Night of the Zombie Chickens

by Julie Mata

  “It’ll be fun,” Margaret insists.

  “It will be a disaster,” I groan.

  If I’m going to be at the auditions to restore the Cute Red Wig, then I need a good reason to be there. My stomach flutters nervously at the thought. This is surely my punishment for taking the wig. In order to return it and make things right, I will have to audition for a role in Annie.

  We spend the rest of the week talking over the plan, making sure we’ve thought of everything. I know exactly what I need to do on Monday. Then, on Saturday, everything changes.

  I’m in my pajamas, watching Saturday morning cartoons and eating a bowl of cereal. I’m totally relaxed, knowing I have the whole day free in front of me to do whatever I want. Then my mom walks in and hands me an envelope. I recognize the handwriting right away. I rip it open and there’s a hand-drawn card—a sad face with tears leaking out of the eyes. It won’t win any art prizes, but I get the point. I’m so shocked I have to turn off the TV. This is the last thing I expected. I’m even more surprised when, a couple of hours later, my cell phone rings. I’m tempted to ignore it, but I have to know why she’s calling.

  “Hi.”

  Silence. The caller takes a deep breath and I hear a catch. “I’m such a jerk.”

  I stare at my fingernails and try to keep my voice light. “Yeah, kind of.”

  “I’m sorry, Kate. I know you’re mad at me. I don’t blame you, but I just wanted to let you know. I’m really sorry.”

  “You’re sorry now that everyone at school hates you,” I point out. “Now that you’re not Lydia’s best friend anymore.”

  “I never wanted to be her best friend.” Alyssa hesitates. “At first, we had a lot to talk about. You know, with her parents getting divorced and everything. But we weren’t getting along very well at the end. Like, nothing I said was funny anymore, but I was still supposed to laugh at all her stupid jokes. She was hanging with Tina Turlick most of the time.”

  Sure, Alyssa wants to be friends now, I tell myself. She comes running back because Lydia’s dumped her. Everyone hates her. Her social life is in shreds. So who does she call? Crapkate Walden. I’m her last resort, her fallback, her Plan Z.

  “So why are you telling all this to me? I’m just a loser, remember? The weirdo with chicken crap on her shoes.”

  There’s a silence. For a second, I think maybe she hung up. “I don’t blame you for hating me,” Alyssa finally says. “But you’re not a loser. You’re a ten times better friend than Lydia.”

  For a moment, I feel better because I know it’s true. Then a horrible feeling comes over me as I realize it’s not true.

  “I knew I was being stupid, but I just couldn’t help myself,” Alyssa says, real quiet. “It’s like I was on drugs or something. All the girls crowding around, and suddenly everything I said was superfunny, and everyone wished they were me....”

  “Not everyone,” I say loudly.

  I hear a tiny sniff and I know she’s crying.

  “I’ve got to go,” I say quickly. I hang up, not waiting for her to answer.

  My head is whirling. In the little movie that’s been running in my brain, this is the part where I get superexcited. I’ve watched the rerun in my head so many times it’s starting to show up in my dreams at night. It’s the one where Alyssa admits she’s all wrong and I beam happily as she begs my forgiveness.

  Now it’s happening and I don’t feel superexcited. When I check the mirror, I’m not beaming. Mostly, I feel confused. Part of me wants my BFF back. I want life to go back to normal. But things aren’t the same. I’m not sure I’m the same. I have other friends now and there’s no way I’m going to turn around and ignore Margaret and Doris. I know how bad it feels.

  I saw girls who were best buddies in grade school turn into strangers once they hit junior high. Usually, one of the girls changed a lot over the summer while the other didn’t change at all. Suddenly, they had nothing in common. Is that what’s happened to Alyssa and me? Are we just two different people now? Or was the last month just a temporary insanity? Has Alyssa really come to her senses, or will she dump me again once things blow over? I couldn’t go through all this again. I’m afraid my heart might explode.

  Still, Alyssa was my friend for six years. Should I let a few bad weeks ruin all those years of friendship? What if Lydia had gotten chummy with me instead? I might have acted the same way. I might have drunk the Lydia Kool-Aid and let it go to my head.

