Girls in Charge (7 page)

“But we also wanted you to know that it's especially important for you to lay low right now,” Ms. Russo said.

“Meaning what?” I asked.

“You don't want to risk getting suspended,” Mrs. Percy said. “And I fear that's what Principal Finklestein would do if he caught you red-handed, or should I say pink-handed?”

“Très amusante,”
Piper said.

I was not so amused.

“Do you think he suspects anything?” I asked Mrs. Percy.

“I don't know. All he would tell me was the official reason he listed for banning you from the class trip.”

“Because we restarted the PLS when he told us not to, right?” I asked.

“Not exactly. The official school rule you broke was operating a student club without being officially sanctioned.”

“Sanctioned?” Kate asked.

“Sanctioned is another way of saying ‘approved.' All school clubs are officially approved at one point or another,” Mrs. Percy said. “Many have been sanctioned for decades, like
le club Francais,
a club Piper is probably well acquainted with.”

“Oui,”
said Piper. French for
yes
pronounced “we.”

A sanctioned club has a charter (a document that explains the rules), a designated teacher-advisor, and signed permission forms from parents to let their kids be in it, Mrs. Percy explained. “I guess the PLS has always been a secret group without official approval.”

“Can we get sanctioned? Ms. Russo has been our teacher-advisor. And we could write a charter,” Kate asked.

“I'm afraid it would be difficult now. Principal Finklestein and the school board would have to recommend it for sanctioning. It's hard to get a new club sanctioned or an old club unsanctioned,” Mrs. Percy said. “Lots of paperwork.”

“Couldn't we at least try?” Piper said.

Ms. Russo and Mrs. Percy exchanged glances but neither said anything. Which in a way did answer Piper's question, and that answer was “No.”

 

Twenty

After school, I nearly dove into my running clothes and sprinted out to the track to start my run. I didn't want to talk to my teammates or my coach or take the long way around to catch a glimpse of the baseball team.

“Want to run together?” Mimi Caritas asked me. Clem's younger sister looked up to me, I knew. She joined the track team when I told her, “If I can distance run, you can distance run.” She was doing great, actually. But today, I just didn't want the company.

“I'm sorry, Mimi. I'm upset about something and I wouldn't be a good partner.”

I felt like if I could run, I could erase the noise and worries filling my head. At mile one, the anxiety had lifted only slightly. All thoughts kept leading me back to our troubling situation—no class trip and a grim future for the PLS.

Though I kept hoping for some miracle to occur, it was now clear that nothing would change. I'd have to tell my parents that I wouldn't be going to New York. Class trips can't be replaced, I thought. There are very few of them and hardly any are overnight, stay-at-hotel trips. When else are you going to get to go somewhere fun with your close friends and the entire eighth grade? And when else would I get to visit New York City, the city that never sleeps? Fashion, art, theater, hot dogs on every street corner—it was all there for the taking.

Missing the class trip meant missing our chance to make a presentation at the Tomorrow's Leaders Today conference, too. Someone would have to tell Forrest. Would he go on without me? It was hard to imagine him making the presentation alone. I wondered how many Blue Locker Society meetings had been held on the roof since he took me up there.

Then there was the larger problem of the Pink Locker Society's future. Should we keep putting ourselves at risk by running the Web site until we graduated eighth grade? At first, I couldn't imagine giving up on our work or passing along our positions and our offices to unknown seventh-grade girls. But the idea was growing on me.

I think that's when I started to understand what the word
bittersweet
meant. It was sad (bitter) to think about leaving the PLS behind, but somehow happy (sweet) to think about this great tradition continuing. To quote Mrs. Percy, it was a chance to actually be “a link in a pink chain.”

But right now, everything seemed uncertain.

Working through all these thoughts, I lost track of how many times I had run our circuit. I'd gone up hills and by the baseball fields I don't know how many times. My legs were aching and I suddenly wanted to stop running. The sky had darkened when I made it to the doors of the gym. Mimi was already dressed and walking out to the parking lot.

