I finish looking through the page with the grant information; it seems really complicated. Like, you need all of this financial information and a whole business proposal. That letter from Mayor Danes makes it sound easy, but it’s actually really hard.
“Lucy, did you hear me?”
I look up from the computer and see Sunny and Yamir standing over me. Is Earth Club over already? I didn’t even realize.
“We gotta go,” Yamir says. “Are you on another planet or something? Mrs. Deleccio dismissed us, like, two minutes ago.”
I turn off the computer and follow them out to the parking lot, where Mrs. Ramal is waiting for us. I can’t believe how much I just learned. It was like all of that green information just washed over me and I absorbed it.
Yamir and I are sitting in the backseat together again, and I move as close to the window as I can. I really don’t want our thighs to touch again.
I wish Sunny would let him have the front seat once in a while.
Beauty tip: Make sure to blend your
foundation and bronzer for an
even, smooth tone.
with the Relaxation Room idea, I’ve been pretty busy at the pharmacy. I’m always adjusting the lighting, making sure the couch cushions are neat, and generally making sure the room looks presentable. I want people to want to sit there.
It’s a work in progress, and I know that. But it’s really fun to work on it. And it’s also bringing in business! Just yesterday a woman bought a few of the Body & Wellness journals. And last weekend, while a man was waiting for his prescriptions, he bought an iced tea and a bag of pretzels and enjoyed them in the Relaxation Room.
I’m putting up some posters, the kind that usually hang in a guidance counselor’s office. They say things like: DREAM BIG! and CLIMB HIGHER!
Maybe they aren’t the most beautiful pieces of art in the world, but I like them, and I think they’re inspiring. And, most important, they were free. Meredith Ganzi’s aunt is a guidance counselor, and she was redecorating her office, so Meredith brought them in for me. Meredith can be really thoughtful sometimes.
“Is Lucy here?” I hear someone ask from the front of the store. I turn around to see who it is.
“Hi, Cassandra!” I call from inside the Relaxation Room. Aside from Sunny, Cassandra’s the friend of mine who visits the pharmacy the most. Her mom has always been a loyal customer. “Come check this out!”
When Cassandra gets to the Relaxation Room, she looks around, confused. I should have known I’d need to explain this to her.
“It’s a Relaxation Room,” I tell her. “When people are waiting for prescriptions, they can just sit in a quiet place. And maybe it’ll really catch on, and people will come here just to relax!”
“Good idea, Lucy,” Cassandra says. “It’s really cool.”
“So, do you need help with anything?” I ask. Cassandra’s still just looking around the room like she’s never seen anything quite like it.
“I’m here with my mom and sister. My sister’s been begging for makeup, and she has a sweet sixteen to go to soon, so my mom finally gave in.”
I walk out of the Relaxation Room, and Cassandra follows me. “Well, I can give suggestions,” I say, feeling excited about another potential makeover.
“Oh yeah,” Cassandra says, giggling. “I forgot you’re, like, Ms. Maybelline.”
Cassandra’s mom and sister, Kristin, are in the makeup section of the store. “Mom, you have no idea what kind of makeup girls my age wear, okay?” Kristin says to their mother. “So stop trying to butt in.”
“Can I help you guys?” I ask them, smiling as sweetly as possible. I have a way with grown-ups. They usually really like me.
Kristin gives me a dirty look, though. I may get along with grown-ups, but definitely not with older sisters.
“Hi, Lucy,” Cassandra’s mom says, readjusting her pocketbook on her shoulder. “We’re trying to find some respectable”—she shoots Kristin a look—“makeup for Kristin.”
“Mom. Can you please stop?” Kristin folds her arms across her chest and looks away from her mother, examining the black and burgundy shades of nail polish. Kristin’s not really one of those black-is-the-only-color kind of girls, but I can tell she’s an I-like-to-stress-my-mother-out kind of girl.
“I can help,” I say, not even looking at Kristin to see what kind of face she makes at me. “I know every single product we have. And we also have another makeup line, called Earth Beauty, that’s near the prescription counter.”
