Being Mary Bennet Blows

by Mary Strand

  Being Mary Bennet Blows

  A Bennet Sisters Novel

  Mary Strand

  Triple Berry Press

  Contents

  Acknowledgments

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  About the Author

  Also by Mary Strand

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Triple Berry Press

  P.O. Box 24733

  Minneapolis, Minnesota 55424

  Copyright © 2016 Mary Strand

  Cover Credits

  Cover design: LB Hayden

  Electric guitar © aspect3d/DepositPhotos

  Piano keyboard wave © panama555/DepositPhotos

  Editor: Pam McCutcheon

  Logo credit: LB Hayden

  All rights reserved. This book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. No part of this book may be used, reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means whatsoever without the author’s express written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

  Electronic ISBN:978-1-944949-02-0

  Paperback ISBN:978-1-944949-03-7

  Printed in the United States of America

  For Jack,

  my favorite skater dude in the whole world

  Acknowledgments

  With many, many thanks to:

  Pam McCutcheon and Laura Hayden, collectively also known as Parker Hayden Media, LLC, who handle my books with great skill, loving care, and good humor.

  Sebastian Joe’s, home of triple-berry scones and a roaring fire, which first became my writing hangout while I wrote this book.

  Dave (Dusty) Engedal, my fave guitarist in all the land, who valiantly tried to explain guitars to me until I caught the bug and started playing them myself.

  Jacob Saxe, who answered my pesky questions about Woodbury High School, even though “my” Woodbury High School differs in any number of respects from the real thing.

  Sarah Lau, who spent some quality time window shopping with me at the Mall of America in the name of book research.

  Key people who provided critiques or edits or beta reads or brainstorming help, including Katy Cooper, Ann Holliday, Sarah Lau, Kate Fraser, Tom Fraser, Ann Barry Burns, and Just Cherry Writers.

  My own high school teachers at Eau Claire Memorial, a couple of whose names I used in this book out of great fondness. In the name of Mary Bennet, I took liberties in this book in particular with Mr. Skamser, who taught English grammar better than anyone. It was a proud moment when we were deemed to have been “Skamserized.” I owe you a debt of gratitude.

  Jane Austen, who probably felt sorry for Mary Bennet, too.

  Chapter 1

  Mary had neither genius nor taste; and though vanity had given her application, it had given her likewise a pedantic air and conceited manner.

  — Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice, Volume I, Chapter Six

  Don’t call me Ishmael. Call me MB.

  Except nobody ever does call me MB, and none of the idiots at my high school have a clue who Ishmael is. On a good day, people call me Mary, or Mary Bennet, but mostly they just ignore me. I’m seventeen, my birthday is next month, and I’m a senior at Woodbury High School, a half hour east of Minneapolis, close to the Wisconsin border. But that’s not my problem.

  My problem is Jane Austen.

  Jane set me up, with help from my mom, who put one over on my dad. Actually, Mom put five of us over on him: Jane, Liz, me, Cat, and Lydia. The Bennet sisters. Two hundred years after Jane Austen wrote The Book, as my sister Liz calls Pride and Prejudice, we got screwed. At least, I did.

  If you’ve read The Book, and I don’t recommend it, you know that the Mary Bennet of The Book is the definition of No Hope. When I read The Book at age twelve, I first knew horror. Even by then, my older sisters Jane and Liz were already becoming the annoyingly perfect Jane and Elizabeth of The Book, and Lydia was an insufferable brat. Cat? Hard to say at that point, but she giggled a lot.

  Meanwhile, I got stuck being Mary. Dull. Unattractive. Smart. Piano-playing. I don’t mind being smart, but the rest of it totally blows. Once I saw the writing on the wall—in black indelible marker—I started dressing in baggy clothes, didn’t bother with hair or makeup or cute shoes or nail polish, and even let my mom do a cram-down with piano lessons when I’d rather play electric guitar. Why bother fighting fate?

