Leading Ladies #2 (10 page)

“Why?” I asked weakly.

“You know perfectly well
why
,” Ivy said. She grabbed another Tagalong and took a bite out of it. “You know as well as I do that he's going to ask you to that dance. It is my job, my duty, as your best friend, to talk you out of this ridiculous idea that going out with him is a bad thing.”

I groaned.

“I don't want to talk about this,” I said. “It makes me all nervous.”

“Tough,” Ivy said. “Now let's start at the beginning. You first realized you liked him last year, and . . .”

“And so Evelyn tried to help, and it backfired. You heard that whole story.”

“Yup. So then what? When did it feel like things really started to change?”

“This year, definitely. During the whole competition, he kept asking about
4 Girls
, how it was going. Then he sent that copy to his uncle, which helped get the extra money . . . somewhere in there, things got easier.”

“Okay, so it's easier now. What's the problem?”

I got comfortable next to Ivy as I tried to explain how going on a date with your friend might ultimately leave you friendless
and
boyfriendless, and how could that be worth it.

And, knowing Ivy, she wasn't going to get off that couch until one of two things happened—I accepted her suggestion that going out with Benny would be fun or we ran out of Girl Scout cookies.

The next day, when I'd forgotten all about tanking in bio, I was given a friendly reminder. Mr. Pilsen always returned tests on Wednesdays, and here was mine placed like a gift in front of me. It had a huge red F on the front. Some gift.

“Okay, well, at least it's officially over with,” Miko said, looking over my shoulder at the test. “You failed. It's done. Now you can move past it.”

“Except Mr. Pilsen makes you get a parent's signature on a failed test,” I said. “To prove you told them about it.”

Miko made a face. “He's so mean,” she said. “Are you going to get in trouble?”

“My mother won't exactly be thrilled,” I said. “But she'll be okay about it. She's more likely to obsess on what Subconscious Adolescent Issue caused me to flunk a test. I usually do pretty well in school, and she's not the type to put the pressure on or anything.”

“You're lucky,” Miko said as we walked toward our lockers.

I knew Miko's parents were the exact opposite. They put a huge amount of pressure on her. When we were working on the first issue of
4 Girls
, I felt like I'd gotten a few glimpses of the real Miko—the one that existed beneath the pressure from her parents and from the PQuits. And I had liked what I'd seen.

“So how's the new issue coming?” Miko asked.

“Oh, it's great,” I said. “I mean, it's not the same without you because we're doing the design ourselves, and we don't exactly have your gift for it. I think we can just get away with it this time. I'm really excited about our features. I think people are going to have a lot of fun with it.”

“I can't wait to see it,” Miko said. “I really mean that. I'm hating having to sit this one out.”

Sit this one out
, I thought, suppressing a smile.
She didn't say quit. She's going to come back
.

We'd reached our lockers. Shelby Simpson was standing in front of hers, examining her reflection in a mirror she had hung inside the door. I knew I shouldn't look too chatty with Miko now that Shelby was standing there. I'd accepted that Miko had to tone things down with me when her best friend was around. Shelby was Head PQuit, and she didn't like me. And when Shelby didn't like someone, none of the PQuits were supposed to like them, either. You had to pick your battles in the seventh grade. This was one I wasn't going to fight.

Shelby caught sight of us in the mirror and turned around.

“Paulina, I got this ridiculous e-mail from that Ivy girl about our Homecoming article. You and I really need to talk about this
4 Girls
thing,” Shelby said. “Also, Meeky, you have got to get that e-mail blast out tonight about Decade Day—it's practically here. Even if you're up till midnight, just make sure that e-mail blast gets out to everybody. And about the article, you've just got to understand that it needs to—”

“Shelby, I'm sorry,” I interrupted. “But like I'm sure Ivy told you in her e-mail, it's her article, not mine. And she's covering all the grades participating in the Homecoming events. And I happen to agree with her.
4 Girls
is for everyone.”

Shelby narrowed her eyes.

“What is your problem?” she snapped.

“I don't have a problem,” I replied coolly.

Actually, I had many problems. This just didn't happen to be one of them.

