The Bookworm Next Door: The Expanded and Revised Edition (13 page)

              She knew her sister wouldn’t be happy with Stage Three of their plans. 

              Delilah briefly wondered if Charlotte was forming more nefarious plans, but the stylist started asking her questions and Delilah forgot all about worrying about what was going to happen next.

              “Nope.  No way.  Not happening.  You are not dragging me anywhere near that makeup counter.  That is not happening.  We’ve spent enough money on clothes and hair supplies and panties and then there was lunch and…” Delilah rambled, dragging her heels for the first time all trip.  Her right eye started to twitch.

              Her sisters just ignored her, knowing that they wouldn’t actually need Delilah in order to pick out the right shades of makeup.  That was the benefit of being siblings with similar coloring. 

              “I would kill for her green eyes,” Charlotte mumbled as she looked at the eye shadow while searching for the perfect shades. 

              “Me too.  We’re just stuck with Dad’s boring old blue,” Samantha agreed, humoring her sister.  Glancing over her shoulder she saw Delilah stubbornly standing ten feet away from them, glaring.  “Too bad we all got Mom’s stubbornness.”  She went back to searching for the perfect shade of mascara. 

              Charlotte looked over at where their sister was looking at the lip glosses, “We should freak her out with an eyelash curler.”

              Samantha shuddered, “Those things freak me out.”

              “It doesn’t mean we’ll actually use it on her.”  Charlotte paused, her hand on a palette of brown eye shadows, “Although we might want to show her how to use it in case she ever decides that she wants to.”

              “Or how to use it as a torture device against stubborn boys?”

Grinning, Charlotte laughed, “That sounds perfect.” 

              Taking their selections to the counter to pay, Delilah joined them to see what they had collected.  Bottles and tubes and lipstick and lip gloss and containers with various shades of eye shadow littered the check out.

              The eyelash curler stood out, “What’s that for?”

              “Your eyelashes,” was all that Charlotte said before a wave of giggles threatened to overcome her. 

              “Do you think you picked out enough?”  She pointed to the two different shades of mascara and eye liner.  The clerk rolled her eyes.  Delilah crossed hers in response, but it went unnoticed by all of them as they sorted the makeup. 

              “No.  You’ll probably want more when you get back home.  Maybe some waterproof mascara if anybody has a last minute pool party before it starts getting cooler.”  As the idea popped into her head, Samantha turned to Charlotte, “Do we need to get her a swimsuit?”

              “A swimsuit? What’s wrong with the one I already own?”  The clerk rolled her eyes, again, at the frantic tone in Delilah’s voice. 

              “It’s a one piece that’s perfectly suited to swimming races with us, but at a pool party you don’t want to be wearing a one piece.”

              Delilah growled, “I’ll want something that can cause a wardrobe malfunction?”

              “That’s one way to get David’s attention,” Charlotte laughed.  Turning to the clerk, “And if you roll your eyes one more time we’ll cancel our order, notify your manager, and buy all of these at one of the other stores.”

              The clerk looked down at the purchases, guesstimated their final total, and knew that her boss wouldn’t be happy if she lost another two hundred dollar sale.  Throwing on her fake smile, she silently started ringing items up without looking at any of the sisters. 

              “That’s better,” Charlotte grinned before turning back to Delilah.  “Later we’ll teach you how to put on this war paint.”

              Panic began to return to Delilah’s voice.  “War paint?”

              “Sweetie,” Samantha smirked, “you are going to war against the male population and will be taking no prisoners.”

              “I never fully understood that phrase.”  Wide-eyed, Delilah looked at both of her sisters, confused.

              Charlotte, never dropping her grin, responded, “They are going to drop dead at the sight of you.”

              Hours later Delilah stared at the packages spread out on her bed.  Her sisters, she thought, had gone overboard.  All of the loose, baggy tops she had brought with her had already been sorted through and trashed (well, donated) with the exception of the five tops her sisters had allowed her to keep.  She would be allowed the same courtesy at home when Charlotte would go through her closet and decide what would be kept and what would be taken to the nearest donation bin. 

