Twelve (18 page)

“Winnie looks cute no matter what,” Dinah said. “Winnie would look cute in a sack.”

Cinnamon rolled her eyes. “Well, that's true,” she said. I stuck my tongue out at her.

“Cinnamon,” Dinah said, “do you, um . . .”

“What?”

“Do you think
I
dress sexy?”

There was such nakedness to her question that my heart went out to her. Fashion wasn't Dinah's strong point, just as apparently it wasn't mine. At least not according to Cinnamon.

“You need to get rid of your purple jeans,” Cinnamon said truthfully. “But in general you look okay.”

“Really?” Dinah said. “You're not just saying that? I mean, I know I'll never look as good as you and Winnie, but . . .”

“Tell you what,” Cinnamon said. “Next weekend I'll come over and help you go through your stuff. We'll find some outfits that make you look fabulous.”

“Yeah?” Dinah said. I could practically feel her smiling over on her end of the line. Good ol' Cinnamon, and good ol' Dinah. I was proud of being friends with them both.

At school, the Service Council was selling Valentine's Day carnations outside the cafeteria. You paid now, filled out a strip of paper with your message on it, and then the carnations were delivered to whoever they were supposed to go to on Valentine's Day morning. Cinnamon and I hovered near the foldout table, watching kids approach, scribble away, and depart. Some did it furtively. Some were bold. The Service Council was raking in oodles of cash.

“Do you think Lars is going to send you one?” Cinnamon asked.

“Hush,” I said, shoving her shoulder.

“And if he
does
,” she went on, “will it be pink or white?”

White meant friendship; pink meant love. Which everyone on the planet knew.

“The question is,” I said, “who's going to send one to you? Maybe Alex Plotkin? Excuse me—
Critter
?”

Cinnamon shuddered. Lately Alex had taken to appearing at Cinnamon's locker reeking of Old Spice, and yesterday he'd offered her a stick of Juicy Fruit.

“Maybe he'll give you your own special countdown to delight,” I said. “Three, two, one . . . kaboom!”

“Grow up,” Cinnamon said, making me feel unexpectedly rebuffed. What, she could tease me, but I couldn't tease her? And Alex's fart countdown was a classic. I knew Dinah would have laughed.

Cinnamon jabbed me. “Look. Here he comes.”

“Alex?” I said. “Where?”

“
Lars
. Act casual.”

I spotted Lars with his buddy Bryce, and I straightened my spine. I tried to act not only casual, but sophisticated and breezy and utterly appealing at the same time. I felt strained from the effort, but that was life.

“Does he see me?” I said through my smile. Because that was the point, for Lars to see me while at the same time seeing the Service Council table, so that his mind could go
Bingo!
and he'd decide to buy me a carnation.

“I don't think so . . . wait! Yes—he definitely does!”

My cheek muscles felt rubbery.
Look pretty, look pretty
, I chanted inside my head. I'd even worn a tighter-than-usual shirt, although I don't think anybody noticed.

“There you are,” said Dinah, appearing from behind us. “I've been searching everywhere!”

Her presence registered, but I didn't give her my full attention because Lars and Bryce were coming our way. I let myself glance at him as he approached—like
Oh, hi! I'm just now noticing you, just this very second!
—and he gave his patented chin jerk. Pleasure tingled through me.

Dinah grabbed my arm. “I really need to talk.”

“Later,” I said.

“It's about Muffet.”

“Who's Muffet?” Cinnamon asked.

“My cat,” Dinah said.

Lars and Bryce stopped in front of us.

“Hey,” Lars said.

“Hey,” I said. I couldn't help grinning.

“Winnie, it's
important,
” Dinah said. “The vet said she's gaining too much weight. We have to put her on a diet, and the only treats she can have are Fishy Yum Yums!”

Bryce looked at her as if she were from another planet. “What is she talking about?” he asked Lars.

“My cat,” Dinah said. “The vet says she's ten pounds overweight.”

“Your cat's too fat?” Bryce said. “Dude, her cat's too fat!”

