Puddin'

I hold up the knife. “Dibs on a corner piece.”

  After we eat cake, our hair full of confetti, and help clean up the mess we made, we all spray ourselves down with bug spray as Abuela pulls out her big torches to give us some “mood lighting,” she says.

  Setting up the tents is lots of trial and error, and by the time both tents are put together, all of our bedding is set up, and we’re all changed and ready for our night in the wilderness, it’s half past midnight.

  The six of us lie out on a huge blanket for a bit and watch the stars while Dad and Abuela go inside and get ready for bed.

  “Oh my gosh, Callie!” says Millie, shaking my shoulder. “I think that’s a shooting star.”

  Willowdean props herself up on her elbows. “I don’t know. That might just be a tiny plane.”

  “For the first time in my life, I actually agree with you,” I say.

  Millie nudges me in the ribs. “You should make a wish just in case.”

  I look up to the flickering light in the sky and I am 99.9 percent sure that Willowdean is right, but on the off 0.10 percent chance that she’s not, I suspend my disbelief in wishes and close my eyes.

  I wish to feel like this all the time. That I’ve found my place, and that my place isn’t just a geographical coordinate, but a living, breathing thing that I carry inside of me. That is my 0.10 percent wish.

  I open my eyes. “Done,” I say. “Just in case.”

  Slowly everyone slips into their tents—Willowdean, Ellen, and Hannah in one, and the rest of us in the other—until it’s just me, Amanda, and Millie lying on the blanket outside. Except Amanda is definitely asleep, and when she’s not asleep, she’s fighting to stay awake.

  “Amanda, you should lie down inside the tent,” says Millie.

  “I’m awake, okay?” Amanda says, her lips barely moving. “Let me live.”

  Millie shrugs. “So, Ashley Cheeseburger,” she says. “How does it feel to be officially seventeen years old?”

  “Huh. It’s after midnight, so I guess it feels pretty much the same as sixteen felt yesterday.”

  “But you can see R-rated movies now,” Amanda chimes in sluggishly.

  Millie nods. “Good point.” She turns to me. “Your grandma is super stinking cool, by the way.”

  “She really is.” I cross my arms behind my head. “I’m weirdly jealous of her. Like, I want to be that put together and know what the hell I’m doing with my life.”

  “Callie, you’ve got lots of time.”

  “I mean, I guess so,” I say. “What if I die tomorrow? My tombstone will just read, ‘She was kicked off the dance team, but at least they went to Nationals.’ I just feel like there’s all this pressure to suddenly know what I’m going to do now that I’m not a Shamrock. And honestly, I just don’t know. Maybe I don’t want to go to college. Or maybe I do, but I want to go to school in, like, Spain. Or hell, maybe I want to be a truck driver or—”

  Millie laughs. “Don’t you get it?”

  “What?”

  “It doesn’t have to be pressure to find something new or be someone else all of a sudden. Maybe you do decide to go back to dance. You don’t need a team to dance. Or maybe you want to be an engineer or work at a makeup counter. It doesn’t matter. I know getting kicked off the Shamrocks stunk, but it doesn’t have to be this dark cloud forever. It can be a chance to find out who you really want to be.”

  I’m quiet for a moment as all that sinks in. The only sound between us is a chorus of crickets and Amanda’s light snores. “That makes sense. It does. But I just want to know who I’m going to be so I can start being that person.”

  “Even the wrong direction sometimes feels better than no direction at all.”

  “Yes!” I say. “That. Exactly that.”

  Millie half smiles. “But that doesn’t make it right. Sometimes the best things are worth waiting for. Don’t be scared to take your time.”

  Something about what she’s said rings true, but it still puts my stomach in knots. Part of me doesn’t care who I am or what I’m doing as long as I’m at the top, but maybe that’s not how it has to be.

  “It kind of reminds me of fat camp out here, and how quiet it was at night,” says Millie, interrupting my thoughts.

  “Well, I guess that means you’ll have to come camping here again, since fat camp is a thing of the past.” For the first time, saying the word fat doesn’t make me feel anything. It’s just a word. It doesn’t make me feel like I’m holding it over someone as a way to make fun of them or like I’m being rude.

