“You seem to be talking to him a lot these days,” I say.
“Yes, I guess so,” Mom says as she leaves the kitchen. I think she was blushing!
It hits me . . . like a bomb! Mom likes Vee’s dad. Likes him like that! OMG!
As I eat, I wonder what it would be like to have Vee’s dad as a stepdad. He seems pretty nice. Of course, Eric’s a pest, but he’s not the worst kid I’ve ever seen. I know it’s early to have Mom and Tom married. Still . . . it could happen. Imagine me and Vee as sisters. Very cool.
When Tom arrives to pick up the book, I see that dark circles ring his eyes and that his right eye is twitching.
“Hey Lulu,” he says.
“Hi.”
Mom comes in holding a fat book. She’s put on lipstick and brushed her hair. “Can I offer you a cup of tea?” Mom asks.
“Thanks, but I should get back to Vee. I’m so worried about her. She’s sleeping now, so I figured it would be all right to run out for a little while.”
“It’ll just take a few minutes,” Mom says. “Have you eaten?”
He says he hasn’t, so Mom persuades him to have a soy burger and a cup of tea. “Just real quick.”
While they eat, I sit on the couch to read the end of The Witch of Blackbird Pond, which I need to finish for ELA tomorrow. Although I’m into the book, I’m also kind of eavesdropping at the same time. I can’t hear every word they’re saying; their voices are lost among the clanking dishes, so I pay more attention to my book until I hear them step out in the hall again and I look up. “Vee doesn’t understand how serious this is,” Tom says to Mom. “I’d better get back. I don’t want to leave her too long. Eric says he’ll call if she needs me.”
“I completely understand,” Mom says.
A phone rings, and Tom reaches into the inside pocket of his sports jacket. “Hello?” The phone continues to ring, even though he’s answered it. “Hello?”
There doesn’t seem to be anyone on the other end and yet the phone is still ringing.
“This is Vee’s phone,” he says with a laugh as he suddenly realizes his mistake. “I forgot I even put it in my pocket. I meant to leave it in the trunk of the car.” He grabs another phone from his outside jacket pocket. It’s stopped ringing but he checks the caller ID. “It was Eric. I’d better get home,” he says, hurrying toward the door. “Thanks for the burger, Susan.” Mom hurries out the door behind him.
I hope Vee is all right. I wish I could text her, but there’s no way to get in touch with her. I return to my book. After a while Mom comes in. She goes to the kitchen. Dishes clank and I get off the couch to help her. That’s when I see it.
Tom put Vee’s phone down on the hall table.
Will he miss it? Will he come right back searching for it? He was pretty distracted.
I press the home button on Vee’s phone and see she has three new Snaps. Putting my hand over the screen, I whisk the phone into my back pocket. Maybe we’re not out of the contest yet.
Chapter 14
MY HEAD HURTS. And my stomach. I hate feeling like this.
Dad rushes into my bedroom. “Eric says you’ve been crying. What’s wrong?”
“I need my phone,” I say.
Dad folds his arms angrily.
“And I feel terrible.”
Dad puts his arm around me. “Forget it, kiddo. All your stuff is safe and sound.”
“But you don’t understand, Dad,” I say.
“You’re right. I don’t understand. I don’t care, either. All I care about is you getting well. It’s late. Get to sleep,” Dad says.
“Dad?” I ask as I get under the covers. “Did Lulu’s mom ask if I could live with them?”
“What? No! Do you want to live with them?”
“I don’t want to move,” I tell him. It occurs to me that maybe I’ve hurt his feelings and I feel bad about that. “I would miss you, but it wouldn’t be forever.”
“Go to sleep,” he says. “We’ll talk in the morning. But forget it. You’re not living with Lulu.”
I lie in bed but I don’t fall asleep right away. I realize that I’m happy he said no to me living with Lulu. It’s nothing against Lulu. It’s just good to know that he wouldn’t let go of me so easily. I’m a little surprised that I feel this way. But I do.
