Revenge of the Teacher's Pets

by Jennifer Ziegler

  A pretty blue scarf was hanging from the edge of the mirror. I pulled it down and held it up, staring at the room through the gauzy material. It made everything seem foggy and distant.

  A thought popped into my head, and before I realized it, I said, “Lily? Are you upset with me, Dawn, and Darby?”

  She paused and looked at me. I turned around so that she’d be seeing the real me, instead of the Delaney in the mirror. “No. Why do you think so?”

  “I don’t mean that you don’t like us or anything. I just mean … do you not trust us?”

  “Of course I do! Why would you wonder about such a thing?”

  I started twisting the scarf in my hands. “It’s just that … you’re getting married again and, well, we’re worried that you’re unsure about us because we kind of loused up your last wedding. We only did that because we love you and we love Alex and we didn’t love Burton — not that we hated Burton or anything, it’s just that —”

  “Delaney.” Lily had stopped packing and put her hands on my shoulders. At some point in my talking, I realized she was saying my name. “Delaney? Delaney, listen.”

  “Yeah?”

  Lily stooped slightly so she was looking me right in the eye. “I’m not upset with the three of you for what happened last summer. Not at all. That wedding was loused up from the beginning. It was my mistake — not yours. And besides, everything has worked out for the best, right?”

  “Well … yes.” I glanced down at my hands. The scarf was now coiled up like a snake. I tossed it back onto the dresser. “But if you aren’t upset with us, why won’t you let us help you and Alex plan your wedding?”

  “That’s what you guys have been thinking?” She sat down on the bed and gave me a sad-looking smile. I nodded, and for some reason, my eyes filled with tears. Lily reached out and drew me into a big hug. “It’s not true,” she said into my ear. “I do trust you all. So much.”

  “You do?”

  Lily let go and held me at arm’s length. “Of course I do.” Her eyes looked past me at her old-timey-looking alarm clock on her nightstand. “Oh, jeez,” she said, standing, “I need to leave in five minutes. I’m so sorry, but I really do need to go. When I get back from my trip, I promise we’ll all sit down and discuss this, okay?”

  “Yay!” I said, twirling around and around. Lily wasn’t upset with us! She didn’t blame us for the Almost-Wedding Disaster!

  Maybe we’d get to help with the wedding after all.

  I sat on the sofa, sighing and growling. I don’t know where things went wrong, but ever since school started, mutiny has been afoot. My sisters don’t seem as interested in doing things together. They’re ashamed to take our solemn oath in front of people. And Darby even missed an important event. Now here I was, sprawled on the couch in the living room, waiting for Delaney to come play Parcheesi with me. Twenty minutes ago she ran upstairs to put on her lucky Parcheesi shirt, but she still hasn’t come back. So either there’s dissension in the ranks or she’s just being plain inconsiderate.

  I could ask Darby to play, but she’s been in a real funk the last couple of days, sighing and staring off into space. While she normally stares off into space, this didn’t seem to be her usual daydreaminess. Her shoulders were too slumpy and her expression too frowny.

  I could ask Mom to play, but she’s in the kitchen starting dinner, and even if she did agree to a game, she would probably give me an extra chore.

  I could ask Lily, but lately she’s been either coming or going and never seems to have time to just hang out.

  I stood up, having just made up my mind to go on a search for a willing Parcheesi opponent, when there came a commotion down the hallway and Lily walked past, pulling a suitcase toward the front door. Behind her danced Delaney, saying, “Bye! Have a good trip! Bye, Lily! Bye!” Behind her came Mom and Darby.

  I followed them out onto the porch and joined them in calling out “Bye!” Lily threw us a kiss before she climbed into her car and shut the door. We stood and waved as she drove off.

  “Where’s Lily going?” I asked after her Honda disappeared into the distance.

  “No idea,” said Darby with a shrug. “I just followed everyone.”

  “She’s going to New Orleans to visit Clare,” Mom said. “Good for her.”

  “And guess what?” Delaney pivoted as she bounced up and down, glancing from me to Darby. “I was just talking to her and she said she isn’t mad at us. Maybe we can help her plan her wedding after all!”

  “She said she isn’t mad at us?” I asked.

