by Lisa Yee
Stanford actually wrote a halfway decent essay on Number the Stars. When I told him so, he got all choked up and I was scared he was going to cry. “Really,” he said, “Wow. No one’s ever told me I was a great writer.”
“I didn’t say you were a great writer. I said this is pretty good, considering.”
Stanford smiled and then added almost shyly, “Thanks, Millie. That means a lot to me, especially coming from you.”
“You’re welcome, Stanford.” I caught myself smiling back at him.
Mrs. Martinez’s squeaky book cart brought us back to why we were at the library in the first place. “Well!” I said, bringing us out of an awkward moment. “Let’s go over your word list….”
“It’s amazing,” I told Maddie today as she opened a fresh bag of Mint Milanos. “Stanford seems more tolerable these days. I wonder what’s come over him?”
“Maybe you’re more tolerable,” she said, biting into her cookie with her eyes closed. She always closes her eyes when she eats her favorite foods. Maddie says it makes the food taste even better. She once ate an entire meal at Tandoori House blindfolded, much to the delight of my grandfather and the chagrin of my parents.
I looked at my grandmother as she sat across from me, lost in her heavenly cookie bliss. The other night Emily and I watched a Kung Fu marathon on the Rerun Channel. I had never seen Kung Fu before and was shocked. It featured a peaceful (except when he was fighting) half-Chinese, half-American man who grew up in a Shaolin temple in China. While he was there, a blind priest befriended him by calling him “grasshopper” and giving him words of wisdom that he constantly flashed back to in moments of moral crisis.
The curious thing was, I could swear that much of Maddie’s sage advice has come from that television show. For example, she often says, “No one has ever died from being misunderstood.” Did she think she could just lift those sayings from Kung Fu all these years without my finding out?
“Maddie,” I said as I nibbled on my Mint Milano.
She opened her eyes and looked straight at me. “Yes?”
“Can I ask you something?”
“I know what you’re going to ask.”
“What?” Maybe she was clairvoyant after all.
“You want to know if the cookie really tastes better with your eyes closed, or if I’m just making that up.” She handed me another cookie and I took it. “That is what you wanted to know, isn’t it?”
I hesitated, considering whether to confront her or not. Then I shut my eyes and bit into the cookie. “Yes, that was it,” I said with my mouth full.
Maddie was right, it did taste better that way.
Who would have guessed that place mats would be my downfall?
This morning my mother asked me to get the good place mats out of the armoire. “Ummm, yes, I’ll get to it,” I mumbled. I was absorbed in trying to create anagrams with my Alpha-Bits, but the vowels kept sinking.
“Please have it done before dinner tonight,” Mom added as she scooped up her purse, briefcase, and brown-bag lunch.
“Sure thing,” I said.
Emily peered up from her cereal. Her letters were all jumbled and impossible to read. “I’ll do it, Mrs. Min!” she said. Emily was continuing her mission to become the favorite Min daughter.
“Thanks, but no thanks, Emily. Millicent will do it. It’s her job,” Mom said as she downed her orange juice.
Dad poked his head into the kitchen. He was all dressed for work in his suit and tie. “Late again!” he yelled as he raced through, grabbing a piece of toast and the last banana. “See you girls later!”
Emily had spent the night. One of us is always at the other’s house, though lately it seems like she’s here all the time. I don’t know what she finds so appealing about my cramped house. My parents are always acting up and forcing us to bake cookies or sing the “Pass the Old El Paso” jingle along with them.
At Emily’s, Alice gives us our space, though I wouldn’t mind spending more time with her. Sometimes, when she’s not around, I sneak a peek at whatever she is working on. Naturally, I am careful not to ruffle through her papers, but rather, I merely glance at whatever is on top, or very near the top. Anything more than that would be intrusive.
“I’m going to get dressed,” Emily announced. She was still in the monkey pajamas and matching monkey slippers her father had bought her, only he doesn’t know it yet. I was wearing my cloud pajamas and had just managed to spell smile and then slime.
