by Lisa Yee
Why do people stop talking when they aren’t getting along?
Why doesn’t Alice just call Grandma?
Why don’t you just call me?
Why can’t I call Millicent?
Why does Stanford call and hang up?
Why is everything so complicated?
Why?
Emily
AUGUST 23
Dear Dad,
This morning as Alice ate her granola and read the newspaper, she kept sneaking peeks at me.
“What?” I asked.
“Your eyebrows still … They … You …”
“I knoooooow,” I moaned. I put down my glass harder than I meant to and milk splashed over the edge. “Just say it, just say that I look stupid!”
“I wasn’t going to say that. I was going to offer to help you fix them.”
Alice hardly ever wears makeup, but I’ve always been impressed with how well stocked her cosmetic drawers are. It was comforting to see her tattered bathrobe hanging behind the door, her toothbrush on the counter, and her clear orange face soap in the ceramic dish I made for her one Mother’s Day.
Once, when I had to recite “Humpty Dumpty” in preschool, I stole Alice’s soap. I kept it in my pocket, and when it was my turn to speak, I held on to it and it got me through the rhyme.
Alice kept rummaging through her drawers, pulling out things that didn’t belong: a roll of red ribbon, a hammer, a pack of gum. “Here it is!” she finally said, holding an eyebrow pencil aloft.
As Alice filled in my eyebrows, our faces were only inches apart. She kept stepping back to examine her work, and then coming toward me again with the pencil. This time I didn’t try to get away. It was the closest we had been all summer.
“There!” Alice stood back. “That’s the Emily I recognize. You’re beautiful. Really,” she said, as if anticipating my protest, “eyebrows or no eyebrows!”
I wiggled my eyebrows at her and we both burst out laughing.
“Thanks, Alice,” I said.
“You’re welcome, honey. Say, why don’t we go out for lunch today? There’s a new Japanese restaurant called Uehara’s I’ve been wanting to try.”
“That would be nice,” I said. “But I won’t eat any eel or things with tentacles —”
Just then, the phone rang and startled both of us. It was Julie! “I’ll take this in my room,” I said.
“Hi, Emily.”
“Hi, Julie!”
“Do you have lunch plans?”
“Ummm … no.”
“Want to come to my house? A bunch of us are going to lunch later.”
“Yes! Sure, that’ll be fun!”
I rushed in to tell Alice. “Julie called and invited me to lunch!”
“Oh. I thought we were going to Uehara’s?”
“Well, Julie’s counting on me to show up….” Alice looked sad and I hoped she wasn’t going to start crying again. She’s been so much better about not crying. “I hope you don’t mind. I mean, I can cancel if you really want me to.”
“No, no, you go right ahead,” she said, putting on a smile. “We’ll go to Uehara’s another time.”
“Great! Well, I’ve got to change. See you later!”
As I headed out I wondered if maybe I had been wrong about Julie. I’ve been wrong about a lot of people lately.
I was the first one to arrive.
“Emily, I’m so glad you’re here,” Julie said, ushering me into her room. There were clothes everywhere.
“Are you wearing a Felice Fashion belt?” I asked Julie.
“Yes!” she cried.
“And a Kirkpatrick Graffi-tee?”
“Yes!!”
“And a Castellucci Collection skirt?”
“YES!!!” she shouted. “Ohmygod, you know everything!”
I shrugged and tried not to look too pleased with myself. She was picking out her jewelry.
“This necklace, or this one?” she asked, holding them both up.
“The green one.”
“Which earrings?”
“The dangly ones.”
I was surprised when she followed my suggestions.
“Thanks for the advice. A friend never lets another friend leave the house looking bad.” Then, even though no one was around, Julie lowered her voice. “Emily, can I tell you something?” She shut her door.
“Sure …”
“I want to be a fashion designer.”
“You’d be great at that!”
“Really? You think so?”
I nodded.
“I’ve never told anyone that before,” Julie confessed. “Please don’t tell. I’m afraid people might laugh at me.”
