Click Here (to find out how i survived seventh grade) (20 page)

“— got to be the biggest loser in the world to punch another girl in the nose.”

I slunk behind a wall jutting out between a store and the food court and peered around it.

Amanda Worthington stood with her arms crossed, her eyes snapping. Chris was a few feet away, Coke in one hand, shoe bag in the other.

Oh, no. It was back. The PI had come back to haunt me and the entire mall. I pressed against the wall, praying no one had seen me. But curiosity made me sneak another peek.

Chris had put his bag and Coke down and was walking toward Amanda. She stepped back, her expression faltering a bit. Then she regained her glare.

“What? Are you going to hit me, too?” she asked. “Does it run in the family?”

For a second I thought he might. He clenched his fist, then released it.

“Your sister has made my sister’s life a living hell since they were five,” Chris said. He wasn’t going to hit her. Even though I kind of wanted him to, I was proud of him because he was so completely in control, keeping Amanda a little off balance. “Jell-O on her seat, stealing her homework, breaking her “Pioneers on the Prairie” diorama — which, I might add, was one of the best dioramas ever made by a seven-year-old — peanut butter in her backpack, cutting off her hair —”

Chris continued his litany, but I had stopped listening. All those times I’d run to one DEFCON or another, he had known why. He knew them all, each and every humiliation. He had been there with me and I hadn’t even known it. Maybe that’s why he always came to get me. Complaining and whining about it, but he’d always come.

“The whole thing could have been left between the two of them,” Chris continued. “But then your sister had to get her little sidekicks to put up those stupid posters all over the school.”

I cringed. I hadn’t told anyone in my family about the posters. But of course Worthlessness had blabbed it to her sister, who had blabbed it to the whole high school.

Amanda laughed. “She deserved it.”

“She never deserved any of it,” Chris said quietly. He looked around at her group of friends, some of whom had stepped a little away from Amanda. “There are a lot of things I could say or do right now that
you
might deserve,” he said. “But that would make me like you. And that’s the last thing I want to be.”

There was a low whistle from a couple of boys sitting at a table. A girl at the counter said, “Right on.”

Chris picked up his stuff and turned away, spotting me immediately. He strode over and Amanda stared after him, twisting up her face in a way that made her quite ugly. She shouted a few choice names at him and I heard her mutter, “Like it matters what Chris Swift thinks.” Funny, but it kind of sounded like it did matter to her. Just a little.

Chris rolled his eyes as he passed me. “Let’s get out of here.” I hurried after him, my throat tight.

“Chris —”

He waved me away. “Don’t say anything.”

“But I —”

His gesture stopped my mouth in mid-word.

“Okay, okay,” I said. I’d just have to wait until the right time to let him know how I felt.

“I am so over her,” he muttered as we got in the car.

“I think her boobs are fake,” I said out of the blue.

“Probably,” Chris said, putting the car in reverse. “Which may explain her rather poor attitude. Silicone is toxic. They probably got mixed up and put some in her brain, too.”

I laughed. “Toxic ooze on the brain.”

“A toxic ooze brain stain.” We were warming to our subject.

“A toxic ooze brain stain with no pain,” I said.

“Don’t drain that brain stain or we may all go insane.” We laughed hysterically. We kept it up all the way home. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d had so much fun with my brother.

When we got home, we swapped high fives. “Thanks for punching Serena,” he said. “If you hadn’t, I never would have gotten to do that today.”

“You’re welcome,” I said, and we both laughed again.

“Oh, good, you’re back,” Mom said when we came inside. “Jilly’s been calling, Erin. She sounds a little desperate.” Mom looked at the clock and so did I. Four. “You can go over for about an hour and a half but then you need to clean your room.”

I had talked to Jilly at nine this morning. Of course she was desperate. She hadn’t been able to talk to anyone about Mark for seven hours. She needed to moon over him to a live body. But I didn’t want to go. I was having fun with Chris.

“Maybe I should do my room now,” I said.

Mom looked at me strangely. “I thought you would want to go to Jilly’s.”

“Oh, I do, but I just feel bad that I didn’t do my room when I was supposed to.”

Mom walked over and put her hand on my forehead. “You don’t have a fever.”

I pushed her hand away. “Mom.”

She laughed. “Well, you have to admit it isn’t like you to give up time with your best friend to clean up your room.”

I sighed. There was really no way out of it. “I’ll be back in an hour.”

“Tell me again what he was wearing Friday.”

I tried not to groan as I leaned against her closet door, hands shoved in my pockets. Jilly asked this every day, even though she saw him every morning when we all got off our buses.

“I don’t really notice what he’s wearing,” she would say. “I’m just looking into his eyes.”

Gag, gag, double gag.

“Well? Was he wearing his khaki pants?” Jilly sat on her bed, legs crossed, looking at me as if I was about to deliver news of her Academy Award nomination. I hated the way she said “his khaki pants,” like she knew his whole wardrobe and was mentally selecting clothes out of his closet or drawers.

