Survival of the Fiercest

by Anna Carey

  Andie’s entire body slowed, her feet feeling like they were made of lead. Three hours had passed since her little white lie, and she wasn’t any closer to having Clay Calhoun as her boyfriend. She needed a plan—and fast.

  TO: Clay Calhoun

  FROM: Andie Sloane

  DATE: Thursday, 10:05 p.m.

  SUBJECT: Hey…

  Hey there,

  I forgot to tell you how great you were at the scrimmage on Tuesday. That goal you scored came out of nowhere. I was telling my friend Kyle, you’re the best one on the Haverford team. Way better than Austin Thorpe.

  Are you still around tomorrow? We should definitely hang out.

  xoxo

  Andie

  TO: Andie Sloane

  FROM: Clay Calhoun

  DATE: Thursday, 10:28 p.m.

  SUBJECT: Re: Hey…

  Hey Sloane,

  I was wondering what the deal was with that toolbag. He goes to Donalty, right? Austin hates that kid.

  Yeah, I’m around tomorrow. We should hang out. Brandon and I are playing Ultimate Frisbee on the Great Lawn anyway, so I can come by your house around 4:30.

  Clay

  GOODBYE MUG THE SLUG, HELLO MYRA GRANBERRY

  “Myra!” Stella pounded on the wood door. “Please—open up!”

  “I told you,” a voice echoed from inside the bathroom. “I don’t want to see your face!” It was Friday afternoon, and the school was practically empty. But Stella was standing outside the eighth-floor loo, waiting for Myra to emerge. Since the open call, Myra hadn’t responded to any of her e-mails. She’d tried everything: explaining (I followed you out but I couldn’t find you), pretending it didn’t happen (Are you free for lunch tomorrow?), and finally defending (It’s not my fault Cate said that). Then this morning, in biology, Myra had moved her seat to a table in the corner, telling Mrs. Perkins she preferred to learn about mitosis alone. Stella had been so busy convincing Blythe and Cate that she could turn Myra into Chi Sigma material, she hadn’t run the idea by Myra herself.

  Stella glanced at the clock on the wall. It was four sixteen. Which meant Myra had been barricaded in the loo for twelve minutes, ever since Stella followed her there after her Mathlete practice. She had to come out eventually, at least for food. And when she did, Stella would plead her case, tell her how the facial hair comment was just Cate’s way of expressing affection (She loves to tease!) and Chi Sigma would be delighted to have her as its third member. Myra would understand it had all been one horrid misunderstanding.

  Or not.

  The door swung open, nearly knocking Stella in the face. “Stay away from me!” Myra growled, storming down the hallway. A portrait of Lady Harriet Ashton hung on the far wall. She watched the scene unfold, her lips pursed in disappointment.

  Stella managed to grab Myra’s arm, but she flailed about wildly, trying to break free. Missy Hurst, a junior Stella recognized from art class, was sitting on a leather couch in the lounge. She glanced at the bright red emergency phone on the wall, not sure what to do. “Bloody hell, Myra!” Stella cried. “It wasn’t my fault!”

  Hearing those words, Myra froze and pointed a finger in Stella’s face. “Wasn’t your fault? You’re the one who told me to show up. You said I had a good chance!” Her brown eyes were wet. Under her white button-down she was wearing an EASY AS π T-shirt, the writing just barely visible. “Did you enjoy watching everyone laugh at me?”

  Stella remembered Myra’s face in the drawing room, how she’d gone ashen when Cate mentioned her facial hair. “No….” Her stomach felt queasy, like she might puke her brown rice sushi all over the floor. “I just didn’t think—”

  “No.” Myra cut her off. “You didn’t think.” With that, she stalked off down the hall.

  Stella watched her go, the monogrammed L.L. Bean backpack bouncing high on her shoulders. With the exception of her mum, no one ever talked to Stella that way. Not Pippa. Not Bridget. Not even Lola, during their most horrid fights. But technically, it was her fault. She knew how Cate would react, and she’d told Myra to come anyway. Stella recognized something unexpected in Myra’s words, something she hadn’t even realized she’d been missing: the truth.

  “Wait!” Stella called. She wrung her hands together, searching for the right thing to say. “I’m sorry.” Myra froze. “I’m really sorry.” She turned around and looked Stella in the eyes, her face softer than before. “We want you as our third member,” Stella continued. “We’re having our first sorority party tomorrow night, and we want you there, as our Mu.”

