Fabulous Five 003 - The Popularity Trap (3 page)

When she got home, Christie dumped her books on her desk and
flopped down on her bed. What a pain. She really
needed
to be
campaigning for seventh-grade president of Wacko Junior High along with trying
to keep all A's in school, she thought sarcastically. What would everyone think
if she stopped doing her homework and dropped out of the elections? It would be
great not to have to worry about what other people wanted and concentrate on
what she liked to do for a change. But that would mean disappointing her
friends and her mom and dad.

At first she had missed Mark Twain Elementary where
everything had been so comfortable and familiar, but lately she had been
starting to enjoy junior high school. It had seemed so much more grown-up than
elementary school. And she had begun to believe that she would have more
freedom now. What a joke! Getting up, she went to her desk and resolutely
opened her math book.

"Hi, sweetheart. I'm home." Mrs. Winchell stuck
her head in the doorway of Christie's room.

"Hi, Mom."

"Doing your homework, I see." Her mother made that
comment at this time just about every day. "How was your day?"

"Fine." Christie smiled at her mother. She was a super
mom. It was just that she was always checking to see if Christie was keeping up
with everything.

"I saw Mr. Bell today. He said you volunteered to tutor
another student in math. That's really nice of you, dear. Not all gifted people
take time to help others. I'm proud of you. Oh, and he also told me that you were
running for class president. That's great. Why didn't you tell us you were
going to run?"

Christie smiled again, weakly. "I didn't know it
myself." She decided against telling her mother that she hadn't
volunteered for either job. After all, hadn't her mother just gotten through
saving how proud she was of Christie? There was no use bursting her bubble.

Later, at the dinner table, her father asked, "What do
you say to some tennis on Saturday, Christie? George Ellis and I were talking
at the office. He was captain of the Dartmouth tennis team, and when I asked
him if he'd help you with your backhand, he said he'd be delighted. Maybe we
can get in a few sets afterwards. You know, to tune up your game a little."

"Vince, Christie may have to study on Saturday,"
said Mrs. Winchell. "She has volunteered to tutor another student, and I
might add, our daughter is running for class president."

"Great!" Her father looked at Christie with
pleasure. "I was president of one of my classes. Hmmm. I can't remember
which one it was now, though."

"Well," her mother continued, "we just have
to make sure she has time to keep up her grades. She's doing better than either
Michael or Edward when they were her age, and we don't want to overburden her
so she can't keep it up."

Christie cringed. Her mother was always comparing her with
her two older brothers, one of whom was in medical school and the other was a
lawyer. She was glad that her parents had faith in her abilities, but keeping
up with Mike and Ed was a real burden sometimes.

Christie finally finished her homework and closed her books
at ten o'clock. She had done all of her assignments, and since Jon Smith might
be as much as two chapters behind in math, she reviewed chapters five and six
so she would be ready to help him.

She climbed into bed, thinking about all that was happening
to her. She loved most of the things she was doing. School was fun. She had the
best friends in the world in Jana, Melanie, Katie, and Beth. The Fabulous Five
had been together since they were in the lower grades at Mark Twain. They had
all been so excited about going into junior high. They just knew that if they
stuck together, it would be more fun than Mark Twain Elementary.

But then they ran into Laura McCall and The Fantastic
Foursome on the very first day of school. The two cliques had been enemies ever
since. When The Fantastic Foursome put Melissa McConnell up for class
president, The Fabulous Five just had to put someone up, too. Otherwise they
would be run over. But why did Christie have to be the one? She had as much to
do as the others. Maybe more with her mom and dad's pushing her. Junior high
was a lot more complicated than elementary school.

Playing tennis was fun, too, or it could be. She loved
playing it with her father. It was just that he kept bringing in other people
to teach her things and talking about how young some of the great tennis pros
were, as if he expected her to start competing any day now. That ruined it for
her. She hated to tell him she just wanted to play and have fun. She knew it
would hurt his feelings.

She just hoped that her mother wouldn't spread the word
among her friends that Christie was tutoring someone and running for class president.
Jon was unhappy with her already. If he thought she was spreading the word that
he was dumb, he'd hate her. If everyone would
just leave her alone.

She pulled the covers up under her chin and concentrated on
going to sleep.

Beth and Katie came running up to Christie as soon as she
stepped onto the school ground the next morning.

"Christie! Guess what Laura McCall and her friends have
done! You won't believe it!" cried Beth. "They've put stickers that
say Melissa McConnell for president on all the seventh-grade lockers!"

"Jana and Melanie joined them just as Katie was saying,
"Yeah, and that includes our lockers, too. It was probably that witch
Laura McCall's idea."