  But fate just keeps getting nastier.

  Today was the first day of school, and my family basically forgot, what with Lydia starting her first day of reform school today. In Montana. She left last Friday under police escort, and Mom practically organized a stupid parade in her honor. Of course, Mom doesn’t know it’s reform school. Even though she’s the lawyer in the family, Dad somehow managed to hide that pesky little detail from her.

  Dad didn’t tell Cat or me, either, but I listened in when he told Liz and Jane. Now the whole school seems to know, so Cat must know, too. She’s a junior here at Woodbury High, and her day can’t be much better than mine.

  And it’s only lunchtime.

  Another girl just stopped by my table in the cafeteria, where I always sit alone. She was skinny with perky boobs and long bleached-blond hair, so she must be a cheerleader. “Is it true about your sister? Lydia’s your sister, right? Like, you’re a Bennet?”

  My bologna sandwich halted halfway to my mouth, but then I took a big bite out of it and choked on the five-hundred-grain granola bread my mom bought as part of her latest diet. It’s like chewing on a pine tree. “MB.”

  She just stared at me, like she’d never heard the initials MB. I also wasn’t exactly sure what she’d heard about Lydia, but it couldn’t be good. It never was.

  “You’re Lydia Bennet’s sister?”

  I shrugged. My bologna sandwich stuck to the roof of my mouth and wasn’t budging.

  “So she was pole dancing?” The girl giggled loudly, a crowd started to gather, and the bologna tasted like lead. “Like, totally naked? And giving blowjobs to a million guys at the same time?”

  I rolled my eyes. I don’t think it’s possible to give blowjobs to a million guys at the same time, not that I would know anything about it—ew—but if it were even remotely possible, Lydia would’ve figured out how.

  I swallowed hard and tried to ignore Jerky Cheerleader Girl, but I still couldn’t believe Dad let Lydia go to Wisconsin Dells for the summer. While I slaved away at the animal shelter where I found my rescue cat, Boris, and tried to do a tiny bit of good for the world, Lydia ran off with the circus and got fired in two seconds and shacked up with a skanky guy and went wild at a strip club and got arrested and sent to reform school. At age sixteen.

  And those are just the highlights.

  As I sat there wondering why I had to be related to Lydia and praying that either the crowd would find someone else to torment or the earth under the cafeteria floor would open up and swallow me whole, a boy with shaggy brown hair in his eyes sat down next to me. He started chomping on a mouth-watering pizza burger and fries while the rest of the crowd gathered
closer. The shaggy-haired guy didn’t say anything, though, either to me or anyone else. Weird.

  Jerky Cheerleader Girl kept asking me questions I didn’t want to answer as she reached for my lunch bag, as if she was going to take it. As if she’d want anything she might find inside. The bologna sandwich beat out everything else by a mile, and that didn’t say much. But way too many cheerleaders and jocks at my school got a kick out of tormenting me, when they weren’t ignoring me, and I’d reached my breaking point.

  I shoved her hand away. Hard.

  She screeched. “Mr. Paymar! Did you see what this girl did to me?”

  Argh. The principal came striding over in two seconds, and Jerky Cheerleader Girl’s pals crowded in even closer, pretty much sucking the oxygen out of the space around my table—or what used to be my table. I had a guess how this scenario was going to play out, and let’s just say I wouldn’t be cheering.

  “Mary? Mary Bennet?”

  “MB.” I mumbled it, and no one heard. Or gave a rip.

  “Do you have an issue with Chrissie?”

  No kidding. But I pretended not to hear Mr. Paymar while I calmly—okay, with knees shaking, but he didn’t need to know that—stuffed what was left of my lunch back in the bag, rolled it closed, and pushed to my feet. But I couldn’t go anywhere. The crowd hemmed me in, and most of them were cheerleaders and jocks and other useless people. The guy who sat down by me was now sitting by himself, leaving no one to save me. Not that I could’ve counted on him to save me. First, he’s a guy. Second, I don’t even know him. Third, he’s a guy.

