My Life Undecided (15 page)

half an inch higher and strain my eyes to see through the glass. But despite al the chaos, the lights, the pulsating music, the commotion of people

trying to get past the bouncer, I only see one thing.

Or I guess I should say, one person.

And that’s Shayne.

Dressed to the nines in whatever super trendy, super flattering, super expensive outfit her dad just purchased for her no questions asked,

surrounded by al her little I-heart-Shayne groupies, standing at the very front of the line, and flashing those irresistible baby blues at the burly bouncer.

My whole body turns to ice.

Of course she’s there.

And why wouldn’t she be? It was foolish of me to think that I’m the only student at Parker High that Hunter would invite. I guess in reality I’m

just the only one who was stupid enough not to accept the invitation. Or rather, stupid enough to listen to the sixty-eight people who told me not to

accept.

“Oh, jeez. Where is that god-awful sound coming from?” my mom says with a scowl.

“Looks like a new club just opened up,” my dad replies, glancing out the window.

My mom groans. “Perfect. Just what we need. Another club. I swear this town is turning into New York City.”

But I’m barely listening. I’m far too obsessed with what’s going on outside my window. With what I’m missing out on. With Shayne Kingsley

stealing my night, right out from under me.

The whole wretched situation just makes me feel sick to my stomach. Thankful y, I don’t have to stare at it for much longer. Because a few

seconds later the light turns green, my dad steps on the gas, and the sights and sounds of Club Raven and everything it represents in my sad,

pathetic life fade away in the rearview mirror.

Unfortunately, though, no matter how far we drive, it doesn’t fade from my memory.

Emotional Fusion

“So how’s the community service going?”
my dad asks as soon as we’re seated in the restaurant with menus.

Just what I need right now. To be stuck in a romantic, candlelit heart-to-heart…with my parents.

I mumble out some kind of noncommittal response as I scour the menu for something that looks even halfway edible. Since when did fusing

foods from two different ends of the globe become an acceptable form of cuisine? I don’t want my Mexican food fused with my Japanese food. And

I’m not sure the Mexican traditionalists would appreciate it much either. If I want Japanese food, I’l go to a Japanese restaurant. Let’s not try to kil

two birds with one stone here, okay? Is it so much to ask that my burrito not be fil ed with seared Ahi tuna?

“Are they stil having you read to that one lady?” my mom asks, trying to careful y reel in the information like a fisherman with a faint tug on the

end of his line.

“Yep, stil reading.”

“What else do they have you do?”

I shrug and close my menu, settling on the safest-looking item I can find: chicken flautas (wasabi guacamole on the side, please). “You know,

just the usual. A little bingo. A little Family Feud. Rummikub. Whatever.”

“Oh, we used to play Rummikub in col ege,” my dad says, getting this dreamy kind of nostalgic grin on his face. “Remember, Camil e? My

roommates and I would have these huge Rummikub tournaments on the weekends. Boy, would those get competitive. Sometimes downright nasty.”

“Wow,” I muse sarcastical y. “Life without TV must have real y sucked big-time, huh?”

My mom feigns offense. “Brooklyn. Your father and I aren’t dinosaurs. We had television in the eighties. We just valued quality time with our

friends. You know, before everyone communicated via text message and Twitter, human beings actual y interacted with one another face-to-face.”

I raise my eyebrows like I’m sincerely interested in taking this trip down pre-technology memory lane with my parents. “Sounds thril ing.”

“Wel , aren’t you in a surly mood tonight,” my dad remarks.

“Sorry,” I mumble, turning away. Even though I don’t real y know what “surly” means, I can pretty much surmise from the way he’s glowering at

me from across the table.

“What’s that about?”

I almost feel like tel ing them. Spil ing it al out on this Mexican fusion tabletop. That I put my trust in the world and the world failed me. That I

placed my life in the hands of the blog-reading population and they let me down. And that if it weren’t for them, I’d be the one standing in that line,

giving my name to the bouncer, being admitted into the most exciting night of my life.

But I know I can’t. For two primary reasons.1) They would never understand.2) If I admit now that I had every intention of sneaking out of the

house tonight to attend the opening of some hot new club that my parents would have never, in a mil ion years, al owed me to attend, I know I would

just get myself into more trouble. And I real y don’t want to give them any reason to extend my grounding. Because even though I didn’t ultimately

end up sneaking out of the house, I’m pretty sure they’d find me guilty by consideration.

So I just shrug and say, “Nothing.”

And my parents press on with the questioning, asking me about school and homework and teachers, until they final y land on the topic I’ve

been avoiding for the past three weeks.

“How’s Shayne doing?” my dad asks. “We haven’t seen her in a while.”

“Because I’m grounded, remember? I’m not al owed to do anything or see anyone.”

My dad laughs. “Yes, I know. But what I meant was, we haven’t heard you talk about her in a while.”

I haven’t exactly told my parents yet that Shayne and I aren’t friends anymore, and I definitely don’t feel like getting into it now, so I just say,

“She’s been real y busy with her stuff and I’ve been real y busy with mine. You know, debate team and al .”

“That’s right,” my mom says, her face perking up with interest. As if the words “debate team” were the secular equivalent of me announcing

that I’m joining the seminary. “How did that come about?”

I sigh and slouch in my seat. What is with the twenty questions tonight? Is today National Dril Brooklyn Day and I just forgot to mark it on my

calendar? No wonder I’m in such a surly mood.

