Meanicures (12 page)

“Yeah. But let’s not,” said Taylor. “She can buy one if she wants.”

“Wait a second,” Olivia said. “Is it because of us she just did that?”

“Obviously that had nothing to do with us.” Taylor tossed a straw wrapper onto the floor. “They’re over there.
We’re
over here. It’s scientifically impossible for us to have made that happen.”

“Okay, but what about the broken plate last Friday night?” Olivia asked. “I dropped it, and she just dropped a tray.”

“Oh, that? That’s just a coincidence. It’s not like we have any actual powers. Come on, Olivia. You’re being ridiculous,” said Taylor.

“Right. I mean, probably. I know. It’s just … weird, don’t you think?” she asked.

“The tray probably just came out of the dishwasher and was wet. Her hands slipped. End of story,” Taylor said.

Right. End of story.

But it still seemed like quite a coincidence.

“Are you
hurt?”

I found Cassidy in the gym on Tuesday after school. She was sitting on the bleachers while the rest of the cheer squad was taking turns on the trampoline, doing flips, laughing, and having fun.

I’d been avoiding her. I didn’t feel like apologizing. She’d been mean to me so many times and had never apologized afterward—instead, she usually rubbed it in so that I felt even worse. So why did I have to be the one who apologized?

“Why are you watching instead of jumping?” I asked. “Because you’re injured?”

She shook her head. “No.” She stretched out her legs on the step below her, rubbing her muscles as if to keep them warm.

“Oh. Well, that’s good,” I said. “I guess. Are you just taking a break, then?”

“Not by choice,” she said. “I’d rather be injured than be in the position I’m in now.” She directed a glare across the gym at her teammates and coach. I didn’t really want to get into it with her.

“So, I don’t know if your mom gave you the message or whatever. But I’m sorry about Halloween. Everything that happened,” I said.

“What happened? Oh, wearing the same costume?” She laughed. “Well, that’s not your fault.”

“Okay, but … we kind of egged your house. And got egg on your, uh, face. And hat.”

“That was you?” she asked, looking stunned for a second.

I was just as surprised—why hadn’t her mom told her? I shrugged. “Yeah. It was me. Sorry.”

“No worries,” she said, as if it were no big deal to get egg on her nose. “I thought I heard you guys. Anyway, it was Halloween. Things like that are supposed to happen.”

“Right. I guess. Sorry,” I repeated. I couldn’t understand why she wasn’t more furious with me.

She sighed, slumping back on the bleachers. “That’s the least of my problems right now.”

She was obviously dying to talk about it, so I gave in. “Why, what’s going on?” I asked. “Why aren’t you over there?”

“I got replaced, okay? I got demoted. To junior cheer. Which is not, like it sounds, for high school juniors. It’s sixth graders,” she explained.

“I know,” I said. “We used to be on it together, remember?”

“Right. Right! Of course,” she said. “Sure.”

“Well, how did it happen?” I asked. “I mean, isn’t
there a chance you could change things?”

“I got into an argument with Ms. Throgfeld. She said I had too much of an attitude and I needed to be in the back row for the next game, with the other sixth graders.” She shuddered. “The back row,” she repeated, slowing to emphasize each word.

I remembered hating the fact that we were hidden, that we were just sort of backups to the older girls in front.

“I just got used to the front, you know? Then, as if that wasn’t bad enough, she said I had to be at the bottom of the pyramid. I said, ‘I’m not going to be the bottom of the pyramid,’ and she said, ‘You’re too tall now to be the one on top, so remember this is a team and we make team decisions.’ ”

“Maybe she meant decisions in the best interests of the team?” I suggested.

But Cassidy continued to rant. She was biting her thumbnail while she talked, which made it a little hard to understand her. “Too tall. As if. I’m only five three. Where’s the logic in that? What am I going to do? Getting tossed in the air was my trademark thing.”

I couldn’t remember the last time Cassidy had asked me for advice. “Um, you’ll teach the younger girls how to do things. Be their leader.”

“Take me to your leader,” Cassidy said in a robotic voice, speaking as though she were an alien from outer space.

“That’s not funny,” I said. “Actually, thinking back, you never were all that funny.”

She looked at me, blinking back tears. “Harsh.”

“Teasing, I was teasing,” I said.

“It’s okay, I deserve it.” Her shoulders sank.

“You know, if this doesn’t work out, you could join the Endangered Animals Club. Except that we actually don’t need anyone right now—”

Just then, Ms. Throgfeld shouted, “Cassidy, over here, now! We need you!”

Cassidy jumped down from the bleachers and did a couple of handsprings over to the coach, obviously trying to impress her. She misjudged the amount of room she had and went cartwheeling off the mat, crashing into the wall on the other side of the gym.

Ms. Throgfeld shook her head as Cassidy stood up, looking slightly crumpled and blushing. “Never mind, go sit back down. I don’t know
how
you’ll be ready for the game Friday night.”

“I can do it!” Cassidy said. “I can do anything you want. Really, just ask!”

Ms. Throgfeld glanced over at me. “Madison, maybe you could talk to her about teamwork, about having the right attitude.”

“Me?”
The person who Ms. Throgfeld had told not to bother with cheer if I wasn’t invested in it a hundred percent? I was the last person who should be talking about teamwork. And hadn’t Cassidy just offered to
do whatever she wanted? Was Ms. Throgfeld even listening to her?

