The One and Only Zoe Lama (2 page)

I’ve since tried nearly everything to fight Sylvia’s cowlicks. Braids, pretty hairbands, scrunchies, clips, and training them by having her wearing a bathing cap to bed for a whole week.

There’s really only one thing I haven’t tried. My eyes drift over to the little jar of Bovine Balm.

It sure would be good for business, heading back to school with the answer to my very best client’s very worst problem.
I can just see the kids’ faces as Sylvia comes out of the girls’ bathroom with smooth, silky hair blowing in the wind and romantic music playing in the background. Everyone would congratulate me for doing the impossible. Everyone would want to know my secret. Even Riley, the Most Unbelievably Cute Guy in School, or MUC-GIS, would stop doubting my meddling. He’d see that my Unwritten Rules can change people’s lives. For the better.

Oh, and Sylvia would be happy, too.

Suddenly I can’t wait to get back to school.

“Mom?” I smile sweetly, sliding off the end of the exam table. “Can I borrow five dollars?”

She agrees to meet me in the drugstore downstairs, so I head out into the waiting room, which is strangely silent. Sure enough, there’s Mrs. Chomsky standing in front of her desk with my bell in her hands.

She rings it and everyone in the room stands up and shifts stations. Mothers are laughing. Babies are gurgling. Toddlers are quiet. Not one single kid is moaning, sniveling,
whimpering, or wailing. Mrs. Chomsky notices me in the doorway and mouths, “Thank you.”

Another satisfied customer.

I
t’s snowing hard by the time we get back home. Mr. Kingsley, the superintendent, is out front shoveling off the sidewalk so no one falls and sues the building. If you didn’t know Mr. Kingsley, you’d think his lumberjack shirt, jeans and work boots, and furry hat with earflaps was a good shoveling uniform. If you did know him, you’d just be thankful a day finally came around that matches his outfit—because that’s what he wears every day.

“Good evening, Mr. Kingsley,” says my mother. Her arms are full of grocery bags and she can barely see where she’s stepping.

He looks up at her and nods, then scowls at me. Grandma caused a little flood a while back and he still suspects me of covering it up. Which I did—who wouldn’t cover for their very own grandma? I step over a little mound of snow and give him a smile. “I like your technique, Mr. Kingsley,” I say. “Much smarter to shovel lengthways instead of side to side.”

I mean it, too. This way he only has to swoop from the front door to the curb and back twice, rather than twenty-five trips from side to side. Saves a lot of energy.

Mom’s already swearing at the front door because her key’s stuck again. “Mr. Kingsley, are we ever going to get this door fixed?”

“You gotta jiggle it to the right,” Mr. Kingsley says. “Like I showed you last time.”

“I
am.
”

She isn’t. “Mom, let me help…”

“Shimmy it up and down as you push to the right,” he says. “Push hard.”

One of her grocery bags slides through her arm and I catch it just before it falls. “Mom, I’ll open it.”

She jams it harder. “You’d think when rents go up that a person could expect a few repairs.” Her face is red as she jiggles her key again.

“Take it up at the next tenants’ meeting,” Mr. Kingsley says.

She scowls at him and bashes the door with her body.

“Mom…”

Finally the door swings open. My mom charges through the lobby and starts stabbing the elevator button. By the time I catch up, she’s already stepped inside the car, which
smells the exact same as the whole eighth-floor hallway is going to smell. Like Mrs. Grungen’s Tuesday-night Golabki.
Hamburger meat, mushrooms, and buckwheat wrapped up in soggy cabbage to look like a dead pigeon wrapped in a greasy napkin.
Which is pretty much how it smells.

Mr. Jeffries gets off as I get on.

He calls back, “Best of luck to you ladies. Elevator’s groaning again.”

“Terrific,” Mom grumbles. She presses 8. Nothing happens. She presses it again. Just as she opens her mouth to swear, sigh, or cluck like Mrs. Chomsky, I whack it hard, right in the center. The doors close and up we go.

