My Little Phony - 13 (12 page)

“Ehma-it’sabouttime!” she said, sliding her chair back against the wood floor.

But the rest of the PC lagged behind. Dylan slowly stood up from her desk. Kristen was rooting through her leather messenger bag for something elusive. And Alicia
pulled out a bottle of clear nail polish and started retouching her tips.

“Um, are you auditioning to be on RuPaul’s new show?” Massie asked.

“No,” her friends said in unison.

“Then why are you dragging?” She sighed dramatically. “Isaac’s waiting.”

Finally Alicia capped her nail polish and looked at Massie. “I’m sorry, Mass, but I read an article that said bedbugs can leap off someone’s clothes and infect the person standing next to them.”

“I have a really big indoor soccer game I can’t miss,” Kristen said, her eyes on the ground.

“Um, I need to walk more because of my new diet,” Dylan said, chewing on the ends of her red hair, the way she always did when she was lying.

Massie stared at her friends. After an entire day of trying to hold it all together, she could feel her anger bubbling up inside her like a shaken bottle of Pellegrino. She closed her eyes and tried to picture the fluffy cloud, to put her bad feelings on it, to push it away. But the only clouds she could picture were those of a hurricane brewing on the horizon. She felt the low rumble of thunder rolling in. And the buzzing of lightning about to strike. The cold, angry rain pelting her shoulders. There was nothing she could do now. She was powerless to stop it.

But losing it at school brought a whole new meaning to LBR, so she just hitched her Coach bag higher on her
shoulder and joined the out-of-school procession. Her boots clomped down the shiny wooden floor, ignoring the protests of the people she pushed out of her way. Through the open door at the end of the hall, she could see the familiar black shape of the Range Rover, the sun glinting off its windshield.

“Where are your friends?” Isaac asked when she opened the door, his brown eyes meeting Massie’s in the rearview window.

“Let’s just get out of here,” Massie growled, popping her seatbelt into the buckle with a loud
click
. She slouched down in her seat, pretending to rub sidewalk salt off her boots, until she was out of view of the school. She did nawt need someone getting one hundred gossip points for spotting Massie Block driving home alone.

Fifteen minutes later, they pulled into the Blocks’ driveway. Massie’s phone started vibrating, and a picture of Landon holding Bark popped up on her screen. But she just sat there with the phone buzzing in her hand—because as shocked as she was to hear from her ex-crush, she was even more shocked at the appearance of her beloved home.

“Cirque de NO WAY!” Massie jumped out of the car.

It looked as though the circus had come to town and exploded all over the Block Estate. The entire mansion had been covered in an enormous, billowy red-and-blue tent. Her parents stood at the front of the house with fumigation masks on. At her father’s feet was a set of matching, monogrammed Louis Vuitton suitcases. Her mother held Bean,
who reached out a perfectly groomed paw toward Massie as she approached. At her mother’s feet were Bean’s matching, monogrammed Louis Vuitton puppy cases.

“What’s going awn!?!”
Massie screamed.

Her dad cleared his throat. “We’re having the house fumigated.”

Kendra adjusted her faux-fur chinchilla hat. “You can never be too careful when it comes to insect infestations.” She reached out to tousle Massie’s expertly tousled hair, but Massie pulled away. Kendra ended up grabbing at the air next to Massie’s head instead.

“No one is allowed in the house until after the fumigation is finished,” said William. “But look at it this way: It gives me and your mom the chance to finally get away on vacation to the Bahamas. And you get to bunk in the guesthouse with your pal Claire!”

Massie took two steps backward, feeling the storm clouds rolling in again. “I. Have. To. Live. With. Kuh-laire?” She dug her fingernails into her chapped, raw hands and narrowed her amber eyes. Suddenly she had a sneaking suspicion that she knew just where those bugs had come from.

“No need to thank us,” Kendra said. “It will be like one big sleepover! We weren’t able to get any of your clothes out, since your room was the site of the infestation. But I’m sure you can borrow things from Claire.”

