The Friendship Matchmaker Goes Undercover

  “Hey, I was just playing around,” Chris said insincerely, as Majur started to walk off.

  Chris looked at the rest of the guys and threw his hands up in the air, pretending not to understand. “Can’t he take a joke?”

  I thought Tanya’s advice was wrong, but I didn’t want to argue with her. So I waited until Majur had left and then glared at Chris and said, “You’re an idiot. You’re being racist.”

  He grinned. “I didn’t mean it,” he said. “I was just messing around.”

  Mandy, from our grade, was having a party for her twelfth birthday. She was one of the beautiful people in school, and had her adoring protégés lapping up her attention and doing as she said. She was popular, pretty, and smart. She knew it too, and so, of course, in my FMM days I’d had to help out lots of girls who’d been caught in her bullying traps. Girls who, in a moment of insanity, had invited Mandy to share a cabin with them in camp and had been laughed at for daring to ask. Girls who had pleaded with Mandy to let them hang out with her at recess only to realize they had to run errands for her (buy her a snack from the cafeteria, return her library books) to earn the privilege of being part of her inner circle. When Mandy cut her hair in a trendy bob, Judy Simons did the same and became the laughingstock of the class. Mandy had silky straight hair. Judy had a mane of untamed curls which, when cut to just under her ears, frizzed out like she’d been electrocuted. When Mandy decided leggings were fashionable, Corine copied her. Except Corine was double Mandy’s weight and learned the hard way that figure-hugging leggings were only flattering on certain body types. And Mandy made sure she knew it.

  For people like Mandy, birthday parties were the biggest events on the calendar. Every time I overheard snatches of her conversations with the other girls she was prattling on about what she was going to wear, what her plans were (bowling followed by a makeover party at her house), and what presents she was hoping for. For many girls in seventh grade, being invited to Mandy’s birthday was a ticket to popularity. It was a sign you’d made the “in” group.

  On Tuesday Mandy approached me after lunch and handed me an invitation. “See you there,” she said awkwardly.

  It’s not that Mandy and I were friends. We didn’t even like each other. The truth was that I was invited because as former Friendship Matchmaker I had a certain status with students. Okay, well, maybe that was stretching things. The fact was that being FMM had meant I tended to know some deep, dark secrets. In Mandy’s case, I knew a thing or two about her family. She was being raised by her grandparents because her dad was busy traveling the world for business. The truth about Mandy’s mom was worse. A court had said she wasn’t allowed to look after Mandy and her younger twin brothers. I’d learned all this when I’d had to counsel Mandy’s ex–best friend, Thao, who’d since left the school, but not before telling me why she thought Mandy was so nasty. And in the last showdown between Mandy and Thao, Thao had stupidly revealed to Mandy that she’d told me all about Mandy’s home situation. The thing is, Mandy told everybody her parents were jet-setting pilots, traveling to exotic locations.

  But knowing Mandy’s secret had its advantages. Last term I got involved in breaking up some horrible friendship spats between Mandy and another girl, Ramona. As soon as I was in the picture, Mandy became a saint and Ramona was back to being invited to sleepovers.

  We’d never spoken about the fact that I knew her secret, but Mandy treated me as extra special and we both knew why. So the birthday invitation was more like hush money in a gangster movie. Which is why I forgot all about it until after school on Friday. Tanya and Emily were at my place, and we’d just finished watching a movie and were sitting on the trampoline, bouncing up and down as we gossiped about school.

  “I heard Claudia bragging that she’d been invited to Mandy’s party,” Tanya said wistfully. “Obviously Mandy personally delivered my invitation to my house.”

  Emily giggled. “Mandy would probably make you come to her house to pick up your invitation.”

  “It’s a bowling party, huh?” Tanya asked.

  “Yep,” Emily said. “Bowling parties are fun. But I’m not sure about the makeover party.”

  Tanya heaved a sigh. “Makeover party? Wow . . . that would be like being a pampered movie star for the day.”

