Pretty Ugly

by Karyn Langhorne Folan

  The older girls laughed and Tasha beamed with pride.

  Dez didn’t say anything. Jamee knew he didn’t like that kind of talk either, but his eyes were fixed on Vanessa’s T-shirt.

  “Speak of the devil,” Renita muttered, cocking her head.

  Jamee turned, along with the rest of the girls, to see Angel walking along the sidewalk alone with her head down and a heavy-looking backpack on her shoulders.

  “She still looks retarded, if you ask me,” mumbled Kym. The rest of the girls chuckled.

  Angel seemed to hear the laughter. She looked up and noticed the girls watching her. Immediately her eyes locked on her feet as if some invisible chain held them down.

  “You know, some people don’t have what it takes for cheerleading,” Vanessa said loudly as Angel got closer. “I’m not sure why some people even bothered to try out. ”

  “Mmm hmm,” Kym said in agreement. “I don’t know neither. ”

  Vanessa turned to face Angel as she approached. “I know some people better not step on my foot. I’ve spent too much money on my sneakers to have somebody scuffing them up with their stinky old shoes. ”

  “I bet her shoes do stink,” Tasha added. Again the girls laughed.

  Jamee squirmed. She hated what Vanessa was doing. She could see by the worried look on Angel’s face that she was scared. Jamee knew if she remained quiet, Angel would think she was just like Vanessa and the rest of her mean friends. Jamee didn’t want that. And yet if she stood up for Angel, Jamee knew she could get into trouble. Vanessa and her friends might turn on her. That was the last thing she needed: a bunch of upperclass girls as enemies. Still, she couldn’t just sit there and do nothing.

  “Yeah, but if Angel moves like she did in the second routine, she probably ain’t gonna step on anyone’s shoes again,” Jamee said, hoping to let Angel know she was on her side.

  Vanessa and Kym glanced at her. Angel didn’t say a word. She just kept her head down and walked a little faster, as if ignoring the girls was the best way to deal with them. Jamee couldn’t blame her. She wished the sidewalk were wider and Angel didn’t have to get so close to them.

  “Yeah, well, you gotta have the whole package to be a cheerleader,” Tasha chimed in. Angel was only two carlengths away. “And it helps if you’re good-looking,” she said with a frown. “But since she ain’t got no hope for that, she better at least learn the moves. ”

  Renita and Kym hooted at Tasha’s comment, raising their hands to their mouths as ugly laughter spilled through their fingers. Finally Dez seemed to wake up.

  “That was cold, Tasha,” he muttered, shaking his head. “Why you wanna say a thing like that?”

  “’Cause it’s true,” Vanessa replied. The girls laughed even louder.

  Angel ignored them. She made a move to rush by the group, but Vanessa stuck out her foot. Angel tripped, hitting the sidewalk on all fours. Her books tumbled from her backpack as she fell. Jamee could see she scraped her leg.

  “Hey!” Dez protested. He bent over her, stretching out his hand to help her. “You okay?”

  Angel ignored him. She bounded to her feet as if she wasn’t hurt, even though a raw red mark appeared just below her knee.

  “How is she gonna be a cheerleader? This girl can’t even walk straight. ” Vanessa shook her head and smirked. Angel quickly stooped to gather her books.

  “I saw you trip her,” Jamee muttered. “Why did you do that?”

  Kym rolled her eyes as if what Jamee said bothered her. “Aren’t you Darcy Wills’s sister?”

  “Yeah, so?”

  “Well, I guess I thought you’d be smarter,” Kym replied with an edge to her voice.

  Just then, a burst of electronic music sliced into the air. Tasha pulled a pink cell phone out of her purse and flipped it open. Angel quickly grabbed the last of her books and rushed off without a word. Jamee wanted to follow her, but she couldn’t bring herself to leave the group of girls. Instead she watched Angel wander down the street alone.

  “I told you I had cheerleading, Mom,” Tasha said impatiently into the phone. “Don’t you remember? I said it, like, a hundred times,” she spoke in a tone Jamee wouldn’t dare use with Mom. And yet, Jamee thought, it almost sounded as if Tasha was putting on a performance. “Okay. Fine,” she said finally and hung up.