“But why? It makes perfect sense. You’re like the most fashionable person I have ever met.”
Now it was Julie’s turn to blush. “Thank you,” she said. “I am very fashion-oriented, it’s true, and I can tell you are too. Alyssa, Ariel, and Ariana wouldn’t recognize a Felice Fashion belt if Richard Felice himself handed them one.”
Julie looked at me and suddenly began grinning. “Emily, I’m going to fix your hair! Don’t say no, I want to do this.”
Julie wouldn’t let me see what she was doing, and was really serious the whole time. “You have nice hair, Emily. Have you ever considered highlights? Like a warm honey color? I could take you to Salon Ferrante. Mimi does the best color.”
I had heard that highlights were expensive. But I did have a credit card. “Sure,” I said. “Why not?”
Finally Julie said, “Voilà!” and walked me to her mirror. French braids. I’ve always wanted French braids!
When everyone arrived, we headed to Mel’s for hot dogs.
“Love your hair,” Wendy told me.
“Julie did it,” I said proudly.
At Mel’s, Wendy and I had diet sodas. The Triple A’s shared a hot dog, and Julie got cheese fries, but she only ate a couple, then threw the rest away.
While we were there, a group of boys on skateboards came by and tried to flirt with us.
“How about a phone number?” the cute one wearing the helmet asked.
“How about no?” Julie said, flashing him her famous smile.
“You’re killing me,” he cried, clutching his heart.
Wendy and I grinned at each other. Then he turned to us and pleaded, “What about one of you lovely ladies? Care to help out a poor heartbroken skateboarder?”
We both started laughing, and he asked again. Finally I rattled off a phone number.
“Thanks, you just saved my life.” He moved in closer to me and whispered, “And my reputation!”
As we watched him skate away with his friends, Julie said, “Emily, I can’t believe you did that! Why would you do that? He wasn’t even that hot.”
“What makes you think I gave him my real phone number?” I asked.
Everyone cracked up, and Julie shrieked, “Emily Ebers, you are soooo bad!” Then we high-fived.
For the record, I didn’t give him my real phone number, but I might have if I could have remembered it. I was so flustered that he even noticed me. It must have been the way Julie did my hair with her barrettes.
After Mel’s, we went to the movies — the real movies where there are twelve theaters in one place, not the Rialto. While we were in the lobby, tons of girls and boys kept coming by to say hello to Julie and the Triple A’s. It was like they were celebrities or something.
Wendy and I just stood to the side. Every now and then, Julie would remember to introduce me to someone. “This is Emily,” Julie would say. “She’s new.”
Then I’d add, “And this is Wendy.”
“I’m old,” Wendy kept saying, until I told her to stop.
“So are you going to stick with the makeover?” Wendy asked as we walked past the concession stand.
“I think so,” I said. I willed myself not to look at the Junior Mints or the Milk Duds or the Goobe
rs.
“Oh Emily, this is so great!” Wendy whispered. She squeezed my arm as we entered the darkened theater. “We’re going to be popular!”
Emily Ebers, popular person.
I could get used to that.
Emily
AUGUST 24
Dear Dad,
Today Alice and I went to the middle school for new student registration. I didn’t want to be seen with her, but she claimed she had to sign a bunch of papers and prove we were residents by showing our cable bill and library cards. Does that mean if we don’t watch television or read books, we’re not really here?
When the registration lady looked over our paperwork and said, “Yes, you officially live in Rancho Rosetta, California!” I felt a twinge of pain. I used to tell people, “I live in Allendale, New Jersey.” Now I can’t say that anymore.
As Alice and I were registering for classes (well, actually Alice was doing that, and I was just wishing she’d hurry up), I saw Julie coming our way. I stepped away from Alice.
“Emily!” Julie called out.
“Hi! What are you doing here?”
“You told me you had to register, so I thought I’d come by and show you around.”
I tried not to grin too wide.
