So I wrote: We need to pretend that we’re the people in the song. We’re bored kids in a small town who want something NEW. I passed the slip of paper again.
Like the space shuttle?
The Olympics!
Poor kids, all they have to look forward to is a Hula-Hoop.
Yeah, they should have had Nintendo.
I could have had a V8.
I circled the word pretend and drew an arrow to an empty spot on the paper, where I wrote, Imagine living somewhere where it’s really hard to see something new. Imagine seeing the same people your whole life. Imagine being told that a Hula-Hoop is dangerous.
The paper went from hand to hand. No one wrote anything until the paper got to Lila. She wrote, Is that what you think about when you sing?
I wrote: I pretend to be the person who would need to sing the words.
Every person in the ensemble looked at me, and I looked each person in the eye to make sure they understood. Every person probably had their own version of what I was talking about. Maybe each person felt some different proportion of angry, bored, and a little scared, but now we were closer to being together.
“Okay,” Mrs. Tyndall said, tapping her cane on the floor. “Let’s hear it.”
We walked over to our places and sang. We didn’t sound perfect, but we sounded better. We had that underbelly of feeling you need to make a song sound real.
I looked at Mrs. Tyndall. In my head, I dared her to keep the Hula-Hoops away from us much longer.
THE NEXT MORNING TARA WAS waiting for me at my locker, like always. “I got us a huge order of buttons,” she said.
“You did?” I still wasn’t sure how I felt about the us part of my button business. But most things were better with the Royal We. And my part of the Royal We didn’t have any family members who were running for mayor. Tara’s part of the Royal We did.
“She officially decided,” Tara said. It was like my mom just deciding to go to law school. “She needs name recognition, and I suggested buttons. Guess who’s making them?”
“Us?”
“The leads have extra practice this week,” Tara said. “So maybe you should handle this one.”
I tried not to feel annoyed. “How many buttons are we talking about here?” It was a job for us, but I was the one who was going to do all the work.
Tara’s eyes twinkled the way they did right before she delivered good news. “A hundred!”
“A hundred!” I did some quick math in my head.
“You can get your jeans.” Tara went over the details. All the buttons had to be in red, white, or blue. They had to say “Buchanan for Mayor” or just “Buchanan.”
“When does your mom need them?”
“She has a breakfast on Saturday morning, so she wants them on Friday night.”
“Friday night!” That meant I had to make twenty to twenty-five buttons a night after practice and homework. I thought about the jeans. “I can do it.”
“You can, totally,” said Tara. “You can repeat patterns. It’s not like you have to make a hundred unique buttons. And if she wins the primary, she’ll probably want more.”
I had been a little upset with Tara since the whole middle-name business, even though I had been trying to let it go. This helped.
“Thanks. This is totally an excellency! A designer jeans ex-cell-en-cyyyyy!” This time I sang it out.
It felt like we were back to the easy way of being friends. I crossed my fingers and hoped it would stay that way.
The day after the ensemble ruled on “Everything Is Still the Same,” Mrs. Tyndall said we could bring out the Hula-Hoops.
We made it through half a rehearsal before: “Vatch this,” Andy said in his Russian accent. He dove through a hoop as Michael rolled it across the floor, and crashed, face first, into a chair.
“Nothing, this is nothing,” he said as blood dripped out of his nose. He wiped it on the back of his hand.
“Maybe Andy will become the ghost of the theater,” said Cheryl. “Woooooo.” Everyone laughed, except Mrs. Tyndall.
“Injuries are not a laughing matter,” she said as Tiffany left to get an ice pack. “We are professionals. We need to be able to control ourselves. And our hoops. We have lost important play time due to an injury.” She was using the royal we. Then she said, “I don’t have this problem with the leads.”
Mrs. Tyndall hooked her cane around Andy’s hoop and lifted it up. Now it had a sharp point on one side.
The ensemble stood on the stage in a guilty circle.
“You,” Mrs. Tyndall said, pointing a bony finger toward the auditorium. “Come here.”
