How to Be Popular (10 page)

DAY TWO OF POPULARITY
TUESDAY
,
AUGUST
29, 1:30
P
.
M
.

Mark Finley spoke to me at lunch again today.

I was sitting there, trying to draw Darlene out on the few subjects she seems to know anything about—makeup and Brittany Murphy movies (I had just said everything there is to say about
8 Mile
, with the help of Darlene’s assorted suitors, several of whom volunteered that their favorite part was in the factory, where Brittany licks her hand)—when one of the guys went, “Oh, hey, Mark,” and I looked up to see Mark Finley standing by my chair.

“Hey,” Mark said, and swung a chair from a neighboring table around until it was near mine, and straddled it.

“Listen, great flyer,” Mark said to me.

Yes. Mark Finley had come over to our table on pur
pose to speak to me. ME. I can’t get Jason and Becca to sit with me at lunch—Jason, still excited about the fact that, now that he has a car, he can leave campus for lunch every day, insists on doing so, and Becca, because of her conviction that Jason is The One, has to follow him…even though today Jason invited his friend Stuckey to come along with them, and Becca can’t stand Stuckey, due to his custom of endlessly relating pivotal moments in Indiana college basketball games.

Clearly, they don’t want to eat with me. Which is just as well, since the ride to school with them this morning was excruciating. As if it weren’t bad enough that Jason felt compelled to comment on every article of clothing I had on—“What’s wrong with that skirt? Why’s it so tight? How are you supposed to run if Gordon Wu blows up the chem lab again and there’s a fire and we all have to evacuate?”—there was the fact that Becca can apparently no longer speak in his (Jason’s) company, on account of being too shy, since he’s Her One, so I had to do all the talking.

I may just start taking the bus.

But Mark Finley doesn’t seem to mind eating with me. At all.

“Oh,” I said, immediately flustered. Because, you know, even though he had e-mailed me last night, and all, speaking to Mark Finley in person…well, that’s totally different. Because of his eyes, which looked greener than usual for some reason.

“Yeah, it was nothing,” I said.

It HADN’T been nothing. That flyer—advertising Thursday night’s auction—had taken half the night to come up with. I’d had to blow off my homework, but it was worth it, since in the end, I’d come up with something semiprofessional-looking…which was good, since I had to buy ad space in the local paper to showcase the event, and needed something especially eye-catching.

I could, I suppose, have sought my mom’s help on this, since ads and window displays are her best thing—her ONLY thing, really, that she’s good at, insofar as running the store goes. She’s great at figuring out what will sell like hotcakes in our town—biographies and Madame Alexander dolls—and what won’t—tell-alls and Sanrio—as well as physically making sales.

But she sucks at the bookkeeping and bill paying…which makes it good that she has me around, now that she’s given Grandpa the boot.

Still, I wasn’t super enthused on letting my mom know what I was up to just yet…not that she isn’t already suspicious, especially when this morning I came downstairs in one of my pencil skirts and she was like, “And you’re going…where? To school? Dressed like
that
?”

I could see that I’d lived in jeans and sweatshirts for far too long.

“The ad should run tomorrow,” I said to Mark. “I faxed it over first thing this morning. Hopefully we’ll get a lot of bidders.”

“Oh, we will,” Mark said with that lopsided smile that made my heart skip a beat. I glanced over his shoulder and saw that Lauren was pretending to be deeply engaged in an animated discussion about her favorite soap opera,
Passions
, with Alyssa Krueger.

But her gaze kept darting nervously toward me. And Mark.

“It’s gonna be awesome,” Mark said. “People are
stoked
. The whole town’s talking about it.”

“Great,” I said. And gave him my most dazzling smile.

Sadly, he didn’t appear to notice—perhaps because at that same moment, Todd said, “Hey, Mark. You coming to the rager at the quarry on Friday, or what?”

“Of course I’m coming,” Mark said with his trademark lopsided grin. “Never missed one of Todd Rubin’s back-to-school ragers yet, have I?”

“Friday?” Darlene looked up from a detailed inspection of her cuticles. “It’s supposed to rain on Friday.”

We all looked at Darlene, because it was so unlike her to be at all familiar with current events.

The weather, however, appeared to be different than actual news, since Darlene explained, noticing our questioning stares, “I always check the five-day forecast before I plan my weekend tanning schedule at the lake.”

Which of course explained everything.

“Can’t have a rager in the rain, man,” Jeremy Stuhl said with a frown.

Todd looked concerned. “I’ll figure something out,” he said, not very confidently.

Which was when Lauren suddenly appeared at Mark’s side.

“Oh, Mark,” she said. “Do you have your car keys with you? I think I left my Carrie Underwood CD in your car, and Alyssa wants to borrow it.” Then, pretending to notice me for the first time, she said, “Oh, hi, Steph.”

“Hi, Lauren,” I said. And waited for the taunts to begin. What would it be this time? “Cute necklace. Not
real
gold, right? God, you’re such a Steph.” Or, “I see you’re eating the chef’s salad. What’s the matter, afraid your butt’s going to take over the cafeteria? Way to pull a Steph.”