  “Mary, I’m just asking what’s going on.”

  “Yeah?” As I heard my voice squeak, I shoved my glasses higher up my nose. “You think I might have an issue with this— Chrissie? Is that your name?” I snorted. “I was sitting here by myself. She was harassing me.”

  Mr. Paymar stared at me, one hand stroking the neatly trimmed beard that had always looked cool—on a principal, at least—until this moment. “Chrissie said you did something.”

  I shrugged. “She’s a cheerleader. She’s lucky to string an entire sentence together.”

  A collective gasp shot through the twenty kids surrounding me. Man, did I hit the wrong demographic with that one!

  As I tried to push through the crowd, Mr. Paymar called after me. “Since I don’t know what happened, I’d like to see both of you in my office. I suspect one of you owes the other an apology.”

  A wave of anger flooded through me, and I suddenly felt myself channeling Lydia. “I’m sorry Chrissie lied to you. I’m sorry Chrissie ruined my lunch. And I’m sorry I attend this stupid school!”

  As the shaggy-haired guy at my table clapped and someone pushed him off his chair, I broke free of the crowd and sprinted out of the cafeteria. I should join the track team.

  Except I’m not an athlete. I’m a loser who’ll probably spend the rest of my day in the principal’s office. If he ever catches me.

  But who’s the guy with the shaggy hair?

  Mr. Paymar never caught me, but Mom did. The minute she walked in the door after work.

  “Mary? Where’s Mary?” Her head whipped around, her gaze darting everywhere as she dumped her briefcase in the front hall. She finally noticed me on the ratty old couch on the far end of the living room, where I curled up with a purring Boris and pretended to be an insignificant speck of dust. “There you are. I got a call at the office today. From your principal.”

  Dad, camped out in his leather recliner, glanced at me from behind his newspaper. He isn’t the type to defend me—no one in the family is—but I admit he looked surprised. “Mary? We’ve never been called about Mary.”

  I shrugged. “With Lydia gone, I guess they had time to focus on another Bennet for a change.”

  Dad cracked a tiny smile, but he buried it when Mom’s hands went to her hips and she stepped toward me. “This isn’t about Lydia, and poor Lydia isn’t here to defend herself, although she is probably thinking of us even while she’s having so much fun at that swanky new school of hers.”

  Unbelievable. My mom forgets me even when she’s chewing me out.

  I tucked my head down and curled into a tighter ball, one inch in diameter at this point. In my mind, at least.

  Boris squeaked in terror, which was kinda how I felt.

  “Don’t try to ignore me.” Mom’s heels rat-a-tat-tatted closer. “What did you do? Pick on some poor girl and be rude to the principal and skip half of your classes?”

  “She was picking on me, and I was only defending myself, but I didn’t skip any classes. They probably just didn’t notice me sitting there.” People usually didn’t, and I told myself it was better that way.

  “But Mr. Paymar said—”

  “Are you gonna believe him or me?”

  Mom paused mid-sentence, her index finger still shaking in my general direction. “Well, I don’t—”

  “It was a cheerleader, and she was cutting on me for having Lydia for a sister. Which isn’t exactly my crime.”

  “It’s no one’s crime. Lydia is—”

  Dad set down his newspaper and looked over the tops of his reading glasses at Mom. “Lydia isn’t here to defend herself, as you already pointed out, my dear. And Lydia wasn’t in school today, so Mary was left to defend her. Based on the call from Mr. Paymar, it sounds like that’s exactly what she did.”

  What? Dad stood up for me?

  Mom looked stunned, and Dad went back to his paper. Jane and Liz walked in the door just then, distracting Mom. As usual, though, they both shot up the stairs to the bedroom they shared, and one of them slammed a door. Probably Liz.

