Revenge of the Cheerleaders (3 page)

And that's when I noticed the witch wasn't Adrian.

Adrian had dyed her hair maroon. This person was brunette.

Oops.

"I've got her," Samantha called to me, as she sat up.

The witch tried to pull away from Samantha again, and screamed, "Help! Get away from me!"

Samantha turned at the sound of the girl's voice—which, now that we were away from the noise, didn't sound at all like Adrian's. Samantha dropped her hands off the girl, and let out a scream herself.

I walked over to them. My mouth moved, but for several moments no words came out. Then they all rushed out at once. " I 'm so sorry. Really, I just—I thought you were someone else. Another Wicked Witch of the West. She looks just like you. Well, in the dark from the back, anyway." I picked up her wig and hat from the floor and handed them to her. "You know, one day this will all seem funny."

She glared as she took her things from me.

"Maybe not today," I added. "But one day."

I didn't have time to say anything else because the security guard pushed his way through the crowd of people and yelled, "What's going
on
here?"

The witch pulled herself up off the floor and pointed a finger in my direction. "I was minding my own business when that psycho-butterfly girl started yelling at me, and when I tried to get away from her, she chased me out here and told that other girl to tackle me."

The guard turned and stared at me. My mouth went dry. "It was all a mistake," I said. "I thought she was my little sister." No one moved. No one spoke. "Great makeup job," I added.

The witch let out a humph and said, "And you didn't realize I wasn't your sister when I yelled out, 'Leave me alone' and ran away from you?"

I shrugged apologetically. "It's something she might do."

The girl arranged her wig and hat back onto her head. "Well, we don't have to wonder why, do we?"

" I 'm really sorry," I said again.

The guard looked between Samantha and me, then growled, "You two, come with me."

We did. And this time I managed to follow without running into things. He marched us down the hall, away from the ballroom, lecturing us about our rowdy behavior. It was people like us, he said, that ruined things for everybody else. What if the administration decided not to let the students put on more fund-raisers because a few people didn't have the decency to behave in public? Had we thought of
that
before we'd gone careening into the refreshment table and jumping on innocent people?

Well, obviously not, but I didn't say so.

He kept lecturing us, and our only saving grace was that he'd taken us away from the crowd. I don't think I could have stood to be chewed out in front of Rick or the Clark Kent guy.

The Clark Kent guy. The thought of him made my shoulders droop. He'd paid for me to get in, and I'd told him I'd dance with him. Now he'd think I'd just used him for his money and disappeared.

The guard led us to an exit, opened the door for us, and said he'd better not see us anywhere near the dance again. The next moment we were outside in the cold night air.

We walked side by side toward the car, moving quickly. "I'm sorry," I told Samantha, "but how was I to know? It was the exact same costume that Adrian bought."

Samantha spoke in a low voice, "Don't tell anyone about this night. Not Rachel. Not Aubrie. It's a secret we carry to our graves. Even if Rick hears about it, we deny everything. It was another medieval princess and angel who got tossed out of the dance, not us."

"Right," I said, and really hoped Rick hadn't been paying attention as I rammed the refreshment table while chasing a hapless stranger. I mean, once that story got around, Naomi would never let go of it.

On the way home my mom called my cell phone. "Guess what? Stefy's mom just phoned and it turns out Adrian has been there the entire time. Stefy's mom just didn't recognize her because she looked so different in her witch costume." My mom let out a relieved chuckle. "So I'm sorry I made you leave your party, but you have to admit, it's funny."

Maybe one day, but not today.

Chapter 3

O
n Monday at school I waited for Rick or one of his friends to say something obnoxious to me in the hallway, like: "Hey—tackle any more strangers lately?" Or "This is just a guess, but you flunked out of guardian angel class, didn't you?"

No one said anything out of the ordinary though, which must mean he didn't know. This was the first good news I'd had in a long time.

After school we had an extra cheerleading practice at my house. Extra because we had a pep assembly the next day and we wanted to make sure we had our routine down. Our cheerleading advisor, Mrs. Jones, had gone to a cheerleading conference and come back with a great choreography to "Be True to Your School" but it was more difficult than the routines we usually did.

Forty-five minutes into practice—and still without us doing the whole thing perfectly—Samantha walked to the CD player and pushed the off button. "We need to take a break."

I started to protest, but Aubrie and Rachel headed to my kitchen, moving very quickly for people who were agreeing that they needed a rest.

