Everybody Bugs Out (2 page)

“You got so tan!” Rachel said.

“I know! We went to the beach every day because my grandma's condo is, like, two minutes away.”

“So cool!” I said.

“And last Thursday we took a boat out to this reef for snorkeling and we saw a shark!”

Rachel gasped. “That's so freaky!”

“It sounds scary but it was only a baby nurse shark. They're small, and pretty harmless unless provoked. At least that's what our guide told us. And no one got eaten, so she's probably right.”

“I wish my grandma lived someplace good,” said Rachel.

I had to agree. “Yeah, mine lives in North Hollywood. The most exciting thing to do near her place is bowl.”

“I love bowling,” said Yumi.

“Okay, I'll trade you—all the bowling you can stand for a week in Hawaii every year.” I held out my hand, as if shaking on it would actually seal the deal. (And don't I wish it were true!)

Yumi crinkled her nose. “Never mind.”

Just then we turned the corner and saw Birchwood Middle School up ahead. That tall pile of bricks had caused me so much angst and stress and general yuckiness last term.

Hard to believe, since this morning all I felt was excitement—and for a good reason.

Rachel was right—plenty of kids had gotten to school early. Most sported new-looking outfits and cute hairstyles. The halls buzzed with excitement. People hugged and laughed and shrieked as if they hadn't seen each other in months.

Rachel, Yumi, and I joined the crowd and, I must admit, I got swept up in the thrill of it all, too. And then I saw Taylor Stansfield.

Suddenly all the drama of last term came rushing back, like one of those super-scary tsunami waves that seem to hit from nowhere.

In one second I felt happy and carefree, and then in the next—not.

My stomach got all twisty and my throat went bone dry.

A silent alarm went off in my head and my molars started aching. (Weird but true!)

And as for my giddiness? It popped faster than a balloon in a field of thumbtacks.

chapter two

think there's no problem? think again …

I
f you don't know who Taylor Stansfield is, you obviously don't go to Birchwood Middle School. She's the most popular girl in the sixth grade, which means—as far as I can tell—that no one really likes her. Sure, people pretend to, but I think that's because everyone is secretly afraid of her. And that includes her best friends, Hannah, Jesse, and Nikki, a group that my friends and I used to call the Three Terrors.

Taylor radiates a bubbly and totally confident persona. She's pretty, too. And fearless—not afraid to stand up to teachers or talk to boys or do whatever she wants, whenever and wherever. On the surface, she seems like lots of fun. But once you get to know her you realize she's not exactly, um, nice.

I used to think Taylor was cool, and for a while it seemed like we were becoming friends. And then I learned the truth—the hard way. She's gossipy and backstabbing and kind of mean. Seeing her made me feel all nervous and prickly inside. Not scared, because I knew Taylor wouldn't actually bite my head off. She'd just take a little nibble.…

Of course, my friends and I didn't act innocent, either. We were all kind of catty. That's how the tension grew and grew until it exploded, like some evil, out-of-control blob in a scary movie.

I couldn't repeat the drama this term, hence my most important New Year's resolution. No, not the one about flossing. It's this: don't act catty.

I repeated it to myself and tried to avoid looking at Taylor.

And I could tell that Yumi and Rachel noticed her, too, because we all got really quiet. Yumi stared straight ahead, and Rachel kicked a small rock on the ground. Not like they didn't notice—but like they were deliberately trying to not make a big deal out of seeing Taylor.

Two weeks is not a lot of time in real life, but when you're in middle school, it's a lifetime. That no one said anything about Taylor confirmed this.

As soon as we got to our lockers, Rachel let out a yell—alarming until I realized she was just excited about seeing Claire and Emma, our other best friends.

Claire is easy to spot because she's got bright red hair and she's one of the tallest girls in the sixth grade. She's probably one of the prettiest, and I don't mean that in a shallow way, just a factual one. She always stands out, too, because her clothes are so bright and colorful. Distinctive, or as Claire calls her look, “fashion forward.” She's a super-talented designer—the girl can make an entire outfit out of duct tape. And that's including accessories and shoes.

