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MONCHERIE'S OFFICE
smells like chemicals when I walk in that afternoon, and she's blowing her beige-pink fingernails dry. “Lotus Blossom,” she tells me, twinkling her fingers. “What do you think?”

It occurs to me that because I now wear makeup and look more like, say, a normal girl, I'm probably expected to have an opinion on things like nail polish. So I try to come up with one. It's brilliant. “Nice,” I say.

Okay, I see
that
part of me hasn't changed.

“Went to this house that's for sale, and the bedroom walls were about this color. Well, come on in and sit down. We'll need to small-talk until this dries.” She blows out a long gust of breath, letting her fingers dance around in the stream of air. She looks like she's playing an imaginary pan flute.

“How's school?”

“Pretty good, actually,” I sigh. Do I tell her about the Fall Ball prospects? Am I really the type of girl now to be having this problem?

“Oh? Not ‘fine'?” she teases. “How's that girl—the you- know-what?”

So I start to tell her about Brynne—the surprising things, like the fact that she called me, that I read her story. That she seems to actually like me. That she seems to be a little different now. Less full of herself.

Moncherie is waving her fingers furiously in the air. “Slow down, slow down,” she says, and blows quickly on her fingers. “Hang on. My polish isn't dry.” Then she stops and looks at me. “Okay, I'm probably going to regret this.” I hear the creak of her top desk drawer opening, and she reaches in with both hands, trying to grab her pad and pen with open palms to save her not-yet-dry fingernails. I wonder if the fumes have gotten to her.

When I hear her start to make little gasps of frustration, I get up and help her.

She gives me a relieved smile. “Thank you.” She takes the pen awkwardly between her fingers. “Now, I thought you didn't especially like this Brynne.”

“I don't. I mean, I
didn't
,” I explain. “She's just kind of interesting in a way. And probably a lot more complicated than I thought. You know she's got a half brother?”

“Oh,” Moncherie says, leaning in. “A half brother.” She might as well be rubbing her palms together with anticipation. “So her parents—are they apart too?”

I realize where she's trying to take us. I almost handed her the key. I catch myself before she starts unloading all my trunk baggage.

“I don't really know.” I shrug. “Anyway, she's being sort of nice to me. It's because of the training.”

She lets out a one-gust laugh. “Oh, yes. The training. Sure would be nice if it worked on men. Now.” She examines her polish by touching a tiny corner of her left thumb. It must be dry, because she adjusts her grip on the pen, smiles, and asks, “So, have you heard anything from your mother?”

I pounce on her last comment. “I bet it does work on men,” I tell her. I mean, if my instincts and those rumors are correct, I could possibly have
two
invitations to the Fall Ball.

“You are
so
young,” she sighs. She gives me a lopsided smile and shakes her head slowly, but it's clear that I've successfully distracted her. Standard training trick, right?

“I can tell how you it works,” I offer.

“
Olivia
.” She narrows her eyes in a teasing-scolding way. “Okay, okay. Just because I like dogs. How exactly does the training work?”

We spend the rest of my session going over “dog training” basics. She's put the pen back down, but she definitely seems to be taking notes.

I DON'T SEE
Brynne on the bus Friday morning. In fact, I don't see Brynne until Delia and I are walking toward our second period classes. Only I don't recognize her—not at first—because she looks like a well-packaged pile of litter. Her hair is covered by a black trash bag, secured at the side of her head with a twist-tie. She is wearing another trash bag like a knee-length dress, upsidedown with holes cut out for her neck and arms. A white trash bag with a drawstring makes a sort of belt, cinching the waist. She is wearing little else, unless you count flip-flops and a big, big smile. “Hi, guys,” she says when she sees Delia and me.

“Hi,” we repeat, our voices weak. We're a bit dumbfounded. It takes me a minute to get it. It must be Trash Bag Day. My brain droppings at work.

The crowd hushes and parts as she crackles and swooshes down the hall. You can't help but turn and stare. It's rare that you see so much plastic—especially worn with such aplomb.

Mandy finds her way to us. “Trash Bag Day! I'm so excited!” she whispers, grinning. “I can't wait to see how stupid all the Spiritleaders look!”

Brynne's smile wavers a little as she spots Tamberlin and Carolyn, who are both in their regular uniform of tight jeans and overpriced T-shirts. “Hey,” Brynne says. “Why aren't you—well, where are your bags?”

