The Wrong Girl

  “I had no choice,” I said. “It had to be done.”

  Jack came in from the kitchen carrying two cans of Coke. He handed me one and dropped down beside me. “It’s a violent world,” he said, shaking his head. “I blame the rap music and video games.”

  “Give me a break, Jack.” I shoved him. “You’re about as funny as Manny.” I jumped to my feet. “Are you all with me or not? Rose has declared total war!”

  Ivy climbed to her feet. She stumbled over Jeremy’s legs as she walked over to me. She wrapped me in a hug. “We’re with you, Poppy,” she said softly. “I’ve never seen you like this. I’m really sorry this happened to you, and we . . .”

  Blah, blah. I only half-heard what Ivy was saying. My thoughts were swirling in my head, spinning like a merry-go-round gone berserk. “My own sister is on her side,” I moaned.

  “Heather was just trying to push your buttons,” Jeremy said. “That’s what sisters are for, right?”

  “Wrong,” Ivy said. “Heather knows the score. She knows how Poppy and Rose feel about each other.”

  “Heather has a lot of anger,” I said. I dropped back down beside Jack. “You’re being quiet,” I told him.

  “I’m thinking,” he said. He was tossing his car keys from hand to hand. The can of Coke was tucked between his knees. He hadn’t touched it.

  “Aren’t we the Shadyside Shade?” I said, feeling a surge of energy. “Forget about Rose Groban. Come on, guys. Help me forget about her and my sister and everything. Let’s do something wild.”

  Ivy curled and uncurled a strand of hair. “I don’t think so,” she said. “That last prank ruined my whole life, Poppy. No New York. No modeling course. Nothing. I say forget the Shadyside Shade.”

  Jack finally spoke up. “Unless we have an awesome idea. And I’ve got one.”

  Jeremy rolled his eyes. “We’re all in so much trouble, we may not survive high school. We should never pull another prank again.”

  Jack shook his head. “But we’re famous, Jeremy. We have tons of followers. They’re waiting for our next stunt.” A thin smile crossed his face. “And I have a good one.”

  I gave him another shove. “Enough introduction. Stop keeping us in suspense. What’s your big idea?”

  “We go rogue!” Jack said.

  I squinted at him. “Huh? What does that mean?”

  “We go outlaw!” he exclaimed.

  “Jack, what are you talking about?” Ivy demanded.

  His silvery eyes flashed. “We rob a store.”

  19

  Heather Takes Over the Story

  “Does your nose still hurt?” I asked. “I don’t see a bruise.”

  Rose moved the hand mirror to a different angle and narrowed her eyes, examining her skin. “She could have broken it,” she muttered through gritted teeth.

  “My sister is crazy,” I said, shaking my head. “She’s not usually a violent person, but she’s angry. Especially when it comes to me.” I sighed. “Don’t ask me why.”

  We were in Rose’s bedroom, perched on the edge of the peach-colored quilt over her bed.

  I had a large paper cup of iced tea in my hand. I took a long sip as I watched Rose. She lowered the mirror to her lap and patted her skin tenderly with the palm of one hand.

  “If she had broken my nose, I’d have no choice, Heather. I’d have to sue. And there’s no way I could lose. Poppy assaulted me, and there are at least a dozen witnesses. Everyone in that restaurant saw what she did.”

  “Insane,” I muttered. “Totally insane.” I didn’t know what else to say.

  My first time hanging with Rose. My first opportunity to learn about acting. The first person who ever took me seriously, who offered to be a friend and help me and teach me. And what does Poppy do? She spoils the whole thing. Deliberately tries to spoil my chance.

  Why? Jealousy? That can’t be right. Poppy can’t be jealous of me. She has the awesome looks and the good friends and the sparkly personality. She has everything I wish I had. So . . . it can’t be jealousy.

  Does she just plain hate me? She has no reason to hate me. I’ve always wanted to be close to her. I’ve never done anything to hurt her.

  What is her problem?

  “Of course, I wouldn’t really sue,” Rose said, crossing to her dressing table. She sat down and began to rearrange her hair.

