Twice As Nice

by Lin Oliver

  Lauren and Bethany got into the car. As they backed up and slowly pulled out onto Pacific Coast Highway, Lauren rolled down the window, waved at me and shouted, “Junior Waves forever!”

  Yeah, right.

  “You don’t look so good,” Sammie said as I climbed into bed that night.

  “Thanks,” I answered. “Way to build a girl’s confidence.”

  “Having trouble with your new friends, maybe?” she said sarcastically. “What a surprise.”

  “Everything’s fine,” I lied. “Or will be, anyway.”

  I reached over and turned out the light, but tired as I was, I couldn’t fall asleep. My mind was racing and my thoughts were all jumbled up. I couldn’t stop thinking about how great the day had been, how close I had felt to everyone, and finally how crushing it was to feel like Lauren had betrayed us. But then, maybe she hadn’t, my mind argued back. Maybe I was just being dramatic. All she did was trade a little information for the good of the group. Now we’d not only get to go to the football game, but to a high school party as well. On the other hand, my mind retorted, Lauren had broken her solemn oath and that was not easy to forget.

  I was like a pancake, flipping from one side of the argument to the other . . . and flipping from my stomach to my back, from my back to my stomach.

  “It’s pretty hard to fall asleep with you thrashing around like that,” Sammie said.

  “I can’t sleep.”

  “It’s Lauren, isn’t it?” Sammie said, flicking on the light. “I bet now that they got their club charter, she wants you out of the group. I told you this would happen.”

  “That’s not it at all,” I said. “Not even close. I’m just a little nervous. I have a lot on my mind.”

  “Nervous about your big Junior Wave debut tomorrow night at the football game?” Sammie said.

  “Yeah, that must be what it is,” I said.

  “Honestly, Charlie, you’re turning into one of those girls.”

  I flicked off the light. Sammie sat up and flicked it back on.

  “What now?” I asked. “Did you think of some other terrible comment to make about me?”

  “Nope, just forgot my retainer,” she said. She got up and went to the bathroom. “It’s not in here,” she called.

  “I think I saw it on the coffee table,” I called back.

  “Oh yeah,” she said, emerging from the bathroom. “I took it out when I was watching TV.”

  She padded into the living room, and came back with her retainer in.

  “I don’t know what’s wrong with me,” she said. “I’m forgetting everything—my retainer, my lunch. Oh, by the way, I also forgot to give you a message from Etta.”

  “The girl with the green hair? I like her.”

  “Well, apparently, for some mysterious reason, she likes you, too. She’s giving a demonstration tomorrow at lunch and she told me to invite you. She’s put together a mixtape of her favorite electronic music and is going to play it with a laser show she’s designing.”

  “Sounds cool,” I said.

  “Yup. Breaking news, Charlie. The SF2s aren’t the only ones who are cool. Some of the rest of us are okay, too.”

  “I know that.”

  “Do you?”

  Sammie got back in bed and flicked off the light. It was quiet for a while. I just lay there wishing I could talk to her like we used to do, to tell her what happened that night, how confused I was feeling—about Lauren, about Bethany, about myself.

  “Sammie,” I whispered after a few minutes. “I’m sorry I ditched you the other night. I’m going to try to be a better sister . . . a better person.”

  I waited for her answer, hoping for her total forgiveness. But all I got was silence. She was already asleep.

  When I got to school the next morning, Lily was waiting for me at my locker.

  “Here it is,” she grinned, handing me a plastic bag. “Open it up. I’m giving you the first one.”

  Inside was my very own Junior Waves T-shirt.

  “Didn’t they turn out great?” she beamed. “Do you have some orange shoes for tonight?”

  “Nikes,” I said.

  “Oh, those really bright orange ones with the pink laces? I love those. They’re perfect. I haven’t seen the other girls yet, so they’ll get their shirts at lunch. We can make plans then about how we’re getting to the game.”

  “Just text me what you guys decide,” I told her. “I have plans at lunch.”

