My Worst Best Friend

by Dyan Sheldon

  “I told you … all my secrets … and everything … and you’re, like … the only person who, like … who really knows me … who loves me … and you turn on me…” Her words got swallowed in sobs.

  “But I haven’t turned on you!” It was a chain reaction. I was crying now, too. “I do love you. I’m sorry. I’m really, really sorry. I didn’t mean to upset you. I just— Oh, please, Savanna… Please say you forgive me.”

  Her bottom lip quivered. “I don’t know. I feel, like, sooo betrayed.”

  I sat down next to her – near, but not touching. “I’m sorry. Savanna, I’m really sorry. Please. Say you’re not mad at me. I just … you know… It’s been, like, really stressful for me. Especially tonight…”

  “I’m not mad… I mean, not that mad… Anyway, I don’t think I can stay mad at you, Gray.” She snuffled back a few million tears. “And, I don’t know … maybe you’re right. Maybe what you said to Archie and Cooper is true. I’m like too—” She wiped her sleeve across her eyes. “Too persuasive or something.”

  “You’re not! I was just saying that because I was embarrassed. You’re just you. Please. Say we’re still friends.”

  “Oh, Gracie…”

  I threw my arms around her.

  We both started crying again.

  Chapter Nineteen

  The Difference Between Truce and Peace

  I didn’t sleep very well that night. I didn’t toss and turn – because I didn’t want to disturb Savanna – but I lay there staring into the dark, going over and over everything Savanna had said and everything I’d said, trying to make them go back in the box so I could forget about them for ever. I could tell from her breathing and the fact that she didn’t have her knee in my back that Savanna wasn’t sleeping either. I whispered, “Savanna?” But she didn’t say anything.

  When I woke up the next morning, she was already dressed. She was standing in front of the mirror, putting on her make-up, humming under her breath. I didn’t recognize the song.

  I rubbed my eyes. “What time is it?”

  She pulled the top off her mascara. “It’s after 9.30.”

  “But your mom’s coming at ten.” I pretty much jumped out of bed. “We won’t have time to make pancakes.” Pancakes were our favourite sleepover breakfast.

  “I know.” She held her mascara wand in the air and looked at me in the mirror. “But I didn’t know whether I should, like, wake you up or not. I mean, I figured you needed to sleep.” She started stroking her lashes. “Yesterday was pretty mega.”

  I pulled on my jeans. “My dad’s probably got some coffee made.” I yanked my genocide T-shirt over my head. It smelled like sour apples. “I’ll fix you some toast.”

  “That’s OK.” She slid the wand over her lashes. “I’m not really hungry.”

  “Well, what about juice? Don’t you at least want some juice?”

  She batted her eyes at her reflection. “Really, Gracie. I’m fine.”

  I watched her put the brush back into the mascara tube. I watched her unscrew the top on a little bottle of cologne and dab some behind each ear. I watched her fluff out her hair with her fingers, tilting her head to the left and the right and giving it a shake. I had this weird feeling that I wasn’t really there. I said, “Savanna, about last night…”

  “Forget it, Gracie. I have.” She dumped her make-up back in its case. “You know, it’s all just water over the bridge.”

  “Under.”

  She snapped the lock. “Whatever.”

  A horn honked in the driveway.

  “Ohmigod! Mother Zindle’s early!” Savanna stuffed her things into her backpack.

  I put on the flip-flops that I used as slippers and followed her out of my room.

  “I don’t think you should come outside with me,” said Savanna when we reached the bottom of the stairs. “You know, in case Zelda asks you something about last night. I don’t want to put you on the spot.”

  “It’s OK, I—”

  “No, really.” Savanna grabbed her jacket from the hooks by the front door. “I thought about what you said after you fell asleep last night. I mean, I know I can be like pretty self— pretty self-involved. But that’s going to stop. From now on, I’m going to pay more attention to how you feel and what you want.”

  I didn’t really like the sound of that. “I think I went a little over the top,” I said. “I was really stressed. I don’t want you to—”

  “Kisskiss, byebye.” She gave me a hug. “I’ll talk to you later.”