  She’s so beautiful. She could be an actress. She seriously has the looks. “Poppy and I have known each other for too long,” she continued, looking at me in the mirror. “I couldn’t sue her or your family. I always considered her a friend.”

  She began to run a hairbrush slowly through her hair. “Sure, we have our competitive sides, but that’s just fun. It’s fun to test each other, to try to win against one another in school or in Drama Club or wherever. I never took it seriously.”

  I didn’t reply. I knew Poppy took it very seriously.

  “It’s not like we’re archenemies or something,” Rose said, brushing faster.

  Oh, yes, it is.

  And of course that explained why Poppy had gone berserk. She saw me sitting there enjoying myself with her archenemy. The whole thing was about me. I guess I should have been flattered, flattered that my sister cared so much.

  But . . . no way. I’m entitled to my own life and my own friends. She will never share her friends with me. Never. She always shuts me out. So what gives her the right to decide who I hang out with?

  “Your sister didn’t just try to humiliate me,” Rose said, setting down the hairbrush and turning her head to admire her work in the mirror. “She tried to hurt me. But I know she’ll do the right thing and apologize.”

  “I’m not so sure,” I said. “I know her and her temper. Also, it cost her her job. She’s probably waiting for you to apologize.”

  Rose grinned. “Yes. Definitely. It was my fault for putting my face in front of the cheeseburger.”

  We both laughed.

  I finished the iced tea and turned the cup in my hands. Rose crossed to her desk and rifled through a stack of papers. “Let’s give you your first acting lesson,” she said. She handed me a one-page script. “We’ll start with the best. See how you do.”

  I skimmed through the lines quickly. “What is this? Shakespeare?”

  She nodded. “Did you read Macbeth in ninth grade?”

  “Yes. But I didn’t understand a lot of it. I thought—”

  “It’s Lady Macbeth’s soliloquy. Remember it?”

  “Not really.” I squinted up at her. “You really want me to start with Shakespeare? Shouldn’t we try something easier?” I tried to read the first lines.

  “‘They met me in the day of success, and I have learned by the perfect’st report they have more in them than mortal knowledge. When I burned in desire to question them further, they made themselves air, into which they vanished.’”

  “Rose? What does that mean?”

  An indulgent smile crossed her face. It was the kind of smile you give an infant. “You need to go slow and think about it and work at it, Heather. Take one line at a time. Go over it until you know the words and the meaning.”

  I stared at the words. They were all a blur now. “Do you have a script to the play you’re doing at school?”

  She shook her head. “Trust me. Before you can do something easy, you need to try something hard.”

  Did that make sense? I decided I’d have to think about it. But I was thrilled that she wanted to pay so much attention to me. She must have thought I really had a spark of talent.

  “Okay, I’ll give it a try,” I said. “I’ll—”

  Her phone buzzed and vibrated, interrupting us. She dove for it on the other side of the bed, glimpsed at the screen, and raised it to her ear. “Oh, hi. I wasn’t expecting to hear from you.”

  I could hear a guy’s voice on the other end.

  “Wait a sec,” Rose said into the phone. “Just a moment.” She turned to me. “You’d better go now, Heather. I have to take this.”
/>
  I nodded. And then the words blurted from my mouth: “You have a boyfriend?”

  I saw a flash of anger in her eyes. Anger that I asked a question she didn’t want to answer? She didn’t reply at all. Just waited for me to get off the bed and leave.

  But then I saw that her gaze was down at my hands. “Heather, look what you did,” she said. “You scratched the backs of your hands. Look—you’re bleeding.”

  I uttered a cry of surprise and stared at my blood-stained hands. “I did? Wow. I didn’t even realize.”

  20

  Poppy Narrates

  “Don’t all jump in at once,” Jack said. “You’re staring at me like I’m speaking Martian. I said, let’s rob a store.”

  “For real?” Ivy demanded. “Rob a store for real?”

  “And video it?” I said. “So the police would know who to arrest?” I rolled my eyes. “That’s genius!”

  Jack scratched the side of his face. “Very funny. I thought you wanted to do something crazy.”

  I squinted at him as if seeing him for the first time. “Not that crazy.”