“THANK you?” Massie gasped.

“Well, okay.” Kendra flashed her Chiclet-white smile. “You’re welcome.”

“Wh-wh-why can’t I go on vacation with you?” Massie sputtered.

“Sorry, honey,” her father said. “You have to stay in school.”

A parade of official-looking men in protective rubber coats and gas masks marched down the flagstone path, holding clipboards and hoses and wearing bright orange backpacks with
HAZMAT
printed on the back.

Suddenly Kendra’s iPhone started clucking like a chicken. “Oops, that’s my alarm!” She leaned over and gave Massie a kiss on the cheek. “We have to get to the airport now, sweetheart!” Isaac loaded their suitcases into the Range Rover. “Really,” Kendra said. “I know you’re going to have a great week. Look at it as an adventure.”

Her father gave Massie a hug, her mother placed Bean in Massie’s arms, and then with the crunch of gravel beneath the Range Rover, they were off, leaving their daughter with nothing but her dog and the Michael Kors riding boots, high-waisted Theory pencil skirt, sleeveless silk blouse, and cashmere shrug on her back.

“Ready, set, GO!” Claire yelled into her computer’s microphone, setting off a commotion of scissoring and taping. She, Cam, and Layne were having a contest over G-video-chat to see who could wrap their holiday presents the fastest. Right then, Claire was using candy cane–print paper to speed-wrap a pair of robot walkie-talkies for Todd. Cam was covering a pair of fuzzy gray slippers for his father in gold foil. And Layne looked as if she were swimming in a sea of metallic blue Santa paper, wrapping a pair of bright pink Converse for herself—according to her, it was “the gift that kept on giving.”

“Done!” cried Cam, holding his finished present in the air.

“Hey!” Layne said. “You cheated.”

Claire giggled as she looked at Cam’s “finished” present: a jagged sheet of gold was halfway wrapped around the slippers. A big piece of tape held the whole thing together.

“We never said it had to be wrapped
well,
” Cam laughed, his green eye twinkling at her from the computer screen.

“True,” said Claire as she stuck a shiny red bow on top of her neatly wrapped box.

“So what do I win?” he said.

“A bed full of bugs?” Layne said.

“I still can’t believe you guys actually bugged Massie’s room,” Cam said, shaking his head.

Claire set out a new present—seashell earrings for her mom—on a sheet of Santas and prepared to cut around it.

“Shall I reenact the moment of discovery?” Layne said. Without waiting for his answer, she clutched her heart and threw herself onto her tie-dyed bedspread. “Argggggggggggggggghh! I’ve been infested with wildlife! Cover the house! Save my shoes!”

“I would have liked to see you in your bug-burglar outfit.” Cam smiled at Claire.

She blushed. She was in crush with the way he supported her, even when she concocted crazy schemes like scaling a wall and breaking into her ex-bestie’s house.

Layne interrupted her thoughts. “Status update,” she said. “Get a room.”

“I have a room,” Claire said, motioning around her. “Unlike some people I know.”

Cam coughed uncomfortably, and Claire looked up to see Massie standing in the doorway, hands on her Theory skirt–encased hips, tapping one nut-brown riding boot in slow motion.

Cam scratched his nose. Layne sneezed. Claire nibbled on her thumbnail. How did Massie manage to suck all the fun out of a room—or in this case, a video conference—like a high-powered Dirt Devil after a birthday party? She had to admit, though, that Massie wasn’t looking good. She was barely a 3 today, while she usually hovered around a 9.2. Bags the size
of silver dollars hung under her eyes, and her bare forearms had jagged red marks all over them, like she’d accidentally hugged a cactus. She had a soy stain on her cashmere shrug. And her usually pin-straight hair looked minutes away from kinking into a curl.

“Have you come to steal Christmas?” Layne said from the computer screen, curling a silver ribbon on the edge of her scissors blade like a butcher sharpening a carving knife.

