How to Be Popular (14 page)

ALMOST THE END OF DAY FOUR OF POPULARITY
THURSDAY
,
AUGUST
31, 11:30
P
.
M
.

I seriously don’t get why everybody got so mad.

I bought Mark Finley—well, his services as a spokesperson for the store—fair and square, and that should be the end of it.

I don’t know why Stan from Courthouse Square Diner had to call my mother and tell her about it, so the first thing that happened as I walked through the door after the Taylors dropped me off was my mother screaming at me that I was the town laughingstock.

First of all,
I
am the one who is going to be laughing when we start counting all the money from the new business Mark’s image on our ads and flyers is going to bring in.

And second of all, Stan should mind his own business.

“He says you bought a boy in some auction,” my mom kept repeating. “How could you buy a boy, Stephanie? How
could
you?”

This is what comes from too much
Law and Order
and ice cream. I’m dead serious. It warps your mind.

Not even Lauren was that mad. Once she got over her initial shock, and all. She and Mark both came over to say congratulations to me.

“Your endorsement is really going to help bring business to the downtown area,” I said to Mark. You know, to make it clear I hadn’t bought him for ME, but for the STORE. “The opening of the Super Sav-Mart has really hit us hard.”

“Anything I can do to help,” Mark said, looking like he meant it.

And Lauren was like, “Oh, Steph, I had no idea your parents’ little store was in so much trouble. I’ll tell all my friends to shop there from now on.”

“Thanks,” I said.

And I swear, for like a minute, I thought to myself that Lauren Moffat might not be all that bad.

But I didn’t even really get to process that thought because Becca came up and was all over me wanting to analyze why Jason had bought her and what did I think it means and should she call him (since he left right after Mr. Schneck declared me the winner of Mark).

I told her of course she should call him, and that nothing was different—he’d been her friend before the auction, and he was still her friend.

“But he must like me as more than just a friend to spend that much money just to make me not feel bad about no one but my dad bidding on me,” Becca said.

“Mark bid on you,” I reminded her.

“He just did that because you made him,” Becca said matter-of-factly. “No one made Jason do what he did. He must have done it because he thinks I’m The One. I’m going to call him as soon as I get home. Maybe I’ll even stop by and see him.”

I pointed out that it was after ten and that the Hollenbachs probably wouldn’t appreciate her stopping by so late on a school night. I swear, sometimes I think Becca must have been raised by wolves.

Anyway, Mark is going to come by the store tomorrow after school to pose for some publicity photos and maybe hand out flyers on the square or something.

It will be a perfect opportunity for him to finally get to know me as a person, outside the confines of school.

And the confines of his girlfriend.

Because I really do think, if he’d just take the time to get to know me—REALLY know me—Mark would realize how much nicer I am than Lauren…despite what my mom seems to believe, which is that boys like Mark are only interested in one thing, and now that I’ve bought him, he’s going to think I’m willing to give him that.

“You know that’s why he’s going out with that stuck-up Lauren Moffat,” Mom said. “One reason and one reason only: because she puts out.”

I almost started to cry, I thought this was so cute. Seriously, it reminded me of Kirsten’s question, “But aren’t the most popular people in your school the nicest ones?”

I don’t think there’ve ever been two people more out of touch with reality than Kirsten and my mom.

Because if I were going out with Mark Finley, I would totally put out, too. Even Father Chuck would understand
that.

FRIDAY
,
SEPTEMBER
1, 12
A
.
M
.

I was just sitting on the bathroom counter, looking through Jason’s window with my Bazooka Joe binoculars, when all of a sudden I saw Becca—BECCA!—come into his room.

Dr. Hollenbach had to have let her in. He’s always got his head so high in the clouds, thinking about doctory things, that it would never occur to him not to send some girl who showed up at eleven thirty at night, looking for his son, straight up to Jason’s room.

I know Becca couldn’t have called first, because Jason was lying on his bed with no shirt on, writing something—a haiku for Kirsten, no doubt—when the door opened and in walked the last person in the world I would have expected to see walk through Jason’s bedroom door. Jason leaped up like he’d just realized his pants were on fire, and reached for a shirt (rats!).

Then Becca started talking, while Jason stood there
looking like he couldn’t believe what was happening. After a while, he said something—I have no idea what…why didn’t I take lipreading instead of Spanish??? WHY????—and Becca sank down onto his bed, looking all depressed.

That’s when it happened. Jason sat down next to her and put his arm around her—

AND THEN THEY WERE KISSING!!!!

I have no idea who started it. I just saw their faces getting closer and closer, and then—

BAM!!!! They were smashing their lips up together.

And of course, as if that weren’t weird enough, Pete had to choose that very moment to come barging into the bathroom.

