by Belle Payton
“Nice game,” said Alex, although Ava could readily see that her sister had long since put the Ashland Middle School victory behind her. “Can you come home with us? We need to figure out what we’re both wearing to the dance.”
“I can’t think too hard about that,” said Ava. “Making Tommy’s mum last night took a lot out of me. I was just going to wear a shirt. And maybe some pants.”
Alex raised a hand to her brow and looked deeply pained.
“What?” said Ava. “Al, the term ‘snappy casual’ means nothing. I’m sure there will be kids in jeans and jerseys.”
“But not the girls,” said Alex. “May I remind you that even though you play football, you’re still a girl?”
“That ridiculous mum is going to cover most of whatever I’m wearing anyway,” Ava said.
Alex continued to stare at Ava. She knew her sister was weakening.
Sure enough, Ava sighed. “Okay, you win. I’ll come home with you, and you can help me find something to wear.”
Alex smiled. “I knew you’d come around,” she said. “I’ve also convinced Tommy to let me shape his hair a little so he’ll look great for his Homecoming tonight. His curls are totally out of control.”
Later that afternoon Ava stood in front of Alex’s full-length mirror and studied her reflection in the mirror. How had she allowed Alex to talk her into wearing a dress? She knew how. When Alex was determined to make something happen, it was practically useless to resist. She looked fine. Just not like herself.
Downstairs in the kitchen, she could hear Alex and Tommy returning from their errand. When even Coach had agreed that Tommy’s hair was beyond unruly, Tommy had tried to make an appointment at a haircut place, but everywhere in town was booked. So he’d finally relented and told Alex she could do it. Alex had talked him into splitting the cost of a pair of haircutting clippers at the beauty supply shop. She’d convinced him that in the long run, he’d be saving piles of money by not having to pay for salon haircuts.
Ava turned around and looked back over her shoulder. The dress she’d borrowed from Alex was plain, a pale purple shade. The hem had a little flouncy ruffle. She twirled around and watched it spin. She had to admit, she didn’t look stupid or anything. She wondered what Jack would say when he saw her. Then she wondered if she’d have to wear that weird mum around her neck for the entire evening. The thing was enormous.
Then she heard Tommy howl. “Uh-oh,” she said to her own reflection, and raced out of the room.
Ava found Tommy sitting on a kitchen stool, his shirt off, a towel draped around his neck. Alex stood behind him, looking quietly stricken. Tommy had picked up the hand mirror and was staring into it.
“It’s not my fault you moved!” Alex said.
“You almost cut my ear off!” said Tommy. “But instead you gave me half a Mohawk! Ave! Look at me!”
Ava looked. Sure enough, a large tuft of brown curls was on the floor at Tommy’s feet. Above his right ear, a patch of hair was distinctly . . . missing. Ava could see the pale, shiny skin of his scalp.
Alex, still holding the clippers, had gone white. “I might have used the wrong attachment,” she said in a tiny voice.
“What are you going to do now?” asked Ava, staring at Tommy with horrified fascination.
“I have to wear a hat to Homecoming!” Tommy said bitterly. “And I can’t take it off for a month!”
“Let me go get my art supplies,” suggested Alex. “I could maybe color in the bald spot over your ear with brown marker.”
“I’m not going to go to Homecoming with brown marker on my head,” said Tommy through clenched teeth.
“No. We’re not going to panic,” said Alex. “I’m pretty sure I saw a video about how to fix haircuts. Let me just go do some research.”
“No way,” said Tommy, and his voice sounded steely. “I’ll call Cassie.”
“What is she going to do?” asked Alex.
“She actually knows how to cut hair,” said Tommy. “She has four brothers, and she told me she cuts their hair all the time.”
This is an interesting twist, thought Ava. Tommy was so private about his dating life. Now they’d actually have a chance to meet the girl he was going to the dance with!
“So why didn’t you ask her to do it in the first place?” asked Ava, genuinely curious.
“Because (a) I thought my hair looked fine the way it was,” said Tommy. “And (b), because I don’t know the girl very well, so I’m not exactly in the habit of asking her to cut my hair. That’s a rather personal request. But this is an emergency.” He texted her.