  “Yeah, I asked her if she was and she said no.”

  “Delaney!” I whacked my hand against my forehead. “Of course she’s going to say no. She’s Lily. She never wants people to feel bad.”

  Delaney gradually stopped bouncing until she was simply standing there, all hunched and wilted-looking. “Oh,” she said, “I hadn’t thought of that.”

  “Girls, is this about the wedding again?” Mom asked.

  “Yep,” said Darby. “Lily doesn’t seem to trust us after her last one.”

  “I wish there was something we could do,” I said, pacing around the porch. “Something that would show her we can be relied upon.”

  “You know what?” Mom’s mouth slowly curved up into a grin. “I think maybe there is something you all could do for her. Something important.”

  “A tradition?” I asked.

  “Yes, in fact.”

  “What is it?” Delaney restarted her hop. “What is it? What is it?”

  We stood in a semicircle in front of Mom, leaning toward her eagerly. Mom put one hand on my shoulder and the other on Darby’s. “How would you girls like to throw Lily and Alex a wedding shower?”

  “Yes!” the three of us shouted, jumping up and down. It was a brilliant idea — so brilliant, I wish I’d thought of it myself.

  “We could do that!” Darby said.

  “We could definitely do that,” Delaney echoed.

  “And here’s the best part,” I said. “If we do a good job with the shower, maybe they’ll let us help with the wedding!”

  * * *

  “I call this meeting to order,” I said, pounding my fist on the back of the porch swing, making it jostle. “This evening we convene to discuss a historic event: the wedding shower of our sister, the amazing Lily Brewster.”

  “We get to be Shower Girls!” Delaney shouted, kicking her feet out.

  “First item of business, planning the festivities. Do any of you have ideas?”

  Delaney held up her hand. “I think it should be a surprise shower. You know. Where we tell all the guests about it, but ask them to keep it a secret. Then on the special day, Alex and Lily will walk into the house and … ta-da!” Delaney took a little hop into the center of the porch and opened her arms wide.

  “I second that idea,” Darby said, writing furiously in her notebook.

  “And I vote yes, too,” I said. “Great. Motion passes.”

  “Yay! We’re Surprise Shower Girls!” Delaney said with a celebratory dance.

  “You know,” Darby said, “if this shower is going to be a surprise, we probably need to come up with a code word for it.”

  “How about bath?” Delaney suggested.

  “Hmm …” I tapped my finger against my chin. “Don’t you think that’s kind of obvious?”

  “Oh. Yeah,” Delaney said. “Then how about cauliflower? It rhymes with shower.”

  “That’ll work.” Again, motion passed, and Darby wrote Operation Cauliflower in the minutes. Two motions down already! We had our mojo back. I felt better than I had in days. “All right, so what are we going to do for the party?” I asked.

  For a long while, no one said anything.

  “Come on.” I pounded my fist on the swing again. “Let’s hear some ideas.”

  Delaney shrugged. “I don’t know what to do,” she said.

  “Yeah. What exactly happens at a shower?” Darby asked.

  The three of us
looked at one another, each of us shaking her head. There went our mojo.

  “Well, that’s just dandy,” I said. “What now?”

  “Can’t we ask Mom?” Delaney asked.

  “Not now, she’s busy with dinner. Besides, this is our thing. We shouldn’t bother her if we can help it.”

  “Hey, look. There’s Ms. Woolcott. Maybe we should ask her.” Delaney pointed to our next-door neighbor, who was weeding her flower beds and singing in a high, quivery voice like an opera singer. She was wearing a dress with big flowers all over it and a floppy, wide-brimmed hat. I was impressed at the sight of it. Ms. Woolcott’s hair is so poufed up, I would never have thought a hat could stay on.

  “Okay, let’s do that,” I said, both because I thought Delaney’s idea had merit and also because I wanted to see the hat up close.

  “Hi, Ms. Woolcott,” we called out as we stepped down from the porch and crossed the yard to the fence.

  “Why, hello, girls.” She lifted the front brim of her hat to watch us. “What are you three up to?”

  “We’re planning a surprise wedding shower for Lily and Alex.”