She shakes her head. “How
do
you know these things?”

I shrug. “It’s what I do.”

We stare at the numbers above the doors while the elevator shudders and moans.

“Mom?”

“Yes, dear?”

“You know how you told Dr. Jensen you were so proud of me for barely scratching my pox at all?”

“Yes.”

“And you know how he said your daughter won’t have one single solitary scar because of her outrageously good behavior?”

Mom smiles. “I don’t recall the words
outrageously good…
”

“Before I left school,
Mrs. Patinkin said it was my turn to take home the class guinea pig.
It would only be for one weekend and I’d keep him in my room—”

She thinks about it. “There’s not a lot of space in the apartment.”

“Mom, please!”

“Does he smell?”

“Like sugar cookies!
Please,
Mom!”

“You promise he’d go back on Monday? No excuses?”

I crossed my heart. “Cross my heart.”

“Okay.”

I squeal and hug her. “Thanks so much. You’re going to love Boris.”

“Boris?” Mom makes a face. Then she makes her voice all bright and shiny. “So it’s back to school with you tomorrow. Back to the old grind.”

“I guess.”

“You’ll have a lot of catching up to do, according to Mrs. Patinkin.”

“I know. Annika Pruitt’s boyfriend will have forgotten to meet her after school and she’ll be ‘tragically wounded.’ And Stewie Buckenheimer will have lost his third retainer of the year and his parents’ dental coverage won’t pay for a fourth. And Avery’s lips will be cracked right down the middle, because he’ll have put his Chap Stick in his front pocket again and it’ll have rolled out and gotten lost.” I smile.

My mother peers closer at me and squints. “And all this misfortune is a good thing?”

“It’s like a rainstorm to an umbrella store,” I say with a shrug. “It’s good for business. I have a reputation to think of.
If things go well when I’m away, my peoples will figure out they don’t need me or my rules. The Zoë Lama could be Ousted.
Overthrown. Usurped.”

I never asked to be the maker of all rules.
I started out life as a regular sort of human with an irregular love for chocolate.
It wasn’t until I neutralized the school bully back when I was about the size of a toenail that kids began to look to me for guidance.

Suddenly requests poured in for advice. Teachers wanted to know how to keep kindergartners from stuffing carrots up their noses during snack time (play Itsy-Bitsy Spider). Girls wanted to know how to get stains out of party dresses (candle wax and a hot iron) or what to use if they were allergic to sunscreen (diaper-rash cream). Boys wanted to know how to get girls to stop running away from them (throw a scented dryer sheet in with your jeans and tees for long-lasting freshness) and how to get rid of the warts on their thumbs (wrap them in duct tape for ten days).

I became known as the Zoë Lama because people thought of me as a teacher of sorts. And what kind of teacher would I be without a pocketful of Unwritten Rules?

Mom grunts. “You know I don’t like you taking pleasure in the distress of others. Even if it is ‘good for business.’” She stares at me and one corner of her lip twitches. “Anyway, wherever did you learn a word like
usurped
? I didn’t know words like that in seventh grade.”

A couple of years ago, I looked up
usurp
in the dictionary and learned it means to dethrone, seize, or overthrow.
I pull my jacket closed and shiver. “That word haunts me every day of my life.”

I stop dead in my tracks and look around the property of Allencroft Middle School, my breath puffing out in little clouds. The place is full of ice and empty of kids. Which makes total sense, since the 8:40 bell has already rung. What did I expect…that people would stand outside in the snow, risking late slips and frostbite, because this just
might
be the day I return from quarantine?

It’s not like I expected a welcome sign out here. I’m not an idiot. Besides, everyone knows that tape doesn’t stick in the cold. The sign would blow away in about three seconds. Quickly, I scan the bushes at the edge of the school fence. Hmm. Nothing but snow and lost mittens.

