Blackbird Fly (4 page)

“Hello,” I said. “My name is Analyn Yengko.”
Analyn. Analyn. Analyn. A-n-a-l-y-n-Y-e-n-g-k-o.

All the crying had turned my eyes pink.

Just call me Analyn.

“My name is Analyn Yengko,” said the girl in the mirror.

I pulled up my hair into a ponytail like Gretchen's.

Analyn Yengko: popular and funny. Analyn Yengko: the prettiest girl in school. Analyn Yengko: lots of friends and boyfriends. Analyn Yengko: does not eat dogs for dinner.

“Good-bye, Apple,” I said. “Hello, Analyn.”

But what was the point of a new name when everyone knows who you really are?

I was Apple Yengko: none of the above. And everyone knew it, including me.

I
n homeroom on Monday, I wondered how many people knew that I was on the Dog Log. It felt like everyone knew, like I was wearing a big sandwich board that said
Ugly
. I watched Claire Hathaway and her friends laughing and catching up on their weekends. None of them were on the list, that was for sure. I watched Claire arrange her books and say something to Caleb Robinson sitting next to her, and
I thought about Jake, Lance, and Braden wanting to take a walk with her in the woods, and even though the thought of kissing Braden Tucker's chapped lips was the most disgusting thing I could imagine, I would have done anything to trade places with Claire Hathaway right then and there. Let Claire have slanty eyes and dark skin and go home to
pancit
and garlic. I'll be the white American cheerleader.

When Mr. Ted stood up at the podium, I turned away from Claire and focused on him instead. That was much easier, because there are only a few things worse than being the only dog-eater at Chapel Spring Middle School, and one of them was being Ted Stanley, the math teacher.

I believe that everyone on Earth has at least three interesting facts about them. One of Mr. Ted's IFs is that he wore the same outfit—or at least the same idea of an outfit—every single day. Flower-print button-up shirt, like he was leaving for a trip to Hawaii that afternoon. Faded khaki pants with pleats that puffed
up front, so it looked like he was carrying a balloon. Black-rimmed eyeglasses. Occasionally mismatched socks.

On the first day of school in August, he told us to call him Mr. Ted instead of Mr. Stanley. He said Mr. Stanley was “just too formal,” and we could “all show respect by using our first names.” Then he lifted his arm to write
MR. TED
in big, block letters on the board, and we all saw rings of sweat on the flower-print of his armpits. Braden was the first to notice. He snorted and snickered behind me.

One of Braden's three IFs: He loved practical jokes but never the fun kind.

That day Braden called Mr. Ted “Sweaty Teddy” under his breath, and Danica Landry laughed. That was all Braden needed. From then on it was Sweaty Teddy this and Sweaty Teddy that. It'd been Sweaty Teddy since day one, and Danica still giggled.

Mr. Ted didn't just sweat that first day either. He
sweated the day after that and the day after that. What made it worse was that he was a really nice teacher, and when people like Braden answered questions correctly and called him Mr. Ted with a big, fake smile, I could tell that he felt like we really were a team showing mutual respect to one another. I try to send Mr. Ted mental mind waves.
Please, Mr. Ted, change your shirt or use some deodorant so that they'll quit calling you Sweaty Teddy.
But I knew that once he was Sweaty Teddy, he was stuck with it, even if he wore fresh shirts and smelled like honey for the rest of the school year. Just like I was stuck being Apple.

Mr. Ted and his big display of red and orange flowers knocked on the podium three times, the way he always did when it was time to “quiet down, please, quiet down.”

“I am pleased that you are all in my homeroom, because that means I get the pleasure of sharing with you the destination of this year's excursion.” Another of Mr. Ted's IFs: He liked to change plain words into
fancier ones. Like saying
excursion
instead of
field trip
. He cleared his throat. “The destination of this year's voyage, ladies and gentlemen, is . . .” He raised up his arms, palms out for emphasis, and smiled slyly, like he was sharing a big secret with a bunch of friends. We all stared back at him and the beginnings of his sweat rings. “New Orleans.”

Whoops and hollers all around.

Mr. Ted's smile got bigger and bigger, like our excitement was contagious and spreading across his face.

“New Orleans is three hours away, so it'll be a long journey. Be sure to get your parents' permission and ask them to sign up if they want to chaperone.” Mr. Ted laid a stack of permission slips on Claire's desk. Claire sat in the first desk of the first row, and Mr. Ted always gave her the papers to pass out. I think that's why she sat there.

She immediately popped up with the permission slips tucked in the crook of her arm, then licked her index finger to pass them out. She did this at the head
of every row. She was very serious about passing out papers. I didn't really like the idea of having a permission slip smeared with a spitty finger, but I didn't have much choice.

The permission slip outlined our agenda for the day: aquarium, lunch, planetarium, museum. The trip was in eight weeks, just before Thanksgiving break. Mr. Ted went over every detail piece by piece, but no one was really listening. Everyone was blabbing about how lucky we were that we didn't get stuck with a boring trip to the state capitol. I was busy thinking about the Dog Log and tearing the chaperone sign-up portion from the bottom of the paper so I could get rid of it.

After the bell, I made my way to Gretchen's locker. Gretchen and Alyssa looked like they were deep in conversation. Gretchen was shoving textbooks into her designer backpack and nodding at Alyssa's every other word. Alyssa talked a million miles a minute. When I walked up, she stopped talking midsentence.

