Too Cool for This School (24 page)

“Jagger will want to help,” Todd went on. “For sure.”

“Right,” I said slowly.

“I bet it’s going to be huge,” Todd said. “I mean, we need to invite the whole class. And maybe some of the seventh and eighth graders. Will you invite the other class captains?”

“Um … that’s a lot of people,” I said. “I’ll have to check with my mom.”
Check with my mom?
What was I doing? I wasn’t supposed to be planning a party for Mint. I was supposed to be telling Todd how I really felt about everything.

“Her favorite dessert is Boston cream pie,” Todd said.

How does he know that? Does he know my favorite dessert?
Staring into his soft brown eyes made my heartbeat speed up. He needed to stop thinking about Mint. He needed to start
thinking about us. This was up to me. It was time for me to tell Todd that Mint was actually an evil and manipulative person who didn’t care about anybody but herself. I wrung my hands. I put them in my pockets and took them out of my pockets.

“What’s wrong?” Todd asked me.

I took a deep breath. “Mint is not who you think she is.”

Upon hearing this, Todd’s face made three different expressions. First, surprise. Second, suspicion. Third, confusion. He glanced at the glacier sketch Kimmie had given him.

“What do you mean?” he asked.

I thought it was a good sign that he wanted me to elaborate.

“I mean that Mint is a fraud,” I explained.

He kept looking at the glacier diagram. “Huh?”

“She wants everybody to think that she’s super cool and interesting, but she’s actually really weird. I mean, she took a taxi from the airport and she ended up flirting with the cabdriver the whole way to my house.”

“Really?” Todd asked. He looked like he didn’t believe me.

“Diego,” I said. “She’s still writing about him in her journal.”

“Are you sure?” Todd asked.

“Yeah,” I said. “And she’s destroyed some of my clothes while she’s been here.”

“How?” Todd asked.

“She trashes them with paint,” I said.

Todd nodded. “Yeah, but they still look cool.”

What a rotten thing to say to me. They did not still look cool.

“You shouldn’t try to defend her,” I said. “She has a very evil other side.”

“It’s just so hard to believe,” Todd said.

What was so hard about believing it? “Well, Mint acts a lot nicer than she actually is.”

Then Todd did something terrible. He squinted at me like he doubted what I was telling him. We had such a long history together. How could he doubt me?

“Did Ava tell you to tell me this? Is this about Jagger?” Todd asked.

I was floored. How could Todd even think that?

“Ava threw up four times yesterday and I haven’t even talked to her,” I said. The words raced out of me. Only after I saw Todd’s face flood with disgust did I realize maybe I shouldn’t have told him about Ava’s vomit issues.

“Gross,” Todd said.

That word was tough to hear, because it basically meant that he thought Ava was gross and Mint was cool. That wasn’t what I wanted him to think at all. “Forget what I said about Ava throwing up,” I said.

“I’ll try,” Todd said.

I took another deep breath. “Ava didn’t send me to talk with you. It’s just, I don’t know. Ever since Mint showed up, everything has changed.”

Todd looked at me as if he wanted me to explain more. So I did.

“Everybody talks about her,” I said.

“She’s interesting,” Todd replied.

Gag.

“Maybe. But stuff changed between us too. I don’t see you as much anymore,” I said.

“What do you mean?” Todd asked. “I feel like I see you now more than ever. I mean, I get to hang out at your house and make props.”

He was missing the bigger picture. “Not with me. You make props with Mint and you also play that dwarf game with her.”

“We were assigned to be in the same group,” Todd said.

“But she’s leaving! She shouldn’t have even been assigned to a group. Her grades don’t even matter.” But I stopped talking before I revealed more.

“Wow,” Todd said. “You’re really upset.”

I was beyond upset. And it was clear to me that I wasn’t going to be able to change Todd’s mind about Mint. So I moved on to the next thing I wanted to talk about with him.

“So are we going out or what?” I asked.

“What?” Todd asked. “What are you talking about?”

“Don’t act like you don’t know what I’m talking about,” I said. “Are we going out?”

“I asked you if you wanted to go out at the end of summer and you said you didn’t want to be official,” Todd said.

Regret tumbled through me. I’d just been nervous. That wasn’t how I really felt. “I don’t think those were my exact words.”

“Lunch is going to end. Let’s go eat and talk about this later,” Todd said.

Things felt very unsettled, but I didn’t want to pressure him any more.

“Okay. I need to get my wallet,” I said. I’d left my lunch money in my desk.

“I’ll save you a place in line,” Todd said.

Cool. If he was saving me a place, it meant I hadn’t freaked him out.

And that was when I went back into Mr. Guzman’s classroom and saw Ava.

“You’re feeling better!” I cheered as I raced toward her.

I didn’t even realize she was standing at the wrong desk. I didn’t realize that until she said, “Shhh. I’ve got four more desks to go, and I’ve got to finish before Mr. Guzman comes back.”

“Finish what?” I asked.

That was when I saw the notes. They had our classmates’ names written on them. Uh-oh. Did Ava write crazy mean notes about Mint to our entire class? That would probably be a mistake, because, as unbelievable as it was, our class really seemed to like Mint.

“You probably shouldn’t be doing that,” I said as I watched Ava stick a note inside Jagger’s desk.

“People need to know,” Ava said. “They need to understand what a mean, judgmental dweeb your cousin is.”