“What are you doing sitting here in the dark again?” he wanted to know.

“Nothing! God! Don’t you ever knock?” I whisper-screamed.

“Not when I don’t see a light under the door,” Pete said. Then, to my horror, he said, “Oh, wait, I know what you’re doing in here. You’re spying on Hawkface.”

“I am not!” I practically shrieked. Only I had to keep my voice down, so as not to wake up Mom and Dad. “And don’t call him that.”

“Why not? You do. And you are so spying on him. You’re holding binoculars. And you can see right into his bedroom from—Hey. Is that BECCA on his bed?”

“GET OUT!” I wanted to kill him.

“What’s Becca doing making out with Hawkface?”

“Nothing. They aren’t making out. See? They stopped.”

Pete and I stood there and watched while Jason—the back of his head to the window—said something to Becca, who seemed to nod. It was kind of hard to tell what was going on.

But I saw Becca get up off the bed and leave.

“Whoa,” Pete said. “Am I going to give HIM a hard time about this at the wedding.”

I reached over and pinched him, hard enough to make him yelp.

“You aren’t going to say ANYTHING to him about this,” I hissed. “Because he can never know we were doing this. Spying on him like this.”

“Why not?” Pete wanted to know. “You started it.”

“I wasn’t spying on him,” I insisted. “I was…meditating.”

“Sure,” Pete said. And turned toward the toilet. “Whatever you say, Crazytop.”

He screamed so loud when I pinched him for calling me Crazytop that he woke up Dad, who called sleepily from his bedroom, “What’s going on up there?”

“Nothing,” I called back sweetly. “Good night!”

I can’t believe it. Becca and Jason? I mean, I knew she had a crush on him, and all. But I had no idea he felt the same way about HER.

Although I guess I should have known, seeing as how he bought her tonight.

Still.
Jason and Becca?

The world has gone completely insane.

STILL DAY FIVE OF POPULARITY
FRIDAY
,
SEPTEMBER
1, 9
A
.
M
.

She didn’t say a word about it in the car on the way to school. Not a single word.

I can’t believe she and Jason have a secret I don’t know about. That I’m not supposed to know about, I mean.

That has to mean something? The fact that she didn’t tell me about the kiss? I mean, the very fact that we were in her dad’s Cadillac again, instead of Jason’s BMW, had to mean something. If she and Jason were an item, wouldn’t he have offered to drive her to school this morning?

That has to mean it was just a pity kiss. Becca probably confessed her true feelings for Jason, and he told her his heart still belongs to Kirsten. Or he gave her the soul mate speech again.

That has to be why she isn’t saying anything.

Unless it means the OPPOSITE. What if it means that kiss was so special and sacred that Becca wants to keep it to herself—hug it to herself, like my secret about wearing Jason’s Batman underwear that one time?

And the reason she had her dad drive us to school, instead of Jason, is that the two of them are waiting for the right time to break it to me—the truth about their love affair, I mean.

The real question is, why do I even care? I don’t like Jason. In that way. Becca can have him. My God. I OWN MARK FINLEY FOR THE DAY.

I have got to chill.

Of course, the fact that Mark looked at me kind of funny when I was at my locker this morning hasn’t helped matters anyway. He was like, “Hi, Steph—what happened to your hair?”

Which is when I realized I forgot to blow it out this morning.

But seriously, there is only so much drama a girl can handle. I was still all freaked out about Jason and Becca. Is it any wonder I’d forgotten to blow-dry my hair and that it was curling all over the place?

Except of course I couldn’t say that to Mark. I couldn’t be like, “Oh, yeah, I’ve got Crazytop this morning because last night while I was spying on my neighbor I saw my two best friends making out with each other.”

So I just went, “Ha, yeah, trying out a new look.”

“Well,” Mark said. “It’s…interesting. So is it okay if
I stop by the bookstore around six tonight? Because I’ve got practice after school.”

“Totally,” I said. “Perfect. See you then.”

Mark raised his eyebrows. “Lunch. I’ll see you at lunch.”

“Right!” I said. “Sorry. Lunch.”

“And, hey, listen…about last night.”

Last night? How did HE know about last night? Had he seen Becca and Jason making out, too?

“The auction,” Mark said, I guess because I’d looked a little confused.

“Oh, sure,” I said with a laugh. “The auction. Right!”

“Yeah. I heard we raised seven thousand dollars.”

“Seven thousand nine hundred and twenty-three,” I corrected him. Because that is how I am.

“Right,” Mark said with his trademark lopsided grin. “Seven thousand nine hundred and twenty-three dollars. I just wanted to say thanks. I mean, that’s more money than last year’s senior class managed to raise all year, and here it is still the first week of school.”