"What includes our lockers, too?" asked Jana. Beth
retold her story with all the drama she could muster.

"What are we going to do?" asked Melanie.

"Not get overly excited, for one thing," said
Jana, looking at Beth. "The first thing we've got to take care of is those
stickers, and then we've got to have a meeting of The Fabulous Five and plan
Christie's campaign strategy. We can meet at my apartment after school. Has
anybody got any ideas about what to do about the stickers?"

"I do," said Christie. She might as well join in
the planning if she was going to have to run, she thought. "Melanie, do
you still have all those big happy-face stickers you got for your birthday?"
asked Christie.

"Yes. They're in my locker."

"Why don't we write on them and stick them on over
Melissa's stickers?"

"Great idea," said Jana. "If we hurry, we can
get it done before homeroom."

"What will we write on them?" asked Katie.

"I know," said Melanie. "'Vote for
Christie—She's Got the Connections.'"

Christie's stomach turned over. She had to get them off that
kick before everyone in the whole school was calling her the principal's pet.

Christie met her friends at their usual table in the
cafeteria. They had divided up the happy-face stickers and had each taken a
section of hallway where the seventh-grade lockers stood. Then they had
scurried around, slapping stickers on lockers, being sure to cover up Melissa
McConnell's stickers, all the way to the lunchroom.

"We did it!" shouted Beth when all five of them
had reached the table.

"The Fantastic Foursome are just simply going to die
when they see our stickers," Jana said with a confident laugh.

Melanie giggled. "I put two on Shane Arrington's locker
and I even put one on Garrett Boldt's locker, even though he's an eighth-grader
and can't vote for Christie."

"What a waste!" said Katie, glaring at Melanie.

Christie listened to her friends' happy chatter, but she
didn't feel like joining in. She only ate half of her tuna sandwich and stuffed
the other half back into her lunch bag to put into the garbage. Her appetite
was gone. Now that those stickers were on the lockers, there would be no way to
back out of the election. She was definitely trapped this time, and what made
it even worse, she had helped.

"Let's chip in our change and stop and get some more
stickers on the way to Jana's apartment," Beth was saying as Christie tuned
in again.

"Good idea," said Jana. "I've got markers and
we can work at the kitchen table."

"Can I bring my new album?" asked Beth. "We
can put it on the stereo in your room and turn it up so we can hear it in the
kitchen."

"Sure," said Jana. "But what's Laura doing?"

Christie looked toward the table where The Fantastic
Foursome were sitting. Laura McCall was half standing, with one knee on the
bench, and she was talking excitedly to Melissa, Funny, and Tammy.

"She probably just found out about our stickers on top
of theirs," said Katie, laughing. "Boy, I'll bet she's mad."

Laura glanced at The Fabulous Five and smirked. She was
flicking her long, blond braid back and forth the way a cat flicked the end of
its tail while it stalked its prey. Christie had a creepy feeling that what
Laura had been talking to her friends about wasn't stickers.

As Christie watched, Laura McCall turned to Funny, Melissa,
and Tammy and nodded. Tammy picked up a large brown paper bag that had been
sitting on the floor, and each of the girls dipped into it and pulled out
ribbons in bright shades of pink and yellow and green. Then they started
handing them out to all the seventh-graders in the cafeteria.

"What are they doing?" cried Beth as Laura worked
her way toward their table.

"Whatever it is, I don't like it," said Jana. "She's
putting one on Randy!" Laura was bending over Randy Kirwan and pinning a
ribbon to his sweater, and he was smiling at her.

When Laura got to their table, she said with a sneer, "I'm
sure you'll want these, too." She tossed several brightly colored ribbons
into the middle of the table and with a flip of her long braid, went on to the
next table.

Christie looked at the ribbons as if they were poison.

"What do they say?" asked Melanie.

"What do you expect them to say?" Christie
answered, picking up one. "They're campaign ribbons." She read the
card, decorated with a hand-colored rainbow, that was pinned to the top of the
ribbon in her hand:

"'Vote for Melissa McConnell for Seventh-Grade Class
President, If You Care Enough to Elect the Very Best.'"

"The very
worst
,
you mean!" said
Katie, ripping the card off the ribbon and stuffing both inside her empty
chocolate milk carton.

"She pinned that ribbon on Randy just to make me mad,"
said Jana, her voice rising.

"Don't get on her case for being ahead of us,"
Christie answered, even though she was getting angry, too. She didn't like
anyone's humiliating her and her friends, and that's just what The Fantastic
Foursome were doing.

"It's time for us to get our act together. If I'm going
to run, let's do it right. Everyone can be at Jana's after school, right?"