“Earth Beauty?” Kristin asks, with one nostril flared. Her highlights are almost grown out, and her hair is black on top and blonde on the bottom.
“It just means the products aren’t tested on animals. It’s actually a really popular line.” Okay, a tiny white lie. I pause, giving her time to think about it. I’m debating saying something else about the Earth Beauty line, something true. And even though I know I shouldn’t gossip, I do it anyway. “Courtney Adner is a big fan of their chemical rinse.”
Kristin’s cheeks turn red, and when she speaks her voice is scratchy. “She is?”
I nod. Courtney Adner is a year older than Kristin. But I knew Kristin would care about what kinds of products Courtney uses. Courtney Adner just has that effect on people. “Okay, so let’s test the blush colors here, and then we’ll go to Earth Beauty for the lipsticks and mascaras. Those are their best products.”
“Cassandra, does she know what she’s talking about?” Kristin whispers, loud enough for me to hear.
“Definitely. She’s, like, an owner of the pharmacy.”
Cassandra may not be Mrs. Einstein, but she’s helpful at times like this.
“We’d love some help, sweetie,” Cassandra’s mom says to me.
I show them all of the tester products we have so they don’t go and start opening every package just to see the color. People have done that before, and it’s rude and wasteful. Don’t they know we can’t sell those products afterward?
It takes a really long time, but finally Kristin seems happy with her choices. Well, as happy as Kristin can be. She’s decided on a blush, a bronzer, two eye shadows, eyeliner, mascara, and a few lip balms and lipsticks.
When Kristin and her mom are heading to the register, Cassandra turns to me and whispers, “She tries to act all cool. But she has no idea how to put on makeup. And none of her friends even care about that stuff.”
“Really?” I ask.
“Oh yeah. My sister’s, like, desperately trying to be in the popular group, but she’s totally failing. She cries about it every night. And I stole her journal, and she’s already filled up sixty pages just on that.”
“Really?” I ask again.
“Uh-huh,” Cassandra replies, sounding almost happy about this fact. “And it’s not even her friend’s sweet sixteen that’s coming up. It’s Laura Gregory’s, and she invited the whole grade. My sister is so happy she gets to go, though. But she knows she needs to look good because it’s Laura Gregory, my sister’s idol.” Cassandra laughs at that, then she takes a bag of Twizzlers off the shelf, opens it, and eats a few.
She’d better pay for that, but there’s no time to worry about the Twizzlers now; I need to help Kristin. She may be kind of a pain, but I can’t let her go to Laura Gregory’s sweet sixteen with really bad makeup.
It’s clear her mom has absolutely no idea about this stuff. Her eyebrows look like they’ve never been tweezed in her whole entire life, and she has turquoise eye shadow on, the color you’d wear if you were in a play about mermaids.
“Hey, Kristin,” I call. Kristin and her mom are standing by the office, talking to my mother. I’m sure they’re discussing stupid PTA stuff. Kristin looks bored to tears.
Kristin turns around, and I run up to her.
“I know how to do makeup, you know,” I tell her. “My sister, Claudia, and I have been practicing on each other for years now. It’s my passion. I am going to be Laura Mercier when I grow up.”
“O
h, I know your sister.” Kristin smiles. “She was president of Support the Arts last year. She’s so nice.”
I smile. Cassandra was right—Kristin’s popular-girl-obsessed. I’ll have to tell Claudia how helpful she was in breaking the tension. “I can do your makeup for the sweet sixteen, if you want.”
Kristin looks down at the floor, picking at her cuticles. “I doubt my mom will pay for that. She really doesn’t want me to wear makeup. I’m paying for this stuff out of my birthday money.”
I laugh. Does Kristin really think I’d charge? I’m a twelve-year-old makeup artist.
“Oh, it’s free,” I say. “No one should ever charge to do makeup. Even fancy spas don’t charge—they just expect you to buy the products after. But you already have the products!”
