Confessions of a So-called Middle Child (5 page)

“Charlie?” Mr. Lawson called my name again.

I glanced over at Marta, totally about to say
yes
, when I was overcome with an involuntary hacking cough. Oh God, I couldn't do it. “I, I.” Cough, cough—

Trixie raised her hand. Her nails were painted powder blue with specks of gold glitter. “Excuse me, Mr. Lawson,” she asked like a meek little dove. Let me tell you, there was nothing meek or dovelike about her. “If it's okay with you, Charlie and I were already planning on being buddies.”

Mr. Lawson nodded. He pointed to Babette. “Babette and Marta, team up, please.”

Babs freaked; her face turned plum red, she kicked her desk and mumbled, “No, no, no, no.”

“That wasn't a question,” Mr. Lawson said. “Teams, go find a quiet place and start working on your first essay, ‘What I Want out of Seventh Grade.' ”

Trixie got her notebook. She was no girlie-girl. She wore camo pants and a pink tank top. I was totally digging her fashion sense. “Over there.” She pointed, and I followed her to a small nook with pillows. We sat side by side, our new notebooks on our laps, both of us picking up our pencils, pretending to write.

“Thanks,” I said, relieved.

“Yeah”—she glanced over at Marta—“she's harmless, but we stay away.” She started writing in her notebook.
Okay, so who do you think is the cutest boy here?

Bobby,
I wrote back, then erased all trace.

She giggled. I wrote back.
What about you?

“Sebastian,” she whispered. “He's in tenth grade; he's Swedish.”

“You'd make an awesome couple,” I said, even though he could be a super ugly albino dog. It so wouldn't matter. Trixie would more than make up for it.

She turned the page as though she'd been writing and said, “Babs doesn't even like guys.” She rolled her eyes. “She's so immature; it's like talking to a baby sometimes, you know?”

Easy, Charlie, easy.
I could feel my heart race, but I knew better this time. “Yeah, but she looks really nice.”

Her eyes got huge, her whisper deeper. “Have you lived in Europe or something?”

“No.” I'm pretty sure she recognized my fashion greatness. But still, I had to ask.

“Why?”

“You look like a fashion designer.” She checked out my seriously rockin' outfit. “There's something about you. You seem so”—she shook her head—“so unafraid, the way you put all that together. It's like you could care less what people think.”

“Thanks.” I think. I did a fashion sweep of the classroom, and I was feeling all warm and fuzzy, and full of hope, until I locked eyes with Babette. Uh-oh. Man, did she look like she wanted to kill me. “She looks pretty mad.” I nudged Trixie. “Does she hate me already?”

“She's lost without me.” Trix waved to her like it was a job. “But come on, I can't do
everything
with her, right? It's a new year, and I want to meet new people like you. Is that so wrong?”

“No,” I said, “course not.” I tried to get down to writing, but Babette's daggers were shooting right at me. I waved and smiled.

When the bell rang for lunch at 12:30, I put my books away and was about to bite the bullet and find Marta when Trixie and Babs came running over to my desk. “Come on—I'll show you where we eat.” Trix bounced up and down. “There's like twenty minutes, that's it, it's crazy how little time we get. In fact, when I run for class president, my whole platform is gonna be longer lunch.”

“Yeah, longer lunch.” Babette hung on her shoulder.

“Thanks, guys.” I scanned for Marta's beehive. “And great idea on the lunch thing”—I had to come up with an excuse—“but you should go ahead. I gotta check on my little brother.”

Total loser thing to say, I know, but far better than saying I had to find Marta.

Trixie gasped. “You have a little brother?”

“Yeah.” I watched Marta kick her desk and growl at it.

“You are so lucky.” Trixie was going on about the brother thing, “I wish I had a cute little brother. I'm the only one. Our house feels like a giant museum—”

Did she say “giant museum”? I was about to try to get an invite when I saw Marta's beehive at the door. “Gotta go,” I said, and ran out into the hallway. I bumped and shoved my way through the pack of kids. And you know what? I loved it. No one knew me here. In Malibu you changed your tanning oil, your highlights, and they announced it on the loudspeaker.

“Marta!” I called her name, but she kept on going, that beehive just bobbin' along. Plus she had one of those Cinderella roller suitcases, so there was a massive space around her where people would not go. Or maybe it was because she smelled. I remained hopeful that she'd walk into the cafeteria and there, off in some dark corner, would be a table of horribly dressed, booger-eating, super smart outcasts just like her, even if they were second graders, it
did not
matter. I could tell Scales at our session next week that I'd found her, but she had a huge group of friends. And then I'd be done with Dr. Scales; no more talking about my feelings all the time, no more thinking about my words. Case closed.

But Marta did not go into the cafeteria. She went to the bathroom. I waited outside. It took forever. My stomach was growling, I was so hungry. I watched the kids going by; they were all so excited, the first day of a new year, all that possibility in front of them with no mistakes yet. Huddles of girls and boys comparing notes, computer games, talking about summer vacations and fashion icons. Oh man, I wanted in!

