by Meg Cabot
To eat at The Cheesecake Factory?
Well, The Cheesecake Factory was good and all, except for the tomato on my plate and the fact that the people I was with were totally horrible.
I wanted to cry. I really did. I was miserable. I was having the worst time of my entire life.
In fact, by the time the cake came — a huge Godiva chocolate cheesecake, with sparklers on it; the entire staff of The Cheesecake Factory, it seemed like, came out and sang a very happy Cheesecake Factory birthday to Brittany. I thought her face was going to break in two, she loved the attention so much — I thought I was going to cry for real, in front of all of them, the well of my sorrow was so deep. I had to excuse myself and go to the ladies’ room. I just needed to be alone for a minute to collect my thoughts.
But The Cheesecake Factory’s ladies’ room was the wrong place to go to be alone. There were tons of people in there. There were moms changing their babies’ diapers and teenage girls complaining to each other about their boyfriends. There were ladies talking on their cell phones and other ladies holding their beepers, wondering when they were going to go off and when they were going to get a table. I had to wiggle my way past all of them to find a stall. Finally, I found one and closed the door and sat there, trying not to cry.
I wished the toilet stall I was sitting in was a time portal and I could close my eyes and use it to travel back through time to this morning in the driveway and come out of it and do everything differently. I would have gotten into the minivan with Erica and those guys and gone to the Twirltacular instead of to Glitterati. Uncle Jay could have explained to Mrs. Hauser when the limo showed up that I was sick or something. That would have been a better lie than the one I gave my friends about my mom making me go to Brittany’s birthday party or she’d lose her job.
Because I don’t even care about Brittany and those guys, and I actually care about my friends.
But unfortunately, the toilet stall wasn’t a time portal. I could tell because when I opened my eyes, I was still in it. And I could still hear all the Cheesecake Factory ladies complaining about how come their beepers weren’t going off.
In A Wrinkle in Time, you can create a thing called a tesseract…a wrinkle in time to get from one place to another in the blink of an eye.
I wished I could create a tesseract and go home. Right at that moment.
If only tesseracts were real.
After a little while, I figured I better come out of the bathroom, or Mrs. Hauser might start to wonder where I was (I didn’t think Brittany or her friends would care). I flushed and came out to wash my hands.
Nothing could have startled me more when I was drying them than seeing Courtney standing there, looking at me. Like she’d been waiting for me!
“Hi,” she said. “I just wanted to see if you were okay.”
I couldn’t believe it. She had been waiting for me! Someone cared! Someone actually cared about me!
“Um,” I said, walking away from the hand blower. “Thanks. I thought…I thought you hated me. Like all the rest of them.”
“No,” Courtney said. “We’re friends. Remember?”
And she pulled out the necklace she’d been messing around with all day. On the end of the silver chain was half a heart. A broken heart.
That’s when I remembered…
…I had the other half. Courtney had given it to me, my last day of school at Walnut Knolls. I’d totally forgotten about that. I’d just moved and never given it another thought.
Now I felt like a jerk.
Because all this time, Courtney had been my friend, wearing the other half of a broken-heart necklace. And I had never called her or tried to see her since I’d moved away from Walnut Knolls. Not once in all this time.
“Oh, Courtney,” I said. “Of course.” I didn’t tell her I’d forgotten. Because that would have hurt her feelings. “I thought…I thought maybe things had changed, and you were friends with Brittany now.”
“No,” Courtney said, and gave a little shudder. It was kind of hard to talk in The Cheesecake Factory’s ladies’ room, because so many people were coming in and out, and they were playing the music so loud in there. Plus there was the near constant sound of the hand blowers.
But we found a little corner where there was a black leather bench and sat down on it.
“I still hang out with Brittany,” Courtney explained, “but ever since she started being best friends with Mary Kay instead of me, she kind of treats me like her dog. She’s always like, Go get me this, and Go get me that.”
I widened my eyes. “Then why do you hang out with her?” I asked.
