The Red Blazer Girls (18 page)

“Guppy and Summerson are both from
Bleak
House
. William Guppy, I think, and Esther Summerson. And Wackford Squeers, of course, is the evil schoolmaster in
Nicholas Nickleby
. Sort of a … personal hero of mine.”

“Did you
say Esther
Summerson?” Margaret's eyes race down the page. “The only
female
. Aaaauugghhh. I should have known that.”

“Easy, Margaret,” says Mr. Eliot. “You're twelve. You can't know everything. Yet.”

“Trust me, she's working on it,” I say. “So, you're telling me that Esther is someone's
last
name?”

“Hey, I saw that one!” Rebecca shouts. “I think I even remember where it is.”

“You're not going to break into the church to look for this tonight.” He looks us all in the eyes. “Promise me, girls.”

“We're not going to
break
into the church,” Margaret assures him. “Jeez, it's like you think we're criminals or something.”

“When really we're just three innocent little schoolgirls.” I bat my eyelashes for emphasis.

“Uh-huh. Seriously, ladies, stay out of trouble with this. Promise?”

“Promise.”

“But… let me know when you find it, all right?”

Oh, yeah. He is hooked. And, later, using my trusty and well-worn nail file to remove the screws, we find a piece of paper folded perfectly to fit beneath the brass
plaque that says “Gift of Dr. Ricardo Esther, In memory of Gloria Esther.”

You know, I've got nothing against farm animals, but isn't “dumb ox” redundant? I mean, are there any
smart
ones out there?

Monday morning brings me back to reality. My teachers are in the midst of some kind of inhumane testing frenzy; I have an essay due in Mr. Eliot's class; and the Dickens banquet is Friday night—and so far, all we have is a script. How in the world am I ever going to find time to solve clue number five?

And then there is Leigh Ann. Who thinks Raf is cute. And nice. And funny. And available.

Deep breaths.

We meet after school in an empty room to work on our skit, which Leigh Ann finished on Sunday, adding several
pages
. Our simple five-minute skit has turned into a ten-minute play let.

“I just thought it needed, you know, more flair, some artistic touches,” Leigh Ann says as she hands out the copies.

I leaf through the pages. “Um, Leigh Ann, you realize this thing is Friday, right? This is a lot of flair and art to absorb in four days—a whole lot of flart.”

“I can only stay till three o'clock,” says Rebecca. “And I'm not memorizing anything. You promised.”

“You don't have to memorize, Rebecca. You're just going to read a letter,” Leigh Ann promises. “Guys, I've done this a million times. We can do it. C'mon, I'll show you.”

Leigh Ann is a one-person production company: director, producer, actor, writer, costumer, makeup artist. She may have been selling tickets during lunch. She tells us how she has been in several plays outside of school, promises to work us like dogs to make everything
perfect
. Hell-bent on turning us into thespians, she doesn't even like the way we walk. (I wiggle. Margaret prances.) Or the way we talk. (Too fast! Too Nuuu Yawk-y!) Faster! Slower! With a little more
feeling!
Not
that
much feeling! It is maddening, and a bit terrifying, but somewhere along the line, I stop worrying about making a fool of myself and start to have fun being Master Herbert Pocket.

And then Leigh Ann's phone rings.

It is almost five o'clock, and we are starting to gather our things together to leave. I am closest to her phone when it rings, so she asks me to hand it to her. I reach for it, and in letters that burn into my retinas, the name RAF—in all caps—appears on the screen.

Stunned, and feeling the color drain from my face, I can't get rid of it fast enough. I toss it to her and go back to closing up my book bag.

Her side of the conversation goes something like this: “Hi! …
[laughing]
…
[more laughing]
… At school … working on a skit for this banquet thing … Yeah, they're—…
[really loud laughing] …
I
know! …
Yeah, I remember … Really? Um, okay … Saturday? What time? No, I had a good time, too—”

And this is all I can take. I am hyperventilating as I run out of the room, yelling, “I've got to go!” to a very surprised and confused Margaret. I run down the hall, down five flights of stairs, and out the front doors, where I stop to take one breath before running down the sidewalk. I am halfway home when Margaret finally catches up with me, pushing me against the window of a sushi bar at Seventy-fifth and Third.

“Sophie, what is the matter with you!” She has a tight grip on my blazer as I try to wriggle away. “Didn't you hear me calling your name? And why did you just run out of the school?” Then she sees my face and stops. “Oh my gosh. Are you crying?” “Her phone,” I sniff. “Leigh Ann's phone? What about it?” “That was … Raf.”

She lets go of my blazer. “How do you know?” “I
saw
it—his name, when I gave her the phone.” “Are you sure? Why would Raf call—you don't think—”

“They're going out. I
knew
it. I am such an idiot.”

“C'mon, Soph, you don't know that. It could be
totally innocent. And what about all that stuff you were just saying? How he wanted to stay and hang out with you on Saturday.”

“I was wrong. C'mon, you heard her! All that laughing and talking about getting together on Saturday night,” I blubber.

