Best Friend Next Door

by Carolyn Mackler

  “Mom!” I hiss. She can be so embarrassing. The other day she tried to kiss me when she dropped me off at school. Of course Alexa and Haley were walking in the front door that very second so I nudged her away. Even so, I could see them elbowing each other and cracking up.

  “Let’s just say that Hannah soaked the competition,” Margo says, laughing.

  Hannah grins and flashes me a thumbs-up. “Cider bath.”

  I smile back at her. It’s good to see she can laugh about it now.

  “What did your teacher do?” Mom J asks. “Mr. Bryce, right?”

  “Be careful or she’ll write an article about you,” I whisper to Hannah.

  “Off the record,” Mom J says, flicking her blinker.

  Hannah shrugs. “We all got a lecture and had to apologize to each other. Then Mr. Bryce made us think of a way to work together to raise more money. It was actually fun.”

  “I wish I had Mr. Bryce,” I say, sighing. When Hannah’s class had a bake sale the following week, I bought the yummiest Rice Krispies Treat. I even ordered it from Denny, who let me look them over and pick the biggest one. “I can’t stand Ms. Linhart.”

  “Really?” Margo asks.

  Hannah’s stepmom is wearing a loose sweatshirt and rubbing her palm around on her belly. It’s so obvious she’s pregnant and yet Hannah still hasn’t said anything about it.

  “She’s really strict,” I explain. “She made us miss recess last week. And that was just because we didn’t finish our writing fast enough. She said we were all talking, except it was only two people. I think she’s Ms. Coldhart.”

  Mom J glances into the rearview mirror at me. I haven’t come home sick anymore, but I’m not skipping happily to school every morning, either. Sometimes when I can’t stand being in class I tell Ms. Linhart I have a stomachache and then I go to the nurse. But most days I just have to deal.

  “Ms. Nohart,” Hannah offers.

  “Exactly,” I say.

  And don’t even get me started on those girls in my class. They make Ms. Linhart look as sweet as hot apple pie.

  When we get home, Mom J and I haul our bags of apples into the kitchen. As Butterball sniffs the apples, Mom J takes a picture and texts it to Mom C. We must have picked fifteen pounds!

  “Do you want to talk about Ms. Linhart?” Mom J asks. “It sounds like things aren’t going so well at—”

  “What’s that?” I say, pointing to a padded envelope on the counter.

  Changing the subject. Number two way of diverting Mom J from a cross-examination (number one is to say I feel feverish). The last thing I want to do is talk about school and how no one in my class likes me. I live it all day. No need to relive the misery at night.

  “It’s from Leesa,” Mom J says. “It arrived this morning.”

  I grab the envelope and tear it open. My cousin finally mailed me our ongoing collage. It took her forever! Back in October, I couldn’t get my panda drawing just right. Instead, I ironed a fall leaf inside wax paper, glued it onto the tagboard, and sent the collage to her dorm at boarding school. (Yep, the rusty orange leaf is me being a geek about my first fall in the Northeast.)

  As soon as I see what Leesa added to the collage, I can’t stop laughing. It was totally worth the wait.

  The next day, my class is pin-drop quiet during math and we all show our work and we even finish our questions early. Ms. Linhart decides to be human and grace us with ten minutes of choice time before gym. Most people grab books or gather together at tables, talking and laughing. I go to my cubby and pull out the collage from Leesa. I’ve already decided I’m going to draw bubble letters saying The Good Vibes Cousins, slather it in glitter, and mail it back to her. If I can get the letters sketched out now, I’ll swing by the art room after school and use their assortment of glitter glue.

  I pull the collage out of the envelope and start laughing all over again. I don’t know where Leesa found this, but she’s stuck on a photograph of a highway restaurant with a sign out front that says CHILDREN WITH GAS EAT FREE. Obviously it’s supposed to mean that if you fill your tank, your kids get a meal. But it sounds like farting children eat for free.

  “Emme?” Gina asks.

  I whip my head around. Gina is peering at me. Her eyes are so pale they look like they’ve been left to dry in the sun.

  “What?” I ask hoarsely. My heart starts pounding in my chest.