“What
happened
to you Saturday?” she asked. “We got back, and you were gone.”

“I had to get home. What'd you guys do anyway?”

Alyssa smiled and tilted her head. “Things . . .”

“So Jake kissed you?” I asked, trying hard to not show what I was really thinking, which was that I would rather lick one of Mr. Ted's shirts than kiss Jake Bevans.

Not that he would make out with me anyway.

“More like
she
kissed
him
,” Gretchen said.

Alyssa sighed. Cool and casual. “Well, sometimes you just can't wait for the other person to make a move.”

Alyssa had kissed one boy over the summer, so now she was pretending like she was some kind of professional seductress. Gretchen had a boyfriend at the beach and they kissed three times, but Alyssa pretends that doesn't really count—although I'm not sure why.

“You're such a vixen,” said Gretchen. They giggled.

I was about to ask what they thought about the field trip when I looked over Alyssa's shoulder and saw Heleena Moffett coming our way. She walked slowly, the way she always did—not really swinging her arms, not really looking around. Just rolling down the hall like an enormous beach ball. She probably weighed more than me, Gretchen, and Alyssa combined. Everyone stepped out of her way instinctively. She reminded me of a giant fish swimming through a school of minnows. And she always swam alone.

I bumped Gretchen's hip lightly. “Hurry up, slowpoke.”

“What's the big rush?” asked Alyssa.

“Almost ready,” Gretchen said. She slipped on her backpack, pulled out a tube of lipstick from the little shelf in her locker, and put some on. Her lips brightened up.

“Can I have some of that?” I asked.

Gretchen looked surprised but smiled. “Sure,” she said, handing it to me.

Alyssa crossed her arms and leaned against the locker next to Gretchen's, which belonged to Heleena. “It's a little late for that now,” she said.

“What do you mean?” I asked, looking into Gretchen's locker mirror as I applied the lipstick.

“You're already on
the list
. You should've been doing that last year.”

I handed the lipstick to Gretchen. I felt like I'd been socked in the gut. I also felt completely ridiculous.

“Alyssa!” Gretchen said. “That was a little harsh, don't you think?”

Alyssa looked away. “Sorry, Apple. I woke up in a bad mood, that's all. And I'm so pissed off that you're on that list. It's, like, so wrong.”

I rubbed my lips together. Suddenly they felt like the brightest things in the world.

Gretchen closed her locker. “Wait a minute—ohmygod. Hold everything. My purse. It's not here.” She reopened her locker and shuffled through her
neatly stacked books as if her pink studded bag could be flattened between them.

One of Gretchen's IFs: She loses her purse about once a week. Sometimes she finds it right away. Other times she has to retrace her steps until she discovers it in the girls' bathroom or under the bleachers in the gym. I groaned.

Gretchen found her purse, but just before she closed her locker again, Heleena tapped Alyssa's shoulder.
Tap-tap-tap.
Alyssa's ponytail whipped around. I smelled coconut.

“Yes?” said Alyssa. Smooth like butter.

Heleena had a tiny voice. She's had the same tiny voice since second grade. It was the only tiny thing about her.

“Can I get to my locker, please?” she asked.

Alyssa blocked Heleena's locker 80 percent of the time. At first I didn't think it was on purpose, but now I'm not so sure.

“Oh, I'm sorry.” Alyssa put her hand to her chest.
“I would have moved, but I didn't see you coming.”

Alyssa shifted to the side to get out of Heleena's way, but she didn't move far enough. She never did. Heleena had to say excuse me two more times.

“Sorry again for getting in your way,” said Alyssa as we headed down the hall. “Blame Gretchen. She takes forever.” She rolled her eyes in a big display that said,
You know how best friends can be.

Heleena turned the dial on her locker without saying anything.

“I always try to be nice to her, because I know she doesn't have any friends, but god, could she be more disgusting?” said Alyssa, under her breath. “She needs some serious help. That's not even
healthy
. I heard she even has lunch in the library, because no one can stand to watch her eat. Or maybe it's just because she has no friends.” Alyssa turned to me. “You may be on
the list
, Apple, but it could be worse. At least you aren't Big-leena Moffett.” She paused. “Unless . . .”

“Unless what?” I said. The socked-gut feeling was
still there. I wouldn't have been surprised to lift up my shirt and see a big bruise.

“Unless you're above Heleena on the list,” said Alyssa. She frowned.

Gretchen rolled her eyes. “That's not possible.” She looked at me and said again: “That's not possible, Apple. And the list is stupid anyway. Who cares?”

But we all knew that everyone cared.

“I've got to find out what number you are,” said Alyssa. She smiled and put her hand on my shoulder. “For your sake. Wouldn't you like to know? I mean, if you're, like, eighth, that's not so bad, is it? That's still almost okay.”

“Still almost okay for what?” I asked.

But she didn't answer.

G
retchen, Alyssa, and I settled in our usual spots under the giant oak tree for lunch and waited for a “big announcement” from Alyssa. She loved to make big announcements. It was one of her IFs. She made one almost every day.

She inhaled sharply, like she was about to tell us that she had terminal cancer.

“I don't think I'm going to try out for swing
choir tomorrow,” she said.