Ready or Not

by Meg Cabot

  5. He calls, often, just to see what you’re doing.

  4. He thinks you look great even when you don’t have any makeup on.

  3. He listens when you whine about your problems and tries to offer you viable solutions for them, even if most of the things he suggests are totally stupid and would never work because he’s a guy and he just doesn’t understand.

  2. He doesn’t get upset when he overhears you going on with your best friend about how hot you think that new guy on Gilmore Girls is.

  And the number-one way you can tell that your boyfriend really loves you:

  1. He doesn’t make a big deal out of it when you opt to spend your Saturday night in front of the TV instead of with him.

  6

  Except that I didn’t get to. Spend Saturday night watching National Geographic Explorer with Rebecca, I mean. Because at around three o’clock, the phone rang, and when I picked it up, I was surprised to hear Dauntra on the other end.

  “Sam?” For some reason, she was yelling. I soon realized why. Wherever she was, it was really noisy in the background.

  “Dauntra?” I was kind of surprised to hear from her. Dauntra had never called my house before. I didn’t even know she had my number. I mean, all of the Potomac Video employees’ phone numbers are posted on the bulletin board in Stan’s office, but I didn’t know Dauntra had copied mine down. “What’s all that noise? Where are you?”

  “Some police station,” Dauntra yelled. I heard someone in the background going, “Put that down, or the cuffs are going back on.”

  “A police station?” I echoed. “What are you doing in a police station? Are you all right?”

  “I’m fine,” Dauntra said cheerfully. “I’m just under arrest.”

  “Arrest?” I nearly dropped the phone. “You mean…you’re calling me from JAIL?”

  “Uh-huh,” Dauntra said. “Because I don’t think I’m going to be out in time to make my shift at the store tonight. Can you do it for me? Four to closing? I promise I’ll make it up to you someday!”

  I was still in shock over where she was. Also, I was glad neither of my parents or Theresa was around to overhear my end of the conversation. I wasn’t sure how excited they’d be over someone from work calling me from jail.

  “What did you get arrested for?” I asked her.

  “What?” Dauntra moved the phone away from her mouth and yelled, “You guys, SHUT UP, I can’t hear her.” Then she said, into the receiver, “What’d you say, Sam?”

  “I said, What did you get arrested for?”

  “Oh, that,” Dauntra said. “A bunch of us did a die-in. In front of the Four Seasons, you know, where your buddy the president is having his big fund-raiser. Boy, was he ever surprised!”

  Um, he wasn’t the only one. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing, either.

  “So, can you take my shift or not?” Dauntra wanted to know. “And if you can’t, can you call around and see if anybody else can? I only get one phone call, and I really don’t want to lose my job.”

  “You only get one phone call, and you called me?” I was shocked. “Dauntra, shouldn’t you call a lawyer?” Then I remembered something. “My mom’s a lawyer. Tell me where you are, and I’ll get her to go down there and—”

  “I don’t need a lawyer,” Dauntra said. “Somebody’ll be posting my bail soon. But not in time for me to make my shift. So will you do it?”

  “Sure,” I said. “I mean, of course. I mean—” I heard someone on Dauntra’s end of the line shout an obscenity. “Oh my God, Dauntra. Be careful!”

  “Careful?” Dauntra laughed. “I’m having a blast! Thanks, Sam!”

  And then she hung up.

  Which was how I found myself, an hour later, manning the cash register at Potomac Video and trying to find a channel on one of the shop’s overhead TVs that was showing the demonstration where Dauntra got herself arrested.

  Sadly, the TVs at Potomac Video aren’t hooked up to cable, since they’re just supposed to be used to show whatever movie we’re trying to promote that week. So all I could get was snow. Finally, Stan made me quit and put in the latest Jason Bourne DVD. He hadn’t seemed too surprised when I showed up for Dauntra’s shift.

  “I don’t even want to know,” he said, when I attempted to feed him my (made up) excuse for where Dauntra was (visiting a sick aunt). “Just watch out for shoplifters. We get a ton of them Saturday nights. Stupid neighborhood kids with nothing else to do. They think it’s hilarious to rip off an Xbox game or two.”

  I was at the cash register watching for stupid neighborhood kids when the overhead bell on the front door to the store tinkled. But instead of Mr. Wade or one of the other regulars coming in to complain about our lack of selection, my sister Lucy walked in.