Gwynneth must be wondering where I am. She’s worrying that I’m not answering her on purpose. Maybe she thinks she sent a Snap that I didn’t like. That I’m angry with her. I don’t even know what she sent. I haven’t been able to see it.
Why did this have to happen to me?! It’s not fair!
If I’m not living with Lulu, then I’m definitely attending Shoreham Middle in a month’s time. And Gwynneth—the coolest kid, the Queen Bee, GQB2the2ndpwr—will hate me by then for ignoring her and ruining her school’s chance for a free Boys Being Dudes concert.
Now, not only will I be the new kid—I’ll be the despised new kid. I’m sure Gwynneth will tell everybody what a loser I am.
Grabbing my pillow, I put it over my face. I want to hide from the world!
Wait! I’m already hiding from the world.
Now my head hurts even worse. Plus, here comes that twisty feeling in my stomach again. Where did I put that trash can? I’m going to puke.
Chapter 15
LULU CHATS WITH ME around nine.
Luloony
You’ll never guess what just happened.
Megawatt
Lulu sends me a Snap video of herself joyfully dancing all around her room holding a phone in the air. I don’t get it. How can she be holding her phone and also making a video at the same time?
Megawatt
Whose phone is that?
Luloony
VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV
VVVVVVVVVVVVVV!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Megawatt
No!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! How?
Luloony
I’ll tell you tmrw. The hourglass is up. Have to send GQB2the2ndpwr a Snap right away.
Megawatt
What are you going to say?
Luloony
I hope your town falls into a sinkhole.
Megawatt
No! No! No! You can’t!
Luloony
Lulu is just wild enough to really do it, so I’m relieved that it’s a joke.
Megawatt
See you tomorrow. Snap something nice to GQB2the2ndpwr
Luloony
Later
I can’t believe she got hold of Vee’s phone. How could she have done it? This changes everything. We still have a chance. I imagine Joe the drummer waving to me from behind his drum set.
Chapter 16
I HAVE LOTS of pictures of Vee in my phone. I click on one where Megan, Vee, and I are making kissy faces at the phone camera and send it to Vee’s phone. I doodle a message.
Wait! Gwynneth might know Vee’s handwriting by now. I erase that and put in a banner that says BFFS FOREVER. Little fairies hold it on either side. Then I decide that the fairies might be too little-girlish. I switch the banner carriers for bees. GQB2the2ndpwr isn’t the only one who can have a hive. Let her think Vee is a Queen Bee in her own school.
Perfect, I think as I hit Send. I was in such a hurry to send out this Snap that I didn’t even bother to read what Gwynneth sent. Who cares?
The important thing is to keep the Snapstreak going.
“Does Vee know you have her phone?” Megan asks the next day as soon as she gets on the bus.
“How would she know?” I ask. “There’s no way to get in touch with her.”
“Do they have a landline?” Megan asks.
A landline? Is she kidding? “Do those even exist anymore?” I ask.
“We have one . . . I think,” Megan says. “Mom says in case there’s a storm or a national emergency she wants a landline.”
“If Vee has a landline I have no idea what the number is,” I say. “Do you?”
“No,” Megan replies. “I guess we’
ll just have to go over there this afternoon.”
Vee’s phone rings and I dig it out of my backpack. She got a Snap from a baby friend. I’m surprised that Gwynneth is still coming up as a baby after all this time. But it isn’t Gwynneth! “Ethan Myers,” I tell Megan quietly. He’s a baby, so they must have just started Snapping. Maybe he’s been checking to see how she feels.
Megan’s eyes grow wide. “Should we look?”
“Of course!”
“Isn’t it sort of an intrusion on Vee’s privacy?” Megan asks. “A very, very, very big intrusion.”
Megan and I look at each other. I don’t know. Is it? “What if we don’t answer and he thinks Vee is ignoring him?” I say.
“It wouldn’t hurt to take a peek,” Megan says.
“Just a peek,” I agree. How can we not? Holding Vee’s phone low, we open Ethan’s Snap. It’s a video. He’s filmed a bunch of fish! Tropical fish!