  Manny laughed. “I’m not sure my brother the cop will approve. He didn’t like our dog-store prank at the mall!”

  “I think we’d look awesome in those orange prison uniforms,” Jeremy said.

  Jack jumped to his feet. He had an impatient scowl on his face. I hadn’t known him for long, but I’d already learned that sometimes he had a short fuse. He definitely didn’t like being teased.

  “Come on, guys,” he pleaded. “It wouldn’t be a real robbery. Just a prank. A fake. No one goes to prison for a prank.”

  “We do a fake robbery?” Ivy said. “But at a real store?”

  Jack nodded. “We’ll set the whole thing up but make it look totally real. You know. Like a reality TV show.”

  “And do we really take stuff?” Manny asked. “We could rob a shoe store. I need new sneakers. Look at these. They’re, like, air-conditioned. I got so many holes in them.”

  Jack frowned at him. “That might be considered a real robbery, you know?”

  “I know where you got this idea,” Jeremy chimed in. He had been watching the whole discussion in near silence. I could see that Ivy was reluctant. But I hadn’t been able to tell if Jeremy was into the idea or horrified by it.

  “You saw the same video?” Jack asked him.

  Jeremy nodded. “On YouTube. Those kids in Seattle. They robbed a seafood store and tossed these big fish back and forth. It was a riot. The store owners were hiding behind their table, and the fish were flying everywhere.”

  “Yeah, and it got them, like, half a million hits,” Jack said. “Everyone in Seattle knows who they are.”

  “And they didn’t get in any trouble?” Ivy asked.

  “No way,” Jack told her. “It was just a funny video. You know. A total fake. The owner of the seafood store was in on it.”

  “And I guess it got the store a load of publicity,” I said.

  “Yeah. Everyone liked it,” Jack replied. “We can do the same thing. Everyone in Shadyside will know us. Ha. The Shadyside Shade.”

  Ivy’s face was locked in a frown. I could see she still wasn’t buying the idea. And I didn’t blame her. She was the one who came out of our last prank with a blown-up car. She was the one who’d had her summer in New York ruined because of it.

  “Listen, guys,” she said, her eyes on me. “How about we come up with something less dangerous?”

  Jack sighed. He swept a hand back over his spiky white-blond hair. “It won’t be dangerous, Ivy. Everyone will be in on it. The store owner will be playing along, too. What could be dangerous?”

  Ivy thought for a moment. “What if someone wanders into the store who isn’t in on the joke?”

  “We’ll make sure that doesn’t happen,” Jack said. “We can always stop the live stream video and explain. Right?”

  A hush fell over the room. Everyone was thinking about the prank, trying to picture it. Finally, I broke the silence. “I think we should do it,” I said. “I mean, we’ve been under a lot of stress. All these tests are killing me . . . All the pressure at school . . . Who is going to blame us for blowing off some steam?”

  I thought I had to be enthusiastic about the plan. After all, I wanted to impress Jack. I had a major-league crush on him, and I wanted him to like me back.

  So I got all rah-rah about the robbery plan. And my enthusiasm can be infectious. It’s one of my best qualities, I think. And after a little more discussion, even Ivy was willing to participate.

  “Let’s all get famous!” I cheered.

  Jeremy narrowed his eyes at Jack. “Have you thought of a store? What kind of store are we going to pretend to rob?”

  “How about a Burger King?” Manny chimed in. “I’m getting hungry.”

  “I’ve been thinking about it,” Jack said. His silvery eyes flashed.

  “That would be funny, right?” Manny continued. “If we robbed a big bunch of Whoppers and fries? We could be the Flame-Broiling Robbers. Let’s say we stole a hundred Whoppers. That could maybe get us in Guinness World Records. The first ones in history to steal a hundred Whoppers? How awesome is that?”

  Jack kept a hard stare on Manny, who was practically hopping up and down in his chair, he was so excited. Finally, Jack said, “Are you finished?”

  I laughed. “Manny, I can’t tell if you’re serious or not! But you’re making me hungry, too.”

  Manny’s face stretched into the dopey grin that was his natural expression. He laughed. “I’m always serious.”