  This was a huge surprise, because so far as I knew, Lucy hadn’t set foot inside Potomac Video for years. Popular people like Lucy don’t have time to watch DVDs, as they are much too busy going to parties and making out with their boyfriends. True, Lucy did spend the occasional Friday night at home, but she always let the video-choosing be done by someone else. Potomac Video, with its life-size cardboard cutouts of Boba Fett and Han Solo, open duct work in the ceiling, and hand-printed signs (RESTROOM FOR EMPLOYEES ONLY. EVERYONE ELSE JUST HAS TO HOLD IT), was hardly Lucy’s kind of place.

  You could totally see that she was thinking as much herself as she made her way past the New Releases shelf—attracting the admiration of just about everyone in the place, most of whom were college-age guys in Kiss the Geek T-shirts, arguing over which Star Trek movie to rent. When she finally saw me at the register, her face crumpled in relief, and she came hurrying up to the counter—oblivious of the jaws she caused to slacken along her way—and went, “Hey, Sam.”

  “Um,” I said. “Hey. What are you doing here?” Because I would have thought she’d have been out with Jack, or some of her girlfriends, at the very least.

  Then I remembered.

  “God,” I said, horrified on her behalf. “Did they ground you, too?”

  Lucy looked confused. “Who?”

  “Mom and Dad,” I said. “You know. For the SAT thing.”

  She went, with a laugh, “No, they didn’t ground me.”

  I stared down at her. On the TVs all around us, Matt Damon’s image flickered as he said, “They killed the woman that I love!” The geeks over in Sci-Fi, I noticed, were staring at Lucy with the exact same look of intense longing that Matt wore.

  “Well, then,” I said, a little confused myself, “what are you doing here?”

  “Oh.” Lucy shifted her tiny little Louis Vuitton bag (a gift for her birthday from Grandma) from one shoulder to the other. “I thought I might rent a DVD. You might have heard of it. Something called Hellboy?”

  I stared at her. “Hellboy,” I said.

  “Yeah.” Lucy looked around the store. As soon as her head moved in the direction of the geeks over in Sci-Fi, they ducked, and pretended to be engrossed in the cover of the new Alien movie. “Do you guys have it?”

  “Hellboy,” I repeated. “With Ron Perlman and Selma Blair. Made in 2004. Based on the Dark Horse comic of the same name. THAT Hellboy?”

  “I guess so,” Lucy said, looking blank. “I don’t know. Harold recommended it.”

  I stared at her even harder. “Harold MINSKY?”

  “Yes,” she said. “He said it’s one of his favorite movies of all time. I thought I heard you talking about it, too. Didn’t you like it? I thought so.” She’d reached out to touch one of the Nightmare Before Christmas action figures Dauntra had wrapped around the Need a Penny? Take a Penny. Have a Penny? Give a Penny tray. “So. Do you have it?”

  Without taking my eyes off my sister, I said, to the geeks in Sci-Fi, “Hey. One of you grab Hellboy and throw it over here.”

  A second later, a copy of Hellboy landed in my hands.

  Lucy glanced over at the geeks and smiled. “Oh, thank you,” she said.

  The geeks, mortified, scattered for
the safety of Documentaries.

  “Here you go,” I said, and handed Lucy the DVD.

  She looked at the cover and said, “Oh. My. So that’s Hellboy, there, with the bumpy things on his head?”

  “They’re horns,” I said. “He files them down.”

  “Oh,” Lucy said. “Is he, um, nice? Because he looks…not nice.”

  “That,” I said, “is the conflict. Hellboy is a demon constantly at odds with his own nature. He is Satan on Earth, yet was raised with loving care by people who had the good of mankind at heart, and now, as an adult, Hellboy has pledged to fight his own nature and save the world from evil. He is redeemed by his love for Liz, who is at odds with her own genetic destiny as a firestarter.”

  “Oh,” Lucy said. “That’s nice. Okay, well, I’ll take it. How much do I owe you?”

  “A buck,” I said. “I’ll give you my employee discount, since you’re family.”

  “Great,” Lucy said, and dug around in her purse. As she did so, she asked casually, keeping her gaze on the gum-blackened floor, “You know Harold, right, Sam? I mean, socially?”

