by Denise Vega
Reede is definitely going 2 join I-Club. I should be happy we’ll have someone who knows a lot of cool stuff 2 make our site really awesome.
So why am I not happy?
CHAPTER 5
MAKING HISTORY
I SAT BETWEEN ROSIE AND Tyler in U.S. history the next day, with Mark behind me. Serena sat on the other side of the room. We waved at each other before she turned to chat with friends. Jilly told me Serena was going out with someone from another track. “And he’s cute,” she had said, as if only someone ugly would like Serena, who was actually pretty and could be nice when she wanted to, which I hoped would be a little more often this year.
“You’re not going to blow us off now that Jilly’s on our track too, are you?” Mark snapped a pencil at me and I caught it with one hand.
“No way,” I said, tossing it back. “Besides, we’ve got I-Club.”
“I-Club’s going to be great this year,” Tyler said. “Let’s do streaming video.” He still wore baggy pants and spiked his hair with the same gel that smelled slightly of pine. It was good to know some things didn’t change.
I pulled out my notebook as our teacher stepped in. Mr. Perkins was tall and thin, with a cute goatee that matched his brown hair. Rosie and I looked at each other and grinned. History just got a lot more interesting.
The bell rang and Mr. Perkins called us to attention, then started taking attendance. A minute later, Reede Harper arrived, stopping just inside the door. She smiled and ducked her head, her long hair falling over her face like she was embarrassed, but it seemed like an act. Everyone’s eyes shifted towards her and I knew if I looked around, tongues would be hanging out of mouths.
“Stop drooling,” I said to Tyler. He scowled at me.
“And you are… ?” Mr. Perkins asked.
“Reede Harper,” she said. “I’m new. Sorry I’m late.” She didn’t look sorry and didn’t offer an explanation or a tardy pass. Mr. Perkins didn’t ask for either but I wondered. Her hair was messed up around her face like she’d tried to fix it without a brush or mirror. Maybe she was already making out with someone in one of the custodian closets. Maybe Mr. F had already caught her. The thought gave me a ripple of satisfaction.
“Welcome, Reede,” Mr. Perkins said, making a mark in his attendance book. “Since you’re late, you’ll have to take a seat in the dreaded front row.” He motioned to an empty desk right in front of his, next to two other empty desks. Then he continued with attendance. “Michael Royston?”
“Here.”
“Erin Swift?”
“Here.” I raised my hand and Mr. Perkins nodded. Reede swung around in her seat and stared at me for a moment, then turned back around.
Tyler leaned over, whispering. “You know her?”
“She’s my locker partner.” I suddenly felt important, then stupid for feeling that way.
“Cool,” Tyler said. “Maybe you could introduce me.”
I rolled my eyes. “Introduce yourself.”
“Fine,” Tyler said. He turned and faced front, tapping his pencil on top of his textbook.
I sighed. “Tyler, if you want to meet her, you should just—”
“I said it was fine.”
“But you’re mad, and you shouldn’t be. I think—”
“Miss Swift, is it?” My head shot up. Mr. Perkins was looking right at me, along with the rest of the class. “I know the first few days back are exciting and you want to catch up with your friends, but we’ve got a lot to accomplish as we travel back in time through U.S. history. Let’s save the chitchat for your breaks.”
“Sorry.” I glanced at Tyler, who was looking straight ahead as if Mr. Perkins and his class were the most interesting thing in the world and he hadn’t just been whispering to me so I had to whisper back.
“Okay, class,” Mr. Perkins said, “I’m going to go over our course schedule.”
Papers shuffled as we listened. Reede was nodding her head. And nodding her head some more. Ah ha. She was listening to her iPod. No wonder she was wearing her hair down around her face—it was hiding the cord that was no doubt snaking up the back of her shirt, the earbuds tucked inside her ears. We weren’t allowed to have any kind of “listening or electronic device” in the classroom, and I couldn’t believe she’d risk that right in front of Mr. Perkins, who stood just a few feet away.