  I waved to Mrs Zindle from behind the storm door as Savanna ran to the car. When she got inside, Savanna rolled down her window. “Tell your dad thanks again!” she called as her mother backed out of the driveway. “I had a really great time.”

  I spent the rest of the morning helping my dad clear up and put the good dishes back in the cabinet and the chairs back in the basement.

  “You guys went to bed kind of early last night,” he said, as we moved the furniture back to where the band had set up. “I was afraid we might keep you awake. We played pretty late.”

  I said that it was OK. “We didn’t fall asleep right away. You know, we had things to talk about.”

  “Oh, right.” He picked up a broken guitar string from the rug. “I thought I heard you.” He looked from the string to me as though he was waiting for me to say something. And then he said, “I had the feeling something was going on with you and Savanna.”

  “Oh, Dad…” I laughed – at what a father he was being. “Something’s always going on with me and Savanna. We’re best friends.”

  He nodded. “Best friends or not, if there is anything bothering you, Gra—”

  “No.” I straightened out the fireplace screen. “Nothing’s bothering me.”

  “Right.” My father slipped the broken string into his pocket. “But you know where to find me if you do want to talk.”

  “Yeah.” I didn’t want to talk. Not ever. As far as I was concerned, the sooner everybody forgot about last night, the better. “Thanks.”

  “You know what?” He gave me a big smile. “You’re not going to believe this, but I’m already looking forward to the leftovers.”

  In the afternoon I finished my homework, and after supper I watched an old movie by myself. I finally went to bed around midnight – after I realized that when Savanna said “later”, she didn’t necessarily mean later today.

  The next morning at school, we all hung out in the lounge as usual. Cooper wanted to know how the Remember the Wampanoag party went, and Savanna said it was cool. “Wasn’t it, Gracie?” asked Savanna. That was the only thing she said directly to me.

  She didn’t come to lunch that day.

  “You know Savanna,” said Archie. “She left all her homework till last night, so she had to go to the library to do her history now.”

  That afternoon, when I met up with Savanna after school, Marilouise was with her. “We’ve got this psycho-killer history test on Friday,” Savanna explained, “so Marilouise’s coming over to study. She is sooo good at history. I mean, you’d think she’d lived before or something.” This was the first I’d heard of Marilouise’s past lives. And from the look on Marilouise’s face I guessed it was the first she’d heard of it, too. Savanna talked about Manifest Destiny all the way to the Old Road.

  Savanna called me after supper. “I’m sorry about that,” she said. “It was, like, not my idea, believe me. I mean, I can study by myself. But you know Marilouise. She’s pretty needy really.”

  “That’s OK.” I laughed. It wasn’t what you’d call echoing with joy. “Only, I was, you know, a little worried that you were avoiding me or something. Since you didn’t come to lunch today.”

  “Avoiding you?” she repeated. “Why would I be avoiding you? I just had stuff to do.”

  And that was pretty much the way it was for the rest of the week. She stopped meeting me in the morning because her dad was leaving earlier and could give her a ride to school. We still hung out
with the others before the bell, but mainly she sat with Archie’s arm around her, talking to him. We ate lunch together with the others, but there was never an empty seat next to Savanna any more. We met in front of the main building at the end of the day – but on Tuesday her mother picked her up to go somewhere after school, on Wednesday she went to Marilouise’s to study some more for the history test, and on Thursday she had somewhere to go with Archie. We’d still talk on the phone most nights, but our conversations lasted minutes, not the hours my dad always joked about – and were usually cut off in the middle of a sentence by some crisis in the Zindle household or another call.

  I started feeling really lonely. It was as if Savanna and I were in some kind of suspended animation. We weren’t exactly fighting, but we weren’t exactly not fighting. We weren’t exactly not speaking, but, unless you count hello, yeah, see you and bye as a conversation, we weren’t really speaking either. It was pretty weird to think that not so long ago I could have told you what colour bra Savanna was wearing and what she’d had for supper, and now I didn’t know anything about her that everybody else didn’t know. A dozen times a day, I’d hear something or see something and I’d think: I have to tell Savanna that… And then I’d remember that I probably wouldn’t get the chance. I’d be smiling and telling jokes at school, but as I pedalled home I’d feel like the last Wampanoag, wondering how everything had managed to go so wrong.

