He continued to glare.
“Really, I’m sorry,” I said again. “But you have to fix it, Marty. Please,” I begged. “Like, you don’t understand.”
“Maureen, you don’t get it. This thing is totally—”
“I mean I really, really, really need you to fix it,” I said. “Like more than you’ll ever know.”
I started to cry.
“Please, Marty,” I said. “For Alice.”
“What? Why for Alice?” he asked.
“I…I can’t tell you,” I answered.
“Uh, hello,” he said. “Like, is this really the time for stupid little kiddie secrets?”
“I don’t know what it’s time for,” I replied. “But I do know that one way or another we have to go to that show tonight, and like, it would be really, really helpful to have a dancing robot dog to join us.”
“I don’t get it,” he said. “You’re making it sound like life or death.”
“Please,” I said softly. “Don’t use that word.”
He stared.
“You’re weird,” Marty said.
“Just fix the dog,” I said. “Please, fix the dog.”
I exited Marty’s bedroom, went to my room, and grabbed the sparkling pink outfit Department Store Mom had made for me. A moment later I walked back into Marty’s room, having put together a last-ditch plan.
“I gotta get changed and back to Q’s before Beanpole gets there,” I said. “Fix Poochy best you can and meet me at the show, okay?”
Marty clearly didn’t understand. A tear rolled down my cheek.
“It’s a big one, Marty,” I told him. “Like the biggest of all time. And I need you to come through.”
I paused and waited for him to answer. Marty looked back at all the broken dog parts and shook his head.
“I’ll try,” he said. “I’ll try.”
“Cool, see you there,” I told him, and then I headed down the stairs.
“But no promises, Maureen,” he cried out as he gazed at the damaged dog. “Just so you know, no promises.”
A moment later, I left for Q’s house.
I knocked and knocked and knocked at Q’s front door like a neighbor that had locked themselves out of their own house and really needed to use the bathroom. Alice answered wearing ugly green pajamas. She looked absolutely terrible.
“Get dressed,” I said.
“What are you doing here?” she asked.
I pushed my way in through the front door and looked for Beanpole. No sign of her.
“He fixed it,” I said. “Get dressed!”
“He didn’t fix it,” she said.
“He did,” I answered. “Well, not fixed it yet, but he is fixing it. He’s almost done.”
Q paused and thought about what I’d just said.
“Nuh-unh,” she said. “Impossible.”
“It is possible,” I told her. “And if he does fix it and we’re not there when he brings it to the show, how lame will it be to lose to the ThreePees that way, like a buncha chumps?”
Q thought about it, yet still she didn’t budge.
“Would you please just go get dressed?” I said.
“It’s not worth it, Maureen,” said Q. “I’m not worth it.”
Suddenly we heard the beep-beep of a car horn. We turned and saw Department Store Dad pulling up in front of the house. Beanpole jumped out of the vehicle, slammed the car door, and started running up to the front door. She was so excited she was practically popping out of her shoes.
Unfortunately, she was also so excited she didn’t see the garden hose, tripped over a green loop of rubber, and did a gigantic face plop into a small mound of flowers.
“Ouch!”
She popped back up with daisy dirt in her hair.
“Don’t worry, don’t worry. I’m okay, I’m okay,” she said as she wiped soil off her chin. “Hey, everyone, ready to go smash some ThreePees into chocolate pudding?”
There was a pause.
“I am!” I answered in an oh-so-perky way.
Q didn’t respond.
“Hey, why aren’t you dressed?” asked Beanpole when she saw Q.
Neither Q nor I responded. Beanpole paused, looked us over, then wrinkled her nose.
“What’s going on?”
“Well, we had some small technical difficulties with Poochy,” I answered. “But don’t worry, he’ll be okay.”
“He’s not going to be okay,” Q said.
“What do you mean, technical difficulties? What’s the problem?” asked Beanpole.
“I’m the problem,” said Q. “I’m cursed. Anything I touch dies.”
Q started walking away. “You guys should just go,” she said. “Leave me alone. You’re better off without me. The whole world is better off without me.”