  My relaxed feeling is gone. Instead, I’m chewing one fingernail after another, trying to figure out what to do. Finally, I send a text. We should talk. Come over tomorrow?

  Right away, she calls. “You mean it?”

  “Sure,” I say gruffly. “We can talk about what a lousy friend you’ve been and how you’re going to make it up to me.”

  “I was a sucky friend. But you know, Hitch,” Alyssa says, real solemn, “I didn’t take the Cute Red Wig. It wasn’t me.”

  “I know,” I say.

  I hear her voice catch. “You mean it? You really believe me?”

  The Cute Red Wig is hidden in a box inside a bag at the back of my closet under a stack of old shoes. Still, I feel like it’s sending out some kind of weird signal that Alyssa will be able to hear, like a foghorn blast or a time bomb ticking.

  “Of course I believe you,” I say.

  Alyssa starts telling me how great I am and what a super friend I am. Every time she says something I feel a little worse. Something starts rising up inside me, like a balloon filling with helium. Only it’s not helium. It’s a strange gas called guilt and it’s building in my throat and choking me. I’m the one who should be apologizing to her. “I gotta go,” I finally blurt. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

  I pace back and forth in my room. More than ever, I wish I could rewind the past couple of weeks and cut out some crucial scenes. My plan didn’t seem so terrible at the time. We were all just actors playing a part. But life is turning out to be way more complicated than any movie. In film noir, the bad guy always takes the fall. All along, I thought Alyssa was the bad guy. Life has added one last twist, though. Now it turns out the bad guy might be me.

  I stare at myself in the mirror. The narrow rectangle of glass looks like a tiny jail and I’m trapped inside it. If life really were a movie, then I’d be in handcuffs by now, headed to prison for stealing, forgery, lying, and general all-around bad-guy behavior. I deserve to have the cops kick in my door and lock me up in the slammer. I imagine myself holding on to the bars of my cell as the camera dollies backward to reveal a long, echoing prison hallway, with me at the very end, lost in shadow....

  Okay, maybe I’ve watched a few too many film noir movies.

  Still, the person in the mirror seems like a stranger. I always thought the idea of turning into somebody else was just a cute Hollywood plot gimmick, like in Freaky Friday. It feels like that’s what’s happened to me, though, minus the body exchange. How did I turn into this mean, vengeful thief?

  I wander over to my window and stare outside. Maybe I should have just called Alyssa and talked to her instead of getting so upset. Maybe I should have accepted that people do change. I certainly have.

  I pull out my phone and text Margaret: Heard from A. We’re talking tomorrow.

  Immediately, she texts back. Wow! Good luck. Going to tell her?

  I think about this for a long time. Finally, I write: idk. It’s probably not the answer she wants to hear, but it’s the best I’ve got.

  After texting with Margaret, I keep pacing back and forth in my room, going over what I should say and do when she comes over. I feel an overwhelming urge to talk to my mother. I figure she’s probably busy counting her chickens or something, but when I walk downstairs she’s sitting at the kitchen table, rubbing her temples. She looks worried and I suddenly feel funny barging in on her. It looks like she doesn’t need yet another headac
he. I’m just about to back out the door when she glances up and smiles at me.

  “Hi, honey.”

  “Hi.” I sit down, wondering why she looks so tired. “Is something wrong?”

  She hesitates, then shrugs. “I lost my biggest restaurant client today. They’re closing their doors.”

  “Burberry’s is closing?”

  She nods. “And the sales figures for last month aren’t what I’d hoped. And some of the hens have a fungal infection—” She shoots a quick glance at me and smiles. “Sorry. I promise, no medical details.”

  “It’s okay. You can talk about that stuff. I overreacted.”

  My mother shakes her head. “No, you were right. I’ve been so busy trying to make this business work I got too caught up in it. I forgot I have a more important job.”

  I’m confused. “Another job?”