I had a feeling Reede Harper did a lot of things against the rules.
After class, Reede walked out the door, surrounded by several boys. Mark, Rosie, and I weren’t far behind.
“Gotta go,” Mark said as we reached the hall intersection.
“Say hi to Kara for us,” I said. Too bad Jilly wasn’t here to see Mature Erin as she showed she no longer had feelings for Mark and wished him well with his little girlfriend.
“Right,” Mark said, turning down the other hall without looking back.
“Are they all good?” Rosie asked when he left.
“Why are you asking me?” I said. “You’re the one who’s known him forever.”
“But you’re the one he talks to,” Rosie said. Most girls would sound jealous. Rosie was just stating a fact.
“He hasn’t said anything to me,” I said. “They seem fine.”
“Okay,” Rosie said as she dropped me off at my locker, “see you on the bus later.”
Reede showed up a minute later, smiling at her followers and waving them on. Then she turned to our locker. “Infants,” she muttered as she pulled a pack of gum from her backpack. “Like I would ever go out with any of them.”
“Yeah,” I said, “a lot of them are really immature.”
Reede leaned against the locker next to ours, blowing a bubble. It grew large in front of her face before she sucked in, popping it with a satisfying smack. “This school blows.”
I stiffened. “It’s not all bad,” I said. “There are some pretty cool people here.” I exchanged my history notebook for language arts and Spanish.
“I’ve just got to get through this year.” She blew another bubble as her eyes roamed my body like some kind of airport scanning device. “You know, you’re really cute but you don’t know how to take it to hot.”
I scowled at her. I hardly registered that she’d said I was “really cute.” Where did she get off dissing my appearance the second day of school? “I’m an athlete,” I said. Brilliant. I was basically agreeing that I wasn’t hot and this was why.
“Athletes can be hot,” Reede said, her eyes still skimming me. It felt like she was trying to mentally transform Erin the Ugly into Erin the Gorgeous. “What sports?”
“Mostly basketball but some soccer.” Why was I talking to her? “So, did you get everything you needed out of the locker or what?”
“Don’t need anything the first week. You just have to show up.” She pulled her schedule out of her back pocket. “Where’s Room 248?”
“I’m going that way,” I said. “I could—”
“Never mind,” she said, “I’ll find it.” She strode down the hall, her hips moving in a way I didn’t think mine ever could, even with a lot of practice.
What was her problem? Was she too cool to be seen with me? It wasn’t like I was a total loser at MBMS. At least, not anymore.
I slammed the locker door and a few people jumped. I didn’t know what bothered me more—that she didn’t want to walk with me or that I cared so much that she didn’t.
Wednesday, August 20
THINGS THAT ARE REALLY ANNOYING
Reede Harper is totally stuck up.
Even though RH is totally stuck up, people still like her.
I survived the YOHE, helped create cool effects 4 the spring play last year, people know who I am & not in a bad way anymore & NONE OF IT MATTERS. Reede Harper is IT.
I want Reede 2 like me even after she dissed my looks. WHY???
HOT— —METER
#1 Mark Sacks—the hair, the butt in shorts—need I say more?
#2 Mr. PerkinsOther cute guys will go here as I s
pot them…
THINGS THAT MAKE ME WONDER
Why haven’t Jilly & her sisters taken me 2 hot?
Could Reede Harper take me 2 hot?
Do I want 2 go 2 hot & have people notice me 4 that?
What would it be like 2 get attn 4 something besides complete & utter humiliation?
Mark just IM’d about I-Club. He knows some 7th graders who might be good. So glad he isn’t worshipping Reede. Thank God 4 Kara.
I know it’s lame that the only guy besides Mark on my Hot-o-Meter list so far is my history teacher. But he is very cute. Rosie thinks so 2… & I want 2 have more than 1 on the ’Meter so there.
Also, it takes my mind off RH.
CHAPTER 6
ERIN PREPARIN’
REEDE WAS STANDING AT OUR locker the next morning, applying mascara.
“No adoring fans?” I asked as she stepped aside to make room for me.
