came time to critique everyone’s drawings, Susan just shook her head at mine as it sat on the windowsill.

  “You’ve rendered a highly realistic portrait of Terry,” she said, in a kind but firm voice, “but he’s still hanging in midair.”

  I had no idea what she was talking about. What did she mean, I wasn’t ready? Who even cared about the stupid background? Wasn’t the subject of the drawing the most important thing?

  Terry sure seemed to think so. He strolled over and was like, “Hey, are you gonna keep that?” and pointed at my drawing of him.

  “Um,” I said. I wasn’t sure how to reply. The truth was, I had been about to wad the drawing up and throw it away. But I hesitated to admit it, because that would have been like saying I didn’t think a portrait of Terry was worth framing and hanging over my fireplace—like he wasn’t attractive enough, or something. And even though I thought he had a really weird job, I didn’t want to insult him.

  “Why?” I asked. Always a nice, safe answer for just about any occasion.

  “’Cause if you don’t want it, I’ll take it,” Terry said.

  I was touched. More than touched. I was flattered. He liked my portrait of him! Despite the fact that it wasn’t integrated into any sort of background.

  “Oh, sure,” I said, handing it over. “There you go.”

  “Cool,” Terry said. Then, noticing that it lacked the artist’s signature, he went, “Could you sign it for me?”

  “Of course,” I said, and did so, then handed it back.

  “Cool,” Terry said, again, looking at my signature. “Now I have a drawing by the girl who saved the president.”

  I realized then that that’s what he wanted—my autograph on a portrait of him, naked. Not that he’d especially liked my portrait.

  But hey, I guess it was better than nothing.

  “So,” David said, coming up behind me at the slop sink, where I was washing charcoal off my hands. “You ready?”

  I have to admit, I kind of jumped. Not because he’d snuck up on me, but because of the question.

  “I still haven’t had a chance to ask them,” I blurted out, spinning around to face him. “I’m really sorry, David. Things have just been so crazy at home with Lucy and this tutoring thing—”

  David looked down at me as if I had grown horns from my forehead, like Hellboy.

  “I meant about the town hall meeting at your school,” he said. “My dad said we’re giving you a lift.”

  “Oh!” I laughed nervously. “That! Right! No, why should I be nervous?”

  “No reason,” David said, a twinkle in his mossy green eyes. “I mean, it’s just MTV. Millions of people will be watching it. That’s all.”

  The thing was, I’d had so much else to worry about, I hadn’t really had time to think about it. What I was going to say at the town hall meeting, and all. I mean, I’d read the stuff the press secretary had given me, and even done a tiny bit of independent reading on my own, but…

  The truth was, I was way more nervous about what I was going to do about the whole Camp David situation than I was about going on TV.

  “Aw,” I said. “It’ll be fine. It always is.”

  Which is true. Going on TV with David’s dad always had been fine, in the past. Not that we’ve done it that many times—I mean, it’s not like we’ve ever paired up for Crossfire, or whatever. But I mean, like, at UN addresses, or the occasional fund-raiser that ended up being on C-Span.

  And it had always worked out fine. I didn’t see how tonight would be any different.

  Until David and I pulled up to Adams Prep, and I saw the protesters. `

  That’s when I knew the town hall meeting was going to be very, very different than talking to a bunch of rich oil tycoons in a hotel ballroom. Because rich oil tycoons don’t generally have to be held back by dozens of police officers as they attempt to storm the car you and your boyfriend show up in.

  Or wave big signs in your face that say KEEP YOUR NOSE OUT OF MY PANTYHOSE.

  Or accuse you of betraying your generation when you try to get out of the car, shielded by Secret Service agents and police officers in riot gear.

  Or try to hit you with an old turkey sandwich as you’re rushing into your school, which, for the evening, has been turned into a battle zone—them versus you.

  But since that’s how it’s always been at Adams Prep—them versus me—I wasn’t all that fazed.

  Except for the fact that I’m pretty sure that within that horde of screaming protesters I spotted a girl with Midnight Ebony and Pink Flamingo hair.

  Top ten things that suck about going on television:

  10. If you are a guest on a talk show or newscast, the person interviewing you will have cue cards or a TelePrompTer telling him or her what to say. You will not. You are just out there on your own. And if they ask you a question you don’t know the answer to, too bad for you.

  9. Seeing yourself on the monitor. Yes, that really is how big your head looks to everyone else.

  8. The five minutes before you actually go live. You’re sitting there, so nervous you want to puke, while everyone else runs around, having a good time. Because they aren’t the ones going on TV. So what do they care?

  7. The makeup and hair person. No matter what you say, he/she will come up with a look for you that in no way resembles how you actually look in real life, and that will cause your grandmother to call you afterward and ask if you meant to look like Paris Hilton.

  6. The host and/or reporter will ignore you, except when the camera is on, and then he/she will try to make it look as if you are best friends. That is just the way it is. Move on.

  5. No matter what you might have heard to the contrary, the food from Craft Services in the green room will mostly be composed of whatever you hate most…in my case, this always means tomatoes.