  Ms. Woolcott gasped so loud, I was at first worried that a bee had stung her. “OH, my GOODNESS! That’s the BEST news! They are SUCH a lovely couple. Ab-so-LUTE-ly perfect for each other!”

  The three of us took a small step back. Ms. Woolcott doesn’t so much talk as sing, and when she’s excited, it’s like listening to a turbo-powered mockingbird.

  “So, um, Ms. Woolcott,” I said, once she seemed to be finished, “we were wondering. You’ve been to wedding showers before, right?”

  “Indeed I have.”

  “What sorts of things do people do there?” Delaney asked.

  “Well …” Ms. Woolcott frowned in concentration, her eyes swiveling upward, as if there was a wedding shower going on in the sky. “Let’s see, the guests eat nice finger foods. Like watercress sandwiches …”

  “What’s a watercress?” Delaney whispered in my ear. I shrugged.

  “And they play games.”

  “Like Spite and Malice?” I asked.

  “Musical Chairs?” Delaney asked.

  “Presidential Trivia?” Darby asked.

  Ms. Woolcott shook her head. “No, dear. Bridal-themed games. Like … Pocketbook Scavenger Hunt. That’s when you have a list of items and all the ladies try to find them in their purse. Like mouth mints, a coin from the year you were born, red lipstick. It’s de-LIGHT-ful!”

  “But Alex doesn’t carry a purse,” I said. “Neither does Dad. Or Aunt Jane, come to think of it.”

  “Oh.” Ms. Woolcott seemed taken aback. “Well, I’m used to showers that are just for the bride and her girlfriends. But these days there are all kinds of different rules. You should just plan something they would like. What do they enjoy?”

  “Let’s see … they like flowers,” I said. “Real ones.”

  “That’s good.”

  “And animals,” Delaney said. “Oh! I know! Let’s get a petting zoo!”

  Ms. Woolcott’s smile drooped. “Well, that’s not typical. But again, it’s for them. So maybe —”

  “I think they’d enjoy a zip line!” Darby said.

  I shook my head at her. “Darby. Don’t even start with your reckless shenanigans.”

  “Whatever you three put together will be lovely, I’m sure,” Ms. Woolcott said. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I see it’s time for me to go feed Elvis.” She motioned toward her house, where her big spoiled cat was frowning out the dining room window at us. “Please do stop by if there’s anything I can do to help. Otherwise, I look forward to getting the invitation!”

  She walked away, basket of flowers in one hand and garden shears in the other, singing the wedding march as she went. “Ya DUM da dum. Ya DUM da dum. Ya da da DEE da, da ya DUM da dum!”

  “Huh,” Delaney said after Ms. Woolcott went inside her house. “I guess that means she’s coming.”

  “Well, it would have been rude to tell her about it, ask her advice, and then not include her,” Darby said.

  “I still think we should get some more ideas,” I said. “Take some time to brainstorm and then report back. Remember, troops — Operation Cauliflower needs to be a success, no matter what.”

  I was dreaming about clouds — big fluffy white clouds that could walk and talk, and I stood below taking lots of pictures — when something pushed against my shoulder.

  “Wake up,” said a voice. The cloud shapes went poof! And when I opened my eyes, a Dawn shape was standing over me in the darkness. “Good. You’re up. Get out of bed, we have important business to tend to.”

  “What? Now?” I glanced over at the clock. “It’s after midnight, Dawn. What are you doing up? Did you have a bad dream?”

  “Are you kidding? I haven’t been to sleep yet. I’ve been working.”

  “Working?”

  Dawn made a huffing sound. “Well, somebody has to keep our official business going. And the hullabaloo about the wedding shower took up the whole evening. As great as it is to do something for Lily and Alex, we can’t lose sight of our original goals — our commitment to spread equality; our responsibility to right wrongs wherever we may find them. Now, can you please poke Delaney?”

  At this point, I knew I had no other choice. Once Dawn gets to speechifying, there’s just no stopping her.

  I slid out of bed, tiptoed over to Delaney, and tapped her on the arm. “Delaney?”

  “No cheese,” she mumbled.

  “What? Delaney, wake up.” I bent down and shook her shoulder.

  Delaney turned over so that she was facing away from me. “Why is he wearing a hat?” she asked, her eyes still closed.