  “Who said we can’t be movie stars now?” Emily cried, and then jumped up and started impersonating a celebrity smiling for her adoring fans. “Thank you,” she said in a snooty voice. “Of course you can have my used tissue as a souvenir. It’s only natural you’d adore me so much. I find it hard enough to hold back when I look at myself in the mirror every day.” We doubled over with laughter. Emily bounced back onto the trampoline, laughing along with us.

  “Were you invited?” Tanya asked Emily, when we’d caught our breath.

  Emily gave her a cross-eyed look that made Tanya giggle. “Yes, but big deal. Don’t even think twice about it, Tanya. You didn’t get an invitation, so I’m not going.”

  “Really?” Tanya said softly, eyes wide.

  Emily shrugged. “Mandy gave me the invitation after school today. But she was so stuck up about it. She just said, ‘See you there.’ It was like she was waiting for me to scream for joy and kiss her feet.” Tanya and I laughed. “It didn’t even cross her mind that I might have other plans or might not even want to go,” Emily continued. “As far as Mandy’s concerned, an invitation to her party means you drop everything.”

  “I’d drop everything,” Tanya said quietly.

  That Emily had been invited didn’t surprise me. Emily was the kind of person most kids would want at their party: she filled in silences, always had an idea, and could make people laugh with her funny impersonations and accents.

  “I’d be the last person Mandy would think of inviting,” Tanya said.

  “That doesn’t mean anything,” Emily scolded her.

  Tanya flashed Emily a pitiful smile. “Emily, I wish I had your guts. Sometimes what the right people think matters.” She shrugged. “That’s just the way school works.”

  “Hey! We’re the right people!” I said playfully and Tanya smiled. “Who cares what Mandy thinks?”

  “That’s easy for you to say, Lara,” Tanya said. “Just because you weren’t invited doesn’t mean you’re not one of the popular girls. Even though you quit being the school’s Friendship Matchmaker, everybody still loves you.”

  I guess I should have mentioned then that I’d been invited too. But I just couldn’t. It would have made Tanya feel even more awful. And I wasn’t planning on going anyway, so there was no point in Tanya knowing. Just then Mom called out for us to come inside for dinner and the subject of Mandy’s party was dropped. Mom always had good timing.

  Later that night I lay awake in bed wondering how to fix the situation. It wasn’t fair that Tanya was the only one of the three of us to be left out. What if she found out I’d been invited? If she was invited then the three of us could go. Mandy was a stuck-up snob most days, but she had a reputation for the best birthday parties.

  So I sent Mandy a text message to say I’d be going to her party. I’d speak to her on Monday and ask her to invite Tanya. Knowing what I did about Mandy, it was basically only a matter of my asking. There was no way Mandy could refuse. It was unfair of me but I figured the end justified the means. And anyway, Tanya was my best friend. I was looking out for her. That was all.

  Chapter 7

  On Monday morning Majur entered the classroom, surveyed the scene, and chose an empty seat in the back row. Chris pounced.

  “Hey!” Chris cried. “That’s my seat.”

  Majur looked puzzled.

  “But you’re sitting down.”

  Chris smirked. “So? That seat’s off-limits.”

  Majur shrugged and sat down in another empty seat in the back row.

  “Hey!” Chris said again. “That seat’s mine too.”

  Chris flashed Majur a triumphant grin and then looked from left to right, playing to the growing a
udience of kids watching him humiliate the new kid.

  But then something strange and surreal and wonderful happened.

  Majur slowly walked up to Chris.

  Stared at him.

  And then punched him in the guts.

  After Majur punched Chris, Ms. Pria swept down on Majur and sent him to the office. I faked a stomachache and spent lunchtime in the nurse’s office so I could see—well, overhear—what Majur’s fate would be. If I was going to help him I needed to keep track of him. Sure enough, Mr. Muñoz’s booming voice filled me in and I didn’t even need to press my ear to the paper-thin wall. Usually, punching a kid would get you suspended. But Majur was going to spend the next week having his lunch with the school counselor, Ms. Clarity.