“No, I don’t think so—sorry, I have to get going,” I said, slowly backing away. I didn’t want to get any more involved with this than I already was.

When I got home, there was a message from Taylor, asking me to call her immediately. When I did, she sounded hysterical. “This is weird, okay? Really, really weird. You won’t believe what happened. I said something to Kayley while she was doing a flip on the balance beam, and she fell off!”

“What did you say?” I asked.

“Just her name!” Taylor said.

“Did she get hurt?” I asked. I hated to admit it, but I almost liked the thought of Kayley having a mishap—as long as she wasn’t seriously hurt. She always made such a big deal out of being so good at gymnastics. It was annoying.

“No, she didn’t get hurt then, but—”

“That’s great!” I said.

“No, it’s not great! Listen, that’s not all that happened,” Taylor said. “I was trying to make up for causing her slip on beam by cheering
extra
hard for her when she did her bars routine, but somehow I yelled, ‘Watch out, Kayley!’ I broke her concentration, and she slipped and fell then, too. So now she has a sprained wrist and she’s completely
out
of competition for at least a couple of weeks.”

“Oh. That’s not good.”
Or is it?
I wondered.

“No. I tried to apologize but I ended up telling her that her timing was off. Madison? What’s going on? It’s like I say things that I don’t mean, and I can’t help it. Nothing I say is coming across right. Now other people are getting hurt,” Taylor said, “because of us.”

“Taylor, listen to yourself. Do you really think that you had anything to do with Kayley slipping off the balance beam or bars?” I asked. “I mean, that happens all the time, right?”

“Not with Kayley! And you know what I think? It’s the stuff we got rid of at your house that night. We have to get it back. My Shawn Johnson pendant—I need it.”

“But that’s only a good-luck charm—”

“I need it,” Taylor repeated. “Okay? Please, Madison.”

“Sure. Okay.” I’d never heard calm, logical Taylor sound so worried before. “I’ll find that box. We’ll take everything out of storage and put it back where it was.”

She sighed. “Call me when you find it and I’ll come over.”

“Right. I’ll call in a few minutes.” I hung up the phone in the kitchen and went straight out to the garage.

I nearly tripped on a ladder that had been left in front of the minivan. Why was there a ladder in front of the shelves?

When I looked up, I saw why. The shelves were empty. The garage had never looked cleaner. All the boxes with extra products? Gone. All the boxes of
excess nail polish? Gone. Vamoose. History. And with them, our own, very historical, once-upon-a-time-we-were-friends box. Nowhere in sight. Vanished into thin, stale garage air.

I rushed back inside and found my mom in her office, which was looking equally sparse. “Mom? What happened to all the stuff we kept in the garage?” I asked.

“Oh, that? I’m getting ready for a new phase in my career, so I wanted to throw out the things I didn’t need anymore, to open up the space for new projects.”

I really didn’t need her granola-speak at a time like this. “But where did you
put
everything?”

“Well, some of it went to recycling, some went to hazardous waste, and some was donated to charity …”

“Charity? But what about me?”

“Why, what do you need? If it’s a product, look no further.” She opened the walk-in closet in her office to show me shelves of shampoos, conditioners, and various other hair treatments. “How about some Refreshing Raspberry Rain Shower Rinse? You look a little stressed.”

I laughed, feeling out of control. “Yeah. You could say I’m stressed. I had left something in the garage—in a box. It’s gone now. And I really, really need it back.”

“Oh. Did you have something important in there?”

Would I say I really, really needed something
un
important back? “Yeah.” I laughed again, sounding borderline crazy. “You could say that.”

“Well, I’m sorry. I didn’t know.” She shrugged, all innocent-like.

“You should have asked!” I said.

“Fine, but since when do you store anything in the garage?”

She had a point. I hated that she was taking the fire out of my argument.

“What was it, anyway? What was in the box?” Mom asked.

“Just some old things. Prized possessions.”
Apparently ones that possess magical, mystical powers
. “Don’t worry about it.”

“Oh. Well, let me know if I can help,” she said.

I wish you could
, I thought as I went back to the kitchen.
I don’t know if anyone can
. I drummed my fingernails against the counter.

If we couldn’t get our time capsule back, what would we do? I had to think of another way out of this. Right then, I had no idea what to do, except take a deep breath and dial Taylor’s number. “I can’t find it,” I said when she answered.

“What?”

“But I’m still working on it and—”

“What
did you just say? You can’t find it?” Taylor asked. “What kind of idiot would lose something that important?”

“
I
didn’t lose it,” I said. “It was my mom. She—”

“Oh, sure, blame it on your mom, like everything,” said Taylor. “What kind of friend are you, anyway, if you can’t hold on to important stuff for me?”

“I’ll fix it!” I said, stung by her anger.

We were talking to each other like we hated each other. Like we were … mean girls.

I rushed
into Combing Attractions, dripping wet, hands frozen from clutching my handlebars, and completely out of breath. It was five minutes to closing time. I shook off my sopping wet raincoat and hung it on one of the oversize combs.

Inside the salon, Poinsettia was working on an older woman’s hair, running the blow-dryer, which was so loud she didn’t hear me come in. When she stopped to put the finishing touches on her client’s hair, she noticed me and walked over.

“What can I help you with? Your cut and color still look great. Time for an updo?” she asked. “Is there a special occasion coming up? Maybe a school dance?”

“Hardly. More like a redo,” I said. “Anyway, it’s a little late for an updo, since you chopped my hair into a bob.”