God. Was it really only the first week of school? It seemed like it had been AGES since I’d first walked down this hallway in my navy blue thigh-highs and said hi to Mark as if I were a real person, not the social pariah I used to be.

“And I owe it all to you,” Mark went on. “So…really. Thanks, Stephanie.”

And then he leaned down and kissed me on the cheek.

Just as Alyssa Krueger went scuttling by on her way to the girls’ room to repair the mascara rings under her eyes, since she’d apparently been crying…again.

It’s funny, but there was a time when the thought of Mark Finley kissing me—even on the cheek—would just about have made my heart explode.

But today when it actually happened, I was just like—whatever.

What’s happening to me?

I wonder if Jason and Becca used tongue.

STILL DAY FIVE OF POPULARITY
FRIDAY
,
SEPTEMBER
1, 1
P
.
M
.

Well. It happened. They warned me, but I didn’t believe them.

I couldn’t face the lunchroom today. I don’t know why. I just…I couldn’t do it. It was nothing against Darlene. It was more…see, I was afraid that if I sat there and Becca didn’t show up, I’d know she was with Jason and that it was true, about them being a couple now.

And that just made me feel like I was going to throw up for some reason.

So I grabbed a PowerBar and some diet soda from the machines by the gym, and took off for the library, since it was too rainy to eat outside. Besides, I figured no one I knew was a big enough loser to be eating in the library, so I’d be safe.

I was wrong.

Because sitting there, right where I’d been going to sit, in the study carrel in the biography section, where no one ever, ever went, was Alyssa Krueger.

I was going to sneak quietly away, but she saw me.

And lowered her own PowerBar and said, “Well, if it isn’t Steph Landry,” in a very unfriendly voice.

She didn’t even bother whispering. That’s because no one ever goes into the Bloomville High library, including the librarians, who are always in the back office, since they never actually have any customers, unless an English teacher makes her class go there to learn about the Dewey decimal system, or whatever.

“Look, Alyssa,” I said, trying to remember The Book’s advice on dealing with enemies. Empathy. It was all about empathy. “There’s no sense blaming me for what happened between you and Lauren. You shouldn’t have written that note to me.”

“Lauren wrote it,” Alyssa said bitterly.

“I know Lauren wrote it,” I said. “You shouldn’t have taken the blame for it. You should have told Mark the truth.”

“Oh, right,” Alyssa said, looking incredulous. “And then Lauren and I both could be eating in here, instead of the caf.”

I pulled out a chair from a neighboring study carrel and sat down in it.

“If she were really your friend in the first place,” I said, “she’d be in here with you now.”

Alyssa’s eyes filled up with tears. “I know,” she said with a sob. “Do you think I don’t know that? She’s such a
bitch
.” Alyssa threw down her PowerBar, unable to eat any more. “What am I telling
you
that for? You know. You’ve been a daily recipient of her bitchiness for the past—what is it now? Since you spilled that drink on her?”

“Almost five years,” I said.

“Right. And now look at you.”

I looked down at myself. I had on a pair of my slim-fit cords and a sweater set, because it was supposed to rain all day and cool things off a little…just in time for Grandpa and Kitty’s wedding tomorrow. I’d checked the Weather Channel that morning and was relieved to find they were predicting clear skies for Saturday.

“Not what you have on,” Alyssa said scornfully. “Your social standing. I mean, I saw Mark Finley
kiss
you this morning.”

I took a bite of my own PowerBar. “Yeah,” I said. “On the cheek. Big deal.”

“He likes you, though,” Alyssa said. “Seriously. He told Lauren. He thinks you’re
nice
.”

She said it like it was a dirty word.

“I
am
nice,” I said. Then I remembered all the times I’d watched Jason get undressed through my Bazooka Joe binoculars. And the sugar I’d sprinkled in Lauren’s hair. “Well, most of the time, anyway.”

“I know,” Alyssa said. “That’s why Lauren’s flipping out. Because you’re making her look bad. In front of Mark.”

“Lauren’s making herself look bad in front of Mark,” I corrected her.

“And then when you did that thing last night, where you outbid her for him—I mean, his sponsorship, for your bookstore, or whatever. I heard her later, in the girls’ room. She was practically frothing at the mouth, she was so mad. She said she’s going to get you, you know.”

I took another bite of my PowerBar. “Oh, right,” I said with my mouth full, even though The Book says bad table manners can keep you from becoming popular. “What can she possibly do to me that she hasn’t already done?”

“I don’t know,” Alyssa said, her eyes red-rimmed and still teary. “But I’d watch out if I were you. Because I was her best friend, and look what she’s done to me.”

“Alyssa,” I said. “You’re only in this position because you LET her do this to you. If you’d just stand up and fight her—if everyone in this school would just stand up and fight her—”

“You’re crazy,” Alyssa said, wadding the remains of her lunch into a tight little ball, and standing up. “You know that, Steph? No one stands up to Lauren Moffat. Not even you.”

