Stitches and Stones (2 page)

Zoey glanced at her friends to see if they'd noticed. Kate's brow was furrowed, but that could be because she was concentrating so hard on trying to imitate Priti. But Libby caught Zoey's eye and gave her a
What is going on down there?
look.

Priti obviously heard it because she danced over to the sound dock and turned up the volume—loud. The kind of volume that would have Zoey's dad shouting at her to turn it down before she made him and Marcus deaf. But the weird thing was, Priti just went on with the routine, as if nothing out of the ordinary were happening. Zoey wondered why Priti wasn't saying anything and what was going on with her friend's parents. She'd never heard them shout at each other like that before.

But no one would guess from Priti's smile that anything was wrong.

“Come on, you guys! Let's do it again,” she said, as bubbly and energetic as ever.

They practiced the routine until Mrs. Mackey came to pick up Kate, Zoey, and Libby, and Zoey thought if she heard that song one more time, she might wake up in the middle of the night
sleepdancing. Zoey noticed that on the way out of the Holbrooke house, Priti's parents were nowhere in sight.

“See you tomorrow,” Priti called from the doorstep. She waved to them until they were out of view.

“I wonder what all that shouting was about,” Libby said. “I felt really awkward.”

“I know,” Kate said. “And Priti was acting weird.”

“What happened?” Mrs. Mackey asked.

Kate paused. “Well, Priti's parents were arguing about something. It was pretty loud, but Priti acted like nothing was wrong, so I didn't want to ask.”

“Me neither,” added Zoey. “I didn't know what to say.”

“Maybe she was embarrassed or felt like it was private family business,” Mrs. Mackey said.

Zoey could understand that. But the more she thought about it, the more she realized that despite Priti's upbeat attitude, she
had
been acting differently recently.

“Have you noticed that when we make plans, Priti's been trying to go to our houses instead of hers?” she asked Libby and Kate. “I mean, today we
went to her house because of her mom's hat collection, but . . .”

“Now that I think about it, you're right,” Libby agreed. “Remember a few weeks ago? We were supposed to go to her house, because her mom was making new recipes for her Indian food blog and we were asked to be taste testers, and then all of a sudden she wanted to go to your house instead?”

“Oh yeah. . . .” Kate nodded. “And we were going to sleep over last weekend, and then for some reason Priti wanted to do it at my house.”

“I wonder if it has anything to do with the big fight we heard today,” Zoey mused.

“The best way to support Priti is by not letting your imaginations run wild with things that
might
be happening and be there for her when she's ready to talk about whatever
is
going on,” Mrs. Mackey advised, glancing at the girls in the rearview mirror.

Zoey was determined to be there with a listening ear whenever Priti decided she wanted to talk. But in the meantime she had an outfit to finalize for the first day of Spirit Week!

Hang On to Your Hats!

Thanks to the British love of millinery—or the making of hats—my friends and I are starting off Spirit Week with the best outfits ever! You might be wondering why I'm not making hats myself. . . . Well, Priti's mom's hats were just too good to pass up.

Priti has a gorgeous navy-blue wide-brimmed hat made out of sinamay, which is a kind of straw, with a huge cream-colored flower decoration. She's going to wear it with a navy-blue skirt she's borrowing from her sister Sashi and a white chiffon top. Kate is wearing this totally adorable and perfectly pink cloche. The word “cloche” means “bell” in French, and it has a simple shape of a bell that looks great on her. We even managed to persuade her (well, by persuade I kind of mean ordered her) to not wear it with jeans. We cobbled together an outfit with Sashi and Tara's help (as in, they let Kate borrow some clothes). Priti is lucky to have not just one but two older sisters whose closets she can raid. Somehow I never feel the urge to go “shopping” in Marcus's closet! Wait—I totally wore his old shoes to school this year. Nevermind!

Libby and I fell in love with the same hats: An awesome fascinator that looks like an orchid and the cutest retro pillbox hat with a veil, so we are going to share. Libby and I were video chatting constantly last night, checking out different combinations of outfits to match. It's kind of like playing a clothing slot machine—mixing and matching shirts and skirts and shoes until
the winning combination falls into place.

Ding, ding, ding!

And the winner is: still my tulle skirt, because luckily it goes well with everything. I had to try on fifteen different tops to figure out which one would work, and finally I settled on a pale green shirt that picks up the color of the orchid's stem but still looks good with the pillbox hat. Libby is going to wear a yellow skirt and a cream-colored shirt.

I can't wait to see what hats all the other kids are wearing. I wonder if our teachers will wear hats too? After all, it is Spirit Week!

I just hope I don't end up with hat hair. That's the only thing I don't like about hats. But everything else I
love
!

Mapleton Prep was a sea of hats when Kate and Zoey got off the bus on Monday morning.

“Look at Thomas! He's got one of those aviator hats with the goggles, like Amelia Earhart had. Cool!” Kate exclaimed.

“And what about Nicole! She's got a real
fireman's hat,” Zoey said, pointing.

“You mean fire
woman
,” Kate corrected, giggling.

“You're right, I do,” Zoey said.

Much to Zoey's amazement, even Mr. Dunn, her social studies teacher, got in on the fun. He was wearing a multicolored beanie with a propeller on the top, and he announced to the class it was his geek hat.

“I'm a geek, and I'm proud of it,” he said. “The geeks shall inherit the earth.”