“Hey!” Trixie saw me hanging out by the bathroom and came running up to me. “What are you doing there? Come eat with us.” She pointed to the playground on the upper yard.

I pressed my back up against the door, like I was not stalking the person in it. “Who's ‘us'?”

Trix played with her hair. “Well, um, the gymnastics team, some cool sixth graders, seventh too—” She stopped suddenly. “What are you doing?”

I swallowed. “Uh, waiting.”

“There are other bathrooms here, you know?” She kinda of laughed, but I could tell she thought I was weird.

“Thanks.” I faked a good laugh. “That girl Marta is taking forever.”

“That's because she's not coming out.” Trixie bounced up and down. “Come on, I want to introduce you.”

“Wait a sec.” I didn't move. “What do you mean?”

 

 

Trixie shrugged. ‘That's where she eats.”

“In the bathroom?”

“Yeah.” She started walking away. “And trust me, you don't want to use it when she's done. Her farts are legendary. They don't call her Marta the Farta for nothing.”

And just like that I knew there would be no corner table in the cafeteria with booger-eating rejects like Marta. There was no doubt in my mind: Marta was always alone. I stood at the window and saw Trixie rejoining the kind of kids I wanted to hang out with but knew I'd never be able to once they saw me with Marta. Yep, I could feel it all slipping away.

“Hey, wait up,” I called to Trix. It wasn't like Marta was coming out any time soon, so I might as well live in the moment. Carpe diem, right?

And so I spent the rest of the day pretending like this was a possibility for me. While Marta sulked around the place, Trixie and Babs took me around school, showed me the last remaining hiding spots, kissing spots, teacher-arguing spots, and even the place called Graffiti Alley behind the school where a hobo lived. By the time the bell rang, I had to say I could see myself becoming huge here. And we're not talking pounds, either.

After school, Pen and Felix were waiting for me at the front gate. I envied the heck out of them. If only my hands weren't handcuffed. If only I weren't wearing a straitjacket, courtesy of one very mean shrink, I could be happy, too.

Pen called out way too loudly, “Hey, Charlie, how was it?”

“Not now, Pen.” I passed by them and started walking fast. Felix caught up to me and grabbed my hand when I wasn't looking.

“You were right.” His freakishly bright blue eyes squinted against the sun. “My teacher is so nice, Charlie.”

I squeezed his hand for a second and let go.

Dreaded Postmortem Family Dinner

Can I ask you something? Besides total butt-kissers like dear old Pen, what kid likes family dinner after their first (horrible) day of school?

My parents asked super annoying questions. Penelope, that eager-beaver pain in the you know what, jumped to go first, of course, because her day was always just so perfect. I could feel my hand gripping my fork all the tighter while she smiled and talked about how great her first day was and how many new friends she made because of the honor society she's been in since birth. Then there's the
Gate
Group
for geniuses and the Honors Club for annoying do-gooders. And her millions of social causes, blah, blah, blah. If she sees a dead squirrel on the road, Pen starts a cause.

“And I'm thinking about spearheading an activist group for inner-city literacy—”
Spearheading
was one of her favorite words. “And spearheading an outreach group to find gifted kids in impoverished neighborhoods.”

The whole time I envisioned stabbing Pen in the forehead with my fork. All right, all right, don't call 911 or anything, I wasn't really going to do it. You can't say anything these days without being called into a shrink's office.

Felix already had two friends who invited him over both Saturday and Sunday. Whatever. He loved his teacher, yeah, yeah, yeah—

Dad looked at me. I was mashing my peas into a greenish paste. “And what about you, Charlie?”

“Oh.” I smiled. “Great, it was just great.”

“Did you meet anyone you liked?” he pried.

“I did.” I told them about Trixie. How beautiful she was, how she had a huge house, which meant she probably had a huge closet, maybe even a wig collection. Have I mentioned how much I love wigs? She also had a pool, and she was an only child,
and
she loved my fashion sense.

“Anything more substantial than that?” Mom gave me that look, that look I hated.

“Mom, you'll be thrilled to know that my teacher wears those nasty Birkenstocks”—I glanced down at her feet—“just like you.” But Mom wasn't biting. “And oh, I know, they celebrate diversity there.” I took a long drink of water. “Now, may I please be excused? I have homework.”

“Sit.” Mom pointed to my seat. “Did you find her?”

“Um.” I looked away. “You know, Mom, it's not that easy. It's not like people wear a shirt saying Biggest Loser, you know.” I got up. “And you're stressing me out a lot. Can I please go to my room?” They were all looking at me like I was crazy. Who begs to go to her room? Someone who's been in solitary confinement, that's who.