I burned a little. Dinah was the type of person who would say things like this, and guys like Bryce would make fun of her. Someone else could have said the very same thing—say, Cinnamon—and it would have been life as normal. Except that Cinnamon wouldn't have said it. I wished Dinah hadn't, either.

“It's not funny,” Dinah said to Bryce. She turned to me. “You know she doesn't like Fishy Yum Yums. What am I going to do?”

“Don't give her Fishy Yum Yums,” I said.

Bryce and Lars cracked up, and Dinah turned red. I hadn't meant it as a betrayal, but I could see how maybe it came across like one.

“Winnie,” she said. She tugged on my sleeve.

I didn't want to go. But I didn't know how else to handle it. I felt a stab of anger at Dinah; its intensity surprised me.

“I'll see you around,” I said to Lars.

“Yeah, sure,” Lars said.

“Let's get some grub,” Bryce said.

They headed into the cafeteria, sailing past the carnation table without a second glance.

“
Dinah,
” Cinnamon scolded
.
“Your cat's weight problem is more important than Winnie's love life?”

It was exactly what I was thinking. I regarded Dinah stonily.

“But she's . . . she has to eat . . .”

“Please don't bring up the Fishy Yum Yums,” I said.

Dinah started to protest, and then the realization hit. Lars. The carnation table. My entire romantic future.

“Oh my gosh,” she said. “I am so so so so sorry. I guess . . . I wasn't thinking?”

“Huh,” Cinnamon said. “You figure?”

Dinah looked stricken, and I sighed. It was hard to be mad at her, because she never screwed up on purpose. It just came naturally.

“Winnie?” she said meekly.

I
was
mad at her, though. On the inside.

“Let's just go eat lunch,” I said without making eye contact. “And you can tell us all about the Fishy Yum Yums.”

At home I discovered that even Ty had a Valentine's crush. He was in crush with a girl named Lexie, who was in his kindergarten class.

“She has pretty hair,” Ty told me over a root-beer float. Mom had told me to fix him a healthy after-school snack while she was out doing errands, and I figured this counted. After all, ice cream was chock-full of calcium.

“And she has pretty teeth,” he said.

“Unlike Taffy?” I asked.

Ty made his face into a Taffy-style underbite, probably without even meaning to. “Unlike Taffy,” he said. “But Taffy wants to marry me. I told her no, because I'm already taken.”

He was five years old and he was “already taken.” Where did he get this stuff?

“Well, you've got plenty of time to figure out who you're going to marry.” I slurped on my float. “The main thing is to remember to be nice. Okay? You should always be nice to everyone.”

“Okay,” Ty said. He tilted his glass to get the melty bit. “I had a dream about Lexie. Do you want me to tell it to you?”

“Sure.”

“I was at Lexie's house, and this is what happened. I made a flying jump over her—remember, this is
just
a dream—and it made her beautiful hair get messed up.”

“Uh-oh.”

Ty looked at me anxiously. “It was just a dream.”

“I got that part. Go on.”

“It did not happen in real life.”

“Go
on
.”

“Her hair came out of her headband, but her mom got it back how it was supposed to be. That's good, isn't it?”

I wanted to hug him. He was such a sweet, great kid. "Yes, Ty, that's very good. But you shouldn't jump over her again, 'kay?”

“It was just a dream!” Ty insisted.

“If you say so,” I said.

“Win
nie
!”

The phone rang, and I got up and answered. It was Cinnamon.

“Hold on,” I said to her. “Ty, you want to watch
Guts
?”
Guts
was a crazy game show for kids that I'd stumbled onto once in the upper range of our cable channels. Ty was obsessed with it.

His face lit up. “Yeah!”

“You can do that while I talk to Cinnamon. I'll come check on you in a bit.”

Ty pushed his chair out from the table and scampered off.

“Hey,” I said to Cinnamon. “I'm back.”

“What's
Guts
?” she asked.

“Just this dumb show,” I said. “Kids, like, ride giant tricycles through obstacle courses and bungee jump into pits of foam.”

