Pride & Princesses (42 page)

    
It was true.

    
I waved to Trey when he was washing the car that weekend and he waved back but it just wasn’t the same. I’d have to start mentally preparing a proper apology. Perhaps I’d even write it down. I could list it in the
Sunrise News
if Mouche could even be bothered reading it. Maybe it would be better to put it in her letterbox, personalize it like in the good old days. Hopefully, Mouche would listen.

    
Let’s face it, my friendship with Mouche seemed just as important as winning the game, maybe even more so.

    
Then something happened which changed everything and forced us all to talk again on the day Miss Love and Mr Frames tied the knot.

Chapter 26

The Wedding

   
Mouche and I were silent junior bridesmaids. It was a beautiful, solemn but joyous occasion, just as a wedding should be. They had a great band playing memorable songs and beautiful flowers adorning the aisles with garlands to decorate the reception tables afterwards.

    
What was left of the brief fall we’d had led to a slight layer of orange crunch covering the ground and an even briefer winter which had left the slightest amount of snow. The first time it had snowed in Sunrise in thirty years, according to Mark’s aunt. The whole town was there, practically the entire school and all the parents of the Sunrise Parents and Teachers Association gathered in synchronicity. It was just the Princesses and Mouche and I who seemed to have some socialization issues. We were dressed (to add to Mouche’s disgust) in pink. I liked the dresses, and I heard Mouche grudgingly admit to Teegan once she had hers properly fitted, that she liked them too.
 

   
By the day of the wedding we had consolidated the dates. After the play, the mix-ups and the dates, came the joining of two like souls in Holy Matrimony. We all had little notes in our inboxes and final drafts of the content of the blog, which was yet to be published on the internet. We still hadn’t had our final group meeting, because none of us were talking.

    
At the reception that followed Mr Frames’ marriage to Miss Love, Jet couldn’t take his eyes off Mouche as she sat at her table between Mark and Jet. How was it she had managed not to come between those two friends? Were the boys actually more mature than the girls or was it just that they’d never let a petty emotion like jealousy get in the way of enjoying life? I think probably the latter.

    
Mark looked at me then smiled and walked over to speak.

    
‘Phoebe, I’m so sorry about what happened...backstage and all that. Seems like I spend half my life apologising to you.’

    
‘Mmm...seems like it.’ I wasn’t convinced.

     
Suddenly Joel appeared like my knight in shining armour.

     
Mark scowled at him, turned and walked over to Mouche, then asked her to dance.

     
Typical.

    
‘Phoebe Harris I missed you more than words can say,’ Joel said.

     
I wanted to laugh. I didn’t believe a word Joel said and if he hadn’t taken my hand before I stood up I would never have danced with him.

    
‘I’m sure you had far too much to do in New York to think about me...’

    
‘I emailed you hundreds of times,’ Joel said in a mocking way.

    
‘That, I find hard to believe, since I only have two emails. It was quite thrilling to hear all about your travels. I didn’t think you’d be back here in a hurry.’ I said sarcastically.

      
Joel seemed to sense I knew something about his past that he hadn’t told me, like what an irresponsible individual he’d been, lying to me and manipulating all the people in his path, including Mark’s sister.

     
‘I couldn’t miss the entire semester. Besides, Miss Love was almost totally responsible for giving me a glowing reference that encouraged the Deputy Principal to re-think my exclusion from school...so here I am...’

    
‘Here you are,’ I said absently, searching the room for Mark.

    
Joel took my hands in his. They were surprisingly warm and not at all clammy which had to mean he had many good qualities yet to be discovered. I figured I’d let someone else discover them.

    
I glanced around the room as we danced. The Sunrise Hall was decked out in strobe light splendour. As the dinner dishes were being cleared, dessert was served, mood music began to play and the night wore on.

     
Teegan brought her date, Jack Adams, the film buff. They’d somehow hit it off in the back of the projection room with Teegan taking ‘our rules’ very seriously, playing hard to get, then finally relenting and letting him know she was interested in him. Jack seemed to like her approach and gave her a box of Coco Mademoiselle perfume for her birthday. Dutifully, she added it to the holding locker which was now crammed full of surprises, as well as a diary filled to the brim with notes due to be uploaded onto our anonymous site.
   

   
Tory was with Tom Allen and his Blackberry which he had switched on to silent. He was checking shares for the stock club, which had dwindled dramatically in popularity but Tory had followed every rule in our guide and all of them had worked out brilliantly with Tom. He wasn’t very generous at first. But by the third date, he presented her with his sister’s ice-skates, unopened, left lying in a box after she’d abandoned them and gone to
 
prep school in upstate New York.
 