  “What?” Myra’s forehead wrinkled in confusion, like Stella had just told her E did not equal MC squared. “What do you mean?”

  “Chi Sigma…Mu. We reviewed the candidates. We want you.” Stella walked down the hall toward her. “And Cate is…sorry.”

  “Cate Sloane said she’s sorry for making fun of me? Somehow I don’t believe that.” Myra crossed her arms over her chest.

  Stella leaned in close, so only Myra could hear. “Look, we’re not letting Paige Mortimer in, or Corynne Handler—they’ve been trying to tear Cate down for the last three years.” Stella was being honest. Myra would never spread lies about Cate having lice, call her stuck up, or threaten to tell the entire school about Stella’s dad and Cloud McClean. Myra was someone they could trust.

  “This isn’t some kind of joke, is it?” Myra studied Stella’s face.

  Stella thought about Blythe’s challenge, how she’d insisted she could make Myra Chi Sigma material. It wasn’t a joke. The bet was more of an…inspiration…than anything else. Still, it was better if Myra didn’t know about it. “Not at all,” Stella said. She threaded her arm through Myra’s and they walked down the hall together. “What do you think? Are you in?”

  Myra nodded slowly. “I’m in.”

  “Good,” Stella said, her lips curling into a smile. “Now there’s just one thing we need to do before the party tomorrow….”

  Stella sat under the colander-looking dryer, the air whooshing around her foiled head. Every seat in the Red Door Salon was filled. A wrinkled old lady was getting the yellowed soles of her feet pumiced while a Botoxed man in a navy Christian Dior turtleneck examined his clear polish manicure. Stella glanced nervously at her dainty Movado watch. “Excuse me,” she asked, waving at a stylist with a trendy, twentieth-century version of the mullet. Even now, it was still ugly. “Did you see where my friend Myra went? White-blond hair? EASY AS π T-shirt?” The stylist shook her head.

  After school, Stella had taken Myra to the Elizabeth Arden salon. The threading artist had disappeared with Myra almost an hour ago. Stella cringed as she imagined Myra in one of the back rooms, squirming in pain as a team held her down and threaded off all her arm hair. Myra would emerge tiny, shiny, and pink, like a newborn hairless Chihuahua.

  A woman peeked out from behind a door that said MAKEUP. She had a pure white tuft of hair in her black bangs, like Pepé Le Pew. “Your friend…is ready,” she said. Stella set her Vogue down in her lap, suddenly nervous.

  Pepé opened the door and out stepped Myra’s beautiful cousin. Her thin blond hair was cut into a chic Katie Holmes bob, showing off her high cheekbones and plump, heart-shaped lips. Her deep-set amber eyes shone beneath her brows, which were suddenly visible after being filled out with light brown pencil. Her face was still pink from the threading, but it was completely flawless. All her bleached lip fuzz was gone.

  Stella stood up, knocking her head on the plastic dome. Myra was still Myra, with her rainbow knee-high socks and her EASY AS π T-shirt, but she looked…different. She looked…incredible. “You’re bloody gorgeous!” Stella cried.

  Myra smiled shyly, her glossy lips catching the light. She spotted her reflection in the mirror on the wall and spun around once, touching the bottom of her bob. “I like it—I really like it.”

  Stella had never seen Myra like this before. She wasn’t hunched over, staring at her Vans the way she always did when she walked around Ashton Prep. Her s
houlders were back, making her look at least three inches taller. And she couldn’t stop smiling. “When you walk into the party tomorrow, those Haverford blokes are going to keel over.”

  Myra kept looking at her reflection, moving closer and closer to the mirror, the way Stella did when she was examining her pores. She hadn’t heard a word Stella said. “I’ve never felt so…pretty,” she whispered, her brown eyes wet with tears.

  Stella felt something stirring inside her, something that tickled her nose and formed a lump at the back of her throat. She’d planned on giving Myra a new haircut, maybe some new shoes and a gauzy T-shirt that didn’t have a math slogan scrawled across the front of it. But she’d done something better—Myra was happy. “You were always pretty,” she corrected. “You just needed a little help letting it show.”

  Myra pulled Stella into a tight hug. “Thank you,” she said softly, her cheek pressing into Stella’s foiled hair. “Thanks.”