  Vanessa continued as if the phone never rang. “I didn’t trip her, Jamee,” she said sweetly. “I moved at the same time she did, that’s all. It ain’t my fault if she gets tangled up in her own feet, is it?” Vanessa blinked innocently. “Besides, be real, Jamee. Do you really think she belongs out there with us?”

  Jamee paused. She didn’t like the way Vanessa, Tasha, and their friends were acting, but she knew Angel was a little odd. Not like the kind of girl who would really fit in.

  “See,” Tasha sounded triumphant. “You know she’s a hot mess, Jamee. So just keep your mouth shut and leave it to Vanessa. She knows how to handle girls like her. Don’t you, Vanessa?”

  “Thanks, Tasha. ” Vanessa put her arms around Tasha’s shoulders and gave her a quick squeeze. “You’re like the little sister I never had, you know that? Oh, by the way, could I have your phone for a second?”

  Tasha stared at her phone. For an instant she was frozen, as if she didn’t know what to do. “Well . . . my mom said I wasn’t supposed to . . . ”

  Vanessa’s arm slid off Tasha’s back. “Oh,” she said coldly. “Well. I just wanted to text my mom at work and let her know I was on my way home. But that’s okay. Maybe I’ll find someone else who’s willing to help me—”

  “No, no! It’s all right if it’s just for a second. ” Tasha fished the phone out of her bag and handed it over. “But just one quick text, okay?”

  A wide grin stretched across Vanessa’s face. “Thanks, girl. You’re the best. ” She looked the phone over, touching the buttons. “Can you take pictures with this, too?”

  “Pictures, movies,” Tasha answered, beaming with pride. “I saved all summer to buy it, but Mom said I can only have a few minutes a month and when they’re all gone I don’t get anymore,” she added as Vanessa’s long fingernails tapped the keyboard.

  “I understand,” Vanessa said, pressing Send. “Thanks, girl. You’re all right. Let’s go to my house. We can practice our jumps for tomorrow. ” Her eyes flicked over Jamee. “You can come, too, Jamee. ” She then smiled at Dez as if she knew something Jamee didn’t. “Unless you guys have other plans . . . ”

  “Thanks, but I have to go home,” Jamee said quickly. “I’m already late. We’re going to dinner at my aunt’s house. ” It sounded like a lie, but it wasn’t. Jamee dreaded seeing Aunt Charlotte. Like the algebra test, it was something she had been doing her best to forget about all day. “I have to go home and change. ”

  Vanessa flipped her hair extensions and smiled. “Well, I guess we have lots of time to practice and get to know each other. I’m telling you right now, this is half the new cheerleaders, standing right here!” She squeezed Tasha’s shoulder again and they walked off, with Renita and Kym following less than a step behind.

  Jamee hoped what Vanessa said was true, that she would make the squad. But she was still bothered by what happened with Angel.

  And Kym’s comment.

  And the way Tasha seemed so fake, especially around Vanessa.

  “Man, them girls are mean. Like a pack of dogs, only better looking,” Dez joked.

  “Yeah, I noticed you couldn’t keep your eyes off Vanessa. Maybe you’re a dog, too. ”

  “C’mon, J. My eyes were on you most of the time, but you didn’t notice,” he said defensively. “Hey, Cooper said he’d treat for pizza tomorrow after school. Wanna come?”

  Jamee hesitated. She knew Darcy would probably be there, too, since she was best friends with Cooper and his girlfriend, Tarah. The last thing Jamee wanted to do was hang out with her sister when she didn’t have to.

  “I got cheerleading, Dez. I don’t know—”

  “So co
me late,” he interrupted.

  “All right. Maybe after practice. ”

  “Cool. ” Dez looked over his shoulder, then leaned in and gave Jamee a long, lingering kiss on the lips that left her a little breathless.

  “Tomorrow,” he said. “Don’t forget. ”

  “You’re late,” Darcy barked as soon as Jamee walked in the door.

  “You’re not my mother, Darcy,” Jamee snapped. “You’re only two years older than me. I don’t know why you think you can talk to me like you’re my boss or something. ” Jamee slapped her books on the kitchen chair, grabbed a glass and filled it with water. After two weeks of hearing each teacher at Bluford tell her she was dumber than Darcy, the last thing Jamee wanted was a lecture from her.

