Theodora Twist (13 page)

T

TO: [email protected]

FROM: [email protected]

SUBJECT:
RE: Save Me

No to both. P.S. Saw dailies from yesterday. Great job. Good girl.

BEEP:
“Hey, it’s Bo. Leave a message.”

Click.

BEEP:
“Hey, it’s Brandon. You know what to do.”

Click.

Where
are
they? Why don’t they love me anymore? What the hell did I do? It’s not as though I left them; we left each other for work. No talk of breaking up. Could Ashley have threatened them? Yeah, right. Like she could.

I can’t believe it, but there’s a possible possibility that I’ve been . . . dumped. Are Bo and Brandon dumping me? I have no idea. I don’t know what to think.

I roll through names in the Contacts folder of my cell phone. No. No. No. No. No. No. How depressing is this? There are, like, two hundred names in here—and I have
no one
to call. They’re all “work” people. Unbelievable. I have no one to talk to. Unless you count the four-hundred-plus Oak City High juniors who can barely say my name without fainting first. I’m so depressed—I need presents. I don’t know what. Where’s Emily?

“Em?”

“In here!” she calls.

I follow the sound of Emily’s low voice into Sophie’s nursery. Emily is sitting in the rocking chair, Sophie on her lap, reading a book about bunnies. Sophie’s huge blue eyes move from her sister’s face to the page.

I wonder if I’d be a good older sister. Probably. Yeah, I would be. I’d be fun.

“Want to go shopping?” I ask when Emily closes the book.

“Definitely,” she says. “Oh, wait. Belle and Jen are coming over. They’re dying to meet you. Can they come?”

“Are they annoying?” I ask.

She mock rolls her eyes. “They’re my best friends. Of course they’re not annoying.”

“Then they can come.”

They are annoying. At first. But they calm down by the time Stew drops us—and Vic and Nicole—off at the mall on his way to a meeting. The one with auburn hair, Belle, keeps staring from the camera to me. Can I put my sunglasses on?

“I love your hair,” Belle says to me as she pulls open the door to the Oak City Mall. “I wish I had straight hair.”

Her hair is pretty awful. Ringletty, but frizzy. She needs Japanese straightening or really good curly-hair gel.

“Thanks,” I say, pinning up my hair and tucking it under a baseball cap. “Okay, we’re all getting our hair done,” I tell them. “What’s the best salon in this place? Or is that a stupid question?”

“Hair Pow is where everyone with gorgeous hair goes, but it’s kind of expensive,” Emily says. “Like forty bucks for a cut—and a little more if they use conditioner.”

“Forty bucks is expensive for a haircut?” I say. “I pay four
hundred
. That’s not including color, by the way.”

They stare as though they’re waiting for me to say I’m just kidding. I’m not.

“It’s hair day,” I tell them. “On me.” Belle and Jen shriek. “Lead the way, girls.”

We look a little weird being followed by two people with video cameras, but Vic and Nicole could be someone’s mom and dad, for all anyone knows, filming our last trip to the mall before graduation.

“Do you usually have a hairstylist and makeup artist?” Belle asks me.

I nod. “And you know what? My makeup artist uses a lot of inexpensive drugstore products, like Girlie Girl cosmetics”—I’m obligated to make reference to Girlie Girl a minimum of three times during the show—“and you’d never know she wasn’t using Chanel or Stila.”

“Can you help me pick out colors for lipstick and blush?” Jen asks me. “I always buy pinky shades and they always look wrong.”

“Sure,” I say.
You’ll all need a really good brow shaping
first, though. And a facial.
They’re all a little too natural. Completely lacking in sophistication. But they dress better than I expected. It’s not so much the clothes, but their style—laid back and
almost
cool. Thin, sherbety cargos. Casual, fun skirts the right length. Close-fitting T-shirts. Cute belts. I was expecting nerd-girl clothes from Emily and her friends.

Belle leads us to a trendy-looking hair salon. At least they have decent products in the display cases.

“Is it possible to get four appointments right now?” I ask the woman at reception. She has good hair. Maybe this cheapie place won’t be so bad after all. “I’ll tip a hundred per stylist to get us in.”

“Up front?” the woman whispers.

I check out my cash. I have six hundreds tucked in my wallet. I hand her four.

“I’ll see what I can do,” she says, and disappears.

Belle beams at me. “You are so not a regular teen.”