  HAVERFORD INTELLIGENCE FOR CATE SLOANE

  REPORTED BY DANNY PLIMPTON: SEVENTH-GRADER HMS

  Wednesday 9:16 a.m.: The Eagle is spotted in the bathroom blowing his nose. The Eagle may have slight cold.

  Wednesday 11:49 a.m.: The Eagle tells an unidentified friend that he got lost walking home through Central Park yesterday.

  Wednesday 12:30 p.m.: The Eagle discloses to Mrs. Hearth, the Haverford librarian, that Catcher in the Rye is his favorite book.

  Wednesday 4:42 p.m.: The Eagle spotted at the Museum of Modern Art, staring at a Dalí painting.

  Wednesday 6:22 p.m.: The Eagle spotted walking a yellow Labrador retriever on Seventy-seventh Street. He was carrying what looks like a small plastic bag of poop.

  Thursday 10:36 a.m.: Three tenth-graders refer to the Eagle as “a cool guy.”

  Thursday 1:53 p.m.: The Eagle seems to be fully recovered from cold. Has not been seen sneezing or blowing nose for the entire day.

  BATTLE OF THE BOYFRIENDS

  Kyle leaned so close to the microphone he was practically kissing it. “And you say,” he sang, strumming his electric guitar wildly, “It’s o-kaay…and that’s okay with meeee.” Behind him the drummer, a stocky boy wearing a Brooklyn Industries hoodie, smashed the cymbals. Kyle’s dark brown hair was soaked with sweat, and he kept shaking his head, trying to get it out of his eyes.

  “So that’s why he wears the aviators and headband!” Andie whispered, digging her fingers into Cindy’s arm. They’d gone to the Living Room after school to see the Wormholes practice. Andie had picked out a teal Cynthia Rowley racerback dress and Cindy had changed into her “Lower East Side hipster outfit”: a vintage plaid shift dress, brown Sigerson Morrison ankle boots, and a gray fedora with a red feather in it. In sixth grade she’d heard a celebrity stylist say, “Only confident people wear hats,” so she’d tried to incorporate one into every ensemble since.

  The bright orange room was packed with empty tables. In the back a man with a green Mohawk swept the floor, getting ready for the night’s shows. “And that’s okay with meeee,” Kyle sang, holding the last note a little longer than the others. He looked out at Andie and smiled, revealing his dimple. She felt the blood rush to her cheeks. She was watching the Wormholes—the same band she and Cindy had listened to on repeat for all of June. They’d sprawled out on her red velvet couch and studied every picture on the band’s website, trying to decide which member was the cutest. The decision was unanimous: K.L. And now she was dating him.

  “Did you see how he just looked at you?” Cindy shrieked. Then she narrowed her eyes at the bass player, a tall thin boy with an unusually large Adam’s apple. “Maybe I could date him—he’s mysterious looking.” She tried to clear her throat but broke into a hacking cough. “I think I’m getting sick. I must’ve caught something from Mike.”

  Andie rolled her eyes. Cindy had a boyfriend for a week when she was away this summer in Maine. He was the busboy at the Lobster Tale. “You only held hands,” Andie whispered, poking Cindy playfully in the side.

  Onstage, Kyle unplugged his guitar from the amp. As the band packed up their equipment, he strode over to their table, still smiling. “Hey.” He sat down beside Andie. He was wearing a tattered blue CBGB shirt. “How’d you like the new songs?”

  “They were great,” she said, trying to steady her voice. “You were great.” Andie kept staring at her hand, which was resting on the table only an inch away from his. She wanted him to grab it, to interlace his fingers in hers like they were a real couple. She kept imagining herself standing in the crowd at one of Kyle’s shows, the other groupies seething with jealousy as they realized he was staring at Andie, that every song was dedicated to her. She couldn’t wait until Cate spotted them playing foosball in the den together and realized that Andie had something she didn’t: a boyfriend. Under the table Kyle’s knee knocked into the side of her leg and she flinched, suddenly nervous.

  Kyle pulled his guitar into his lap. “It’s awesome you came.” He strummed slowly, covering the strings with one hand so it made a muted metallic sound. “What are you guys doing now? We’re all going over to Mark’s loft.” Kyle nodded to the bassist, who had covered his shoulder-length blond hair with a backwards Mets cap. “You should come.”