Q stalked down the hall. Beanpole and I stood in the doorway, unsure of what to do.
“What is she talking about?” Beanpole asked me. “I’ve never seen Q so depressed.”
“Yesterday, after you left, the ThreePees stole Poochy from her and threw him into the Fountain while she was having one of her panic attacks,” I said.
“Into the Fountain!” she exclaimed.
“But it’s okay,” I quickly added. “Marty is fixing him, and it’s going to be okay.”
“It is?” said Beanpole, unsure of how that could really be possible.
“Yes, it is,” I said. Then I turned and yelled to Q, “Will you please get dressed? The show is gonna start and we need to get rolling.”
Though Alice might have been feeling sad or pitiful or whatever, I knew that what she really needed was strength. Encouragement. “Positivity,” as my mom would say. And though I don’t know where it came from—I mean, I never really had an ounce of it in my life—suddenly I felt as if I were oozing with uplifting energy.
“Come on, let’s go, girl,” I shouted. “It’s time to get dressed!”
Right then I felt like I had just one purpose in this whole entire world: get Q to the talent show. I just felt that if I could get her to the performing arts center, things were going to work out.
Somehow they would work out.
No, I didn’t know how, but I knew they just had to. I mean, if you want to have rainbows, you gotta have rain, right? Well, in my opinion, our dorkasaurus mafia had had about enough rain to water an entire desert.
But there was something else, too. Something I was scared to even think about. For some reason I sensed that if I couldn’t get Q to the talent show, I might not ever see her again.
Maybe no one would.
I gulped and tried not to think about that. After all, Q was about as sad as I had ever seen a thirteen-year-old girl in my life, and a person could only take so much, right?
I looked at the picture on the mantel of Q and her father wearing Mickey Mouse ears.
“Q!” I said, “I am telling you for the last time, go take off those ugly-butt pajamas and get dressed! We have to go.”
Suddenly, we heard a voice from down the hall.
“Oh, hello there; you must be Barbara.”
We all turned. It was Mrs. Applebee. She approached us, looking through her purse.
“Hi, nice to meet you,” said Beanpole, greeting Q’s mom with a smile and a handshake. “You have a very lovely home.”
“Well, thank you,” said Mrs. Applebee, impressed with Beanpole’s good manners. I had to hand it to them: though the Department Store Parents might have been weirdos, they certainly had raised Beanpole to be very polite.
“And this is Maureen,” said Q in a low voice introducing me to her mother.
“Oh,” answered Mrs. Applebee, “we already met.”
Q raised her eyes, surprised by the news.
“You already met?”
Ssshh, ssshh, no, I thought.
“Yes,” explained Mrs. Applebee. “Earlier. When Maureen came over.”
“You came over?” asked Q in an almost accusatory manner.
“Yes, dear
, when you were napping,” explained Mrs. Applebee.
Ssshh, ssshh, no, I thought.
“Now, where is that…” Mrs. Applebee continued looking through her purse.
Q stared at me. “Why?” She started turning from sad to angry right in front of my eyes.
Gulp.
“Why?” I asked.
“Yes,” said Q, crossing her arms. “Why?”
“To uh...” I started. “To, uh...” Quick, Maureen, think. Think! “To, uh…to tell you the good news. The good news that Marty was going to be able to fix Poochy!”
Phew! I thought. Close one.
Q stared at me with a deep, penetrating glare. She wasn’t buying it.
“Now, come on,” I said. “Get dressed. We’ve got a show to do.”
“Oh, my lipstick,” said Mrs. Applebee, mostly to herself. She closed her purse. “That’s what I’m forgetting. Be right back.”
She disappeared into the back bedroom.
Q stared at me with ever increasing anger. Wheeesh-whooosh. Wheeesh-whooosh.
“What?” I finally said.
“You’re lying,” Q answered. “I don’t believe you.”
“Lying about what?” I said.
“Lying about something, and I don’t believe you. I don’t believe”—Wheeesh-whooosh. Wheeesh-whooosh—“any of it.”
