The Queen of Kentucky

by Alecia Whitaker

  He noticed. Hmmm…

  “So, anyway, that’s all,” he says. “Just don’t be mad anymore, okay?”

  I only wish I could stay mad at him.

  “Okay,” I agree. “Took you long enough, though.”

  “What?”

  “You were a jerk, and it took you five days to admit it,” I tease again. “Just sayin’.”

  He chuckles. “Well, first of all, I’m not used to apologizing. Second, girls usually forgive me faster. All week I’ve gone out of my way to talk to you and you’ve been, like, stone cold. I thought you’d crack.”

  I laugh. I can’t help it. It’s so funny to me that I’ve thrown off his game. “Were you starting to feel you’d lost your touch with women?”

  “Ha!” he answers. “Not possible. Come on, Ericka, you know the ladies love me.”

  “Gag!” I gurgle, dramatically faking a gagging sound. “Ugh! I’m gagging!”

  We both laugh and suddenly I remember that I’m talking to the love of my life on the telephone. My poor carpet; I’m pacing it threadbare.

  As we come down from laughing, there’s another little pause. I guess this is where we should get off the phone, but I don’t want to initiate it. I could sit silent on the phone with him forever.

  “You going to homecoming next weekend?” he asks out of the blue.

  Oh!

  My gut explodes and I fall back on the bed as if someone has punched me in the face. David Wolfenbaker just used the word homecoming in a personal phone call to me. He’s gonna ask me to homecoming. He’s about to ask me to homecoming. Oh my gosh!

  I play it cool.

  “Uh, yeah, I think so,” I say, furiously kicking my feet in the air. “You?”

  “Yeah, it should be pretty fun,” he says.

  “Yeah, should be,” I say.

  Pause, pause, pause, heartbeat racing. I can’t catch my breath.

  “You know who you’re going with?” he asks.

  I’m sorry, but OH. MY. GOD.

  “Nah,” I say, pulling off nonchalance like a pro. “You know me; it’s hard to choose when half the school is beating down my door.”

  He chuckles. “I don’t doubt it.”

  Beat down my door, Wolf. Beat it down right now. I’ll say yes!

  “What about you, Mister Player?” I say instead, rolling over on my side and fluffing my hair. “You got your eye on some pretty young thang?”

  “Eh, sorta,” he says, clearing his throat. “I’m thinking about asking Mackenzie Watts to go with me. Her brother’s trying to take my spot on the basketball team, and it’d probably piss him off pretty bad.”

  What?

  Who?

  I stop smiling, stop breathing, stop listening. He’s still blabbing about how much he hates Mark Watts and how sucky he is at basketball (Who cares?), which I interpret as Blah, blah, kill me now, blah, blah, my life is over, blah, blah, blah.

  The ceiling spins and I hear a loud buzzing in my ears. I feel nauseous.

  “Ericka?” he asks. “Are you there?”

  “Uh, yeah,” I manage.

  “So, what do you think?”

  What do I think? I think you’re in love with me and you’re too stupid to see it! I think I want to marry you and I know I’d make you happy and I really, really, really want to make out with you after homecoming and I am in love with you! I think Mackenzie could have any boy in our whole town and I’ll kill her if she takes mine! I think I want to die.

  “Whatever,” I say flippantly, suddenly eager to get off the phone. “I think Mark’s a nice guy.”

  “Well, yeah,” he says, “he’s nice to you. You’re best friends with his sister.”

  “Oh, he can’t be nice to me just ’cause I’m a good person?” I ask heatedly.

  “I mean, sure, I guess,” he says. “You’re pretty funny and stuff, but he’s the kind of guy who’s gonna ask a cheerleader to homecoming. I mean, uh, a Varsity cheerleader. No offense.”

  “I gotta go, Wolf,” I say abruptly.

  “Oh, okay. Well, see you at school on Monday. And you better start talking to me again or I’m gonna fill your entire locker with Silly String or something,” he teases. “Remember, I know your combination.”

  “Actually,” I say, feeling sour, “I’m surprised you haven’t already.”

  He laughs. I don’t. And we get off the phone.

  I roll over on my stomach, completely defeated, and smother my face in a pillow.