  “You’re not eating with us?”

  “I’m going to an event in Ms. Carew’s room. A friend of Sammie’s is performing, and I want to be there for her.”

  “That’s nice,” Lily said. “By the way, did you get the text from Lauren this morning?”

  “Yup,” I said, even though I already knew the news. “Seems we’re all invited to Bethany’s party on Saturday.”

  Lily gave me a hug.

  “It’s been a good week for the Junior Waves,” she said as she bounced off down the hall. As I headed off to homeroom, I wished I felt like bouncing, but the events of the night before were still weighing heavily on my mind.

  One good thing did happen that morning, though. Spencer Ballard passed me a note in homeroom that said, Save the seat next to you tonight. I’ll bring cold pizza. I hurriedly shoved the note in my bag before Mr. Boring saw it.

  I couldn’t help it but my mind started to wander. I thought of our ceremony and almost teared up. So much good had happened. I shouldn’t let the argument with Lauren and Bethany ruin it. We all make mistakes. I probably made one by telling Sara’s secret. I for sure made one when I ditched Sammie the other night. Lauren made one in sharing one of our secrets with Bethany. But as GoGo always says, human beings make mistakes. That’s what makes us human.

  Forgive and forget, she says. Just resolve to do better. That’s all anyone can do.

  At lunch, I went to Ms. Carew’s room. Etta had set up turntables at the front and Ms. Carew had shoved the desks back and scattered a bunch of big pillows on the floor. About fifteen or twenty kids were there, some leaning on pillows, some sitting cross-legged on the floor. I knew a lot of them from Truth Tellers, but there were some new faces, too.

  “Welcome, Charlie,” Ms. Carew said. I could tell she was trying not to look surprised to see me there. “Take a seat anywhere.”

  Sammie hadn’t arrived yet. Sara was sitting on the floor, leaning back against a pillow, her long legs with her black lace-up boots stretched out in front of her.

  “Hi, Sara,” I said, flopping down next to her. “How are things?”

  “Looking up,” she said. “I’m working on my courage.”

  Again, that horrible pang of guilt shot through my whole body. She was such a nice girl, working so hard to feel good about herself. Why did I have to go and open my big mouth?

  Forgive and forget, Charlie. Just resolve to do better. Remember?

  I gave Sara my best smile.

  “You’re looking great,” I said to her. “Courage looks good on you.”

  “Really?” she said, smiling happily. “Wow, Charlie, that means a lot.”

  The next thing I saw was the most shocking thing ever. Sammie came walking in, and directly behind her was none other than Lauren Wadsworth.

  “Well, it’s nice to see you, Lauren,” Ms. Carew said, again trying not to look surprised. “And of course, you too, Sammie.”

  They both headed over to us. Sammie sat down on the pillow next to me, and Lauren actually sat down next to her. I gave her a look as if to say, What are you doing here?

  “Lilykins said you were here,” she whispered to me.

  “So you just came to see me?”

  “Kind of,” she said. “I had to do something for Bethany. Can you believe it? She gave me one last initiation assignment. At least this one didn’t
involve any clucking. Anyway, I had to come over to this building, so I thought I’d stop by.”

  A lot more people came into the room, so we had to squeeze in very close together. Sammie shifted uncomfortably.

  “You guys are crowding me,” she complained. “I don’t have room for my elbows.”

  “Hand your bags over to me,” Lauren said to Sammie and me. “I’ll take them over by the door to give us more room.”

  We handed over our stuff to her, and she high-stepped across the bodies on the floor to the hallway door, arranging our stuff in a neat pile on the floor. Ms. Carew had closed the blinds and lowered the lights so the room was mostly dark. Before Lauren could make her way back to us, Etta flipped on a machine that cast green lasers around the room, and then turned on the music. The lasers flashed in time with the beat of the music.

  I looked over at Lauren. I could just barely see her in the darkness, but I motioned for her to come back. She gave me a sign that she’d just stay where she was.

