The most wonderful time of the year inspired a holiday-themed dinner and a movie. It was at Clem’s house again because her parents were among the most tolerant. Mr. and Mrs. Caritas always retired to their bedroom when we arrived. After taking coats and saying hellos, it was rare to see them hanging around. When you’re thirteen, that’s exactly the amount of parental contact you’d like to have when your friends are over.
Clem and Beau made a modified Christmas dinner. There was turkey and mashed potatoes and Christmas cookies for dessert. The house smelled warm and wonderful and put me in a holiday mood. I was doubly jazzed for both Christmas and the upcoming wedding.
Looking back on this second dinner and a movie night, I can see that I was overexcited and revving too high. For one thing, I was talking a little faster than usual. I seriously couldn’t stop myself. I was just so happy to be there, happy I’d be sitting next to Forrest at the table, and happy to be spending the evening at what was nearly a grown-up dinner party. We didn’t need to go out again in the cold because Clem decided our movie would be old Christmas specials that she had downloaded.
“I hope you like turkey,” I told Forrest, and he laughed. I was not about to fall for the same trick he pulled last time with the pad thai.
I said the food was amazing, which started a domino-effect of more compliments from other people. Clem basked in the praise.
“Clem could have her own cooking show,” Beau said.
“I totalllyyy could,” Clem cooed.
I looked at her and wondered what it was like to be her. I tried to imagine owning that face and that body and being paid good money just for someone to take pictures of me. Frankly, it was easier to imagine myself hurtling through space like Sally Ride.
“Who wants cleanup duty?” Clem called out when everyone was stuffed.
Unable to stop myself, I said I would do it. Forrest, feeling the pressure, said he would help me. Everyone cleared the table of dishes, bowls, and glasses and went to get started on the movies. First up was The Grinch.
The kitchen, unlike the candlelit dining room, was an utter disaster. The big roasting pan that held the turkey was brown with baked-on grease and full of bones and turkey goo. Potato skins sat in heaps on the countertop and the sink was full of dishes Clem and Beau had used in their prep work.
“Great idea, Jem. I’d rather be washing dishes than watching The Grinch with my friends,” Forrest said.
I turned to face the mountain of dishes in the sink and started sudsing and rinsing them.
“I’m sorry. I was just trying to help Clem, since she made all this stuff. You don’t have to clean up if you don’t want to,” I said.
“Okay,” Forrest said bluntly.
I got into a rhythm at the sink so it took me a while to realize he had gone. He just left me alone in the kitchen, like Cinderella. But what could I do? I would look freakish if I just wandered back into the family room. And I couldn’t exactly go tell him to get back in here, like I was his mom.
A real boyfriend would have stayed. He might have put on some music, blown into the soap bubbles so they sprayed on me, or even taken the opportunity to kiss me in the privacy of a foreign kitchen. But the reality was that Forrest was just my forever crush—not a boyfriend. And right now, in the quiet of Clem’s kitchen, I was thinking that he wasn’t even that great of a friend.
I heard the swinging door creak and spun around hoping that Forrest had returned. But it was Clem’s sister, Mimi. This time she was in regular pink flannel pajamas, not a tutu.
“Are there any cookies left?” she said. “I like the snowmen with white icing.”
I found the tin of cookies for her and she poured a glass of milk.
“Why are you in here alone?” Mimi asked.
The question caught me off guard. I couldn’t say the truth and I was getting tired of lying all the time.
“My boyfriend was helping me but he left.”
“Boyfriend” stuck in my throat like a bone. Even when I tried not to lie, I lied.
“I don’t want a boyfriend,” Mimi said.
“No?” I said, “You don’t have a crush on anyone?”
“No,” she said. “Boys are gross.”
“Yeah, I used to think that, too. But then something happens and some of them aren’t gross anymore.”
In fact, one of them is so not gross that I think about him all the time.
“I can help you,” Mimi said. “I know how to load the dishwasher.”
