Mission (Un)Popular (14 page)

“I used to have one of these,” Em said, fingering it idly.

I was about to ask her who had the other half when I glanced at the clock. It was 6:30—almost two full hours since Erika had run off. If I wanted to have any hope of holding on to my
^ST
_END
I
needed
to write that e-mail,
^ST
_AT
.

“Oh my God. You never called home!” I said suddenly.

“Oh my God, relax!” Em imitated me. “Don't worry. My mom won't care. She probably hasn't even noticed I'm not home yet.”

I glanced at the clock again. 6:31. “Yeah, but…it's getting kind of late. I should probably do some homework or something, so—”

“You're kicking me out?”

“No,” I said quickly. She'd been so nice to me, giving me the green jacket and walking me home. And now, especially with Erika at Sacred Heart, seriously mad at me and potentially never planning to forgive me, I couldn't afford to lose her as a friend, too. “You can stay!” My voice sounded too eager. “My stepdad won't be home until eight. We can do our homework together.” She raised her eyebrows, giving me this look that made it clear she wasn't interested in being study buddies. I took a deep breath, determined to act normal. “I mean, if you want.”

“It's fine. I have stuff to do. I probably should have left ages ago, actually. Where's the phone?”

About ten minutes later, the same black car with tinted windows came to pick Em up, and she waved from the sidewalk, seeming to have forgiven me.

“See you tomorrow,” she called. “And don't forget to wear lip gloss. You never know if it might be your big day for kissing floppy hair guy.” I forced a smile.

The second the car drove away, I ran back to my room to see if Erika was on IM. I knew she would be. She always was that time of night, but her status must have been set to invisible. So I sat down and wrote her the long e-mail, telling her how sorry I was. Then I sent it, and waited ten minutes. When there was no response, I called her house.

“I'm sorry, Margot,” her dad said. His voice sounded tired. “Erika's indisposed at the moment.”

“Well, could you ask her to call me back?” I said. “Please?”

“I'll ask,” he promised.

After hanging up, I wandered miserably to the kitchen. I cleaned up the stuff from the spoon game, drank a huge glass of water to get the lingering tastes out of my mouth, and went back to my room to recheck my e-mail. Nothing. But as I turned off the monitor and looked around, I couldn't help noticing that the room was full of Erika. Her Parasuco jeans were still on the floor, but that was only the beginning.

On the dresser was a stuffed platypus she bought me for my birthday in third grade. The sticker books we were obsessed with in fourth grade were shoved sideways on a shelf, right beside this chapter book series about magical horses she'd lent me, which I'd never really gotten into. The note she'd put in my pocket for School Year's Day was still sitting unfolded on the dresser. I knelt on the bed and kissed the Ian Donahue lips picture. I didn't care what kids in New York listened to. He'd always be my eternal crush.

After turning on the computer one more time, checking my e-mail and sighing, I went to microwave some eggplant bharta. It was mushy and brown, but it tasted okay. I ate it in the quiet kitchen and was just throwing the carton into the recycling bin when I saw the bag of onions sitting on the counter. I don't know what made me do it, but I grabbed three and glanced at the second hand on the clock. I threw them into the air and got a good rhythm going. I didn't look up until the first one hit the floor.

And it was while I was bent down, crawling under the kitchen table to pick it up, that I finally lost it. I'd just hit twenty seconds, blasting the all-time summer orange juggling record out of the water. Plus, I had exciting new information—Spanish onions are even easier to work with. But Erika didn't want to talk to me, and there was nobody else in the world who would even care.

W
HEN I WOKE UP
on Tuesday morning, I found my mom in the living room. She was lying on the couch watching a yoga video while the triplets ate VTV organic oatmeal on the carpet. The oatmeal looked awful—like beige snot. My mother looked worse.

“They've been up since four thirty,” she said, blinking heavy eyelids. “I don't understand. They've been sleeping so well lately.”

“That's weird,” I said, feeling slightly terrible. “I hope it wasn't my fault,” I added. “I put them to bed a little early.” Somehow this made me feel better, even though it was still a lie.

“Did your new friend end up staying to help you babysit?” my mom asked, switching off the TV and sitting up. I nodded. “That was nice of her,” she said. “Speaking of friends, I haven't seen Erika since school started. How's she doing at Sacred Heart?”

“Good,” I lied. “She's been busy. Tons of homework.” I turned my back and walked to the window to open the blinds so my mom wouldn't notice the sad look on my face.

The last thing I needed was for her to get all concerned and bug me about “working things out” with Erika—like I wasn't already trying. I'd checked right before going to bed, and again first thing that morning, and she still hadn't answered my e-mail, which made it clear: she was pretending I didn't exist anymore.

My mom stretched out her back before bending to pick up the oatmeal bowls. “I found a green jacket on one of the kitchen chairs this morning. Does it belong to your friend, Em?”

“Oh. That's mine. She gave it to me.”

“Are you sure she cleared that with her mother first? It looks like an expensive jacket.”

“It's fine,” I said. “It's like nothing to her family. They're really rich. Her mom's a soap opera actress and her dad's like, a stockbroker or something.” I didn't technically know if that last part was true. Actually, now that I thought about it, Em hadn't said anything about her dad at all…but he probably did something like that.