I shook my head. “No. Jeans, Gateway T-shirt, and Asics.” I threw my leg over the chair at her desk, straddling it as I rested my arms over the back.

Jilly sighed and I knew she was imagining Mark in this stunning outfit.

“What did he have for lunch?”

“Don’t you talk about these things when you meet between classes and after school?” For people on different tracks at opposite ends of the school, they managed to see a lot of each other.

“No. We have more important things to do.” She grinned wickedly and I looked away. It had taken days for me to get the image of my best friend and the love of my life with their lips locked together out of my mind. I didn’t want a rerun.

“Pizza and a Coke from one of the kiosks,” I said in answer to her lunch question. Afterward he had eaten two Starburst candies — cherry and strawberry, from the original flavors. I didn’t tell her this part. Those are my two favorite Starburst flavors and I just wanted to keep this important connection between Mark and me to myself.

“So you ate lunch with him?”

“I was at the same table. With Rosie.”

“You’re getting to be good friends with her, aren’t you?” Jilly asked. I would have welcomed a subject change but not this one. Even though it didn’t make any sense, I felt guilty for having Rosie for a friend.

“Mark’s really good friends with Rosie,” I told her, deciding I’d rather be in the agony of talking about Mark than the discomfort of having another friend besides Jilly. “They’ve known each other forever.”

Jilly’s face lit up. “Really?”

Uh-oh. I could see the wheels turning inside Jilly’s head. Rosie was best friends with Mark. Rosie would know about Mark. Jilly would use Rosie to find out about Mark.

Rosie was going to kill me.

Saturday, November 16

Well, I was right. Yesterday on the bus, Jilly followed Rosie to her seat like a puppy. When she came back she was all, Rosie’s kind of snotty, isn’t she? And I’m like, no, maybe she doesn’t like to play go-between. Then Jilly goes, I like to play go-between, like that meant everyone should like it. Then she launched into how cute Mark was and didn’t I just love the way his bang fell over 1 eye like that (I noticed it 1st, on the 1st day of school. That eye and those bangs were MINE), and did I see his butt in those pants? (No, you can’t see any butt in those baggy jeans. But I’d seen him in gym shorts, so THERE, Jillian Gail Hennessey).

Is it a crime to strangle your best friend when she won’t stop talking about a boy? I think there must be some exception when it comes to situations like this. She just wouldn’t stop. Ok, maybe I don’t want to strangle her but a nice muzzle would help…or a filter that would only let in conversation that had nothing to do with Mark…easy to set up…anything with Mark text in the subject or body of the conversation would be sent to the Trash. Then Jilly and I could have a normal friendship again…a quiet 1, though, if she couldn’t talk about Mark.

The worst part is that I never see her anymore, except after play practice when we go home together. And when I do see her she’s babbling on and on about Mark…it’s like I don’t even know her. She’s liked boys B4 but not like this…keeping track of how many times they’ve kissed and where and how long it lasted and whether they used tongues and I had to tell her to stop cuz I really didn’t want to know anymore. Geez. I’d seen enough on the bus. I cried all over my pillow last night, so I couldn’t even practice kissing, even if I’d wanted to. Which I didn’t. Not when Jilly was getting to actually kiss the real thing. It was 2 pathetic.

chapter 20

No Strings Attached

I never thought I’d say I was glad for
A Harvest to Remember
, but this week I was because Jilly was more obsessed with her part than she was with Mark. Since we had dress rehearsal and the performance next Tuesday night, she was rehearsing day and night, with and without me.

I, on the other hand, was trying to figure out how I could go to both the dress rehearsal and the computer lab, because my team was counting on me to help them get everything ready.

Wednesday afternoon I stood in the back row of the Vegetable Medley, waiting for our cue to sing the opening song. Once I sang that, I could sneak away before having to be back for my line in about forty minutes. This would be a test to see if I could make it back during the dress rehearsal next week.

I turned slightly so I could see Mr. Trubey through my eyeholes. Our costumes were amazing — they were made out of foam rubber and looked real. But the ear of corn costume was like being inside a toilet paper tube. I could only take small baby steps, though I did have my arms free, which helped.

When our song was over, I shuffled off the stage and down the hall. I had no peripheral vision so I kept knocking into lockers when I got too close to one side. I finally figured out that if I kept to the middle of the hall, I would be okay. I felt like Scout in
To Kill a Mockingbird
(probably the only black and white movie I liked), trying to get home after her school play where she was a ham. I hoped no one was lurking, waiting to jump me.

“Hey, look! Corny’s here!” Steve shouted as I shuffled into the lab a few minutes later.

“Erin the Corncob!” said Tyler. “Get your kernels over here and help me.”

I smiled inside my costume. I still couldn’t believe this semi-nerdy boy had written that beautiful poem about me. I had never said anything to him and of course he never brought it up. But sometimes I thought of the words, which I knew by heart now, and marveled at how a spiky gel head could have written it.

And I would never admit to anyone that I liked Tyler’s teasing, his easy way around me now. I wondered if he was more comfortable because he had stopped liking me.