“Maybe you need to rethink this,” Shelby said, putting her hands on her hips. “Right, Miko?”

“Wrong, Shelby.” My mouth dropped open at Miko's words.

“I'm with Paulina,” Miko continued. “It's Ivy's call, and it would be lame of
4 Girls
to only feature their own grade. And if you want an e-mail blast so badly, put it together yourself.”

O. M. G. Miko was really doing it. She was standing up to Shelby Simpson. In front of me. A non-PQuit.

“What's lame is when other people refuse to do what they're
supposed
to,” Shelby shot back, glaring at Miko.

“So now you're in charge of what I'm supposed to be doing?” Miko snapped.

Shelby glowered, then turned and slammed her locker shut.

“I'm the head of the seventh-grade Dance Committee. You are on the committee. So yeah. I'm in charge of what you're supposed to be doing,” Shelby stated.

“Well, that's easy to fix,” Miko said. “I quit.”

Shelby's eyes grew wide, and her face turned a deep red.

“Don't be crazy,” Shelby said. “You can't quit.”

“Well, I just did,” Miko said. “I don't have time for this, Shel. I don't have time for anything until my honors project is handed in. I keep telling you that, and you don't listen. But you know what? If I don't have time to work on
4 Girls
, then I'm not working on your thing, either.”

“
My
thing?” Shelby exclaimed. “It's our thing!”

“But it isn't,” Miko said. “Or maybe it was once, and it just isn't anymore. But I'm out, Shelby.”

Shelby glared at Miko for a few moments. Then she narrowed her eyes. “You know what? You are out, Miko. You are all the way out.”

With that declaration, Shelby spun on her heel and marched off down the hall.

Miko sighed.

“I'm sorry,” I said. “I feel like that was partly my fault.”

Miko looked surprised. “Not at all. I told her when she asked that I didn't have much time, and she just acts like she doesn't hear me. So I'm out. It's done.”

The bell for the beginning of lunch rang.

“Are you going to the cafeteria?” I asked. “We're supposed to have one of our
4 Girls
mini-meetings. I mean, you're welcome to come if you want.”

Miko hesitated, looking down the hall in the direction Shelby had stalked off.

“I'm not really hungry,” she said. “I'm just going to go to the library and get a jump on my homework.”

I nodded. It was one thing to face Shelby down in the hallway when it was just us. It was quite another to deal with a lunch table of PQuits when half the middle school was sitting within earshot.

“Catch you later then,” I said.

So now Shelby and Miko are on the outs
, I thought as I got my lunch out of my locker. They'd been best friends since fourth grade. I'd seen plenty of PQuits come and go, but Miko and Shelby had always been tight. I thought of Evelyn and Ivy moving away. I got a bad feeling in my stomach. I was happy that Miko had stood up for herself, but nobody should have to lose their best friend.

I ran into Ivy paying for a couple of milks at the cashier.

“Hey,” she said. “I'm sitting in back with Tally. Her supporting cast is with her. I don't think she's going to be too focused on the meeting. She's experiencing acute Teale-itis.”

Ivy had been calling all of Tally's
Annie
-related mood swings Teale-itis for the last week.

“Poor Tally,” I said. “It's bad enough that Valerie got the part, but from what I hear, she's being even more obnoxious than she was when the cast list went up.”

“Yep. That's bad karma for Valerie. Sooner or later it will come back to get her. Listen, I finished my ‘Slice of Life' survey for the magazine. The pie chart looks great—I'm going to e-mail it to you tonight.”

“That's fabulous,” I said. “The articles are done now, so all we'll need are the photos of Decade Day, a wrap-up of Homecoming Week after the fact, and the review of
Annie
, and we're good to go! And with more than a week to spare!”

“Don't forget the Mr. Barrymore interview,” Ivy reminded me. “Tally did e-mail him the questions, so I'm sure we'll have it soon.”

“We will,” I said. “So listen, Miko just quit the Dance Committee!”

“What?”

I nodded. “I was standing right there. She told Shelby she didn't have the time and that she didn't agree with her trying to pressure you to focus your piece on our grade. Then she quit. Shelby was really mad.”

“Huh,” Ivy said thoughtfully. “She
really
quit?”

