Gabby Duran and the Unsittables (2 page)

“It has nothing to do with confidence,” Carmen retorted. “Maestro Jenkins never says who will get the solo until five minutes before curtain. Right now it could just as easily
be Madison’s.”

“How do I get you to go back to that wanting-to-make-me-feel-important thing?”

“Can’t,” Carmen said. “Psychological experiment, remember?” The tiniest hint of a smirk played at the left corner of her mouth.

“Maestro Jenkins will choose
you
,” Alice told Gabby. “I have complete confidence. Got your phone and portable charger?”

“Always.”

“Text every hour. If you’re in the air and can’t, then when you land. Love you!”

“Love you, too!”

Gabby darted out the door and ran down to the curb, where a long black limousine sat waiting. From across the street, she saw Madison Murray framed in her living room’s picture window.
Madison’s perfect blond hair danced gently around her beautiful face as she practiced her flute.

Gabby grimaced. Madison was her archenemy, at least in orchestra. They were both in sixth grade, but they’d played with the Brensville Middle School Orchestra since elementary school.
That’s how good they were. And while they played very different instruments, they were always up for the same solos. Orchestra leader Maestro Jenkins thought fierce competition was good for
his two stars. He tweaked each solo piece just a bit for each instrument, had both Gabby and Madison learn and practice it, then awarded the prize only at the last minute.

Gabby wanted Friday’s solo badly, and she’d have a much better shot at it if she were practicing right now, just like Madison. But duty called. Ali, Lia, and Ila needed her, and she
couldn’t say no to them. Besides, there was still plenty of practice time before the concert.

In her living room, Madison finished a passage and looked up, catching Gabby’s eye. Gabby smiled and waved. Madison merely glanced from Gabby to the limousine and back again, then walked
pointedly to the window and drew her blinds shut.

It was frustrating. They might be bitter rivals in orchestra, but Gabby always thought that away from the stage, she and Madison should be friends. After all, they had a lot in common. They were
both amazing musicians, they’d lived across the street from one another since birth, which was already twelve years now, and…

Okay, maybe that was all they had in common. But still, that should be enough! Madison didn’t agree, and even though Gabby knew her best friend Zee would say
If someone doesn’t
have time for you, you shouldn’t have time for them
, Gabby still really wanted to win Madison over. She knew she could, too. She just needed the right in.

The limo beeped. Gabby jumped and yanked open the door. She was about to slip inside when something strange caught her eye. A tall, severe-looking older woman stood on the corner. She was
dressed all in black and seemed to be staring right at Gabby.

Most of the people in Gabby’s neighborhood had lived there for years. Everyone knew everyone else, and the place was a solid car ride from any shopping. This woman was a stranger to Gabby,
and strangers didn’t generally just find their way here.

Gabby shook off a nervous chill. Most likely the woman was someone’s grandmother, here for a visit. Maybe for a funeral, given the outfit.

“Hi!” Gabby called with a smile and wave, but the woman didn’t respond. Of course she didn’t. She was probably too deep in mourning. Gabby felt awful for disturbing her
at a time like this and promised herself she’d ask around the neighborhood when she got back home to find out who had passed away. Then she, Carmen, and Alice could send flowers to the
family.

Gabby climbed into the limo and slammed the door shut behind her. “Hi, Albert!” she called.

“Hiya, Gabby,” Albert called. “Good to see ya!”

“You, too!”

Gabby settled back to enjoy the ride, but something nagged at her as Albert pulled away from the curb. She turned around in her seat and looked out the back windshield.

The woman in black was still there. And despite the windshield’s dark tint, Gabby could swear the woman’s eyes were locked directly on to her own.

A
few hours later, Gabby was sitting in the back of another limo, somewhere in the middle of Florida. The car pulled up to a soundstage, and a tank
of a man strode with purpose toward Gabby’s door. The man wore tattered army-green pants, with nothing over his ripped-with-muscles chest and abs but two bandoliers of ammunition. A deep scar
ran down the left side of his face, the remnant of some long-ago brutality. It twisted his expression into a permanent wicked sneer. With unbelievable force, this man tore open the limousine door,
yanked Gabby out by her arm…

…and pulled her into a huge bear hug.

