“Ooh,” I said. Because those might be juicy. I wished I had known to look for them. Maybe finding these would help Piper calm down.
“Melanie Soto. She was such a good friend. Until she got all caught up with Greg Nelson,” my mom said.
A switch in Piper flipped. I could see it. My sister was far, far away from calming down. “What do you have against Greg? He and Mel are still together. They’re a great couple.”
“They are?” my mom asked, sounding surprised. “Greg with all the piercings and the vegetable-oil Volkswagen?”
I found a chart Piper had made about running. I tried to hand it to her but she swatted it away.
“What’s wrong with piercings? Bobby has piercings. Are you saying there’s something wrong with Bobby?” Piper asked.
I held my breath. This was a trap. I really hoped that my mother was smart enough not to say anything bad about Bobby.
“You were a much happier person when you ate meat,” my mother said.
I couldn’t believe she had said something so blunt and so true. I would have danced around it. Piper gasped.
“The only person making me miserable is Professor Weisner!”
“Who?” my mother asked.
And that was pretty much the end of the end.
“A man I hate! Actually, I hate everything about this semester,” Piper said.
I’d never heard her sound this unhappy. Ever. It scared me.
“Don’t be like this,” I said. I reached out and tried to hug her, but she gently pushed me away and walked out of the garage.
“Stop,” she said. “I’m on the verge of a total meltdown.”
Wow. Piper had never had one of those. I followed after her, but my mom stayed put.
“And tell your friend I’ll call her back tomorrow,” Piper said. “I just can’t deal with her questions right now.”
That didn’t make any sense. What friend was she talking about?
“Venice called you?” I asked.
“No. Your geeky friend. The one who dropped by for pizza,” Piper said.
“Drea Quan?” I asked. I was stunned.
“Yeah,” she said. “She is so insecure. I think she’s asked me a hundred questions.”
“Wait,” I said. “You’ve been talking to her on the phone?”
I didn’t call Piper nearly as much as I wanted because I didn’t want to bug her. It was alarming to think Drea was ringing her up any time she pleased. The nerve!
“You don’t have to talk to Drea,” I said. “You can actually decline all her calls.” I walked with her through the house and out the front door.
“I’d never do that to you,” Piper said. “I know how important saving the geeks from their geekiness is to you.”
But I was starting to care less and less about that. Really, I just wanted to survive my thirty-eight tasks.
“Piper,” I said, “can I just ask you one question?”
We’d reached her car, but I wasn’t ready to let her go. Piper took her light-gray ISU sweatshirt off and tied it around her hips. “Okay. One. But that’s all I have the emotional energy to handle.”
So I tried to combine as many of my questions as I could. “What’s an easy Halloween costume I could wear that would make a boy I don’t like stop crushing on me?”
Piper shrugged. “You can’t control another person’s feelings. Let the kid have his crush. You should just go as a cat. You like cats. They’re easy. And you look super cute with whiskers.”
She kissed the top of my head and got in her car. I watched her drive off. I heard the screen door shut behind me and I turned to see my mom. She looked stressed out, which made sense. Her oldest child was considering quitting school and leaving the continent.
“She’ll calm down,” my mom said. But she sounded a tiny bit uncertain.
“I blame Dr. Weisner,” I said. “He sounds terrible.”
“I blame Bobby,” my mom said. “He’s a bad influence.”
This surprised me, because even though I knew my mom wasn’t thrilled with Bobby, I’d never heard her say anything negative about him before. My mom and I stood on the steps watching cars slowly drive down our street.
“Your dad is going to be late again today,” my mom said. “So pick whatever you want for dinner.”
My dad had been working so much lately. It felt like half of Idaho Falls was experiencing dental emergencies.
“Does this mean we get pizza again?” I asked.
I felt my mom rest her hand on my shoulder. “I think we should eat something more nutritious.”
That really surprised me, because any time I ever suggested that we eat pizza my mom always said, “Sounds good.”