Margaret puts her arm around me. “I'm sorry, Soph, I really wasn't paying that much attention. I mean, I heard her laughing, but I still think you might be jumping to conclusions. Give it a little time. Come on, let's get you some ice cream.”

“I'm not hungry. I just wanna go home.”

“My darling friend, you don't eat ice cream because you're hungry. It's therapy that just happens to come in a bowl—with chocolate syrup and whipped cream. And frozen yogurt just isn't going to cut it. You need the real thing.” She flags down a taxi, and we climb in. “We're going to Serendipity.”

The driver takes a good look at my puffy red eyes as the always-prepared Margaret hands me a
much
-needed tissue. “Sometimes ya jus' gotta have some ice cream.”

“You see?” Margaret says.
“Everyone
knows.”

It is going to take more than two scoops of double pistachio to pull me out of my funk, though. I sit with my chin in my hands and pout while Margaret does her best to cheer me up. It just isn't
fair
. What has Leigh Ann done to deserve him? I've been his friend for
years
—helped him with homework, hung out with him after
school, e-mailing, texting, everything. And what do I have to show for it?

“A really good friend?”

“I hate that.”

Margaret's phone rings, reminding me to check mine for messages and that I need to call Mom and let her know I haven't been run over by a bus or something.

Suddenly Margaret is waving wildly, trying to get my attention. She mouths the words, “It's Raf,” and my stomach does a double somersault. With a twist.

“I am
not
here,” I whisper. I look at my phone—dead. I have forgotten to charge it again.

“Oh, I'm at home,” Margaret lies. “Sophie? I don't know. So, you only call me to find out where Sophie is? Thanks a lot, Raf.”

“What is he saying?” I hiss.

“Maybe she's at a movie with her mom. She probably just forgot to charge her phone. You could try her house.”

What? I wave my hands back and forth. No, no, no.

“So, what's
new?”
she asks. Clever girl. “Nothing? Jeez, aren't you the one who's always telling us how much more exciting life on the West Side is?” She mouths “I tried” to me. “Are you coming to the Dickens banquet on Friday? It's going to be fun—really! We're doing a skit. Sophie, and Rebecca, and me. And Leigh Ann, you remember her? That's right. Friday, seven o'clock.”

I put my hands over my ears.

When she finally snaps her phone shut, I am all over her.

“He's been trying to call
you
all day,” she says. “What is up with you and that phone? I'm going to start calling you at night to remind you to plug it in.”

“Nothing about … her?” I can't say
her
name out loud.

“Nothing. He might be just playing it cool, but if he is going out with Leigh Ann, why would he try to keep it from us? It's not like we wouldn't find out. You know, Soph, maybe if he
knew
how you felt—”

“Stop! I know. I know.”

Her phone rings again.

“Oh, hi, Kate! Yeah, she's with me. She forgot to charge her phone
again
. You want to talk to her? We're on our way right now. Bye.” She stands up to leave. “Your mom wants you to come home.”

“You call my mom Kate?”

“Your mom is cool, and she wants me to. So, are you going to be all right?”

I feel a little better, if a little embarrassed. “Yeah. Thanks, Marg. I don't know what I would do without you.”

And double pistachio ice cream.

When I get home, I immediately plug my phone into its charger and tell Mom that if anyone calls on our main phone, I'm not home. I need to get down to some serious work on my essay about the first stage of Pip's life in
Great Expectations
. Margaret showed me her second draft during lunch, and reading it made me realize how lame my final draft was.

“This is sick, Margaret,
way
too good. You'll make the rest of us look bad if you turn in something like this.” I even offered to make a few minor changes for her, to bring it down to merely dazzling. “You know, throw in a few grammatical errors, some spelling mistakes, maybe the wrong ‘there’ or the wrong ‘your.’ Mr. Eliot
loves
that. Or when you use the ‘it's’
with
the apostrophe when it should be the other one. That one always gets a ‘for crying out
loud
.’”

Personally, I'm not really worried about my grades; I've gotten As and Bs on pretty much everything I have
done so far (except for that
una prueba horrible
). My parents expect all As, but I'm pretty sure that a B won't get me grounded or my cell phone taken away. But a C?
That
would have dire consequences.

Margaret has never received a B for a final grade. In her family, even an A-minus is a mark of slight shame, and she's concerned with her English grade. She has aced all the tests and quizzes, but Mr. Eliot gave her—and trust me, this was quite a shock to Margaret—a B-minus on a paper on Francie Nolan's coming of age in
A Tree Grows in Brooklyn
, a book Margaret absolutely loves. The fact that it was the highest grade in the class was no consolation to her, so she was pulling out all the stops, taking no prisoners, and leaving no stone unturned in pursuit of an A-plus on her
Great Expectations
paper (take your pick of clichés).

“No Bs for me,” she said, gritting her teeth.

I am nearing the point where I can, with clear conscience, press “CTRL-P” and move on to other homework when he calls. I let it ring. Thirty seconds later, the house phone rings.