  Darcy frowned. “Well, everyone else is almost ready, and you know how important this is to Mom—”

  “I know, Darcy. I don’t need you to tell me, okay?”

  “Then why are you so late?”

  “I told you this morning,” Jamee said between gulps of water. “It was the first day of cheerleading tryouts. Remember?”

  Darcy grunted. She sat at the kitchen table wearing khaki pants and a white blouse. Textbooks were spread around her at the table. In addition, there were a couple of thick library books stacked right in front of her. The Official SAT Study Guide was on top. Darcy was only a junior at Bluford, but lately all she talked about was “college this” and “college that. ” Mom and Dad were no better. When they weren’t talking about the new baby, there were nonstop discussions about Darcy getting a scholarship if her SAT scores were high enough.

  She’s only a junior, Jamee wanted to scream each time the subject came up. And it’s only September. Why’s everybody rushing everything? Last week Jamee mentioned it to her sister, and Darcy snapped.

  “Just because you blow off school doesn’t mean I’m going to,” Darcy had yelled. Mom jumped in on Darcy’s side. Jamee rolled her eyes at them. She was still angry that they ganged up on her.

  “So how were the tryouts?” Darcy mumbled as she flipped through the SAT book.

  “Fine,” Jamee muttered. She would have liked to tell her about how hard the step routine was or what had gone down with Vanessa and Tasha and that odd girl Angel. But she could see Darcy wasn’t interested. Her eyes were focused on the page in front of her.

  “Is Dad here yet?” Jamee asked.

  Dad had struggled to find work since Mom announced she was pregnant. Recently, he took a new day-job as a customer service representative for the cable company. At night, he was a cab driver. Most evenings, he barely had enough time to eat dinner before heading out to work again.

  Darcy nodded. “He and Mom are getting ready. You really should hurry up and get changed. If we’re late to Aunt Charlotte’s because of you, Mom’s gonna get upset. You remember what her doctor said—”

  “Jamee?” Mom’s angry voice cut Darcy off. She stood in the hallway in a blue dress stretched tight around her pregnant belly. “Why aren’t you ready? We’re supposed to be at Charlotte’s in half an hour!”

  “I told you,” Darcy mumbled under her breath.

  “I can get ready in five minutes, Mom,” Jamee said, moving toward her room.

  Mom had been tired and irritable for weeks. Last month, she was so exhausted that her back had given out one night at work at the hospital. Her doctors explained that the pregnancy and the long hours as an ER nurse were too much for her forty-year-old body. The family had talked about it and agreed to help out more so Mom wouldn’t be so stressed.

  But then Aunt Charlotte called and invited the family to dinner. Jamee thought it was a bad idea from the start. Mom always seemed tense around her sister. And Jamee couldn’t stand to go to her house since a fight they had there last year. Yet for some reason, Mom agreed to go.

  “You were supposed to be home by 4:30,” her mother fussed as Jamee walked down the hallway. “What were you doing all that time?”

  “Cheerleading tryouts!” Jamee cried. “I told you yesterday, remember?” She was used to repeating herself. No one in the house seemed to listen to a word she said.

  Her mother took a deep breath. “I told you I’m not sure about you cheering right now, Jamee,” she grumbled. “You barely made it out of eighth grade, and that counselor said you need to pay attention to your schoolwork. ”

  “Yeah, I know what he said,” Jamee grumbled, thinking of Mrs. Guessner and the crumpled test somewhere at the bottom of her backpack. She didn’t know how she would ever get her parents to sign it.

  “Since I’m late, maybe you should just go on without me,” she offered. “Aunt Charlotte hates me anyway. ”

  Mom glared at her. “Don’t start with me, Jamee Wills,” Mom said. Whenever her mother used her last name, Jamee knew she was getting mad.

  “You two may not always see eye to eye, but she still loves you. Understand?” Mom stared hard into Jamee’s face.

  Jamee knew better than to say anything. Instead she nodded.

  “You’re going, and you’ll be nice,” Mom added.

  “I’ll try. But what am I supposed to do when she’ s not nice? What if she acts the way she did last time when she started saying mean things about me— and about Dad? I can’t stand sittin’ there while she’s badmouthin’ and lookin’ down on us. ”

  “No matter what she says, you’ll mind your place, you hear me?” Mom warned. “She’s your aunt and you’ll show her respect. ”

  Jamee could see the lines in her mother’s forehead and the weariness in her eyes. She knew she should just stop arguing with her, but in that moment she just couldn’t.