  4. You will never get your own dressing room, but will instead have to share the ladies’ room with two quilting bee finalists from Pennsylvania who will keep going on about how nervous they are until you want to scream.

  3. Inevitably, someone at the studio will call his or her niece or nephew on his or her cell phone and make you say hello to him or her, because you are the girl who saved the president, and the niece or nephew is a big fan of yours.

  2. Then, when you get on the phone, the niece or nephew won’t have the slightest idea who you are.

  And the number-one worst thing about going on television:

  1. Right after the camera turns off, and you remember everything that just came out of your mouth.

  And you want to die.

  11

  “I’m so excited,” Kris kept saying.

  She didn’t have to keep telling me. I could tell she was excited by the way she kept jumping up and down and squeezing my arm.

  I guess I should have been excited, too. I mean, the president of the United States was going to be addressing the youth of America from my very own school.

  But since I pretty much hate my school, it was hard to summon up any kind of enthusiasm over the fact that Adams Prep was about to get its fifteen minutes of fame…well, forty minutes,
actually, if you factored in commercials.

  Plus there was the small fact that outside the school were about a thousand people who really weren’t all that jazzed about what we were going to say.

  But Kris’s conviction that her beloved alma mater was about to get its well-deserved due wasn’t what had Kris so excited. And the protesters weren’t even within her radar. No, she was practically delirious with joy over the fact that she was going to get to meet the president…

  …not to mention Random Alvarez, the hottest VJ around.

  “There he is,” she kept saying, bouncing around beside me. “Look at him! He’s so smart!”

  Occasionally, she would say, “He’s so hot.” That was the only way I could tell who she was talking about. Smart meant the president. Hot meant Random Alvarez. Both men were in hair and makeup, getting ready for the show.

  “It’s too big,” Random kept saying to the stylist who was trying to get him ready to go on. “It’s sticking up too much!”

  “That’s how it’s supposed to look,” the stylist kept assuring him, as they both gazed at his reflection in a large hand mirror. “It’s how all the kids are wearing it.”

  Random looked at me and went, “She’s not.”

  The stylist glanced my way. I saw her jump as if a bee had stung her or something. Then she said, to Random, “Yeah, well, she’s, um, doing her own thing.”

  Very nice! I mean, my hair doesn’t look that bad.

  Or does it?

  The president certainly didn’t seem too thrilled when he first noticed it. He took one look at my head, gave a kind of shudder, then went, in a sort of strangled voice, “Is that permanent?”

  “Semi,” I said.

  “I see,” he said. “And you’re supposed to be…”

  Do not ask if I’m supposed to be Ashlee Simpson, I whispered fiercely. Only I did it inside my head.

  “…punk?” The president finished.

  “No,” I said, surprised. I mean, how could he think I looked punk? I was wearing jeans, it’s true. But also my form-fitting Nike shirt. Punk rockers don’t wear Nike products. “I’m just supposed to be me.”

  “But—”

  But David’s dad evidently thought better of asking whatever it was he’d been about to ask, because he just looked heavenward, then turned back to the makeup artist who was blotting his nose. He didn’t glance my way again.

  Which just goes to show that you can’t please all the people all the time.

  Although you can please some of the people some of the time.

  “I can’t believe I get to meet you,” the stylist I had been assigned was saying, as she tried to wipe the shine from my forehead. It is very hard to keep from sweating when you know you are about to go on TV. “You are, like, one of my idols. I loved the way you saved the president. That was so awesome!”

  “Thanks,” I said.

  “It is such an honor to be able to work with you.” The stylist’s grin revealed perfectly straight teeth, the work of a really skilled orthodontist, or the product of pretty decent DNA…it was hard to tell which. “You are such a role model to girls everywhere. You know?”

  “Gee,” I said to her. “Thanks.”

  Some role model. I was seriously considering having sex with my boyfriend on a national holiday. Oh, and someone had just tried to hit me with a turkey sandwich.

  “It’s just too bad,” the makeup lady said. I glanced at her sharply. Oh my God, had she read my mind? Did she know, somehow? About David and me? I’d heard about barbers who could read the minds of their clients just by touching their hair….

  “About this dye job, I mean,” the makeup lady went on, fingering a loose curl of my hair. “You really should have let a professional handle it.”

  When she was done with me and my forehead shine, I went and sat in my assigned seat while everyone else ran around, going on about how nervous they were. Well, everyone else but Random Alvarez and the president.

  “Oh, God,” Kris said, coming up to me and squeezing my arm again. “Do you think he’d give me an autograph?”

  “Which one?” I asked her.

  “Either,” she said. “Both. I don’t care.”

  “The president will,” I said, because I knew he would. “I don’t know about Random. I never met him before.”

  “I’m going to go introduce myself,” Kris said. “Before the show starts. Don’t you think I should? I mean, I’m on the panel. It would only be polite to introduce myself. Don’t you think? Just say hi, and welcome them to our school. It’s the right thing to do. Isn’t it?”