“Just be nice to her.” Pen shrugged. “It's not that hard. Like today I found this girl in the bathroom eating. Can you imagine that? She said people made fun of her food.” Mom and Dad looked horrified. “So I took my food into the restroom and ate with her.”

“What?” I stared.

“Yeah, Charlie, it's not hard,” Felix said. “We're nice to you.”

I threw my hand against my mouth and held my breath for fear that every swear word I'd longed to say would come pouring out in a never-ending stream and ran up the stairs and into my room. Why didn't they understand? What was wrong with them? With me? I collapsed onto my bed. “Oh, Mr. Mandela! No one understands me!”

Under my pillow was my laptop. I Skyped my friend Jai, who lived in an area called the Mumbai slums in the heart of Mumbai, India, lucky kid. He was so smart, he didn't even have to go to school anymore, which was totally unfair, because I was just as smart and I had
zero
free will. “Hey, Jai.”

“Good morning, Charlie. How was your new school today?”

“Horrible.”

He was sitting on the floor cross-legged, looking oh so fashionable in a white shirt. “Drop out like Gates, Charlie. Work with me. You're too gifted for school.”

Right now I felt anything but gifted. “Yeah, yeah.” In the background I could see his entire family, who did whatever he said because he was saving up to buy them a beautiful beach house on this tropical island called Goa where he said they could fish all day long and the rest of the time they'd prepare for tsunamis. God. Lucky him. Ever since he entered this competition set up by Interpol, the huge European version of the CIA, to find the best hackers out there, Jai had been fielding offers right and left. He was a rich and famous genius. His parents were his slaves, and he was twelve. Can you top that? I don't think so.

“Can I ask you something?”

His older sister served him tea. “Please.”

“It's a conundrum.”

“I'm good with those.” He drained the cup and handed it back to his sister. She bowed and left. See what I mean? Pen would have thrown it at my face.

I explained my task, the task of Marta versus my own personal quest. “Okay, Jai, I'm gonna be straight. No matter how lame this might sound, I want to be popular—”

He shook his head. “A useless pursuit.”

“But a lifelong dream,” I admitted.

“Oh, Charlie.” He bobbed his head; his little sister came in front of the camera and blew me a kiss. “You are too smart and far too funny. Why do you care for such silliness?”

“Jai, stop,” I interrupted. “Just tell me, how do I do both?”

He was very quiet while he gathered his thoughts. Oh, this was going to be good! Jai could tackle any problem in a perfectly scientific way, so I knew he was going to give me something I could really, really use. Like an equation for popularity. And so I waited.

“Well, in my country, Charlie, good people like Mother Teresa and Gandhi were far more popular than those who just wanted the votes—”

“Whoa.” I stopped him right there. “They died like a million years ago. How can they possibly matter to my own personal struggle?”

“Well.” He pulled up a photo of each of them and split the screen. “In this country they are heroes.”

Yikes, that's all I can say. They were some scary-looking people back then.

“They stood for something,” he continued, “and it was this that made them hated at first, then loved later.”

Whoa, whoa, hated? Who said anything about hated? “I can totally skip the hated part, 'cause guess what?” My nose tickled. “I'm pretty sure everyone hates me already, even here at home.”

He shrugged. “Maybe it's because you're not nice to them, Charlie.”

“I'm nice,” I shot back.

He shrugged again. “Or you're terribly insecure.”

I wanted to slap that Hindi accent right off his face. “Do I look insecure to you?”

For a while he said nothing. I was just staring at the screen. His whole family was moving around behind him while he sat with his legs crossed. After a while I thought he'd fallen asleep, and then his eyes jerked open, and he said, “You know something, Charlie? People, very important people, know about me through my work, but they don't know I am twelve years old. If they knew that, they'd never hire me, so when I converse with them, I simply pretend to be something I am not.”

“You invent a new persona?”

“Yes, of course.”

“But you don't lie?”

“No, because it is a new persona.” He smiled. “You can be someone who cares about the bullied. You can make that your new persona.”

Suddenly Pen came to mind. She had tons and tons of dumb causes. I bet when she came out of that bathroom with Marta, people thought she was a saint. “Like a cause.”

“Mother Teresa.”

I thought about it for a while. When you have a cause, people don't think you're doing it because you're a lonely loser; they think you're above it all, like you don't care what they think.

 

 

Like Pen. At our last school, she was so disgustingly popular, and she didn't care about it at all. “I'll go in there as the Mother Teresa of the bullied, obviously much better-looking and minus the massive wart. Thank you, Jai—you're a lifesaver!”

“Charlie, Charlie, hold on,” Jai cautioned. “Whatever you do, don't go overboard. Go slowly, you must be balanced—”

At the sound of that horrible word
balanced
, I had to click off. I dived into Pen's closet, checked the hallway, then tiptoed to Mom's room to locate her jewelry box. Time to get my new outfit together. Think saris, think color, think jewels, think wow!