“No, thank God.” She straightened up and did another eye-scan over my body.
“Would you mind not staring at me?” I said as I opened my backpack.
“Sorry.” She shrugged and looked back at the mirror. “I kind of have this ability to make someone over in my mind and sometimes I do it without realizing it. You don’t need much of a makeover, I just see you with—”
“Not interested,” I interrupted, grabbing the books I’d need for my next few classes. “It’s not all about looks, you know.” Even as I said it, I was hearing her words echo in my head: You don’t need much of a makeover.
Reede raised an eyebrow. “No. But they help.”
I closed the locker just as Mark and Kara walked towards us down the hall.
“Hi, Erin.” Kara’s voice was bright, but she didn’t look at me.
“Swift,” Mark said, pointing at me. “Get ready to die at the Y.”
I shook my head, smiling. That was his new phrase whenever we played basketball, which we were supposed to do this weekend. “You’re the one who’s going down,” I said.
Kara’s smile flipped to a frown.
A familiar twinge of guilt-annoyance pinched me. Kara claimed it was fine that Mark and I played basketball together, that she knew we were only friends and “totally trusted” us. But here she was looking pissed at the mention of Mark and me going to shoot hoops.
When I had asked Jilly about it, she had said of course it was fine because Mark and I had been playing together before he went out with anyone. And he always invited her.
“You’re lucky because there aren’t too many girls who have a friend who’s a boy—that they do stuff with outside of school,” she had said. Then she had said something really cool: “You shouldn’t have to give up a good friendship for anyone.” The way she had looked at me, I knew she was thinking of last year, when she told me I had to pick between my friendship with her and my friendship with Mark. Thankfully, we had worked it out after a big fight. But it was cool that she could bring it up.
“Who’s the hottie with the hair?” Reede’s voice brought me back to the hallway.
I frowned. I really didn’t want Mark on Reede’s radar. He seemed like the only guy who was immune to her. “Just another infant,” I said, using her word.
“That one’s an exception,” she said, looking at me. “So, who’s he to you?”
None of your business, I wanted to say but instead I said, “a friend.”
She snorted. “Does he know that?”
“What do you mean?”
She glanced down the hall. “You didn’t catch that little energy surge he sent your way?”
“Energy surge?”
Reede tucked her books against her hip. “He likes you, girl.”
I furrowed my brow. “Um, hello? He had his arm around his girlfriend?”
“Who, by the way, is totally and completely jealous of you,” Reede said. “And she’s history.”
I glanced down the hall where I could just make them out in the crowd.
“I give them another week, tops,” Reede said.
“What?” I said. “You don’t even know them.”
“I don’t have to know them to know how they feel,” Reede said, with an authority that made me believe her. “He likes you, she can feel it, and she’s totally jealous and trying not to show it. Didn’t you hear how fake her ‘hi’ was?”
I didn’t know how to answer that. If I said I had noticed, then it would be like I knew she was jealous of me and that sounded self-centered. But if I said I didn’t notice, it would seem like I was a totally unobservant dork who couldn’t read anyone’s body language.
“Play the innocent bystander if you want, Erin,” Reede said. “But that guy is totally into you and his little girlfriend is going to be solo very soon.”
I looked at her.
“I think I just made your day,” she said, walking backward down the hall. “You can thank me later.” She turned around and picked up her pace, leaving me shaking my head. How could one person be so complicated? One minute Reede’s dissing my look, the next she’s saying Mark is sending me “energy surges” and is going to break up with Kara. I was so confused as I looked for Mr. F that I nearly barreled into Puppet Porter—I mean Mrs. Porter—our principal.
“Watch where you’re going, Miss Swift,” she said, as she placed a hand on my shoulder to steer me out of oncoming traffic. “Staying out of trouble so far, I hope?”
“Yes, Mrs. Porter,” I said. “That’s my plan.”
“Excellent, excellent,” she said. “And how are your puppets?”