“Hello!” Alice said. “Emily, is this one of your friends?”
Instantly my grin disappeared.
“ThisismymotherAlice,” I mumbled to Julie.
“Pleased to meet you,” Julie said. “Would you mind if I showed Emily around school?”
“How nice. Yes, we’d love that,” Alice answered. “Let me just finish up here. Emily, you get to choose an elective. How about photography? Remember those photos you took of Mercedes Metz’s lawn gnomes?”
“Alice,” I hissed, “Julie just wants to show me around school.”
“Oh! Oh. Okay, well then. You two run along and have fun. I’ll catch up with you later, Emily. I have to meet someone anyway. It was nice meeting you, Julie!”
As Julie and I took off, she turned to me and said, “What’s with her crazy clothes?”
“It’s research for an article she’s writing,” I said defensively.
For almost an hour, Julie and I roamed around school. The campus is so big and there are trees everywhere. There are lots of cool, old buildings and a beautiful tile fountain in the middle of the courtyard. Julie says there’s a rock-climbing wall in the gym.
“That bench is where the losers hang out.
“That’s the make-out tree. It’s where you go to show that you’re in a serious relationship and don’t care who knows.
“Those stairs are the ones where the popular kids gather. That’s where we’ll be.”
It was so exciting being with Julie. I couldn’t wait to tell Wendy. Oops! I just remembered that yesterday Wendy offered to show me around campus. Oh well, she’ll understand.
As we crossed the street to the athletic field, Julie asked, “So Emily, how’s the diet going?”
“I don’t know if I can do it,” I confessed. “It’s a lot harder than I thought it would be.”
“You’re right, Emily. It is hard. Being popular is a lot more difficult than people think. I mean, look at me. Do you think looks like this appear by magic? No, I have to work on it. I play volleyball to keep in shape, I diet constantly, I TiVo all the hot shows, and I put up with Ariel, Alyssa, and Ariana. Plus half the school tries to imitate me, so I constantly have to reinvent my style to stay ahead of everyone. I’m also big on helping others, like always giving them fashion tips and pointers on how to look better.”
I wondered if when Julie told me to stay away from bright patterns, she was trying to be helpful.
“Popularity is work. It really is,” Julie said, sounding sincere.
“Is it worth it?”
“Well, yeah, of course it is. I can sit wherever I want in the cafeteria. Girls admire me. Boys go crazy around me. Even teachers like me. It’s so totally worth it. I like to set goals. Like this year, I’m going to be the Winter Formal Queen, and I’m going to get Stanford Wong to be my boyfriend.”
I felt my face burn red. Was it only a short time ago that my goal was to have Stanford Wong as my boyfriend? How deluded was I to think that something like that could ever happen? He never told me he was popular. It wasn’t until Wendy explained who he really was that I figured it out.
Stanford still calls every day. It doesn’t bother me like it used to. In fact, I actually get depressed when he doesn’t call and hang up on me.
“What?” Julie asked. “Do you have a problem with Stanford?”
“Noooo,” I said, hoping my voice didn’t waver. “I barely know him.”
“Well, he’s the best basketball player the school’s ever had. I’ve seen you talking to him. What’s with that?”
“He knows Millicent.”
“Who?”
“Millicent Min, from volleyball.”
“Oh, her. Well, Stanford or Stretch, that’s my big decision. I could easily go for Stretch too. In fact, I might. He is sooooo gorgeous and practically the only boy in school taller than me. But he doesn’t talk, and Stanford and I talked all the time last year in Mr. Glick’s English class.
“Stanford’s the head of the Roadrunners and I’m the head of this group. They’re the most popular boys, and we’re the most popular girls, so it only makes sense for us to hang out together. Besides, he has five in his group and there are five of us.”
“Six.”
“What?”
“There are six of us. You, me, Wendy, Ariel, Alyssa, and Ariana. That makes six.”
Julie shook her head and gave me a pitying smile. “There are four of us who are already popular, one of us who will be popular when I’m through with her, and one who’s more of a sidekick, if you know what I mean.”