  I tried not to let anyone see that I was upset. I didn’t want to take Savanna’s behaviour personally. I wanted to believe that she just happened to be really busy that week. But it was hard not to. I felt as if I’d driven her away by criticizing her and refusing to help her. I wasn’t the friend she’d thought I was. I was less. I figured that if I were Savanna, I’d feel completely misunderstood. And let down. It was as if I’d said to her, “Jump and I’ll catch you,” but when she jumped I stepped out of the way. Then I told myself that I was overreacting as usual. Maybe Savanna was acting weird, but, if you looked at it objectively, that was pretty understandable. We’d never had a fight like that before. She was shaken. In shock. It would just take a little while for things to get totally back to normal.

  “Did you lose your phone?” my dad asked me on Wednesday, while we were doing the dishes. “Or did Savanna lose hers?” He half-smiled. “It’s been pretty quiet in here the last few nights.”

  I said that Savanna had been really busy. “You know, coming up to Christmas and everything.”

  “I see.” He nodded as if that made perfect sense. “It’s just that you seem a little mopey.” His eyes were on the plate he was rinsing. “Are you certain everything’s OK?”

  I said that I was positive.

  He slipped the plate into the drainer. “You know, Savanna isn’t always right, Gracie. No matter how confident she seems.”

  I said that of course I knew that. “She’s not exactly the Pope, is she?”

  He didn’t so much as crack a smile. “No,” he said. “Not exactly.”

  “So what’s going on with you and the Princess Zindle?” asked Cooper as we were leaving the cafeteria together on Thursday.

  “Nothing.” I put on a puzzled face. As if he’d asked me how many pairs of socks I owned. “Why?”

  “Why?” Cooper cocked an eyebrow. “Because I thought I detected an atmospheric shift. A little darkening of the usually cloudless blue skies over the peaceful village. An unseasonable drop in the temperature. The subtle distancing of twin stars.”

  I laughed. Haha. “What is this? Meteorology for beginners?”

  “Let me put it more succinctly, Ms Mooney.” Cooper came to a stop and leaned against the wall. “The eggs and bacon are both out, but they don’t seem to be together any more. The egg is on one plate, and the bacon on another.”

  I’d stopped, too, but I was shuffling from foot to foot. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “You and Savanna seem to be on the outs.”

  “We’re not on the outs.” Not officially. “We … you know … we did have a little argument about something really stupid, that’s all. But we made up. It’s not a problem.”

  “Right, it’s not a problem,” said Cooper. “Only the white water of Savanna’s conversation doesn’t seem to be flowing towards you any more.”

  I said that I hadn’t noticed.

  “Really?” Cooper was holding on to my book bag as if he thought I might run away. “So you’re telling me that any parting of the ways I’ve detected is just a figment of my warped imagination? You’re telling me that nothing’s wrong?”

  I said that that was what I was telling him.

  * * *

  Savanna said that she wasn’t still mad at me when I spoke to her on the phone that night.

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” She was on the landline. I could hear the TV blaring behind her. It was something that involved a lot of shrieking and laughter. “We made up, remember? It’s, like, way in the past.”

  “Yeah,” I said, “but you’ve been acting strange all week. Kind of distant.”

  “No, I haven’t, Gracie.” Savanna’s laugh was sharper than the laughter on the television. “I think you’ve been working too hard – as usual. You’re imagining things.”

  Was I imagining that I hadn’t been sitting next to her at lunch?

  “And? I sit right across from you, don’t I? I am allowed to sit with other people, you know. It’s not like we’re going steady, Gracie. Or Siamese cats.”

  “Twins.”

  “Anyway, it’s just how it’s been working out,” said Savanna. “It isn’t part of some fiendish plan.”

  The fact that she’d been busy every afternoon wasn’t part of some fiendish plan, either.

