Just Your Average Princess (13 page)

 

16

“Up for any dinner, Jamie?” Mom says from my doorway. She leans in slightly, scanning the room.

I'm lying on my bed with my arms behind my head and my legs crossed out in front of me. I've been like this for the past hour, trying to decide how I should call Milan out and expose her for who she really is. So far I've got nothing. But I am starving since I'm not actually “sick” so I may as well get up. “Sure.”

“Good, I made some soup,” Mom replies.

I sit up, smiling. That was nice of her. And I love my mom's chicken soup. First she boils a chicken in a big stainless steel stockpot, getting all that fat off it and into the water. Then she takes the chicken out, throws in some onion, celery, and carrots, a couple of chicken bouillon cubes, and a box of acini di pepe noodles—those little tiny pasta balls. She sprinkles in salt and pepper and pulls off hunks of chicken and throws them back into the soup and then it's done. I've been watching her make it for years. It's the best.

I sit down at the table, my stomach growling. Milan sits directly across from me, and Dad takes a seat on my right. Mom sets a steaming bowl in front of me and my smile quickly fades. “What's this?” I point to the bowl of orange mush before me.

“It's a vegetable soup made with acorn squash and carrots,” Mom replies, in a way-too-excited-about-soup tone.

“But it's not chicken,” I say, stating what is already completely clear to everyone at the table.

“Vegetable soup is good for you, Jamie,” Mom retorts. “Give it a try.”

“But my cold,” I continue. “It's chicken soup that's for colds…” I trail off.

Milan takes a big spoonful of soup. “Well, I think it's delicious, Aunt Julie.”

“Thank you, Milan,” Mom says, and looks at me. And then at my bowl of soup. And then back at me.

I guess she's waiting for me to try it. I put a tiny bit of soup on my spoon and bring it to my lips. It tastes mushy. And bland. And a bit lumpy. I try to look like it's not completely disgusting. Maybe if I added salt it would be better? I grab the salt from the table and shake it vigorously over my bowl.

“I already added a pinch of sea salt, Jamie,” Mom comments.

Sea salt? Since when does Mom cook with sea salt?

“Yeah,” Milan pipes in. “Too much salt isn't good for you, Jamie. It makes you retain water.”

Of course. Milan must have turned Mom on to the sea salt. Well. If I'm going to retain any of this dinner I'm going to have to add something to it. “I'll be right back,” I tell the table, and head for the kitchen.

I scrounge around in the refrigerator and find an almost empty bag of Oscar Mayer hot dogs on the bottom shelf. Hmm. The expiration date has rubbed off. I'm sure they're fine though. I nuke a hot dog on a paper plate, slice it, and then carry it back into the dining room with me. Once I'm seated I empty the paper plate into my bowl of soup. Milan gasps.

“What?” I say, looking up. Milan has one hand on her chest and Mom has her eyes closed, like she can't bear to see what I've done to her soup. Puh-lease. Milan makes a sex tape and we practically erect a statue of her in the middle of town. I put a sliced hot dog into my orange mushy soup and there's an uproar. Let's get a grip here, people.

I decide to ignore them, and take a bite of soup. Mom turns her head away from me. I look at Dad and I think I see a tiny smile start to come to his lips, but it's gone so fast I can't be sure.

You know, the soup isn't nearly as bad this way. I bet some ketchup would make it even better. But I don't dare get up for the ketchup. Not with Mom looking like I've just committed the world's worst sin.

Speaking of sins, I return my gaze to Milan. She's quietly resumed eating her soup in between shooting me disgusted looks. I would love to tell her that if anyone should be shooting disgusted looks at this table it's me, and that I know about her gross tape so she can go ahead and step down from her high horse anytime now. And it's only a matter of time before everyone else knows too. We may be a small town but we have Internet access and we know how to Google. Surely someone will out her. It just can't be me. And not to my parents. I've been down that road before and they instantly jump to Milan's side. And if I make a big fuss calling Milan out in front of everyone in town they'll say I'm mean and jealous. Which I'm not.

“Did you have a good day today, Milan?” Mom asks, and then takes a slow sip of her water.