Ethan
My mom says someone with a concussion should only do restful things. These fish seem pretty tranquil so I hope you like fish . . .
“That is so sweet!” Megan says. “Oh, I love it!”
“I can’t believe he knows a word like tranquil!” I say.
“Fish are restful,” Megan says. Suddenly she looks panicked. “This video is going to disappear before we get a chance to show Vee. She’ll never know Ethan sent it.”
“We’ll just tell her about it,” I say.
“But then she’ll know we watched it,” Megan says. “We’ll just have to confess.”
“You’re right,” I agree. As we roll along toward school, though, I imagine how it will be this afternoon when we visit Vee and tell her we have her phone. The first thing she’s going to say is, “Let me have it.” She’s not going to take no for an answer, either.
It’s as though Megan has been reading my mind, because the next thing she says is “Vee’s going to want her phone back, isn’t she?”
I nod. “Yes, she is.”
“It would be bad for her health if we gave her back her phone, wouldn’t it?”
Of course, the answer is yes! It would be very bad! But I don’t want to lie to Vee. I’ve never lied to Vee about anything in my entire life.
“She might not like us taking over her Snapstreak,” Megan says. “But what if we give her back her phone and she gets sicker because she’s Snapping with Gwynneth—and now Ethan? And you know she’d start Snapping with us and we’d Snap back because we couldn’t ignore her. You know we just couldn’t. Then she wouldn’t get better and it would be all our fault. What kind of friends would we be then? The worst! The worst! The worst!”
Megan definitely made sense. “But how can we not tell her?”
“I don’t know,” Megan says. “What should we do? I have no idea.”
“That makes two of us,” I say.
By the time we get to Vee’s house that afternoon, Megan and I still haven’t figured out what we’re going to tell her. When Eric answers the door he tells us that Vee’s sleeping. We turn to leave but she appears on the stairs. “Don’t go!” she says. “I’m awake.”
Barely. Her eyes are puffy and her hair looks like she stuck her finger in an electrical socket. She’s got on yellow pajamas with a pattern of kittens playing with balls of yarn. They’re way too big for her. I’ve never even seen them before and I’ve slept over at her house plenty. Vee sees me staring at her pajamas and laughs lightly. “My grandma sent me these when she heard I was sick,” she says, smiling down at them. “I barfed on everything else I usually wear to bed.”
“I think they’re adorable,” Megan says.
“They’re very special,” I say.
Vee rolls her eyes because she knows I’m messing with her. “Come on up to my bedroom,” she says. Vee’s room is always neat but today it’s a mess. The sheets and blankets are tossed into a knot. Her wastebasket overflows with tissues, and, to be honest, there’s a kind of barfy smell. Megan immediately starts smoothing out the blankets. “Get back into bed,” she tells Vee. “We have some things to tell you.”
Thank goodness Megan’s taking the lead on this because, honestly, I had no idea what to do.
Vee’s face grows serious. “Something bad?”
“No,” Megan says. “It’s all good. Good. Good. Good.”
“Good,” Vee says.
“Exactly,” Megan says. “It’s just that we want you to stay calm when you hear our news. Promise?”
“How can I promise when I don’t know what the news is?” Vee asks.
“You have to promise or we won’t tell you,” Megan says.
“Aw, come on!” Vee says. “That’s not fair!”
“Just promise!” I say, growing impatient.
“All right. I promise,” Vee says.
Megan turns toward me. “Lulu, tell Vee how you got hold of her phone.”
“YOU HAVE MY PHONE!!!” Vee cries out. Actually, it’s more like a scream.
“Vee, remember that you’re still getting better. You promised to stay calm. It’s important for you to get better,” Megan reminds Vee. “Let Lulu talk.”
Vee presses her hands over her mouth so she won’t say anything as I tell the story of how her dad mistakenly picked up her phone when Eric was calling him on his own phone, which was in his other pocket. “He was so worried about you that he put your phone down on a hall table and rushed out of the house without taking it.”
“Has he mentioned it?” Megan asks. “Does he realize he’s forgotten it?”