I went with them, and while I poured everyone drinks, Samantha said, "I think we've almost got it. One more time through is all we need."

Rachel eyed Samantha's still-in-place long blonde hair and perfectly applied makeup. "You just want to end early so you can go hang out with your boyfriend."

Samantha gave her a satisfied smile. "Right."

She had totally missed the point. Love apparently makes you immune to sarcasm.

"I think we need to go through it until—" I took a sip of my drink, "we do it flawlessly a bunch of times."

This brought forth groans from Aubrie and Rachel. "It's a pep assembly," Aubrie said, "not the Olympics."

"I can't mess up in front of Naomi and her minions."

Rachel let out a sigh. "Since Mike broke up with you, you've become an absolute perfectionist." She turned to Samantha and Aubrie as though I wasn't in the room. "You know, we'd all have a lot more free time if Chelsea got a boyfriend. We should do something about that."

"Maybe we could take up a collection to buy her one," Aubrie said.

"Or we could set her by the road with a sign that says, 'Will cheer for hot guy,' " Samantha added.

Rachel sighed into her drink. "I know I'd cheer for a hot guy."

Right. Poor her. Apparently she hadn't found Mr. Right at her party.

While I finished my drink, Adrian and Rick strolled into the kitchen. Adrian had taken to gelling and hairspraying her short hair so that it stuck up in random angles, resembling a maroon feather duster. Today Rick's hair was almost as messy.

Adrian went to the cupboard, grabbed a bag of Cheetos, and sat down at the table with them. She used to hate Cheetos. We used to laugh at anyone who ate food with so much orange powder on it that you could use it to write messages on the table. But Rick liked them and that changed everything.

He pushed past me and stood in front of the fridge. "Well, if it isn't the cheerleading quadruplets: Blonde, Blonder, Blondest"—he nodded in my direction—"and Dangerously Blonde. Are you done jumping around in the living room, or is it still unsafe for normal people to come out?"

Rachel folded her arms and eyed his shirt, which looked like it had been spray painted by thugs and then thrown under a moving truck. "Since when are you a normal person?"

He let out a snort. "Like you'd know the difference."

It was one thing for Rick to insult
me
at my house—which trust me, he did often enough—but it was another thing for him to insult my friends at my house. Instead of ignoring him, and saying my usual prayer that Adrian would wake up from her almost trancelike adoration of the guy, I turned to him and said, "Do you need something? I mean, besides the obvious fashion lesson?"

He sneered at me, reached into the fridge, and grabbed the last two cans of soda. "Sorry to take it all," he said, "but hey, it's probably for the best. If you keep dipping into the treats, it won't take long before you can put a lot more besides the word 'Cheer' on your rear end." He threw one can to Adrian, then eyed me over with a smile. "Looks like you're almost to sentence length as we speak."

First of all, I am in no danger of being able to spell out sentences on my shorts. And while I'm bringing up the inaccuracy of Rick's insults, I'll also mention that only three of us on the cheerleading squad are blonde. Rachel has brown hair that she highlights. Rick just says anything that he thinks will bother us.

I walked away from Rick and back to where Adrian sat flipping Cheetos into her mouth. In a low voice I said, "You know you're not supposed to have boys over when Mom isn't home."

Adrian rolled her eyes. "Yeah, and have I thanked you lately for that rule?"

I did not make that rule. I've often wished I had the power to make rules at our house because there are a lot of things I'd change, and most of them have to do with Adrian. For example, right after I made our property a Rick-free zone, I would restrict the amount of dreary clothing Adrian wears. I mean, sure, I like a little black dress as well as the next woman, and black pants are versatile—but Adrian wears all black, every day. It's like living in a funeral home. And the friends she brings home usually smell so badly of cigarette smoke that you have to ventilate the place after they leave. Seriously, one day she'll bring over too many and they'll set off the smoke alarm.

I didn't make the rule about Rick not being allowed over when Mom wasn't home. Mom asked me questions about him and then made the rule all by herself.

I put down my drink. "Come on guys, let's run through our routine one more time."

My friends didn't argue the point. Probably because they didn't want to stay with Rick and Adrian any more than I did. We went back to the living room, turned up the song loud enough to drown out any conversation in the kitchen, and did the number perfectly. In sync. In step. And in time. "We're ready," Samantha said as the music ended.

Rachel held her hair off her shoulders. "Which is a good thing because I'm totally sick of that song."

From the kitchen doorway, where they had been watching us, Rick called, "Finally something we have in common. Tell Chelsea to get some taste in music."

