My Little Phony - 13 (15 page)

The whole thing was more frustrating than conjugating irregular French verbs. Even the knowledge that her sleepover
was about to begin didn’t cheer her up at all. With her luck, it was bound to be a disaster.

Not only was Todd there, but the snacks were terrible. She couldn’t order personal thin-crust whole-wheat pizzas with tropical fruit parfaits because of the credit debacle. Inez had the week off, and Judi Lyons’s idea of gourmet was a basket of deflated Cheetos, a half-popped bag of microwave popcorn, and celery sticks with peanut butter and raisins (aka ants on a log, which, due to Massie’s recent infestation, she did
nawt
appreciate).

The only possible bright spot was that she’d asked her friends to bring back all the clothes she’d lent them in the past year. There had to be
something
she could salvage. She was counting on it.

“Heck yeah!” Todd whooped.

“TODD!” Massie cried. “BE QUIET!”

“Owner’s rights!” Todd called back, not taking his eyes off the screen.

“The Pretty Committee is getting here in ten minutes,” she hissed.

Todd pressed
PAUSE
and turned to wink at Massie. “Don’t worry. You don’t need to be jealous of all the other babes.” He turned back to the game. He and his virtual self crashed and screamed through virtual landscapes, and Massie was
thisclose
to nonvirtually killing him.

Bean wandered over, sniffed at a celery stick, and then lay back down. She was wearing one of her ah-dorable Prada parkas, but Massie could tell her pup’s heart wasn’t in it. She missed Bark Obama and snoozing on his doggy bed.

“I hear you, Bean,” Massie said, rubbing under her pup’s chin. “But this is our life now.” She slumped down onto the blue-and-white-slipcovered couch and leaned her head on her fist, just as the hold-music feature started to replay the
Annie
soundtrack. She shook her head and finally hung up. Maybe she should try her parents again.

Suddenly her phone vibrated with a picture text. It was from Landon, and the picture was of Bark, who’d buried his nose in his paws and was looking at the camera with round, wet eyes.

She pressed
IGNORE
, and Bean shot her a disappointed look.

“I know, I know,” Massie said. “But I can’t let him see me like
this.
” Massie motioned to her current outfit: she’d cut the arms off the shrug to make leg warmers and turned the pencil skirt into a tube top. She’d repurposed the blouse into a pair of silky, day-to-evening boxer shorts, which she wore over the same tights she’d been wearing since her parents had left the previous afternoon. She had gotten so desperate that she’d yanked a strand of translucent beads that Mrs. Lyons used as curtain tiebacks in the kitchen and tripled them to make a necklace. She didn’t know whether she looked fabulous or was one fingerless glove away from looking like a runaway, but she had a whole new respect for the whiny contestants on
Project Runway
.

Furthermore, she had a blister on her thumb thanks to the stupid hot glue gun, and her hands were cramped from sewing, and the Lyonses’ Febreze-scented living room was making her throat seize.

“I’m on FI-YAH!” Todd shouted, high-fiving his head again. The sudden sound broke Massie out of her reverie.

“You have fifteen more seconds, then I am unplugging that box,” Massie yelled, getting ready to throw one of the couch cushions at him.

“So you can have me all to yourself?” Todd asked. “Don’t worry, Princess Peach is no competition for you, baby.”

“We’re heeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeerrrrrreee,” Dylan yelled, bursting into the living room.

“Finally!” Massie snapped as Alicia and Kristen filed in after her. Snowflakes dusted Alicia’s long black lashes. The tip of Kristen’s nose was pink from the cold.

The three of them dropped their sleeping bags, overnight bags, and suitcases (full of her old clothes, she hoped) on the floor.

Alicia eyed Massie’s outfit and the glue gun on the coffee table. “Oh, are we having arts and crafts night?”

Massie self-consciously hugged the pillow to her chest, covering her outfit. For a brief moment, she remembered how it felt to be friends with her old crew, the Ahnnabees, who’d laughed at her for thinking charm bracelets were stylish.

Dylan picked up an ant on the log and sniffed it suspiciously before dropping it back on the plate. “It looks like poo-berries on a log!”