“Gabby!” he cried. “It’s so great to see you!”

Gabby knew that pretty much every other sixth grade girl at Brensville Middle School would die to be in this man’s arms right now, but she just didn’t think of Adam that way.

“You’re doing a
Decimator Four
?” she asked after they pulled out of their hug. She gestured to the telltale scar, but Adam only winked and put a finger to his lips.

“The code title is
Samba Serenade
. Super top secret.”

He offered a hand, pinky extended, and Gabby looped her smallest finger through his, swearing to keep mum.

“Is Sierra here, too?” Gabby asked. Sierra Bonita was Adam Dent’s wife. The two met when she did the bit part on the first
Decimator
that launched her career, but now
she was as big a movie star as him. Maybe even bigger.

“Nah, she’s off in Siberia shooting something meaningful,” Adam said. “Twenty degrees below zero. Give me action in the heat and humidity any day, am I right?”

“And geckos,” Gabby added. She wiggled side to side and climbed her palms through the air, imitating the cute little lizards that always came out at night here, but Adam winced away
and shuddered from his chiseled jaw down to his banister-size calves.

“Geckos freak me out,” he admitted. “Come on—let’s go see the girls. They’ve missed you like crazy.”

“I’ve missed them, too!” Gabby gushed.

Adam nodded to the security guard at the soundstage door. Like a secret service agent, the guard stood upright and kept his eyes on the field as he held the door open. He didn’t even
glance at Gabby or Adam. Gabby tried to catch his gaze and give him a friendly hello anyway, but what she saw reflected in his glasses made her voice dry up in her throat.

She wheeled around, her heart racing.

“You okay, Gabby?” Adam asked.

Gabby looked up and down the street. Nothing unusual at all. A couple other soundstages, some golf carts, a few other cars, scattered people walking together to go over business or their
lines.…

No sign of the tall, severe-looking older woman dressed all in black. The same one she’d seen watching her as she got into the limousine back home. The one she’d seen in the security
guard’s glasses staring sternly at her from right across the street.

Gabby didn’t realize she’d been holding her breath until it came rushing out of her in a long sigh. “I’m fine.” She laughed. “Just…thought I saw
something weird.”

“It’s a movie lot,” Adam said. “There’s a lot of something weirds. This morning I had to push past three zombies and an elephant just to get coffee. Come
on.”

Gabby followed him into the soundstage, glancing back into the guard’s glasses on the way in. This time she saw nothing unusual, but why would she? There was no way the old woman could
possibly be here.

It must be the humidity. It was messing with her mind. Good thing the stage was air-conditioned. The rush of cold air woke her up inside, and all other thoughts disappeared as she marveled at
the incredible giant-size scenery. This
Decimator
apparently took place in New York City, after some near-cataclysmic event for the Earth. Wreckage of buildings lay in massive, crazy-shaped
piles. Even the Statue of Liberty was there. Or at least her head. It was sandwiched between a fallen radio tower and half a billboard for a Broadway show.

Two five-year-old girls crawled over it like ants.

“Wheeee!” one of them cried as she slid down a prong of the statue’s crown.

“No!” screamed a man in jeans and a T-shirt. The way everyone on set watched him, Gabby assumed he must be the director. “You have to get off!”

The probably director growled to a young man standing next to him holding a clipboard. “This is insane. I swear, if Adam Dent wasn’t the biggest movie star in the world right
now…”

“Look at me!” cried the other little girl. She stood next to Lady Liberty, pushed one finger into the giant plaster left nostril, and twisted it back and forth.

“NO!” wailed the director. “That’s the Statue of Liberty! You can’t pick her nose!”

“To be fair,” Adam interjected as he and Gabby drew close, “we
did
decapitate her.”