  Gina tips her head to one side. “Were you just, like, talking to yourself?”

  “I was …” I quickly slide the collage back into the envelope. The last thing I want is for Gina to see my project with my cousin or to know anything about me. “I was laughing.”

  “O.M.G., she was talking to herself,” Gina announces to Alexa and Haley, who rush over as soon as they see Gina with me.

  Alexa flashes her tremendous teeth. “You’re kind of weird?”

  I’m not sure if she’s asking a question or stating a fact. Either way, it’s not a compliment. My face flushes and I stare down at the floor.

  “We’re just joking,” Gina says, touching my arm.

  “O.M.G.,” Alexa says.

  I want to pull away from Gina, but I’m stuck. Completely stuck.

  “What’s in there anyway?” Gina asks. She lets go of me and snatches my padded envelope up off the table.

  “No,” I plead. My throat is so tight it comes out like a whisper.

  As Gina sticks her hand into the envelope, I reach out to grab it back from her, but it’s no use. She’s already yanked out the collage and she’s turning away from me, holding it out for Haley and Alexa to see.

  “Oh my god!” Gina says to them. “A leaf in wax paper? Didn’t we do that in kindergarten? A peace sign? Drawings of shells?” Gina shoves the tagboard into Haley’s hands, like it’s so far beneath her she doesn’t even want to touch it. “Is this, like, a joke?”

  “It’s just something … my cousin …” I pause. My cheeks are burning hot and tears are stinging my eyes. Why am I even trying to explain myself to Gina? “It’s nothing,” I finally say.

  Haley pokes Gina’s arm. “Look at this about children with gas.”

  “Gross!” Alexa squeals.

  “Here’s a helpful hint,” Gina says, leaning down so her face is really close to mine. Her breath smells like warm Doritos. “Grow up.”

  As Gina pulls back from me, I’m literally in shock. I can’t believe this is happening.

  “We’re not getting to you, are we?” Haley asks. She glances at Ms. Linhart’s desk and smiles sweetly. Ms. Linhart nods back at her like nothing is going on. “You don’t mind, right?”

  “Right?” Gina asks. She brushes her fingers over my shoulder. “I mean, we’re just trying to be helpful.”

  I nod slowly. It’s all I can do not to cry.

  As soon as they walk away, I go over to the water shelf, where we keep our bottles. I face the wall and take a few deep breaths as I sip my water. Part of me doesn’t want to let them win. I might even go back to my table and get the collage out and write The Good Vibes Cousins just like I planned to do before they made fun of it. I bet that’s what Leesa would do—be strong and be herself no matter what.

  I return to my table. I won’t even let myself look at Gina or the other girls as I take the collage out of the envelope.

  But then I see it.

  Someone has written LOSER in bold black letters across the top of the collage.

  LOSER.

  I look across the classroom. A bunch of kids are huddled around Gina, Alexa, and Haley. They’re all whispering and giggling and covering their mouths with their hands.

  I crumple the collage into the envelope and head up to Ms. Linhart’s desk. She’s marking up our math work with a red pen.

  “I need to go to the nurse,” I say.

  “Again?” she asks, pressing her lipsticked lips together. “You seem to be very fond of the nurse.”

  I don’t even answer. I just walk out.

  On the way down the hall, I t
oss the envelope and the collage into a trash bin.

  “Emme, are you okay?” Hannah asks as she parts the pea-green curtain around the cot in the back of the nurse’s office.

  I’m sitting cross-legged on the cot, tears trickling down my face, a tissue scrunched in my fist, unsure how I’ll ever walk back into Ms. Linhart’s class. Everyone in there thinks I’m a LOSER. The nurse offered to call my moms, but I knew that would start a cross-examination, so I just said I had a headache and needed to rest.

  “How did you know I was here?” I ask.

  “Marley told me,” Hannah says, sitting next to me. “She was delivering a new EpiPen to the nurse and saw you coming in and said you looked upset. Are you okay?”

  I consider telling Hannah that I have a headache (not true) or that I hate Ms. Linhart (true). Instead I bite my bottom lip and then say, “Can I tell you the real truth?”

  “For the Og Twins?” Hannah says, squeezing my hand. “Always.”