Their date was at the Sunrise ice-rink and very romantic, according to Tory, who seemed to have all but forgotten about Mark Knightly. Don’t ask me why. ‘Anyway those ice-skates will be perfect for skating in winter at the Rockefeller centre,’ Tory said wistfully as she placed the new white skates next to a previously gifted pair.

   
Brooke wore a somewhat sullen expression underneath her apricot winter hat and had straightened her curls in honour of the day. She’d managed to take Peter Williamson for a weekend with her and her very wealthy parents to one of the lake resorts (where they occupied separate wings because there was no way either Peter’s or Brooke’s parents would have considered any other arrangement) even though Brooke desperately tried to pull off more than rule one ‘the kiss,’ and didn’t even achieve that. However, to thank Brooke for her hospitality, Peter had very sweetly insisted on buying Brooke the sunglasses she’d admired in the resort gift shop window.
 
They weren’t exactly Chanel but they were the latest style and we arranged them nicely on the top shelf of our now bulging treasure chest.

   
Freya had arranged to go to an art gallery opening with Josh Klein who spent the entire evening talking about his passion for playing the violin and why he loved the early works of Picasso. Freya was so surprised by how much he knew about the world of life and art that she had bypassed rules one to three and gone straight to collecting proof (in the form of an old-fashioned photo booth – she had resorted to kissing Josh in there before he’d had any chance to protest) and had even forgotten about collecting a ‘gift’ for our treasure chest.
 
It was good that he had agreed to accompany her to the wedding.

   
‘He didn’t freak out like
Mrs Jones’ Guide
suggested he might’ Freya said.
 
He had, of course, loaned her his mother’s cashmere coat and it would be at least six months before Mrs Klein missed this particular item from her extensive wardrobe. Freya didn’t ask questions once she had claimed her prey.

   
None of them (that we knew) had secured Mark for the prom and we had, in fact, heard that he was due back in London for the holidays. He was going with Mouche - or not at all. We weren’t surprised to notice him ignore us or to see Jet glance lovingly at Mouche as our teachers said their traditional vows.
   

   
Wednesday had come along because Miss Love desperately needed a flower girl and all the children she taught were teenagers and Wednesday was happy to be dressed like a little princess in crown and ‘diamonds’ for the day. She currently sat under the table with the page boy (Miss Tartt’s nephew, Timmy) playing pick-up sticks.

    
My cousin Ella and Mouche’s cousin Katie made a brief appearance. Ella resumed a conversation with Joel (whom she had met in the local candy store just hours after he’d arrived back from the airport). If I’d been paying more attention, I probably would have noticed Ella flirting with Joel, but I was busily finishing dessert and wondering how best to approach Mouche again by then.
 
 

   
Now that the Princesses were playing by their own rules their dates had gone surprisingly well. The boys seemed flattered and thrilled that these girls had taken the initiative to ask them out and who could have predicted their basically generous natures would rub off on the Princesses.

   
Let’s face it, love was making everyone kinder.

   
Except, of course, Mouche and me and Jet and Mark.

   
We were all more confused than ever.

  
And there was Petra. She may have been too young for a serious boyfriend, but she would certainly benefit from the company of good friends. Instead of socializing she arrived late and sat isolated in a corner. I found her a seat at my table for the entree (delicious lobster mornay and crunchy bread and butter with tomato soup – very exotic) which cheered her up no end and had her looking quite full and happy. I think me and Mouche (if our friendship survives this impasse which I am sure it will) will adopt Petra as our next (and slightly younger) best friend and give her the benefit of all our good advice. That’s if we ever talk to each other again.

   
Petra told us she is transferring to Sunrise next semester and I have my eye on a sophomore called Josh for her. Actually, he’s sitting in the corner over there and I think I see him heading this way. Mouche coached him for a Big Sister program our school took part in last year.

   
The lights were dimmed, the strobe turned to dimmer. The band played softly, and the lead guitarist took a swig of spiked soda.
 
Guests drifted off the dance floor, couple by couple. Minutes passed. My favourite song played in the half light.

    
Suddenly Mark was at my side. He cut in and took me by the arm and said, ‘please come with me outside. I need to speak to you.’

    
Joel seemed to disappear the way he’d arrived, quickly.

    
Tory mouthed ‘go for it,’ since we weren’t sitting with the Princesses anymore (obviously) and she was intently conversing with Petra.

   
‘Was I just one of your little...trick dates?’

   
‘Excuse me?’

   
‘Tory told me about a...diary’