Kristen snorted.

“SCOOOOOOOORE!” Todd yelled.

Massie’s skin sizzled. “THAT’S IT!” She crossed the room in five steps and unplugged the Wii.

“Heyyyyy! I was about to beat my fastest time!”

Mrs. Lyons, who was knitting in the kitchen, popped her head into the living room. “Todd, please let the girls have their sleepover. You can come help me make cookies if you want.”

But Todd just glared at his mom and stormed up the stairs. Mrs. Lyons let out a loud sigh and retreated back into the kitchen.

Massie settled back onto the couch. Her friends were still eyeing the room warily, unsure of where they should sit. Massie’s stomach knotted like one of the mini pretzels in the bowl Mrs. Lyons had put on the table.

“Luckily I raided a gift basket Brangelina sent my mom,” Dylan said. From her leather hobo she pulled a cellophane clump filled with peppermint bark, dark chocolate pretzels, and salted caramels. She promptly dug in.

“I stopped at the magazine store,” Alicia said, spreading out
US Weekly, People, Star,
and
Star UK
. She eyed the selection on the coffee table. “These ones are current. Don’t worry. My treat.”

Massie’s cheeks burned. She turned her attention to the suitcases, dumping out the contents of Kristen’s Adidas duffle, Dylan’s LV trunk, and Alicia’s Ralph wheelie. Neon yellow tube tops, slanted stripe sweaters, horseshoe-print blouses, high-waisted jeans, and satin camis tumbled out, rolling together like laundry on a spin cycle.

“Oh my gawd.” Massie held up a slouchy-shouldered poof dress in lime green sateen. “This is so 1982!”

“Actually,” Kristen corrected her. “It was 2009, when we all decided to dress like it was 1982.”

Massie pulled out a pair of pointy-toed, knee-high boots while Kristen put on a pair of chunky gold hoop earrings.

“Look! I’m the ghost of Christmas Fashions Past,” Dylan intoned in a low voice, draping a lavender pashmina over her head.

“And I’m Captain Jack Sparrow!” Kristen said, thrusting her arm through a ruffly white top.

“Point!” Alicia said, trying on a pair of square-toed Ferragamos.

“Gross,” Massie said, holding up a pair of yoga pants. “I can’t wear these. They’re way too stretched out!”

Dylan paused, a big piece of peppermint bark halfway to her mouth. She sucked in her stomach. “Hey!”

“Ugh.” Massie held up a beige sweater. “No wonder I lent this to you, Kristen. It works well on boxy, boyish figures.”

“Excuse me!” Kristen squeezed her sides in an attempt to form an hourglass figure.

“Um, Leesh,” Massie said, throwing the sweater onto her reject pile and picking up a Theory bra tee. “Why don’t you look into a minimizer? Your boobs left saggy imprints in this shirt.”

Kristen narrowed her eyes. Dylan pinched a piece of popcorn until it shattered.

Alicia crossed her arms over her C-cups. “If I wanted to be put through torture, I’d hit the Coach outlet on the Sunday before Christmas.”

“Maybe you should, so you can stop borrowing my clothes and turning them into camel covers.” Massie heard how mean the words were, and she registered the anger on her friends’ faces. But it felt like she was a shaken can of Coke Zero—her anger tab had been popped open, and there was no stopping the spray of insults. “Dylan, if you’re worried about the junk in your trunk, stop eating junk food. And Kristen, if you want to look like a girl, for Gawd’s sake, get some highlights and
stop wearing sneakers
!”

“That’s it.” Alicia grabbed her magazines. “I’m out of here.”

“Same!” Kristen shouted.

“Guys like my junk!” Dylan snarled, balling up the bag of popcorn in her hands.

As though watching an episode of
The Hills
where Audrina and Heidi have yet another falling out, Massie watched, oddly detached, as the three girls gathered up their things and marched through the door. A chill filled the room that had nothing to do with the temperature outside.

Claire’s face peered around the edge of the steps. She was holding a clipboard and looking incredibly smug. Layne appeared behind her.

