Teen Idol (3 page)

Anyway, when I got called to the office the day after Kurt Schraeder kidnapped Betty Ann Mulvaney, I figured it was either something to do with a Cara letter or that, alternatively, it had to do with Betty Ann.

Because even though Mrs. Mulvaney had been her typical self about the whole thing, shrugging it off, you could tell it really kind of bothered her. Like I noticed her gaze often strayed toward the place on her desk where Betty Ann used to sit.

And she made this giggling announcement before each class, that if Betty Ann’s kidnappers would just return her, there’d be no hard feelings and no questions asked. I had even caught up to Kurt in the lunch line and asked him if he was going to do a ransom note or whatever just because I thought if Mrs. Mulvaney saw the whole thing was a joke, she might feel better about it.

But Kurt was all, "What? A what note?"

So then I had to explain to Kurt, all carefully, about what a ransom note was and how the joke—since that’s what I assumed he was doing, kidnapping Betty Ann, and all—would be funnier if he sent Mrs. Mulvaney a note instructing her to, for instance, waive the weekend homework or distribute Brach’s caramels to everyone in class, in order to ensure Betty Ann’s safe return.

Kurt seemed to really like this idea. It was like it had never occurred to him before. He and his friends went, "Whoa. Genius, man!" and high-fived one another.

Which got me kind of nervous. I mean, these guys weren’t the sharpest knives in the drawer. I had no idea how Kurt even got elected senior class president, except, you know, he was the only person who had bothered to run.

So just to be sure they even still
had
Betty Ann, I went, "Kurt, you didn’t do anything stupid, did you? Like throw Betty Ann in one of the quarries or something. Did you?"

Kurt looked at me like I was crazy. He went, "Hell, no. I still got her. It’s a joke, see? The senior prank, Jen. Heard of it?"

I didn’t want Kurt to think I didn’t find his prank hilarious. So I just went, "Yeah, funny joke," and grabbed my tacos and ran.

So you can see that when I got called to the office, I pretty much had a feeling that if Cara hadn’t locked herself in a toilet stall, crying again, I was probably going to be facing some major grilling on the whereabouts of Betty Ann.

Which would put me, as anyone could see, in a fairly uncomfortable position. I mean, I couldn’t side with the administration in the Betty Ann thing, even though I did think it was stupid and wrong of Kurt to take her. But the senior prank—even if it’s a terrifically lame one, like Kurt's—is the senior prank, and like a lot of stuff about high school—the SATs and the prom and the pep rallies—you aren’t allowed to mess with it, no matter how pointless and dumb you might find it.

So as I dragged myself into Ms. Kellogg’s office, I was making all these promises to myself—like how even if they tortured me with the prospect of working in the office all summer, I was going to stick to my guns on the Betty Ann thing and not tell—and I didn’t even notice that Ms. Kellogg wasn’t the only person in there.

No, Principal Lewis was there, too. And Vice Principal Lucille Thompson—Juicy Lucy, everyone calls her, which is really mean, but the truth is, it sort of fits in an ironic way, because a drier, more sticklike school administrator than Lucille Thompson you really could never imagine.

There was another guy there, too. A guy wearing this shiny gray suit. I should have noticed him straight off—also the fact that he clearly wasn’t from around Clayton, since he had a black T-shirt instead of a button-down under his jacket, which is how people in California or New York, not southern Indiana, dress—but I was too worried that I was in trouble.

"Listen, Ms. Kellogg," I said right away, to get it over with. "If it’s about Betty Ann, I can’t tell you. I mean, I know, of course. I saw the whole thing. But I can’t tell you who did it. I really can't. But he promised me Betty Ann’s all right, and I’ll work on getting her returned in one piece. That’s all I can do. I’m sorry. . . ."

That’s when I noticed the T-shirt guy . . . not to mention Dr. Lewis and Juicy Lucy. My voice kind of dribbled off.

Ms. Kellogg came to my rescue. I guess she recognized that my chi had been all thrown off by the presence of Dr. Lewis, Juicy Lucy, and a total stranger.

"It’s not about Betty Ann, Jen," she said.