Alex backed away and leaned against the counter, an anxious look on her face.
Ava ran upstairs and changed out of her dress. She threw on a T-shirt and running shorts, and then returned to the kitchen.
The three of them waited, listening to the ticking of the kitchen clock and to Tommy’s fingers, drumming on the kitchen table. Ava tried not to stare at the tuft of hair on the floor. She didn’t dare meet Alex’s gaze either.
After a while they heard a car pull up, and then there was a tap at the kitchen door. Ava sprang to open it.
A pretty girl stepped in. The first thing Ava noticed was her hair—it was raven black and pulled back into a casual ponytail. She had light-brown skin and huge, dark eyes. And she was wearing a New England Patriots jersey! Ava’s mouth fell open. She forgot to say hello.
“This is Cassie,” said Tommy abruptly. “Cassie, this is my sister Ava, and her evil twin, Alex, the one who just shaved off half my hair.”
Cassie smiled at the girls and then turned to Tommy. Ava could see her dark eyes dancing with merriment, but she managed not to laugh out loud. “Oh, my, my,” she said, shaking her head as she looked at the troublesome patch of short hair above his ear.
“Can you fix it?” croaked Tommy.
“I definitely think that this is fixable,” she replied. She rummaged through the clipper attachments and selected one. “Come watch, Alex. I’ll show you how we’re going to blend in what’s, er, not there anymore. It will look okay, T, I promise.”
Alex seemed grateful to be invited by Cassie to watch.
Ava stepped out of the way, but she remained in the kitchen, fascinated by what Cassie was wearing. A football jersey! And for Ava’s favorite team!
Ava scrutinized the way Cassie lightly touched Tommy’s shoulders as she examined his bald patch. And she’d called Tommy “T.” That sounded so—girlfriendish. Was Cassie his actual girlfriend? Was she wearing one of Tommy’s jerseys? Ava prided herself on not being nosy, the way Alex usually was, but she couldn’t help herself. She had to know. “Um—are you a Patriots fan?” she asked Cassie.
Cassie was about to turn on the clippers, but she paused to answer. “My uncle’s family lives in Connecticut,” she explained. “So yeah, I’ve been a Pats fan all my life. It doesn’t always go over well around here.” She laughed.
Ava nodded, enthralled. Tommy had found the perfect woman!
CHAPTER
FOURTEEN
Both the middle school and the high school dances started at seven p.m. that night, so Mrs. Sackett insisted on taking a group picture of the three Sackett kids all dressed up. Ava was the first to come downstairs.
“Wow,” said Coach. “Is this our Ava?”
“Don’t embarrass her, Michael,” said Mrs. Sackett, smacking his arm playfully. “Or she might run back upstairs and put on a football jersey. Honey, you look beautiful.”
Ava felt like a dope. The dress she’d borrowed from Alex wasn’t too uncomfortable—the material had a little stretch to it, so she could move reasonably freely—but this bizarre mum! Her mom had added a loop around the top so that she could wear it around her neck. The long ribbons trailed almost to her ankles. “Do I have to wear this thing all night?” she asked.
Coach and her mom looked at each other. Mrs. Sackett raised her hands in a helpless gesture. “When in Texas, do as the Texans do,” she said. “So just se
e what the other girls at the dance do with theirs, and follow their cue.”
Tommy was the next one down. He wore a black suit and a fashionably narrow striped tie. It was strange to Ava to see his curly hair cropped short, but she conceded that he looked pretty good. And Cassie had done a nice job camouflaging the almost-bald spot that Alex had created. You could only see it if you looked closely. Cassie had left the sides a little long and had shown him how to glue the hair back and over the bare place with some of Alex’s hair gel. With his hair slicked back and his elegant outfit, he actually looked kind of like a movie star, Ava thought.
“Luke’s going to be here any minute,” said Tommy. He picked up the mum they’d all made for Cassie, stared down at it, and shook his head, perplexed. “I don’t think I have time for a picture.”
“Yes, you do,” said Mrs. Sackett firmly.
“Alex!” all four of them yelled at the same time.