Everyone’s head swiveled around to see who she was talking to. David looked up from his book. “Who, me?”
I think David had just assumed that Mrs. Tyndall would never notice him hanging out at play practice. We had silently agreed not to acknowledge each other’s existence when we were at school. Though I might speak up if he suddenly needed a kidney or something.
“Yes.” Mrs. Tyndall waited for David to walk up to her. I could tell David was nervous because he kept tugging at his shirt.
“You are here a great deal for someone who has no responsibilities with the play,” said Mrs. Tyndall.
“I’m just waiting for Hector,” said David. And Kelli Ann, I silently added. Kelli Ann, whose lines as Elvis’s publicist in the play consisted of, “Did someone in this town ask for a hip shaker?” and “Right this way, Elvis.” Her mom character was a member of Mothers United for Decency, so she also frowned a lot and made comments about her children.
“Well, I need a hoop wrangler,” said Mrs. Tyndall. “Do you want the job? Otherwise, I am going to ask you to leave the practice. It really is only for students involved with the play.”
“Okay?” Then David asked what we were all thinking. “What’s a hoop wrangler?”
“The hoop wrangler is in charge of making sure that the hoops are ready for rehearsal and are not used for any offstage shenanigans. You bring the correct hoops on for the scene we are rehearsing, and you collect them immediately afterward. If any hoops are damaged or broken, you need to let the props manager know immediately.”
David nodded. “Seems pretty simple.”
“It is exceedingly simple. But what I need is a perfectly simple job performed with pimple serfection.”
The whole room exploded in laughter. David turned red, even though he wasn’t the one who said it; maybe because it’s the sort of thing he would usually say.
“Settle down,” said Mrs. Tyndall. “You know what I mean.” Though she smiled a tiny bit.
After we got back to our seats, Duncan whipped out a piece of paper. He wrote, Pimple Serfection sounds like an acne treatment.
Better than pimple infection, I wrote. We passed the paper around.
Gross.
Pimple surf-action?
Clearasil. That’s the way to go.
Pimple serfection is another sign of American decadence. That was Andy.
Did I miss something? Michael, of course.
After Andy got his bloody nose under control, Mrs. Tyndall introduced the Hula-Hooping expert that she had promised. That expert was Tiffany, button purchaser, fetcher of ice packs, and stage manager. It turned out that Tiffany was the San Fernando Valley Hula-Hoop Champion of 1982. She was wearing a white leotard with matching tights and baby-blue leg warmers, with a matching headband. She looked like the women on TV who did perfectly synchronized aerobics. I did not think this outfit was necessary for Hula-Hooping, but apparently I was wrong.
Some of the eighth-grade boys who worked in the lighting booth in the back of the auditorium stopped to watch. And laugh.
“Okay. So. The first move we’re going to work on is the catch and swirl,” said Tiffany. She demonstrated by doing a few hoops before swiftly catching the hoop in her hand and continuing the motion up. She made it look easy. It was not.
Max, Andy, and Duncan had not improved much, even though I had
told them to practice whenever they could. They could not do the catch and swirl because you needed to be able to do a basic hoop first so that you had something to catch. Tiffany stopped to watch them.
“We have an impending issue here,” she said. “Most imminent.”
The lighting booth boys laughed harder. One of them stabbed at a button on the panel, making the ghost light flick on and off. “Look,” he said. “Special effects.”
“The lighting crew will be respectful,” said Mrs. Tyndall, thumping her cane for emphasis. The light turned back off.
“Hey,” Tiffany said to David. “You’re going to have to, like, make some adjustments as the hoop wrangler.”
The lighting booth boys were still laughing. “Like, um, is like my favorite word,” said one of the boys, mocking Tiffany.
Tiffany pointed her perfectly polished fingernail at Max, Andy, and Duncan. “You need to adjust the hoop size to the person. If the circumference is too small, you need to work harder to keep the hoop up. Also, do you have any weighted hoops? That will slow down the rotation and make hooping easier.”
“I—I think I have different sized hoops?” said David. It was not a bad answer given that he had only had his new job for five minutes.
