by Robin Palmer
Just then he stopped walking and turned to me. “Hey, Lucy?” he said, his hand moving toward my cheek.
“What are you doing?” I demanded. Was he going to kiss me? He couldn’t do that! I wasn’t even sure I for sure had a crush on him yet!
“I was just going to tell you that you had a piece of seaweed on your face from when you wiped out back there,” he said.
“Oh,” I said as I felt my face get hot.
“Dude, it is so cool how your face gets red so fast,” he said. “When Austin and I did that movie Chimp Island—the one with the killer chimps?—there was this special effect where, whenever one of the mechanical chimps bit us, it made our entire bodies turn green. It was gnarly.”
Before I could say, “That’s kind of disgusting,” his hand touched my cheek, and that’s when it happened.
Not a kiss, but the blinding flash of a camera right in our faces.
“Ha! Gotcha, Forrester!” a safari-jacket-wearing guy yelled over his shoulder as he ran back toward the road.
I couldn’t believe it—a “pap” had just snapped a picture of Connor Forrester and me! This was not good. In fact, my psychicness told me it might be very, very bad.
“Man, I can’t believe Vinnie Vincenza finally got me!” Connor said, stomping his foot.
“That was Vinnie Vincenza?” I asked nervously. Laurel had warned me about him. His pictures were the ones that ended up in the really sleazy gossip magazines. I didn’t even want to think about what kind of lie they were going to make up if they ran this one. One time, back in Northampton, a pap took a picture of Laurel, Alan, Mom, and me where it looked like I was picking my nose, when really I was just trying to hide the huge pimple on the side of my face.
“Yeah,” Connor said. “I wonder if he thought you were the special-needs sister from that TV show.”
Great. “Well, I should get back,” I said. Now a fluttering in my stomach had joined the electric shocks. This was getting really annoying.
“Oh yeah?” he said, disappointed.
“Yeah. Laurel’s probably worried about me,” I said, smacking my stomach to try to get the fluttering to stop.
Forget Laurel—I was worried about me. All of these crush symptoms were getting worse, and I wasn’t sure how much more I could take.
chapter 13
Dear Dr. Maude,
I hope you don’t think I’m being rude for saying this, but I just want you to know that I really think if your viewers knew about everything that had happened to me in the last few months and found out that you had the opportunity to have me on your show, but didn’t, they would be VERY upset. ESPECIALLY if they found out that tonight I ended up hanging out with Connor Forrester. By myself. Just him and me. On the beach. At sunset. But it wasn’t a date.
Except even though it wasn’t a date, how come I keep thinking about him and can’t fall asleep? Which is why I’m writing this to you at two o’clock in the morning. Laurel says the reason I keep thinking about him is because I like-like him, and I just haven’t admitted it to myself, but I think she’s wrong. Like I said, Connor Forrester + me = CRAZY. Plus, when she said that she was half sleeping because I had gone into her room and said, “Laurel? Are you sleeping? Because if you’re not, I have a question for you,” really loud, and even though she said, “No. I’m up. What’s wrong?” her voice was all froggy, which means that she was sleeping. And everyone knows that most of what people say when they’re sleeping doesn’t mean anything.
I don’t know if the world was such a confusing place back when you were twelve and a half, but I’m telling you—you would NOT want to be a kid nowadays!
yours truly,
LUCY B. PARKER
When you don’t fall asleep until three o’clock in the morning, being woken up at eight by your frister, saying, “Lucy, Lucy—you have to get up,” is bad enough—especially when she’s a total morning person and you’re totally not. But when that frister is also shoving a laptop in your face and saying, “You have to see this now!” it’s worse. Especially when she manages to wrestle the covers away from your head so you HAVE to open your eyes.
“AHHHHHH!” I shrieked when I got a look at what “this” was. Smack in the middle of HottGossip.com was the picture of Connor and me on the beach with a huge headline: “Romantic Sunset + New Gal Pal = Time to Smooch!” Underneath the picture it read, “Looks like teen heartthrob Connor Forrester is following in BFF Austin Mackenzie’s footsteps. While sources tell us that Austin and costar Laurel Moses were taking their on-screen romance offscreen last night at the boys’ beachfront bash, Connor was getting to know Laurel’s soon-to-be little sister Lisa just a little bit better during a romantic walk on the beach.”