“I don’t have any puppets, Mrs. Porter.” I sighed. Ever since I’d hit Serena last year for calling me a puppet and had to talk to Mrs. Porter, who had a whole collection of puppets, she thought I had a collection, too. “But how is your collection?”
“I added another marionette from Germany,” she said. “You should stop by.”
“Maybe I will,” I said. “Right now I need to go.” I ducked down the hall toward the gym where I spotted Mr. F outside one of the larger custodian closets.
“Running from trouble?” Mr. F said when I arrived, out of breath.
“Just my past,” I said. I glanced at the open door, noticing several photos taped to it. “Were these up last year?”
“Same kids, different photos,” Mr. F said.
“I can’t believe I never noticed,” I said. “Who are they?”
Mr. F emptied a box of paper towels and looked up. “Some of the best kids around.”
“Better than us?” I joked, placing a roll of paper towels on the shelf next to the others.
He chuckled, then pointed to a young girl, whose toothless smile filled her face. “That’s Olivia. She’s seven.” He shook his head. “Sweetest smile you’ll ever see and the best hugger I’ve ever met.” He picked up the empty box and set it in the hall. “They’re kids at a place I visit.”
“They’re cute,” I said. “I’d like to meet the best hugger.”
“Maybe you will someday,” Mr. F said. He offered me a Tootsie Pop from his jar on the shelf. “But I bet you didn’t come here to talk about pictures. What’s on your mind?”
I unwrapped the Tootsie and settled on top of a step ladder near the door. “There’s this new girl.”
“Reede Harper,” Mr. F said. Now he was cleaning scrub brushes in the big sink, rubbing them together so the soap squished and squirted.
“How did you know?” I asked. “Aren’t there a lot of new people every year?”
“Just a hunch,” Mr. F said. “Go on.”
“Well,” I said, “at first she seemed really stuck up, like she was too cool for everyone, but then she says things that are the total opposite of that.”
“Sounds pretty normal,” Mr. F said, raising an eyebrow. “Is that all?”
I concentrated on peeling the wrapper off my Tootsie Pop. “Reede thinks this one guy is going to break up with his girlfriend and that he likes someone else.”
Mr. F smiled. “I don’t know if Mark will break up with Kara b
ut I do think he likes you.”
I almost fell over backward off the step ladder. “Would you stop that?”
Mr. F laughed, rinsing one of the brushes. “So, what’s the problem with this situation?”
I put the Tootsie Pop in my mouth. “I don’t know,” I said, the round sucker pushing my cheek out. “I guess it’s just, well, weird.”
“Because of last year?” he said. “How you liked Mark and he liked Jilly but you stopped liking him and didn’t think you liked him that way anymore. Only now that you’ve found out he might be interested in you, you may be taking a second look?”
I shook my head in amazement. “Are you sure you aren’t a middle school girl under that gray hair?”
Mr. F chuckled. “I listen and observe, that’s all.”
Sighing, I folded the wrapper into a tiny square and tossed it into the garbage can next to the door. “So, I don’t know what to do.”
“Why do you need to do anything?” Setting the brushes carefully on the shelf above the sink, Mr F adjusted them in a neat row. “Nothing’s happened yet. Why don’t you let things go the way they will and then decide what to do.”
I frowned. “But I want to be prepared.”
“For what?”
“If they break up,” I said. “If Mark likes me and asks me out. If Kara hates my guts.”
Mr. F laughed. “That’s a lot of ifs. I think you’re much better off living right here, right now, and not preparing for things that may never happen.”
“But what if they do?”
Mr. F put some cleaning supplies in the bucket. “Then you’ll handle them with your usual good sense, Erin P. Swift.” He lifted the bucket and turned to face me. “Lunch is almost over so if you want to eat, you’d better get going. And I’ve got to get to work.”
“Thanks for nothing, Mr. F,” I said as we knocked fists.
He laughed. “You’re welcome.”
Thursday, August 21
QUESTIONS TO PONDER
If Mark sent me an energy surge w/o me knowing, did I accidentally send 1 back 2 him? Does he think I like him?