“You should also consider wrapping some of the hoops with gaffer’s tape. You have that, right? You’ll make the hoops less slippery, and the increased friction will make it easier for the guys to keep hooping. Like you totally can’t work with two slippery surfaces and expect any traction.”
“Got it,” said David.
The boys in the lighting booth stopped laughing and got back to work. But I had to admit, I had underestimated Tiffany, too.
“The maximally important thing, though? You have to practice,” said Tiffany. “Promise you’ll practice, okay? You need to develop muscle memory so that you don’t have to think when it’s time to perform.”
They mumbled okay, and Tiffany smiled and went back to demonstrating different moves. The elevator, where the hoop moves up and down the body. Isolations, which make the hoop look like it’s practically floating and spinning in place. Hand spins. It was a lot to take in.
At the end of the practice, Tiffany looked up at the lighting booth. She’d been acting like she hadn’t heard the boys making fun of her, but it was clear that she had.
“Hope you enjoyed learning some new moves,” she said sweetly. “I was San Fernando Valley Hula-Hoop Champion in 1982.” She paused. “Because I was San Fernando Valley Science Fair Champion in 1981.”
DAVID TOOK HIS ROLE AS HOOP wrangler seriously. He figured out who should have what size hoop, and asked people if they wanted grip tape. He also checked the hoops before and after practice for warping and damage.
“I think you’re getting a little carried away,” I told him after he’d been on the job for a few days. I snagged Tara as she walked by. “Don’t you think that David’s getting a little too involved in this hoop wrangler business?”
David stood up a little straighter. “It’s actually an important job. I just found one of the hoops in the lighting booth.”
“Maybe the theater ghost put it there,” I said.
“Maybe one of the lighting guys was inspired by Tiffany and borrowed a hoop without asking.” He turned to Tara. “Your wooden hoop should be coming in tomorrow.”
As Brenda Sue, Tara had a song called “Circling through Time,” where she sang about the ways children played with hoops all over the world through the centuries. Mrs. Tyndall didn’t want one made of plastic, like all the rest, and had arranged to get a wooden hoop instead. It was Tara’s big solo for the show, with a spotlight and everything.
“Thanks,” said Tara. “Make sure no one touches it, especially those dimwits in the ensemble. I don’t want one of them to break it.”
Dimwits in the ensemble?
“You got it,” said David, as if Tara was being perfectly reasonable. “Your hoop is safe with me.”
David returned to the chair he had in the middle of the stack of hoops, like an eagle in a nest.
“Look,” I said, after Tara had walked away. “Can I just have four hoops? Medium weight? Some of us need to practice. She won’t see.”
She was Mrs. Tyndall. The Royal She.
“She’ll fire me,” he said.
“So?” I said.
“So this is my job.” He looked over at Kelli Ann.
“A made-up job,” I said.
“A useful job,” he said.
“Not as useful as walking Bao Bao,” I said. “Which I would be willing to do on a day of your choosing if you can part with four Hula-Hoops for fifteen minutes.”
David let out a breath. “Fine. But don’t let her see you. Do you know what the record is for spinning Hula-Hoops simultaneously?” He didn’t wait for me to answer. “Sixty.”
I took the Hula-Hoops to the end of the hall and turned the corner, where it dead-ended into a bunch of science classrooms. It was sort of like a hidden cul-de-sac. No one was watching.
“Ready?” I said to Duncan, Max, and Andy. “Go.”
It was as if I’d said, “Throw the Hula-Hoop at the ground but hit a body part on the way down.” On that count, they were successful.
“You move in a circle,” I said.
Duncan turned around in a circle.
“You move your hips in a circle, you dope,” I said. I took a hoop and put it around my waist. “When the hoop hits your left side, move your waist toward the left, and when it moves to the right, move your waist toward the right.” It was weird to try to explain it. “You have to find your rhythm,” I said.
Duncan lifted the hoop again.
We heard a swishing noise. Could a theater ghost leave the theater?
Swish. Swish. Swish.
“What are you kids doing here?”