“At home.” Tamberlin says, putting her hands on her hips. “Under the kitchen sink.”

“But—why?” Then her smile drops completely and she slaps her forehead. “
Oh. Em. Gee.
I got the day wrong, didn't I? Is Trash Bag Day
next
Friday?”

Carolyn squeals with laughter and the crowd builds as Brynne looks increasingly confused. Corbin Moon sweeps down the stairs, chanting, “Hefty, hefty, hefty!” A few kids chant back with a high-pitched “Wimpy, wimpy, wimpy!” Soon at least half the crowd joins in.

Brynne looks around desperately. Then she starts to run. One of the guys grabs a wheeled trash can and starts pretending to chase her with it, but Brynne, thankfully, disappears into the bathroom.

So, they took my, well, “idea,” and made it into a prank on Brynne. I wilt a little inside. It must show because Mandy looks at me and says, “Look, Olivia, don't get all racked with guilt. This is the
exact
same stunt she would have pulled if she still had her power.”

“I know.” I remind myself about a certain incident involving ketchup, which still makes me burn with embarrassment, And, of course, countless other indignities. I also try—really hard—not to think about the sad smile Brynne had on the bus the other day. And the nice things she said to me on the phone. And the way she looked just a few minutes ago, dressed in plastic, unaware that it was just a prank. Unaware that she was the target.

“Can you believe this?” I say. I feel dizzy. Almost sick.

“No,” Delia says. “What should we do?”

“What do you mean, ‘What should we do?'” Mandy says, laughing. “You got any cookies in that bag?”

“No,” I say. “Bad idea. We can't reward this behavior.”

“That's right. Plus, I only have two cookies anyway,” Delia says, with slight relief.

“Oh, no problem.” Mandy grins. She opens her own bag. “I was just going to resupply all the campaign posters anyway.”

I take a breath. “Look, Mandy, okay, so we probably shouldn't feel bad for her. She's had it coming. But I don't think—”

“Um, hello?” Mandy leans in close to me. “Your idea, if I remember correctly. Freedom fighters? Ring any bells? Unless…” She steps away. “Unless you
are
Benedict Arnold.”

“I'M NOT A TRAITOR!” I say too loudly.

“And you—” She points to Delia. “What about Sojourner Truth? Would she be proud of you for backing down from the enemy?”

Delia exhales, surrendering.

I shrug, throwing my palms up. “All right. Let's just get this over with.” And then I feel the heft of the not-so-fun-sized bag of Jolly Ranchers in my left hand.

“Oh my God! Jolly Ranchers!” someone yells. And we are swarmed. It's like vultures picking apart roadkill, just a faster, more frenzied version. It's probably less than a minute until we are all rewarded out, which means that later, after fourth period, when Brynne resurfaces wearing
The Sassie Lasses(!)
I'll have nothing to give Corbin Moon when he murmurs, “Ugly girls say
what
?” and Brynne seethes, “
What?!
What did you say?!”

Okay, okay. Not being able to reward that fool—actually, it's a little bit of a relief. Just not quite enough.

All weekend long, I keep trying hard not to think about that beatific, proud, trash-bag-wearing version of Brynne. On Sunday night I even work ahead in my algebra book in an attempt NOT to think about it. At least with solving equations there's a definite right and wrong. Unlike life.

The phone rings. I pick it up. It's Brynne. I almost drop it again.

She sounds nervous. “I have something to ask you,” she says.

My heartbeat comes fast and erratic, but I try to sound cool. “Okay.”

“Trash Bag Day.” Her voice cracks. “I heard that was your idea?”

“No,” I say, quickly. Then I correct myself. “Well, yes, sort of. But not like you might think.”

And I tell her about Tamberlin and Carolyn coming over to the table, looking for ideas, and how I blurted it out. “I didn't know they were going to make it into a prank, though.”

She's quiet for a second, and then she mutters, “
Trash Bag Day
. I can't believe I fell for it. I'm so done with them.”

“Well, they'll probably get in a lot of trouble,” I say.

“No they won't,” she tells me. “I just told Vander-Pecker I got the day wrong. All she's going to do is make Dress-Up Day illegal.”

I'm shocked. “But why'd you tell her that?”

She sighs. “I don't know. I was stupid enough to fall for it, for one. I mean, why drag it out? They're not worth it to me anymore. They're just not worth the trouble.”