  “Nooooo,” I groan into the pillow. “No! No! No! No! No!”

  David Wolfenbaker is going to ask Mackenzie Watts to homecoming. Not new-girl me, but new-girl Minnesota. Damn that stupid Ouija board.

  No, you know what? Damn those stupid mushrooms!

  I call Mackenzie immediately—I need to know if he’s already asked her—but she’s not home. I call Laura next and find out she’s not home, either. Before calling Sarah, I can’t help but wonder bitterly if everyone’s just down the road again, having another awesome sans-Ericka get-together, but Mrs. Whitman tells me she’s staying with a friend tonight. Which leaves only Kimi, the last person I want to call, but I can’t stop myself as I punch in the numbers of her cell phone.

  “Hello?” she answers.

  “Hey, Kimi, it’s Ericka.”

  “Oh my gosh!” she squeals. And then she whispers to someone in the background, “It’s Ericka.”

  I was going to ask her if she knows where Mackenzie is, but then, when I hear her tell someone that it’s me on the phone, I stop cold. I don’t want to believe it, but I have to know.

  “Are you having a party or something?” I ask, hoping not to sound desperate.

  “No,” she says really quickly. “No, not at all. Why? What’s up?”

  “Um, nothing,” I answer, and then realize that I really don’t know what to say. I don’t want to tell Kimi that Wolf’s going to ask Mackenzie to homecoming, but—

  “I gotta go, Ericka,” she says, cutting me off before I can even think through my game plan.

  “Oh! Okay.”

  “Bye,” she says abruptly and hangs up the phone, though not before I hear some giggling.

  Great. This is just freaking awesome. Obviously, the Fab Four—who, let’s face it, may not be so fab after all—are hanging out without me again. It’s like, they act like they love me at school. I mean, they’re always laughing at my jokes, and they’ve all called all week asking about Bandit. But weekends must be sacred or something, and five’s a crowd. Whatever.

  I lie back on my bed and stare up at the ceiling fan, trying to focus on just one blade as it goes around and around. I was just reading in Seventeen about how cliquey girls can stir up a lot of drama.

  I grab my journal and thumb through the pages, taking a deep breath as the smell of the leather cover fills my nostrils. Lately, I’ve been writing a lot about Bandit. A bunch of those pages are smudged, but my last entry is especially hard to read:

  Luke scared me today, the way he talked about standing up to his dad. I can’t imagine living in a house like that… in fear like that… constantly worried, not so much about yourself, but for someone you love.

  Depressed, I flip through to earlier in the journal and rediscover Project Ericka and my ten goals for this year. As I look over the list, I sink deeper into a funk. I’m making straight A’s—but that’s it. No period, no boyfriend, and the most pathetic back handspring you’ve ever seen.

  The last thing I want to do right now is relive my phone call with Wolf and the subsequent conversation with Kimi, so I toss my journal back under my mattress and head outside. Might as well help my dad; at least it’ll get my mind off my sucky “BFFs.” In reality, my real best friend is at his house and has to build a fence all day with his brothers. My other loyal friend is at the veterinarian’s office hobbling around with a tube stuck in his chest. And actually, those are the only real friends I’ve got. Pathetic.

  At the back door, I look over across the living room and see my momma staring
out the front window like she’s looking for someone, probably my dad. When she sees me, she can’t help herself.

  “Who was on the phone?” she asks, all high pitched and girly. Ugh.

  “Just this boy from school,” I say.

  She makes a face, like she wants more juicy details.

  “Spanish,” I say and shrug my shoulders.

  She smiles, as if part relieved, part disappointed to hear that it was just about schoolwork, and goes back to looking out the window. I can’t help but grin to myself as I walk out back. My knack for bending the truth is a gift.

  Outside, I see my dad coming back down from the barn and realize that I must’ve been inside a lot longer than I’d realized. He sees me and smiles.

  “Sorry, Dad,” I say, joining him in the yard.

  “Not a problem, girl,” he says. “They were all up at the barn waiting for me, so it didn’t take that long today.”

  His cell phone rings and I roll my eyes. Cowboys in the old days wore guns on their belts; my dad whips his cell phone out of a leather case clipped to his belt, like his very own six-shooter. So not cool.