My mom looked surprised—and doubtful, I think. I could tell by the way she paused and looked up at me for a second before picking up the last oatmeal bowl. I couldn't exactly blame her. It wasn't like soap stars and stockbrokers were flocking to Darling, Ontario, by the dozen. “Anyway,” I added, tickling Aleene, then scooping her up off the floor and flipping her upside down so she squealed like a piglet, “I have to get ready for school.”

I ended up doing a near-perfect job on my hair. And I chose a plain white T-shirt, which looked good with the army jacket. The only problem was my pants. All my jeans were in the wash, so I chose a pair of black cords. They would have been normal looking, too, if they hadn't been so short. I put on a pair of black socks with them (hoping nobody would notice that they ended practically an inch above my ankles), dodged a bowl of VTV oatmeal snot my mom held out to me, and ran out the door.

I rounded the corner and was partway down Delaware when I spotted the enrichment-program girls from Colonel Darling who I'd walked behind on the first day of school. You could tell they were good friends. Just the way they were talking to each other made me miss Erika.

“Did you honestly forget?” one of them was asking.

“No, I just didn't remember,” another one laughed.

“Don't worry. You can copy mine,” a third said. “I owe you anyway. You've saved my butt a squillion times.”

“Thanks,” the girl answered, pulling her red hair back into a ponytail and fastening it with an elastic band from her wrist. They walked in silence a few steps. “Hey, did you hear about that thing yesterday, with Sarah J. and the sandwich?” My ears perked up.

“I had band at lunch, but Caroline saw the whole thing,” the first one answered. “She said there was mustard all over Sarah's clothes
and
her face.”

“Oh God. That could
not
have been pretty.”

“Well, personally, I'm glad. I hate that girl,” said the one with the red hair. “I used to be friends with Maggie Keller until Sarah brainwashed her against me last year and turned her into a clone. Now she won't even talk to me.”

“Yeah,” one of her friends consoled her. “But you're better off now, right?” The girl nodded, and I felt a small burst of pride. I mean, it was only a mustard stain, but still, I felt like I'd made some small contribution toward righting the wrongs of popularity for the little people.

“Margot!” I heard somebody call. I turned to look over my shoulder. It was Andrew, running to catch up with me. I stopped, letting the enrichment-program girls walk ahead. “Hey. What's up?”

“Not much.” I spun a little in a pile of leaves.

“Not much?” he said. “I saw what happened yesterday. Everyone's talking about it.”

“They are?” I answered, curious to find out what else people were saying about how Em and I had heroically and permanently rid the school yard of Sarah J. and Matt's lip slurping.

“Yeah. Amir said Sarah was glaring at you all through French class. And Mike heard that her boyfriend tried to beat you up after school.”

“What? Sarah J.
always
glares at me. But nobody tried to beat me up.” I raised my fists and smiled, hoping to erase the worried look from Andrew's face. I threw an incredibly wussy fake punch into his shoulder. “Anyway, did you see Sarah's boyfriend? He's four feet tall. Okay, four and a half if you count his hair. He wouldn't stand a chance.” Andrew smiled weakly. The truth was, Matt could pulverize me, and we both knew it.

“Yeah, well,” Andrew went on, fake punching me back. “Just be careful, okay? Amir's sister knows that guy Matt. She says he's a jerk. If you want me to walk you home after school or anything…” He let his words trail off. I didn't miss noticing that he couldn't seem to look me in the eyes.

“Thanks,” I answered. “That's really nice of you.…” I ran my fingers along the fence as we came up to the school yard, then grabbed a leaf that was sticking through the chain link and studied its thread-thin veins. “But you have basketball after school most days, right? I don't want to make you miss it.”

“Right.” He shrugged and smiled at the same time. “But you know, still…if he ever bugs you.”

“I'm pretty sure Em and I can handle it.” I smiled a little because I liked the way that sounded:
Em and I
. What I didn't know, of course, was that my
very new
friendship was about to get
very
complicated.

“What's with your pants?” Em said first thing when I walked into class. So much for nobody noticing how short they were. But I was glad I could count on my new friend to be honest with me—at least when it came to fashion.

“They shrunk in the wash,” I lied.

“Come here.” She lifted my shirt up a little. “The waist is big. Just pull them down.”

I grabbed the waistband and settled them as far down on my hips as they would go. They still didn't touch the tops of my shoes.

“You want to talk about who should get a room?” I heard Sarah J.'s voice before I saw her. “New York just told Ham-burglar to pull her pants down,” she announced. Maggie and Joyce started laughing like it was the funniest thing they'd ever heard.

“It's like a lesbian love affair over there,” Maggie added, backing Sarah up. Had she really been friends with the nice red-haired enrichment-program girl last year? Now that I thought about it, Maggie
did
used to do stuff like collect the money on pizza day. She also brought doughnut holes for everyone at lunch once. It seemed crazy that someone could turn so evil so fast.

“Seriously, you want to talk about disturbing displays of sexual behavior,” Sarah said, making a gagging noise.

Then again, with Sarah J. as an influence, maybe it wasn't that hard to imagine.