I pushed my Alpha-Bits around, making miles and limes, but Emily still had not returned. I hoped the washing machine hadn’t overflowed. It happened once before and my room resembled the Johnstown, Pennsylvania, flood of 1889.
“Emily, everything okay?” I yelled. When she did not answer, I decided to see what the problem was. That’s when I discovered Emily staring in disbelief at the dining room table. It was piled high with my trophies, certificates, and news clippings. She looked confused.
“What does this mean, Millicent? Are these all yours?”
I hesitated, not knowing what to say. But the proof was in front of her. I thought of the promise I had made to Stanford, and how I had sworn on my mother’s life. “Tell me,” she said, her voice rising.
“You were snooping!” I cried.
“I was not,” she said. She stomped her foot, but because she was wearing monkey slippers there was no sound. “I was helping you out by getting the place mats out of the armoire and I pulled out these….” She swept her arm over the booty like a game-show hostess.
Before I could tell Emily about the real Millicent L. Min, how I was a certified genius, how I was going to graduate from high school next year, how I was attending college for summer school, before I could even begin to explain my point of view, she became unhinged.
“Millicent, how could you do this to me?!!!” Emily yelled. “I heard rumors. Some kids at volleyball were talking. But I didn’t believe them. We’re never going to be in the same grade, you don’t even go to middle school anymore. You’re a genius, a stupid genius!”
I decided that pointing out her oxymoron would only serve to flame the situation.
“Millicent, when were you going to tell me? Are you even listening to me?” Emily shrieked.
It was hard for me to believe someone could bellow as long as she did. Unless, of course, that someone happened to be a banshee, the Gaelic folklore spirit who wails to warn of impending death.
I wondered if it was possible I had misjudged Emily’s ability to comprehend my situation? After all, it was true I hadn’t given her a chance. However, observing her histrionics made it clear that she would not have been able to handle it.
“Millicent!!!” Emily screeched. “What’s the matter with you? Why are you just standing there? Well, aren’t you going to say anything?”
What could I say? She was being totally irrational. As I paused to collect my thoughts, I noticed her face and neck turning a splotchy red. Still, I forged ahead. “Intelligence,” I began, “merely refers to the all-around effectiveness of an individual’s mental processes….”
“Don’t you get it?” she said, silently stomping her foot again. “Millicent, what is your problem?” I shrugged helplessly, not knowing what she was after. “It’s not about how smart you are, it’s that you didn’t tell me! Didn’t you think I’d find out? Didn’t you think that it would hurt my feelings to be the last to know? Didn’t you trust me? Didn’t you think at all?”
When I hesitated, she took the opening as an opportunity to continue her condemnation. “And why then, if you’re supposed to be so smart, do you even need a tutor? Why does Stanford have to tutor you at all …” She squeezed her eyes shut and took several deep breaths.
I was about to offer her a calming mint or perhaps a jar of Mom’s aromatherapy bath salts when she smacked herself in the forehead and shouted, “You lied about that, too, didn’t you? Stanford’s not tutoring you, you’re tutoring him. Geez,
Millicent, you’re really something. I can’t believe I thought you were my friend.”
Emily grabbed her overnight bag and stormed out the front door, slamming it behind her. I was going to remind her that she was still in her pajamas, but I don’t think she would have heard me.
Today I went solo for the first time in weeks. I refrained from telling Maddie and my parents about my falling out with Emily. The humiliation of them being right would be too much to bear. Also, with my mother’s failing health, I do not wish to add to her burden.
I had nothing to do after poetry class, so I climbed up in my tree to work on some math puzzles. It was hard to get back into the rhythm and I tore up several pieces of paper in frustration, letting them fall to the ground. Max rode past in the station wagon just as another series of rejected cryptarithms drifted down from the tree. “Stop the car,” he yelled to his mother. “It’s snowing!!!”
Later I dropped by Maddie’s. She always has plenty of snacks around and I was in desperate need of chocolate. There were boxes everywhere, and it looked like she hadn’t done any packing since the last time I visited.