  He’s only on the phone a couple of seconds, though, before he puts his arm around me and leads me around front with a big, goofy smile. “Come here, Ricki Jo. I want to show you something.”

  I don’t know what he’s up to, but I walk with him around the side of the house. An old tree house perches by the plank fence and I remember how long I begged for it as a kid, and how infrequently I actually used it once my dad built it. It’s funny how that seemed so important at the time. Makes me wonder what I’ll think when I look back at my freshman year of high school. Please feel just like this. But I’m afraid high school is way more serious than a dumb tree house. I should be building a reputation and making friends and getting French kissed!

  I shake my head. I shouldn’t be thinking about kissing around my dad. That’s gross.

  At the front of the house, I’m surprised to see Momma and Ben out on the porch swing. Dad leads me over to Old Glory and I look up, thinking maybe he wants help taking her down from the flagpole. Instead, he just stands there and crosses his arms, his eyes fixed on the road, his lips twitching. I look around at everybody (obviously they’re all lunatics) and start to feel like something’s up. My momma won’t stop smiling and my dad is now starting to chuckle. Ben is so fidgety, he finally climbs off the swing and cranes his head to look down the sidewalk to the driveway. Which is when I finally notice the minivan sitting there.

  Wait. I know that minivan.

  “SURPRISE!”

  The door slides open and I see them. My friends. Mackenzie, Laura, Kimi, and Sarah all climb out of the van with balloons and flowers and backpacks and sleeping bags. I look from my momma to my dad, my mouth wide open in shock.

  “What…?”

  Momma joins Dad and me by the sidewalk and they both put their arms around my shoulders, leading me toward the driveway.

  “We know things have been hard this week,” she says, “with Bandit and everything. So I got your friend Mackenzie’s phone number off the caller ID, and she helped us put together this surprise slumber party for you.”

  At this point we’re by the van and Mackenzie throws herself at me and encloses me in a huge hug.

  “Are you surprised, Ericka?” she asks, bouncing up and down on her toes.

  “Yeah, are you shocked?” Kimi asks. “We were totally freaking out when you called me.”

  “Oh my gosh!” Sarah screams. “We were driving out of my driveway! We were so close!”

  “She’s totally shocked,” Laura states. “You’re totally in shock, aren’t you?”

  The girls hug me one by one, and I can’t help but smile like mad. All of their voices are running together and pretty soon we’re all holding hands and jumping up and down. I’m not sure why; it just seems like the perfect thing to do. A minute ago I felt like I had no friends, and now I feel like I’m on top of the world.

  The bubbly as ever Mrs. Watts is nearby with her camera, snapping away.

  “Get together, girls,” Mrs. Watts shouts. “Smile!”

  We scrunch together in front of the minivan and I become starkly aware of the red-and-black checkered flannel shirt I’m wearing. But at this point, who cares? The photos are snapped and my friends are here and this is the farm, doggone it. They’re the ones who are out of style right now!

  “Ricki Jo, why don’t you show your friends inside?” my dad suggests.

  As we gather up their things, I hear Momma mutter under her breath, “It’s Ericka to her friends, Clark,” which I think is really nice of her.

  We’re like a herd of donkeys, loaded down with all their gear. I don’t know how long this surprise slumber party is going to last, but based on all the stuff they brought, they might as well be moving in.

  Inside, the girls compliment our house, although I know it’s nothing like what Mackenzie and Sarah are used to. Still, it’s “cute,” “cozy,” and “really homey.” I smile when I hear it, happy to have them here.

  “Oh, wait,” Mackenzie says suddenly. “I need to go say bye to my mom.”

  She says this, but then she just stands there.

  “O-kay,” I say.

  “No, like, I need to go say bye to my mom.”

  “Oh!” Laura says. “Oh, okay. Me, too. Let’s all go say thanks, you know? For driving us all the way out here.”

  I frown at the all the way out here part, but I follow them back outside. Was the drive that bad last weekend, when they went to Sarah’s? I shake the thought from my head. They’re here, at my house, surprising me and making me feel special. Forgive, forgive, forgive.