"And I was just about to give you the same advice," I called back.

Adrian flopped down on the couch, put her feet on the wall and leaned back so that her head nearly touched the floor. She looked at me from her upside-down perch. "You know, you should start being nice to Rick. One day he'll be famous."

"Uh huh." That was all her comment merited in the way of a rebuttal. According to Adrian, Rick is the next Elvis. Well, Elvis in a grungy Goth sort of way. It wouldn't hurt her to live in this fantasy world, or at least it wouldn't hurt me, but lately she and Rick had reached insufferable ego levels, thanks to a new show,
High School Idol.

The makers of
High School Idol
billed it as
American Idol
for teens, and were unfortunately doing an audition in our town. This was about the most exciting thing Pullman had seen since, well, since ever, really. It didn't matter that auditions were also taking place in L.A., New York, Chicago, Miami, and Dallas, or that the winner would certainly come from one
of
the big cities. The producers wanted a contestant from rural America to show that the next superstar could come from anywhere. So as an oddity, a ratings-getter, they were offering a slot to one teenage singer or group from Pullman.

I figured they were stopping here mostly to make fun of us. I mean, really, how could a town that only had about seven hundred kids in high school ever compete with L.A.? They just figured we were a bunch of hicks who'd dress in gingham and sing off-key to
Sound of Music
songs.

Only no one saw it that way besides me. It's all anyone talked about at school. One of us would be on TV performing in front of the nation. What if one of us won the whole contest? People who didn't know clef notes from Cliffs Notes were suddenly breaking out into song in the middle of the school hallways. It was like being trapped in some bad musical.

I can sing, but I'm a little too realistic to think I'll suddenly be discovered and dropped into a limo on its way to Epic Records headquarters. My friends and I aren't even auditioning. What's the point?

But Adrian and Rick are convinced that fate designed this show just to launch Rick into stardom. And I've had to hear about it since they announced the auditions a week ago. Fortunately only three weeks are left until they come and we can put this whole unfortunate episode behind us. I probably won't rub it in too badly when Rick is rejected.

My friends picked up their pom-poms and backpacks and made their way to the door. They probably would have stayed longer—-well, at least Rachel and Aubrie would have—if Rick hadn't been there harassing us.

As Aubrie left, she cast a glance in Rick's direction and then looked back at me. "You can come over to my house for dinner if you want."

Aubrie is an angel. I didn't even hesitate. I walked out the door and called over my shoulder, "I'm going to Aubrie's. Tell Mom when she gets home."

I knew Adrian probably wouldn't, but that didn't worry me. Mom can reach me by cell phone. Besides, she doesn't hassle me much about where I go. This is the one advantage to having a rebellious little sister. In comparison, you're always the good child.

When I came home, I could hear Adrian and Mom in the kitchen fighting. Mom went on about trust, and how Adrian needed to obey the rules; then Adrian went on about how Mom was never home so the rule wasn't fair. Mom said something, I couldn't hear what, but Adrian stomped off to her room with the declaration that she hated us all.

If I shut my eyes, I can still see Adrian in pigtails following me around with puppy like adoration, but not long ago she shook off her affection for me, like a person shakes rain
off
an umbrella.

After Adrian had slammed her bedroom door shut, Mom came into the living room to grill me for information.
How
long had Rick been over?
I didn't know because I left shortly after he called me Dangerously Blonde.
Why had he come over?
Probably just to torment me.
What had Adrian and he done
when he was over?
Insult me, my friends, my music, and drink the rest of the soda.

Then Mom laid into me for leaving the two of them alone together. She went on about how I should have stuck around to be their chaperone because Adrian was almost sixteen—she was old enough to seriously mess up her life by doing something stupid with Rick.

"You know your sister doesn't have any sense," Mom said. "If she had her way, Rick would be moving in here, and you'd have to introduce him to your friends as 'my brother-in-law'."

Chilling, yes, but probably true. Still, I didn't see what I could do about it. It's not like Adrian listened to me anymore. After the election fiasco, I'd told her she ought to dump Rick, and then I'd spent the entire summer trying to set her up with all sorts of guys just to pry her away from his clutches.

Most little sisters would appreciate this, considering that the guys I know are way cooler than the people she hangs out with. But no, it only made her more devoted to Rick because, "He isn't like other guys."

Exactly. Other guys are better.

I tried to explain all of this to Mom, but the more I did, the more Mom insisted that I needed to watch Adrian.