“Well, because if it weren’t for her, I wouldn’t have any friends at all,” Courtney said simply.
I felt doubly sorry after that that I hadn’t called Courtney since I’d moved. Not everyone could be like me — I mean, a strong person who would stand up to someone who put her down, like I had with Brittany and then Cheyenne O’Malley.
“Wow,” I said. “I’m really sorry, Courtney.”
I wasn’t sure if she knew what I was saying sorry for. I wasn’t sure I knew myself. It was true I hadn’t called Courtney since I’d moved — but then, she hadn’t called me, either.
“It’s okay,” Courtney said with a shrug. “Brittany’s kind of mean, but at least she’s not boring, like Mary Kay.” That was definitely true.
“And Paige and Lauren can be all right,” she went on.
“I just don’t get,” I said, “why she invited me to her party when she seems to hate me so much.”
“Oh, that,” Courtney said. “Everybody wants to be friends with you because of your mom being on that TV show. And you moving to that new school, and having that big new house, and going with boys, and all of that.”
I rolled my eyes.
“Courtney,” I said. “None of that stuff is true. I mean, it’s true my mom is on a TV show, but she doesn’t even get paid for it. And my new school isn’t really that different from Walnut Knolls, except that it’s really old, and my new house is really old, too, and the boy who asked me to go with him…he’s nice, and everything, but…the truth is, he likes to bark instead of talk, and he hardly ever remembers to wash his face in the morning.”
Courtney looked like she wanted to laugh but was afraid to. “No way…really?”
“Really,” I said. “I think people have been making my life sound way more glamorous than it really is.”
“They have,” Courtney said. “And Brittany is really jealous. That’s why she started being so mean to you. She couldn’t stand hearing about you having a boy ask you out, and you actually turning him down. It made her so green with envy, she started trying to make you have a bad time at her party, first by forcing you to dress as a pirate, then telling you you looked dumb, then saying she never told you that, then by making fun of your gift. It will probably get worse as the night goes on.”
This made my eyes bug out.
“Really?” I asked. I couldn’t imagine it getting worse. Unless Brittany planned on murdering me.
“Yeah,” Courtney said, with a nod. “After you left to go to the bathroom, I heard Brittany telling Mary Kay and those guys that tonight in the hotel, after you fall asleep, she’s going to stick your hand in a glass of hot water to make you wet the bed.”
My eyes got even wider. How had I gotten into this mess?
“It’s true,” Courtney said. “And after that, they’re going to get a red pen from her mom’s purse and draw little spots all over your face, so that when you wake up, you’ll think you have pimples.”
I threw my hands over my face. This was awful! Now, just because Brittany was jealous over my relationship with Joey Fields — Joey Fields! — I was going to get humiliated in the night while I slept! Who knew what else Brittany might be planning right now, as Courtney and I were talking.
Well, I wasn’t going to just sit here and take it.
And unlike last time, I wasn’t going to make the mistake of tellin
g on Brittany, either. I had learned my lesson with the thing with Lady Serena Archibald. I was going to handle this situation on my own.
With a little help from my friends, of course.
Because suddenly, I had realized something:
There was such a thing as a tesseract.
Well, sort of.
“Courtney,” I said. “Can I borrow your cell phone?”
“Sure,” she said, looking surprised. She dug around for it in her purse. “But who are you going to call?”
“Home,” I said.
As soon as he picked up the phone, I said, “Uncle Jay?”
“Allie?” Uncle Jay sounded out of breath. That, I realized, was because he’d had to run from the living room, where he’d set up the tent, to get to the phone in the kitchen. Still, he sounded cheerful, like they were having a good time. And why wouldn’t they be? They were having a cookout in the living room. “Hey! How’s it going?”
“Not very good,” I said. “I need you to come pick me up.”
Uncle Jay stopped sounding so cheerful.
“What? Why? Are you all right?”
“No,” I said. “Brittany and her friends are being really mean to me. They’re going to do some really mean stuff to me tonight after I fall asleep. And I need you to come get me.”