“Hey, how’s it going?” I asked, gingerly sidestepping the Fiestaware.
“Slowly, but surely,” Maddie said. She was sitting cross-legged on the floor going through an old photo album. “Every time I start to pack, I come across something that deserves my attention. Like this …”
I sat down beside her and we looked at her wedding photos in silence. She was so beautiful. Her hair was back in a bun and her wedding dress was simple and elegant. Grandpa stood tall beside her with a big sloppy smile on his face. He looked handsome in his tuxedo with the white carnation. They both looked younger than my parents, which was a disconcerting thought.
“We had a small wedding,” Maddie said, running her fingertips lightly over Grandpa’s likeness. “Just family and a few friends. Over the years, we collected friends the way other people collect stamps. We kept promising each other we’d renew our wedding vows and invite everyone we know. And this year I said to myself, ‘This is the year we’re going to do it!’ But instead …” She left her thought in the air.
I recalled Grandpa’s funeral. Once we said our last good-byes, six men, including my father, got up to carry Grandpa away. Maddie whispered that it was an honor to be a pallbearer and that she had a problem choosing since he had so many friends. I don’t even have six friends.
I left her with her memories as I wandered through the house nibbling on a Baby Ruth. As I studied a picture my mother had drawn when she was a child, I detected some Impressionist influence. Or perhaps there was a bit of Picasso’s Blue Period in Mom’s vivid depiction of the whale — or was it a cow? Maddie came up and stood next to me. She smelled like gingerbread.
“I’ve always loved that picture your mother drew of me,” she said.
I looked at it again.
After a while Maddie asked, “Have you seen Chow Lee Low?”
“Who?”
“Your mother’s old stuffed dog.”
“No,” I said, wondering why she would think I knew where he might be.
Maddie frowned. “I must have misplaced him,” she said.
My grandmother is always misplacing things. Once she misplaced Grandpa when they were on a car trip to Las Vegas. She drove off from a gas station thinking he was asleep in the backseat when really he was in the mini-mart buying Slim Jims.
“Where’s Emily?” she asked, as if she too had been misplaced. “Say, aren’t you supposed to be at volleyball?”
I held up my hand in a claw position. “Hand cramp,” I explained. “Too many essays in my poetry class made it impossible for me to play volleyball today.”
Maddie looked into my eyes, so I turned away in case she was going to try some of her psychic-cosmic mumbo jumbo on me. “Did you have a fight with Emily?”
“No,” I fibbed. “Everything’s fine, just fine.”
“Okay then,” Maddie said as she took her portrait off the wall and stacked it with the others. All that remained were rectangle imprints where the pictures used to be. “If that’s what you say, then we’ll leave it at that.”
Any signs of Stanford being human have disappeared. Poof!
“How could you tell her?” He had gotten a buzz cut and reeked of cologne. Ode de Oaf, it smelled like. “Why did you do it? You swore on your mother’s life!” he said accusingly. “What happened? Did you have a massive brain fart or something???!!!”
Mrs. Martinez looked up from her desk and signaled for us to keep our voices down, even though there was no one else in the library.
“I didn’t tell her,” I tried to explain as I gagged at his smell. I have very sensitive olfactory nerves. “I told you she found my certificates and diplomas. Hey, I just thought you’d want to know.”
Stanford slumped back and glared at me as if I were responsible for his bad haircut. “Now I’ll bet she hates us both. It’s all your fault.”
“No, it’s your fault, I wanted to tell her the truth, but noooo, you wouldn’t let me!”
The entire hour we ricocheted back and forth assigning blame and, needless to say, got in exactly zero minutes of tutoring time. I wondered if I could still charge his mother the seven dollars.
Just as we were about to come to blows, Emily walked in and headed straight toward us. Both Stanford and I shut up and corrected our posture. I started to stand to give Emily a hug, but saw the look on her face and immediately sat back down.
