by Jim Benton
of the day on the couch like a classic person.
He hadn’t read all of them, but he said he
really liked the movie
The Three Musketeers
, so
maybe that book would be a good choice.
39
Dad told me that
The Three Musketeers
are
these French guys with fancy hats and swords that
save the day or something. Mom joined in and said
it might be a good book for me because Isabella,
Angeline, and I are like three musketeers. The
thought of slashing swords around with those two
both delighted and terrified me.
But then Dad added that
The Three
Musketeers
were more like four musketeers,
because a lot of the story revolves around a fourth
guy that kind of joins up with the first three. He said
that the fourth guy really made them complete,
and even saved their lives from a shark. But then he
said the shark might have been in another movie
he saw, so it’s hard to tell just how much of any of
this he had right. And then he went back to sleep on
the couch. (Looks like screamy kid and TV aren’t the
only ones with attention -span issues.)
40
But my dad’s pointless jabbering made me
think of something: The band I saw on TV had four
people in it. That goes for most other bands, too.
And it’s not just bands, either. Tennis never
has three on a team. Ping-Pong never has three on
a team. Crime-fighting superheroes never work in
threes. You never see, like, Batman and Robin and
Steve. You just know that Steve would get in the
way and be all like, “Hey, what’s this thing do? Can
I drive the Batmobile? Maybe the Joker isn’t such a
bad guy — did you ever try to get to know him? HI,
JOKER! WE’RE OVER HERE!”
I think I know what I must do.
I have a plan.
Like most plans, it has two phases. Phase
One, or outer phase, which is like the frosting,
and Phase Two, which is the inner phase, like
the cake. That reminds me — I didn’t do math
homework with Isabella like she wanted. It might
seem strange that this made me think of Isabella,
but experience has taught me that wheresoever
there is frosting, soon shall there also be Isabella.
41
Monday 09
Dear Dumb Diary,
Today I dropped the idea on Isabella of
forming a band for the Talent Show. She didn’t hate
it. And that was a critical moment in my plan.
I even said we should include Angeline because
my psychic powers told me that if I didn’t , they
might go and do Isabella’s magic act without me,
which Isabella said out loud at the exact same time
as my powers said it.
(Honestly. My psychic powers would be a lot
more impressive if people would allow enough time
for them to occur before they said things.)
42
Handling Isabella is like handling a
rattlesnake. Except that a real rattlesnake won’t
explode when you least expect it and blurt out some
sort of embarrassing thing that it knows you did,
like kissing a magazine cover until you got printer’s
ink all over your lips and you had to use dishwashing
liquid to get it off. Not that I ever did that. Or ever
will again.
Also, a rattlesnake won’t sit on you and let
just a little drool dribble out of its mouth and then
suck it back up at the last moment. It’s weird to
think that my BFF has done things to me that are
beneath a rattlesnake.
Anyway, handling Isabella is tricky, and
nobody but me has even the slightest hope of doing
it. Observe:
“But,” I went on, “you might rather do
the magic act. Magic is cool,” I said. “Probably the
coolest.”
That was the bait. I crossed my fingers and
waited.
43
“It’s not the coolest,” Isabella said. I
knew that her undeniable expertness on coolness
would come through. “A band would be the
coolest.”
“But you and I can’t play anything,” I said,
crossing my fingers even harder. I tried crossing my
toes. I think I may have crossed my organs. If the
rattlesnake was going to explode, or sit on me and
drool, this was the moment.
44
And that’s where I left it. A less experienced
Isabella-Handler might try to close the deal right
then and there, but you have to be patient. If you
try too hard to sell Isabella on something, she
starts to get suspicious and might make you eat
it without even taking it out of the box, like I’ve
seen her do to Girl Scouts trying a little too hard
to sell her cookies, and once with a second grader
selling stuff for a class fund -raiser. ( Science
Note: you can get a roll of wrapping paper about a
foot deep into a kid’s mouth.)
45
By lunchtime, I saw that Phase One (the
frosting phase) was complete. Isabella was telling
Angeline about our band as if it had been her idea
all along. Angeline, being profoundly crippled with
Permanent Good Attitude, is unable
to respond to any idea in any way other than
positively.