Complaining to Todd about Mint was one thing, but notifying our entire class in writing seemed extreme.
I saw that the last note Ava put inside somebody’s desk had Mint’s handwriting on it. The only time I’d ever seen Mint’s handwriting was in her diary. Were those notes from her diary?

“What are these from?” I asked.

Had Ava broken into my house when I was at school? That was totally crazy. Was Ava totally crazy?

“Her diary. When I was over at your house for our three-way call, I took pictures of some pages with my phone. I printed out the best sections and voilà! I’m ruining Mint’s life.”

“Ava! What do they say?” I asked.

I hadn’t read Mint’s journal, but I sort of thought Ava should describe the contents of the messages right now. I should know what she stuffed in our classmates’ desks.

“I used the pages where she says stuff about people in our class and Mr. Guzman and Diego to create a collage!”

I blinked a lot. Like maybe if I did it enough I could blink away reality and turn this all into a dream. Of course, that didn’t happen.

“This is a bad idea,” I said.

“Maybe,” Ava said. “But I didn’t ask for Mint to come to Santa Fe and wreck my life. And it’s only fair that I wreck hers.”

“Let’s think this over,” I said. Yes, Mint had come to Santa Fe. And somewhere in her inability to blend she’d stolen that light that usually glowed above Ava. But was that light really supposed to glow all the time? Was it possible
to share the light? Should you really destroy somebody for just being such a weird and unique person that they wind up on the news and go viral?

And then Mr. Guzman walked into the room.

“Well, it’s too late now,” Ava said.

“You shouldn’t be in here during lunch,” Mr. Guzman said.

“I forgot my money,” I said.

“Mr. Guzman!” a voice yelled. “The water fountain won’t shut off. It’s like a monsoon! Come quick!”

Mr. Guzman hurried out. And it was as if I’d been given a gift. I lifted up Todd’s desktop and grabbed a note. As quickly as I could, I unfolded it and saw that at the top there was a title:
Here Is What Mint REALLY Thinks of Us
. Then there was a list of quotes in Mint’s handwriting. The one with my name in it caught my eye.

“I have a great sense of humor,” I said.

But Ava didn’t want to listen to me defend myself against Mint’s stolen diary quotes.

“Leave it,” she said, grabbing the list from me and shoving it back in Todd’s desk.

“Ava,” I said. “Give that back to me.”

“No.” She climbed onto Todd’s chair and sat on his desk. “He deserves to know what your awful cousin thinks.”

Did he? Did Todd need to know what else Mint wrote
in her diary about him? Did I need to know what else Mint wrote about me? I didn’t think so. As much as I hated my cousin right now, it felt as if Ava had crossed a line.

“I don’t even recognize you,” Ava said.

“I don’t recognize
you
,” I said.

“Girls. You can’t be in here during lunch.” Mr. Guzman entered the classroom again and flashed the lights on and off.

And so I walked out of the room.

What did she say about everyone else?

All I knew was that people were going to be hurt and lives were going to be changed. And there was nothing I could do.

23

My life as I knew it was ending. And so was Mint’s. Things began falling apart right after lunch. Tuma approached me. And he looked upset.

“Is it true
that your cousin
is leaving to go back to Alaska?” he asked. His face was pink and pinched with anger.

“Yeah,” I said.

“Good!” he said. Then he stomped off to his desk.

He knew. Tuma had read the insult list. I sat at my own desk and held my breath. It was only a matter of minutes. Maybe even seconds. I picked up my Algebra Readiness book and held it close to me.

“Lane,” Lucia whispered in a voice way too loud to be a whisper. “Lane.”

I didn’t know what to do. Why should I have to deal
with any of this? With my Algebra book still in my arms, I jumped up and hurried over to Ms. Fritz.

“I really need to go to the bathroom,” I said. Normally, I would have phrased that differently. I would have simply asked for a bathroom pass. But the pressure had gotten to me.

“Let me get you a pass,” she said.

But I didn’t even wait for one. I just ran out of there.

“Lane!” somebody called behind me. I looked. It was Lucia. But I didn’t stop. I sped down the hallway past an open classroom door. Derek waved as I raced by.

“Lane!” Lucia called again.

Her sneakers squeaked as she chased me. Then I heard the sound of another pair of shoes. I turned around. Now I was being chased by Lucia and Derek. I sped up. When I reached a door that led outside, I burst through it. Once daylight hit me, I paused. Because where was I going to go?

“Lane!” Lucia said as she pushed the door open. “Stop.”

Derek was there too. All three of us stood outside the building staring at each other.

“Did Mint really write these things?” Lucia asked me, her voice filled with anger.

The bright sunlight continued to pound me. “Um,” I said.

“Tell me!” Lucia said.

“Calm down,” I said.

“Your friend is really hyper,” Derek said.

Why was he even here? I mean, he really did not belong in this picture.

“Derek,” I said. “You should go back to class.”

“First tell me what’s going on,” he said. “Is this about the flash mob?”

An hour ago my life had problems, but they were simple. My cousin was in a flash mob and I hated her but she was leaving town soon so it didn’t really matter all that much. Now my problems were much more complicated.

“No,” I said.

“I really want to talk to you alone,” Lucia said.

She was right. “Derek,” I said, gently touching his elbow. “This is private.”

He seemed a little hurt when I said that. “So you only want my help when you’re desperate?” he asked.

He seemed pretty upset, and that surprised me. “I didn’t mean it
that
way,” I said, trying to sound as kind as possible. “But this isn’t about you.”