A Snitch in the Snob Squad

by Julie Anne Peters

  “Serious as sauerkraut,” Dad said.

  Gag. I said what I was thinking: “No one goes bowling anymore,” adding to myself, Especially with their parents.

  “You wanted to do more things together, so from now on Friday night is family night.” Dad yanked up the parking brake.

  Mom said, “We’ll have to make a run for it. Ready? Go!” She opened her door and shot out.

  Stomping through puddles with only our arms to cover our heads, Vanessa pulled up beside me and snarled, “This is all your fault.”

  I opened my mouth to argue, then I wondered if she was right. I mean, I wanted our family to be more of a family. I was in favor of making dinnertime our family time. But it wasn’t my idea to spend every waking moment together, which seemed to be Mom and Dad’s interpretation. We were starting to drive each other nuts. And I’m not talking lightly salted.

  Standing, dripping, in the entryway, Mom hollered over the bowling alley racket, “Robert, why don’t you go get us a lane and I’ll buy something to eat.” To us she said, “You two look for balls and shoes.”

  “If anyone I know sees me here, I’ll die,” Vanessa muttered as she skulked down the alley. “This is like the ultimate humiliation. It is so Neanderthal.”

  My sister is overly dramatic. Unlike me. “Oh, my God!” I screeched to a stop. “You can’t be serious. These shoes are used.”

  “Duh.” Vanessa curled a lip at me. “You act like you’ve never been bowling before.”

  “I haven’t.”

  “Yes, you have. We went once when you were like four years old.”

  “Give me a break,” I said. “The only thing I remember from my early years is falling down the stairs and breaking my arm.”

  Vanessa frowned at me. “That wasn’t you. That was me.”

  “Really? Then I don’t remember anything.” Which was scary. Maybe I was abducted by aliens. My eyes strayed back to Dad, who was eyeing the bowling lanes, smiling hypnotically. Maybe I’d never returned.

  Vanessa pulled out a pair of shoes and sniffed them. Her nose puckered. She dug down deep into her bush bag and said, “Here, use this.” She handed me a moist towelette. “I’d advise you to wipe out the finger holes on the bowling balls, too.”

  Did I mention my sister is also obsessive/compulsive? Her condition has improved—she doesn’t zone out as often as she used to—but only an obsessive/compulsive would carry a whole canister of moist towelettes. I wondered what else was in her two-ton canvas bag. A new pair of shoes, perhaps? I could squeeze into a six if I had to.

  I spotted Mom first, or maybe my nose did. She was carrying a tray of hamburgers and fries and drinks. No sign of cottage cheese, thank goodness. Maybe this wouldn’t be so bad after all. I made a mental note: Dear Fatty Food Diary, know all the dieting I did this week? Blow it off.

  We trailed Mom over to our lane. Dad was sitting at the controls, cranking up the scoreboard, which was huge and lit-up. When he wrote down my name, I freaked.

  “Dad,” I said, wrenching down his writing arm, “everyone can see our scores. Don’t use our real names.”

  He met my eyes and saw that I was serious. “Who do you want to be?” he asked.

  I considered the question. “Ashley Krupps,” I replied.

  He smiled and wrote, Aslee Craps.

  Close enough. Apparently Vanessa and I got our defective spelling genes from him.

  Mom was up first. At the end of the lane, she poised with her ball, aimed, and threw. The ball thudded on the lane, bounced, and rolled down the aisle. Straight toward the middle pin. Which toppled and set up a chain reaction. When the last pin dropped, Mom shrieked and jumped for joy.

  Beside me, Vanessa muttered, “I was switched at birth.”

  “You’re up, Van,” Dad said.

  “Do I have to?”

  Mom gave Vanessa the look. You know the one: Life is short, especially yours if you keep this up. Vanessa exhaled in disgust. She rose from her seat, stormed to the machine, grabbed her ball, and flung it. It rolled right into the gutter. She stormed back.

  “We’ll call that a practice shot,” Dad said.

  “You can’t,” Mom told him. “It’s automatic scoring. No free balls.”

  Vanessa grumbled, “Let’s call it a night.” She threw her second ball, also into the gutter, then slumped over in her seat.