  The show lasted about twenty minutes. If I told you it was my kind of music, I’d be lying. It was pretty strange, but the lasers created a cool effect in the darkness. I was glad the room was too crowded for people to dance. The Truth Tellers kind of dancing—no steps and a lot of intense swaying and arm flinging—made me incredibly uncomfortable, especially with Lauren there.

  After the show, I went up to Etta and congratulated her. I stayed to help Sammie and Ms. Carew push the chairs back into place for our fifth period class. When we were finished, we stepped out into the hall. Lauren was waiting for us, holding both our bags.

  “Forget something?” she said, holding our stuff out to us.

  “What is wrong with me this week?” Sammie said. “Next thing you know, I’ll forget my name.”

  Lauren laughed and handed Sammie back her bag.

  “Here you go,” she said. “Oh, and just in case you forget, it’s Samantha, but everyone calls you Sammie.”

  Sammie nodded. I could tell she thought it was funny, but she wasn’t about to give Lauren the satisfaction of laughing at her joke.

  I hurried down the hall to my locker to get my English book. Lauren followed me.

  “Okay, truth time,” she said, walking beside me. “I thought that music thing, or whatever Miss Green Hair calls it, was ridiculous. But I wanted to hang out with you today at lunch, to show you there are no hard feelings. The football game will be so incredible tonight, I don’t want anything to ruin it.”

  I didn’t answer, so she went on.

  “Did you see the shirts? Aren’t they the best? Here’s the plan. We’re going to meet at the snack stand at the field at six thirty. If you need a ride, we can pick you up.”

  “That’s okay. My dad will drop me off.”

  “Good, but wear a jacket over your shirt. After we’re all together, we’ll take our jackets off and make a grand turquoise-and-orange entrance. Bethany says we can sit in the row right above The Waves. Everyone is going to notice us.”

  It did sound pretty terrific. Lauren was working really hard to make this a fantastic night for all of us. I relaxed a little. Forgive and forget, I told myself.

  “Do you think anyone will think we’re high school kids?”

  “Fingers crossed,” she giggled. Reaching out to give me a hug, she whispered, “This is going to be so cool,” before she ran off to her class.

  I got my English books out of my locker and hurried back to class before the bell rang. Sammie was just returning from her locker, and we almost bumped into each other.

  “I guess on the list of things you’re forgetting, one of them is to look where you’re going,” I said, in a friendly kind of way. She didn’t laugh. “Listen, Sams,” I said. “I’m really sorry I’ve been ignoring you. I’ve been a lousy sister. But I’ll be better. I want things to be okay with us again.”

  “Easy for you to say,” she said. “You weren’t the one who got ditched. We had a tradition, Charlie, and you blew it off for something that was more important to you.”

  “I’m so sorry,” I said. “Can’t we forgive and forget? Like GoGo says.”

  “I don’t know,” she said. “I’ll have to work on the forgiving part. The forgetting part is coming easy, though. My head has stopped working completely.”

  “Just because you forgot where you put your retainer?”

  “That’s not all. I just went to text dad and it took me forever to find my phone. Turns out I put it in the left zipper pocket this morning. I never do that. Maybe I need to eat more fish. They say it’s brain food.”

  “You’ve got a great brain, Sams.”

  “Don’t butter me up,” she said. “It won’t work.”

  The bell rang, and we both ducked into class. As we slid into our seats, Ms. Carew wrote the quote of the day on the board.

  There comes a point in life when you realize who really matters, who never did, and who always will, she wrote. I looked over at Sammie, who was busily putting her phone back where it belonged.

  After school, Sammie and I walked home together. As we headed down the California Incline, the hill that leads from the Palisades down to the beach, she turned to me and said, “I might as well tell you now. We’ve decided to go to the game tonight. “

  “We who?”

  “Alicia, Sara, Etta, Bernard, and me. Will wanted to go, too, but his parents won’t let him, so it’ll be the five of us.”

  That was a surprise. Ever since she’s been part of Truth Tellers, Sammie hasn’t been interested in supporting school sports. Going to games isn’t the kind of thing their group does.