  I shrugged. To tell you the truth, I didn’t really care what Kris did. I had my own problems.

  One was that I had seen my whole family sneaking into the gym a little while earlier, and seating themselves next to David and the first lady. My whole family—my parents AND Lucy and Rebecca. I’d hurried over to them and been all, “WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE?” and my mom had looked at me like I was nuts.

  “You didn’t expect us to miss your little town meeting, did you?” she wanted to know.

  “But you could have stayed home and watched it on TV,” I pointed out. “I mean, it’s live, so you wouldn’t have missed out on anything.”

  “Sam,” my mom said, sounding a little offended, “the president’s speech is about how families need to spend more time together. Wouldn’t it be just slightly hypocritical of us not to be here to support you?”

  I hadn’t thought of that. And I guess she was right.

  But it was clear that, even though they were there, supporting me wasn’t all that high on their agenda. My dad was on his cell phone—because somewhere in the world, a bank is always open—and Rebecca was reading a book on chaos theory. My mom kept checking her PDA, and I saw Lucy craning her neck, looking around the crowd in the folding chairs for her friends.

  But when her gaze skipped over Tiffany Shore and Amber Carson, I realized it wasn’t her friends Lucy was looking for at all. It was Harold Minsky. Who wasn’t there, probably because a town hall meeting from his school—even one over which the president of the United States was presiding—wasn’t anywhere near as interesting as whatever was on the Sci-Fi Channel tonight.

  But my family embarrassing me in front of everyone in my school—not to mention the nation—wasn’t the only thing getting me down. The other thing I couldn’t stop thinking about was…

  Had that really been Dauntra out there? And if so…what did that even mean? I mean, does she hate me now, or something? Just because I’m supporting my boyfriend’s father’s initiative?

  When I got back to my seat in front of the cameras—which hadn’t been turned on yet—I saw that Kris had summoned up all her courage and gone over to introduce herself to the men of the hour—David’s dad and Random Alvarez. She was pumping Random’s hand as I watched, seemingly oblivious to the slightly annoyed look on his face. He was clearly still unhappy with his hair.

  “Hey.” David’s voice tickled my ear. “Break an arm.”

  “Very funny,” I said to him. He always tells me to break an arm when I’m about to go on TV, because breaking an arm was, basically, how we’d met—when I broke my arm saving his dad from being shot.

  “Don’t worry,” David said, kissing me on top of the head. “You’re going to be great. You always are.”

  “Thanks,” I said, even though I didn’t believe a word of it.

  “And, hey,” David said, still trying to cheer me up, “you get to meet Random Alvarez!”

  “He’s a total cheesehead,” I said.

  “Your friend Kris doesn’t seem to think so,” David pointed out. I looked in the direction he was nodding and saw Kris laughing at something Random had said (probably something like, “At least my hair looks better than that chick’s, over there”). Kris put a hand out, resting it on Random’s chest, as if to say, “Stop! You’re killing me with your wit!” But really, you knew she’d just wanted to touch his chest.

  Random didn’t look as i
f he minded too much, because a second later, he leaned down and whispered something in Kris’s ear. She turned an interesting shade of pink, but nodded enthusiastically. Then Random slapped her on the butt.

  Really.

  I looked at David. “Ew,” was all I could think of to say.

  “What’s up with Lucy?” David asked, nodding toward my sister, who was still looking for the love of her life in the many folding chairs along the darkened gym.

  “She’s looking for Harold,” I said. I’d told David all about Lucy and her tutor in the car on the way over from the art studio. His response had been to nod sagely and say, “Oh, sure. She has a crush on him because he’s the only guy in the world who’s never paid the slightest bit of attention to her. You can see the allure.”

  I raised my eyebrows at this. “You can?”

  “Well, if you’re someone like Lucy, who’s always gotten any guy she’s ever wanted, having a guy not want you is a bit of a novelty. Of course she’s going to fall for him.”

  I hadn’t really thought about it that way. But it did make sense.

  “It’s a genius plan on the part of what’s-his-name,” David had remarked.

  “Plan?” I’d scrunched up my face—but not in a repulsive, Brittany Murphy way, I hoped. “You think Harold PLANNED this?”

  “Oh, sure,” David said. “To get her to like him? Come on. It’s brilliant. Pretend he doesn’t care, drive her insane …he knows he’ll have her eating out of his hand by the end of the week.”

  “Um,” I said. “If you’d ever met Harold, you’d know…he’s not that kind of guy.”

  David looked surprised. “Really?” Then he shook his head. “Poor Lucy.”

  Watching her now, as she tried to appear casual while she looked around for Harold, David said it again: “Poor Lucy.”

  You could say that again.

  Now the director was calling, “Okay, people, we go live in ten. Places.”

  “Hey, listen,” David leaned down to whisper in my ear. “I almost forgot. The weirdest thing just happened. My mom was talking to your mom just now, and she mentioned the whole Thanksgiving thing. My mom did. About you coming with us to Camp David.”