“And we never even got a picture!” he lamented. “No one’s going to believe we met Luna Amatulli without proof.”
“I have proof,” Anna claimed calmly.
Steve and I swung around to face her.
“What do you mean, you have proof?” he asked.
She held up her iPod.
“I took a picture,” she said.
CHAPTER FIVE
We stared at the photo on Anna’s device for a long couple of minutes. Steve was the first to speak.
“Huh,” he said.
“How’d you take a picture without her noticing?” I asked Anna.
“She was talking to Mr. Holst,” Anna said. She peered down at the photo and added, “Hey! It sort of looks like she’s going to kiss Derek on the cheek.”
Even I hadn’t missed that. It one hundred percent looked like she was about to kiss me. Her face was close to mine and her lips were puckered from whatever she’d been saying to Mr. Holst.
Unfortunately for Steve, he was on the other side of Luna, so she was turned away from him.
“You probably shouldn’t show that around,” Steve said. “I think we should respect her privacy, especially now that we actually met her.”
“I thought you wanted proof you talked to her,” Anna said.
“I wasn’t thinking straight,” he answered. “But, yeah. This is the right thing to do. Don’t you think so, Derek?”
“Sure,” I said.
“Okay,” Anna agreed.
Steve looked pleased at how easy it had been to persuade us. I, on the other hand, knew it didn’t matter. I could have told him what was going to happen next, but I figured he’d find out soon enough.
It was even sooner than I’d have predicted.
As she’d promised, Anna didn’t show the picture around. She only shared it with Paige and Kim, who immediately texted it to everyone they knew.
My phone started pinging first, but it was only seconds later that Steve’s lit up too. We’d been back at my place for nine minutes.
It took a lot longer — an entire week in fact — before he stopped being grumpy about it. In fairness, I know Steve didn’t actually begrudge me the boost in popularity. What he minded was how the normal order of things had reversed. Suddenly, I was the one everyone noticed, and he was the invisible friend.
He finally brought it up one day when we were at his place, a female-free sanctuary. Well, technically his mom is a female, but I’m not counting mothers.
Steve had gone into the kitchen to grab us each a can of Pepsi while I kicked back on the couch. His return sent his dog Slipper into a fit of barking and jumping and hanging his tongue halfway to the floor, as if he hadn’t just seen him two minutes ago. Steve waited for that bit of insanity to settle down before he started talking.
“I’ve been thinking about this whole situation,” he said. “Specifically, ways we can maximize the benefits.”
“What benefits?” I asked.
He shook his head. “Seriously? How many girls have come up and talked to you since this started?”
A smile spread itself across my face. “A lot.”
“And before that, how many girls talked to you on an average day?”
“I dunno. Not that many.”
Or, more accurately, zero, unless you counted comments like, “Oww! Watch it!” or “Look where you’re going, klutz!” when I accidentally stepped on someone’s foot.
“Exactly!” Steve said.
“Except, these things never last,” I pointed out.
“Unless —”Steve paused, spreading his hands slowly in front of him.“Unless you make it last.”
“How do I do that?” I asked, getting interested.
Steve shook his head and rolled his eyes.
“You are completely hopeless,” he said.
“I got that from the head shaking and eye rolling,” I told him.
“It’s a wonder.”
I let that go. “So, what are you thinking?”
“There’s got to be a way to keep this thing going.”
“I dunno,” I said. “Flukes like that don’t happen every day.”
“So we figure out how to make it happen,” Steve said. “With something we can both be in on.”
“Yeah, that would be good,” I agreed. It was the closest Steve had come to admitting he was feeling left out.
I gulped down some Pepsi, belched and said, “Would a video work? I saw a really cool one the other day of a guy doing amazing skateboarding tricks. What about something like that?”
The look Steve gave me told me how unimpressed he was, even before he spoke.
“That’s perfect, except for one thing. Neither one of us skateboards. We’d probably kill ourselves.”
“Right. I guess we’d have to practice a lot for something like that.”
“And since when are girls interested in skateboarding stunts?” Steve said. “We’ve got to think of something funny, or the kind of cute thing a lot of girls get excited over.”
“My sisters go crazy over animals,” I said. “Videos, pictures — whatever. They’re nuts about that stuff. Especially cats.”
“I think you’re onto something,” Steve said. “Maybe some pictures of kittens with funny captions. And us in the background like we’re hiding or sneaking up or whatever.”
The only problem was, neither one of us had a cat. I pointed that out to Steve.
“The animal shelter does, though,” Steve said. “They’re always looking for people to take cats — the place is overrun with them!”
I liked that idea. And after years of being blackmailed into helping feed the shelter animals, it was about time the place gave something back to me.
“So, could we borrow some kittens for a couple of days?” I asked.
“Doubt it. They don’t even let people adopt them without filling in a bunch of forms. That’s how we got Slipper.”
I vaguely remembered them getting Slipper, but hadn’t known he’d been a rescue. It was right at the time that Steve’s folks split up. His mom decided they should have a guard dog; she said she felt vulnerable now that she was a single parent.