"If Miss Greenley knows anything about that doll," Juicy Lucy chimed in, looking upset, "I think she needs to say something, Elaine. Mrs. Mulvaney was very disturbed this morning to see that it was still missing. I understand the
Register
is doing a story on it, so obviously the paper’s staff members know something. It’s unconscionable that people’s personal items are not safe on their own desks—"

"Never mind about the doll, Lucille," Dr. Lewis said. He had on a short-sleeved shirt and khaki pants. I noticed there were grass stains on them. I think he’d been called in from the course. Whatever this was about, I knew it had to be
big
. They didn’t call Dr. Lewis in from the golf course for just anything.

"Jane," he said, "we’d like you to meet—"

"Jen," Ms. Kellogg corrected him.

Only nobody ever corrects Dr. Lewis, so he blinked like he didn’t know what she was talking about.

"Jane," Dr. Lewis started again. "This is John Mitchell. John, this is Jane Greenley."

"How do you do, Jane," Mr. Mitchell said. He held out his hand. I shook it. "Nice to meet you."

"Nice to meet you, too," I said.

I sounded calm enough, I guess, but inside my head, thoughts were spinning around like the Tilt-A-Whirl at the county fair. What was going on? Who was this guy? How much trouble was I in? Did this have something to do with me putting that I wanted to be a drill press operator on the state achievement test? Because I was seriously only kidding around about that. Trina had done it, too. And was this going to be over by lunch? Because I only get twenty-five minutes to eat.

"Jane," Dr. Lewis went on, "Mr. Mitchell here has just arranged for Clayton High School to receive a great honor. A very great honor."

"Some honor," Juicy Lucy said with a snort. Dr. Lewis shot her a warning look, but Miss Thompson didn’t take the hint. In fact, she got defensive.

"Well, I’m not going to sit here and lie, Richard," she said. "It’s completely ridiculous. We’re supposed to drop everything—disrupt all our students—and for what?"

"We hope there won’t be any disruption at all, Miss Thompson," Mr. Mitchell said. "And of course the minute there appears to be—"

"There won’t be any disruption, Jui—I mean, Lucille," Ms. Kellogg said. I’d once let slip to her what everybody calls Miss Thompson behind her back, and ever since then, Ms. Kellogg had been incapable of calling her boss anything else. "That’s the whole point. They want this to go as smoothly as possible—"

"Well, I don’t see how they can expect it to." Juicy—I mean, Miss Thompson's—lips practically disappeared, she had them pressed together so hard. "The boy is going to be mobbed the minute he sets foot on campus. Those girls . . . they don’t have the slightest bit of control over themselves. Did you see what Courtney Deckard was wearing today? A halter top. To school! I made her call her mother and ask her to bring over something decent to wear for the rest of the day."

Both Dr. Lewis and Mr. Mitchell stared at Miss Thompson as if she had just sucked all the available oxygen out of the room. In a way, I think maybe she had. I know
I
felt a little light-headed.

"I can assure you," Mr. Mitchell went on, "that that isn’t going to happen. Because Mr. Striker is going to keep a very low profile. And he’s going to be wearing a disguise."

"A disguise." Miss Thompson rolled her eyes. "Oh,
that
will help."

"You’d be amazed," Mr. Mitchell said, "what a simple pair of glasses can do."

"Oh," Juicy Lucy said, throwing her hands into the air. "Well,
glasses
. Why didn’t you say so? That’ll fool them."

"Excuse me," I said. Because I was really curious to find out what was going on. It didn’t appear to have anything to do with Cara or Betty Ann. In fact, unless I was way off base, it seemed to have something to do with— "Do you mean
Luke
Striker?"

Ms. Kellogg grinned, and started to nod like a maniac. "Yes," she said. "Yes, yes. Luke Striker. He’s coming here. To Clayton High School."

I looked at her like she was nuts. Actually, this is how I normally look at Ms. Kellogg. Because most of the time, I think she
is
nuts.

"Luke Striker," I repeated. "Luke Striker, the star of
Heaven Help Us
?"

Which used to be like one of the most popular shows on television, back when there were no reality shows. I used to watch it. Luke Striker, who played a preacher’s kid, had grown up on the show, getting seriously hotter every season. Hot enough that he ended up leaving the show to pursue a film career and had managed to get cast as Tarzan in the latest Tarzan movie, in which he’d been quite . . .

Well, naked.

Then he’d gone on to play Lancelot in the latest Camelot movie. . . .

And had done pretty well in them both, too. At least, so far as diehard fans like Trina were concerned.