  Millie smiles. “Yeah.” It comes out like a sigh. “I’d like that.”

  “Hey, did you ever send in your application for journalism camp?” I ask.

  “Just putting the finishing touches on my application. I made my audition video, too.”

  “Shut up! I want to see.” As soon as the words are out of my mouth, I regret it a little bit. I’ve never been great at hiding my feelings and I might be a jerk, but I don’t want to hurt Millie.

  She checks behind us to make sure everyone is asleep, Amanda included. “Okay, but you can’t laugh. The only other person who’s seen it is Malik, because he’s the one who helped me cut the whole thing together.”

  We both sit up, and she pulls her cell phone out of the pocket of her lavender hoodie and scrolls through an album until she lands on a video.

  I take the phone from her and hit play. I watch Millie, in a sharp blue suit, sitting behind a news desk. Her curls are a little too tight, and at first, she’s giving me deer-in-headlight vibes. But I think that’s just because I know everyday Millie. She delivers stories about our school and there are even fancy graphics. And she actually has some great jokes—better than our local weatherman, who dons a yellow raincoat and cranks up a wind machine anytime storms are in his forecast. I would even go so far as to say she’s charming. Her puns are cute and perfectly timed. And her lipstick! I know that lipstick.

  The video cuts to a few shots where Millie is reporting “live,” and then it’s over, with short credits naming her and Malik.

  I hand the phone back to her, and she waits in silence for my response.

  “You. Were. Born. For. This,” I finally say, and to my horror, I hear my voice crack. God. When did I turn into such a feelsy loser?

  “Oh my gosh,” says Millie, touching my leg. “Are you okay?”

  I nod and laugh, tilting my head back like that might somehow keep the tears inside. “I’m great. I don’t know. Or maybe I’m not.” Dabbing my eyes, I look to her. “You were amazing, though. Like, if they don’t accept you, they have shit for brains. I mean, how are you so good at that? I feel like I’d be a total mess on camera.”

  “Well,” she says. “I don’t know that I’m all that great, but I want to be better, which is why I need to get into this journalism camp. Because I want to be unstoppable. I want there to be no reason for people to say no to me. I want to be so perfect that if they’re going to say no to me because of this”—she motions down to her body—“then they’ll have to say so out loud to my face.”

  “Wow.” I gasp. When did the tables turn? My life is in shambles, and Millie Michalchuk has her shit together. Like, really together. Or maybe I was always a wreck. “And your lipstick!”

  “Revlon Certainly Red 740. Thanks to your mom.”

  “I swear that lipstick is magic.”

  “Something about it just made me feel . . . powerful. I didn’t know something as silly as red lips could make me feel like that.”

  “That’s what it was,” I say. “You looked like you were in charge. Like you were calling the shots.”

  “You wanna know what being friends with all those girls has taught me?” She motions with her chin back to the tents.

  “What?” I ask.

  “Sometimes you have to fake it till you make it. If I want to call the shots, I have to start acting like it. And when that camera turns on, it’s like someone flips a switch inside me and gives me permission to be
the version of myself I only dream of.”

  We both lie back again.

  “So,” I say, “according to you, if I want people to treat me like a lobster, I have to act like a lobster?”

  “No.” She laughs. “But yeah, in a way. Yeah.”

  I think about that for a while. Acting like a queen bee definitely bumped me up the social ladder, but now it’s more obvious than ever to me that I was a total sham.

  So maybe after all this time faking it, I should think carefully about the person I want to be. Maybe between that and my 0.10 percent wish, there’s hope for the future of Callie Reyes yet.

  Millie

  Twenty-Seven

  After school on Tuesday, Callie and I make a brief stop at the post office before heading to Sonic and work.

  I slide the gear into park just outside the front door and fish my large manila envelope from my backpack. I’ve addressed the envelope with my teal glitter marker and decided to use the limited-edition Harry Potter stamps I was saving for a special occasion.

  “Nice stamps,” says Callie.

  “You don’t have to make fun of me.”

  She laughs. “No, really, I mean it. I especially like the Luna Lovegood one. In fact, if Neville Longbottom and Luna Lovegood had a baby, it’d be you.”