  Dad was next. He stood with his ball, gazing down the lane. Then he wiggled his hips, aimed, and threw. He was left with what he called the dreaded seven-ten split, which apparently meant there were two pins still standing, one on each side.

  I’m no physics whiz, but even I know you can’t hit two pins, a hundred feet apart, with one ball. And Dad missed both pins. Then he said a really bad word.

  “Robert!” Mom scolded him. “Really.”

  I was next. My ball was heavier than I remembered, and the finger holes were smaller. The worst part was waddling up to the line. Everyone who was bowling stopped to gawk. “Go ahead,” I said to the bowlers on either side of me. “I’m testing the wind.”

  They both rolled strikes.

  I studied their form. Tried to copy it. But as my arm swung back, my fingers lost their grip. The ball clunked behind me, right after my arm popped out of its socket. Everyone in the universe watched my ball roll off the alley and under a seat. Vanessa covered her mouth. Dad’s shoulders shook.

  “Shut up.” I scowled at them.

  Mom said, “Honey, I don’t think that’s your ball.”

  Oh, gee. Is that why I blew a disk in my spine?

  Dad retrieved the ball and took it back, while I tested the other balls. After picking out the lightest, I tried bowling again. This time my ball found its mark—the gutter.

  You know how when you rent a horse to go horseback riding, and all it ever does is head back to the barn? Think of my ball as the horse, and the gutter as the barn. By the fifth frame I had a score of zero. Vanessa got lucky once. Her score was three.

  When Mom hit her third strike in five frames, I could feel Dad bristle. Then Vanessa shrieked, “Oh, my God!” She whipped her head around and whispered into my shoulder, “I know him. Don’t let him see me.”

  I peered around her. Three people were coming toward us. Vanessa thought she was in trouble. Two of them, I knew.

  Chapter 5

  When our eyes connected, Prairie called, “Hey, Jenny.” She waved her free hand. The other hand was held by Hugh. He grinned at me.

  Prairie hobbled down to our lane, with Hugh in tow. Thank God Kevin wasn’t with them. Kevin and Hugh were sort of friends, but only because they shared an interest in computers (not to mention members of the Snob Squad).

  I don’t know why I was shocked to see Prairie and Hugh. I knew Hugh’s favorite sport was bowling. Before the spring fling, when Prairie told us she liked Hugh Torkerson and we decided it was our duty to get Hugh to ask her to the dance, Lydia had concocted this phony survey—a questionnaire to find out a bunch of stuff about Hugh so that we could devise a plan. One of the questions was, “What is your favorite sport?” And Hugh had answered, “Bowling.”

  Basketball is a sport. Baseball is a sport. Even badminton is a sport, sort of. But bowling? There was a reason Hugh was known as Tork the Dork.

  “I didn’t know you liked to b-bowl,” Prairie said to me.

  I saw Hugh studying the scoreboard. “It’s my first time,” I said quickly.

  “Mine, too.” Prairie smiled demurely. “Hugh’s going to teach me.” She beamed up at him.

  I couldn’t take my eyes off their intertwined fingers. The closest Kevin’s hand had come to mine was the M&M’s exchange. It made me wonder if Prairie had ordered her wedding cake.

  “Hugh and his cousin Bruce are on a team,” Prairie added.

  “In a bowling league,” Bruce said, stepping out from behind Hugh.

  Pummel me with a nine pin. Bruce was probably Vanessa’s age. He must’ve been the one she recognized. Bruce was also as far from a nerd as any guy cou
ld get. Jet black hair with sky blue eyes, his huge muscles bulged out of his cutoff denim shirt. Hugh still had his pocket protector in.

  “Notice anything different about me?” Prairie said.

  I scanned her. She looked radiant. The way she always did around Hugh. Without thinking, I blurted, “You grew a foot?”

  Prairie looked stunned.

  Oh, man. Talk about insensitive. Prairie wears a prosthesis because she was born with a deformed foot. “I, I meant—”

  She cut me off with a giggle. “Jenny,” she said as she kicked my bowling shoe with her prosthesis. She said, “No, silly. Here.” She brushed back the hair over her left ear. In the fluorescent light, something sparkled.

  “Prairie!” I jumped up. My hand automatically reached over to touch her earring. It was a half moon; the other half was on the other ear. “Is it—are they—real gold?”

  “Fourteen karat,” Hugh said as he puffed out his pocket protector.