Massie ignored Layne and blew her bangs out of her eyes. “Can anyone guess how this guesthouse is like my sense of style?”

“It’s rigid and outdated?” Layne tried.

“No,” Massie snarled. “It’s MINE.”

“Is everything okay, Massie?” Layne asked in a sugary-sweet voice. “It seems like you’re
bugging
out.”

“So are your eyes!” Massie said, scratching at the soy stain on her shrug.

Claire grimaced. Even Massie’s comebacks had taken a dive. The alpha was in serious trouble. “I’m sorry you have to move out of your house,” she said. “But you can borrow my PJs if you want. Rainbow gummies or reindeer print?”

Massie was quiet as she considered the two sets of flannel sleepwear—and perhaps Claire’s act of kindness with them. But when she looked up, her face was devoid of any warmth, almost like she was the wax Madame Tussauds version of herself. “I would rather be fumigated than wear anything you own.”

“She’s just trying to be nice, Massie,” said Cam, coming
to his crush’s defense. His green eye was crinkled in outrage, but Claire could tell his blue eye was trying to maintain an air of reasonableness and sympathy.

“Well, that explains why she’s hanging out with you,” Massie snapped.

That did it!
Massie could belittle Claire if she wanted, but Cam was off limits.

“Go to the spare room!” Claire ordered, her voice harder than a Jolly Rancher.

“Amen, sister!” Layne clapped from her bedroom.

Massie rolled her eyes, like she couldn’t even be bothered to respond, then reached down and tore the candy-cane paper off Todd’s walkie-talkies. With that, she whirled around and stomped out of the room, slamming the door behind her.

“Is it my imagination, or is she getting even meaner?” Cam asked.

“Is that even possible?” Layne affixed a mass of curly silver ribbon strands to her wax lips. “That would be like the ocean getting wetter.”

Claire finished wrapping the earrings for her mom. This time last year, she’d bought a gold lion charm for Massie. The red metallic box it had come in was so pretty, she couldn’t bring herself to wrap it. Massie had immediately put it on her charm bracelet and worn it every day since. Claire had always seen it as the moment they’d truly become friends. With a pang, she wondered if Massie had taken it off when she’d declared war on Claire.

Once again, just for a moment, Claire couldn’t help but
feel guilty. Maybe she and Layne
had
gone too far. But no. Massie had brought this on herself by being controlling. She was a bully, and if this were the fifth sequel to
Bring it On,
this would be the part of the movie where Claire battled back from a bruised ankle (courtesy of Massie tripping her) only to rise to the top of the cheer-pyramid during the last seconds of the Nationals. She’d fist pump the air to the uber-emotional strains of Taylor Swift’s “Fifteen,” while Massie sat alone in the crowd, wearing an ill-fitting sports cap and eating a box of caramel popcorn.

And like that cheer-champion, Claire refused to feel bad. It was her turn to be on top.

“All the jingle ladies, all the jingle ladies,” the Pretty Committee sang as they glided through the garlanded doors of the Westchester Mall.

Alicia and Kristen harmonized while Dylan swung her hips, narrowly avoiding knocking over a display of high heel–shaped gingerbread cookies near the Saks entrance. While her friends sang, Massie kept her Sugar-and-Spice Glossip Girl–glossed lips closed. She was on a mission.

And it did not involve caroling.

“Wow. They’ve literally decked the halls,” Kristen said, admiring the Swarovski crystal lights that bordered every archway and window, and the red and green silk ribbons that draped artfully from ceiling to floor. Every store sparkled with tinsel and glass ornaments. The scent of pine filled the air. It was like walking through the most expensive forest in the world.

“Merry Christmas!” called an elf wearing curled green shoes, handing Massie a candy cane.

“Ugh,” Massie growled. She cracked the candy in half and threw it back at the elf.

“Hey!” the elf cried, throwing up his hands to deflect the flying shards.

“The halls aren’t the only things getting decked around here,” Dylan joked, taking the candy cane another elf handed her and sticking it in her mouth.