Part 10 (2/2)

*Mom,' I protested, *you can't. You just can't, OK? Everyone will know. You have to let me handle it myself. OK?'

*OK, Allie,' Mom said, after a second or two. *OK. If that's what you really want.'

*That's what I really want,' I said. Even though it wasn't. Not even the slightest.

Mom let out a big sigh and said, *Fine, then. I'm going to go downstairs now. I want you to go wash your face and hands and get ready for dinner. Dad made one of your favourites: tacos.'

*OK,' I said. I didn't want to go downstairs. I wanted to stay in my closet, on my mom's lap, forever.

But I knew I couldn't.

Mom gave me a kiss, and then got up a” with a little trouble a” and climbed out of my closet. On her way out of my room, she wrinkled her nose and said, *And don't forget to scoop out Mewsie's litter box. In fact, I think you should probably move it to the kids' bathroom. I think he's old enough now for you to can start letting him out of your room during the day.'

*OK right,' I said again.

After I'd scooped out Mewsie's box, I washed my hands and looked at myself in the mirror. My face was all red and splotchy from crying. I looked exactly like what Cheyenne had accused me of being: A big baby. I guess because that's what I was. A big baby who let other people boss her around.

Except I hadn't. I hadn't played the Kissing Game and I wasn't going with Joey Fields.

And I hadn't let my mom call Mrs Hunter.

Who knew what kind of torture I was going to walk into when I went to school tomorrow? Still, whatever it was, I was going to handle it on my own. Like a mature person, not a baby.

I dried my hands and went downstairs for taco night.

In spite of my nervousness about tomorrow, I was starving. I ended up eating three tacos with everything on them (except salsa). Everyone was very impressed by my appet.i.te.

After dinner, we three kids and Uncle Jay had a burping contest, and I won. Mom said I was disgusting, but that she was glad to see I was feeling better. She also asked Dad when they had had a fourth child, because someone seemed to have slipped one into the house without telling her.

Uncle Jay knew exactly what she was talking about . . . him. He said not to worry, that he'd be leaving soon.

*Because,' he said proudly, *I got a job today.'

*No,' Mom said, looking astonished. *You did not.'

*Yes,' Uncle Jay said, *I did. You are now looking at the newest delivery person for Pizza Express.'

Mom stopped looking so astonished. *Oh,' she said. *You got a job delivering pizzas.'

*Funny,' Uncle Jay said. *That's exactly the way Harmony said it. It may not be the most upwardly mobile job. But every journey starts with a single step. And I get all the free pizza I want. And I should meet a lot of interesting people. Anyway, Harmony's going to give me a second chance. We'll be taking things slowly. But it's a start.'

*Hallelujah,' Dad said. *I can have my remote back.'

*And I can have my guest-room back,' Mom said.

*Does this mean I'm not going to get your futon couch?' Kevin asked.

Uncle Jay told Kevin that, sadly, he wouldn't be getting his futon couch a” a fact which Kevin accepted eventually (he got me and Mark to help him move his bed back to where it had been. I have no idea how he'd scooted it around to make room for the couch).

That night I didn't sleep very well. I kept thinking about how Cheyenne's face had looked after I'd told her she wasn't the boss of me . . . like I was about to learn a lesson. The truth was . . . Cheyenne actually sort of was the boss off me. Because Cheyenne was the boss of the whole fourth grade. I don't know how it had happened a” especially considering the fact that she was the new girl, and she wasn't very nice. But somehow Cheyenne had come along and everyone in Room 209 had let her turn into the boss of us all.

And in the morning I was going to have to pay for standing up to her.

The thought of it made my stomach hurt.

The next morning I met Erica at our door when she came by to pick me up for school, I didn't tell her about how I'd shut myself into my closet, crying, most of the evening, or that I'd told my mom everything that had been happening in our cla.s.s. I didn't tell her that I'd been up half the night worrying, or that, more than anything, I was dreading going back to Room 209 to face Cheyenne and be called Big Baby Finkle all over again.

I could tell by Erica's face that I didn't have to tell her any of these things. She already knew. She gave me a big hug and said, *Don't worry. It won't be that bad.'

But Erica was just being Erica. It was absolutely going to be that bad.

And we both knew it.

On the way to school, Erica tried to give me a pep talk anyway, saying how if Cheyenne called me Big Baby Finkle she was going to call Cheyenne a name she'd come up with, and that she'd talked to Caroline and Sophie on the phone the night before, and that they'd both agreed to call Cheyenne the name too.

I didn't ask what the name was. I was too busy thinking my own thoughts. Which were mostly thoughts about how much I wished Erica would stop talking about all this in front of Kevin, who was listening very interestedly.

Which was why, when we reached the stop sign, I hardly even noticed at first that Caroline and Sophie were both there. Just like they used to be, back in the old pre-fight days! They weren't as chatty as before. But they weren't trying to kill one another either, which was definitely a step in the right direction.

I don't know what Erica had said to them, but she had gotten them talking, at least.

Erica totally had some kind of future ahead of her as a diplomat or something. Her skills as a queen didn't lie just in lobbing evil warlords' heads off. I guess all that trying to keep people from fighting all the time actually had taught her a thing or two.

I for one really appreciated it.

For the first time, I felt a little tremor of hope about the day ahead of me. I mean, in between the thoughts about how I was about to die.

Still, even though Caroline and Sophie weren't at one another's throats for a change, the closer we got to school, the twistier my insides started to feel. It had rained in the night, and then the rain had frozen over, so everything was covered with a layer of ice, making the tree branches all pretty and sparkly.

But it had also made all the old dirty snow completely treacherous and slippery, so that we couldn't go on the baseball diamond (Mr Elkhart was out there with the salt machine).

So that meant everyone was just standing around with nothing to do.

And it also meant that Cheyenne was totally just waiting for me the minute I dropped Kevin off in the playground. I mean, she couldn't play the Kissing Game (because that had been outlawed) or watch the boys play kickball (because it was too slippery for them to play), and it wasn't like any of them would talk to her . . . not even her alleged boyfriend Patrick, since he was busy trying to kick the ice apart, lift up chunks of it and throw it at people. This is what boys at Pine Heights Elementary did on very icy mornings.

So of course all Cheyenne's attention was free to focus on me the minute I set foot on school property.

*Oh, look,' Cheyenne called, the second I let go of Kevin's hand at the jungle gym (which was covered in icicles. No kindergartener was allowed to climb on it). *Big Baby Finkle dared to show her face in school today!'

I set my jaw, even though my stomach twisted harder than ever at the sight of her miniskirt, tights and high-heeled zip-up boots. I couldn't help noticing that Marianne, Dominique, Shamira, Rosie and even shy Elizabeth had all gotten their parents to go out and get them high-heeled zip-up boots just like Cheyenne's. They were all wearing them. Their heels made click-clack sounds on the ice as they came towards us.

Looking down at my thick snow boots, I felt exactly like what Cheyenne had accused me of being: a little bit immature.

But if I'd been wearing boots like they had on, I wouldn't have been able to get Kevin to school without slipping, I realized.

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