The Aristobrats (8 page)

Per protocol, Parker, Kiki, Ikea, and Plum met beside the old phone booths in Freeman Auditorium before Matin for Hair & Makeup and mints. They watched as Wallys funneled past them in the foyer toward the doors. Most everyone followed the Lylas's lead and did a discreet check of hair, a fresh application of Lipglass, and a handful of some minty candy before Matin. Also per protocol, the boys always came in wearing enough Axe deodorant to make the whole auditorium smell like Dark Temptation and Impulse.

Hotchkiss had made a way bigger deal out of the day than any of them realized she would. Every Orion Super-Screen in the building rippled with giant 3-D graphics of the school seal. Just the sight of all that Latin waving on every wall of the school made Parker nervous enough to gobble up the entire pack of Tic-Tacs.

“
Semper Veritas,”
Plum repeated the motto at the bottom of the school seal. “What does that even
mean
?” she asked with a pop of her gum. “Stay
true
? To what?”

“Mottoes aren't supposed to mean anything, are they?” Parker said as she took out her Lipglass and reapplied. She watched as Emily Townsend copied her reapply move. “I thought they just stuck one on there because every school has one,” she added.

“A good motto is supposed to be an expression of the guiding principal, spirit, or purpose of an organization.” Ikea explained. “Something that everyone tries to be.”

Kiki checked her reflection on the back of her phone. Nearly everybody who walked by checked her out, too. “Stay
pretty
,” she said with a fluff of her hair. “Now
that's
a motto.” She smiled. Parker almost laughed. Good old Keeks: she had the right idea.

Ikea stood on her tippy-toes and looked over the heads of students filtering in. She opened a second pack of Tic-Tacs and gobbled some up herself.

“You looking for your dad?” Parker asked, her mouth spicy with cinnamon flavoring.

Ikea shrugged. “I guess not really.” She scanned the foyer once more. “He's pretty busy.”

Kiki pulled the two sides of her cardigan tightly around her stomach as gobs of Wallys walked by. She'd been yanking on her sweater all morning, trying to cover up the results of two weeks of Pop Tarts.

“So you gained, like, three ounces, Keek.” Plum took a few of Ikea's mints and chewed them up into her gum. “Big whup.”

“You don't get it, Plum,” Kiki protested. “This was supposed to be my super-skinny-jeans year.”

Parker bit her thumbnail. She couldn't deal with the piddly Lylas tension right now. James looked over at her from his spot in the projection room. He was waiting for Hotchkiss to hand him the key drive that they'd made the night before. She was reminded again how she'd been wrong about James's eyes. They definitely weren't dark. They were like computer screen blue, lit from behind. There was something about them that made you want to keep looking—a page-turning mystery you'd better put down. Parker took her own advice and turned away.

Kenneth Accolola walked up to Kiki and gave her a backhand snap. “Hey?” He looked down at her stretched out sweater. “Wasn't this going to be our super-skinny-jeans year, Keeks? I thought we weren't eating.” Kiki didn't return Kenneth's snap. “I've spent the entire week carbo-loading and repeating the phrase ‘tofu corn dogs and chocolate turtle pie' like a thousand times. Okay, Kenneth?”

“No probs, Miss Pissy.” Kenneth dismissed Kiki with a wave of his hand and swaggered into the auditorium. Parker would have reminded Kiki about the be-nice-to-Kenneth-you're-his-only-friend rule, but Kiki was too upset about the skinny-jeans year for Parker to get into it.

The Lylas followed a few yards behind Kenneth toward their row in the back of the eighth grade section.

Parker's jaw dropped.

Cricket Von Wielding was occupying a seat in the Premiums. So was Courtney Wallace.

Plum's gasp was audible. She nearly lost her gum. Even Ikea looked like she might have a hairy nip fit.

“
These…”
Kiki marched right up to them with a hand on her hip. “Are
our
seats.” She looked right at Courtney (who last year had completely stolen Kiki's signature Flamenco-inspired approach to formal wear, which Kiki considered trademark infringement and further proof of Courtney's lack of the qualities necessary to become a Lyla)
.

Parker had to steady herself. This was a test. Of course it was. One of many. If she wanted to make the best of what she had left, she'd have to give up some things. Important things.
Look at Joan of Arc!