  Andie looked at her watch, torn. It was already four, which meant in half an hour she had to be home and ready for her “date” with Clay Calhoun. If she was going to get back to the Upper East Side in time, she should’ve left five minutes ago. “We actually have to go….” She sprang up from the table, pulling Cindy with her.

  “Right.” Kyle stared at his black and white-checked Vans, like she’d just told him she would rather spend the afternoon with the Haverford chess club. “Well, maybe I’ll come over tomorrow? Lola mentioned you and your sisters were throwing a party?” He stopped strumming and looked up, waiting for Andie to fill in the sudden silence.

  She tugged nervously on the highlight in her bangs. Kyle had already heard about the party. If she didn’t invite him now, she could forget about him IMing her tonight, or tomorrow…or ever again. It didn’t matter if she was supposed to be dating Clay, or if Lola had started straightening her hair just to impress Kyle. Kyle didn’t know any of that. He would just think she hated him. “Yeah…you should come,” she heard herself say.

  Kyle pushed his sweaty bangs off his forehead and smiled. “Cool,” he said. “See you then.”

  Andie swallowed hard, but her throat felt dry. She would hide out in her room if she had to, or fake a horrible stomach virus. She didn’t have to go to the party. And now she couldn’t—not with both Lola and Kyle there.

  “You’re completely insane,” Cindy hissed, throwing her long jet-black hair over her shoulder. They turned down Madison Avenue, nearly knocking over a chubby-cheeked toddler who’d escaped from his mother. “When Lola sees you two together she’s going to kill you.”

  It was a cool, breezy afternoon, but Andie’s skin felt hot, like she’d gotten a second-degree sunburn. “What was I supposed to do? I couldn’t not invite him.”

  Cindy shook her head. “You should have told him you weren’t going to the party—anything. Now he’s going to be there tomorrow, and so is Lola. She’s going to figure out that you two have been talking. This is bad. Really, really bad.” She let out a low cough. Cindy was great at making Andie feel like she was just as smart and talented as Cate, shooting mock fashion spreads on her Nikon Coolpix, or consoling her when the Ashton soccer team lost. But in crisis situations, she went into complete panic mode.

  Cindy pulled off her fedora and smoothed down her hair. “You just have to tell Lola—she can’t be mad at you. She’s modeling for Gunther Gunta!”

  “I tried,” Andie mumbled. “There hasn’t been a good time.”

  “Try again!” Cindy said, shaking her head. “She’s going to know something is wrong when Kyle is wandering around the party looking for you.” She blew Andie a kiss before taking off toward her apartment building, the Stagecoach, which had a blown-glass sculpture of a horse
and buggy in the lobby.

  Andie turned down Eighty-second Street. Cindy’s words were still ringing in her ears when she spotted Clay in front of her town house. He was leaning against the wrought iron fence, kicking around a crumpled Coke can. “Sloane! Where you been?” he called.

  Andie tried hard to smile, but couldn’t. Right now Kyle was in a loft space in SoHo, probably talking about the Shins or playing Wii bowling with his bassist, Mark.

  She pushed open the wrought iron gate. It felt like it weighed five hundred pounds. “Hey…sorry I’m late,” she said, not feeling even the slightest bit sorry.

  “No worries, yo. He pulled down his Yankees hat over his shaggy blond hair. “I told Brandon we were hanging out; he might come over later.”

  “Sure,” Andie mumbled. “I love Brandon.” The only thing worse than spending the afternoon with Clay was spending the afternoon with Clay and Brandon. They’d probably pants each other in the middle of the kitchen as Margot looked on in horror.

  They walked into the foyer just as Lola was bounding down the stairs. She was wearing her red plaid Gap boxers and a Sherwood Academy sweatshirt. Her dirty blond hair looked just that—dirty. Instead of its usual dry, frizzy texture, it was greasy, like she’d washed it with vegetable oil. She looked from Clay to Andie, her green eyes bright. “Hello!” she said in her little British accent, a little too cheerfully.

  Andie let out a deep breath, reminding herself that Lola was the reason Clay was over in the first place. As an aspiring model, Andie knew how to channel every emotion: happy, scared, mysterious, or bold. But today she’d be put to the ultimate test. Today she’d pretend she was in love…with Clay Calhoun. “Lola!” she said, winking behind Clay’s back. “This is Clay.” She singsonged the word Clay.

  Lola smoothed down her red cloth headband. “Oh, hi! I’ve heard so much about you!” Clay’s lips curled into a smile.