They look much better. Emily’s hair is pin straight and just an inch shorter, and highlighted. She’ll never be able to straighten it herself at home, though. Belle’s hair is frizz-free ringlets and looks great. Jen had good hair to start with and it looks exactly the same. Long, straight, a little flippy. She lucked out.

What I discovered during our endless chatfest in the salon is that Belle and Jen and Emily are like any girls anywhere, just a little more boring. They lack snark. They’re so earnestly honest. And they’re so into the prom.

We’re now on our way to the food court. There better be a good salad place.

“I’ve been dying to ask you,” Emily says to me as they beeline for McDonald’s. “What event is Ashley planning that’ll pick a prom date for you?”

“I have no idea,” I say, “but I’m sure it’ll be a total nightmare. I’ll get stuck with Fred Wubble.”

“Fred Wubble is so sweet,” Jen says. “Odd-looking, but sweet.”

“He was number ten on the list of guys for Emily to ask out,” Belle says. “Did she tell you about her plan to ask out guys who are well known for something besides their looks?

“No, she didn’t,” I say, shooting Emily a smile. “So did you go out with anyone?”

“Yeah. I went to see
Family
with Todd Tuttle. He told me he couldn’t bear to come back to reality after looking at you for two hours.”

I crack up. “You’re kidding.”

“I wish.”

“That’s awful,” I say. “Who else did you go out with?”

“No one,” she says. “I was going to ask out Ray—” She stops dead in her tracks.

“What’s wrong?” Jen asks her.

Emily leans in. “The camera is recording my every word. I can’t believe I’m using names.”

“Forget they’re there,” I tell her. “It’ll drive you crazy otherwise.”

“No names, though,” she says. “I was going to ask out a certain very smart guy, but then the press release came out about you and the show and everyone started asking
me
out, which ruins the whole point of the experiment.
Michael Street
asked me to the prom.”

Jen and Belle’s eyes bug out.

“He just wants entry into my bedroom to get close to Theodora,” she says. “I’m no fool.”

“Speaking of entry into your bedroom,” I say, “someone told me today that Samantha Paris and her minions are selling raffle tickets to win a half hour alone with me.”

“I can’t believe her!” Emily says. “She asked me to go in with her and I told her no and she did it anyway! I don’t know how she thinks she’s getting the winner in my house—or my room.”

“Oh, I’ll take care of that,” I say. “It’ll be the only evil thing I’m allowed to do while I’m here. It seems like something a regular teen would do, so I’m not worried about Ashley freaking on me.”

“What are you going to do?” Emily asks. Nervously.

“Don’t worry,” I tell her. “It’ll be good.”

TEENSCENE.COM LACROSSE TEAM DOES THE TWIST!

Oak City, New Jersey . . . Monday, April 15
—As reported on E!, teen queen bad girl Theodora Twist was supposed to study for her Spanish exam after school with host sister and good girl Emily Fine. Instead, she was seen French-kissing half of the Oak City High School lacrosse team before a practice session today, sources close to one of the players said. “She is so hot,” Ryan Sattler is quoted as saying. Full story, click here.

Theodora

Ashley screams into the phone so loud that I have to hold it away from my ear.

“Will you just shut up for a second?” I yell back. “It’s not true. Jesus!”

“Theodora, save it for the idiots, okay?”

“I’m not even taking Spanish!” I scream. “And anyway, I was with Emily and her friends at the mall for three hours after school. I wasn’t screwing the lacrosse team.”

“Did Vic and Nicole come?” she asks, her tone suddenly nicey-nice.

“Yup.”

“Great,” Ashley says. “A group of girls hanging out at the mall after school is perfect! You didn’t go crazy spending, did you?”

“I paid for haircuts and I bought everyone one of those brown leather bracelets.”

“Adorable! Friendship bracelets. Theodora, I could kiss you! I’ll call you back in a couple of hours with some stuff I’m finalizing for you.”
Click.

So sorry for thinking you’re a whore, Theodora.
If I didn’t need her so bad, I’d fire her butt.

“No, you clean it up!” Emily’s mother is yelling. It’s a good thing Ashley hasn’t called back yet. I wouldn’t be able to hear her over Mr. and Mrs. Shrill. Everyone is yelling today.

“I didn’t make the mess!” Stew yells back.

“Did
I
spit up all over the sofa?” Stephie asks.

“I just got home from work, Steph.”

“Well, I’ve been working all day too, Stew. Here.”