I nodded. “She told me in bio that she liked working on
4 Girls
better. She's going to come back, Ivy.”

“Boy,” Ivy said. “That's the last thing I expected. Well, good for Miko! That took guts.”

“I know, right?” I agreed. “I thought she would—”

The rest of my sentence was drowned out by the sound of someone launching loudly and aggressively into song.

“They'll be there calling me baaaaaby . . .
maaaaaaybe
!”

Valerie Teale was standing at a table by the window, delivering her swan song to an enraptured audience. They burst into applause, hooting and cheering as she finished. Valerie took a deep bow, then turned toward the table where Buster and Audriana were sitting with Tally and blew her a not-so-gracious kiss.

“Ignore her,” Ivy said to Tally as we reached the lunch table. “She's a show-off.”

“She's an idiot,” Buster added.

“She's
Annie
,” Tally moaned, putting her hands over her face.

“Maybe she's just doing that method acting thing,” Audriana said. “Living the part and all that.”

“She's gloating,” Tally shot back. “It's completely inappropriate. That is not how a leading lady is supposed to act!”

“Well, I wouldn't know about that,” Audriana muttered. “You know, since I'm not a leading lady myself.”

“And she's got two and a half weeks left to lord it over everyone,” Buster said, shaking his head. “What a diva.”

“Mr. Barrymore ought to do something about it,” Tally said. “It's not fair.”

“Maybe he doesn't realize how she's treating people,” Audriana suggested. “Maybe she doesn't even realize it. Maybe a person can be rude and insensitive and have no clue that's what they're doing.”

Uh. Oh. I didn't think I could handle watching another best-friend-duo break up this week.
Come on, Tal
, I thought.

But Tally rolled her eyes, completely missing Audriana's point.

“She knows exactly what she's doing,” Tally said. “And I'm sure Mr. Barrymore notices when one of his actors is trying to create a peeking order.”

“I think it's called a pecking order,” Ivy suggested.

“Exactly!” Tally said. “I mean, no offense, Audriana, but you kind of have to have been there to understand what it's like to be cast in a starring role.”

From the look on Audriana's face, I suspected that Tally's “no offense” had not worked.

“Just make sure Valerie doesn't find out about the secret agent,” Buster warned. “She'd probably toss you under a bus to get to him first. Have you found a picture of him yet?”

“I have some very good clues I'm tracking down,” Tally said mysteriously. “But it's getting complicated. I'm not finding Mr. Barrymore's agent's information on the New York websites that are supposed to list everybody. But I will find him, and I'll figure out what he looks like, and when he shows up on opening night, I'm going to be right there to meet him. And I'm going to knock his socks off.”

“Spoken like a true leading lady,” Ivy said, grinning.

I snuck a glance at Audriana. She was rolling her eyes and stabbing at her spaghetti with a plastic fork.

At that moment, though I can't possibly explain it, something made me turn around and look toward the cafeteria door.

Benny Novak was standing in the doorway. He seemed to catch sight of me at the same moment I did him.

He sort of gestured toward the hallway with his head. Just a quick nod, then he turned and walked out.

“Paulie, go on,” Ivy said softly. “We talked about this. You can't avoid him forever, and at some point he's going to give up. And if that happens, I for one will repeatedly be saying ‘I told you so.'”

“But what if I . . . what if . . .”

“Give me a break,” Ivy told me, nudging my arm. “So your friendship might change if he asks you on a date. At this point, your friendship has already changed. Just go for it! Do not make me give the whole ‘What if the Wright brothers had been afraid of crashing?' speech. Because do you know what would have happened? Someone else would have invented the airplane. And the Wright brothers would have spent the rest of their lives wishing they'd taken a gamble on something.”

She was right. I knew that.

“What's going on? What are we talking about?” Buster asked.

“Do I . . .”

“You look fine,” Ivy said. “Wait, just . . .” She reached up and unclipped the comb holding my hair up. Then she tucked one strand behind my ear and straightened both my earrings.

“Perfect,” she said.

“Will somebody please translate?” Buster said. “I can't stand not knowing what's going on.”

“Okay,” I said. “Okay. I'm going.”