“Things feel chaotic,” she said now. “Let’s eat soup.”
“If that’s what you want,” I said, because things did feel chaotic. “Hey, would you mind if I lit a candle?”
My mom sighed heavily. “Last time Piper burned one of those things at dinner, our house smelled like bamboo and frankincense for a week.”
“It doesn’t have to be a meditation candle,” I said. “A birthday candle would work just fine.”
I really didn’t want to explain to my mom that I needed to send a message to the universe for help. I just wanted to do what Piper had done and get results.
“Sometimes I feel like you and Piper live in a different world from the one I grew up in,” my mom said, opening the door. “I never thought about candles or Thailand. I just stayed focused on getting good grades and enjoying myself. I was most happy swimming at the local pool.”
I followed my mom inside the house. “Yeah, that sounds like a different world,” I said. But really I wasn’t paying complete attention anymore.
“Do I have to wait for you to make the soup?” I asked. “Or can I light the candle right now?”
My mother opened the cabinet beside the sink. Inside, there was a neatly stacked row of cupcake decorations, food coloring, and candles. My heart jumped. I mean, I knew it was unlikely that magic was actually going to work, but what if it did?
“Where should I put it?” she asked, pulling a single yellow candle out of the box.
“I’ll just hold it,” I said.
My mother frowned. “I’m not going to let you hold a lit candle and get hot wax all over your fingers.”
“Don’t worry,” I said. “I’m going to blow it out pretty quickly.”
My mother opened up the refrigerator and pulled out a lime. I watched her grab a paring knife and poke the lime’s side. Then she stuck the candle inside.
“Cool,” I said. It never would’ve occurred to me to turn a lime into a candlestick.
My mother lit the match and set the candle’s small wick on fire. My mind zoomed a million miles a minute to try to figure out my wish. I needed something powerful. Something that would make both Hayes and Drea scram from my life. And a Halloween costume idea. And also I needed help with my photo clinic on Friday. And getting PopRat approval.
“The wax is dripping,” my mother said.
I licked my finger and went to snuff out the candle, like Piper had done, but my mom swatted my hand away.
“You can’t touch open flames!” she said.
I watched the lime roll onto its side and then tumble into the sink. The candle sizzled and went out when it hit a wet sponge.
“Bummer,” I said. Because I wasn’t sure if that meant my magic wish would fail.
“Okay,” my mother said sternly. “You’re not ever allowed to light anything in the house ever again. And if I ever see you try to touch a flaming object from this day forward, you’re grounded. That’s how people wind up in the burn unit.”
It felt pretty terrible that nothing seemed to be working out and that my mom was yelling at me about the burn unit.
“Okay,” I said. “I get it.”
“Good,” she said, giving me a brisk hug. “Now let’s open the pantry and try to find some soul-nourishing food.”
That seemed
pretty impossible, because last time I checked, our pantry was filled mostly with stale Cheez Doodles, Corn Pops, and several cans of low-sodium garbanzo beans. My mom seemed pretty disheartened when she saw the state of our pantry.
“We’re living like animals,” she said, selecting a can of garbanzo beans.
After trolling through the refrigerator, my mother found a few more ingredients. I helped her make some interesting soup and when my dad finally came home he was still wearing his light-blue dental scrubs and looked totally beat.
“Some days I wish I painted houses,” he said. “Because when you’re done, you’re done. Nobody ever calls you with an emergency.”
He sat down at the table and sighed. Work was always this bad when Dr. Pedit, Dad’s business partner, took his annual fishing trip to Alaska. My dad had to pick up all the slack.
“Mom made soup,” I said.
“That sounds fantastic,” he said, slipping off his shoes under the table. “So how’s sixth grade treating you? Anything exciting happening?”
And rather than tell him about the exciting stuff, I figured I’d keep things general.
“Things are good,” I said.
My mom set down an empty bowl in front of me and ladled in soup. Spiral noodles and interesting vegetables bobbed in the steamy broth.