“I don’t know,” I say, taking a sip from the virgin strawberry daiquiri the waiter just delivered and trying not to think about the fact that had I

been at Hunter’s dad’s club tonight, the word “virgin” wouldn’t have been anywhere near the name of my drink. “I guess I just wanted a change of

pace. And, you know, I thought it might be fun.”

My dad opens his mouth to comment, but thankful y, I’m spared from further scrutiny when the waiter appears to take our order. And I don’t

know if it’s the anticipation of their teriyaki salmon enchiladas and lobster spring rol taquitos that has distracted them or just some unexpected

consideration for my sour mood that keeps them from pressing the issue, but by the time the waiter leaves with our order, they’ve moved on to other

topics of conversation.

My Life Undecided

LIFE GOES ON…

IF YOU CAN CALL MINE A LIFE

Posted on:
Sunday, October 31st at 8:14 pm by BB4Life

My first debate competition with Heimlich is coming up this Saturday. Heimlich says the debate team always goes to the same diner

in town on Saturday nights and he’s invited me to come along after the tournament. My parents have okayed it since technical y it’s

“school-related.” Now it’s up to you.

That’s al .

BB

Buried Beneath the Rubble

As soon as I publish my latest post
, I feel just a teensy bit guilty for my brusque tone. For a minute I even consider going back in and sprucing it

up with some fun phrasing and exclamatory punctuation, but I’m far too depressed to muster the energy. So I just close my laptop, mope around my

room for a few minutes, and final y just col apse on my bed.

To be honest, I’m a little bit pissed off at my blog readers right now. Okay, I’m a lot pissed off. I recruited them to help improve my life, not

make it worse. But that’s al they seem to be doing lately. I have no doubt they’l be total y gung ho about Saturday’s highly unpromising night out with

the debate team because the majority of them seem to live for dul stuff like that.

Raging Saturday nights at a hot new guest-list-only club? Nah, I’l pass. But hitting the local diner that’s been here since the Depression? Al

right! Rock on!

I’m so miserable I don’t even do anything for Hal oween. Although it’s not like I can. I’m obviously stil grounded and usual y fun Hal oween

activities involve leaving the house. So instead I’m forced to stay home and hand out candy to the neighborhood kids. But my mood doesn’t exactly

make me the world’s best candy distributor, because every time I see one of their smiling, carefree faces peeking out from underneath a princess

tiara or cowboy hat or prairie girl bonnet, I find myself bitterly dol ing out little nuggets of advice with each Snickers bar that I drop into their awaiting

sacks. “Live it up while you’re young.” “Have fun now. Because it’s al downhil from here.” Or my personal favorite, “Make wise choices with your life

because the rest of the world certainly isn’t going to do it for you.”

The first snowstorm of the year hits on Monday morning. As if Hal oween was some kind of trigger to the weather gods to get their butts in gear and

stop messing around with this Indian summer business. That means the bus is probably going to be late. Of course, I stil have to be at the bus stop

on time. Just in case it’s not.

I zip up my coat, slide on my mittens, wrap my scarf tightly around my neck, and start the ten-minute trek to the bus stop. When our school

budgets were slashed last year they had to merge some of the bus routes, which meant longer rides and fewer stops. The bus route goes right by

my house every morning but does it stop there? Of course not. It stops half a mile down the road. Because apparently the extra five seconds it

would take to stop at my driveway is not in the budget. And if I’m running late and Mrs. Gore happens to drive past me on my way to the stop, do you

think she has the compassion to slow down and let me on? Of course not. She just drives right by.

This is why one of my parents has always taken me to school. Because they felt sorry for me that I had to walk so far to catch the bus. But

apparently they stopped feeling sorry for me about the time they heard the words “burned down model home.” And what’s that thing they say about

not knowing what you have until it’s gone? Yep, that pretty much sums up how I feel about my morning commute right about now.

Today I get to the stop with time to spare. In fact, I stand out there for a good ten minutes freezing my butt off while I wait for the big yel ow

tank to round the corner. Then I hunker down for the forty-five minute ride to school…which, by the way, is five miles away.

At least I’m not waking up at the crack of dawn anymore to fol ow my former Shayne-approved preparation routine. And I have to admit, this

plain, solid-colored long-sleeved shirt that I found at the back of my closet is pretty darn comfy. Roomy. And not at al binding. And it’s kind of nice

not to walk around with two pounds of makeup on my face. Plus, now that I’m getting so much sleep, I no longer have to wake up early to apply

complicated treatments to fight the bags under my eyes that I used to get from lack of sleep.

Hmmm…

At school, I do everything in my power to avoid both Hunter and Shayne. I fear that if I get anywhere near Shayne I’l be forced to overhear

some ful or partial retel ing of how total y amazing her Saturday night was. And with Hunter, I don’t want to have to try to come up with some pathetic

excuse to explain why I wasn’t there. Of course, that’s assuming he actual y noticed I wasn’t there. He was probably too busy bumping crotches with

Her Royal Heinous al night to even realize I never showed up. Maybe in my former life when I was stil popular and glamorous and worthy of being

noticed by someone as fabulous as Hunter Wal ace Hamilton I I he might have missed me. But not now. I mean, he just moved here a month ago

and already he’s king of the school. The kind of guy people flock to. Basical y a male version of Shayne Kingsley.

Me, on the other hand, wel , I’m pretty much a has-been.

Because look what I’ve become. A member of the debate team who spends her lunch hour in the library. Yes, I’ve returned to my little back

table in the library. After my near-death experience in the cafeteria two weeks ago, I don’t think I’l be returning to the world of public meal consumption anytime soon. But it’s not like I’m cheating or anything. The pol specifical y asked about that day and that day alone. It didn’t make any