The director wheeled around and his entire demeanor changed. “Adam!” He beamed. “Yes! Excellent point. Adorable girls. But, um…isn’t your assistant supposed to be
watching them?”

“She was, yeah,” Adam said, then called out, “Romina?”

“She’s right here, Daddy! Look! I did it all by myself!”

This was a third little girl, and Adam followed her voice to another corner of the soundstage. The girl stood triumphantly next to a frazzled-looking dark-haired young woman who wore glasses, a
gag around her mouth, and handcuffs on her wrists and ankles. Adam smiled.

“Hey, that’s great technique! You remembered that from my last film!” Adam knelt down to get face-to-face with his handcuffed assistant. “So you and the girls are having
fun?”

Romina responded with a series of gag-bound
mmmph
s.

“Oh right!” Adam realized. He loosened the gag, leaving Romina free to gasp for breath.

“Great fun,” she said semi-convincingly. Then she noticed Gabby and her eyes went wide. “Gabby! I’m so glad you’re here!”

The second they heard her name, all three little girls wheeled around, their eyes aglow.

“GABBY!” they screamed in unison. They ran and leaped on top of her, tackling her to the ground as each one scrambled for the first hug. Gabby laughed and did her best to wrap her
arms around all three of them at once.

“Okay, you have to let me get up,” Gabby said. “I need to look at you! Two candy bars each if I can’t tell you apart!”

Like cadets falling in line, the five-year-olds sprung off Gabby and stood at attention.

“Um, Gabby,” Adam began, “I don’t know about the candy bar thing. Sierra keeps them gluten/dairy/sugar-free.”

“It’s okay,” Gabby assured him as she walked up and down the row of triplets. “They won’t win.”

“But Gabby…
I
can’t even tell them apart.”

Adam had reason to be nervous. The three girls stood exactly the same height, and each wore identical denim shorts with the exact same green-and-white striped shirts and identical black canvas
sneakers. While they each wore mismatched socks, they wore the
same
mismatched socks: purple anklets with blue stars on the left foot, red knee-highs with pink polka dots on the right. Their
blond hair was fashioned in the same asymmetrical bobs, with bangs the exact same length falling over their right eyes.

They even had matching scabs on their knees.

Gabby knew she was at a disadvantage, but she wasn’t worried. She clasped her hands behind her back, plastered on her best knowing-detective look, and paced in front of the girls. As she
reached each one she spun toward her, raising one brow and leaning in close to fix the triplet in question with a piercing stare.

The girl in the center giggled. Just the littlest bit, but it was enough.

“Ila!” Gabby shouted, pointing to her.

Ila always broke first.

“How did you know?!” the little girl squealed.

“My freckles give me psychic powers,” Gabby intoned. “Now, don’t tell me…”

Gabby got down on her knees and swayed back and forth, looking from one end-triplet to the other. Ali and Lia were good; they stood identically stone-faced. Luckily, Gabby wasn’t looking
at their faces. She glanced down and saw the triplet on the far right gently drumming her fingers against her leg, just like Lia always did when she forced herself to be still.

“My freckles are revealing the answer…” Gabby said, dramatically closing her eyes and placing her fingers to her temples. “You’re…Lia!”

“Yes!” Lia cheered.

Adam shook his head, amazed. “Pretty terrific, Gabby.”

“Gabby’s the best!” Lia agreed.

“No fair!” Ali sulked. “I wanted the candy bar.”

“Oh, I have something way better than candy bars,” Gabby assured the girls. “My psychic freckles are telling me the perfect game. Want to hear it?”

The girls did. They leaned into her like daisies reaching for the sun. But before Gabby could speak, Romina cleared her throat.

“I’m sorry,” the handcuffed assistant interrupted, “but can you get me out of these?”

“Oh right,” Adam said, then turned to his daughters. “Which one of you has the key?”

“I do,” Ali said brightly…but then her face fell in an impishly exaggerated frown as she rubbed her stomach. “In my belly.”