I turn the page in my math book, and for the first time ever, am relieved to see about fifty extra problems. That's another good thing about math. Math is fair. Life is not.

I AM ON
my way to the Bored Game Club on Monday afternoon when I hear my name called. I know it's Brynne before I even turn around. “I want to show you something,” she says. “Come here.”

I open my mouth, although I'm not sure what to say. “I can't,” comes out.

“Yeah, you can,” she says. “It's easy. Just turn around and start walking this way.”

I give her a halfhearted smile. She smirks.

So I start walking toward her, totally going against all the proper training techniques. Like she said, it's easy.

She smiles a little, grabs my wrist, and starts running down the hall with me attached. I feel like a dog on a leash. Then she stops in the middle of the hallway, looks around, and pulls me into Mr. Renaldi's dark classroom.

My body becomes stiff. I have somehow got sucked into trouble. “What are we doing in here?”

“Just hanging out.” She looks at me and laughs. “Don't tell anyone, but sometimes I come in here and just chill. He forgets to lock his door half the time.”

“You hang out in here? Alone?”

“Pretty much. Especially lately,” she says. “Sometimes I just read.”

“Books?”

“Sometimes. But he doesn't have a lot of good ones,” she says. She goes to the “Rock-n-Read” basket and picks up the composting book I was stuck with the other day. She looks at the cover, puts it back in the stack, and digs deeper.

“This is fun and all, but we should leave,” I tell her. Everyone knows sneaking around dark, empty classrooms is considered trespassing, and I'm terrified of getting caught. Corny can be really sweet, but you don't want to cross her. She can bring a pit bull to its knees—well, you know, not knees, since dogs don't have those, but she can make it roll over and act like a major suck-up.

Brynne walks behind Mr. Renaldi's desk, pulls
Catcher in the Rye
off his bookshelf, and fans herself with it. “I like it in here.”

“What if Mr. Renaldi comes back?”

“He won't. His backpack is gone. Plus, he always turns out the light when he leaves.” She sounds like an expert.

Phoebe and Joey are probably fighting over who gets to be the little shoe piece in Monopoly, I think. But Delia and Mandy are probably wondering where the heck I am.

“Aren't you supposed to be somewhere, though?”

She lowers her eyebrows and stares up at me. “Like?”

“I don't know. Yearbook committee?”

“Pfft.”
She sweeps my words away with a backhand gesture. “I've already taken a bazillion pictures. And before you say anything about Spiritleading, I'm glad to be done with it. That spandex was giving me a rash anyway. So it's either hang out here, or go home and fight with my butthead brother and my maniac mom.”

“Oh,” I say. “Sorry.” And it's the truth—that's exactly how I feel for her right now.

She studies me for a few seconds. “You know, speaking of moms, you're lucky yours doesn't live with you. I sure wish my mine would like, go away or something, like yours.”

My chest starts to feel tight, but I say nothing.

“You don't have to feel bad, you know. I know exactly what it's like. My mom's crazy too.”

I swallow. How on earth could she know about that, when Delia's the only one who does?

“It's okay,” Brynne says. “I know about your mom.”

So many things start to creep up from the little round balance part at the back of my brain, and clog up my thinking. I mean, Delia would never—
ever
—

I somehow manage to ask, “What about her?” and I try to act like my throat isn't starting to close in on itself. “That—that she travels a lot?” The words sound ridiculous now. They probably always have. I've just been too stupid and too scared to admit it.

“That she went a little crazy and just left you. It's okay, though, you know. My mom's—”

“Who told you that?” I ask, but something tells me I don't want to know the answer.

She just shrugs and says, “Delia.”

“What?
Nuh-uh
!” I know I sound like I'm four years old, but I guess that's what happens when you sense a crisis. Fetal position and thumb-sucking are also starting to seem like appealing activities.

This can't be happening.

“Yeah,” she says. “Well, she's the one who called me, but your friends were all there. They had me on speaker.”

All my friends. Were there. Which makes it all so much worse.

“Mandy too?”

“Yeah, the goth one, right?” She looks at me. “Yep. And Pheebie-Jeebie too. Even that fat kid.”

I don't know which I feel more of—anger or hurt. “When was this?” I finally ask.

“Like a few weeks ago. Delia wanted me to leave you alone, so she pretty much gave me your whole sob story. But don't worry. Like I said, I can totally relate.”