“Ahhhh,” Cinnamon said.

“My mom hates it. But she's not here, is she?” I propped my feet on Ty's chair. “So what's up?”

“Oh my
God
,” Cinnamon said. “I wanted to talk about this afternoon. At lunch.”

“With Lars, you mean?”

“And Dinah. What was she thinking?”

I opened my mouth to agree, then hesitated. Cinnamon wouldn't do the listen-in thing to
me,
would she? Just to make sure, I said, “Is Dinah at your house? Is she listening in?”

“Ha ha, very funny.”

“Dinah!” I called. “Are you there?”

“Winnie,” Cinnamon said, “Dinah is not at my house.”

“Do you swear?”

“Yes, I swear. What kind of friend do you take me for?”

“I was just checking.”

“If she
was
here, I'd have to give her a lecture on how not to be such a . . . I don't know, not such a—”

“Spaz?” I supplied.

“Ex
act
ly. What was her deal? Why was she going on and on about stupid Muffy?”

“Muffet,” I said.

“With Lars
right there
. Weren't you embarrassed?”

“A little,” I admitted. “I sort of wish . . .”

“What?”

“Nothing.”

“
What?
” Cinnamon persisted. It was her “come on, you can tell me” voice. Cinnamon made gossiping fun, even though I knew it was bad.

“Well . . . I guess I wish she didn't act so young all the time.” There, I said it. “I mean, we're in the seventh grade, you know?”

“So true,” Cinnamon said.

“In my head I was like, ‘Shut up already! Nobody cares about the Fishy Yum Yums!' ”

“She's going to grow up to be one of those spinster ladies with five zillion cats. No one will want to go out with her because all she'll do is talk about her little darlings.”

I giggled. “A cat hoarder! Her apartment will smell like cat food, and she'll have a ceramic plaque that says PURRRR-FECT hanging in her kitchen.”

“You know I love Dinah,” Cinnamon said. “But I do wish she'd clue in a little. Like, there's a time and a place for everything.”

“And today wasn't the time or place for any of it,” I said. It felt liberating to get it all out. “Bryce didn't want her there, Lars didn't want her there, and I sure didn't want her there. How could she not know?”

A choked cry came over the line, and then Dinah's trembling voice. “Maybe because no one ever told me—until now!” Then a click. My heart literally and truly froze in my chest.

“D-D-Dinah?” I stammered.

“She hung up,” Cinnamon said, sounding amused.

“But . . . you said . . .”

“I said she wasn't at my
house
. You didn't ask about three-way.”

A sick feeling spread over me. I sat there, clutching the phone.

“Winnie?” Cinnamon said.

I made no sound.

“Oh, relax. You didn't say anything
that
bad.”

But I had. In Dinah's mind, and in my own, I knew I had.

“I'll call her back,” Cinnamon said. “It was a joke, okay?” Her tone was exasperated, but with an underlying thread of worry, too. She shouldn't have done what she did.
I
shouldn't have said what I did.

She grew brisk. “I'm hanging up now, Winnie. I'm saying good-bye. So take a chill pill—everything's going to be fine.”

But it wasn't. The next day at school, Dinah refused to talk to me. As in, nada. Zilch. Not a single “hello” or “bug off” or even “I hate your guts.”

“Dinah, please,” I said when I caught her between classes. “I didn't know you were on the line!”

She opened her locker, her lips pressed together.

“Don't be this way,” I said. I tried to angle myself in front of her. “I'm sorry, okay?”

She shut her locker with a clank. She strode down the hall.

“Dinah!”

She didn't turn around.

Cinnamon said she was being a baby. Dinah wasn't talking to her, either, but Cinnamon shrugged it off, saying, “Her loss.” I was furious at Cinnamon, but I didn't know what to do with my anger. I didn't want to lose
both
my friends. Although right now, Cinnamon didn't even feel like a friend. Not only because she'd played the phone trick on me, but because now that she had, there was all this weird space between us. Maybe because she felt guilty? But she wouldn't say that out loud. Instead she just acted as if I was being stupid.