My Extra Best Friend (10 page)

Brooke licks sprinkles off her spoon. “You’re just jealous because they like me best. Don’t come if you don’t want to.”

“They’re not your friends, Brooke,” Jenna says back. “If you can’t see that, then you need glasses worse than Liz
butt
.”

Elizabeth shoots a look at Jenna. “My name is
Li
—”

“Where’s the hideout?” I jump in.

Brooke shrugs. “Somewhere in the woods.”

Meeka looks up from her sundae. “But that’s where the Meadowlark Monster lives.”

“Yeah, what if the monster eats
us
before we eat the candy?” Randi asks.

“Oh,
puhlease,
” Brooke says. “There are eight of us.
Ten
counting Nat and Emillie.
One
monster doesn’t stand a chance.”

Meeka thinks this through. “Maybe we could take his picture and then run away fast.”

“I promise not to delete that one,” I say to Meeka.

She gives me a smile.

“They’d put it on display for sure,” Stacey says. “Right next to the one of us winning the Silver Paddle!”

“We might even get on the news!” Randi adds.
“Campers Conquer Meadowlark Monster!”

Everyone giggles and nods.

“Works for me,” Brooke says. “We’ll sneak out with Nat and Emillie, and if that dumb monster comes around, we’ll take his picture and get famous. Who’s in?”

Randi raises her hand. “Me!”

Stacey, Meeka, and Jolene raise their hands too.

“There’s something fishy about this plan,” Jenna says, “but you would be lost without me. I’m in.”

Brooke looks at me. “And you, Ida? Are you sneaking out with us?”

My stomach tightens. I don’t want to get caught sneaking out, but I don’t want to get left out either.

“In,” I say.

Brooke turns to Elizabeth. “How about you?”

Elizabeth doesn’t answer right away. She’s busy sculpting her sundae into an ice cream castle. She got lots of practice making castles at the beach while me and Jenna played catch, and hunted for pretty rocks and snail shells, and buried them like treasure in the sand. Then we went to the crafts cottage and drew treasure maps. We forgot
to invite Elizabeth along, accidentally on purpose.

Elizabeth looks up from her ice cream castle, her eyes bright with an idea. “You’ll need someone to stay behind and be the lookout, won’t you?”

“Ooo…” Brooke says. “That’s clever. I wonder why I didn’t think of it.”

Randi nods. “It’ll be just like a spy movie. Liz can do bird calls to warn us if someone is coming.”

“That won’t work,” Jenna cuts in. “Birds aren’t out at night.”

“Owls are.” Elizabeth cups her hands around her mouth and tips up her chin, just like the boys did when they sang
Figaro
this morning. “Who-who-whooo!” she calls to the gathering clouds.

“Perfect!” Stacey says. “You sound just like an owl!”

Jenna huffs. “I’ve heard better.”

“It’s settled then,” Brooke says. “Liz will stay by Chickadee. If anyone comes poking around, she’ll
hoot
and we’ll
scoot
!”

“When do we sneak out?” Jolene asks. “Tonight?”

Brooke shakes her head. “Nat and Emillie have some very important texting to do tonight.
And tomorrow night is Hawk cabin’s campout. So we’ll have to wait until Wednesday. But that’s okay because it will give me time to plan out all the details. When we’ll leave…where we’ll meet…what we’ll wear…everything!”

“We should wear fake mustaches and carry the candy in a briefcase,” Randi puts in. “That’s how spies do it.”

“I am
not
wearing a mustache,” Brooke replies. “And where are we going to get a briefcase?”

“Mustaches? Candy? A briefcase?” Rusty and the other boys walk up to us. “What’s going on?”

“None of your business,” Brooke says, pulling her sundae away from Joey as he reaches for it.

“Aw, c’mon,” Rusty says, squishing in. “What are you guys cooking up?”

“My lips are sealed.” Brooke pinches her mouth like a prune.