I got up super early this morning so I could load up my backpack and get here before the bell. But halfway to school I realized I forgot my doctor’s note. And my binder. And my pencil case. So I had to go back home, and now I’m late. What I didn’t forget is the following:

1) Antibacterial wipes
so I can disinfect my desktop—in case anything fungus-y or festering touched it while I was in exile.

2) A red apple
for Brianna Simpson, because the skin contains Quercetin, which should make her sneeze less around Boris the guinea pig.

3) A baggie full
of chocolate chips for my #1 and #2 BFIS (Best Friends in School) Susannah Barnes and Laurel Sterling. I’ll save just a few so I can bribe Smartin Granitstein not to pour grape juice in his ear at lunchtime. That’s one delight I did not miss.

4) A Wundercloth
we got in the mail that’s supposed to de-smudge the smudgiest glasses. Avery Buckner’s smeary glasses could very well be the eighth wonder of the world, and should make a nice test subject.

5) Bovine Balm.
For my #1 BCIS (Best
Client
in School) Sylvia.

If I want to see anyone before class starts, I’d better hurry. I tear across the snowy field with my schoolbag
bashing against my knees and cold wind biting at my face.

T
he first thing that hits me inside the building is the smell of school. I suck in a deep breath and smile. Ahh, there’s nothing quite like it. Photocopies, pencils, winter jackets, and floor cleaner, all mixed into one.

Bloomer Girl, aka fifth-grader Allegra Lohman, rushes past. Not only are her boots looking freshly buffed, but her backward haircut (long in front, short in back) seems to be turned right-way-round. Which isn’t remotely possible. Hair doesn’t grow that fast. “Hey, Allegra,” I call after her. “I’m back!”

She spins around. “Huh?”
For one ugly moment, she seems to not recognize me.
Then she smiles and says, “Oh yeah. How was Florida?”

Florida? “No, I was sick. Deathly ill. I had the chicken pox, remember?”

“Um, sort of…”

“I was in quarantine. Total lockdown…”

But she’s already gone.

The farther in I go, the more I realize something’s not right. Brianna’s down the hall and I can see from here she has good color in her cheeks—her freckles are barely noticeable—and
could that be…? I stop and squint. It is! The most vile boy in the school, Smartin Granitstein, is carrying an armload of actual library books.

I turn a corner to come face-to-face with Susannah and Laurel, who are talking to three girls from sixth grade. Susannah is my #1 BFIS for being fierce loyal and for being almost-but-not-quite famous. Famous enough from her TV commercials to need to wear dark glasses everywhere, but not famous enough that we get driven to the movies in her limo. Mostly because she doesn’t have one. Yet. And my #2 BFIS, Laurel, well, how can you not love Laurel? She only eats blue food, and she makes us laugh. Mostly at her, but she’s cool with that.

As I run over to them, the three Sixer girls scatter. Susannah and Laurel squeal and rush to hug me so hard they pick me up.

“Zoë!” says Susannah from behind her big sunglasses. “You’re back from the dead! Wait…” She backs up and lowers her glasses, but only for a split second. “You’re not contagious, are you?”

“Nope.” I beam.

Laurel sneers at Susannah. “Worried
what a couple of scabs might do to your acting career?”

“As a matter of fact, yes!
One scar and my agent would drop me like an overheated latte.
You think I’ll land that Neutrogena commercial with bumpy skin?”

For Susannah, who up until this point has only done commercials for bed-wetting, sanitary pads, and head lice, landing a commercial where she gets to stand at a sink and splash sparkling clean water on her glowing skin is pretty much The Ultimate.

“Whatever,” says Laurel, who seems to be still battling that troublesome zit on her chin. She pulls her blue turtleneck up to her mouth and smiles at me. “Good to have you back!”

“It was SO boring, sitting around watching
Regis and Kelly
every day,” I say. “Plus, I had to entertain little kids all the time. My mother’s friends kept bringing their darlings over for free babysitting so they wouldn’t have to haul drooling, wailing toddlers around the grocery store.”