“It's fine
.
” Parker put her arm around Kiki's waist and poked a finger in her side. (Secret Signal:
Shut up!
) “It's totally, absolutely, completely fine for you guys to sit here,” she said, “in
our
seats.” She smiled, anger bubbling inside her. “The ones everybody knows belong to us.”

Cricket looked up from Parker's
seat with sharp eyes, her overly natural eyebrows and her matchie-matchie headband-tote thing, but said nothing.

“And Courtney,” Parker continued sweetly, “It's really super-nice of you to show Cricket around this…
new
place.” She took a deep breath and led the Lylas to the next best seats, the ones
next
to Cricket and Courtney. It would all be just fine.

Kiki grumbled as they pushed past Courtney and Cricket toward the places next to them. Parker tried to feel good (or at least
look
good) about it even though whisperings among the lower-on-the-populadder Wallys had clearly started. Yup, the news was going viral: the Lylas had given up their primo seats just so Miss Preptobismol and her trademark infringing BFF could sit in them.

“Aren't you
sooo
psyched, Parker?!?”

Parker practically jumped when Tinsley nudged in behind her and took the seat beside Courtney before any of them could sit down.

“Yeah,” Parker said, taking the seat next to Tinsley. “Way psyched.” Even though she couldn't see them, she could feel the eyes of Kiki, Ikea, and Plum on her as they sat down directly behind Cricket Von Full-of-Herself and the two Hangers-On. “And aren't you
sooo
psyched about the Big Game this weekend?” Tinsley added. “I've
so
been shopping all
week for it. Go Tigers!!”

“The Big Game!” Parker exclaimed without even a hint of confusion. She'd been working so hard on the show that she'd completely forgotten it was this weekend. But how could she have forgotten? The Big Game was an immense event. And hopefully not her last. “
Totally
psyched…” Parker realized there was less than twenty-four hours to compose, collect, and beautify. This would be her first-kiss-with-Tribb day, after all. She'd have to set her alarm for super-early. “
So
shopped till I dropped,” she added.

“It's one of the truly major-domo social opportunities of the year,” Tinsley reminded Parker unnecessarily. “But I don't need to tell
you
that.”

Parker tuned her out and scanned the rows up front for Tribb and the rest of the team. Kirby was trying to make it seem like he was just playing drums on the back of the seat next to him but really he was sort of staring in Plum's general direction, bobbing his head up and down and left and right to an imaginary song. Parker grimaced.
Maybe he has an actual medical problem?

“He's here!” Ikea turned around. She yanked so hard on Parker's sleeve that she nearly popped a button. She shot up from her seat and waved. “Dad!” She tried to get his attention before she sat back down.

“That's great, Ike!” Parker fixed a stray bit of Ikea's glossy straight hair. She knew how important this was to Ikea, how living up to her dad's expectations probably wasn't all that easy. She was glad the Lylas had all stuck together.

Ikea turned toward Parker. “Thanks for doing this,” she whispered. “I mean it. It means a lot to me.”

“No probs.” Parker smiled.

The lights dimmed, the audience quieted, and a spotlight lit the center of the stage. Death Breath was still looking around for one final victim before Matin began. Kiki quickly thrust a scrap of paper under Plum's chin. “Gum, hotshot,” she said before the teacher could catch it.

“Thanks.” Plum spit.

And the room went completely dark.

Mrs. Rouse raised and lowered her fingers on the piano keys one last time before Hotchkiss took her place behind the podium. There was a full minute of silence (not even a belch from Graham Henry) before the headmistress looked up into the spotlight and spoke. Allegra Oliphant made the mistake of clapping at that moment—it was a little like applauding in church.

“This year,” Hotchkiss said with one of her evil Terminator smiles, “brings forth a time of change…” She pressed a button on her black Orion Tablet with the Genius Pen and the Super-Screens were suddenly filled with a collection of old, tea-stained images of Wallingford's first headmistress, Miss Thistle, and ancient pictures of Wallys—back when it was just a girls' school, when
Wallingford Academy Today
was just a stinky one-page newspaper. “It is a time of technological advancements beyond Miss Thistle's wildest imagination…And we here at Wallingford are on the
cutting edge
”
(yes, she made the words sound super-scary) “of this brave new world.” She used her stylus again and the surrounding screens switched from the ancient Wally images to the modern Orion Computers logo swirling around the room. “And again…” Hotchkiss kept it going at a clip. “I'd like to thank our generous Alumnae body for making these opportunities available to our students…”

Hello.
Everyone got who she meant: Fitz Orion. If it weren't for him,
Wallingford Academy Today
would still just be a one-page newspaper
.