  “Hugh gave them to me,” Prairie said.

  “Well, I didn’t think Bugs Bunny did.”

  Prairie laughed. Hugh didn’t get it. “Karats?” I repeated. “Bunny?”

  “Oh,” he snorkled.

  What, I wondered for the trillionth time, did she see in him?

  Prairie said, “It’s an anniversary present.”

  Anniversary? They’d only been together since the dance.

  As if reading my mind, Prairie added, “Our one-week anniversary.”

  Wow, if she got gold after a week, what would she get for the entire month of May?

  I was in awe. I was jealous. Kevin hadn’t gotten up to gift giving, and I didn’t know if he ever would.

  “Ashley, your turn,” Dad said.

  Still staring at Prairie’s earrings, I said, “You take it, Dad. You need the practice.”

  Wrong thing to say. Mom laughed.

  “Is Ashley here?” Prairie peered around me.

  “No,” I said, then freaked. “I hope not.” My eyes scanned the bowling alley to be sure. The whole school would know my score by Monday with her gutter mouth. “I’m Ashley,” I told Prairie and Hugh. “I’m not, really. It’s just for tonight.”

  They both looked vacant.

  “Never mind.”

  From the scoring station, Mom called, “You’re leading with your wrong foot, Robert. That’s your problem.”

  Dad’s spine went rigid. He threw the ball and it bounced. Right into the gutter.

  Mom said, “Try starting over to the right a little. Use the lane arrows.”

  Dad turned and smiled. It wasn’t a friendly “Gosh, honey, thanks for the advice” smile, either. Under his breath, he snarled, “I’ll lead with any damn foot I want.”

  Storming back to the table, he spilled his beer and cursed real loud.

  I cringed. Vanessa dug her head deeper into her bush bag.

  “She’s right, you know,” Hugh said. “He should lead with his left.”

  Prairie must’ve sensed my father’s imminent implosion because she yanked Hugh away. “We b-better get going,” she said. “Bruce is getting impatient.”

  Bruce was getting a date. He stood behind a girl on the next lane over, showing her how to swing the ball. Maybe if Mom used that approach on Dad….

  Crraack! Mom rolled another strike. She started to shriek, then saw the look on Dad’s face and shrugged.

  It was a fabulously fun family night. Fortunately no one captured it on film for the Solano Moments to Remember family album. Which we’d start someday.

  Chapter 6

  Not only was family night a bust, it made me miss Kevin’s phone call. There were three messages on the machine. Two hang-ups, which had to be Kevin because I’d know his hang-ups anywhere, and Lydia. “Jenny, call me immediately!” She sounded desperate. So what else is new? “Don’t call after nine, though. My mom doesn’t allow me to talk on the phone after nine.”

  She only told me this every other day. I checked my watch. Nine-twenty. Great. Guess I’d have to wait till morning to see what the emergency was.

  I tried calling Lydia the next morning. No answer. All weekend I kept trying. It made me mad because I never heard from Kevin either. I figured he was trying to call me while I was dialing Lydia. Which I could’ve confirmed if Dad didn’t believe call waiting was too rude to use. Whatever. Lydia was ruining my love life.

  That’s what dieting does to me. Makes me irritable and irrational. No doubt I missed Kevin’s calls because Vanessa was constantly gabbing on the phone with her new friend, Phoebe the flautist.

  “I need my own phone,” I informed Mom and Dad at dinner. “I’m missing all my important calls.” In a moment of brilliance, I added, “And you’re missing yours, because I’m tying up the only phone in the house.”

  “That’s the truth,” Vanessa said.

  I couldn’t decide if I should sneer or thank her for her support.

  In unison, Mom and Dad glanced up and barked, “No!”

  It made me back off quick. They were still steamed about family fun night. Good thing they had marriage counseling on Monday. Van met my eyes. She was obviously wondering the same thing I was: Would they stay married till then?

  As soon as I stepped off the bus Monday morning, Lydia attacked me. “I talked to Max on Saturday and she sounded really depressed. I think we should meet at the Peacemobile and see what’s going on with her.”

  The Peacemobile was our secret meeting place. It was an old rusted-out VW minivan that belonged to Max’s brother, Scuzz-Gut. The van was parked in his used auto parts establishment behind their house.