  “Seriously deranged,” Ivy said. She reached out a hand and messed up his hair.

  Manny made two fists and pretended he was going to sock her.

  I could see that Jack was getting impatient. “So? Do you have a store in mind?” I asked.

  He nodded. “Harlow’s.”

  I blinked. “Harlow’s Pic ’n’ Pay? Here on River Road? Why Harlow’s?”

  “A lot of reasons,” Jack said. “One, it’s never crowded. It’s kind of out of the way. Two, it’s small, with narrow aisles, and the cash register is right near the front door. And three, Harlow is a really nice guy. He’s even nice to teenagers.”

  Manny laughed. “Why would anyone be nice to teenagers?”

  “He’s a good dude. He’ll go along with a joke,” Jack said. He clapped his hands together. “Everyone raise your right hand. Like taking an oath. We’re going to do this thing and it’s going to be awesome, and we’re all going to be famous.”

  We all raised a hand high. Manny raised both hands. Ivy was the last to do it. I could see she still had her doubts.

  After Jeremy, Ivy, and Manny had left, I found myself on Jack’s lap, his arms wrapped tightly around me. He ran a hand over my springy hair. I think he liked the way it bounced. We nuzzled our faces for a little while, just teasing each other, and then we kissed, a long, hard kiss that took my breath away.

  “You’re amazing,” he growled, soft and low.

  With our second kiss, he wrapped me up even tighter. The back of my neck tingled and I felt chills run down my spine. His lips were hard, not soft. I didn’t know what that meant. I couldn’t think clearly. Actually, I couldn’t think at all.

  But as I pressed my hands on his cheeks and kissed him, I found myself thinking about our store robbery. Just another prank by the Shadyside Shade.

  I was right to go along with the idea.

  Because this—what I was feeling with Jack—couldn’t be wrong.

  21

  Poppy Continues

  A few nights later, Jack, Ivy, and I drove to Harlow’s to check out the store and plan some things. Jeremy couldn’t come with us. He’d had an asthma attack during sixth period at school, a pretty bad one, I guess, because an ambulance came for him and took him away.

  Ivy texted him around dinnertime. He said he was home but still feeling weird and not breathing normally.

  And Manny . . . we couldn’t find him. He didn’t a
nswer his phone. We had no idea where he was.

  A wide asphalt driveway leads up to Harlow’s, which sits on a low hill overlooking River Road. The front of the store is all glass, a big window. There’s no window display, except for a few neon beer signs. You can see the aisles inside the brightly lit store. A red neon sign above the glass entrance reads: Pic ’n’ Pay. No checks accepted.

  Ivy and I followed Jack in. Mr. Harlow was leaning over the front counter, reading a newspaper. He glanced up as we entered and nodded hello. He’s pretty old, maybe in his fifties or sixties. He has silvery hair, tanned cheeks with lots of little crisscross lines in them, and dark eyes that only half open, like he’s always drowsy or something.

  It was a warm spring night, but Harlow was wearing a checked flannel shirt, red and black like a lumberjack shirt. Everything else he was wearing was hidden behind the counter. “Let me know if I can help you,” he said. He has a warm, friendly voice, with just a touch of a southern accent.

  We made our way to the long beer display refrigerator that runs the whole length of the back wall. A small black radio on the shelf behind the front counter was playing a baseball game. Harlow had his head down, studying his newspaper.

  “I see two security cameras,” Jack said in a low voice. He motioned with his head. “One above the back wall, one over the front counter.”

  Ivy and I followed Jack’s gaze. “Don’t all look at once,” he scolded. “Do you really want to look like you’re casing the joint?”

  “You’re right,” I murmured. “We’ve got to be subtle.”

  We moved farther along the beer display. A chill came off the glass. A gray cat watched from an aisle opposite us.

  My heart was pounding. No reason to be nervous. We were just checking things out. Jack tapped my shoulder. “See the back door? It leads to a small parking lot. We can park back there, avoid the bright lights up front.”

  “Do you believe this?” Ivy called loudly. She held up a package. “Carrot Cake Oreos? Are they kidding?”