“Jemma, how far did you go today? No one could catch you and it was like you didn't even notice.”

“Sorry, I'm in my own world today.”

“Well, if you need someone to talk to, you can ask me. I'm a good listener,” Mimi said. “Just yesterday, my sister was telling me about this boy, Shane, who she really likes, but who is majorly into Tayor Mayweather.”

“I know you're a good listener, Mimi,” I said. “We'll run together tomorrow.”

 

Twenty-one

As I watched my large-bellied mom make breakfast, I thought about how I didn't know much about pregnancy before. Now, with the due date edging closer, I knew plenty. I knew my mom was having trouble sleeping at this late stage. I knew that she had heartburn when she ate pizza. I learned that women don't get a period while they're pregnant (who knew?). And I found out that you didn't want the babies to be born too early because their lungs were still developing. It was seven weeks and counting for the Colwin Twins.

My mind drifted again, like it had all of yesterday, to my own twin worries: the PLS's future and having to tell my parents about the lost school trip. If you threw in Jake, you could have called them my triplet dilemmas. Toss in my period, which still hadn't come, and we'd have quadruplet troubles.

I thought for a moment about saying something to Mom about what was on my mind, but I just couldn't do it. She looked happy, humming something as she scrambled my cooking eggs in the nonstick pan. She was probably thinking about what else she needed to buy before the babies were born. It was an activity that was taking up most of our weekends.

“I heard about the New York City problem, by the way,” she said, still stirring the eggs.

“What?”

“Ms. Russo called. She just feels terrible. And I feel terrible that you girls are going to miss out.”

“It's completely unfair,” I said, relieved she didn't seem too angry.

“Well, it's better than a suspension, I guess. You're learning the tough lesson of what it means to go out on a limb for something.”

“The limb crashed to the ground, with me on it,” I said. “We don't know what to do, actually.”

“Ms. Russo said not to lose hope. She and Mrs. P. are still working on the principal. He might change his mind.”

“Sure,” I said, not really believing it.

“I could come in and talk to him,” she said.

“Please don't.”

“Well, I would have, but Ms. Russo said it probably wouldn't do any good.”

“Right,” I said.

“You know, your father and I could always take you to New York at some future point.”

I pictured the three of us in Times Square with two adorable but screaming babies.

“Right,” I said again.

I finished my eggs and orange juice and headed for the bus stop. When I arrived at school, Bet was waiting for me at my locker.

“What's the latest?” she said.

“Nothing good, I'm afraid,” I said.

“So I heard,” Bet said. “I'm planning on interviewing Principal F., you know.”

“Ask him why I can't go to New York City. On second thought, don't.”

“I have to interview him because he's celebrating forty years of working at Margaret Simon Middle School,” Bet said.

“Oh, joy.”

“Yes, it's a dull reason, I know,” Bet said. “But I'm going to ambush him with some other topics. I have been digging around in the school records and I may have something that will help the PLS.”

“What kind of something?”

“I don't want to say until I get more info—and talk to the big guy.”

“Good luck with that,” I said.

“Hey, Jemma.” It was Forrest, pulling open his locker next to mine, like he did every morning.

I smiled at him and turned back to continue my talk with Bet. Then I heard another voice over my shoulder.

“Jemma, hey.” It was Jake.

He hugged me hello, which was kind of a normal thing at my school. It didn't exactly mark us as boyfriend and girlfriend, but it was an awfully warm greeting for an ordinary Wednesday.

“Oh, hey. Hi, Jake,” I said, returning the hug, but only briefly. I thought I could feel Forrest looking at us, but it could have been my imagination.

“Coming to my game on Friday?” Jake asked.

“Yeah, sure. I guess,” I said.

“Cool,” he said, and walked off to class.

“I'm pitching,” Forrest said, more to his locker than to me.

“What?” I said.