  This was stupendous news. Majur had sent a kid to the doctor and ended up hanging out with the coolest teacher in the school. Ms. Clarity was the funkiest, spunkiest teacher ever to set foot in Potts County Middle School. She was popular and cool without trying to be. She was like Mr. Doyle’s antidote. You spent five minutes with him and his try-hard kid-lingo vocab and you lost hope for humanity. Then you spent a minute with Ms. Clarity and the world seemed bright again. Chris would go nuts when he found out, especially since the time he was caught hitting someone he was suspended for three days.

  Chris missed school for a week. I think it was probably more out of shame than because he was injured. While he was away everybody had a relaxed, dreamy look on their face, the kind of look you get on the last day of school before the summer. Even Ms. Pria seemed less tense.

  “Lara, you can do the section about Roald Dahl’s life,” Emily said, putting a pencil behind her ear. “About his writing shed and his childhood. There’s loads of research on that.”

  “Okay,” I said.

  “Tanya, you can do the summary about the book, plus our favorite parts, quotes, and stuff like that.”

  “Great!”

  “What will you do?” I asked.

  “I’ll set up the program with my mom and upload the photos and download the images from the Internet.”

  Tanya clapped her hands with excitement. “This project is going to be so much fun!”

  Chapter 8

  Stephanie must have read my note because she bounded up to me in the playground and said: “Hey, Lara! I’ve got an idea that’s sure to win me the top journalism prize in the country. Lila has a dream, and there’s nothing like having a dream to get people excited.”

  I beamed at her, delighted with her response.

  “Lila’s got her heart set on walking to China,” Stephanie gushed. “She’s agreed to let me follow her around for the next couple of weeks and report from the walking front line.”

  At that moment Lila joined us, adjusting her pedometer.

  “Hi, Lara,” she said happily. “Stephanie and I are going to be hanging out for the next couple of weeks. Isn’t that cool?”

  “Yes,” I said, grinning. “Very cool.”

  I eventually left Stephanie and Lila sitting on a bench (well, Stephanie was sitting and Lila was walking in place). Stephanie had whipped out her portable voice recorder and was already in interview mode, quizzing Lila about blisters and the pros and cons of nylon socks.

  I had to hand it to myself—I hadn’t lost my touch.

  Although Majur’s spoken English was good, he didn’t say much, and seemed to be off in another world in class. He sat alone, always at the back, and when he wasn’t staring out the window, he was dozing off. It was fascinating watching him fall asleep, his head rolling around side to side and back to front. Once when Ms. Pria was reading a poem, Majur, who’d fallen asleep again, suddenly woke up with a jolt and leaped out of his chair, scaring the living daylights out of Talia, the class actress.

  “Oh my goodness!” she squealed, fanning her face dramatically. “You scared me!”

  Some of the kids laughed at Majur. Emily cried out, “Oh Talia, why don’t you quit being a drama queen.”

  Talia giggled and her face flushed red.

  Ms. Pria cleared her throat. “Majur,” she said gently, “you need to stay awake in my classroom, please.”

  “Sorry,” he mumbled and sat back down, resting his elbow on the desk and his head in his hand.

  “As for you, Talia,” Ms. Pria said, shooting her a disapproving glance, “Emily’s right. Save your acting for drama class.”

  At other times everybody pretty much left Majur alone. Sometimes there were snickers when a teacher asked him a question or when he asked a teacher something that was obvious to us (like whether we had to copy something from the board).

  I was trying really hard—completely under the radar of course—to match him up with somebody, at least during recess and lunchtime. So when Tanya was off at choir practice during recess on Monday, and Emily was hanging out with Bethany, Jemma, and Claire, helping them with their latest animal activism campaign, I hung around the seventh-grade lockers trying to sell the idea of Taking Majur under Your Wing. The plan? Appeal to people’s hearts. Get them thinking about helping Majur adjust. David was my first target.

  “But he doesn’t understand me when I talk to him.” David groaned.

  I tried to remain calm. “So talk slowly.”