“Oh no!” I cried. I didn’t know what was worse—that they had printed the picture, or that they had gotten my name wrong.
“I hate to be the one to tell you this,” Laurel said, “but this picture definitely looks like two people who like-like each other.” She squinted as she looked at the picture. “What’s that on your face?”
“Seaweed,” I moaned, pulling the covers back over my head. This was just awful. I pulled them back down. “Maybe no one will see it,” I said hopefully. “I mean, HottGossip isn’t that popular.”
Laurel pointed to the #1 GOSSIP SITE ON THE WEB! line, which was written in big bold letters across the top. “And I hate to tell you this, but it’s on at least ten other sites. Probably more, but I stopped counting after that.”
I scooched deeper underneath the covers. If the thing about Connor and me were true, maybe I could’ve dealt with it, but when I got back to New York and seventh grade started and kids came up to me and said, “I can’t believe you dated Connor Forrester—what was it like?” and then I’d have to say, “Um, actually, I didn’t. That was just something they made up,” and then they’d say, “Oh. Well, see you around,” then I’d feel even more stupid.
I grabbed my iTouch and looked at my mailbox. There were three e-mails from Beatrice, four from Alice, and nine from Marissa, all essentially saying the same thing: “I CAN’T BELIEVE YOU KISSED CONNOR FORRESTER!!!! HOW COME YOU DIDN’T TELL ME????” I’d have to deal with that later. It was a good thing Mom and Dad and Alan didn’t go on those sites or else I’d REALLY have trouble. “What am I going to do?” I wailed.
Laurel shrugged. “You just hold your head high, and if a reporter stops you, you say, ‘No comment.’ That’s what I do.”
“No reporter is going to stop me,” I scoffed. “I’m not a big star like you or Connor.” I was just a normal kid. They couldn’t even get my name right. No one cared what I had to say most of the time anyway, so why would they start caring now?
When we got down to the lobby, there were about ten or so reporters and photographers camped out there.
“Laurel! Laurel!” a bunch of them yelled as we got out of the elevator and a fireworks-like explosion of flashes went off in our faces. “Are you really dating Austin Mackenzie?”
She put on her sunglasses. “No comment,” she said as she began to make her way toward the exit.
Phew, I thought as I put my fancy new sunglasses on and started to follow her. I knew I was right in thinking that they’d care only about Laurel. I was already yesterday’s news. Literally.
“Lisa! Lisa!” a few more of them yelled. “What’s it like to kiss Connor Forrester?”
Uh-oh. Maybe not. As another round of flashes went off, I was momentarily blinded and ended up tripping, which, in turn, set off another round of flashes. When I got back on my feet, I took off my sunglasses and turned to the reporters. “Okay, my comment on that is no comment,” I announced. “But before I don’t comment, I just want to say that (a) my name is not Lisa—it’s Lucy. Lucy B. Parker.” I watched as a few of the reporters whipped out their pens and pads. “That’s P-A-R-K-E-R, if you end up putting it in an article, but to be honest, I’d really rather you didn’t. And (b) I did not kiss Connor Forrester. I repeat—I. Did. Not. Kiss. Connor. Forrester.
”
Uh-oh. That was a lot of no-commenting for someone who didn’t have any comment.
“Sure you didn’t,” a guy with Brillo-pad hair said. “So what was it like?”
I rolled my eyes. “I just told you—I didn’t kiss him! In fact, not that it’s any of your business, but I’ve never kissed anyone. Ever.” A few of them started scribbling away. Oh NO! Why did I have to pick that moment to overshare?! “Please don’t write that part down,” I said.
“So are you madly in love?” asked a woman who was so tan she looked orange.
“What do you have to say about the fact that before you, every girl he’s been seen with is tall and blonde and you’re so . . . not tall and blonde?” asked a guy with a T-shirt that said WILL WORK FOR FAME.