I was so glad Wendy wasn’t there to hear that.
“Wendy’s skinnier than you, and way better at volleyball. But she lacks that sparkle that you and I have. Plus we know fashion better than any of the other girls. It’s so sad that they can’t even tell the designers apart.”
I was so glad I was wearing my John Gabby blue skirt, the one with the swirly pattern. I smiled back at her. It was like at that moment we totally connected.
“Well, I have to go now,” Julie said as we walked out to the street and she slipped her sunglasses on. “My dad’s taking my mom and me out to dinner tonight, so I have to get all dressed up. It’s my mother’s birthday. She’s turning thirty-five again. My dad gave me some money to get her a gift, so I spent half of it on perfume and kept the other half since I don’t think my allowance is big enough. Do you get an allowance?”
“My dad gave me a credit card,” I mumbled.
“Wow!” Julie’s eyes widened. “You are so lucky!”
She gave me a quick hug and headed down the street.
When Julie mentioned her mother’s birthday dinner with her father, I thought about you. Not that I am expecting us to go out to dinner. In fact, I don’t expect anything from you anymore. I’m not even sure why I’m still addressing this journal to you, except that it’s gotten to be a habit. Remember that article Alice once wrote about bad habits being hard to break?
Well, even though your postcards have stopped and it’s pretty clear you’re not going to call, ever, at least I still have my credit card. When you sent it, I really thought things were going to change. I thought you had changed. I hoped you had. You remembered my birthday! Last year you didn’t remember till you stopped by the house and saw the cake.
“Just a minute, I have something special for you,” you said. Do you remember?
You ran to your car. When you returned you handed me a Bob Dylan CD and a ten-dollar bill. “Happy birthday, Emily, I think you’ll like this.” And I did like it because it was from you. I only wished the CD hadn’t already been open. I still have the ten dollars, but I think I’ll spend it tomorrow.
Emily
Dad,
This afternoon Wendy’s mom drove us to the mall. Wendy’s parents are nice, but they’re just regular parents, not cool like Mr. and Mrs. Min.
“How’s the diet going?” Wendy asked. She slammed the minivan door shut and waved good-bye to her mother.
“It’s awful. I’m hungry all the time and all I can think of is food.”
“I know,” she moaned. “Me too.”
“Why are you on a diet? You’re already too skinny.”
“Julie says I should lose five more pounds.”
“Then you’ll be invisible.”
“You are so funny!” Wendy laughed. “You know, Julie really likes you. All I can think of is how great this next school year’s going to be now that I’m hanging around with the popular girls!”
The air-conditioning hit us when we stepped into the mall. I hadn’t realized how hot it was outside. Wendy spotted Julie first. She was in Sandberg’s Shoe Emporium and had piles of sandals scattered around her.
“What about green, like a metallic green. Do you have these in green?”
“I’ll see,” the salesman said through gritted teeth.
“Emily!” Julie squealed when she saw me.
“Hi, Julie,” said Wendy shyly.
“Come on.” Julie jumped up and hooked her arm into mine. “We’ve got to meet Ariel, Alyssa, and Ariana. I want to show you something!”
Wendy looked unsure of herself until I said, “Come on, Wendy, join us.”
“Wait!” the shoe salesman called out to Julie. “Miss! Miss, I have them in green — did you want to try them on?”
“You keep them,” Julie laughed.
As we strolled through the mall, we passed a group of good-looking guys who looked like they were in high school. They checked Julie out. “Later, boys!” she said. Wendy and I glanced at each other. “I get that sort of thing all the time,” Julie explained, shaking her head. “It gets old after a while.”
The Triple A’s were waiting for us in the purse section of Shah’s.
“Well?” Julie asked.
“It was hard, but we did it,” said Ariana.
“Mission accomplished,” Alyssa or Ariel chirped up.
Julie glanced at the counter. “Good job.” The Triple A’s beamed.