  “How come you decided that?” I asked her.

  “We talked about it at lunch yesterday, and we all agreed that we really haven’t given going to games a fair chance,” she explained. “It’s easy for us to say that is so stupid or those kids are only into sports. But then we’d be acting snotty and prejudiced like the SF2s, no offense.”

  I decided in the interest of making peace, I’d ignore her jab.

  “Besides, Sara says she’s drummed up the courage to break out one of her new looks tonight,” she went on. “She’s coming over before the game, and Alicia and I are going to put together her pirate look with GoGo’s scarf and gold hoop earrings.”

  “Wow. She mentioned she was building up her courage, but it takes a whole lot of guts to take a chance like that at a football game.”

  “We told her to go for it.”

  “I’ll look for her there,” I said. “Maybe I can give her a little moral support.”

  “Careful,” Sammie said. “You don’t want to damage your precious reputation with the popular kids.”

  “Sammie,” I said, trying to be really calm and patient “just because I choose to have different friends than you doesn’t mean I’m a horrible person. I like Sara, and I’d like to be helpful to her. She’s my friend, too.”

  As I said those words, I felt my stomach flip over on itself. How could I call myself a friend, when I had done the one thing she asked me not to do? That guilty feeling, the one I had been trying to squash all day came creeping back. It just wasn’t going to go away.

  “I love Friday nights,” my dad said as he picked up his car keys. “Nothing more fun than a high-school football game.”

  “You’re not going, are you, Dad?” I asked, panic in my voice.

  “Don’t worry, Noodle. I’m going to keep him very busy right here,” GoGo said. “He promised to help me skewer the kebabs for Bethany’s party tomorrow night. Didn’t you, Rick?”

  “Let’s see,” my dad said. “Football game or kebab skewering. What should I do?”

  “It’s not even close, Dad,” Ryan said. “Those kebabs need you.”

  My dad actually laughed. Everyone in our house was in a pretty good mood, even Sammie. She and Alicia were busy getting Sara all fixed up.r />
  Six of us—Sammie, Alicia, Sara, Ryan, his friend Winston Chin, and me—piled into my dad’s minivan to drive to Pacific High School. When we got there, my dad tried to pull into the overflowing parking lot but he got stuck in a total traffic jam and couldn’t go any farther.

  We got out and went our separate ways. Sammie and her friends went to buy tickets in the general seating section. Ryan and Winston found some other guys from the volleyball team and went off with them.

  I made sure my jacket was zipped up, and headed off to the snack stand. My friends were all there. We couldn’t stop hugging and giggling. We were just so excited. Everyone gathered in a circle and Lauren counted to ten. At nine, we unzipped our jackets, and at ten, we took them off. Then we cheered.

  A bunch of high-school kids, who were buying nachos and popcorn, turned to look at us.

  “What do we have here?” a guy with bleached-blond hair asked.

  “We’re the Junior Waves.” Lauren smiled proudly. She’s awesomely pretty to begin with, but that smile kicked everything up a big notch.

  “Sweeettt,” he said. “You girls connected to Bethany’s group?”

  “Absolutely,” Lauren beamed. You could tell that answer impressed him.

  “Sweeettt,” he repeated. “Welcome to Pacific High.”

  He walked away with his friends, who all turned around to give us a good-bye wave.

  “How awesome was that?” Lauren squealed when they were far enough away not to hear us.

  We all agreed that it couldn’t have gone better. Just then, a girl wearing a Waves T-shirt ran by us. Lauren waved to her and called out, “Hi, Lizzy.”

  “What’s up with those shirts?” she asked, looking us up and down, not in the nicest way.

  “We’re Junior Waves,” Jillian answered. “We’re hanging out with you guys at the game.”

  “Wow, I didn’t know this was our night to babysit,” Lizzy said. “Okay, follow me, kidlets.”

  We followed her into the stadium. She didn’t get any nicer, but at least she didn’t get any meaner.