So we worked together, efficient as sisters, until the kitchen was clean. I even wiped off every countertop. Then I turned off the overhead lights and switched on the light over the stove, like a nightlight, just like my mom did.
Back in the family room, everyone was gathered in twosomes, except for Forrest. This wasn’t exactly a makeout party, but everyone looked really cozy. I sat near Forrest but not super-near him. He hardly looked up when I came in. Moments later he stood up and walked out. Bathroom. I took it as my opportunity. I followed him and waited a polite distance from the door. As I stood in the hallway, a door down the hall inched open and I saw a sliver of light. I prayed it wasn’t Mr. or Mrs. Caritas. I was having a bad time but I didn’t want to break the spell that we were having an adult-free party. It was Mimi again.
“Hey, Mimi,” I said, “C’mere.”
I had forgotten to ask her about library club and the bookmark bandit.
She widened her door. “Clem says I can’t come out.”
“Just for a minute.”
She approached me and I asked if she was in library club.
“Uh-huh.”
“I thought so. This is kind of secret, but I wanted to know if you ever saw anything unusual at library club—like someone putting bookmarks in some of the books.”
“Um, no,” she said.
She turned and fast-walked toward her room. I was going to stop her but Forrest opened the bathroom door.
“Forrest, hey. Can I talk to you outside?”
“Why? There’s another movie starting. Peanuts, I think.”
“I just need to.”
He followed me to the front porch and I closed the door behind us.
“I’m worried about something,” I said.
“What?’
“Well, Piper told me that people are saying stuff about us.”
“Like what?”
“That they, um, don’t understand why we’re a couple. Because you’ve dated all these, you know, hot girls.”
I fake-coughed out of nervousness. He looked at me blankly, so I had to press on.
“People don’t believe that you like me. For real, anyway. That’s what it sounded like.”
“Jem, this is exactly what I’m talking about. All these people always in my business. I’ll go out with whoever I want. What does it matter to them?”
“I don’t know. I guess I thought you should know that people don’t—well, some people might not—believe the act.”
“I don’t care who believes what. And you shouldn’t either.”
“So that’s it?”
“Yeah.”
“Are you going to the wedding?”
“Yeah, we can go together, if you want.”
“That’s what people—other couples—are doing. You know, it’s New Year’s and everything,” I said.
I was talking to his back now because he had turned to go back into the house. I thought about pulling on the hood of his gray sweatshirt, to stop him like a dog on a leash. I resisted the urge. Forrest pulled on the doorknob but it wouldn’t go.
“Jemma, you locked the door.”
“I didn’t lock it. It must have locked automatically.”
“Great, we’re stuck out here.”
I felt a stab of sadness. First, he left me alone in the kitchen. Then he blamed me for something I didn’t even do.
I saw Forrest’s hand reach for the doorbell.
“Don’t ring the bell! We’ll wake up her parents.”
“It’s freezing. We can’t stay out here ’til eleven.”
Forrest took me by the elbow and led me out into the yard, aiming for the back of the house, where the family room was. I wish I could tell you he was holding my arm like an escort. But he was clutching my elbow just to steer me this way and that way. It was pitch-black and the ground was unsteady below my feet. I worried about stepping on a wild animal or dog poop. I let Forrest lead me. Step by step, we edged our way around the house, looking for the milky blue light of the TV.
“Birdbath,” Forrest said as he helped maneuver us around it.
It took awhile and we went slowly, together, in the dark.
“Patio furniture,” he said.
It didn’t look like patio furniture. They were shapeless forms shrouded in protective canvas covers. Summer felt a long way off. It was cold enough to snow. Would snowflakes change Forrest’s mood? I hoped it would snow at the wedding. Finally, we saw the family room windows on the back of Clem’s house and had only to go up and knock.
“Now you have me thinking like they do,” Forrest said.
“What?”
“The only good explanation for us to be out here is, you know.”
“Oh,” I said.