“Hear ye, hear ye!” Layne said. “All rise for the great and honorable Claire Lyons, who has a very important announcement.”

“It’s the dawn of a new Claire-a!” Claire said.

“A new what-a?” The end of Massie’s nose felt numb. She reached up to touch it, to make sure it was still there. To
check if this evening had actually happened—that it wasn’t just some cheap candle smoke–induced hallucination. Faster than you could say
credit denied,
she had lost her crush, her house, and her wardrobe, and now her friends had abandoned her. She felt emptier than the foreclosed home down the street and more pathetic than Jessica Simpson’s new reality show.

Layne rolled her eyes. “Claire-a. Like ‘era.’ Like a period of time. Only it sounds like Claire’s name, so we’re calling it Clai—”

Claire elbowed Layne. “Rule number one!” she shouted. “Thou shalt put the ‘end’ in ‘bad friend.’”

“I’m going to put the ‘up’ in ‘shut up,’” Massie said, pushing past Claire and bolting up the steps.

Claire darted after her, Layne close behind. “Rule number two: Thou shalt not interfere with my friendships by spreading lice rumors or anything of the kind.”

“You are interfering with my patience right now, Kuh-lassless.” Massie reached the landing and turned around.

“Rule number three! Thou shalt not say my name in vain!” Claire yelled. “Rule number four!”

Massie ran into Claire’s room, slammed the door behind her, and locked it.

“RULE NUMBER FIVE!” Claire shouted through the door.

Massie grabbed Claire’s headphones, put them on, and turned up the volume.
Wicked
’s “Defying Gravity” blasted into her ears.

“Let me in!” Claire pounded on the door. “This is my room!”

“Open up!” Layne yelled.

With a shaking hand, Massie turned the volume even louder, understanding for the first time why LBRs hide in the world of virtual reality.

The door shook. Claire and Layne faded into the background and the lyrics took over.

IT’S TIME TO TRY

DEFYING GRAVITY

I THINK I’LL TRY

DEFYING GRAVITY

AND YOU CAN’T PULL ME DOWN!

Once the pounding stopped, Massie whipped off the headphones. She hadn’t defied gravity. She’d sunken to its lowest depths.

“I can’t believe people actually came,” Claire whispered to Layne and Cam. “Are you sure they’re really all here for us? Or did a new
Twilight
book come out today? A scratch-and-sniff version maybe? In 3–D?”

Layne grinned. “This is for us, Claire. It’s all YOU. And after all, we did Facebook everyone from OCD
and
Briarwood. The people are ready for this. POWER TO THE LITTLE PEOPLE!” she shouted.

All the people within earshot broke into cheers. She turned back to Claire. “See? I’m going to go hand out more flyers.” She motioned to a stack of hot-pink
A NEW CLAIRE-A WILL GET YOU THERE-A
flyers and then disappeared into the crowd.

It was the first official rally of the new Claire-a, and despite the cold, a small but rabid crowd of about twenty-five people had gathered outside Forbidden Planet. They were talking, laughing, dancing in place, using their asthma inhalers, putting wax on their braces, and Tweeting the event, all to the pumping strains of Jay-Z’s “Off That,” which, thanks to Danh, could be heard for blocks. Kori, Meena, Strawberry, and Heather marched through, holding two giant banners Layne had given them. One read
USHER IN A NEW CLAIRE-A
(complete with a Photoshopped picture of Usher and Claire, giving each
other a high five), and on the other they’d put
IT’S THE DAWN OF A NEW CLAIRE-A
in orange, pink, yellow, and red—or, as Layne put it, “dawn colors.”

To Massie it probably would have looked like a gathering for a makeover show “before.” But to Claire it looked like an assembly of future world leaders: smart, fun, creative people who had been persecuted by the current regime. Well, no more!

Danh approached and tapped his tiny laptop. “All systems are go on our end,” he said.

On the minuscule screen of his laptop, Claire could see the members of OCD’s astronomy club, their backs to an enormous window on Westchester Hill. They all gave Claire a thumbs-up, and she gave a thumbs-up right back.