It was not Mrs. Tyndall, but it was almost as bad. The school custodian, Mr. Shea, was standing there, holding a mop like a sword. And he was growling.
“Remedial Hula-Hooping?” I said. It was the truth. Mr. Shea wasn’t friendly like the elementary school custodians. He yelled at kids when they walked across his clean floors, and also when they didn’t.
“Hand it over,” growled Mr. Shea.
“Please,” I said. “We’ll go!”
“Hand it over,” he said again.
I breathed out and handed him my hoop. The boys handed over their hoops, too, and we started to file by. David was going to kill me for losing four Hula-Hoops.
“Wait,” Mr. Shea said. We froze.
Then Mr. Shea put all four hoops around his waist. He started rotating his hips and kept them all going at the same time.
“Whoa,” Duncan said. “Mr. Shea, you should be in the play.”
Mr. Shea stopped scowling and looked … pleased. I had never seen him look pleased about anything, but maybe it was hard to look pleased when you were cleaning up throw-up or getting balls off of the school roof. Now he looked like, well, a kid.
Finally he stopped swirling his hips. He stepped out of the hoops and handed them to us.
“Still got it,” he said. “Don’t leave any trash behind.”
“Wait,” I said. As the school custodian, Mr. Shea was all over Dwight D. Eisenhower Junior High. “Have you ever heard of a ghost in the auditorium?”
“Heh,” said Mr. Shea. “I’ve worked at this school for eighteen years. It has some secrets.”
I looked at the guys, who seemed more interested in the hoops. Mr. Shea’s moves had been an inspiration. Duncan actually got the hoop to stay up for a few rotations, and Max no longer seemed to be actively working against the Hula-Hoop.
Someone coughed. We all looked up. But it was Tara.
“It’s just Tara,” I said. “No big deal.”
“Actually,” said Tara, “Mrs. Tyndall is looking for you guys, so it is kind of a big deal. The ensemble is supposed to stay in the auditorium.”
“We’ll be there in a minute,” I said. “Mr. Shea said we could practi
ce here. Hey, you should have seen Mr. Shea. He had four—”
“Mrs. Tyndall was really mad,” Tara said.
“Mrs. Tyndall is always mad.”
“Because you guys don’t follow the rules,” said Tara. “That’s why we have a hoop wrangler now.”
“We’re here to practice for the show,” I pointed out. “They’re just getting the hang of it.”
“You can’t just run off and do what you feel like,” said Tara.
For half a second, I hated Tara. And then I hated myself for hating her.
“C’mon,” I said. Duncan picked up the Hula-Hoops, and we walked back to the auditorium. Tara walked slightly ahead—near but not a part of us.
On Friday, I brought the hundred buttons to school with me. Mom had gotten mad because I’d stayed up late finishing them. My fingers were red and blue from the markers, and achy from making all the buttons. I’d also had to make sure I spelled BUCHANAN correctly every time after I realized I had made a BUCHACHAN button.
“Thanks,” said Tara, taking the bag from me. “Mom said she’ll give you the money the next time you come over.”
I was wearing a new button that said PIMPLE SERFECTION, which I had made during a break from the Mrs. Buchanan buttons.
“What do you think?” I said, holding up the button. I wanted to make Tara laugh. I wanted to feel like we were on the same side again.
“I don’t get it,” said Tara.
“Mrs. Tyndall, remember? She was trying to say simple perfection?”
Tara tilted her head to one side. “Kind of?”
“Everyone laughed when she said it,” I said, to make my point. Someone from the ensemble would have gotten it.
“Sorry,” Tara said, pinning one of her mom’s buttons to her jacket. She chose one that said BUCHANAN FOR MAYOR. I wondered if anyone would think she was running instead of her mom. “I must have missed it.”
“Clearly.”
“Don’t be mad! I’ve been thinking about other stuff. I’ve got oratory on top of the play. County finals are tomorrow,” said Tara. “Wish me luck! I’m going to wear the oratory button you made for me.”
Not Your All-American Girl Page 8