“Excuse me,” I said, swallowing. “What do you think I’ve been doing all week?”

“That’s not standing up to her,” Alyssa said. “That’s playing her game her way. And you know what? You’re going to lose. Because she’s going to find a way—some vulnerable spot you don’t even know you have—to get
you, to make you look bad in front of all these new friends of yours. And then you’re going to be right back where you started. You mark my words.”

And with that, Alyssa left.

I thought about what she said the whole time I was finishing my PowerBar. But the truth was, I just couldn’t see it happening. Lauren finding some way to pull the popularity rug out from under me, I mean. Because there was just no weapon she had that she could use against me. If anything, I had the upper hand. Because now I knew that Mark liked me.

And that Lauren was upset about it.

I was feeling pretty good about myself as I finished my lunch and got up to go…

Until I noticed who’d been sitting in a third study carrel, not ten feet away from me.

“What are
you
doing here?” I demanded.

“Trying to get some peace and quiet,” Jason said. “And, man, did I come to the wrong place.”

“Why didn’t you just go sit in your car?” I asked.

Jason scowled. “Because everyone knows they can find me there.”

I tried not to let myself think that by “everyone” he meant Becca, and that he was avoiding her. For one thing because I didn’t care. And for another because it made absolutely no sense that I should be so happy that he was trying to avoid Becca.

“She’s right, you know,” Jason said, nodding in the direction Alyssa had stormed off. “About Lauren. She’s
going to figure out some way to get back at you for buying her boyfriend.”

“Oh, please,” I said. “Like I’m scared.”

“You should be,” Jason said. “She could make your life pretty unpleasant.”

I just stared at him. “Jason, where have you been these past five years? What can she possibly do to me that she hasn’t already done?”

“That’s why I don’t understand,” Jason said, holding a bag of Funyuns toward me (and which I declined), “why you even want to be friends with her.”

“I don’t,” I said.

Jason’s scowl deepened. “Then what’s this all about? This whole…
thing
this week?”

“I just want to be popular,” I said.

“Why?”

The funny part was, he asked it like he genuinely didn’t understand.

“Because, Jason,” I said, not even quite believing I had to explain it, “my whole life—well, since sixth grade, anyway—I’ve been at the bottom. And now it’s my turn to be on top.”

“Yeah, but”—Jason chewed a Funyun—“what’s so great about being there? You can’t even be yourself.”

“Yes, I can,” I said.

“Oh, right. Because that’s how your hair normally looks.”

I raised an eyebrow at him, and he said, “Well, okay, today you’ve gone all Crazytop. But I mean the rest of
this week—what does it take you, like half an hour to get it straight? Why do you want to be friends with a bunch of people who’ll only give you the time of day if you have straight hair? What’s so wrong with your old friends, who loved you the way you were?”

“Nothing,” I said. I couldn’t believe I was even having this conversation. “But what’s so wrong with wanting to have other friends besides just you and Becca?”

“Nothing,” he admitted. Grudgingly. “But
Lauren Moffat
? Or is it just her boyfriend you’re trying to steal?”

“I’m not trying to steal him,” I said, feeling myself flush.

“Oh, you’re not? You just spent a thousand bucks of your hard-earned cash on him for no reason?”

“No,” I said, forgetting about limiting my saturated fat intake and reaching into the bag on his desk for a Funyun. “You know why I did that. To bring business to the store.”

“Oh, sure. And you don’t have a crush on him.”

“Right. Just like you don’t have a crush on Becca.”

Even as the words were coming out of my mouth, I was longing to stuff them back in. But it was too late. They were already out.

“Becca?” Jason made a pretty funny face as he said the name, for someone who, only twelve hours ago, had been kissing her. “Since when do I have a crush on Becca?”

“Well, you bought her,” I pointed out. Since I couldn’t very well mention that I’d seen the kiss.

“Of course I bought her,” Jason said. “What else was I supposed to do? Let her stand up there and be humiliated because only her dad was bidding on her? I couldn’t very well let
Mark Finley
buy her.”

“What’s wrong with Mark Finley?” I demanded. “He’s a really nice guy.”

“Sure,” Jason said with a sneer. “If you like mindless clones who just do whatever their girlfriend—or you—tells them to.”

“Mark’s not like that. He—”

“Whatever, Steph,” Jason said, standing up. “You know, Alyssa’s a troll, but she’s right about one thing. The only thing you’re going to get out of hanging around the likes of Lauren Moffat and her golden boy is burned. And I just hope when it happens, I’m there to see it.”

The weirdest part of it all is, when it happened?

He
was
there.