  My hands are sweaty, but Hannah never lets go as I tell her about Gina and Alexa and Haley and how they’re so mean to me and how the rest of the kids ignore me and how Ms. Linhart makes it even worse. I even tell Hannah what someone (I’m guessing Gina) wrote on the collage and how I threw it away.

  When I’m done talking, my face is wet and my nose is running, but I feel a little better. I had no idea I was holding so much inside.

  “Oh, Emme,” Hannah says, hugging me. “What are we going to do? We need to tell your moms.”

  “I’ve thought about that and there’s nothing anyone can do.”

  “How do you know?”

  “It’ll just make things worse. It’s not like I want Ms. Linhart going around the classroom trying to get someone to confess that they wrote LOSER about me. Everyone will deny it and I’ll look even more like a loser.”

  “But what if it’s not just about the collage?” Hannah asks. “What if you say that people have been mean to you for months?”

  I shake my head. “Then Ms. Linhart will hate me even more, like I’m accusing her of letting this go on. Gina and the rest of them will make fun of me for telling.”

  “I see what you mean,” Hannah says. “But it’s just so …”

  “Awful,” I say, blowing my nose.

  I glance around the little room with only a cot, a box of tissues, and a barf basin on the floor. They had the same barf basin at the nurse’s office on Captiva Island. But back in Captiva, I was actually sick when I went to the nurse. I wasn’t hiding out.

  “Can I tell you the real truth about something?” Hannah says, chewing at her thumbnail.

  “For the Og Twins?” I blot my eyes. “Of course.”

  Hannah leans in close to me and whispers, “Margo’s pregnant. My dad and Margo are having a baby.”

  I’m so relieved she finally told me that I smile.

  “What’s so funny?” Hannah asks.

  “It’s just …” I pause. I’m not sure how to tell her this.

  “Kind of obvious?”

  “Yeah,” I say, exhaling. “She’s huge. She looks like she’s going to have the baby any day now.”

  “Not until February,” Hannah says quickly. “Late February.”

  I can tell she looks upset so I squeeze her hand back.

  “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you before,” Hannah says. “Plus, there’s this other thing going on.”

  As Hannah pauses, I think about how we’re in the nurse’s office and the phone keeps ringing and there’s a barf bucket (with a weird brownish stain in it) on the floor and yet it actually feels cozy and safe in here. I had good friends in Captiva, Olivia and Lucy, but we’ve been talking less and less since I moved. And really, I feel closer to Hannah than I ever was to them.

  “The thing is,” Hannah says, “Margo is adopting me.”

  I totally didn’t see that coming. “She’s adopting you? But what about your—”

  “Real mom?”

  “Birth mom,” I say. “Margo is your real mom.”

  Hannah nods like she hadn’t thought about that before. “My, uh, birth mom never wanted kids,” she says quietly. “She gave me up to my dad when I was born. I’ve never talked about that to anyone before. Not even Sophie.”

  Mom C says I always have a comment or question about everything. But at this moment, I can’t think of a single thing to say.

  “They’ve been working on the adoption for a while,” Hannah says. “It’s going to be finalized soon. We’re waiting for a court date any day now.”

  “Wow,” I say. “Congratulations.”

  “I guess.” Hannah sits on her hands and rocks side to side. “I’m scared, though.”

  “Me too,” I say.

  “I’m glad we’re Og Twins,” Hannah says. “I feel like this is what it means to be best friends. To tell each other things we wouldn’t tell anyone else.”

  Best friends. I’ve been thinking it. She said it. Best friends.

  “Me too,” I say.

  Hannah stretches out her foot and kicks the barf basin under the cot.

  “I couldn’t look at that for one more second,” she says, laughing.

  The next day is Saturday and we practice hard. Coach Missy has us do the usual warm-ups of freestyle, backstroke, and freestyle again. Then we get into kicking with the board while she’s timing us, which is brutal for me because my legs are short (I’m much better when it’s all about the arms). Then Coach Missy has us do breast and free sprints with descends, which means our times have to be faster with each lap.