  Delaney talks a lot of nonsense while asleep. Dawn says it’s because Delaney can’t help babbling, even in her dreams. Sometimes it’s annoying, but mostly it’s kind of funny. I thought my cloud dream was pretty cool, but judging by what she says, Delaney must have amazing adventures as she slumbers.

  As I continued to shake Delaney’s shoulder and call to her, a big white cone appeared beside me. “Wake up!” Dawn said through the megaphone. And somehow, quick as can be, Delaney was on her feet.

  “What’s going on?” she said, blinking hard and wavering slightly.

  Dawn set down the megaphone and sat cross-legged on her bed. “I call this meeting to order,” she said, pounding the headboard.

  “Now? Really? Am I still dreaming?” Delaney said.

  “Nope,” I said. I turned on the lamp next to my bed and found paper and a pen so I could take minutes.

  “What’s gotten into you, Dawn?” Delaney asked, rubbing her eyes.

  “Look, this is important,” Dawn said. “And it won’t take long at all. I wouldn’t have woken you up, but it’s time sensitive.”

  “Time sensitive?”

  “Yep, in that we need to take action tomorrow. I just got off the computer” — she pointed to the front of the room where the old laptop on our desk was still glowing — “and I’m happy to say that I’ve found us a new event to go cheer at for Operation Cheer-for-All.”

  “But … I thought we weren’t going to do that anymore,” Delaney said.

  “I thought we weren’t allowed to do that anymore,” I said. “Didn’t we promise not to?”

  “People, people. How soon you forget.” Dawn shook her head in that smug way she sometimes does. “We promised not to cheer for any more competitions. But this isn’t a competition. It’s a show.”

  I was almost afraid to ask. “Um … what kind of a show?”

  “A goat show.”

  “Okay, I really am still dreaming, aren’t I?” Delaney said, rubbing her eyes.

  Dawn slid off her bed and faced us, arms crossed and legs apart — like a giant letter A. “Look, the 4-H Club will be proudly displaying show goats at the Ranch Park tomorrow after school. Anyway, they never get any attention from Cheer Squad, so we should go there and boost their spirit.”

  “The goats?
” Delaney asked.

  “The 4-H Club!” Dawn threw up her hands.

  “And you’re sure we won’t get in more trouble?” I asked.

  “Why would we?” Dawn said. “All we’d be doing is acknowledging their hard work. And what’s wrong with that?”

  For a moment, no one spoke. While I knew Dawn meant well, and technically we weren’t going against the promises we made to Mr. Plunkett, I still felt uneasy. It wasn’t just that I was afraid of getting another office slip, either. It was that, for the first time, I was getting tired of all the last-minute meetings and covert operations. Things were complicated enough without Dawn pushing her brilliant ideas on us.

  But I didn’t have the heart to say this. For some reason, it was just so important to Dawn that we do this. So I sat there like Petrified Darby and kept quiet, just like I do in history class — which was something else I hadn’t spoken up about. Adding that to my thoughts made me feel even worse.

  “Do I hear any further objections?” Dawn asked.

  Again, we were silent.

  “All those in favor?”

  Delaney and I both voiced our feeble-sounding ayes.

  “Okay then. Motion passes.” Dawn pounded her headboard. “I guess if there’s no other business, we should probably get back to sleep.”

  Delaney plunked over sideways like a felled tree.

  After Dawn had woken me, I couldn’t wait to be left alone so I could return to my cloudy dreams. But now that I was up, with bad thoughts tormenting me, I knew I couldn’t go back to sleep until I’d done something about it.

  I raised my hand, but then realized she probably couldn’t see it in the dim light. “Dawn? I think I have something to say. Something I need to tell you guys.”

  “Some new business?” Dawn asked.

  “Sort of. I … um … I’m failing history.”

  “You’re failing?” Dawn’s mouth dropped open.

  Delaney sat up again. “You’re failing history?”

  I hung my head in disgrace.

  “What happened?” Delaney asked.

  I took a deep breath and explained about the way Mrs. Champion runs her class, and how she’d told me that if I didn’t participate in the discussion soon, I’d get an official progress report about my bad grade.