“
Opportunities…
” Hotchkiss continued, “like our very own
Wallingford Academy Today
webcast.”

Parker's heart began beating loudly in her chest. She tried to focus on posi-thoughts: laying out her outfit for the game tomorrow, taking a couple of “Coke or Pepsi?” quizzes with Plum, IMing it up with Tribb—being clever but not too LOL, sweet but not too emoticon overloaded, girlfriend-like but without ever coming out and exactly saying it that way.

Hotchkiss nodded to James in the back of the auditorium and held the stylus up at attention.

“And I hope you will enjoy the following,” Hotchkiss said, “It is an…
an
…” She squinted up at the chandelier like she might find the right word up there. “An…
abecedarian
effort by our new and exceedingly talented team
.
”

“Abecedarian?” Parker spun to Ikea. “That's good, right?”

Ikea looked perplexed. “I have no idea,” she said.

If the word was too smart for Ikea, it probably meant it was pretty good. But good in Hotchkiss's eyes? That meant bad in every other way.

“We do look forward to the future efforts of our new staff.” Hotchkiss looked directly at Parker. “And finally,” she added quickly, “we wish Captain Tribble Reese and the Tigers the best of luck as they play the Fox Chapel Acorns at home tomorrow. Go Wallingford Tigers!” She pointed her wand at James and gave the signal to begin.

The room erupted in the excited hoots and hollers for the Tigers. Parker could hear Tribb and the team yelling in the front. Tinsley screeched out one of her mind-numbing whistles. It was so noisy just about everybody missed the entire first minute of the webisode—the host's introduction.

But Parker didn't miss it. Not a millisecond.

“Hello and welcome to
Wallingford Academy Today!
”

There she was. On the most humongous Orion Super-Screen in the building. Parker's nose alone was the size of the Statue of Liberty. That minute,
that minute of noise,
lasted about a hundred years.

Watching herself on the screen wasn't anything like watching herself in the mirror rehearsing her Academy Award acceptance speech or practicing “Hey, Tribb” poses. Every little part of her showed, the ugly parts especially: her crooked smile, the big freckle beside her eye, the baby fat still filling her cheeks, her egg-shaped head. Even the sound of her voice was horrible. Nasal, like she was honking instead of speaking.

But it wasn't her face or her voice that made Parker want to die right there; it was what showed underneath all that—the part of herself that she always thought she was hiding. The secret things she felt inside that no one, not even the Lylas, knew. Everything she felt was right there for everyone to see: stupid, insecure, afraid, lonely, uncomfortable, different. She looked like a part of her was missing. A big part. How could someone like that think she was something special?
How could anyone think I'm something special?

Suddenly petrified, she looked back at James. Is this what he saw in his camera?

Parker barely heard a word of the next eleven minutes and fifty-three seconds. Instead of wanting it to be over, she never wanted it to end. She wanted to sit in the dark forever.
This isn't perfect one bit. This is the opposite of that.
She dreaded the lights coming up…

Plum's set looked great though. And Ikea's segment, “Milestone Cases in Supreme Court History,” was Yale-worthy. Parker squinted across the sea of Wallys at Ikea's father. The back of his head didn't reveal much, but he had to have been impressed.

“We're loving the webcast, Park!” Courtney leaned in and whispered.

“Awesomage!”
Tinsley added.

“Way better than Allegra Elephant could have done!”

“Way.”

“…And the vegetarian selection of tofu corn dogs is followed by your choice of chocolate turtle pie or butterscotch pudding…”

“Maybe my other side was my better side after all?” Kiki critiqued her performance.

“This is
definitely
the best of all your sides,” Plum assured her. After fifteen hours of filming and hundreds of takes in every possible direction, they were all experts on which side was Kiki's best. And this was definitely
not
it—Plum was just sick of discussing it.

“You think I look okay? I mean, not the most disgusting mammal on the plant, right?” Kiki asked. “How can anyone expect to look good in a uniform anyway?”

“You look fine, Kiki. Great.” Parker tried to calm her. “Very…British. Okay?”

Kiki seemed to take Parker's word for it. She smiled as she watched the rest of the webcast play out.