  By the end of practice, my upper arms are sore and my neck is stiff. I stand under the shower for several minutes, trying to decide what I want to do when I get home. Eat (I’m so hungry) or sleep (I’m so tired). Or can I eat and sleep at the same time?

  “Too hot to hoot!” Hannah sings when I finally wrap myself in a towel and meet her at the lockers. She’s dressed and packing her wet bag.

  “Huh?” I ask.

  Hannah snaps her goggles at me, but they hit a locker instead. “You’re too hot to hoot. A palindrome.”

  “Ah.” I grab my heap of clothes, sit on a bench, and start getting dressed. It’s not easy to tug on clothes under a towel but that’s how we do it. “I’m just glad I got through those sprints.”

  “And I’m glad practice is over,” Hannah says. She looks in the mirror and attempts to gather her hair into a ponytail. I’ve noticed that it’s started to get longer. “I didn’t want to come today.”

  “Why not?” I ask. As much as it can be exhausting, I still love swim practice.

  “Volleyball is so much more fun,” Hannah says. She shakes her hair around her shoulders again. “So is basketball. So is eating. Did I tell you I heard about a restaurant in New York City that specializes in peanut butter? Cinnamon peanut butter … maple peanut butter … spicy peanut—”

  “I’m so hungry!” I say. “Don’t talk about peanut butter right now.”

  We both laugh and then hurry into the lobby of the YMCA to meet her dad.

  After lunch, I’m in my room when Hannah knocks on the door and then walks right in. That’s typical for us these days. We’re always running back and forth between each other’s houses.

  “What’s up?” I say. I finally unpacked my ribbons from my swim meets in Captiva and I’m hanging them above my bed. I was going to use nails, but Mom C suggested thumbtacks instead.

  “Cool ribbons,” Hannah says. “That’s a lot of firsts.”

  “Mostly breaststroke. Some medleys, too.” It’s true that I’ve placed first a lot. People say that if you want to be a serious swimmer you have to be tall with long arms and legs, but being short hasn’t hurt me so far.

  “So,” Hannah says, handing me a thumbtack. “I’ve been thinking about it and we have to tell your moms.”

  I turn to her. Is she saying what I think she’s saying? “Tell them what?”

  “About what’s going on at school.” Hannah gestures toward the door. “Like … now.”

  I
shake my head quickly. I seriously don’t want to do this.

  “You can do it, Emme.” She points to my neat row of ribbons. “You’re a winner.”

  I feel like the opposite of a winner. But I also get what Hannah is saying and so I set a second-place ribbon (breaststroke, twenty-five meters) back in the shoe box, run into the bathroom to pee, and then follow her downstairs.

  Mom J and Mom C are in the backyard, digging holes to plant bulbs. They’ve become obsessed with daffodil bulbs and tulip bulbs and how you have to plant them in the ideal location on the ideal day in the fall with the ideal low-nitrogen fertilizer.

  As Hannah pushes open the back door, I drag slowly behind her. I think I have to pee again.

  “Claire? Julia?” Hannah says.

  Mom J wipes her hands on her jeans and looks over at Mom C, who leans her shovel against the tree. “What’s up?”

  “Maybe we can all sit down,” Hannah says, steering me toward the picnic table. “Something’s going on at school. With Emme.”

  As we slide into the table, I keep telling myself you’re a winner, you’re a winner. But I’m definitely feeling more like a loser, just like they wrote on the collage.

  “The thing is,” Hannah says, “Ms. Linhart is terrible. And some girls in Emme’s class are being awful to her. Gina and Alexa and Haley. I know them and they’re all really mean. They’re making fun of Emme. They even ruined her collage. They wrote something bad on it.”

  “Oh, Emme,” Mom J says. “Have you told anyone? Why didn’t you tell us?”

  I glance at Hannah and she nods encouragingly. “There’s nothing you can do about it,” I say quietly. “I told Hannah. And I told Leesa a little.”

  “What did Leesa say?” Mom J asks.

  “To be true to myself,” I say. “And to keep up the good vibes.”

  This time Mom C gives Mom J a look. Leesa is Mom C’s older sister’s daughter. I think she drives both my moms a little crazy.

  “Does Ms. Linhart know?” Mom C asks. “Have you talked about it with her?”