  “Did she say if she took the money?”

  “Jenny!” Lydia slapped my arm. “I didn’t ask her.”

  “Scared of the answer, huh?”

  Lydia smirked.

  “I’m just kidding. We all know who did it,” I said.

  “We do?” Through her glasses, Lydia’s eyes magnified.

  “Of course. Ashley.” I repeated the conversation I’d overheard on Friday.

  Lydia shook her head. “That sounds like the kind of asinine remark she’d make.”

  “You mean it sounds like the kind of incriminating remark she’d make. No way Mr. Krupps could blow off something like this. I mean, stealing from a teacher? That’s got to be a felony or something. Remind me to ask Max.”

  Lydia giggled and slapped me again.

  “If only we could prove Ashley did it,” I said.

  Lydia nodded slowly. “If only.” As we walked past the bike racks, she turned to me. “I found out how much was stolen. Eighty-five dollars.”

  My eyes bulged. “Geez.”

  “That’s what I wanted to talk to you about. Well, one of the things.”

  “I tried to call you all weekend,” I told her. “Where were you?”

  Lydia replied, “My mom had to give this talk at some church retreat and she was leaving Saturday night. She said I couldn’t come so I had to stay with my day care provider.”

  Your baby-sitter, you mean. I didn’t say it.

  “I wanted to stay with you instead.”

  “You could have. I didn’t do anything all weekend.” Besides make the Guinness Book of World Records for lowest bowling score ever and camp out by the phone waiting for Kevin to call.

  “Can we meet after school today?” Lydia asked.

  “Fine by me,” I said. “Where’s Prairie?”

  “With Hugh, of course. Over by the bleachers. Probably making out.”

  “No way.”

  “You saw what he got her for their anniversary, didn’t you?” Lydia rolled her eyes.

  Okay, way. But I didn’t say it; didn’t even want to think it.

  Kevin materialized from under the stands and Lydia said in a sing-song, “Here comes your lover boy. Kiss kiss.”

  “Shut up.” I elbowed her hard enough to break a rib.

  “Hey, Jen,” Kevin said.

  “Hey,” I said back casually, even though my heart was hammering hip-hop.
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  “Hi, Kevie,” Lydia said. “Whatcha got?”

  He stopped in front of us, hiding something behind his back. His eyes held on Lydia, like she had a festering scab on her nose. “Could I see you for a minute?” He blinked over to me.

  “Take a hint, Lyd,” I said, not taking my eyes off Kevin.

  Beside me, Lydia bristled. “I just remembered something I have to do. Something more important than being with my best friend.”

  “Better go, then,” I said.

  In a huff, Lydia stormed off.

  Feeling guilty, I called, “See you later, Lyd. In like two minutes.”

  Kevin murmured, “I thought she’d never leave.”

  I laughed. Okay, it wasn’t that funny, but his nearness was making me giddy.

  “I called you Friday night, but no one was home,” he said. “And I had baseball camp all weekend.”

  See? I know his buzz on the machine. “Yeah, we had this family thing on Friday.” I made a face. After we got married, I’d fill him in on my family. No sense jeopardizing the union at this stage.

  “Drag.” He scraped a foot across the gravel. Without warning, he whipped his hand out from behind his back and handed me a box. It was a little square white box covered in comics newspaper, then taped all over. “I’m not too good a wrapper,” he said.

  He was so adorable. Patient, too. The box was wrapped tight as a Tootsie Roll. It took me about ten minutes to dig off one little strip. Finally Kevin drew out a Swiss Army knife from his front jeans pocket and slit the bottom. Since knives were highly illegal at school, he quickly hid it.

  I opened the box and gasped. Inside was a pair of earrings. Like Prairie’s, except mine were gold hearts. “Oh, my God!” I blinked up at him. “Are these for me?”

  “No, they’re for Lydia. Could you give them to her?”

  I whapped his arm.

  He asked, “You want me to help you put them on?”

  Goosebumps prickled my whole body. The thought of him touching me… “Uh, sure.” I shivered.

  While Kevin fiddled with a clasp on one of the posts, I removed my other earrings. They were fake pearls that I bought at Dollar Daze when I was eight. “I went with Hugh to pick out earrings for Prairie, and I didn’t want you to be jealous,” Kevin said.