“Okay, (c) I am not in love with him, and (d) I happen to like my hair now that it’s grown out after I burned most of it off a while back.” I put my sunglasses back on. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have no more comment on the matter,” I said as I marched toward the exit.
Laurel said that because Lady A kept forgetting her lines the day before—and then couldn’t read the cue cards because she didn’t like to wear glasses in front of people—the movie was behind schedule, which meant that she didn’t have to work that day. Which meant that we could finally have a frister-to-frister non-Austin-involved sightseeing-slash-bonding day.
“Are we going on the Haunted Hollywood tour?” I asked excitedly as we had breakfast at this place called John O’Groats, which had the best blueberry pancakes and biscuits I had ever tasted in my life. The biscuits were so good that after eating Laurel’s, I asked the waitress if I could have another one, which made her say, “Jiminy Crickets—finally someone who eats bread in this country!” in her Irish accent.
“No, we’re going shopping . . .” Laurel said.
Shopping? Ugh. We could do that in New York. Plus, I’d just gone shopping with Lady A. I was hoping we were going to do something you could only do out here. But NOT something in the getting-your-picture-snapped-on-the-beach-in-Malibu-by-a-pap family.
“Shopping for something to wear to the Fifteen Candles premiere!” she added.
“Are you serious?” I squealed. Fourteen Candles had been my favorite movie of last year, and this was the sequel.
She nodded. “It was hard to get on the list,” Laurel said. “I had to promise I’d tape a special ‘Congratulations on your Bat Mitzvah’ message for the head of the studio’s daughter, but I know how you’ve been dying to see it.”
“So it’s just you and me?”
She nodded. “It’ll be our IBS outing for the week.”
This was amazing. This almost made up for the really horrible first part of the week. If only the girl who was staring right at Laurel would stop. It was kind of freaking me out. I shifted in my seat so I didn’t have to look right at her. Granted, maybe because we were in L.A. and they were more used to seeing famous people, not as many came up and interrupted our meals, but still, having someone watch you while you ate was really annoying, because it meant you couldn’t just scarf it all down.
A minute later there was a tap on my shoulder. I turned around. “It is you!” she gasped.
“Huh?” What was she talking about?
“You’re Lisa—the girl who was kissing Connor Forrester on the beach last night!” she squealed. Laurel and I looked at each other, alarmed. She wasn’t supposed to be interrupting our meal to talk to me—she was supposed to be talking to Laurel. The girl grabbed my arm. “He’s so cute. I have to know—is he a good kisser? I know I’m a lot older than him, but he’s just to die for.”
I yanked it back. “Okay, (a) it’s Lucy—not Lisa, and (b) I don’t know because I DIDN’T KISS HIM!” I cried. “We’re just friends, I swear.”
“I can’t believe I’m standing right in front of someone whose lips touched Connor Forrester’s,” she went on. She whipped out her phone and started texting. “Can I take a picture? My friends are totally going to die when they find out.”
I looked at Laurel, alarmed. What was going on? I wasn’t the one people were supposed to make a big deal about—she was.
By the time we were done browsing in the shops on Third Street in West Hollywood, Laurel had been stopped for her autograph three times. And me . . . four.
“Wow. I don’t think I’ve ever been with anyone more famous than I am,” she said as we walked back to the car. “It’s kind of weird.”
“And I’ve never been famous,” I said. I shielded my face as a trio of Japanese tourists snapped away at me. “It’s definitely weird.”
A few minutes later the car pulled into the parking lot of a store with a sign outside of it that said Frank Pigeon. I knew before we even went inside that it was really fancy on account of the cars outside. There wasn’t one dinged-up Volvo in the lot (which was the kind of car that Mom had had when we lived in Northampton). They were all shiny black Mercedes and BMWs, which I knew from overlistening to Dad were what “greedy capitalists” drove. I wasn’t sure what a capitalist was, but I could tell from the tone of his voice that it wasn’t good.
The other reason I knew it was a much nicer store than H&M or Urban Outfitters was because when we walked inside and passed a rack of T-shirts that were all faded—like someone had put bleach in the washing machine—I glanced at the price tag on one.