“Didn’t you mention you had an oral report due in Idaho History?” my dad asked. “Aren’t you doing it with Venice? Something about mining history in Silver Valley.”
I stirred my soup and took a bite. I didn’t know why my dad loved talking about homework so much at the dinner table, but it was basically his favorite topic. Probably because he didn’t have any.
“That’s not due for two weeks,” I said. “We haven’t even picked our topic yet.”
My dad’s eyes grew wide. “Well, you should decide right away so you can get started on it.”
He tore up a piece of bread and tossed the uneven cubes into his soup. It looked super soggy and disgusting.
“Chill out,” I said. “It’s important for me to pace myself. I don’t even know why you’re worried. I always get As.”
My dad scooped up the soggy cubes and frowned. “I’m only trying to help. I logged on to TRAC and it doesn’t list any assignments due this week in English, Science, or Idaho History.”
“That’s actually wrong,” I said. “I think the teachers are just forgetting to put them online.” Because I had plenty of assignments in those classes. I took a big drink of water because the soup was so salty.
“This happened last year,” my mom said. “At the beginning everybody is so gung ho for the online calendar. And by mid-November it’s only half complete. By February it’s worthless.”
“It’s only October and other than Yearbook I’m mostly ahead with all my assignments,” I said. Because I didn’t like thinking about November or February until it was actually November or February.
“Both my daughters are such good students,” my dad said. “I’m a lucky guy.”
My mom looked at me sternly. She did not want me to bring up Piper and Bobby and Thailand. But I wasn’t planning on doing that. I was smart enough not to create drama at the dinner table. Besides, everything happening with Piper bummed me out. Also, I had homework to do. I didn’t have time to stress out about Piper, Bobby, and Thailand. I needed to stress out about my own life. It was plenty complicated.
My life was raining problems. And not little tiny problems. Giant awful ones. As soon as I got to school I bumped into Drea. She was wearing so much berry lip gloss that her mouth was turning blue.
“You’re wearing too much lip gloss,” I told her. “You look like you need oxygen.”
“You are so funny!” Drea said. She laughed way too loud and swatted me.
Was she always this annoying? Or was it a new quality? I couldn’t tell. But I decided to let her know how I felt about her calling Piper. “Hey,” I said. “You need to stop bugging my sister.”
“Oh no,” Drea said. “Is she still upset? Does she want her sweatshirt back?”
And then I noticed that Drea had a light gray ISU sweatshirt tied around her hips.
“That’s Piper’s?” I asked. It made no sense that Drea was wearing it.
“I sent a pop to Piper last night about lip gloss. I ran out of hers and clearly I bought the wrong shade.” She pointed to her overly purpled lips. “And then she said she was a block away. And my family was making banana splits. So I invited her over. And she was super upset about her psychology teacher. I mean, she was mad at the whole school. And she said she didn’t want to be reminded of ISU every second of her life. So she asked me if I wanted her sweatshirt.”
This story didn’t even sound real. Piper would never go to Drea’s for a banana split when she could hang out with me instead.
“No way,” I said.
“You mean no way I can keep her sweatshirt?”
And even though I thought Drea was probably making everything up, there was a small piece of me that wondered if she actually was wearing my sister’s sweatshirt. If she was, I wanted it back.
“That’s what I mean,” I said. “You need to give it back to me.”
Drea sluggishly untied the sweatshirt and handed it to me. “Does this mean she’s not going to give me her other clothes?”
It felt like somebody had hit me in the face. Why would Drea think my sister was giving her more clothes?
“Sorry,” I said. “Piper needs all her clothes.”
“Even though she’s going to Thailand?” Drea asked. “Because she said she wanted to lighten her load.”
I felt my face turn hot. No way. No way. No way was my sister giving her cool clothes to this geek!
“She changed her mind,” I said.
And then I didn’t even want to talk to Drea anymore. She was becoming a total pest.