  “So I’m supposed to just sit in her stupid dining room while she disrespects me?”

  “YES!” Dad boomed from down the hallway. “You heard your mother, and you know better than to keep arguing with her, especially right now. ”

  “Just drop it, Jamee,” Darcy added from the dining room.

  Jamee’s head began to throb. She wanted to scream at everyone in the house. None of them seemed to listen or care about her anymore. Everything was focused on the baby or Mom’s health or Darcy’s SAT scores. Nothing else mattered. For an instant, Jamee could feel angry tears in her eyes. Mom seemed to notice them.

  “Please, Jamee,” she said calmly. “Just go and get ready. For my sake, if for no other reason. ”

  Jamee took a deep breath, fighting to swallow down her rage.

  “Fine,” she said sullenly. She grabbed her backpack and hurried to her room, slamming the door.

  Chapter 4

  “So,” Aunt Charlotte said, eyeing Jamee from her seat at the head of her fancy wooden table. “What’s new with you?”

  Jamee shrugged. She had hoped Aunt Charlotte would just ignore her for the entire meal. So far it had worked. Jamee had quietly smeared the goopy vegetable lasagna around her plate, pretending to eat it just to be polite.

  “That’s all organic vegetables. Mushrooms, eggplant, and squash,” Aunt Charlotte boasted several times since they sat down. “I know you probably don’t get good produce where you live, so I figured I’d get some for you. ”

  Darcy had thanked her, but Jamee fumed as she stared at the mushy mixture. It’s not like we live that far away from you, she wanted to say. Why do you always act like you’re better than us? Besides, she almost said out loud, it may be organic or whatever, but it’s still nasty.

  Every time Jamee visited Aunt Charlotte, it was the same—food that made her want to gag and comments that made her want to scream.

  It was as if everything her aunt said had an edge to it, like each word was an invisible knife aimed at Jamee and her family. While they were never direct, Aunt Charlotte’s comments were full of jabs about Dad’s job or Mom’s tired face or their neighborhood being an unfit place to raise a baby. The last time Jamee visited, she couldn’t hold her thoughts back. Instead she accused her aunt of being selfish and mean. That’s when Aunt Charlotte told her to get out and never to come back.

&nbs
p; Jamee was fine with the idea, but then Aunt Charlotte called last week and invited them over. Maybe she realized that with Grandma gone, they were the only family she had left in the world. Or maybe it was something else. Jamee couldn’t help but wonder what Aunt Charlotte really wanted.

  “Jamee,” Mom’s voice was full of warning, breaking her thoughts. “Aunt Charlotte just asked you a question. ”

  Jamee sat up in her chair, trying her best to stay calm. “Nothing really. I just started at Bluford. I’m still getting used to it. New teachers and classes, you know. It’s really different from middle school. ”

  “Yes, it’s very different from middle school. And I hope you’re gonna treat it differently, too. Like Darcy. ”

  Anger churned in Jamee’s stomach, but she pressed her lips together and said nothing.

  “Don’t worry, Charlotte. Jamee knows what she’s gotta do,” Mom said icily.

  Aunt Charlotte put a forkful of lasagna into her mouth, and for a second an awkward silence filled the room.

  “Well, I hope so. I’d like to see her go to college one day too, you know. That’s what this is all about, right?”

  Again silence filled the room. Jamee felt like dumping her plate of lasagna on the beige carpeted floor and walking home. Instead she took a sip of water from the oversized glass and tried to hide that her hand was shaking with anger. Dad seemed to notice because he put his hand gently on her back, as if it would steady her somehow.

  “Jamee’ll get there when she’s ready. I have no doubt of that,” Dad said.

  Aunt Charlotte ignored his comment. She stood up suddenly, as if the dinner had reached a point she had been expecting.

  “Well, I was going to wait until after dessert, but since we’re talking about college, I think now’s as good a time as any to make this announcement. ” She beamed from the head of the table, stopping for a second to smile at Darcy.

  “I’ve bought you all something. A gift, I guess. ” She disappeared into the kitchen and returned a few seconds later with a big box topped with a red bow. She plopped it on Darcy’s lap.