              She wondered what her friends would think as soon as they saw all of the clothes and shoes that her sisters insisted she buy. 

              “All of this isn’t meant to impress a boy, Delilah,” Charlotte had insisted.

              “Sadly, we live in a visual world,” Samantha agreed.  “Studies have shown that people that are well-dressed and look like they take care of themselves, no matter their body type, are treated differently than the people that look sloppy and dirty.” 

              “Yes, you’ll get David’s attention, but you’ll also be taken more seriously at a job interview if you are wearing clothes that actually fit.  It tells people that you care about yourself.”  Charlotte thought about the people that weren’t called back for auditions in her school’s drama department whenever they came in wearing pajama bottoms instead of actual pants.  “I see it all the time.” 

              “That doesn’t mean you should overdo it,” Samantha added.  “Those heels and wedges are for special occasions, not for every day or for school.”

              “People will wonder what you are trying to prove if you wear heels to school, especially every day,” Charlotte pointed out, reminding Delilah of some of the girls who did wear heels to school.  For some of them it made sense; they were fashionistas.  For others those heels were used to intimidate. 

              “Or if you are trying to overreach your station.  I remember some people will always be diligent about maintaining the social order at all costs.  For them high school will be the main highlight of their lives.”  Samantha started yanking tags off of clothes. 

              Following suit, Charlotte copied her older sister’s actions with a pair of scissors, “I’m sure you know somebody who is exactly like that.  Remember, I graduated with her sister.  I would love to see one of the Kirkland girls being put in her place.  They are just a pair of spoiled girls with the ability to play their guilt-ridden divorced parents.”  Charlotte paused, “Was she really behind setting up Savannah Blake to take the fall for damaging Mr. Wallace’s car?”

              “We think so, but nobody could ever prove it.  Nobody has been able to figure out how she never gets caught by the cameras.”  Delilah started sorting the clothes in order to put them in the wash.  “We think it was because Kelly thought that Savannah had broken up with her brother, Brady.”

              “Did she?”

              “Not really.  Brady Johnson had met Hannah Stanfield through Savannah’s Bible Study class and Savannah could tell that they were better suited than she was with him.  Her only condition was, since they’d been dating for weeks and he had already asked her to prom, that he still take her to prom.  She doubted she could find a new date in two weeks.”  Pausing as she started piling the skirts on top of the pants, “I guess the only person who didn’t realize what was actually going on was Kelly.  She can be unobservant sometimes.”

              “Brady…Brady…Brady…” Charlotte repeated as if she was trying to remember something.  She went on pulling tags off of the tops as she thought.  “That name sounds familiar.”  Looking over at Samantha, “Do you know what I’m trying to remember?”

              “No, but you are a year older than he is.  He would have been in the ninth grade when I was in twelfth grade.”  She tossed a black top over to the dark colors pile.  “He should have graduated last year.”

              “Wait, wasn’t he the person who…” Charlotte slowly remembered.  “Brady pushed his younger sister out of the road when a car was heading right for her.  He took the hit and had a broken arm during baseball season because of it.  His sister, Kelly, had the worst case of hero worship, swearing that he saved her life, and he probably did since she was a little slip of a thing.  She would follow him around everywhere the next year when you both entered high school.  I think she even wandered into the boys’ locker room one time because she wasn’t watching where she was going.” 

              Delilah tilted her head in thought as she pondered what Charlotte had just revealed.  She could barely remember that accident, but that was also the year that their Mother had left and she was a little wrapped up with other things like hiding all of the pictures so that their father would stop throwing things on the grill and lighting them on fire. 

              “She still needs to calm down; she’s been scaring all of his girlfriends away.”

              True to her threat, Charlotte explored the depths of Delilah’s closet while Delilah showed her new clothes to her best friend, Grace Chandler.  “Then they forced me over to the makeup department and bought all of this crap.” 