  “Being a mom.” She smiles ruefully. “You know, Kate, I always wished I could live on a farm when I was your age. I loved animals, but your grandmother was allergic to everything. The only pet I ever had was a fish. I wanted to give you and Derek a chance to enjoy all the things I missed.” She glances wistfully around the kitchen. “I guess one person’s dream is another’s nightmare. I’ve dragged you both out into the country, away from everything. And now you have these problems with your friends.” She gives a deep sigh. “I’m starting to think this was all a big mistake.”

  I’m tempted to agree with her. It’s on the tip of my tongue to blurt Does that mean we can lose the chickens and move back to town?

  But I bite back the thought. The sadness in her face reminds me of how I felt when I thought I had to give up on my movie. When I lost my best friend. It’s true that my mother’s heavenly hens have turned out to be devils in disguise. Instead of a movie about zombie chickens, I should have made a flick about gangster hens, hatching eggs by day and criminal plots by night. On the other hand, Alyssa and I had a lot of fun chasing after them. Hens aren’t the easiest animal in the world to direct, but some of our biggest laughs came from trying.

  It’s nice to hear that she still thinks being our mom is an important job. It’s nice that she’s worried about me. Maybe the hens haven’t won her over to the dark side yet. Maybe my mom doesn’t hate me as much as I thought. Maybe she doesn’t even hate me at all.

  “Without the hens I wouldn’t have my movie,” I point out. “And you’d still be stuck at a job you didn’t like.”

  And then it hits me—my mother and I are trying to do the same thing. We’ve gotten on each other’s nerves and we’ve gotten in each other’s way. We’ve both run into roadblocks. But all this time, we’ve both been trying to follow our passion. Okay, hers is a little weird, but some people could say the same about making a movie.

  Instead of backing her up, I’ve spent all my energy hating her new business and complaining about it. Now she’s thinking about calling it quits, and I might be partly to blame. I guess I have to add being a bad daughter to my list of accomplishments. I’m glad the day is almost over. I don’t think I can stand to find too many more character defects.

  I remember how excited my mother was when she announced her new business to us and lit her old clothes on fire. It hurts when you have a dream and it gets squashed. I’ve learned all about that. So I take a deep breath.

  “You can’t quit now, Mom. Derek and I are surviving just fine. This is your dream. You have to go for it. If you don’t do it now, when will you ever do it? You and Dad aren’t getting any younger.”

  My mother mock frowns at me. “Are you calling me old?”

  I shrug. “I’m just saying.”

  She looks me right in the eye. “Are you sure, Kate?”

  For a second, I have a flicker of doubt. This is my chance to get rid of those hens once and for all. If I’m lucky, Spike might end up in a can of chicken soup....

  I meet her gaze. “I’m sure.”

  She gives me a relieved smile. “Don’t worry, I’m not throwing in the towel yet. But thanks for the pep talk. I definitely needed to hear that.” She gives me a searching look. “Now, how about you? How’s your movie coming along?”

  “It’s okay.” I nervously fidget with a lock of hair. Now that I’m sitting in front of her, I’m not sure what to say.

  She gives me one of her concerned-mom looks. “Anything wrong?”

  A lump rises in my throat as I nod. Then, it all comes spilling out. Sort of. “I have these two friends and they had a fight. One friend...borrowed something. The other friend doesn’t know about it, but she ended up getting in trouble because of it.” I avoid her gaze. I know I’m not fooling her with the two-friends bit.

  My mother nods thoughtfully. “Did your friend ask before borrowing the item?”

  I shake my head. I can feel my cheeks reddening.

  “Then that’s a little like stealing,” my mother says gently. “I would advise the borrower to return the item and then tell her friend what she did.”

  “What if she tells her friend and then the friend hates her forever?”

  My mother takes my hand and squeezes it. “It’s hard to do the right thing.” She gazes at my fingernails, which are nibbled down to nubs, and for a moment I think she’s going to lecture me. Instead, she gives my hand another squeeze. “You know, Kate, all of us get busy building our careers, building our families, our friendships. It’s easy to forget that we’re also building who we are. We do it every day. It’s not what other people think of us that defines us. It’s what we do and how we act. I guess your friend has to decide what kind of person she wants to be.”