  I squint. “I’m not sure you mean that as a compliment, but I’m going to take that as one, because Luna and Neville forever.”

  “Totally a compliment,” she assures me.

  “Maybe if I just pretend this letter is going to Hogwarts, I’ll be able to muster up the courage to walk inside and mail the dang thing.” Something about mailing this in real life feels irreversible.

  Callie grips my leg. “Hey,” she says, her voice no louder than a whisper. “You’ve already done the hard part. You wrote the essay. You did the video. Shit, Millie, you’ve even submitted it online. All you have to do is walk in there and mail the damn thing.” She quickly adds, “And then break it to your mom.”

  I glance over to her. “Well, suddenly this isn’t the hardest thing I have to do today.”

  “Didn’t you need her signature for the application?” she asks.

  “You could say I have a habit of forging my mother’s signature. It’s more of a vice, really.”

  “Millicent Michalchuk!” she howls. “That is the most badass thing to come out of your mouth ever.”

  “We’ve all got a rotten streak,” I say as I open the door with the envelope held tight to my chest.

  I march inside and hand the envelope to Lucius, who’s worked behind the counter here since my mother was a little girl. “I’d like a receipt upon arrival, please.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” he tells me.

  He rings me up for the cost of certified mail and then he takes it away from me and that’s pretty much it. Good-bye, Daisy Ranch. Hello, University of Texas Broadcast Journalism Boot Camp.

  Callie and I rush into work, and Inga squints at the two of us, preparing to scold, but then I say, “I’m so, so sorry. It’s my fault we’re late.”

  Inga nods. “Your check is in the office.”

  “Getting paid?” mumbles Callie. “What does that feel like?”

  I nudge her with my elbow. “Thanks, Inga. Kiss Luka and Nikolai for me.”

  “They’re monsters,” she says as she gathers her keys and things. “Little hairless monsters who just eat and poop. Eat and poop. I tell your uncle every day that if men could have babies, we’d be making people in labs instead of bellies.”

  Callie nods her head. “Yeah, and if they had to deal with periods, you better believe tampons would be free.”

  Inga nods toward Callie. “She gets it.”

  Callie keeps a straight face, but I can tell that Inga’s slight approval has not gone unnoticed.

  After I grab my check, Callie and I settle in behind the counter to see what’s left of the daily checklist.

  Callie gasps.

  I look up just in time to see Mitch pull the front door open. He’s not wearing workout clothes and he hasn’t got a gym bag with him.

  “Uh, hey,” he says.

  “Hi,” Callie and I say in unison.

  I shrink back a little when I feel Callie tense up beside me.

  Callie holds out the sign-in clipboard. “You can go ahead and sign in.”

  Mitch clears his throat. “I’m, um, actually not here to work out today.”

  “Okay,” says Callie.

  Mitch nervously pops his knuckles until they won’t pop anymore.

  I so desperately want to jump in and mediate the situation, but I do everything in my power to restrain myself.

  “Could we maybe talk?” he asks.

  “Totally!” I say.

  They both look to me with raised brows.

  I grin sheepishly.

  Mitch turns back to Callie. “Maybe in private?”

  That’s my cue. “I have so much to do,” I say, taking the checklist. Trying my best not to sound awkward, I turn to Callie and add, “Callie, could you watch the front desk while I work on my super-long to-do list?”

  Her eyes are wide with panic, and her cheeks are turning pink, but she says, “Uh, yeah. You go do that.”

  I skip around the gym, trying to make myself look busy. I don’t purposely eavesdrop, but it’s not like this place is very big.

  After a while, I hear Mitch say, “What about Saturday?”

  “Saturdays aren’t good,” says Callie.

  “Saturday’s good!” I say before I can stop myself.

  Callie twirls around to find me cleaning the mirrors above the hand weights. Our gazes meet in the reflection of the mirror. “I thought we had our thing,” she says through gritted teeth. “You know, our thing.”

  I turn around and shrug. “It’s Easter Sunday weekend, so we’re skipping this weekend. Plus Hannah says Courtney is demanding a Saturday date night.”