“Allie,” Uncle Jay said, “I can’t come get you. You’re all the way in the city. That’s an hour away. And I’ve got Mark and Kevin here. I can’t drop everything and drive all the way up there just because some of your girlfriends are picking on you.”
This was the last thing I expected to hear from Uncle Jay. He had always been there for me!
“Uncle Jay,” I said, turning away from Courtney, so she couldn’t hear me. Or see the tears that were filling up in my eyes. “I don’t think you understand. It’s bad. Really bad. I made a big mistake coming here. And I need someone to come get me before things get even worse.”
“Can’t someone there drive you back?” Uncle Jay wanted to know. “Mrs. Hauser?”
“No,” I said. “Nobody is coming back until tomorrow morning. And by tomorrow morning, I’ll be dead.”
There was silence on the line. It was kind of hard to tell if he was still even on the line, because of all the music in the bathroom and the ladies talking and the beepers going off and the hand blowers and everything.
But I could faintly hear the sounds of Mark and Kevin in the background, fighting over who got to hold the stick for the marshmallows for the s’mores.
They were roasting marshmallows over the fire in the fireplace for s’mores? No fair!
I wished I was home more than ever now.
“Well,” Uncle Jay finally said, “I guess I could call Harmony. If she doesn’t have too much studying to do, maybe she could come get you.”
“Uncle Jay,” I said, my heart feeling like it was about to pound out of my chest, I was so happy. “If Harmony could do that, I would be so forever grateful to her. I would do anything you say for the rest of your life. I would make all the pizzas for Pizza Express forever…”
“I think that would be a violation of child labor laws,” Uncle Jay said, maybe remembering how the pizza I’d made last night had turned out kind of number eight — shaped and not really round. “But you would definitely owe me. And Harmony. Because she has way better things to do than drive up to the city and pick up confused little girls who don’t know who their real friends are.”
“That is so me,” I said sadly. “I deserve to be called that.”
“You do,” Uncle Jay said. He didn’t sound at all happy with me. “Also, I’m going to have to give her some of your mom’s money for gas. So that means we’re going to have to eat Hot Pockets all day tomorrow. Anyway. Where should she pick you up?”
“The hotel lobby,” I said. “I’ll be waiting for her.”
“Okay,” Uncle Jay said. “And, Allie, you owe me for this one.”
“I owe you so many times over,” I said. “Uncle Jay, you’re my tesseract.”
“Your what?”
“My tesseract.”
“Whatever, kid,” he said.
And hung up.
Then I handed the phone back to Courtney.
It was only then that I noticed she looked like she wanted to cry.
“So,” she said as she glumly slipped her phone back into her purse. “You’re going to go home.”
“Um, yeah,” I said. All my excitement over knowing I was getting out of this bad situation disappeared. I felt terrible for ditching Courtney.
Then I had an idea.
“Hey,” I said. “My uncle’s girlfriend is coming to pick me up. Do you want to come home with me? You could spend the night. I’m sure he’d say it was okay. You could call your mom and ask.”
“No,” Courtney said sadly. “It’s all right for you. You never have to see Brittany again if you don’t want to. You get to go back to your new school and see all your new friends on Monday morning. But I have to see those same girls every day. If I leave, they’d never stop torturing me. So I better stay.”
I felt bad, hearing Courtney say all that. It was true, though. Her staying and facing her problems was the best thing she could do.
Courtney was a way braver person than I was. I really admired her for that. I decided I wanted to be more like her.
But for now, I was getting my tesseract and taking it the heck out of there.
Because sometimes, the brave thing to do is go home. That’s a rule.
“Well,” I said. “I promise you, when this is all over, I’m going to have you over to my new house, and you’re going to see my life isn’t as great as Brittany and those guys think. But we’re going to have a blast.”
“Okay,” Courtney said. But she didn’t look like she believed me. “I better get back out there. What do you want me to tell them?”