Not a lot of people who wanted a guard dog would have picked Slipper. I don’t know what kind of dog he is — I doubt anyone does — but he barely comes up to my knees, can’t weigh more than twenty-five pounds, and is about the friendliest animal I’ve ever seen. Unless the plan was to have him lick an intruder to death, Slipper wasn’t going to be much protection to anyone.
None of that mattered now. We needed kittens, and from what Steve had just said, the shelter wasn’t going to be much help.
But that was only because he hadn’t told me the rest of his idea.
“We can volunteer!” he explained, grinning.
“What? At the shelter?”
“Exactly. That will give us access to all kinds of kittens. We’ll have our pick of the lot for our video.”
It sounded like a reasonable plan.
CHAPTER SIX
If I hadn’t already made up my mind to go along with Steve’s plan, what happened the next day would have been more than enough to convince me.
I was in the living room, doing my best to ignore a conversation between Paige and Anna. That wasn’t easy. They were both talking at the same time, which meant the volume kept going up and up. One of their most annoying and least effective communication strategies.
I could have just left the room, but I was there first. Also, I didn’t want to give them the satisfaction of driving me out.
Blocking out their nonsense and focusing on my tablet took concentration, so it didn’t even register when the phone rang in the other room. Not that I would have paid much attention to the house phone anyway.
The next thing I knew, Mom was hollering my name li
ke I was halfway out of town instead of a few feet down the hall.
“DER-REK!”
I hardly had time to turn my head when she appeared in the archway. Her face was lit with some strange kind of motherly excitement, which immediately caused Paige and Anna to fall silent.
“Call for you, Derek,” Mom announced, holding the phone toward me. And then, in the loudest whisper in history, she added, “It’s a girl.”
“Ooooooooo,” said Paige and Anna, as perfectly synchronized as if they’d rehearsed it.
I grabbed the phone and slammed my hand over the mouthpiece — as if it wasn’t too late. I tore out of there and raced up the stairs to my room where I could talk without my sisters pretending they weren’t listening to every word. As soon as I was inside, I took a deep breath so I wouldn’t be panting like some kind of perv when I answered.
“Hello?”
“Derek?”
“Yeah.”
“This is Tamrah Kingston.”
Yeah, right. There was no way Tamrah Kingston was calling me. I snorted good and loud to let this trickster know I wasn’t that gullible. Except, as I did that, my brain caught up with the rest of me and I realized, against all odds, it actually was Tamrah. Her voice is unmistakable — rich and warm and definitely the voice on the other end of the phone.
I did my best to cover the snort by switching to a violent cough.
“Are you okay?” Tamrah asked. She sounded more nervous than concerned.
I quit coughing. Possibly too abruptly.
“I’m fine,” I said. “Great, in fact. I just, uh, ate some cayenne.”
“By itself?”
Was it my imagination, or had that impressed her? So hard to tell — awe and shock can sound a lot alike.
“I don’t do it that often,” I said vaguely. Thinking fast isn’t my strong point, but claiming to swallow a spoonful of cayenne was dumb even for me. I changed the subject with a witty question.
“So, what’s up?”
“I was calling to invite you to a party I’m having on Friday. At my place.”
My stupid quota must have been full for the day because I ignored my first instinct, which was to ask: Why?
“Great, thanks,” I said.
If my sister Kim had received this invitation, she’d have asked a bunch of questions. Did the party have a theme? What would people be wearing? Should they bring something with them? Blah, blah, blah. Her brain is hard-wired to inquire.
I, of course, asked nothing, and it wasn’t until I’d hung up that it occurred to me a bit more information might actually be useful. Like, what time.
I shrugged that off. I had days to find out anything I needed to know.
The main thing, and at that moment the only thing that mattered was that Tamrah Kingston had called me and asked me to a party.
Of course, I knew why. It was the photos. If it wasn’t for the photobomb and the picture with Luna Amatulli, the moon would have turned into a gigantic meatball before a girl like Tamrah ever invited me anywhere.
Tamrah Kingston!
Did I mention she was gorgeous? And, while I’ve never personally gotten very close to her, Steve sits behind her in History and (I hope this won’t make you think less of the guy) he’s actually told me she smells good. He’s even used words like citrusy and spicy and, one time, luscious. I remember having the urge to smack him out of it, like a victim of shock.
But after two minutes on the phone with her, I understood that what had happened to Steve really wasn’t his fault. I knew this because of the goofy face that was grinning at me idiotically from my dresser mirror.
“That’s right,” I said, pointing a finger at my reflection. “She wants you bad.”
“Who wants you?”
I spun around to find Paige smirking at me from the doorway.
“Get out of my room!”
“I’m not in your room, I’m in the hall.” She nodded toward the phone, still in my hand. “Mom sent me to see if you were done — she has to make a call.”
I passed it over and waited just long enough for her to get down the stairs before I followed. Except, I hauled on my shoes and headed for the front door, calling behind me that I was going to Steve’s place.
“Supper will be ready at six,” Mom said, appearing in the kitchen doorway. “Make sure you’re back in time.”