  “But all I do at recess and lunchtime is play basketball. If I need him to pass me the ball, I can’t exactly say that slowly, can I? We could lose the game!”

  His stupidity was too much to bear so I left him alone.

  My next attempt was Sammy. At first, it looked promising.

  “I hung out with him at recess yesterday.”

  “That’s fantastic!” I said. “What did you do?”

  He looked at me like I was senile. “We ate our lunch.”

  “Okay . . . what did you talk about?”

  “We didn’t talk. We just sat and ate our lunch.” He rolled his eyes. “What language am I speaking?”

  “Why didn’t you talk?”

  “I don’t know.” He shrugged. “What’s there to talk about?”

  I didn’t bother replying.

  After four more equally idiotic exchanges, I gave up. Then I tried approaching Majur myself, waiting until Tanya was safely tucked away in the library so she wouldn’t see me in FMM mode.

  Majur was sitting on a bench in the covered outdoor learning area, watching a group of the younger kids playing handball.

  “Hi, Majur,” I said brightly, sitting beside him.

  He gave me a funny look. “Hi,” he said quietly.

  “This morning’s art class was a lot of fun, wasn’t it?” I said, making sure I didn’t speak too quickly.

  He shrugged.

  Given my experience having conversations with boys lately, I wasn’t sure if he was being a typical boy or just holding back because of his English. So I tried again.

  “So what’s your favorite subject?”

  He glanced at me. His eyes seemed to smile for a moment. And then he said, “Home time,” stood up, and walked away.

  Tanya sent me a text message:

  How’s the research going?

  My response?

  Fantastic!

  It was easy to lie in a text message. I had to start working on my section of the project soon, but I’d been so busy. If I was going to unofficially help kids, I was going to put my heart and soul into it.

  I’d get around to the project tomorrow.

  Chapter 9

  “It’s so obvious Majur doesn’t fit in,” Emily said to Tanya and me at lunch later in the glorious week of our Chris-Martin-free existence. “He just left the class to go to the bathroom yesterday without asking Ms. Pria, and when she realized and he got back, she looked like she was going to lose it, but she must have thought twice. If he’s never been to a real school before, how was he supposed to know?”

  “Yesterday he didn’t go to recess or eat lunch,” Tanya said. “Ms. Pria offered to buy him something, but he said he wasn’t hungry.”

  “He just walks around looking lost,” Emily
said. “But you know what I’ve noticed? He doesn’t have that feel-sorry-for-me look.”

  “What do you mean?” Tanya asked.

  “She means he doesn’t act like a victim,” I said.

  And that’s when it dawned on me. I’d been thinking of how to help him fit in from the wrong angle. Majur needed friends, not babysitters.

  The answer hit me in the chest the next day at recess—literally.

  Tanya and Emily were in the library working on the Roald Dahl project. I’d made up an excuse—that Mr. Laidlaw needed to see me about my work. They’d bought the story, although Emily wondered aloud why I always seemed to have something going on when it was time to work on the project. I just laughed it off.

  I’d been stalking Majur since the bell rang. It had been tricky because I’d had to break up an argument between a trio of girls along the way, help a sixth-grade boy find a group of kids to play with, and remind a girl that wearing her brother’s jeans wasn’t going to help her join the cool group, which she had her heart set on. Doing all this undercover was hard work, because I had to swear everybody to secrecy and make it look like I was only offering casual advice.

  When I eventually made it to Majur, he was sitting on the bleachers near the grassy area, watching a group of sixth- and seventh-grade boys play soccer. I positioned myself close enough to watch him without it being obvious. It was the first time I’d seen him concentrating. They had his complete attention as his eyes followed the ball. I was so absorbed in spying on him that I didn’t realize the ball was heading toward me until I felt it thump into my chest.

  “Ouch!” As I fell backward, landing smack on my butt, Majur launched at the ball, hooked it on his right ankle, teased it back and forth, and then kicked it back—one smooth, long, perfect kick that (and I swear I’m not making this up) landed straight between the goal posts.

  It was the kind of scene that delivers one of those lightbulb moments.