She didn’t say any of those things. Instead, she said, wrapping both her hands around Mark’s bicep, “My dad’s real excited about the auction. Guess who he says he’s going to buy?”

Mark looked delightfully bewildered. “Who?”

“
You
, silly,” Lauren said, throwing her head back and laughing infectiously. Or at least, I suppose she thought it was infectious.

Mark frowned. “But I’d work for your dad for free, babe.”

“Don’t tell
him
that,” Lauren said. “God, he’ll have you out at the lot every single day. Do you have any idea how much business you’ll bring in, hon? I mean, the QB? Especially if you guys get to State this year.”

The chances of the Fighting Fish getting to State were extremely slim, and we all knew it—even, I suspect, Mark. But we all nodded and said, “Yeah, totally” like we
actually believed it could happen.

“Gee, babe,” Mark said. “That’d be cool if your dad bought me.”

Lauren beamed.

I couldn’t help feeling a little sorry for her. Because there was no way on God’s green earth Lauren Moffat’s dad was going to win Mark Finley on Thursday night. Not if I, and Emile Kazoulis’s wallet, had anything to say about it.

STILL DAY TWO OF POPULARITY
TUESDAY
,
AUGUST
29, 4
P
.
M
.

I think I died and went to heaven.

It didn’t seem that way at first, of course. When I got to the student parking lot after school and looked around for Jason, I saw that his car wasn’t there. Then I noticed Becca standing over by the bike racks, looking even more unhappy than she had when she found out Craig on
Degrassi
was bipolar.

“Where’s Hawkface?” I asked her.

And the floodgates let loose.

“He said he had some important errands to run for his grandmother, for the wedding,” she burst out, tears trembling on the ends of her eyelashes. “And that he was really sorry, but that he didn’t have time to run us home first and that we were just going to have to take the bus! The BUS! How could he do this to us, Steph? I mean, the BUS!”

I thought she was being a little overdramatic, but I knew what she meant. Once you’ve ridden to and from school in a BMW, going back to riding the bus has got to be hard.

Even if you’re getting a little tired of the Bee Gees.

“Don’t worry about it,” I said, patting her comfortingly on the back. “Things
are
a little nuts right now with the wedding, and all, and—”

“I think he was lying,” Becca interrupted, wiping her tears with the back of one wrist. “I mean, he took Stuckey with him. STUCKEY! Do you know what Stuckey talked about all during lunch today? Indiana’s 1987 NCAA Final Four victory. He wasn’t even ALIVE in 1987. But he knew every stupid detail. And wouldn’t stop talking about it. And Jason took HIM along to run errands, instead of us. I think he just doesn’t want to hang out with us, because I’m so quiet around him, on account of my great love for him, and you’re so—” She broke off and bit her lip.

“I’m so what?” I asked. Even though I already knew what she was going to say.

“You’re just acting so weird!” Becca cried. Almost as if it were a relief finally to say it. “I mean, eating with Darlene Staggs? She’s such a slut!”

“Hey, now,” I said gently. “Darlene’s not a slut. Just because she’s got big boobs—”

“They’re store-boughts!” Becca reminded me.

“They could be,” I said. “But that’s no reason to judge people. Darlene’s really nice. You’d know that, if you’d come sit with me.”

“Those people don’t want to talk to me,” Becca said, looking down at her shoes. “I mean, to them I’m still the dumb farm girl who used to sleep all through class.”

“Well, maybe it’s up to you to show them you’re not that girl anymore,” I suggested. “Now, come on, let’s go around so we can get the bus before it—”

And then I let out an expletive that I was going to have to tell Father Chuck about at confession next week.

“What?” Becca asked. “What is it?”

I was looking at my watch. “We missed the bus,” I said tightly.

Becca repeated my expletive. “Now what are we going to do?” she wailed.

“No problem,” I said, rallying. It was hot out in the parking lot. I was beginning to sweat. Soon, I knew, my blow-out was going to start to frizz. “I’ll just call my dad. He’ll come get us.”

“Oh, God,” Becca moaned. Which I understood and wasn’t insulted by. There’s nothing worse than having to be picked up at school by your dad in his minivan.

It was right then that the miracle occurred.

“Oh, hey, Steph,” a familiar—but still oddly thrilling voice—called from the doors to the school.

I knew who it was even before I spun around, because of the goose pimples of delight that had risen on my arms.

“Hi, Mark,” I said as casually as I could, as I turned….

And then I saw, with a pang of disappointment, that Lauren and Alyssa were with him.

Oh well. What did I expect? He’s the most popular guy in school. Did I really think he goes
anywhere
alone?

It was right then, though, that things really started looking up….

“What’s the matter?” Mark asked, noticing Becca’s tears (they were hard to miss, despite her attempt to mop them up). “Miss your ride?”

“Something like that,” I said with a smile that only Mark returned. Lauren and Alyssa just stared at me stonily.

But that was okay. Thanks to The Book, I knew the most appropriate course of action to take under the circumstances was to smile sunnily back at them.

“Geez, that sucks,” Mark said. I couldn’t see his hazel eyes, because they were hidden beneath the lenses of his Ray-Bans. “I’d offer you a ride, but I gotta stay here for after-school practice. I was just walking Lauren to her car.”