  So I released my frantic grip on Boris, who slinked away in disgust, and headed to the piano, something I hate almost as much as cheerleaders. I opened my Beethoven book and shoved my glasses higher on my nose as I flipped to his Fifth Symphony. I wanted to pound something, and no one else was handy.

  “Mary, do you have to—”

  “Practice?” I snorted, wishing I had Liz’s guts and could tell them I hated piano. I was the only one who’d stuck with it, which Mom claimed she wanted, but she kept asking all the time if I had to practice. “Don’t you want me to practice?”

  “Well, yes, but—”

  “But it’s never quite the right time for it.” I threw the book inside the piano bench and slammed the lid closed. Dad flinched, but Mom had already moved on to the kitchen, shedding her suitcoat as she went.

  Dad’s newspaper lowered again as I stomped across the living room. “Mary, is there something you want to talk about?”

  “With anyone in this house? Not likely.”

  He just stared at me, like I was some weird animal in a zoo and he hadn’t even meant to buy a ticket in the first place. Kinda how I felt pretty much every day around here.

  I kept stomping but hauled up short at the sight of Liz and Jane, who were now huddled at the bottom of the stairs and talking in low murmurs. Liz looked like she was about to go running, and Jane—being Jane, a/k/a Miss Perfect—didn’t. They both ignored me, of course, but kept whispering as they headed to the front door and stepped outside. When I moved to follow them, Jane yanked the door shut behind her.

  As I stood there, debating whether I’d rather endure Mom’s wrath inside the house or Liz’s if I followed them outside, the door flew back open. Barely missing me, Liz shot past and up the stairs, leaving Jane outside on the front step. They’d probably decided to make a DQ run, another thing I wouldn’t mind doing if it weren’t for the fact that Liz would crush me like a cockroach under her sneaker if I asked.

  Mom suddenly flew into the front hall, shrieking as she frantically wiped her hands on a dish towel. “Oh, God. Charlie?”

  How had Mom seen him from the kitchen? And . . . Charlie Bingham? Was he back in town? After the way he strung Jane along last year and then dumped her—which is exactly what guys do—how did he have the guts to face Jane, let alone Mom?

  I glanced at Jane, still on the fr
ont steps but trying to tiptoe back inside. She didn’t look too wild about seeing Charlie, either. In fact, she looked like she was gonna hurl any second.

  A door slammed upstairs, Liz’s feet pounded on the ceiling above us, and it sounded like she was throwing furniture around. Leave it to Liz to lose her wallet when she ought to be down here rescuing Jane from Charlie.

  Charlie and his snooty friend, Alex Darcy, reached the still-open front door moments after Jane slithered back inside. I called up to Liz. No answer except for the continued thumps and crashes, so I’d just have to rescue Jane myself. Then maybe she and Liz would start appreciating me, and even want to hang with me.

  Although I doubt it.

  Jane wasn’t speaking, and Mom was muttering something unintelligible and possibly rude. Charlie and Alex just stood there, staring at Jane.

  I frowned. “Charlie? You’re back?”

  He blinked, belatedly nodding, as Alex frowned back at me and Jane looked like the odds of hurling were growing.

  “So what brings you guys here?” I looked out the front door and didn’t see a car or a cab or whatever. “Are you living here again?”

  Mom regained her not-so-silver tongue. “Mary, could you help with dinner while Jane says good-bye to Charlie?”

  I stared at her, eyes wide. “No. I don’t cook. I’m the daughter who has to play piano, remember?”

  I might be the Mary Bennet of Pride and Prejudice fame—dull, unattractive, smart, and piano-playing—but even she didn’t have to help make dinner in The Book, and I wasn’t about to change history.

  At least, I wasn’t going to start cooking.

  As Mom glared at me, Charlie kept staring at Jane, Jane kept staring at her shoes, and Liz kept thumping the hell out of something upstairs.

  Mom flinched at the latest thump. “Mary, could you go see what Liz is doing?”