  “Of course not. I’ve had stuff to do. Don’t you ever have stuff to do?”

  “But we don’t talk on the phone any more.”

  “Um, duh…” She choked. “I don’t want to shock you or anything, but it just so happens that we’re talking now.”

  “Yeah, but you don’t really tell me anything.”

  “I’m trying to think of you and how you feel, Gracie. I’m trying to give you some space. Isn’t that what we said?”

  “Well, yeah, it is, only—”

  “My cell phone’s ringing, Gray. I’ll talk to you later. Kisskiss. Byebye.”

  At lunch on Friday, Archie asked Savanna if she wanted to go to the lake the next day. “It’s still warm enough to take the boat out.”

  Savanna made a disappointed pout. “I can’t. We’re going shopping.” She leaned her head against his. “I still have to get something totally special to wear to the Christmas dance, don’t I? I can’t go in something old.”

  I stopped in mid-chew. This was the first I’d heard of another shopping expedition.

  “What about when you get back?” asked Archie.

  Cooper turned to me. “You mean you’re not going to Neighbours this week?”

  I looked from him to Savanna.

  “Oh, I’m not going to the mall with Gracie!” Savanna laughed. “You know how much Gracie hates the mall.” She was looking at the gap between Cooper and me. “And anyway, Gracie’s not going to the dance. Because she doesn’t want to do that, either. She hates dances, too.” She smiled as if she was in a toothpaste ad. “And I’m, like, not going to make Gracie do something she doesn’t want to do.”

  “Oh. Right.” Cooper nodded at me. “So you decided not to go after all.”

  Well, someone had.

  “Yeah… You know, it’s not really my thing.”

  “I’m going shopping with Marilouise.” Savanna stabbed at her salad. “She needs something for the dance, too.”

  “Marilouise?” I put down my sandwich. “Marilouise is going to the Christmas dance with you?”

  Savanna made a what-can-I-say kind of face. “I know, it’s, like, blue snow or something, isn’t it?” She was wearing tiny Christmas-tree earrings that shook when she laughed. “I mean, I figured I’d see Marilouis
e skateboarding on the moon before I’d see her at another dance after what happened in Middle School, but she thought all of us going together like it’s a party was a great idea.” The teeth flashed. Unlike some people. “She’s really excited about it.”

  “So what about tomorrow night?” Archie was saying to Savanna. “Maybe we could all go to a movie or something.”

  Savanna glanced at me. “I’m not sure. I may have something to do with the Zindles.”

  I once asked my dad to explain what the difference between a truce and peace was. It must have had something to do with what I was doing in school. “I don’t get it,” I said. “Aren’t they pretty much the same thing?”

  My dad said no. He said peace means things are settled, but a truce is temporary. A truce might be called to give the armies a chance to regroup. Or because they wanted a break from mutual annihilation. Or because it was Christmas. The war wasn’t over. The problem hadn’t been solved. There was no forgiveness – and no forgetting, either.

  So now I knew.

  Chapter Twenty

  Yet Another Change of Plans

  I was always happy to go to Neighbours, but that Saturday I was really happy to go. Everywhere else, I missed Savanna – even sitting at home on the couch, where we always scrunched up together watching movies, made me feel lonely. But she’d never been to Neighbours. It was all mine – a Savanna-free zone. As soon as I walked through the doors, I felt better. I wasn’t some kind of outcast, I was a regular person that other people liked and chatted to. The kids all came running as soon as they saw me. “Miss Mooney! Miss Mooney!” Look what I wrote … look what I made … listen to this… It was the only place where I didn’t feel alone.

  The book I was using that week was called And Then The Moose Got Into the Pool. It was about this really baking summer and a baby moose who is so hot he wanders into someone’s backyard and gets into the wading pool to cool off. Everybody loved it.

  By the time the class was over, I was in a pretty good mood. But Cooper wasn’t. He was waiting for me in the hallway as usual, but instead of smiling and humming under his breath as usual, he had a pained, stricken look on his face – you know, as if he had heartburn or his shoes were too tight.