Susannah crinkles her nose in disgust. “But you were contagious!”

I nod. “Exactly what I said. But, apparently, they’d all been vaccinated.”

“Bummer,” says Laurel.

“Exactly what I said.”

I unzip my schoolbag and pick through my supplies. “But I’m back and I’m prepared to fix everybody who broke while I was gone. I have a nail buffer for Boris’s split toenail, mints for Mrs. Patinkin—ever since she switched to decaf coffee, her breath hasn’t been the same…” I stop talking because Susannah and Laurel are nudging each other. “What?”

“Nothing,” says Susannah, fidgeting with her zipper. “We’d better get to class. The bell’s going to ring.”

“Forget class. Why do you guys look all nervous?”

Laurel nudges Susannah. “Tell her.”

“You tell her!”

Laurel says, “It’s just that things aren’t nearly as bad as you think around here.”

I narrow my eyes. “How not nearly so bad?”

“Things are actually good.
Really
good,” says Laurel.

“But how can that be?” I ask, feeling my nostrils flare. “I’ve been gone for a week and a day.”

Susannah twists her mouth to one side.
“Remember Devon Sweeney—the Sixer?”

“No.”

“You wouldn’t. Before you left, she was a total dork. She hung out with the Emos behind the baseball diamond and wrote poems about her dead cat.”

“What do I care about Devon and her lousy cat?”

Laurel shifts her books to her left arm. “Because,
while you were gone, she stepped up.”

Huh?

Susannah nods. “It’s true. It’s like you never left. She kind of took over.”

“It started when Annika Pruitt was having one of her ‘tragically wounded’ moments,” says Laurel. “She found out that Justin had Meredith Morgan’s phone number written on the bottom of his shoe. The very last number was worn off, but still, Annika could tell. She locked herself in a bathroom stall and Devon found her. She talked Annika off the ledge.”

I shake my head. “What ledge? You said she was in the bathroom.”

“The toilet ledge. Annika was about to dunk Justin’s history binder.”

“She should have,” I say. “Justin’s got a history. A bad one.”

“Devon said all she needed to do was fluff up her hair—” Susannah explains.

I interrupt. “She told Annika to fluff up all that hair? Right there in the stall? That’s not even sanitary. Annika’s hair is bigger than Justin’s ego!”

“But it worked,” says Laurel. “Justin’s a sucker for curls. By that afternoon, he was following Annika around like he was on a leash.”

I’m so mad I catch my finger while zipping up my bag. Annika’s always been a loyal client of mine. So has her enormo-hair. I’ve coached it through everything from seriously nasty bangs to an even nastier home perm. Any and all hair advice comes from me and her overworked hairstylist.

The second bell rings. I march toward Mrs. Patinkin’s homeroom. Susannah and Laurel jog to catch up.

“Zoë, don’t be upset,” says Susannah. “Think of it as a good thing. Devon’s saved you tons of work. Now you can relax and focus on catching up with your schoolwork. And us. Mostly us.” She giggles.

“She moved in on my turf,” I say.

“For a few days…and now that you’ve returned she can go back to her rotten poetry,” says Laurel with a wave of her hand.
“Don’t worry. You’re still the One and Only Lama in this school.”

I give my girls the secret punch for believing in me, which comes from the knuckles and involves an unexpected maneuver at the end. But if I told you any more, I’d have to kill you.

Just before I reach the classroom, I’m picked up and twirled around from behind. Which is annoying when you’re as small as me, because it’s been happening to you ever since you learned to crawl. I turn around and instasmile because the annoying picker-upper isn’t annoying after all.
It’s Riley Sinclair, the Most Unbelievably Cute Guy in School (MUCGIS) and the boy I’m going to marry,
and he’s wearing the shirt I gave him for his birthday.