  I blinked at her. This wasn’t exactly flattering, considering the social circles in which Harold travels. Also…where was this sudden fascination with Harold Minsky coming from?

  “Um,” I said. “Not exactly. I mean, he’s my computer lab TA. But we don’t exactly have the same friends. I’m a nerd. But not that big of a nerd.”

  “Yeah, but you collect comic books like he does, and stuff,” Lucy said.

  “Manga,” I corrected her. “Harold collects manga. I like to draw it.”

  “Whatever.” Lucy found her dollar and handed it over. “The point is—have you ever heard about him having a girlfriend?”

  I was so shocked, I nearly fell over.

  “HAROLD? HAROLD MINSKY?” What girl would touch him? I mean, with that hair? “No. Harold doesn’t have a girlfriend.”

  “I didn’t think so,” Lucy said, looking thoughtful. “That’s what makes it so weird.”

  “What makes what so weird?”

  “Well, the fact that he doesn’t seem to like me,” she said. “I mean, he likes me, I guess. But he doesn’t seem to like me. What I mean is—”

  “I know what you mean,” I cut her off. “You mean he hasn’t hit on you.”

  “Well, yeah,” Lucy said. “It’s just so…weird.”

  The thing is, you can’t even get mad at her, really, for saying something like that. She genuinely doesn’t know any better. Lucy is the kind of girl guys always hit on—all guys, except ones who are gay, or taken, like David. Having a guy not hit on her, the way Harold apparently hadn’t, was a whole new experience for her.

  And evidently, not one she particularly relished (SAT word meaning “to appreciate or enjoy”).

  “Lucy,” I said. “Mom and Dad like Harold because they think he’s the type of boy who won’t hit on you. So unless you want someone even worse”—although to tell the truth, there really isn’t anyone worse than Harold, nerdiness-wise. Except maybe someone from Rebecca and David’s school—“I wouldn’t complain, if I were you.”

  “I’m not going to complain,” Lucy said, giving me a look that clearly said, “Are you crazy?” “It’s just weird, is all. I mean, all boys like me. Why doesn’t he?”

  Now I felt a burst of irritation with her. True, Lucy can be the coolest of sisters—case in point, the contraceptive foam she’d gotten me.

  But she’s also one of the vainest people on the planet.

  “Not everybody judges people on how they look, Luce,” I said to her. “I mean, I’m sure in your circle of friends, that’s de rigueur”—(SAT word meaning “conventional or fitting”)—“but Harold has probably learned to judge people more on their insides than their outsides.”

  When Lucy just looked at me blankly, I tapped the cover of the DVD she was renting.

  “Like him,” I said, pointing at Hellboy. “He looks evil, right? But he’s not. You can’t always judge people by how they look. Ugly people might be beautiful inside. And beautiful people might be ugly inside. That’s all I’m saying. Maybe Harold thinks your insides leave something to be desired.”

  “Why?” Lucy demanded tartly. “I’m not evil. Or stupid, either, if that’s what you’re thinking. Just because I don’t know what waggish means is no reason—”

  “Why do you even care, anyway?” I asked her—just to make sure, you know, that she wasn’t, against all laws of nature, falling for Harold. “Don’t you already have a boyfriend? Where is Jack, anyway?”

  “Oh,” Lucy said, keeping her gaze on the floor again. “He didn’t come down this weekend. I told him not to. You know, on account of how Mom and Dad are so upset about this SAT thing.”

  “Yeah,” I said, a little more sympathetically. “I heard about Bare Essentials. And cheerleading. That must suck.”

  “Whatever,” Lucy said with a shrug. “I was kind of over cheerleading, anyway. It isn’t as much fun when you’re the one in charge. I mean, now that I’m a senior, I’m supposed to help make up the routines and stuff. It’s way too much responsibility. Know what I mean?”

  I wasn’t sure I’d ever heard anyone refer to making up a cheerleading routine as too difficult of a responsibility. But I figured I had to take her word for it. I mean, God knew I had never made up a routine. Maybe it was hard. As hard as integrating the subject of a drawing with its background. Who knew?

  “Was Jack mad?” I asked her. “I mean, how did he take it?” Because Jack is the sort of person who expects to be treated like he’s the most important thing in everyone’s life.