He grabbed my hand and pointed us toward the family room, where there was a patio door. I was cold and my cheeks were flushed, from the cold and/or the conversation. I was trying to make sense of this outdoor adventure and shake out the important parts.
But before I could, Forrest positioned himself between me and the patio door. People could probably see us from inside, I thought. We were standing face-to-face. He looked at me and then I saw his eyes close, his head tilt, and the ever-closer image of his lips coming toward mine. I flinched and then tried to prepare in a nanosecond. I closed my eyes, I tilted my head left, then right, and felt his lips touch mine. He held them there maybe two seconds and pulled back. He smiled at me. My insides melted like marshmallow inside a s’more. I smiled, too. Then Forrest pulled the handle of the patio door.
Piper rushed to the door to let us in.
“Oooh-OOOH-ooh,” Piper sang out.
I had a fierce urge to run to the bathroom so I could—I don’t know—examine my lips to see if they looked any different. I didn’t know what you were supposed to do after you got your first kiss. I was making it up as I went along. I sat down next to Forrest, but not too close.
The girls at the party looked up at us in what I swore looked like jealousy. Forrest McCann had kissed me under a cold, starlit, almost-Christmas December sky. They probably wondered what that felt like. It all happened so fast, I wasn’t sure I even knew.
Twenty-five
Ms. Russo made a surprise appearance at Tuesday’s Pink Locker Society meeting. This time, we heard her clomp-clomp-clomp down the school basement stairs. We were temporarily terrified, but then the shadowy figure edged closer and said, “Yoo-hoo, girls. Don’t panic. It’s just me.”
She pulled up a chair and joined our circle.
“Sorry to interrupt, but I needed to get word to you. Mrs. Kelbrock said she just can’t keep ahead of the bookmarks anymore.”
“What does that mean? She’s just going to let it get out in the open? Principal F. will shut us down in ten seconds flat,” Piper said.
“I know, it’s frustrating,” Ms. Russo said, “but she does have more to do than sift through all the library books for renegade bookmarks.”
“We have to catch the person who’s doing it,” I said.
“Is that right, Sherlock?” Piper said.
“We’re just going to have to get more serious about watching the video surveillance of the library,” Kate said. “If they keep showing up, someone’s doing it and they could be caught red-handed on that tape.”
“Good idea, but may I offer another suggestion?” Ms. Russo said. “This one comes from Mrs. Percy.”
Ms. Russo said the two of them talked and she sent a note. Ms. Russo pulled it out of her pocket and cleared her throat.
Dear Girls,
Kudos and laurels for your continued work on the Pink Locker Society! I sympathize with the bookmark issue, but perhaps this is the right moment to allow the PLS to come out in the open. Why spend so much energy trying to hide your light under a bushel basket? Sure, Principal F. may raise a stink, but your supporters are more vast than you know. Then you could forget about the bookmarks. Free speech and all that.
Yours pinkly,
Mrs. Percy
It was intriguing, but also entirely crazy. We’ll just let Principal F. and our parents find out and everything will magically turn out fine? I doubted it. I doubted it very much.
“Mrs. P.’s absolutely right,” Piper said.
“It does make a certain amount of sense,” Kate said.
It was like they read my mind and decided to think the exact opposite.
“You’re both completely off track,” I said, reminded of the GPS voice on my dad’s car.
Kate and Piper turned and looked at me.
“Does anybody except me remember what happened last time?” I said.
I thought back to that awful afternoon, when Principal F. showed up at my house. And I thought about Forrest and how he got dragged into the mess. I cried after everyone left and promised my parents I’d follow the rules. Au revoir, Pink Locker Society.
“I do remember all that, but I think things have changed,” Kate said. “We were caught completely off-guard. Now we know what we’re doing—and who our friends are.”
Kate eyed Ms. Russo, who winked at her.
“Right. I say let the cookie crumble,” Piper said. “Just think of how things would be so much better. No more hiding in basements. Maybe we could get our old office back”
“Indeed. I must say I agree,” Ms. Russo said. “But it’s entirely your decision.”