Zoey liked the sound of that. Go, geeks! She never thought Mr. Dunn would get into the spirit for Hat Day. Maybe he wasn't as tough as he seemed!

“And now put your books and notes away, because geeks should always be prepared for a pop quiz,” Mr. Dunn said.

Zoey took it back. On second thought, maybe Mr. Dunn
was
as tough as he seemed!

Her English teacher was sporting a fedora, worn with an oversized jacket and slim dark jeans. Zoey loved everything about English class, except one of her least favorite people was in it—Ivy Wallace.

“Nice hat,” Ivy said when Zoey passed by on her way to her desk.

Zoey was about to offer a surprised “thanks” when Ivy added, “Too bad you had to wear it with that outfit. What are you, six years old, wearing a tutu to school?”

It was hard to ignore Ivy's comments, but Zoey knew Ivy's goal was to see Zoey upset, so she just kept walking till she got to her seat.

“Wow, cool hat!” said her friend Gabe Monaco.

Zoey smiled. Ignoring Ivy just got easier. Gabe was wearing a shiny black top hat, like the guy on the lid of the Monopoly box. The hat sat on top of his brown curls, and Zoey secretly thought it looked kind of adorable on him.

“I love your hat too,” she said. “It looks like it could be in a museum.”

“It probably could be in a museum,” Gabe admitted. “It was my great-grandfather's. Mom had it in a trunk up in the attic. She even had Grandpa's formal tuxedo.”

“You should have worn it! It would have been awesome.”

“I thought about it,” Gabe said. “But I wasn't sure how into it people were going to get, and I didn't want to be
that guy
who came to school totally overdressed.”

Zoey liked that Gabe was enthusiastic about getting dressed up for Spirit Week. When she looked over at Lorenzo Romy, her on-again, off-again crush, he had barely made any effort at all. Okay, he
was
wearing a hat, but it was just a regular old baseball cap, and he had it turned backward, just like he normally would. Nothing in the least bit special or spirited about it.

For today, at least, she figured that crush was off again.

All students were required to take off their hats for class, anyway, which was good because Gabe's top hat was kind of an obstruction to Zoey's field of vision. She was worried she might have hat hair, until she remembered today was Hat Hair Day as much as it was Hat Day. If she had hat hair, everyone would.

She talked to Kate and Priti in the hall on the way to gym. “Looking good!” she said.

“You too!” Priti said. “I just wish we didn't have to take off our hats for every class.”

“Well, I have gym next,” Zoey said. “I can't imagine playing basketball with a veil. I'm bad enough at scoring
without
something blocking my vision!”

Kate and Priti laughed.

“Just keep your eyes on the ball,” Kate said, giving Zoey a hug. “And have fun. I wish I had gym now!”

“You wish you had gym all day!” Priti chuckled.

“Ha-ha. Good one, Priti! See you at lunch, guys,” Zoey said. She didn't have the heart to tell Kate that gym was her
least
favorite class of the day. Zoey's father was a physical therapist for Eastern State University's athletics teams, so she kind of liked watching sports. She had to! But gym class was another story.

Zoey arrived at the locker room and placed the pillbox hat on a nearby bench while she changed into her gym clothes. She could hear Ivy and her friends Shannon Chang and Bree Sharpe in the next row of lockers. They were singing a song Zoey had heard
everywhere lately called “Get Your Cool On.” It was simple but catchy, and starting to grow on her.

“We're going to rock it on Friday!” Shannon said enthusiastically.

“You better,” Ivy replied coldly, then added a halfhearted, “Just kidding!”

The song was okay but still not Zoey's favorite.
Well, it's perfect for them,
Zoey thought as she stuffed her backpack into her locker and hung her clothes on the hook inside. That's when Zoey felt a tap on her shoulder. She turned around.

“Hey,” said Bree. “You forgot your hat.”

Zoey was confused. “Um, thanks?” she said, watching in awe as Bree placed Zoey's hat in her locker for her.
That's weird,
Zoey thought.
Why is Bree being nice to me?

Then the bell rang and it was time to go to the basketball court. Zoey tried to follow Kate's advice and just have fun, but it seemed like Ivy was making a lot of intentional fouls on her—and the teacher didn't see any of them. Another typical day in gym class . . .

When gym was over, Zoey changed back into
her regular clothes and headed to lunch. She was too hot and sweaty to put her hat back on. Zoey shuddered at the thought of having to return Mrs. Holbrooke's ladylike hat with post-gym sweat stains on it after she'd made the girls swear to keep the hats in perfect condition. Besides, she and Libby were going to switch hats at lunch in a few minutes, and Libby probably wouldn't appreciate a sweaty hat either. Yuck!

In the cafeteria, Zoey sat down next to Priti, set her hat down on the lunch table, and pulled out her lunch bag.

“What's for lunch?” Zoey asked Priti.

“
Saag paneer
calzone, I think,” Priti answered, eyeing her lunch suspiciously. “My mom's been trying some hybrid recipes for her food blog, and I'm the guinea pig. Last night we had lamb burritos with naan instead of tortillas for dinner. ”

“Lucky you!” Zoey said, then pointed at the calzone. “Wanna trade? I have a chicken sandwich with kale, peppers, and zucchini. My dad says it's fuel. For my brain. You know how he is. Actually, it's pretty yummy, but I love your mom's cooking.”