“Okay,” Drea said. She handed me Piper’s sweatshirt and it smelled just like my sister, plus a little bit like Bobby. It was unbelievable.
“Bye,” I said. I tied the shirt around my own waist and stomped off.
When I got to Yearbook, I was really hoping to run into Venice first so I could tell her about all the drama in my life. But I ran into Anya instead. And she looked like a total nut. She had on a fringed black vest and yellow polka-dot pants. I mean, it felt like maybe she was sick with a fever and delirious when she got dressed. And so I tried to ask her about her outfit in a kind way.
“Why are you wearing such weird clothes?” I asked.
Anya smiled at me in a snarky way. “Aren’t we working on the photo-clinic assembly presentation today?”
“Yeah,” I said. I didn’t know why that mattered.
“So I decided to show up looking like a full-on geek, so that you and Venice can de-geek me for the school. Like a step-by-step on how to look like a normal and attractive person.”
I just stared at her. I couldn’t believe that she thought my photo clinic was going to be all about her. When Venice walked in, I could tell the exact moment she noticed what Anya was wearing, because she did a hilarious double take.
“I’m dressed like a nerd on purpose,” Anya explained to Venice. “I figure I’ll show up looking like a dork and then you guys will de-dork me for the assembly.”
Venice blinked several times. “Are you going to wear that all day?”
Anya’s eyes grew wide. “I’m not crazy! Of course not. My real clothes are in my cubby.”
I looked at Venice and I really hoped she could read my mind. Because I had no desire to let Anya steal my assembly presentation.
“I think it’s offensive to geeks to take this approach,” Venice said.
“Totally,” I said. Even though I was sort of down on geeks at the moment. Considering one of them was trying to steal my sister’s clothes.
“Dorks don’t care if you make fun of them,” Anya said. “It’s like their feelings are made of rubber. Nothing sticks to them.”
“Um, yeah,” I said, “that’s not true
.”
“And how would you know? Are you a dork?” Anya asked.
And while I didn’t think I was a dork, I did think I could understand how they felt.
“We should use a regular student for the assembly,” I said.
“Exactly. What you’re trying to do feels very strange,” Venice said, pointing to Anya’s pants.
“I totally disagree,” Anya said. “I think I’ll do great. So do Sailor and Sabrina.”
“Yeah. Your friends will always think you’re great. That’s their job,” I said. I winked at Venice.
Ring.
Venice leaned in and whispered to me, “I’m going to run up and ask Ms. Kenny if we can do it our way, and use a regular student, okay?”
My best friend was so smart. Of course we should cut Anya off at the knees before she had a chance to worm her way into our clinic.
“Do it!” I said.
“Do what?” Anya asked.
When Venice ran off I had to keep Anya busy.
“So where did you get those pants?” I asked.
“Park City,” Anya said. “At the outlet mall. I wore them for Halloween for a bumblebee costume.”
And just like that Venice was back.
“So Ms. Kenny likes the idea of using Drea Quan as a volunteer for the assembly,” Venice said.
My stomach flipped and flipped again. I thought Venice and I were on the same page. How was it possible that my own best friend had accidentally sabotaged me? Seriously, how? I gave Venice a stern look, but she didn’t seem to notice.
“Why are you two compelled to throw all your free time away assisting hard-core geeks?” Anya blurted out. “It doesn’t make sense.”
I watched her storm off to find Sailor and Sabrina.
“You can thank me later,” Venice said.
But I didn’t feel like thanking her. I felt like explaining how I felt about Drea Quan. “I am getting really sick of Drea.”
“You are?” Venice asked. “Why? I thought you wanted to help her. She’s trying so hard to improve her social status.”
And even though I wanted to tell Venice all about how Drea was hogging Piper’s free time, I wasn’t sure how to phrase it. Because if Piper wanted to help Drea and talk to her, that really wasn’t anything I could control.
Totally Crushed Page 6