“They want someone to pay a hundred and twenty-five dollars for this?!” I yelled. This place was as bad as those stores on Rodeo Drive.
“Shh,” Laurel said, turning red and pulling her hat down a little farther on her head.
An Asian girl wearing the same T-shirt but in red came walking over to us. She looked like one of the Bikini Butts from the night before, except not blonde. “Excuse me, but can I help you?” she asked, all snotty. Was there something in the water that made people in L.A. so stuck up? Because they sure weren’t like this back in New York.
Laurel flashed a smile. “No, we’re just looking.”
“Well, I’m going to have to ask you to keep your voices down,” she said. Had I missed the sign that said this place was a library? The girl squinted. “Wait a minute—you’re Laurel Moses.”
Laurel nodded. Okay, this was better. This was the way it was supposed to be—Laurel being noticed and me fading into the woodwork. Sure, I may have complained about it in the past (or, like, two days ago), but now I realized it wasn’t so bad.
“Cool,” she said as if she barely cared. When you thought about it, celebrities were some of the only people who could afford to buy $125 bleach-stained T-shirts, so the salespeople here were probably used to seeing them all the time. She turned to me, and her eyes widened. I got nervous. Was I going to get thrown out because I wasn’t famous? Because instead of being a Somebody-with-a-capital-S, I was a nobody-with-a-little-n?
“You’re the girl who kissed Connor Forrester on the beach last night!” she announced in a very non-library-like voice. She grabbed my arm. “Omigod—you guys make such a cute couple! Are you looking for something special? Maybe something for a date with Connor?” Suddenly, she couldn’t have been friendlier. It was like how the kids at school treated me once they found out I was living with Laurel.
“What?! No!” I cried.
“It’s for the premiere of Fifteen Candles,” explained Laurel.
The salesgirl click-clacked over to a rack. “I have the perfect thing.” Uh-oh. I’d seen what L.A. people wore to premieres on the gossip blogs, and there were some pretty crazy outfits.
When she turned around, she was holding a purple maxidress with pink and red flowers splashed all over it. It was beautiful. And purple. It was PERFECT. I was so grateful for her good taste, it almost made up for the fact that I totally saw that she stopped to Tweet about Connor Forrester’s new girlfriend being there.
“It’s beautiful,” I said. “And not only that, but I bet it’ll make my boobs look smaller!” I announced, as I went into the dressing room.
“We’re so getting th
at for you,” Laurel said as soon as I walked out of the dressing room. Unlike some people (say, Cristina Pollock), I don’t walk around thinking I’m a supermodel, but in this case, the salesgirl was right—the dress did look great on me. And I was right, too—it did make my boobs look smaller.
“Try these on,” the salesgirl said, handing me a pair of gold sandals.
They were pretty, but . . . “But these have . . . heels,” I said, alarmed. “And if this is a premiere and I’m with you, that means I’m going to have to walk down the red carpet. With photographers!” Sure, I wanted to see the movie, but suddenly this didn’t seem like such a good idea.
“They’re not heels-heels,” said Laurel. “They’re what are called kitten heels. They’re totally easy to walk in. I swear.”
I gave her a doubtful look. “Yeah, maybe for someone who doesn’t have a coordination problem.”
“Just try them,” she said.
I put them on and clomped across the room as Laurel and the salesgirl cringed. “Huh. They’re not so bad,” I admitted. I took another step, twisted my ankle, and almost went down.
“We’ll work on the walking part later.” Laurel sighed.
“You’re going to look so cute in the pictures they take of you and Connor tonight!” the salesgirl squealed.
I rolled my eyes. “No, I’m not,” I replied. “Because there aren’t going to be any pictures of Connor and me, because Connor’s not going. I’m going with Laurel.”
Laurel looked up from her phone. “Actually . . . he is,” she said. “Austin just texted me, and said he was able to get two tickets, too . . . after he promised his agent he would come to his son’s Career Day at school. So he’s bringing Connor.”
My eyes narrowed. “Did you plan this?” I asked suspiciously.
“No!” she said. “Lucy, you’re not the only one who wants to see Fifteen Candles. I mean, the first one was the number one movie at the box office for forty weeks.”