  I nod. I expected my mother to freak out and demand to know what got stolen and how I’m involved. Instead, she leans over, strokes my hair, and asks if I want a cookie.

  It reminds me of when I was young, when a kiss from her along with a homemade chocolate chip cookie used to cure just about anything. I’m twelve now, though. Does my mother really think a cookie can help?

  “I’m not hungry,” I tell her. She kisses my forehead as she gets up to go, leaving me to ponder the horrible person I’ve become.

  “Are they chocolate chip?” I ask, just out of curiosity.

  Because even though a cookie won’t help, I decide it won’t hurt, either.

  When Alyssa shows up at our door Sunday afternoon, my mother practically screams with excitement. She’s so happy that I realize she must have been a lot more worried about our fight than she let on.

  “It’s so nice to see you again,” she gushes. “I think you’ve grown since the last time you were here. How’s your mom? Would you like a snack?”

  It’s kind of embarrassing, but it’s also kind of sweet. Finally I rescue Alyssa and we escape upstairs. Then we’re standing alone in my room, looking everywhere except at each other. Alyssa starts in and says she’s sorry again. She’s playing with the stuff on my dresser, but she suddenly turns toward me. “Hitch, I really didn’t take the wig. Everyone thinks I did, but I didn’t.” She hesitates. “I was in the music room to meet Jake Knowles. He sent me a note, but then he didn’t show up.”

  If it were me, I would have walked right up to Jake and asked him why he stood me up. But then again, I don’t have a crush on him. Alyssa gets tongue-tied whenever she’s near Jake, so I guess that’s why she hasn’t asked him.

  I can feel the guilt balloon rising up inside me again. I know I should tell Alyssa. It’s the right thing to do. Still, part of my brain is screaming, Don’t do it! I think about what my mother said and I take a deep breath. And another. Then a few more.

  “I know about Jake,” I finally tell her.

  She looks surprised. “Did he tell you?”

  The balloon is huge. It’s pressing against my chest. If I tell Alyssa, I’ll be in a boatload of trouble. When she tells everyone what really happened, they will hate me. Mr. Cantrell will hate me. My classmates will think I’m a
lying, stealing, two-faced, scheming loser. My parents will probably disown me. I think of Margaret and sigh. I know she would do the right thing.

  Finally, the balloon in my chest pops. I cover my face with my hands. “I know because I did it!”

  Alyssa looks worried. “Did what?”

  I can’t utter the words. I walk to my closet, dig down, and pull out the plastic bag. I have to move the baby monitor out of the way to reach it. Just seeing the monitor sends a nervous jolt through my body. I’d almost forgotten about my plan to spy on my dad. Is there no low deed I’m not capable of?

  I grab the plastic bag, dump out the box, open it, and pull out the Cute Red Wig.

  Alyssa gasps. Her eyes go round. A small, twisted part of me wishes I was getting all this on camera. I could use that reaction shot in my movie.

  “You took it?” Alyssa shakes her head, looking confused. “Why?”

  I tell her the whole terrible story. She gets mad—really mad—when I explain how I wrote the note, used Margaret to deliver it, and made sure Mr. Cantrell was in the hallway to see her.

  “Wow, that is so low, I can’t even...I can’t believe you would...”

  “You dumped me for Lydia!” I blurt. “You made my family sound moronic. And you were pathetic, making fun of Margaret. She didn’t deserve that.”

  “But you did this on purpose,” Alyssa says, her voice shaking. “You set the whole thing up for me to get in trouble. And now everyone hates me.”

  She glares at me and I wonder if she might even call the cops. Technically, I’m in possession of stolen property. Alyssa stalks to the door, then turns. Her lower lip trembles. “You have no idea how awful the last weeks have been.”

  “Yes, I do,” I say quietly.

  She pauses at my words and a funny look comes over her face. Then she slams shut the door. Just as I feared, she’s never going to forgive me.

  I hear my mother’s voice on the landing. “You’re not leaving already, are you, Alyssa?”