Emma doesn't stand out so much, physically. She's regular height with big brown eyes and brown hair that she parts in the middle. She's more into books than clothes, and she's usually pretty quiet, too, unless you know her really well.

Yet the two of them are essential to our group. They balance each other out, I guess.

“Hey, you guys!” Emma said as she struggled to fit a bulky dictionary into her locker.

“Can't you just use the one at the library?” Rachel asked her.

“This one's more up-to-date,” Emma replied.

“So great to see everyone!” Claire said, giving us all quick hugs.

“You chopped off all your hair!” said Rachel.

“Not all of it.” Claire ran her fingers through her hair, now layered and shoulder length and bouncy instead of super-long. “I got bangs, too.”

“So cute!” said Yumi.

“
Très chic
!” said Emma.

“Glad you approve!”

After everyone hugged like we hadn't seen each other in a year (see above for two weeks seeming like a lifetime), we compared Christmas presents. Which was Hanukkah for Claire and both Hanukkah
and
Christmas for Emma. Lucky her!

Everyone agreed that Yumi's gift was the best. Not only did her parents take her to Hawaii for ten days, they also bought her a cute new cell phone—flat and silver with a pink and green striped case. “So pretty!” said Claire.

“Do you have unlimited minutes?” asked Rachel.

“I don't know.” Yumi frowned at her phone. “Probably not because my parents said not to use it too much. Of course, they never said how much too much is. And I'm afraid to ask, because I might not like their answer. So I figured I'd just use it whenever and wait and see what happens when the first bill comes next month. That way, they can't really complain.”

“Good thinking,” said Emma.

“But be careful using it at school,” Rachel warned. “If you get caught talking on the phone in class, your teacher is allowed to confiscate it.”

“I know,” said Yumi. “But does that count for texting, too?”

“I think so,” said Claire.

“I've seen lots of kids use their phones at lunch,” said Yumi.

“Lunch is fair game,” Rachel said.

“What about in between classes?” Yumi wondered.

“Frowned upon but not forbidden,” said Rachel. “That's the official word, anyway.”

“Who are you texting, anyway?” asked Claire. “None of us have cell phones.”

“I do,” said Rachel. “Except I can only use it in emergencies.”

“We know,” said Yumi, Claire, and Emma at the same time.

“But why are you so worried?” I asked.

Everyone looked at Yumi, who seemed squirmier than usual.

“No reason,” she said quickly. “I was just wondering, is all.” She was quiet for a moment and then said, “I can't believe they could just take it, though. What if they scratched it? Or left it on and the battery ran out? Do you still get texts if they come when your phone is out of batteries?”

We all looked at each other blankly, no one knowing the answer.

As Yumi put her phone in its matching pink case, the first bell rang, so we headed to class.

When I got to English I said hi to Tobias, who sits behind me. I also smiled at our teacher, Mr. Beller.

Here's the deal with Mr. Beller: he seems like a tough-as-nails grouch, but if you stay quiet and don't cause any trouble, he's really not so bad. In fact, today he smiled back at me and asked, “How was your winter vacation, Annabelle?”

“Fun,” I replied. “And yours?”

“Very nice, but too short,” he said gruffly, and then sat down at his desk and began shuffling around some papers. “I barely had time to catch up on my grading, and now I've got to start all over again.”

“Or you could just not give us any homework,” I suggested with a sly grin and a one-shouldered shrug.

Mr. Beller glared at me, which is when I remembered that he's got no sense of humor.

“Kidding!” I added, holding up my hands.

I decided to stay quiet for the rest of the period. Sometimes it's just safer that way.

Class ended before I knew it. In fact, I made it through the entire morning without one snafu. Pretty amazing considering that back in September, I was brand new and intimidated—no, totally scared—about what I'd find in middle school.

I got lost. I got humiliated. And since I went to an all-girls school up until the fifth grade, I was totally inexperienced when it came to dealing with boys.