“It’s true,” I said, trying to be as sincere as I could be, even though I was completely lying. “See, Marty did a…he did a…” Quick Maureen, think! “Marty did a backup.”
“A backup?”
“I mean he made a backup,” I said. Come on, Maureen. I started talking about a mile a minute. “You know how computer geeks are, they back up everything. That’s how he was able to fix Poochy. See, he had a computer backup of all the brain stuff, and the rest of it was just wires and things, but you know how wires are wrapped in all that wirey stuff? Well, turns out Poochy wasn’t under the water too long, and with the wires wrapped in the wirey stuff, and Marty having a backup of the computer brain, he fixed it, or rather, well, he is fixing it, so go get dressed.”
Q stared. Beanpole stared too, her pink sweater sparkling. Right then I realized that if Beanpole didn’t believe me, there was no way in the world that Q was going to believe me, either.
I waited for a response.
Wheeesh-whooosh. Wheeesh-whooosh.
It was quiet for about a hundred years. Q glared at me so intensely I couldn’t even look up.
“Well,” began Beanpole, “I guess if Marty said he could fix it...”
“He did!” I exclaimed. “I mean, by now he’s almost done. And he’s going to deliver it to the theater, and how lame would that be to let the ThreePees beat us because we didn’t even show up? I mean, we have to show up. We just have to.”
I waited for Q to respond.
“So…” I said. “What’s it gonna be?”
There was another ten-hour pause.
Wheeesh-whooosh. Wheeesh-whooosh.
“Oh, come on, like let’s go smash some ThreePees, huh?” I said in the perkiest voice I could muster. “Smash ’em like packages of chocolate-chip pudding.”
“Chocolate-chip pudding?” said Beanpole.
“Did I say chocolate chip?” I said. “I meant…”
I turned to Q, my eyes begging her to trust me. To believe in me. To have faith in me.
Slowly, she took a step toward her bedroom door.
“Gimme a minute,” she answered. “While I go get changed.”
“To the Nerd Mobile!” said Q’s mom.
Mrs. Applebee looked about as happy as I had ever seen an adult. Unfortunately, the three of us—Beanpole, Q, and I—were about as joyful as a rained-out holiday parade.
We got in the car, closed the doors, and fastened our seat belts.
“Oh, where’s the fun, Nerd Girls?” asked Mrs. Applebee as she began driving. “A little nervous, huh?”
No one answered.
“Well, that’s understandable,” she offered. “But you’re going to do fine this evening,” she said. “I just know it, because when you hit that stage you’ll have the one thing you need most.”
She took a left at the traffic light.
“Each other,” she said. “You’ll have each other.”
Beanpole and I were as silent as a piece of wood. Q took a long, slow slurp off her scuba tank—Wheeesh-whooosh. Wheeesh-whooosh—and the car continued along.
Occasionally I looked over at Q. And occasionally she looked at me. But we never looked at each other at the same time. Either her eyes were staring out the window, or mine were staring out the window, but we both seemed to know to follow this rule: not to ever look at each other at the same time. Though we were in the same car going to the same place at the same time, Q and I might as well have been a bazillion miles apart.
A few minutes later we pulled into the parking lot and saw, like, ten thousand cars with all sorts of families getting ready to come see the talent show. When I recognized how far we’d have to park from the auditorium due to the lot being so full, the realization of just how many people were going to be in the audience that night hit me.
A lot. It would be a heck of a lot. I looked to the heavens.
Come on, Marty, you gotta come through. You just gotta.
Mrs. Applebee kissed Q on her forehead, wished us good luck, and left us to get a good seat for herself inside the auditorium. Beanpole, Q, and I, dressed in our outfits, walked around to the side of the building and then signed in backstage with Mr. Piddles.
“Nerd Girls, check,” he said when he saw us. “Please wait in the assigned area. And good luck tonight.” He smiled softly. “But based on what we saw yesterday, I’m not sure how much luck is going to play a part in this evening’s show, right, girls?”