I sink down into a beanbag chair in the corner of the room. I force a few breaths down my tight throat. My entire head is stinging and throbbing, and if I were alone or in the company of dogs, just dogs, I'd be crying my eyes out.

But I'm not alone. Or am I, really? Maybe not physically alone in this room, but all alone in my crashing-down little world. The one person I trusted—Delia—has told my biggest secret. She and all my friends must have discussed me behind my back; they've probably made secret pacts never to mention it in front of me; they've probably told their parents. They probably all know that I go to therapy, where a weird lady with bad fashion sense tries really hard to get me to admit that my mom didn't want me. All because of Delia, and because of my own stupidity in trusting her.

Brynne pulls another book off the shelf and leafs through it. “You know, everyone used to think your mom was dead.”

“Well”—I make myself exhale a little laugh, which sounds more like I'm choking—“she's not.” Although that would be a lot easier to explain, I find myself thinking.

I keep my head down, but out of the corner of my eye I see Brynne look up from the book. “Well, duh, I know that
now
. My dad died, you know,” she says, even though I didn't. “From an accident. I was with him but I was like, four. This is what I have to remember him by,” she says, touching the scar on her chin. She might as well be talking about what she had for lunch—she sounds completely over it.

“Well, sorry about your mom,” she continues. “But once you meet mine, you'll see how lucky you really are. Total nutter.”

Yeah, right
, I think. I'm so sure. Most people think their moms are crazy if they sing out loud in the car, or eat plain yogurt, or wear high-waisted jeans. She has no idea. Zero.
Zilch
.

“I'm talking one word here,” Brynne says, as if reading my thoughts. “Prozac.”

Okay, then. Maybe she
does
.

At this moment I feel so betrayed by Delia—by all of
them
—that it's almost a relief to think Brynne and I have this thing in common.

Suddenly, through the window in the door, we see the top of a graying head. “Hide!” Brynne yells in a whisper, and drops to a crouching position beside Mr. Renaldi's desk. I roll to the floor and move the beanbag chair on top of me. Over the loud beating of my heart, I hear the door open and then footsteps. I slowly open my eyes, which ache from squeezing shut, and watch a pair of wide sneakers walk by. For a second the trash can disappears, then it clangs back to the floor, and the sneakers walk off, shutting and locking the door behind them.

Brynne's voice rings out. “Mrs. Vittle, the janitor,” she cries out, laughing. “
Oh. Em. Gee.
That was great.”

I exhale with a laugh, relieved not to be in trouble.

“We really should go,” I say.

“Good thing she didn't lock the door,” Brynne says.

“But—I heard her key in the lock.”

“You did?” She shoots me a look of panic that I'm sure I return.

“Oh,
no way
,” she says, and scurries to her feet. She grabs the handle and turns back to me, eyes panicked. “No freakin' way.”

I get to my own feet. “What?”

“We're locked in!”

“
What
?” I ask, even though I heard her perfectly. We are going to be in
so much
trouble. My voice feels shaky, and I dash toward the door.

But she grabs me before I can reach it, and a volcano of laughter erupts from her. “I'm kidding,” she says, between gasps.

I grab the knob and turn. The door opens, so I shut it again quickly. She holds back her laugh with her hand. “The doors don't lock on the inside. You can always get out. Otherwise, we'd all burn to death if there was a fire.”

“Oh. Right,” I say.

“You should have seen your face.” She stops laughing just enough to mimic my expression—a combination of terror and surprise. She looks like a caricature, her pretty face wrestling itself into something so ridiculous. Despite the fact that I'm upset, a laugh leaks out of me like a whine.

Then the bell rings, which causes us both to scream, which makes it even funnier.

“We…better…go,” she tries to say through her laugh. We both take deep breaths, then she peeks down the hall in each direction. “Quick!” she yells. We scamper into the hallway and I trip and actually make a noise like
splat
on the floor, and by now I'm doubled over with laughter and we're both finding it hard to walk. It takes us extra time to get outside, and when we do, we hear the buses start up. We begin to run—fast—and make it to our bus just before the door shuts for the last time, and she pulls me down to a seat with her and begins her interrogation for gum, like it's any other day.

I feel an empty churning inside my stomach. I break out a pack of Goldfish crackers from my backpack and offer a few to Brynne. But it's something other than hunger, because after downing all but about three of the crackers, the feeling is still there.