“Tell them I’m sick,” I said.
“But…” Courtney looked at me funny. “You aren’t sick.”
“Oh,” I said confidentially. “I will be.”
RULE #11
Always Be True to Your Friends, Just as You Are to Yourself
Part of preparing to have a future career as an actress slash veterinarian — besides reading every book you can find in your school library about animals — is that you have to be ready for every acting challenge that comes along. Not just getting a part that you don’t necessarily want, like a role that’s maybe a little less glamorous than the lead.
But playing a part in real life, such as the part of yourself, only being sick to your stomach from something you ate at Brittany Hauser’s birthday dinner, so that you had to call your uncle’s girlfriend to come get you.
So instead of going up with the rest of the girls to the hotel room Mrs. Hauser got for them, you have to sit in the lobby and wait for your uncle’s girlfriend to come pick you up.
This is called acting. It’s very difficult.
I didn’t want to have to do this whole fake-sick thing, but it wasn’t like I had any choice. I knew Brittany’s intentions: to put my hand in a glass of warm water, thus making me wet the bed, and to put red spots all over my face, using a red pen from Mrs. Hauser’s purse, all while I slept.
How did I know the ink from that pen wouldn’t give me ink poisoning, something Sophie once warned me had caused a kid in England to die?
And what if I was somehow electrocuted from the water they stuck my hand into? Everyone knows water plus electricity equals death. Sophie had told me all about that.
Asleep, I wouldn’t be able to protect myself from either of these things. I was in a life-and-death situation.
Therefore, acting was called for.
That’s why, as soon as Courtney left, I turned on one of the hand blowers and swung the nozzle thingie so that it was blowing onto my forehead. I stuck my head there and let it blow for as long as I could stand it.
Then I walked over to the mirror and fixed my hair — which had gotten pretty messy, from being blown
around — and felt my own forehead.
Perfect.
Then I practiced looking sick. It wasn’t hard. I had barely eaten anything all day except Coke and caramel corn and a few fries. I felt a little sick.
A few minutes later, Mrs. Hauser came into the ladies’ room, looking worried.
“Allie,” she said. “Courtney says you aren’t feeling well.”
“I’m really not,” I said from the black leather bench, where I’d gone to slump like a sick person.
Mrs. Hauser felt my forehead.
“Oh, my,” she said. “You do feel a little warm.”
“Yes, ma’am,” I said faintly. “My stomach hurts a little, too. If it’s okay, I already used Courtney’s phone to call my uncle. He’s going to have his girlfriend, Harmony, pick me up in the hotel lobby. I’m really sorry to spoil Brittany’s birthday.”
I liked that line, I’m really sorry to spoil Brittany’s birthday. It had taken me a little while to come up with it. It seemed like the kind of thing a person who was really sick might say.
And while I was sorry for lying to Mrs. Hauser, because she had always been really, really nice to me, being Mewsie’s grandma and all, I wasn’t sorry at all about potentially spoiling Brittany’s birthday. Because I knew I wasn’t really spoiling Brittany’s birthday. Brittany could not have cared less that I was leaving her birthday party early. She was probably happy to be getting rid of me.
Except for the part where she wasn’t going to get to torture me in my sleep. That part of her birthday really was ruined for her.
“Oh, you poor thing,” Mrs. Hauser said, giving me a hug. “Don’t you worry about Brittany. I’ll make sure we get you to the hotel soon so you can meet — what’s her name?”
“Harmony,” I said.
“Harmony. Of course. Do you think you can make it back to the table without…?”
She wanted to say “throwing up” without actually saying it, because she was afraid saying it might make me do it. Which it usually does, for people who are really sick. It’s a rule.
“Yes, ma’am,” I said again, all faintly. I let Mrs. Hauser lead me back to the table, keeping my face arranged in the way I thought a sick person might look. It totally worked, too, because people moved out of our way as we walked back to the alcove where Brittany’s birthday table was. That hand blower trick had actually worked. I looked all feverish and sweaty.