  “Clark, could you help me with something in the back?” Mrs. Watts asks my dad when we’re all back outside. “The girls brought something special for Ericka.”

  I look at Mackenzie, perplexed, but she just clasps her hands to her chest and smiles at me deviously. The other girls are wearing similar looks of anticipation, and even my family is inching closer.

  Then my dad opens the back door of the minivan and I gasp.

  “Bandit!”

  I run over to the van and stand next to my dad, more surprised than I’ve ever been in my entire life. Bandit looks up at me and I start to cry.

  “Oh, Bandit,” I cry, leaning in and kissing him on the head. “You’re home. You’re home.”

  I turn to Mrs. Watts and hug her fiercely. And then it’s a regular hug-fest, cry-fest, love-fest, with our very own paparazzo getting lots of candid shots, blinding us all with the constant flashing. My parents and Ben and I pose for a pic beside Bandit, and then we carefully lift him out of the van on his brand-new dog bed.

  “That’s a really nice doggie bed,” I say to my dad as we carry him across the driveway.

  “He’s an outside dog, Ricki Jo,” he reminds me sternly.

  “Well, maybe he can be a garage dog for a few weeks, Ericka,” my momma cuts in, really punching my name for my dad’s benefit. He starts to protest, but she puts her foot down. “Just for a few weeks, Clark. Garage.”

  This is maybe the best Saturday of my life.

  CHAPTER

  TWENTY-FIVE

  “Okay, so what’s the plan tonight?” Kimi asks.

  We’re all situated in the family room. Ben was not happy getting the boot, but my parents bribed him with glow-in-the-dark stars and they’re spending the evening sticking them all over his bedroom ceiling.

  “Don’t ask me,” I say. “I didn’t even know y’all were coming over!”

  I look at the girls, all sitting around drinking soda and eating popcorn, chips, and chocolate. I’m having the best time, and it’s only seven o’clock!

  “Wait, doesn’t Luke Foster live by you?” Laura asks.

  All the girls die laughing and she turns bright red.

  “Ooh!” Kimi squeals. “Why do you want to know? Thinking of some late-night sneak-out making out?”

  Laura screams and puts her head in
her pillow, completely covering her face as her curly auburn hair falls forward. Wow. I didn’t know she liked Luke that much. And I don’t want to say anything, but I don’t think he likes her like that.

  “Ericka?” Kimi says, waving her hand in my face. “Earth to Ericka.”

  I blush a little and we all giggle.

  “So, seriously, E,” Kimi continues, absentmindedly smoothing her jet-black bob. “What’s the deal with sneaking out? Can you call Luke and his brothers? Will they be home? What time do your parents go to bed?”

  “Sneaking out?” I ask.

  I’m not a total dork, okay? But I don’t want to get in trouble—get grounded, miss homecoming, lose any chance of getting at least one slow dance with Wolf. And, I don’t know. It’d be one thing to explain sneaking out after Luke’s dad broke his leg. I mean, my folks would’ve been mad, but they probably would’ve understood. But risking it so that Laura can make out with Luke? Ugh… I’m feeling that same nausea I had when Mackenzie asked for my homework—like I want to say no but have no idea how.

  A knock at the door saves me, and Momma peeks in. “Ericka? I’ve got some frozen pizzas in the kitchen if y’all get hungry, and there’s lots of Cokes, okay?”

  “Thanks, Momma,” I say, giving her an extra big smile for remembering to call me Ericka. Unfortunately, this special smile gives her a false sense of lovey-dovey-ness and she blows me a kiss before shutting the door again.

  When I turn back to the group, expecting them to tease me, I see Mackenzie bent over to get something out of her bag.

  “Mackenzie!” I scream, diverting my embarrassment. “Crack kills!”

  The other girls look and we all start laughing. Mackenzie looks up and sees Sarah pointing at her butt. She flushes bright red and hikes up her jeans. Lucky for me, the conversation turns from sneaking out to skinny jeans and long tank tops and the amount of butt cracks teachers see at school, even with the dress code.

  “I’m surprised we don’t wear uniforms,” Kimi says.

  “I’m glad we don’t,” Laura says.