Miss Matched (7 page)

“She went home,” said Max. “Will you play with me now?” Max jumped up and down and pulled his cape over his head like a hood.

“I'm busy,” said Fiona.

“I'll play,” said Harold.

Max looked Harold over. “Um, that's okay,” he said. And he was gone.

Fiona tapped her foot and patted Harold's goopy head while she thought. “Just a second.” She opened her desk drawer and rooted around. “Don't move.”

“What are you doing?” asked Harold.

“It's in here somewhere,” said Fiona. She tossed out her box of broken crayons, dried-up markers, glitter pens, and bag of felt scraps. “Found it!” She
emptied the bottle onto Harold's head. Then she pinched and pulled at his hair.

“Fiona?”

“What?”

“I smell glue.”

F
iona's dad looked
like he had just eaten ten corned beef sandwiches. It wasn't pretty. “What were you thinking?” he asked. Fiona had heard this question lots of times before. And there was no good answer.

Fiona swiveled on Turner and thought about what she was thinking. Which was a not-so-easy thing to do. Especially when all of the green blobs on Dad's computer screen looked just like a bunny rabbit with giant fangs.

Dad leaned on his desk at WORD news station and waited.

“Harold wanted to be popular. That was his match,” said Fiona. “Do you have a headache?”

“A big one,” said Dad. “What do you mean that it was his match?”

“I'm a matchmaker,” said Fiona. “I started a club at school and Harold wanted to be like Milo Bridgewater.”

“And you thought glue in his hair was the way to go?”

Fiona said, “How else do you get hair to stand up?”

Dad's eyes got a little bulgy. But he didn't say anything, which made Fiona think he didn't know so much about hair. “Harold's grandmother said she doesn't want you playing with him anymore.”

“It's not all my fault that his grandma cut it out,” said Fiona. “I told Harold not to let his grandma see it.”

Dad pulled at his eyebrow and sighed.

Fiona watched the bunny rabbit with fangs turn into a T. rex. Then she spun around on Turner, hugging her knees to her chest.

“Milo Bridgewater?” said Dad, clicking his mouse and looking at his computer screen.

“Milo Bridgewater,” she repeated as if his name tasted like cauliflower.

“I think he's the boy who sent an e-mail to the station about starting a meteorology club at your school,” he said. “He wants to learn more about the equipment we use here to produce some kind of news program.”

Fiona stopped spinning. “What did you tell him?”

“I told him that I think it's a great idea.”

She buried her face between her knees and squeezed her eyes shut. She remembered a movie on TV where Superman spun the earth in the opposite direction to turn back time so he could save Lois Lane. And so as fast as she could, she
spun Turner in the opposite direction. To save herself from Milo Bridgewater.

It was too bad she didn't have any superpowers.

• • •

Loretta Gormley and Max were play
ing
a game of Fish on the living room floor when Fiona got home. “Give me all your kings,” said Loretta.

“Where's Mrs. Miltenberger?” asked Fiona.

Loretta said, “Bingo.”

“Go fish,” said Max. “And I'm not talking to her.” He jabbed his finger in Fiona's direction.

“He's not talking to you,” Loretta told her.

“What did I do?”

Max turned away and Loretta shrugged.

Fiona huffed. Some matchmaker she had turned out to be. She perched herself on the arm of the couch and watched the game.

Loretta pulled her cell phone out of her jacket pocket and dialed. After a few moments with the
phone to her ear, she sighed and then snapped it shut. “Do you guys want to go somewhere?”

• • •

The seats inside Loretta Gormley's car
had gray tape on them, and a cardboard tree hanging from the mirror made it smell like cinnamon spice. Fiona and Max rode in the backseat, and Loretta told them to be on the lookout for a cute boy with beautiful eyes. It was getting dark outside, which made it hard for Fiona's eyeballs to see anything.

Loretta pulled in front of Ordinary Java and parked. “Want some java?” she asked, as she turned off the car and opened the door.

Java was coffee, Loretta explained. Which was very disappointing to Fiona because “java” sounded like “lava” but had nothing at all to do with a volcano. “I had a sip of coffee once,” Fiona told her, “but I spit it out because it tasted like earwax.”

They went inside. “Why is it so dark in here?”
Fiona asked. Ordinary Java had red walls with paintings on them, couches and coffee tables, rugs with fringes, and lamps with shades sort of like the ones in the Finkelstein's living room. Teenagers were everywhere, and Fiona hoped that one day she would learn to like the taste of earwax so she could hang out at this place.