Vee shakes her head. “He told me all my stuff was in his car and then he took it to work so there was no chance I’d find it. He’s totally forgotten he had it in his pocket that day. He thinks it’s with the other stuff.”
“Excellent!” I say.
“The Snapstreak is already broken, though, isn’t it?”
“I sent Gwynneth a Snap from your phone last night,” I tell Vee.
“Great! Did she reply?”
“Not yet,” I say.
“Okay. I’ll have to wait for her reply. Can I have my phone?” Vee asks.
I’m not kidding when I say that Vee actually gets a sparkle in her eyes now that she thinks she’s getting her phone back. Megan sees it, too, and shoots me a worried look. “Here’s the thing,” Megan begins. “We don’t think it would be good for you if we gave you your phone.”
There it is. It’s out. Megan squeezes her hands into two fists as she waits for the explosion. I chew lightly on my lower lip, also expecting Vee to blow.
“I suppose you’re right,” Vee says.
Megan and I stare at each other in complete disbelief. Did she really just say that?!
We must look completely shocked because Vee laughs. “I mean it. I know you’re right. Dad took me to a doctor this morning and she told me all the bad stuff that can happen if I don’t let my brain rest,” Vee says. “She showed me pictures of swollen brains and brains of athletes who have had lots of untreated concussions. It was scary. I want to get better from this.”
Megan eases Vee back down onto her pillow. “Okay, you rest, remember? Vee and I will keep the Snapstreak going. We can handle it. There’s absolutely nothing for you to worry about. We’ve got this. Totally got it.”
“We still have to discuss the fish,” I say, wishing we didn’t have to.
Vee looks confused. “Fish?”
Megan tells her about the aquarium Snap from Ethan. Vee gets all soft and dreamy-eyed. “Can I just see it for a second?”
“No,” Megan says. “It disappeared. Besides, you can’t be on the phone.”
Vee’s eyes narrow as she realizes something. “Hey, this means you guys will be reading all my email, texts, tweets, Facebook messages, and Instagram.”
“We’ll answer Ethan and just say thanks and you appreciate it and hope he’s well,” Megan says.
“All right,” Vee agrees. “I’m not sure how I feel about this.”
“You show us everything anyway,” I say with a shrug. br />
“That’s true,” Vee agrees. “But don’t you guys write anything that makes me look like an idiot, okay?”
“We’d never do that,” Megan says.
“I’m trusting you with my phone,” Vee says.
“We’ll guard it with our lives,” I say. I mean it when I say it, too. At that moment, I have no idea that things are going to get so crazy.
Chapter 17
BEING CUT OFF from the Internet plays tricks with my mind. It’s as though there’s a whole world going on and I can’t be any part of it. I might as well have washed up on a desert island. It’s lonely, too. Out there kids are sending each other funny stuff. They’re talking about what’s going on in their lives, in school, on TV. And here I am. Alone. Doing nothing.
I’m not even allowed to read a book. Here’s what I’m allowed to do: knit! I’m not kidding. My grandma taught me to knit and the doctor said that would be all right as long as I don’t strain my eyes knitting for hours on end. As if! But it’s better than nothing, so I drag out my old, tangled yarn and the half-done scarf I abandoned because it was getting way wider than I’d planned. And I knit.
While I knit, I stare out the window. Heidi Dog comes to see me and I scoop her up onto the bed. I think she knows I’m sick because she snuggles up closer than usual next to me. Out the window I see our neighbor’s black and white cat stalk a pair of cardinals feeding in the grass. They don’t seem to notice the cat. They’re in trouble and they don’t even know it. I rap hard on the window and they fly away. The cat glares angrily. He doesn’t know it was me who’s spoiled his hunt.
I worry. About everything. What crazy stuff are Megan and Lulu sending to Gwynneth? They wouldn’t intentionally make me seem strange, but . . . in their own way, each of them has a unique approach to the world. Just different from mine. Will what they send seem like it comes from me? Giving my phone to them—to anyone, really—is much harder than I would have expected.