“Yeah, I did. I spent a lot of time at the concession stand this afternoon, making pumpkin spice lattes. We had a ton of teens hanging out and they mentioned they'd come by again after school lets out tomorrow. I think that's going to be a prime time for selling lattes,” Milan says.

“Do you need help?” Dad asks her. “Jamie can come over to help you right after school.”

I widen my eyes at Dad. No, Jamie cannot! Is he crazy, trying to stick me in a little concession stand with Milan all afternoon? “Um, I don't know how to make lattes,” I say. There, that should get me out of it.

“They're a cinch, I could teach anyone how to make them,” Milan says.

“Great, you can teach Jamie tomorrow,” Dad concludes.

Well, all righty then. Thanks for asking me what I had planned for tomorrow afternoon.

“I'm going into town tomorrow,” Mom says, looking at Milan. “Do you need me to pick up anything for you? Do you have what you need for the Pumpkin Princess contest?”

Milan thinks it over. “I think so. I already have a dress and my makeup and hair supplies. I don't think I need anything extra.”

“Hey, I'm running for Pumpkin Princess too,” I blurt out, and then feel slightly embarrassed when the whole table turns to look at me.

“Of course. We know that, Jamie. Do you need me to pick something up for you tomorrow?” Mom adds slowly, as if I'm hard at understanding or something.

“Um, no,” I say. There's nothing I need and it's not like I can't drive myself into town anytime to get anything I do need.

“Samantha and April helped me fill out the Pumpkin Princess registration form so I think I'm good to go,” Milan adds.

Huh? Who's April? Oh. She must mean Kettle Corn Girl. Geez, I've been calling her that for so long in my head I forgot she has a name.

“Luckily I had some head shots in my suitcase. I attached one to my registration form,” Milan continues.

Head shots? I don't have any head shots. Though I did include a picture of me reading in the storybook barn and one from last year, of me and the Spinelli twins posing with their newly picked pumpkins. I hope that's good enough.

“Did you turn in your registration form, Jamie?” Milan asks, suddenly taking an interest in me.

“Yes, of course,” I reply, annoyed that she's asking. I sent in my registration form as soon as I could. I wrote about how the Pumpkin Princess should be someone kind and good, someone who works hard every day at home, at school, and in the community. I said that the Pumpkin Princess should be mindful that the younger girls in town look up to her and want to be like her. That she should be responsible in her actions and behavior and not disappoint those kids. The Pumpkin Princess doesn't only lead the pumpkin parade and kick off the festival; she is someone the townspeople of Average should be proud to have represent them.

Milan grins at me. “May the best girl win, then.”

I nod. “Yeah.” Okay, so it wasn't the wittiest response but I couldn't think of what else to say.

Hmm. The contest is this Saturday. It's always two weeks before Halloween so that the Pumpkin Princess can also attend events around town like calling out bingo numbers at the senior citizens' center or cutting the ribbon at the Megastore. Which I've never understood. Seems to me the Megastore has a reopening once or twice a year but I don't recall it ever closing. Regardless, maybe I can nudge things along a little. I don't really have the luxury of time to wait for people to figure out Milan's scandal on their own. Truthfully, I'm shocked it isn't all over the Patch already.

“Speaking of the contest,” Mom says, pointing her spoon at Dad. “Did you e-mail the schedule of events for the pumpkin festival to the town board Listserv? I'm sure they're going to want to get up flyers and put something in the paper.”

“I e-mailed that weeks ago,” Dad replies, furrowing his brow and shaking his head.

“All right, all right, don't get your socks in a twist. I only wanted to make sure.”

“Been running this festival for twenty-one years…” Dad mumbles under his breath, and then shoves another spoonful of the soup into his mouth.

I put a hand over my mouth to cover my giggle and it hits me. E-mail. That's it! I can't publicly expose Milan to everyone in town but I can do it anonymously. I'll get into Dad's e-mail and retrieve the e-mail addresses for everyone on the town board. It'll be easy to break into Dad's e-mail. I've known his password practically forever: pumpkin. Then I'll set up an anonymous account, compose a message linking to the article about Milan's sex tape scandal, and hit Send. It's perfect.