“Then you won’t be needing this.” Joey swipes Brooke’s sundae and takes a lick.

All the boys snicker.

Brooke snarls. “I wouldn’t tell you apes our plan in a million
eons.
”

“That’s a long time,” Tom says.

Elizabeth nods. “Indefinitely long.”

Quinn snorts. “And not one moment more.”

They do a three-way smile.

I frown. “We’re sneaking out,” I say.

Quinn turns from Elizabeth to me. “Seriously?”

I nod, happy to take the attention away from her.

“You weren’t supposed to tell, Ida,” Brooke snaps.

I eat the cherry off my sundae. “Oops.”

The boys nudge in.

“We need details,” Tom says.

Rusty nods. “Spill it, Brooke.”

Brooke clamps her mouth shut again. But her lips squirm, trying to let the words out. Brooke loves an audience. And right now, eleven pairs of eyes are on her.

“Fine,” she finally blurts. “But you boys have to
swear
not to tell anyone. The future of my friendships depends upon it.”

“Cross my heart and hope you die,” Rusty says, flicking a freckled finger across his chest.

The other boys flick their fingers too.

Before I can even finish scraping the last of my hot fudge out of my sundae bowl, the whole story gushes out of Brooke like this is Yellowstone National Park and she’s Old Faithful.

“Plus, if we see the monster, we’re going to take his picture and get famous!” Meeka adds.

Joey snorts. “One look at the Meadowlark Monster and you
girls
will be crying for your
mommies
!”

Stacey straightens up. “Girls are way braver than boys.”

Rusty slaps the picnic table, laughing. “Good one, Stacey,” he says. “Got any more?”

As soon as we finish our sundaes, Alex takes us boating. Me, Stacey, Brooke, Randi, and Elizabeth in one rowboat. Meeka, Jolene, Jenna, and Alex in the other. We don’t get back until suppertime because rowboats don’t always go in the direction you want them to. Especially when gray clouds are stirring up the wind.

Then, after supper, Alex takes us on a nature hike. When we get to the clearing where the trust fall platform is, she makes us sit on the ground
and close our eyes and listen to the sound of evening settling in.

At first, evening doesn’t sound like it’s settling in at all. It sounds like it’s having a slumber party. And all the chipmunks and birds and insects are invited. Chattering. Chirping. Buzzing.

But if you make yourself sit still and silent long enough, all the noisy sounds soften until you swear you can hear the trees yawning and the grass bending and the flower petals folding. It makes you want to open your eyes and look around to see if the animals are sneaking out from behind the trees to gather near you, like fish circling your ankles.

But when I take a peek, I don’t see any animals. I only see Elizabeth Evans, peeking back at me.

I close my eyes again.

“Any takers on the trust fall tonight?” Alex asks, breaking the silence a few minutes later.

Meeka and Jolene say, “Okay.”

I say, “No.”

Elizabeth says, “No thanks.”

Brooke says, “No way.”

I lie awake after Alex gets done reading more about the girl who lives with wolves, listening to raindrops play patty-cake on the roof, and thinking about all the stuff that happened today. Camp stuff. Friendship stuff too.

How Randi and Elizabeth kept splashing everyone with their oars on our boat ride, and how Meeka and Jolene practically fell into the lake, trying to splash them back. How Brooke promised to reward Elizabeth with an extra sucker at the sneak-out because she came up with the clever idea of carrying the candy in a pillowcase. How we sang goofy songs at the campfire. How Stacey’s and Elizabeth’s marshmallows plopped into the flames at the exact same time, and how they hung on to each other, trying to hold in their giggles, while Randi used a stick to dub them the Knights of the Burnt Marshmallows.

I roll toward the wall and pull George under my chin.

“Everyone likes her,” I whisper to him. “Except Jenna and me.”

George shifts in my arms, like he can’t decide whose side he’s on.

I hear scritch-scratching below me. Maybe Elizabeth’s mosquito bites are itching her too.