              “At least we showed you how to put it on.  I had to learn it the hard way before Samantha realized what I was trying to do,” Charlotte mumbled from the stack of rejects that she was removing from the closet.  She still shuddered whenever she remembered the disastrous smoky eye attempt. 

              “They locked me in the bathroom and threatened to drown
The House of Seven Gables
,” not that it had been much of a threat, “until I sat there and went along with their scheme.”   

              “You’ve spent all summer complaining about that book,” Grace whispered.  “I’m surprised you would want to save it.”

              Shrugging her shoulders, Delilah pointed out, “Well, it’s still a book.”

              “Now somebody tells us,” Charlotte mumbled.  “I knew we should have targeted her mp3 player.”  With a final shove, she pushed the trash bag filled with clothes into the hallway.  For a moment she was tempted to roll it down the stairs. 

              “So, what is the game plan?”

              They both ignored Delilah’s look of panic.  Things were becoming all too real. 

              Charlotte was the one to answer Grace’s question.  “Delilah will look all gorgeous, with my help of course, on Tuesday while she walks right past David and his friends.  Hopefully he’ll drop something.  It’d be even better if Will Cooper drops something; I remember how girl crazy he was his sophomore year.”  Turning to her sister, “I know you and I know how you hate Will for that comment he made about you a few years ago.  I really wish David had punched him; he wanted to, but the stupid boy held back.” 

              In a small voice, Delilah voiced her biggest fear about the whole plan, “What if this doesn’t work?”

              “It will or David Carver is a bigger idiot than any of us knew and doesn’t deserve you.”  Charlotte started to turn to leave the friends to look over the shopping haul.  “Remember, don’t just trust him at his word, you have to judge his actions too.  I know what it is like to wear a façade and after a while that mask starts getting heavy.  Resist until after Thanksgiving if at all possible.  If he gives up on you too quickly then David isn’t the person we all thought he was.” 

              Softly, Delilah whispered, “We never thought he’d betray me like he did.” 

              “Remember, Samantha explained that,” Charlotte stated, sitting down on one of the skirts.  “David was lost after his father died.  He started spending more and more time with Will because he didn’t have to think around Will and he would have to think around you.  Then he started thinking about girls and you were a baggy mess from when Mom left.”   Pulling her sister close, “Someday he will wake up and will regret every single moment he didn’t stand up for you.  He’ll regret every single second that he lost because he was spending time with the wrong people.”  She paused.

              “Remember this, both of you,” Charlotte advised them, standing up to leave, “it does not matter how interested a guy appears to be if he can look at somebody else.  Then he isn’t as interested as he thinks he is in somebody.  Delilah, it doesn’t matter who David was dating, he always looked in your direction; even when you weren’t there he would look for you.  One day you’ll be the only person he’ll ever look at and he won’t be able to look away.”  Chuckling, “We all knew that the day he was chasing you around the yard with a hand full of worms.”

              With those parting words, Charlotte went to take the clothes to the donation box so that Delilah wouldn’t try to sneak them back into her room in the middle of the night. 

              Delilah waited until she heard the front door shut, “Do you think she’s right?”

              “There’s only one way to find out.  If you really want to do this then I’ll help you out.  That doesn’t mean that I won’t worry about you.”  Grace stood up to hug her best friend, trying her best to keep her worried thoughts out of her eyes.  “Now, what are you going to wear to school next week? Pants or a skirt?”

              “Pants of course.”

              Both girls looked up at the cackling sound that they could clearly hear just outside the door.  “Good luck finding your pants,” Charlotte called out before running down the stairs. 

              Looking down at the bed, both girls realized that the stacks of khaki and navy pants were, in fact, missing. 

              Realization filled Delilah’s voice, “They really are going to make me wear my skirts for a full week.” 

              Further investigation revealed that all of her ponytail holders were also missing. 

              “At least you don’t have to wear your new heels,” Charlotte pointed out.