Green Algae and Bubble Gum Wars (5 page)

Scott now was glad to turn on his iPod—though he wished he had
not
had it on before…back outside the train with Elena Maria. He had a funny feeling that he acted like a total dweeb when she offered him those cookies, which were delicious. Not to mention how pretty she looked. He tried to be subtle as he turned around to catch a glimpse.

Unfortunately his view was blocked by one peppy redhead, who was vivaciously babbling, “So at first I thought, be natural, Maeve. Wear your hair curly. After all, it is your signature look, right? Then I thought, but straight 'n sleek is soooo hot right now.
And
I'll look way older.
And
Matt is in college, so older is good! Not like,
old
old, but like,
college
old, you know?”

“Uh-huh.” Maeve noticed Elena Maria make eye contact with Scott and give him a shy smile.
Oops!
Maeve felt a little twinge of guilt as she realized that by sitting next to Elena Maria, she was keeping the two high school lovebirds apart. She
was
all for Scott and Elena Maria getting some face time. But they would have hours together at the festival, and this was an emergency—she would be seeing Matt in less than twenty minutes!

Meanwhile, Charlotte was finding Sam quite entertaining. She was surprised at how much he knew about outer space, especially for an eight-year-old. Charlotte herself was an astronomy buff, and she and Sam were having a fantastic time trying to outsmart each other with a game of constellation trivia. “What are Orion's hunting dogs named?” Charlotte challenged.

“Duh! Canis Major and Canis Minor. C'mon…gimme a hard one!”

Avery and Isabel were pleased that they snagged seats next to each other, but very disappointed with the Elena Maria/ Scott situation. “You know, for someone who's obsessed with romance, I can't believe how clueless Maeve is!” Avery complained.

“I know!” Isabel agreed. “Scott and Elena Maria are soooo perfect for each other. This day is going to be a total waste of matchmaking efforts if we don't do something, and
fast
.”

Isabel stretched her neck up and slyly observed her sister—batting her eyes in Scott's direction. And Scott, Isabel was relieved to see, was batting
his
eyes right back at Elena Maria. She slid back down in her seat, turned to Avery, and said with a soft giggle, “I have a feeling that Cupid has taken matters into his own hands.”

M
aeve was still chatting Elena Maria's ear off when the T screeched to a stop at the Kendall Square station. “And so first he's all like, ‘Oh, Maeve, come to the Festival.' But then he's all like, ‘Oh, you should bring your friends.' And I'm like, well, that's a little weird, right? But
then
he's like, ‘We can chill.' So
now
I just have no idea
what
to think!”

Elena Maria was trying very hard to be patient, but Maeve's ridiculous fantasy about her tutor needed a serious reality check. “Maeve, think. I mean, Matt is way too old—”

“Shh!” Maeve suddenly grabbed Elena Maria's arm,
hard
. “He's coming over. Omigosh, omigosh. How do I look? Is my hat on straight?”

“Um…no…” Elena Maria started.

“Good,” Maeve replied as she fanned her face with two hands. She quickly inspected her fellow BSGs and decided, smugly, that she definitely was dressed in the
most
sophisticated ensemble. She watched breathlessly as Matt made his way over to the group, adorable as ever, in a tattered,
backwards Red Sox cap. She
did
feel a sliver of annoyance when she saw the light-colored jeans he was wearing. Stone-wash was so over at AAJH.

Matt saw the cluster of seventh grade girls waiting by the T stop at 10:00 a.m., just as he and Maeve had specified. He scanned the girls, trying to recall if these were all the BSG, since he had only met them a handful of times before. The short girl with black hair in a side ponytail practicing batting with an imaginary bat and ball—that had to be Avery. And the tall girl reading some sort of fashion magazine, Matt had a feeling, was Katani. He could spot Charlotte and Isabel, playing with Sam. The only thing was…Maeve wasn't there.

A girl with long, straight red hair spun around and gave a little wave. Matt blinked. “Whoa!”

Maeve stood there for a moment…a long moment. “Um, uh, 'sup?” she finally managed.

“Good thing the
female
of the species is so much more advanced!” Isabel giggled to Avery.

“I didn't recognize you there for a second, Maeve. Wow, way to break down the hydrogen bonds in your hair's cortex with ceramic plates and ionic technology!”