The three of us faked small smiles back at him, and then did as we were told, taking our proper places backstage while the audience took their seats. There was no sign of Marty anywhere.
Beanpole bit her fingernails. I looked at Q.
Wheeesh-whooosh. Wheeesh-whooosh.
We sat on our stools in silence. To our left, Disgusting Danny Dortenfuller loosened up his fingers for the cello. Turns out he was going to be able to perform, but with his booger-picking fingers still wrapped in all kinds of thick bandages from having been smashed by his father, no one expected him to be able to do much at all.
Wheeesh-whooosh. Wheeesh-whooosh.
We waited some more.
About ten minutes later the lights dimmed and Mr. Piddles took the stage and prepared to give a few welcoming announcements.
“Where’s Marty?” Beanpole asked.
“Sshh,” I said. “I want to hear this.”
“Maureen,” she asked again. “Where is Marty?”
“Don’t worry, Beanpole,” I said. “He’ll be here. Now, I want to hear this.”
Beanpole stared at me, then turned to Q to see what her thoughts on this matter were. Alice didn’t say a word. Instead she just sat there dressed in her pretty, pink, sparkly little outfit, waiting for the nightmare of this entire evening to end.
Wheeesh-whooosh. Wheeesh-whooosh.
Come on, Marty, I thought. Come on.
Mr. Piddles took the microphone and made a joke about how all of the contestants were really talented, ending with the line, “Even if their abilities might be less obvious to the untrained eye.” The parents laughed. I think it was the same corny line he’d used for the past seventeen years, but still, the whole audience knew that what he was really explaining to them was that “Look, some of these kids absolutely stink, but please be nice and applaud and realize that they are trying their best tonight.”
“Ha-ha!” I said with a big laugh in response to Mr. Piddles’s joke. I turned to Beanpole and Q, trying to lighten the mood. “Mr. Piddles is a good teacher.”
They stared at me like I was from another planet.
“Oh, just relax,” I told them. “I’m sure Marty’s gonna bring the dog in, like, five min
utes, so be ready to rock it tonight, okay?”
Again, Beanpole bit her fingernails while Q looked at me with an unmistakable expression on her face: she had absolutely no desire to “rock it” at all.
Just then the ThreePees came out of their own private dressing room—of course—and took their positions on the other side of the backstage area, directly across from us. Thank goodness we couldn’t hear them. But we could see them, all right. They were dressed in black and gold with peacock-style tails coming out of their butts. Top to bottom they shimmered like volts of high wattage, golden electricity.
The three of us stared. There was no doubt that with their hot bods, skintight outfits, and professional makeup, they looked absolutely great.
Just great.
Kiki puckered her lips and blew me a mean-spirited kiss. I lowered my eyes and looked away.
“Like, five minutes?” Beanpole asked in a hopeful manner after she saw Kiki taunt me. “Like, five minutes,” I answered. “For sure.” Q just stared into the distance.
Wheeesh-whooosh. Wheeesh-whooosh.
Come on, Marty, I prayed. Please, you gotta come through.
Talentless loser after talentless loser hit the stage, but all the parents were nice and proud and understanding, and after each act, they politely applauded.
“You know, if Spacey Susie learned not to drop her clarinet, she might become a real force in the music scene one day,” I said, referring to Susie Clayborne as she exited the stage.
Q stared at me. I lowered my eyes and avoided her gaze. “Where the heck is Poochy?” demanded Beanpole. “You said five minutes and it’s been like seventy-five!”
“Oh look,” I said, turning my attention back to the show. “Max is gonna jump on the pogo stick. I love pogo sticks. Don’t you guys love pogo sticks?”
“Maureen!” shouted Beanpole, grabbing me by the shoulder and spinning me around. “Where is Poochy?”
I stared at her with a frightened look.
“I told you, Marty’s going to bring it,” I said uncertainly.
“He’s not gonna bring it,” said Q. “He’s not gonna bring it at all.”
Q stood up.
“He is,” I said. “Look!”
And just then, like some sort of Christmas miracle, Marty showed up backstage carrying a black bag.
Nerd Girls Page 15