I said I would and beat it out of there.
Steve’s mom answered the door.
“Oh, hi Derek,” she said. “Steve’s in his room.”
I told her thanks, stepped inside and hurried down the hall to Steve’s room. His door was partly open so I shoved it the rest of the way and swaggered in like a guy with something to brag about.
“Hey,” Steve said. “What are you doing here?”
“Thought I’d fill you in on something that just happened.” I shoved a balled-up sweatshirt off the edge of his desk and leaned against it. He raised an eyebrow and waited.
“Tamrah Kingston just called me.”
His eyes actually bugged out.
Then he grinned, like I’d gotten him good.
“Sure she did,” he said.
“Seriously. She invited me to a party at her place this Friday.”
It took a few minutes, but I finally convinced him I was telling the truth. Which was when he said, “Sweet. This is going to be awesome.”
Something uneasy stirred in me.
“I don’t know if I’m supposed to bring other people,” I said.
“What are you talking about — it’s a party. Everyone brings other people.”
I hadn’t been to a lot of parties. None, in fact, unless you counted Tiffany Manchester’s birthday party last year, which she threw for herself. To give you an idea of how cool it was, it featured balloons, streamers and her mother hovering around trying to force cake on everyone. (I had four pieces, to be polite.)
But a real party — as in, one that wasn’t chaperoned by a cake-pushing parent? This would be the first. I decided to take Steve’s word for what the rules were, even though his social life and mine were pretty much identical.
CHAPTER SEVEN
My folks encourage us to bring our friends over. It helps them keep track of where we are and what we’re doing. And they like knowing who we’re hanging around with.
For me, that’s Steve and a couple of other guys.
In Anna’s case, I think she’d bring home stray animals if she could, but the friends she has practically fit that category anyway. There’s always something scraggly and woebegone about them, as if they were left somewhere on the side of the road.
Paige goes from being a bit of a loner to having a BFF who practically lives here. Until they get mad at each other, which always happens. Then they never speak again as far as I can tell, and she goes back into loner mode until she makes a new BFF. Except the second F never works out.
Kim is the social butterfly in our family. When she’s home she’s hardly ever alone. Steffie used to be the person who was here with her the most, but lately she’s been dragging home that nasty Riley, always with Trisha, a quiet girl who makes me think of shadows. They seemed like an odd combination until the other day when I heard Riley telling Mom she and Trisha are cousins.
“I’m just living at Trisha’s place while my mom and dad are working out of the country,” she said.
“What do your parents do?” Mom asked.
“They’re with Doctors Without Borders,” Riley told her. “They spend time in different parts of the world.”
“It must be hard on you, having them away like that,” Mom said. “When will they be back?”
“I’m not sure,” Riley told her. “The dates keep changing.”
“At least you’re able to be with family,” Mom said.
“Right,” Riley said, but she
didn’t sound thrilled. It gave me the impression she didn’t like living at her cousin’s place all that much.
It was probably because I was paying more attention than usual to who was around that I noticed Junior hadn’t been over for a while. That had me thinking Paige might have given up pretending she had a boyfriend. So, naturally, just as it seemed that bit of grossness was over, Junior appeared back on the scene.
It was Thursday, right after supper, when Anna answered the door and found him standing there.
“Oh,” she said. “It’s you.”
“Is Paige home?” he asked.
“Paige!” Anna called out.
“Is that my boyfriend?” Paige hollered back from the kitchen. “Tell him to come in.”
But Anna told him … nothing. Most likely she figured if she’d heard Paige, then he had too, and saw no reason to waste any more of her time on him. Instead, she turned and walked away from the door without a word. I was on the upstairs landing, on my way to the bathroom, but I paused to see what Junior’s reaction would be. He stood there looking lost.
I watched with interest as his expression morphed into a kind of worried frown. For a second it looked like he might step inside. He started to put his foot forward, but then he lost his nerve and pulled it back. I swear, I could practically see some of the things he was thinking. Like, where was Paige and why wasn’t she coming to his rescue instead of leaving him standing there like a doofus?
Then he noticed me and his face lit up with hope.
“Hi, Derek,” he said. “I’m here to see Paige.”
“Huh,” I answered, and ducked into the bathroom. By the time I came back out, there was a commotion in the living room with Junior in the middle of it. He looked like he wished he’d stayed home. Paige was railing against the mistreatment her fake beloved had received at the hands of her siblings. We were, by Paige’s estimation, the WORST brother and sister EVER.
I found myself undisturbed by the label, while Anna looked downright bored. If she’d had another couple of minutes to get it out of her system, Paige’s anger would have fizzled out and that would have been the end of it.
Unfortunately, Dad heard the squabbling and came along to intervene. If there’s one thing Dad thinks he’s really good at, it’s squashing squabbles among his kids. His theory (which I’ve actually heard him tell people) is that diversion is the greatest peacekeeping technique ever. So Dad diverts. Usually with a bizarre and sudden change of subject.
The Rise and Fall of Derek Cowell Page 3