Her four friends nodded.

"I'll talk to Lisa Snow and Kim Baxter and see if they
can come," offered Katie. "They signed the nominating petitions, and
I know they'd like to help."

"I'll talk to Sara Sawyer in my gym class," said
Melanie. "Jana, don't you have classes with Alexis Duvall and Mona Vaughn?"

"Right," said Jana. "Leave them to me."

"I'll talk to Jon and see if he can come after supper,"
Christie said. She hated to put him off again, but planning her campaign was
getting serious.

Christie saw looks of determination on her friends' faces.
Look out, Laura McCall and friends! she thought.

Jana's mother wouldn't be home from work for an hour or so,
so The Fabulous Five and their friends had the apartment to themselves. Jana
got sodas out of the refrigerator and went to get her markers. Beth and Melanie
picked out records and turned the stereo up high while Christie and Katie
organized the things they had bought on the way from school on the kitchen
table. Jon had only grunted when Christie asked him if he could come over after
dinner instead of right after school. She guessed he had meant yes.

"I get to work on the happy-face stickers," sang
Beth.

"Me, too!" echoed Sara and Alexis.

"Why don't we all do it," said Jana. "Then we
can work on the posters together, too."

"I see you did get orange poster board," said
Christie.

"Sure. We'll cut them into circles and put faces on
them so they'll look like oranges, and we'll write the slogans at the top and
bottom."

"Wow!" exclaimed Mona. "What a terrific idea.
But I still don't get what all the slogans mean. 'Cure all your troubles with
Vitamin C'? and 'Vote for Christie, she's got the connections'? What's that all
about, anyway?"

Christie felt emotion rising inside her like steam in a
teakettle, and she opened her mouth to answer when Katie cut her off.

"Save your big speeches for later, Christie," said
Katie.

Jana glanced nervously at Christie. "You see, Mona, we thought
it would be great to have a class president who . . . well . . . sort of had an
in with the teachers and with Mr. Bell."

"I get it," said Alexis. "Because Christie's
mom is principal of Mark Twain and all the teachers know who she is, they would
probably listen to her if she went to them and asked a big favor for our class.
Pretty smart."

"You've got to help spread the word," said Melanie.
"We can't exactly put all that on our posters, but once kids understand
the idea, every time they see a poster they'll remember. Christie will have it
made."

"Listen, you guys," said Christie. She couldn't
stand being quiet any longer. She felt depressed and out of control. It was
like being washed along by a huge wave. "I said I'd run for president, but
I
never
said I'd ask for special favors if I got elected. If you want me
to keep my promise and run, you'd better help me come up with a platform that I
can live with."

Nobody said anything for a moment. Finally Melanie collected
all the finished posters and called everybody to order. "Okay. We need to
come up with a platform that Christie likes, and we need to do it now so that
we can give it to Curtis tomorrow. I'll write," she said, pulling a pad of
paper out of her backpack. "You talk."

"Melanie didn't like my ideas about women's lib,"
said Katie after everyone had stared at the floor and thought for a moment. "What
about law and order? There's too much rowdiness and pushing in the halls."

"That's right," agreed Sara. "And Clarence
Marshall is one of the worst."

"True," Jana joined in. "And what about a
school mascot costume? We could try to get the school to buy an Indian outfit
for the Wakeman Warriors, and someone could wear it to the pep rallies and in
parades and do Indian dances at all the games."

"Great idea!" squealed Beth. "And I get to
wear it first."

"Dummy," said Katie. "There would have to be
competition to wear it. But it's a great idea."

"And what about more school dances?" chirped
Melanie. "Just think, I'd have more chances to dance with Scott and Shane."

"And plays," added Beth. "We need more school
plays and talent contests. Things like that."

"Wait a minute," cried Melanie. "I can't
write that fast."

"I've got another idea," said Lisa. "From now
on, let's all wear orange tops. People will notice, and we'll tell them it's
for vitamin C, which is Christie's symbol, and ask them to vote for her."

"I thought I told you that I wouldn't run as someone
who's going to cure everybody's troubles," Christie huffed.

"But you can't drop the symbol now," argued Alexis.
"Everybody has seen it and knows it is you."

"That's true," piped up Mona. "But maybe we
can just say that Christie is wholesome and sunny like vitamin C and that
voting for her will make you feel good!"

"Terrific idea. We're on a roll now," shouted
Katie.

Christie sat listening to her friends come up with ideas. They
were so excited. And the new way of using vitamin C and oranges as her symbol
was great. She knew that it ought to make her feel better, and she wished she
could join in on all the planning, but she couldn't. They were talking about
her, but it was almost as if she weren't even there.