“Oh, don’t worry about us,” I said breezily. At least I hoped I sounded breezy. “We’ll get a ride somehow.”

“Oh, hey, I know,” Mark said.

And I knew—I just knew, maybe because Mark is My One—what he was going to say.

“Why don’t you give them a ride home, babe?” Mark asked Lauren.

Mark must be HER One, too, though, since she seemed to have known what he was going to say next and had an answer already prepared. Or at least it seemed that way, given how fast she came out with, “Oh,
gee, hon, wish I could. But they live in town, and you know that’s so far out of my way.”

This was actually true. Lauren and her family lived in one of the newer McMansions out by the Y, three miles away from the turn-of-the century (nineteenth, not twentieth) homes, just blocks from the courthouse, that Becca and I live in.

“Yeah, but weren’t you gonna stop by Benetton downtown to pick up something to wear for the rager on Friday?” Mark asked. “I thought I heard you guys saying something like that.”

Lauren was caught, and she knew it. Mark had made it clear how grateful he was to me for my brilliant talent auction idea. She didn’t dare dis me right in front of him. There was nothing she could do but smile tightly and say, “Oh yeah. I forgot. You guys want a ride?”

Beside me, I heard Becca gulp. But I said, still sounding breezy (or so I hoped), “Oh, sure, Lauren. That would be great.”

“Great,” Mark said.

And then, super boyfriend that he is, he walked all four of us to Lauren’s red convertible, which sat gleaming in the sun.

“Later, hon,” Mark said, leaning down to kiss Lauren good-bye, after having held the front seat back for Becca and me to climb past (Becca was so stunned by this development, she didn’t remember to voice her usual argument about how she had to sit in front due to a tendency toward carsickness), then helped Lauren behind
the wheel, as tenderly as if she were made of china.

“Have a good practice,” Lauren said, and twinkled her French manicure at him.

Then she pulled out of the lot.

And just like that, Becca and I? We were riding in the backseat of Lauren Moffat’s BMW.

A part of me expected that as soon as we got to the corner, where Mark could no longer see us, Lauren was going to pull to the side of the road, with a squeal of brakes, and order us to GET OUT, in a voice like that poltergeist from
Amityville Horror
.

But she didn’t. Instead, she started making small talk.

LAUREN MOFFAT WAS MAKING SMALL TALK WITH ME.

“So,” she said. “Don’t you guys usually ride with that guy? That Jason guy? What happened to him?”

I loved how Lauren was referring to Jason as “that Jason guy.” As if she hadn’t sat next to him all through second grade, and acted as Snow White to his Prince Charming in the class play (I’d been cast as the Wicked Witch. And yes, tears were shed over getting this part and not Snow White, until Grandpa told me that without the Wicked Witch, there’d be no story, so it was really the most important part of all).

“He had to go run some errands,” I said.

“For his grandma,” Becca chimed in. “His grandma is marrying Steph’s grandpa this weekend.”

Whoa. Talk about TMI. I shot Becca a
Cool It
look. But she was too far gone. She was babbling like Bloomville Creek.

“Steph’s the maid of honor,” she went on. “And Jason is best man.”

“Isn’t that, like, incest?” Lauren asked, shooting Alyssa an amused glance. Alyssa, who was slurping on what had to have been her sixth Diet Coke of the day, stifled a laugh into the can.

“Why would it be incest?” Becca asked.

“Well, like, aren’t Steph and that Jason guy going out?” Lauren wanted to know.

“WHAT?” Becca looked as if she’d been slapped. “No, they aren’t
going out.
”

“Really?” Lauren glanced at me in her rearview mirror. “I always thought you two were going out. I mean, you’ve been practically joined at the hip since, what? Kindergarten?”

I gazed steadily back at her reflection. “Jason and I are friends,” I said.

“
Just
friends,” Becca emphasized, leaning forward to grab the back of Alyssa’s headrest. “They’re
just
friends. Jason’s single.”

Seriously. I know she thinks he’s The One and all. But could she calm down about it?

“Oh,” Lauren said, cracking another smile in Alyssa’s direction. “That’s a relief.”

“Really,” Alyssa said, polishing off the remains of her soda. “I mean, that a catch like him is still available.”

Then the two of them broke down in semi-hysterical giggles.

I glowered at the backs of their heads. Jason may be
a bit of a weirdo. But he’s MY weirdo. How dare they make fun of him?

I wasn’t too pleased with Becca, either. Why couldn’t she learn to cool it once in a while?

Lauren pretended like she didn’t remember where I lived, even after I pointed out that she’d been there. She acted like she had no recollection of the burnt oatmeal OR Navy Seal Barbie incidents.

There is nothing in The Book about needing selective amnesia in order to become popular, but obviously it is a crucial part of the process. You pretty much have to forget all the crappy things people did to you in the past in order to move on to a more successful future. Maybe when this is all over, and I am popular, I’ll write my own book.

Oh, wait. I already AM popular: Lauren Moffat just gave me a ride home from school.

And she wasn’t even that mean to me.

Jason freaking out and refusing to give me rides anymore might just be the best thing that ever happened.