Scritch…scritch…scratch…

She must have a lot of them, because the sound goes on for a long time.

When it finally stops, her bed creaks.

A papery shadow rises up from the crack by the wall.

I shine my flashlight on it and see lots of words.

I read the note again.

I let George read it too.

When he’s done, I wait for him to say something. But, like always, he doesn’t say a word.

So I stick the note under my pillow and turn off my flashlight.

George snuggles in.

Thunder rumbles in the distance.

I lie awake for a long time.

We’re supposed to be cleaning our cabin on Tuesday morning while Alex is at her staff meeting, but we voted 7–1 to give ourselves the morning off. We’re all tired and a little cranky from the storm that rolled through last night. Thunder sounds a lot scarier when you’re away from home. Even if you are with mostly friends.

Instead, we’re sitting on our bunks, eating the candy Brooke rationed out for today. One sucker each. Green or red because those are her least favorite colors. She’s saving all the rest of the candy for our sneak-out tomorrow night.

I look across the room at Stacey. She’s lying on her bunk, twirling a red sucker in her mouth, looking at a magazine and pretending to listen to Brooke babble on and on about Nat and Emillie.

“Hey, Stacey,” I say, pulling the green sucker out of my mouth.

Stacey looks over.

I flick my green tongue in and out like I’m a frog catching flies. Then I smile and wait for her to laugh.

But she doesn’t. She just shifts the sucker in her mouth and turns the page in her magazine.

I sigh. She’s mad because of what I did to Elizabeth at breakfast this morning. When Elizabeth asked Jolene to please pass the last cinnamon roll, I snatched it first and took a bite. I also accidentally on purpose knocked over Elizabeth’s cup, sopping her in orange juice. Instead of apologizing, I fake said, “I’m
soooo
sorry.”

Stacey saw it all. I tried to link up with her on the way back to the cabin after breakfast, but she pulled away from me like my arm was electrified or something.

Stacey doesn’t know about the note I got from Elizabeth last night. I’d show it to her if she’d give me a chance. Then she’d understand why I’m being a tiny bit mean.

Elizabeth knew I’d be mad at her for never writing to me. Still, she made it sound like I’m
supposed to feel sorry for her. But I was just as sad, and I mailed
lots
of letters. Why couldn’t she?

I should show the note to Jenna. She’s good at organizing mixed-up stuff. And right now, I’m feeling very mixed up inside.

But Jenna would say the same thing whether she reads the note or not. She would tell me I don’t need Elizabeth Evans as long as I have her around. Which is true. I have new friends. I don’t need an old one. So why am I worried about it?

Because of Stacey.

She’s not as organized as Jenna—seriously, you should see her room. Still, if you were at her house and asked to borrow her magenta hair band—the one with the silky white flower—she would say “Help yourself” and you would say “I would, if I had X-ray vision,” and then she would scan around her messy room for a minute and, one second later, reach into that mess and pull the magenta hair band out.

Stacey can see things that other people can’t. Plus, she knows how it feels to move away. I think that’s why she wants me to give Elizabeth another chance.

But I did give Elizabeth chances.

Tons.

She let them all slip away.

I don’t want a friend who doesn’t even try.

I finish my sucker and then reach under my pillow for my sketchbook. I’m taking it with me to morning activities so Alex can see it. Me and Jenna are going to walk with her to the crafts cottage.

But as I pull out my sketchbook, Elizabeth’s note from last night comes with it. I pick it up and read it again.
What does she mean…“I wouldn’t have to explain why I did what I did”? What did she do, besides not write to me?

“Garbage,” someone says.

I look up.

Elizabeth is standing next to my bunk. She’s wearing a different outfit now. One that doesn’t smell like orange juice.

“Huh?” I say.

“Garbage,” she says again, holding out her hand. “Sucker wrappers and sticks? I’m collecting them before Alex gets back. General Jenna’s orders.”