Kristin smiles and starts chewing on her pinky nail, thinking it over, I guess. “Yeah, actually, that’d be really awesome,” she says. “I’m sure if you and Claudia practiced together, you’re really good at it. Claudia always looked so pretty—natural pretty, though. She didn’t even wear that much makeup. Just, like, the perfect amount.”
“Oh yeah, don’t worry.” I smile and look over at her mom and my mom chatting like they’ve known each other for years. “Claudia taught me everything I know.”
Kristin and I make a makeup application date, and then she goes back to her mom so they can pay for the stuff. I look around and realize I’ve somehow lost Cassandra, but a few minutes later, I find her in the Relaxation Room. She’s sprawled out on the couch with the empty bag of Twizzlers next to her.
“This place is really relaxing,” she says, sounding half-asleep.
“Good! But listen, Cass, your mom and sister are leaving the store now. And if you stay here, my grandma’s gonna put you to work.”
She jumps up from one of the denim couches, and when she realizes she never paid for the bag of Twizzlers, she gives me a confused, sorry, “what should I do now?” look.
“Don’t worry about it,” I say, taking the package from her and putting it in my pocket. “But next time you’re paying.”
Cassandra smiles and leaves the store. I’m already excited about doing Kristin’s makeup. I hope Mom and Grandma won’t think that’s really weird or inappropriate. But they shouldn’t. There’s nothing wrong with it.
And look at the difference it’s already made in Kristin’s life. When she walked into the store she was angry and miserable, and when she left she was more relaxed, happier, even a little more confident.
I don’t like it when people say makeup makes you prettier. That’s not really true. Makeup can make you feel a little better about yourself, though. Like when you’ve broken out but you have the perfect shade of concealer, you don’t feel as upset about going to school. You feel okay about yourself. And then you carry yourself better and smile more—you’re generally happier.
When I tell my friends this kind of stuff, they think I’m crazy. They think I talk like a psychologist or something; that’s what Sunny says. I can’t help it, though, if these kinds of things are ingrained in me. I can’t help it if this is the business I was born into.
Beauty tip: Make sure to get your beauty sleep.
ballpark, what this house will go for,” Grandma says. I’m still in bed, all cozy under my down comforter, with the sun streaming in through the windows.
“Flo, ballpark,” Grandma says again. “The most you think we can get for it. The least you think we can get for it.”
I hate it when Grandma calls her Flo. It sounds so gross.
I just woke up, and I was in a good mood too, because it’s parent-teacher conference day. And that means no school. But waking up to Grandma on the phone with her friend Florence has squashed my good mood like a sneaker on an ant.
Normally, Grandma on the phone with Florence wouldn’t faze me at all, but today it does. Florence is a real estate agent, and it’s very obvious what they’re talking about, especially since I overheard Grandma’s conversation with Morrie the other day.
Instead of staying in bed for a few minutes longer, I walk into the computer room to see if I can find out anything more about Mayor Danes’s grant. I’ve been thinking about it, and maybe it’s not as hard as I originally imagined. Maybe I just need to read the application over more carefully.
I go straight to OldMill.gov and then click to bring up the News from Mayor Danes page.
The grant application opens up as a PDF, and when I scroll through it, I see that it’s twenty-eight pages long! A lot of that is instructions and guidelines, but still—that’s a lot to read in one sitting.
I print it out, go back to my room, and put it on my desk. I’ll read through it later. The real problem is, I’m not really sure this is something I can do on my own, and I don’t want to add another thing to stress Grandma out.
It’s probably not even worth it, anyway. I’m sure a lot of businesses are trying for it.
The house has been silent for a few minutes, and I wonder if Grandma’s off the phone with Flo. I slump down the stairs, still in my pajamas.
Grandma’s still on the phone, but she sees me, waves, and then starts doodling on the memo pad in front of her. I pour myself a bowl of Crispix, cut up a banana, and sit down in the den to eat my breakfast. Flo doesn’t seem to be letting Grandma get a word in. I turn on the TV so Grandma won’t think I’m listening.