“Stanford. Millicent,” she said, giving us each a formal nod. “I don’t have much to say to either of you, other than I hope you had fun with your little charade.”
Stanford opened his mouth, but Emily silenced him by merely raising her hand. I wish I had that power. She reached into her purse and pulled out The Outsiders. “Here, you can have your book back,” she said, tossing it in front of Stanford. “Even though you raved about it, I don’t think I want to read it anymore.”
I looked at him in amazement. He had given Emily a book? A book that he had raved about? I started to say something, but then Emily turned to me. She reached around her neck and unclasped her necklace. The one that I had made at our very first sleepover.
“I think this belongs to you,” she said, slapping it down on the table. I felt as though she had punched me in the stomach. “I hope the two of you have fun together making up lies. Good-bye.”
Then she was gone. Stanford and I just looked at each other. I wondered if he felt as bad as I did. I wanted to talk to him about Emily and I wanted to talk to him about The Outsiders. But he didn’t want to talk to me.
Finally, Stanford looked like he was about to speak. I waited for him to tell me that I was right and that we should have told Emily the truth before she found out on her own. Instead he said, “You’re such an idiot,” as he pushed everything off the table and stormed out of the library.
“You’re such a cretin!” I yelled after him.
Mrs. Martinez looked over at me, but didn’t say anything. I bent down and picked up the friendship necklace off the floor.
Imagine anyone even thinking that Stanford was my tutor. What a joke. As if there’s anything he could ever teach me.
No one called today.
Nada.
Nothing.
Not that I care, but it has now been 247 hours since Emily’s dreadful hissy fit. I am determined not to call her, especially after the mean things she said to me. In the past I might have spoken to Maddie about this, but I can’t tell her what has happened. I can’t tell anyone, and the only ones who know are Emily and Stanford, and they aren’t speaking to me either. I must remember to erase Emily from speed dial.
Volleyball has spun into a study in awkwardness. With Emily and I trying our best to ignore each other, our game suffers. One of us sets up the ball, and the other runs in the opposite direction. Coach Gowin is not amused. It is sheer torture being on the same court with Emily.
After
volleyball the other day, Emily headed toward me. To my relief she was smiling. In return I sent her a huge grin. I was so glad she had finally come to her senses. But she brushed past me and joined Wendy, one of the nicer girls on our team.
“Ready?” Emily asked. She made a big point of not looking at me. If she had lifted her nose any higher her whole body would have levitated.
“Let’s go,” Wendy answered, swinging her gym bag over her shoulder. “Millicent, are you coming too?”
My heart lifted as I rose to join them. However, my reprieve was cut short when Emily said in a snooty voice, “Millicent L. Min is too busy going to high school to want to spend time with dummies like us.”
I felt a twinge in my chest. Wendy has always been friendly. Once Emily and I had even considered asking her to join us after a game. Nevertheless, to see the two of them walk away from me caused instantaneous peristaltic contractions that I diagnosed as pangs of hunger. Curiously, even after two U-NO bars and an open Yoo-Hoo I found in the refrigerator, I still felt unsettled. It’s no wonder. There is just too much to think about.
I wish I could walk into Bob’s Hardware Store and buy a shutoff valve for my brain. At bedtime my mind races. Thoughts pour out and dance around. Numbers add up and divide. Lists begin and never end. Songs without names taunt me. If my head could only be as empty as Stanford’s, I would be able to slip into the delicious, deep sleep that eludes me.
The Idiot Stanford is bent on making my life even more miserable. He has stopped reading, instead choosing to sit and glare at me during our tutoring sessions. Therefore, I respond accordingly and glare back. The only person who is happy about this is Mrs. Martinez, since Stanford and I are no longer yelling at each other. I can’t believe I practically considered him a friend.
And life just keeps getting worse. I am convinced my mother is dying. Today I brought in the mail and saw the doctor bills, plus bills for lab tests. Her prognosis looks pretty grim. I’ve been compiling a list of her ailments. They are in line with the symptoms of a brain tumor.