Bet, seeing me caught up in yet another conversation, smiled, waved, and headed off to class herself.

“I'm pitching,” Forrest said. “I didn't pitch the last game you were at.”

“Well, good luck, then. For Friday.”

“Thanks,” he said, and smiled.

 

Twenty-two

Weary of always running from the law—or at least the law handed down by Principal F.—we decided to meet officially only once a week. So our deluxe office sat empty every day except Wednesday. It wasn't that we didn't have a ton of Pink Locker work piling up. But the fewer chances to get caught climbing in and out of our lockers, the better. We were trying to keep the Pink Locker Society running while staying as invisible as possible.

We also decided to permanently set the date on the Web site's main page to March 21, when we had had our meeting with Principal F. Then, if he ever checked, it would always look like we hadn't touched the Web site since he confronted us about it.

But in truth, we continued to answer questions. We had been handling the usual questions about bra cup sizes, leg shaving, and all matters boy-related. Periods remained a popular topic and I relaunched the Period Predictor after making some “improvements.” I was living proof that we really couldn't narrow it down to the exact day that a girl would get her first period. Instead, we gave an estimated six-month range—and even that we had to say was just a rough estimate. It was not the crystal-clear answer girls were looking for, but it was medically correct, the school nurse and my mother's doctor had assured me.

We also started getting a rash of new questions about the NYC trip. This made us deeply depressed, but we answered them. A lot of it had to do with friends squabbling about who was going to share a hotel room with whom. Two girls wrote in saying they were scared to be out of town without their parents. Discussing the subject left all three of us upset all over again. We used our conference call phone to dial Mrs. Percy's extension.

“We're sorry to bother you, Mrs. P., but can you talk to us?” Piper said.

Piper covered the receiver and said Mrs. Percy would be on as soon as she moved to a private spot to talk. Piper pressed the speakerphone button so we all could hear.

“Yes, girls. How can I help you today?”

“We are all just so … so upset about the trip. Is there anything at all that you can do?” Piper said.

“Ms. Russo and I are just torn up about it as well. In fact, she contacted Tomorrow's Leaders Today intending to say you girls couldn't be there and they told her that the Pink Locker Society is up for a major student leadership award.”

“What?” I said.

“Yes, evidently it's a big deal. They nominate student groups appearing at the conference and one of them gets to represent Tomorrow's Leaders Today at their international conference,” Mrs. Percy said.

“OMG,” said Piper.

“Yes, that was Ms. Russo's reaction, too. So she just couldn't bring herself to pull you guys out of the lineup just yet.”

“Couldn't we just go to New York on our own?” Kate said.

“Yes, we thought about that, but if Principal F. found out, Jane—I mean Ms. Russo—and I could lose our jobs.”

“The New York trip is next week. Time is running out for us,” I said.

“Let's not lose hope and let's look ahead. Have you identified any candidates yet?”

I nominated Mimi Caritas and Piper recommended Shannon Andersen, the student council rep who had passed out the carnations on Valentine's Day. Kate and Piper seconded the nominations.

“Excellent, Jemma. Time marches on and the Pink Locker Society will, too.”

Then Mrs. Percy hung up the phone and we were alone again.

“I hope she's right,” Piper said. “If I don't go on that New York trip, I think I'm going to lose it.”

“I know,” I said. “I want to scream when I hear people talking about the clothes they're packing or whether they're brave enough to go to the top of the Empire State Building.”

“Maybe we should plan an alternate activity,” Kate said, “just in case, so we're not too upset if the trip really does happen without us.”

“No thanks,” Piper said. “It'd be no fun if we're sitting around playing Scrabble when everyone we know is having the time of their lives.”

The bell was ringing to signal the end of study hall. With the call to Mrs. Percy, we lost track of time. Quickly, we gathered our stuff and stepped inside our lockers. While standing there, I started to wonder if it was the end-of-study-hall bell I heard or the start-of-the-next-class bell. I hadn't checked a clock or my phone.