“We’ll just pretend to play the instruments.
And we’ll pretend to sing. You know, like
lip- synching,” Isabella explained.
“That will be so funny!”
Angeline said.
I saw the whole plan begin to crumble.
FUNNY was not going to work for Isabella, and
Angeline knew it.
I had to think fast. “You bet it will
be funny,” I said. “We’ll fool every body into
thinking it’s us playing and singing. We’ll
totally trick everybody. You’re right, Angeline —
funny.” Then I said it again all stretched out:
“FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUH - NEE.”
46
47
I could have gone longer than that, but was
worried that if I stretched out my UUUH a few
U
s too
many, Isabella would know I was up to something.
She can be very perceptive when it comes to
trickery.
In that moment, I can imagine what was
going on in
Angeline’s head. Part of her head wanted
to object to the trickery of it. The rest of her head
was devoted to full- time hair manufacturing. But
another part, a beensy- teensy part of her
head, really
liked
the idea of being up onstage as
part of a band. What’s cooler than people thinking
you can rock out on a guitar?
“Yeah,” she finally said. “Funny.”
“Yeah,” Isabella said. “Everyone will be
totally fooled.”
“Yeah,” I said in an extremely casual and
offhand kind of way. “Now I’ll have some aud
itions
for another band member.”
“Another band member?” Isabella repeated,
narrowing her eyes at me. I swear I heard a
rattlesnake ticking.
Leave it to Angeline to play snake charmer. I
guess Blondy bought the whole idea. “Makes sense
to me,”
Angeline said. “It will look more like a real
band with more performers.”
Looking more like a real band meant fooling
more people . This clearly pleased Isabella’s wicked
side, which is pretty much both her sides.
She nodded, and now Phase Two (the cake
phase) was in motion.
48
49
50
Tuesday 10
Dear Dumb Diary,
I posted some flyers for band auditions
today. Even with the handicap of not having glitter
on them, I’m pretty sure they’ll work. I couldn’t
really write GIRLS ONLY on the flyers, because I
think it would be wrong to discriminate against the
boy species without doing it secretly. So they say
things like, “Fashion sense a must” and “High heel
skills a plus” and “Should be able to sing prettily in
a very high pretty voice.”
51
Glitter would have helped the flyers, of
course — there are few things it doesn’t help —but
I needed to save my full glitter assortment for my
art project.
When I got home from school today, I spent
several hours deciding what kind of art masterpiece
I wanted to create. I was so happy to have put my
Talent Show plan in motion that I just arted all
over the place.
Even the combined repulsiveness of Stinker
and his dogdaughter didn’t distract me. They
seemed content to sit there and watch me work and
smell bad.
You understand, of course, that I meant that
they smell bad, not me. I smell delicious: like
glitter and a plan coming together.
52
53
54
Wednesday 11
Dear Dumb Diary,
Okay. See, if I owned the Universe — and
maybe I should, I don’t know, it’s not up to me —
when a person went to the bathroom, the rest of
the Universe would politely wait until she got back
before it did something stupid.
Today in art, Miss Anderson gave us one of
her favorite assignments: Drawing portraits of each
other during class. We were split up into pairs and
had one class period to complete the portrait.
This is a classic art assignment of Miss
Anderson’s that helps us develop quick, confident
drawing skills. It also permits Miss Anderson to talk
to her new boyfriend on her cell phone for forty
minutes. We’ve done this many, many times and
everybody knows that Isabella and I ALWAYS
pair up.
You put peanut butter with jelly, bacon with
eggs, and Jamie with Isabella. Nobody ever asks
for a peanut butter and blond hair sandwich or a
big plate of bacon and eggs and four-inch- long
eyelashes.
I had to go to the bathroom FOR, LIKE,
ONE SECOND and when I came back,
Angeline
AND ISABELLA had paired up for the portrait
assignment. Just like that. Jelly with no peanut
butter.
As I looked around, I realized that there
was nobody left for me to pair up with except for
T.U.K.W.N.I.F. (That Ugly Kid Whose Name I
Forget). So now I was like one half of a peanut
butter and sewage sandwich. Does that sound good
to anybody? No? No takers?