“Actually, I just used a hair straightener.” Maeve ran her fingers through her smooth locks. She couldn't believe how well her plan was going. Matt was obviously captivated by the new look—Maeve 2.0—the undated version.
This is just how I would picture it if we were dating in, like, seven years or something. I would be shooting my first big movie—co-starring Caleb Tucker. Matt would be a world-famous doctor, getting out of the hospital after saving a baby's life. We'd meet here, by the T stop at the Charles River, and he'd sing to me—

“Well, we should get a move on,” Matt announced, clapping his hands together. “It's already pretty crowded.” Maeve blinked her way back to reality, as Matt ushered the group in the right direction. “I'm glad you all came,” Matt was saying. “I have some very cool stuff to show you. Before you all head off to the workshops you signed up for, there's an awesome street fair part of the festival that we can check out. There are some mind-blowing booths with stuff like robots you can control and the chemistry of food.”

Isabel and Maeve exchanged looks—both girls were there for chemistry that had to do with hearts, not test tubes.

“Wait till you guys see the phytoplankton exhibit. When you see algae under a microscope, well, let's just say it's a miracle how beautiful scum can be,” said Matt.

Isabel perked up a little at that comment. She
did
love looking at beautiful things. That was how she got her artistic inspiration.

“What about the tunnels?” asked Avery. “I definitely want to check out the other exhibits here, but Maeve told me there were tunnels, and I love tunnels. So…what's the deal?”

Matt chuckled. “When we're finished up with the festival, I'll take you on a guided tour of the tunnels. But for now, let's hit the street fair. Then I'm going to take you to see my friend Bailey's booth.” Maeve wondered if Bailey would be as adorable as Matt. She doubted that was even possible.

 

“Welcome!” said a friendly volunteer, as the group approached the entrance. Maeve loved that the girl was rocking super-short, super-curly, dark brown hair.

“Everyone's with me,” Matt assured her. “We got special permission for this little guy.” He indicated Sam.

“Sure, but the festivals are for girls in fifth to eighth grade,” she said, looking at Scott and Elena Maria. “Sorry, guys.”

Matt rubbed the back of his head, thinking, then said to Scott and Elena Maria, “Well, you two wanted to check out the campus anyway, right? Why don't you do that for a couple of hours and then meet us back here? Do you have a cell phone?”

Elena Maria nodded while Scott stared at his shoes nervously. Meanwhile, Isabel was beaming. She slapped Avery a secret high five behind Elena Maria's back. “Looks like they'll just
have
to spend two hours exploring a beautiful college together,” she whispered to Avery, giggling.

“If Scott can work up the nerve to look at something other than the ground!” Avery whispered back, shaking her head.

“Okay, we'll see you back here when the festival is over,” Matt instructed Elena Maria and Scott.

“Catch you later!” the BSG called out, with big smiles, as they watched their romance project walk away.

“All right, listen up, girls!” The volunteer got their attention. “Do you see the Sally Ride T-shirt I'm wearing? There are tons of other people in these T-shirts, just like me, and we're all here to help you. So if you have questions or need directions, just ask someone in one of these T-shirts.”

“Now let's head in!” Matt exclaimed.

When she got a good look at the street fair scene, Maeve couldn't believe her eyes. At first, Maeve had had her doubts that the festival would be that cool an event. But now, she
had to admit, it was totally looking like the happening place to be. There were girls everywhere, and all of them looked like they were having an absolute blast, running around with bags full of treasures and souvenirs they had collected from the various exhibits.

“Hey! What in the name of Einstein are
you guys
doing here?”

Maeve and the rest of the crew turned around. There was the AAJH seventh grade class president, Henry Yurt, wearing an over-sized T-shirt that read “My other car is a Proton Rocket.”

“It's the Yurtmeister!” Maeve cried. She loved running into friends from school outside of school…especially when she was with a super-cute older boy. She hoped Henry would take note and report this incident back to the rest of his guy friends in their class. “We're here for the science festival, silly. That's my
friend
Matt.” She pointed to Matt, who was looking at the next booth over. “He's showing us around. He's in
college
.”

“How did you get in?” asked Katani, trying to bring the conversation away from Maeve-fantasyland and back to planet Earth. “I thought it was for girls only.”

“My dad works here. He teaches zoology, and he helped organize this thing. Hey, wanna meet him? He's right over there.” Henry Yurt pointed at a nearby booth.

The Yurtmeister led the way over to a booth with a banner hanging above it that said,
DO
YOU
BELONG IN A ZOO?
It was obviously a popular booth, because girls were swarming around it, laughing and chatting. In the middle of the booth was a short man with carrot-colored hair. He was a little on
the bald side and also a grownup, but otherwise he was the spitting image of Henry Yurt. Avery noted that, like her, both Henry and his dad were “vertically challenged”—Avery-code for “short.” But what really caught her attention was the tiny, furry creature sitting on Dr. Yurt's shoulders.