My cheeks were burning, but I started to take my books out of my backpack, fully prepared to ignore them, when Em spoke up. “Oh my God, Margot.” She tilted her head to one side like Sarah had just done the cutest thing. “Sarah is pretty much repeating everything I said yesterday word-for-word. I think she wants to be like me.”

Just then, Mr. Learner walked in and set his briefcase on the desk. “Good morning, eager young minds,” he said sarcastically, clapping his hands together.

Sarah was glaring hard at Em, but Em just smiled back, giving her the finger underneath her desk. Then she turned to face the front. As for me, I gave Maggie a tight, satisfied smile before flipping open my copy of
Lord of the Flies
.

For the rest of the morning I heard people talking about the sandwich incident wherever I went. But unlike the enrichment-program girls, most people seemed to be siding with Sarah J. “I think it's so immature to throw food, not to mention wasteful. I mean, hello. People are starving in foreign countries,” I heard Michelle Cobbs tell her best friend Bethany as they walked around the bend and past Sarah's locker on their way to volleyball practice.

“That new girl is wack,” Ken said to Gorgeous George, motioning toward Em as she took a drink from the water fountain after math. “I heard she's like, mentally deranged.”

As usual, Em had “a personal thing to take care of” when the bell rang for lunch. She left me at our lockers and disappeared down the hall, turning right before the bathrooms. I couldn't help myself. I mean, if getting called lesbian lovers, then hitting the most popular girl in school in the head with a sandwich and living to tell about it wasn't a bonding experience, I didn't know what was.…We were friends. There wasn't any reason for secrets between us. I followed, hiding behind a group of eighth graders when Em stopped to check her reflection in the trophy case. Then I watched as she slipped into a room and closed the door behind her. As soon as the coast was clear, I wandered over casually, stopping to tie my shoelace. The nameplate on the door read:
MRS. MARTINE, STUDENT SUPPORT OFFICE
. So this was Em's “personal thing.” What were they talking about in there? Was she honestly mentally deranged? I decided enough was enough. She owed me an answer. And I didn't waste any time. The second she came out to the yard, I paused War of the Druids level three, looked over to make sure Andrew, Mike, and Amir were still busy doing free throws, then turned to face her.

“What do you do in the Student Support Office at lunch every day?” I asked. She stopped midway through taking her Whole Foods sandwich out of her bag. “Are you seeing the guidance counselor or something?”

“No!” She began to unwrap the cellophane angrily, and I glanced down, worried that I might end up being the one covered in mustard today if I didn't say this just right.

“I just saw you go in,” I said as gently as I could. “Are you in trouble for something? You can tell me if you are. I told you about the ham.”

“I'm not in trouble for anything,” Em said, bunching the plastic wrap into a ball and throwing it hard at the garbage can, where it bounced off the rim. “Why would you even say that?”

“It's the reason most people see a guidance counselor, or a social worker.” I added that last part, waiting to see how she'd react.

“What do you mean social worker?”

“I heard you talking to Mrs. Vandanhoover in her office,” I admitted.

She took a bite of the sandwich, staring off into the distance for a while before sighing. “Okay. Fine. I did something bad at my last school. I cut class a lot. That's all. To spend time with my dad.”

“Why?” I knew people cut class to go to movie theaters or malls—but not to hang out with their dads. Actually, most people our age went out of their way to avoid their parents. “I mean, don't you see him enough at home?”

“No. He's a really busy person.”

“Is he a stockbroker?” I asked.

“No,” she said simply.

“Oh. Well, why's he so busy?”

She sighed like I was asking too many questions. “He's an agent for musicians. So he's like, at shows all the time. And he travels a lot. He didn't even move here with us. He stayed behind in New York to work. So, not that it's any of your business,” she went on, “but I go to the Student Support Office to talk to him on the phone. Mrs. Martine lets me use her desk so I can have some privacy. Okay? Are you happy now?”

I didn't get why she was so pissed off, or why she'd been trying so hard to keep it a secret. I only
wished
my dad cared enough to want to talk to me on the phone every day—or even once in a while. She was lucky!

“Are you mad at me for snooping?” I asked.

“I'm not mad.” She kicked at a pile of leaves. “I just don't want anyone to make a big deal about my dad.” She turned to look at me.

“Why would anyone make a big deal?” Just then I noticed Andrew waving me over. Mike and Amir were crouched down in one corner of the basketball court, looking at something on the ground. It was probably an old robin's eggshell or something. There was a nest on the school roof, and sometimes they fell.

“My dad represents some big names, okay?” she said suddenly, just as I was about to stand up and go see what Andrew wanted. “Like huge. Like, SubSonic, just to name one.” Okay, so I still hadn't actually listened to their music, but I had Googled them after Em mentioned liking the band the night before, and this was amazing news. All of their albums had gone platinum and their videos were topping the charts. “One sec,” I mouthed to Andrew, then turned to face Em.

“I don't want
anyone
to know,” Em went on seriously. “I told you we moved to Darling to get a break from the entertainment industry, right?”

I nodded. “Okay.”

“So swear you won't tell anyone.” She fixed me with a steady stare.