Several seconds ticked by. They heard a muffled “Coming!” from upstairs, and then Alex’s door opened and closed and she appeared at the top of the stairs.
Alex had finally decided on a shimmery silver shirt with a halter neckline over a short, twirling black skirt, and clunky black wedge sandals. She’d pulled her hair back into a dramatic, twisty high knot. She looked extremely glamorous, Ava thought, although the huge mum around her neck was a little distracting.
“All right. Let’s take this picture, Mom. Quick,” said Tom, as Alex finished drifting down the stairs like an old-fashioned movie star.
The three stood in front of the couch, with Tommy in the middle, an arm around each sister. Moxy insisted on being in the picture too and flopped down in front of them. Which worked out fine, because all three of them laughed at that, just as Mrs. Sackett snapped the picture.
There was a honk in the driveway.
“That’s Luke. Gotta go,” said Tommy, picking up the mum again. “Have fun, dudes,” he said.
“Do you forgive me?” Alex called after him.
“Ask me in about eleven years,” his voice called back.
“We need to go now too,” said Alex, glancing at the clock over the mantel. “We’re supposed to meet the whole gang in front of the school so we can walk in together.”
Coach picked up his keys. “At your service, ladies,” he said, and gestured gallantly toward the door.
Alex linked arms with Emily as they walked into the gym. In a way, she was glad she didn’t have a real date. It was fun to go with all her friends. The only two people in her group who had ended up officially going as a couple were Lindsey and Corey.
All the girls had on their mums when Alex and Ava joined up with them, and Alex was relieved to see that the mums she and Ava were wearing fell just about in the middle of the pack in terms of elaborateness. She silently thanked her mother for the trillionth time.
They all purchased a raffle ticket as they entered, at Annelise’s insistence. “The sixth graders organize the raffle every year,” she said, “There are, like, ten different prizes, and some of them are super awesome.”
The gym looked amazing, Alex was thrilled to see. All that work had paid off. The place was transformed. The rotating silver mirror ball they’d rented (that had been Alex’s idea) cast a thousand points of swirling white lights around the room. The effect was magical. The DJ was up on the stage, and the music was just the right volume. The song ended and a new one came on—a super-popular song that made everyone immediately start tapping their feet or nodding their heads.
“Come on!” said Emily. “Let’s dance!”
She lifted her mum off from around her head and dumped it onto the nearest table. Alex did the same. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Corey and Lindsey dancing together and felt a tiny pang of jealousy. But it soon passed. Surrounded by Emily, Rosa, and Annelise, with Ava and Kylie nearby, Alex finally felt like she belonged.
Ava was immensely relieved when Kylie told her she could take off her mum almost as soon as they got to the dance. Kylie’s mum was full of brightly colored feathers and beads. They dumped theirs together in an out-of-the-way corner near the portable basketball hoop.
It took Ava’s eyes a few minutes to adjust to the spectacle in front of her. Alex had been blathering away about the silver ball the seventh-grade class had rented for the evening, and Ava had to admit that the effect was pretty awesome. She was beginning to be able to identify people in the dim, lavender-tinted glow flecked with tiny points of white light. There was Ms. Nelson, talking to Mr. Kenerson. There was Mrs. Monti, standing in towering high-heeled sandals, tapping her toe in time to the beat.
“Hey, Coach!” said a girl Ava didn’t know, passing by with several other seventh graders.
“Coach! Nice dress!” said another.
At first Ava didn’t acknowledge these greetings, but after the fourth person said “Coach,” she realized they were addressing her.
“Look! There’s Mrs. Fowler!” shouted Kylie to Ava over the music.
Sure enough, Mrs. Fowler seemed to be making a beeline for them. She was beaming.
“Ava! I was going to wait until Monday to tell you, but I was just too excited not to tell you now—you got twelve out of fourteen points on both your essays! Your test grade has risen to a ninety! I’m so proud of you!”
Ava gasped. That was one of the best grades she’d gotten all year!
Kylie clapped her on the back. “Awesome job, Coach!”
Ava grinned. She kind of didn’t mind this new nickname. “I can’t wait to tell Alex!” she said.