“And this little guy is on loan from the zoo, just for this special occasion,” explained Henry's dad. “His name is Chewy.”

“Like Chewbacca from
Star Wars
. Aaaaawesome!” exclaimed Sam. “Hey, Henry, your dad gets to take care of a monkey? That is so cool!” He gazed at Henry's dad like he was a superhero.

“That's no monkey, Sam,” Avery corrected. “That little guy is a
lemur
. They're super-special because they only live in Madagascar. But monkeys and lemurs
are
both primates.”

“Good for you, little lady.” Yurt's dad pointed at Avery.

“Professor Yurtmeister! Duuuuude! You brought Chewy!” called a guy wearing a backwards baseball cap.

“What's up, my dawwwwgs?” Professor Yurt greeted his students.

Charlotte had to stifle a giggle. She'd seen her own dad trying to be cool around his students and knew exactly what was up. She turned to Maeve and whispered, “No matter how ‘down with it' parents think they are, it never works.”

“Hey, there, Li'l Yurt!” The guy with the baseball cap grinned, bending down to give Henry's hair a friendly rub. Avery always admired Henry's confidence: for a little dude, he had the self-respect of someone six feet tall. He totally embraced the nickname and attention. In no time at all, he had a crowd of college students surrounding him and his
father, cracking up at the father-son comedians.

“You think we could get ‘Li'l Yurt' to stick back at school?” asked Maeve.

“Maaaaaybe. All I have to say is, Yurt plus Yurt is a dynamite combination!” Avery told Isabel. Suddenly, something behind Isabel caught her eye. “Check it out: Make your own slime!” Avery shouted. “Let's go, Iz. It's kinda like an art project.” The two girls took off to a nearby booth, which boasted that each girl could create her own custom made slime…with different colors and textures.

Katani took one look at the slime stand and her face turned pale. “No way is any kind of slime juice getting near this scarf,” she vowed to Charlotte. “This material is 100 percent silk!”

“Fine by me,” Maeve agreed, nervously brushing off her soft pink blazer.

“And me. I do not have a good track record with slimy stuff,” Charlotte added. She scanned the scene around them and pointed at a booth. “Hey, look! A solar car display.”

Sam started jumping up and down. “Solar cars are sweet, man!”

He may be smart, but he probably doesn't know what solar cars are.
Maeve sniffed. She was miffed that Sam wasn't paying any attention to her at all. Suddenly, Charlotte was his favorite person in the world.

“That looks interesting,” Katani agreed. In Maeve's opinion, electricity meant math, and math equaled total yawn-fest, but at least at the solar booth thingy she wouldn't get any slime on her clothes.

The girls and Sam walked over to the booth, where a girl
with white-blonde hair was explaining what the big block sitting next to her was: a hydrogen cell that could power a car. “That's the H in H
₂
O,” she told them. “Hydrogen is like the most abundant gas in the universe. In a process called fusion, two hydrogen atoms combine to form one helium atom, releasing energy as radiation. And best of all, enviro-fans—it's totally nonpolluting. Right now, it's expensive, but there are smart folks working on a hydrogen car that's more affordable.

“And now, the moment you've all been waiting for!” The girl whipped a black silk scarf off a small, shiny model sports car. The crowd oohed and ahhhed as the car drove around and around in a circle.

“This car is a hydromobile,” the blonde girl explained.

“Gotta love the style,” Maeve whispered to Katani and Charlotte.

“You know,” Charlotte began, “my dad promised that if we buy a new car in a few months it will be a hybrid—a combo of electric and gas engines. I don't want to be driving a gas guzzler.”

“A pink car,” Maeve added and sighed. “All cars should be pink.”

“Hey, what's that big crowd over there for?” asked Katani.

Indeed, a huge mass had formed at the booth beside them, and at the front Charlotte noticed something that nearly made her eyes pop out of her head. “You guys, it's—it's about
stars
! Meet a real live astronaut! I gotta—”

And with that, she was off, with Sam in tow. “I want to meet a real live astronaut too!” he shouted.

“C'mon, c'mon!” She laughed, eager to have her pint-sized partner in crime by her side.

“Take care of Sam!” Maeve shouted after Charlotte. Charlotte gave her a thumbs up as she swung Sam's hand into the air.

Maeve and Katani could barely keep up as Charlotte and Sam made their way through the crowd with the type of frenzy the girls had only seen Avery use during an intense game of basketball.

“A real astronaut!” Even Maeve was excited.