  “Sure, let me just plan my life around Hannah’s girlfriend,” she mumbles.

  I smile and shrug.

  She whirls around and throws her hands up a little but quickly lets them drop to her sides. “Okay then,” she says to Mitch. “I’m still grounded, so I’ll have to check with my mom, but maybe Saturday.”

  Mitch’s rosy cheeks flare. “Maybe Saturday.”

  Callie nods. “Maybe. But probably not. You should know I am definitely a glass-half-empty kind of person.”

  Mitch thinks on that for a minute. “So it’s a glass-half-empty maybe then?” He holds his hand out awkwardly, like he means to shake Callie’s hand, but then just fist bumps her before leaving.

  I wait for the door to shut entirely before I loudly say, “Is that a date?”

  When Callie turns around, I expect to find her normally grumpy something-smells-bad expression, but it’s clear she’s brimming with excitement despite how hard she’s trying to keep a lid on it. “Maybe,” she says. “It’s a maybe date. Glass half empty, maybe.”

  I rush to her and she meets me halfway, our hands clasped, as we squeal at approximately the same level of sound as a dog whistle.

  After work and dropping off Callie, I sit in the driveway at home for a minute to check my text messages.

  MALIK: Did you send your application in?

  MILLIE: I did! Your directorial debut!

  MALIK: Well, that calls for a celebration. Friday night?

  MILLIE: It’s a date.

  A tidal wave of excitement hits my stomach. A date! Not only does Callie have a date this weekend, but now so do I. What can I say? Love is in the air.

  Inside, I find both my parents getting ready for dinner. Now, I think. This is the perfect time to tell them. With Dad here to ease the blow.

  My mom spins around the kitchen island just as my dad plants a big, wet kiss on her cheek. “Your father brought home brisket, mac and cheese, green beans, dinner rolls, and peach cobbler from Melba B’s Barbecue, so I guess it’s cheat night for everyone.” She hums “Go Tell It on the Mountain” to herself as she runs
back to the kitchen for a few serving spoons.

  Melba B’s is my mother’s favorite—food so good she hums!—and if it’s up to her, it would undoubtedly be her last meal, but she so rarely eats it and my dad is usually the only person who can convince her otherwise.

  A low sigh slips from me.

  I can’t tell her I’m not going back to Daisy Ranch. Not right now. I won’t ruin this perfect night for her.

  On Friday night, Malik picks me up for our date. Well, if you ask my parents, it’s a study date, and Malik is picking me up so we can go to Amanda’s, but that’s because I’m not sure what their opinion on dating is. If I had to guess, they’d prefer I just didn’t.

  After much deliberation, I settled on a mint-green cotton dress with little daisy buttons sewn all around the collar—my own personal touch, obviously—and a pair of yellow flats.

  When I get into his car, Malik hands me a fresh pair of socks. “You’ll need these,” he tells me.

  “What are these for?” I ask. “Are we going bowling?”

  His lips twitch for a second, like he’s second-guessing himself. “Would it be a problem if we were?”

  I shake my head. “Only if you don’t mind getting beat by a girl.”

  “Oh, so you’re a smack talker?” he asks. “Well—” His ringtone interrupts him. He glances down at his phone, resting in the cup holder. “I better get this,” he says as he pulls over to the side of a residential street.

  “Hello?” asks Malik into the receiver.

  I listen carefully, but I can’t make out the voice on the other end, so all I’ve got to work with is his one-sided conversation.

  “Well, has he tried taking any medicine? . . . He just has to sit in a dark room and change out the reels. It can’t be that hard. . . . He’s sure he can’t? . . . Fine. Okay. Give me twenty minutes.”

  Malik hangs up the phone and turns to me.

  “Is everything okay?” I ask.

  “Yes. No,” he says. “I have to cancel tonight.”

  “Oh.” I try to hide my disappointment, but it’s no use.

  “It’s just there are only three of us at work who know how to change out the film reels in the projector rooms, and normally it wouldn’t matter, but one guy is visiting his internet girlfriend in New Mexico and the other guy is hung over. Or maybe he’s still drunk. I’m not sure.”