“That’s great. Actually, just hearing this from you has made me feel better,” Grandma says finally. “I want to be able to stay in business without worrying every day, and having the money from the sale of the house will help.”
I take another bite of Crispix, trying to crunch as softly as possible. But I don’t know how I’m able to eat at a time like this. Grandma’s serious about selling this house. “Flo, I’m not concerned about what Jane will say!” Grandma yells into the phone. Florence is that kind of friend—the kind you can yell at and not worry about it. “We have Claudia’s college to pay for, and Lucy’s eventually. It’s got to be done.”
Through the entryway to the kitchen, I can see Grandma pacing. “I don’t have other options, Flo,” Grandma says, more quietly now. “Unless you count going out of business. That’s hardly an option. Jane and I will end up killing each other. Besides, can you imagine me folding shirts at the Gap?”
I burst out laughing. Milk and Crispix fly out of my mouth and land on the glass coffee table. This is really no time for laughing, but I can’t help it.
“All right, Flo, we’ll talk later about when to list it and all of that,” Grandma says, sounding calmer now. “Get me some comps, and call me later. Love to Bernie.”
Grandma gets off the phone and sits down at the kitchen table. She puts her head down, and I don’t know if I should go in there and talk to her, acknowledging that I just heard that whole conversation, or if I should just go up to my room and call Sunny and figure out what time she’s coming over.
I’m still sitting on the couch thinking this over when I see Grandma standing in the doorway to the den.
“You heard?” she asks.
I nod.
“I don’t want to do this, Lucy, but I can’t take this constant worry anymore.” She comes to sit down next to me, and I rest my head on her shoulder.
“Grandma, I can’t believe you. You don’t even listen to your own advice,” I say. “What do you tell everyone who comes into the pharmacy when they’re worried about something? What do you tell me when I’m scared about a test?”
Grandma smiles. “What?”
I roll my eyes. “ ‘Have a little faith, will ya?’ That’s what you always say.”
Grandma’s gray hair is tied back in a short little ponytail. I don’t know any other grandmas who wear their hair this way. I like that she has long enough hair to do that, though. I like that she doesn’t have boring, white, grandma hair.
“I know, Luce, I know.” Grandma picks my bowl up off the coffee table and stands up. “And I do have faith. I have faith that the business will pick up again,
but until then, we need some extra money.”
I follow her out of the den. “If we sell this house, we’ll never get it back, you know,” I say. “The maple tree that Grandpa planted in the front yard will be somebody else’s. And the pool with fake rocks on the bottom—some other girl will be using it, inviting all of her friends over to go down the spiral slide a million times.”
She doesn’t respond to that, which I take as a good sign because maybe it means she’s thinking it over, and maybe she’s realizing that I’m right. That we can’t sell this house.
I go up to my room to figure out what I’m wearing today.
A few minutes later, Grandma yells to me from downstairs. “Bye, Lucy, I’m heading over to the pharmacy.”
Part of me feels guilty for not going to the pharmacy today to help out. But it’s a school holiday, a day off, plus Sunny and I always hang out on school conference days. It’s like a ritual.
Rituals shouldn’t be broken. Not if it can be helped.
Beauty tip: The mall is a social fishbowl.
It’s important to always look your best—no sweats!
Sunny says when she gets to my house. “I overheard Evan and his friends on the bus line yesterday. That’s what they’re doing today.”
I’m so excited that Sunny’s talking like this that I reach over and hug her, and we start jumping up and down together. “Good. I need to buy new sneakers anyway. And guess what?”
“What?”
“My mom didn’t have any cash, so she left me her credit card!” I take it out from my jeans pocket and put it right up to Sunny’s nose. “Cool, huh?”
She nods. “We’re not gonna talk to the boys, though,” Sunny says. “We can just watch them from afar. Oh, and we need code names.”
“For ourselves?”
“No, dummy, for Evan and his friends. Just in case they overhear us.” Sunny gets glasses out from the cabinet and pours us some fruit punch.
PG01. My Life in Pink & Green Page 6