It was even worse because I had to draw an
ugly face. Sorry, T.U.K., I know it’s not your fault,
but it’s not mine, either. Your parents are the ones
that will do time for this crime.
55
56
Plus, as everybody knows, ol’ T.U.K.ster
can’t draw portraits. Perhaps it’s because he has
grown up resenting faces, since his hasn’t done
him any favors. Maybe he’s just all computery and
not familiar with pencils and pencil- like -drawing-
objects. Maybe because his face resembles so
many other non- face things, he’s a little unclear on
exactly what role a face actually plays.
At the end of the class, Miss Anderson said
we’d look at all of the portraits next week. She just
picked up a couple portraits to show as examples
to the class —T.U.K.W.N.I.F.’s and mine. My drawing
of him was as flattering as I could possibly make it,
and his drawing of me — which looked a lot like if
an orangutan fell face- first into a blender — got a
HUGE laugh.
57
See, Universe, I’m not sure you got this
one right. I think you really , really need to ask
yourself if it was wise to make me and Isabella
AUTOMATIC Friends with Angeline.
I think it may be time for me to admit that
even though I’ve been trying very, very, very hard to
make this whole three- way friendship with Isabella
and
Angeline and me work, I may have to let go of my
dream and face the fact that Angeline is making me
let go of my dream.
Three-person friendships are like three- person
bands — they exist, but they’re rare. Like unicorns
and male librarians. (Which I believe were known in
mythology as Guybrarians.)
58
Thursday 12
Dear Dumb Diary,
It’s amazing, but I think my brain might have
been trying to tell me something. You know, like
how TV does.
Last night I had this dream —
Hey! It just occurred to me: Dreaming is just
like watching TV, but you can’t change the channel,
and the shows often feature an insane clown that’s
trying to kill you. Or maybe that’s just me.
Anyway, in this dream, Angeline and Isabella
and I were all flowers. (Though Angeline might have
been one of those weeds that looks like a flower.)
We were just sitting there, growing, and my brain
came walking along dressed up like an adorable
little- girl gardener and planted a seed right next to
us. The seed grew and grew into another flower, but
I never saw its face.
59
Then this weasel- looking thing came
along and said, “I’m hungry. I think I’ll eat two
scrumptious flowers.” It bit the heads off of Angeline
and the new flower. And Isabella and I were all
laughing and high-fiving. Except that we had leaves
for hands, so we were kind of high- oneing.
Do you see what this means, Dumb Diary? My
brain is telling me that I need to get another friend,
not just another band member
. I need a fourth
friend in our little group. Then Angeline will pair off
with the new person, and Isabella and I can be the
peanut butter and jelly that we’re supposed to be.
IT’S SO SIMPLE. And here�
��s how I’m
going to do it: As girls audition to be our fourth
band member for the talent show, they’ll really be
SECRETLY auditioning to be my new friend. And
Isabella’s friend and Angeline’s friend, too, but I’ll
decide for all of us. I mean, that’s what friends are
for, right?
60
Later in my flower dream, a bee came and
stung me over and over in my flower face. I’m not
sure what that means, but I put on a little bug
spray this morning before I went to school. Just in
case.
61
Today was Meat Loaf Day. Thursday is always
Meat Loaf Day. So, to keep Miss Bruntford off my
neck, I asked my mom to pack me a lunch. (If you
bring your lunch from home, Miss Bruntford hardly
even bothers you about what you’re eating.)
Mom was flattered— and, let’s face it,
kind of surprised — that I asked. See, my
mom’s food is whatever that thing is just before
it turns poisonous. Like, down at the government
they can’t really decide if her food should get that
little skull- and- crossbones picture on it or not. Her
food won’t kill anybody most of the time, so maybe
they’d give it a little skull- and- crossbones that’s
sort of hunching its shoulders in one of those “I
Don’t Know” gestures.
So, like I said, Mom was really flattered and
spent a long time getting my lunch ready. I felt
really good about how happy I had made her when I
threw it all away.
62
I sat down with Isabella and Angeline and
watched them eat and felt left out all over again
because I sadly didn’t have any lunch. I can’t really
say for sure whose fault that is. I imagined that I
was a poor starving girl that, despite her extreme
malnutrition, was very beautiful and had filth
cutely smudged on her face just so.