“Wait here,” said Loretta.

Fiona watched as Loretta walked around and talked to other cool teenagers. Max pressed his face against the glass at the dessert counter.

Loretta returned. “He's not here,” she said. “Ready to go?”

“Who's not here?” asked Fiona.

“Jeremy,” said Loretta.

Max bent the tentacles on his Squidman action figure. “Who is Jeremy?”

“That's what I'm trying to figure out,” said Loretta. “Who is the real Jeremy?”

Max and Fiona looked at each other. Fiona
shrugged. Teenagers were so mysterious.

When they were back in the car, Loretta sighed. “He could learn a few things from Noah Wycroft. Why is it that boys on TV are so much more mature?”

“I know Noah Wycroft,” said Fiona. “I mean, I've never met him or anything. But I know who he is.” He was a character on her mom's TV show,
Heartaches and Diamonds
.

“Yeah. I've written him, like, a ton of times. I mean, I've written Oliver Piff, the actor who plays Noah. But he's never written me back. Do you watch that show?”

“Sometimes,” said Fiona. “My mom plays Scarlet von Tussle.”

“No way!” said Loretta. “You're so lucky!”

Most people said the same thing about Fiona's mom being an actress on TV. But Fiona couldn't always share their excitement.

“I thought Jeremy and I would be such a good
match,” said Loretta. “We're in all the same clubs. And he was even talking about giving up eating meat. I thought he liked me.”

Max leaned his head against the car window and began to snore. “Too bad Noah's a made-up person,” said Fiona.

“Yeah, too bad.”

“I wish I could help,” said Fiona. “But my matchmaking days are over.” It was another declaration.

“How come?”

Fiona yawned. “I'm no good at it.” What if she wasn't extraordinary at anything? What if she was going to be ordinary for the rest of her life?

Then Loretta suddenly said, “There he is!” She pulled the car up to a basketball court across from Baker's Square. “I'll be right back.”

Fiona watched from the window as Loretta marched right into the middle of the basketball game. Loretta waved her arms in the air at this Jeremy boy while the other basketballers watched.
And that's when Fiona saw Milo. He had his hands stuffed in his jeans pockets, and he was staring at Loretta and this boy.

Fiona had something she wanted to say to Milo. And she didn't want to wait until school to do it. She closed the car door gently so she wouldn't wake up Max, and she headed straight for Milo. His eyes were on Loretta and the boy, so he didn't see her until she was right in front of him. “Milo Bridgewater,” she said. He jumped back a little. “I think you should give up your meteorology club,” said Fiona.

Milo must have been shocked by her declaration because he didn't say anything.

“Don't you have anything to say?” asked Fiona.

“You know her?” he asked, pointing to Loretta.

He sure was good at changing the subject. “Loretta's my watcher. Anyway,” she said, “like I was saying, if you do give up your meteorology club, then I'll give up my S.N.O.W.-slash-A.W.S.O.M.M. club. Deal?”

For a gazillion years he didn't say anything. And the only thing Fiona could think of to do next was shake his hand. But Fiona wasn't an experienced hand shaker, and at the last minute, she couldn't remember which hand you were supposed to shake with. So, she reached out with both of her hands toward Milo, grabbing his shoulders. Then she gave them a shake.

Milo stepped backward. “No way,” he said as he knocked into his bike.

By the look on his face, Fiona figured she must have looked real scary. Like a brain-eating zombie from one of those movies she was not allowed to watch but sometimes did anyway.

Or worse, like she was trying to give him a hug. Boy, oh, boy, she hoped Milo didn't think she was trying to hug him.

As Milo got on his bike and pedaled down Augusta Street, Fiona didn't know if he was saying “no way” to giving up his club or to a hug that she wasn't trying to give him anyway. She didn't want him to get the wrong idea, so she yelled after him, “It's okay, Milo, I don't
like
-like you!”

F
iona pressed her
forehead into the frosted window of the school bus.
OUTER SPACEY
she wrote with her finger. Then she leaned forward and wrote
SORRY CLEO
and drew an unhappy face on the window of the seat in front of her.

Cleo peered over the seat.

“I'm sorry I matched you up with Max,” said Fiona.

Cleo shrugged. “Are all little brothers like that?”

“I'm pretty sure.”

Cleo made a sour face. “I don't think I'm ready for a little brother or sister.”