“Principal Finklestein could expel us—or worse,” I said. “Can’t we at least try to catch the person?”
“Okay, Jem,” Piper said. “I guess we can give it one last try.”
Twenty-six
Since this was all my idea, I was given the first shift. I had to bring our pink laptop home so I could monitor the library’s video surveillance for twenty-four hours. That meant Wednesday after school and all day Thursday. I watched that night until I fell asleep. All was dark and empty by the time evening came. I watched the school janitor make her rounds through the library, thinking for a minute that she was someone with the opportunity. But she touched nothing other than floors and trash cans. Then she turned out the lights and you couldn’t see much at all. I doubted the bookmark bandit was sneaking in overnight, so I turned off the laptop and went to bed. Just FYI, watching an empty library on surveillance cam puts you to sleep faster than counting sheep.
I couldn’t exactly monitor it during school hours. But I could during study hall since we were all just down in the basement for the PLS meeting anyway. The study hall shift—though the camera showed it was busy in the library—yielded nothing. I watched people take books off the shelf and put them back, but I had to watch with eagle eyes to note if they seemed to insert a bookmark in a book. It appeared no one did.
* * *
Kate was on for Thursday. She did as I did, doing what she could from home then checking during study hall. Again, she saw nothing of note. Piper agreed to watch over the weekend.
“This is excrutiatingly boring,” Piper said the following week during our PLS meeting. “I don’t see how we can keep this up.”
Piper explained that she borrowed her mother’s smart phone and figured out how to monitor the surveillance from it.
“My mother doesn’t understand this phone anyway. It’s really too much phone for her,” Piper said.
But even with the gift of mobile access, she didn’t spot anything or anyone that could help us uncover the bookmark bandit. And if that person kept on spreading the word about the PLS, it would be only a matter of time before we were exposed and, in my opinion, finished for good.
/>
I begged everyone for a few more days, which they granted reluctantly. By Wednesday, Piper wanted to end our failed stakeout.
“Do you really want me to stay home and watch the same boring footage of the library instead of going to the basketball games?” Piper asked.
Friday was the kickoff of the annual boys’ basketball tournament. The Candy Cane Tournament, always held the week before Christmas, brought in teams from all over for three nights of basketball. School break was just days away and it was something we looked forward to. Everyone went and watched two games per evening—an approved reason to be out until eleven. We decorated our gym to support Margaret Simon Middle School. Go Patriots! Then we spent three nights rooting for them and sitting high in the bleachers in clusters of friends. And boyfriends.
I could not believe Forrest and I had been “dating” for more than a month. Though I had the recent kiss to cling to, our one-month anniversary went by unnoticed. Piper and Kate asked if he got me anything, but I told them that we both thought one-month anniversaries were stupid. I learned that this was the wrong thing to say because Piper and Kate routinely marked these on their calendars and celebrated them with their boyfriends. Now, Christmas loomed. What would I say to explain why Forrest and I didn’t exchange gifts—that we thought celebrating Christmas was stupid?
My mom took me, Kate, and Piper to the school gym for the first night of the tournament. We walked in and admired the decorations we had contributed to the decked-out gym. We made giant candy canes to represent each player. We painted them red and white and then used glue and glitter to emblazon the player’s number on the candy cane. We cracked ourselves up wondering if the other team would really be intimidated by the thought of facing a team of jumbo peppermint sticks.
“How would a candy cane dribble the ball or shoot?” I wondered aloud.
“I do believe you’re underestimating the power of mint, Jemma,” Piper said. We laughed so hard, we kind of stumbled into school, three astride.
In the lobby, the school’s Christmas tree stood proud in twinkle lights, regular-size candy canes, and basketball ornaments. Forrest wasn’t there yet, but Brett was, so Kate ran off to sit with him. Piper was momentarily boyfriend-less, though Dylan would be there as soon as his hockey game was over.
The Forever Crush Page 7