But today my whole morning flew by. I had social studies in an entirely different building—one I'd never been to all the way on the other side of campus, but I found it easily. In fact, I even helped one of my classmates, Justin Johnson, find his way there.

I didn't get lost.

I didn't get tripped.

Didn't get laughed at.

Nor did I use the broken drinking fountain—the one so clogged with gum that it only squirts a small, hard stream of water straight up. (Something I fell victim to three times last term.)

I knew which bathrooms were too gross to enter (all but the one near the music room).

And I knew which eighth graders to avoid. (Most of them.)

In short, I'd figured everything out. School was old hat, but not boring. I was comfortable. Happy. It was like I finally belonged.

At least that's what I thought before I got to lunch. That's when I approached our regular table and noticed all my friends huddled close and whispering to one another with urgency.

My stomach twinged with nervousness. Clearly my friends all knew something I didn't—never a good thing. “What's going on?” I asked, half fearing the answer.

“Valentine's Day,” Rachel informed me.

“Um, isn't that in February?” I unpacked my lunch, still feeling uneasy but trying not to make a big deal out of it. Mom had made me a meatloaf sandwich—yum! And she'd packed pretzel sticks, carrots, celery, and two of Ted's homemade oatmeal chocolate-chip cookies. He'd just taught me how to make them and there are few things more delicious.

Not that I could appreciate them at the moment, what with the thick cloud of silence enveloping our table. All my friends stared at me with shocked expressions, like I'd said something crazy. Or had decided to wear that vest made out of Brussels sprouts again.

“What?” I asked.

“February is next month,” said Emma. “And the fourteenth is only six weeks and four days away! Or forty-six days. And that's merely one thousand, one hundred and four hours from now. Which is—”

“Okay, I get it.” I held up my hands, interrupting before she got carried away. Well, even more carried away. “We know you're a brainiac—you don't have to prove it all the time.”

“What'd I do?” asked Emma, all innocent.

“Nothing.” Rachel put her arm around Emma. “It totally makes sense that you'd be so excited about Valentine's Day. You're the only one of us who has a boyfriend.”

“Shh!” said Emma. In two seconds flat, her cheeks matched her strawberry yogurt.

We all cracked up. “I didn't know it was a secret,” Claire said.

“It's not,” said Emma. “But that doesn't mean we have to talk about it all the time.”

Emma didn't need to be so shy. Everyone knew that she and Phil Vandenheuver were going out. And everyone thought they made a great couple. Phil is in the physics club with Emma. He's the second-smartest kid in the entire sixth grade. (Emma is the smartest.) He's got sandy blond hair, a hamster named Einstein, and he's lactose intolerant, which means he'll never guzzle milk and then squirt it out of his nose—which was one of her ex-boyfriend's favorite hobbies.

It made complete and total sense that Emma would be excited about Valentine's Day. For her, the holiday probably meant gifts of chocolate or flowers. Jewelry or a cute stuffed teddy bear, or maybe jewelry
and
a teddy bear. Something cool.

But last time I checked, the rest of my friends were single. “So what's the big deal?” I asked, taking a bite off my celery stick.

I didn't mean to sound like the scrooge of Valentine's Day, but their excitement left me flummoxed. Bewildered. Completely confused. Absolutely— Okay, never mind. You get the picture.

“It's not merely Valentine's Day,” Claire explained. “It's also the weekend of the first school dance. It's on Saturday, the fifteenth.”

“Which is kind of anticlimactic,” Emma said with a frown. “They should have it on Friday, the actual holiday.”

“Saturday is better because it'll give us more time to get ready, and we won't be all tired and weary from school,” Rachel said.

I pointed my celery stick at Rachel. “So you're going, too?”

“We're all going,” Rachel said, sitting up straighter and smiling brightly. “We just need to find dates.”

I finished chewing and gulped down my food. “Dates?” I asked. “You guys are kidding, right?”

Everyone just stared like I'd said something totally mixed nuts. And who knows? Maybe I had.

The thing is, I'd only just recently figured out how to deal with Birchwood's unruly boys. And now I'm supposed to find one to go to the dance with? Impossible!