The fans weren’t as excited over what was going on in Luke Striker’s personal life, however. Rumor had it—at least according to Trina, who’d talked about it ad nauseam all winter—that Luke had embarked on a torrid romance with his
Lancelot and Guinevere
co-star Angelique Tremaine. They were even supposed to have had each other’s names tattooed on their biceps at some kind of commitment ceremony. You know, instead of wedding rings.

Only I guess Angelique hadn’t followed through with her part of the commitment, because not even six months ago, Angelique had up and married some French film director twice her age, behind Luke’s back! Trina had been exultant—though sad for Luke, of course. Because now he’s free—brokenhearted, according to the tabloids—but free. Free to fall in love with Trina.

And now it appeared that Luke Striker, star of the silver screen and lover scorned, was coming to Clayton, Indiana.

"He’s been cast as a midwestern high school senior in his next film," Mr. Mitchell explained pleasantly, "a riveting drama of love and betrayal in the Hoosier heartland. Since Luke grew up in L.A.—you know, he started working on
Heaven Help Us
when he was just seven—he feels he needs to immerse himself in Indiana high school culture in order to lend authenticity to his role—"

"Isn’t that amazing?" Ms. Kellogg asked, her eyes shining. "Who knew he was such a true artist, so dedicated to his craft?"

Um, not me. I mean, you certainly couldn’t tell from that Doritos commercial he’d done that was aired during last year’s Super Bowl.

"So . . ." I looked from Mr. Mitchell to Ms. Kellogg and back again. "Luke Striker is coming to
Clayton
?"

"Just for two weeks," Mr. Mitchell said, "to research this role he’s playing. And he specifically requested—or at least, the studio specifically requested—that his true identity be kept strictly confidential. Luke doesn’t feel he can have an authentic high school experience if he’s got hordes of fans following him around."

"Which is where we thought you could help us out, Jen," Ms. Kellogg chimed in, still looking starry-eyed. "See, we’re planning on having Mr. Striker pose as a transfer student with the name Lucas Smith."

"Uh-huh," I said. Now that I knew I wasn’t there to defend Cara or be grilled about the abduction of Betty Ann, I was only half listening—for one thing, because I’m not as into celebrities and stuff as, say, Trina is and for another, because I was missing Troubadours, and Mr. Hall always gets kind of peevish when I’m called out of class. Not because I’m this huge integral part of the choir or anything, but because I still need to work on my arm movements before Luers, that show choir invitational we’re supposed to go to at the end of next week. I just can’t seem to get the whole jazz hands thing right.

"So what we were suggesting to Mr. Mitchell, Jen," Ms. Kellogg was going on, "is that—well, because you’re so good at keeping secrets, and we know we can count on you not to blow this one or get silly about it—you could be assigned to be Luke’s student guide. You know how we like to give transfer students a guide to help them out their first few days. And you could take Luke around with you to all of your classes—show him the ropes, so to speak. Answer his questions, maybe help deflect anyone who gets too suspicious. . . . Then he can, you know, soak in the atmosphere here at Clayton without anyone suspecting that he is who he really is. How does that sound?"

Truthfully? It sounded like a load of horse manure. I mean, did they really think no one was going to notice that the new guy looks exactly like Luke Striker? Did they honestly think calling him Lucas Smith was going to throw everyone—especially someone like Trina, who worships the guy—off? I really thought Mr. Mitchell, the administration, and Luke Striker himself were underestimating the intelligence of my fellow Clayton High students.

But, hey, it wouldn’t be the first time.

I shrugged. I mean, what was I going to say? No?

"Sure," I said. "Fine. Whatever."

Ms. Kellogg smiled in a pleased way and shot what looked to me like a triumphant glance at Juicy Lucy. I mean, Miss Thompson.

"See?" Ms. Kellogg said. "I told you so. You can always count on Jen not to make a fuss."

Which is totally true.

Ask Annie

Ask Annie your most complex interpersonal relationship questions.

Go on, we dare you!

All letters to Annie are subject to publication in the Clayton High School
Register
.

Names and e-mail addresses of correspondents guaranteed confidential.

Dear Annie,

I tell my best friend everything. I even tell her about the dreams I have at night. But she never seems to open up to me – even about important things, like who she likes and stuff like that. I don’t feel like we really have the open, engaging relationship that I’d like. What can I do to let her know it’s safe to confide in me
?