“You know it’s not the same thing,” he says.

A door slams, and I glance up, hoping it was Emily’s mom who shut the door on that lazy ass. But it’s our bedroom door. Emily is standing there shaking.

“I am so sick of their stupid fights!” she says, throwing her backpack on the bed. “Why did they have Sophie if they couldn’t figure out who was going to do what? It’s so—” She notices Nicole filming in the corner and lets out a deep breath, then flops down, pulling the pillow over her head.

I have no idea what to say. I always know what to say. I sit down next to her and scoop up her hair and start braiding. She sits up and glances at me, then turns to give me more room. “You really have to let your hair grow,” I say. “Can you imagine how awesome your highlights will look if your hair is a little past shoulder length?”

She smiles and then her lower lip starts to tremble.

“It’ll be okay, Emily,” I tell her, even though I have no idea if that’s true. “They’ll figure it out. It’s baby barf, for God’s sake. It’s not like a real problem. Anyway, it’s no big deal if they end up getting divorced, right? I mean, it’s not like he’s your dad.”

Her shoulders sag. “My mom really loves him.”

“Why?” I ask. “All he does is read the paper. Oh yeah, he drove us two miles to the mall because it was on his way to a meeting.”

“Before they had Sophie, they talked constantly, saw movies, read and discussed books, went to the theater, walked around the neighborhood arm in arm. They were totally in love. And now all they do is argue.”

“So maybe they’re just adjusting to having a baby,” I point out.

“But Sophie’s almost a year old.”

“Then they’re probably almost done adjusting,” I offer with a smile.

She looks up at the ceiling. “I miss how things used to be. I miss my mom. I miss everything. When it was just the two of us, even though she was working full-time and totally grief-stricken, she came into my room every night, sat on the edge of my bed, and talked about my dad. Sometimes I couldn’t say a word, sometimes I cried, sometimes I’d just fall asleep in the middle of her talking. And then she got pregnant and married Stew and it all stopped.”

“Why?” I ask.

“She was just always so tired. Hormones, morning sickness, exhaustion from her job. And instead of feeling bad for her, I guess I got kind of snotty because all of a sudden Stew started a weekly ‘discussion night.’ ”

“Discussion night? That sounds cheesy.”

She smiles. “He thought almost-fifteen was a critical age and that the new marriage and baby might be overwhelming for me. So the three of us met in the dining room once a week to talk about our feelings. I liked it. Not that we ever said anything. And it only lasted three or four weeks. I think the only reason they started it was so I wouldn’t come home one day with a pierced eyebrow and wearing black lipstick.”

“Like I did.”

She glances at me. “I didn’t mean—”

“You didn’t insult me,” I tell her.

“It sucks when you can’t talk to the person you really need to talk to about stuff.”

“I know,” I say, squeezing her hand.

Emily

Theodora cut every class today except the ones being filmed for the show. Not a good start to Day Two. She shows up at lunch, bringing conversation and movement to a dead stop. People stare, take a few minutes to get used to her presence, then go back to their fries.

“I got you a present,” she says, handing me a small Prada bag. Inside are a pair of what must be incredibly expensive sunglasses in an incredibly cool case. “So you can go incognito like me.” She leans close. “Just because I have to look all regular teeny in my cheapie shades doesn’t mean you have to suffer too.”

I was with Theodora at the mall when she bought her seven-dollar sunglasses off a spinning rack. They look as amazing as my new pair, which might have everything to do with how gorgeous Theodora is. I jump up and hug her. “I can’t believe you got me these.” It’s amazing how Theodora goes from insufferable to awesome and back again. Right now she’s at awesome. I slip on the sunglasses. “How do I look?” I ask, modeling.

“Like you’re too good for this table,” Belle says, biting into her sandwich.

“You went into Manhattan?” I ask. There’s no Prada store at the Oak City Mall.

“Yup. I took the train. Baseball cap, sunglasses, baggy clothes, and I was left alone.”

“Ashley mad?”

“If she finds out, she will be,” she says. “But what’s the big whoop? What am I supposed to do here all day? Be bored out of my mind and pretend I’m listening to some clueless teacher lecture about the Vietnam War? Please. It’s not like I’m on house arrest. Hey,” she adds, her eyes twinkling suddenly. “Cut the rest of the day. Let’s fly to Berlin and go see the Bellini Brothers in concert. Belle, Jen, you come too.”