The place was so crowded that Ava didn’t manage to find her sister until just before they were going to announce the raffle winners. When Ava told her about her science grade, Alex gave her a huge hug, and Ava beamed.
“You know what prize I’m dying to win?” Alex said. “The day of beauty at the Belle Visage salon. That would be so totally awesome.” She clutched her ticket stub and closed her eyes as though trying to will the principal, Ms. Farmen, to read her number.
“First off—the winner will receive three batting lessons with former major league batting champ Derek Rivera!” said Ms. Farmen. Most of the boys in the room adopted the closed-eyes praying posture Alex had just done. “And the winner is—Alex Sackett!”
Ava and Alex both gasped as the room erupted with the collective groans of disappointed nonwinners, a smattering of laughter—but not mean laughter—from people who knew Alex, but mostly a warm round of applause. Alex laughed too and waved as she headed up to receive her prize in the form of a white envelope. Then Ms. Farmen was on to the next prize.
Alex rejoined Ava, and the two stood side by side, listening to Ms. Farmen read off a few more raffle prizes. “I never win anything,” said Alex, “and now I get a total jock prize.” She shrugged. “Maybe it’s fate telling me to be more athletic,” she said with a laugh. “Remember my lateral pass?”
“I sure do,” said Ava with mock enthusiasm. Then she laughed too. “I never win anything either.”
“And the winner is—Ava Sackett!”
Ava jumped as Ms. Farmen called out her name. She’d won a prize too? “Wait! What did I win?” she asked Alex over her shoulder as she started toward the stage.
“The makeover,” Alex said, laughing. “Fate has spoken once again!”
Ava took the envelope from Ms. Farmen and turned to walk back toward Alex. The applause turned into a chant, which started low and then grew in volume: “Coach! Coach! Coach! Coach! Coach!”
Ava couldn’t help but laugh, giddily, although she blushed from the attention.
“How ironic is it that I won a sports prize and you won a makeup prize?” Alex said to her when Ava returned to her sister’s side.
Ava grinned. “May the best twin win,” she said.
“Better.”
“Huh?”
“May the better twin win,” said Alex.
“Whatever,” said Ava, and she grabbed Alex’s hand and dragged her back to the dance floor.
R
eady for more
ALEX AND AVA?
Here’s a sneak peek at the next book in the It Takes Two series:
Are You Thinking What I’m Thinking?
“I knew it,” Alex Sackett declared. “I just knew it!”
“Knew what?” Ella Sanchez asked.
“That it was going to rain,” Alex said. “It’s pouring.” She pointed toward the huge windows bordering Ashland Middle School’s front door.
Ella peered through the rain-splattered glass. “Wow. It really is. Who knew?”
“I did!” Alex cried. “I sensed it this morning. I had this cute outfit planned, very nautical. Navy-and-white-striped top, navy pants, and my new red suede ballet flats. But I changed to a sweatshirt and sneakers. Ava said I was nuts, because the sun was shining when we left the house.”
“So she didn’t change her outfit too?” Ella asked, pulling her dark hair into a ponytail.
“Hello? Have you met my twin sister?” Alex asked with a laugh. “She was already wearing jeans and a sweatshirt. Ava wears the same outfit practically every day, rain or shine.”
Ella shook her head. “I don’t have any classes with Ava. Why doesn’t she do debate club with us?”
“It’s not really her thing,” Alex replied. She and Ella had just left the after-school meeting of the debate club. Although they’d gotten to know each other a little when they were both running for seventh-grade class president, they weren’t close friends. But after watching Ella outdebate an eighth grader on why America needs a female president, Alex knew that would change. Especially because Ella had been really nice to Alex when Alex won the election.
Alex loved debate club. She loved sharing ideas and talking in front of a group. But Ava didn’t—she loved sports. And she was good at them too. She was the only girl on the Ashland Tiger Cubs football team.
“Any sign of the late bus?” Ella asked.
Alex pressed her nose to the glass. The wind caused the trees to sway and the rain to pelt sideways. “Nothing yellow out there,” she reported. “No bus yet.”