 

17

I open my bedroom door as quietly as I can and listen. All I can hear is the clock on the wall in the front hall ticktocking away. The house is completely dark except for the flickering of the small angel night-light plugged into one of the lower outlets in the hallway. Milan went to bed over an hour ago and I heard Mom and Dad go to their room about twenty minutes after that. Everyone should be asleep.

I creep down the hallway, being careful to avoid the spot in the wooden floorboards in front of the bathroom that always creaks. A moment later, I reach Dad's small office. The walls are covered in pictures, mostly different shots from around the farm, but there is one of me when I was maybe two years old. My hair is in poofy pigtails and I'm sitting atop a huge pumpkin with both of my chubby hands wrapped around the pumpkin stem. Dad's desk is a total mess: papers and receipts and pens and paper clips and a big calculator are piled on top of one another in a chaotic-looking mountain, at least a foot high. I know not to touch any of it though. Even though it looks like chaos, Dad knows where each and every single thing is. And he knows when something has been touched. A couple of summers ago I came in here to snatch a few stamps from his plastic stamp dispenser and apparently I tossed the dispenser back on his desk five inches north of where he normally keeps it. The next morning he didn't yell at me or anything but he did make a point to tell me that the next time I needed something from his office, I'd better ask him first.

I take a mental snapshot of which way his desk chair is facing and then I slip into it, hit the Power button on his old computer, and wait. A few minutes later it's finally booted up. I keep checking the door, nervous that either he or Mom is going to wake up and catch me. I didn't turn any of the lights on though … so far so good.

I locate Dad's e-mail program and launch it. The sign-on pops up with his user name already typed in: HEdwards. I type “pumpkin” in the password box and I'm in. I scroll through his sent items, looking for his e-mail to the town board. Bingo. I launch the e-mail and it hits me, how am I going to get these addresses back to my computer? I scan Dad's desk and spot a pad of Post-it notes. I write down the e-mails as fast as I can, power off the computer, and check his office one more time to make sure everything is exactly like I found it. I creep back to my room with my list. Yes! This is going to work.

Once in my room, I take a seat at my own computer and launch a browser. I set up a Wow! Mail! account with the user name HelpfulFriend and type in the town board's e-mail addresses. I look over the names closely and I'm pretty sure at least five of these people are also on the Pumpkin Princess committee. This will be perfect if I can figure out what to say. It's tricky because I don't want to say too much, and risk someone figuring out it's me. But I do want them to know everything.

I sit back and stare at the screen. Hmm. In the subject box of the e-mail I finally type: “Our Pumpkin Princess?” In the message section I paste in a link to the SuperScoop.com article. That's good. Not too much but right to the point. I hit Send. There. Let's see them give her the green rhinestone stem now.

*   *   *

I rub my eyes and blink, adjusting to the sunlight streaming into my bedroom. I stretch my arms over my head and glance at the alarm clock. Two minutes before my alarm is set to go off. I love when I wake up right before it wakes me. I flick it off before it has time to buzz and I sit up in bed. I slept so good last night. I know it's going to be a great day.

I slip into my seat next to Dilly in math class. “Hey, Dill!” I say.

“Hey, girl,” she says. “You're awfully chipper. Did Milan move back home or something?”

I laugh, shaking my head. “No, she's still living with us.” For now, anyway.

“What's got you grinning like that? Is it a
boy
?” she teases. “Is it
Danny
?”

I feel my face flush.

“It
is
Danny then!” Dilly says, pointing at me. “What, did he ask you out finally or something?” Dilly reaches up and pushes a stray piece of bangs out of her face. She's got her bubblegum-pink hair in two Princess Leia buns today. It's pretty cute, I have to say.

“No,” I insist. And it wasn't Danny I was thinking about. Not until just now. “I wasn't thinking about Danny,” I add. “And he's not interested in me anyway. I think he has something going on with my cousin. Well, except for…”

“Except for what? Except for what?” Dilly asks, practically bouncing in her seat.

I shrug. “He did sort of compliment me yesterday. My hair, anyway.” I reach up and run a hand through my hair. It's not interesting and unique like Dilly's, but it's pretty okay hair in its own right. “That doesn't mean anything though,” I continue. “People compliment other people all the time and it means nothing.” I pull out a notebook and begin doodling, emphasizing the nothingness of Danny's compliment.