  “Oh, he had a cow,” Lucy said cheerfully. “He wanted to know why he couldn’t be my tutor…like his scores were that much better than mine. Mom and Dad put the kibosh on that right away. They were all, How much studying will you two do, anyway? Plus Dr. and Mrs. Slater want him to concentrate on his own school stuff. He hasn’t really been paying much attention to it, coming down here every weekend, and all of that. He got an F on some project, and they were all bent out of shape about it.”

  I could easily imagine this. The Slaters had to pull a lot of strings to get Jack into RISD in the first place, on account of his below-average grades. I guess his whole theory on how grades don’t prove anything didn’t really work out the way he’d planned.

  “So I guess you’re really gonna miss him,” I said, trying to offer some sisterly solace. “Jack, I mean. While you two are apart, getting your grades and stuff back up.”

  “I guess so,” Lucy said, a little vaguely. “Do you think Harold likes chocolate chip cookies? Because I was thinking I might make him some. As a sort of thank you, for tutoring me.”

  “Mom and Dad are paying him to tutor you,” I pointed out. “You don’t have to make him cookies.”

  “I know,” Lucy said. “But it never hurts to be nice to people.” She picked up the bag with the DVD in it. “Well, thanks.”

  “You’re welcome.” Then, realizing maybe I was being ridiculous—I mean, LUCY? Falling for Harold Minsky? Please—I added, “And, uh, thank you, too. For the, um. You know. Package you left me.”

  “Oh, no problem,” Lucy said, with a twinkle that caused one of the geeks to bump into the life-size Boba Fett cutout, then hasten to right it.

  “Hey, Madison.” Stan suddenly appeared at my side, and stood blinking down at Lucy. “This a friend of yours?”

  “My sister,” I said. “Lucy. Lucy, this is the night manager, Stan.”

  “How do you do,” Lucy said politely, while Stan just stared down at Lucy as if she had stepped off the front of an Amazing Nurse Nanako video.

  “Hi,” he breathed. Then, getting a hold of himself, he said, “Listen, Madison, you want to head home with your sister, go ahead. I’ll close up.”

  I looked at the clock on the wall. There were fifteen whole minutes until my shift was up. And he was letting me go home early! God, it was great sometimes, having such a hot sister.

  “T
hanks, Stan,” I said, and grabbed my coat and backpack.

  “Uh, wait a sec,” Stan said, as I started to slip beneath the counter to join Lucy.

  Then I remembered and silently handed him my backpack, which he opened and quickly flicked through, while Lucy looked on, curious.

  “There ya go,” Stan said when he was through, handing my bag back to me. “Have a nice night.”

  “Thanks,” I said. “See ya.”

  And Lucy and I walked out together into the crisp night air.

  “Does he search everybody’s backpack before they leave,” Lucy wanted to know, as soon as the door had shut behind us, “or just yours?”

  “Everyone’s,” I said.

  “God,” Lucy said. “Doesn’t that make you mad?”

  “I don’t know,” I said. The truth was, I had way bigger things to worry about than whether or not my bag got searched after work. I would have thought Lucy did, too. “Didn’t they search your bag at Bare Essentials?”

  “No.”

  “Well,” I said thoughtfully, “you can’t really make as much selling bras on eBay as you can selling stolen DVDs.”

  “What, are you kidding?” Lucy snorted. “Some of those bras retail for as much as eighty bucks. I’m really surprised at you, Sam, putting up with that kind of treatment. From that Stan guy, I mean. It’s not like you.”

  “Well, what am I supposed to do about it?” I grumbled. “Have a die-in?”

  “I don’t know,” Lucy said. “But something.”

  Which was all well and good for her to say. I mean, Mom and Dad weren’t making her work anymore. I needed my job. If I wanted to pay for my art supplies, I mean.

  I should have known, then. I mean, her showing up at Potomac Video like that should have been my first warning sign as to what was going on with Lucy.

  But I was too involved in my own problems to pay attention to hers. Especially considering the fact that my problems? They were about to get a whole lot bigger.

  Top ten ways I suck as a girlfriend:

  10. Instead of going out with my boyfriend on Saturday night, I choose to fill in at work for someone who was arrested that day for protesting something my boyfriend’s father feels very strongly about.